Game Central started out as a little idea I had back in 2001. However, I never did anything with it until I got involved with Keenan and Tom from PC Gamer’s (PCG) forums and TF2 server.

Shortly after getting to know a few of the regulars, an outright civil war erupted on the PCG boards between posters and editorial staff. After the dust settled and cleared, I approached Keenan and Tom. I asked them: “Hey— interested in starting up a PC exclusive gaming site?” Fairly excited, they both jumped on the band wagon, and the site was officially launched.  The existing PC Gamer Fan Podcast was retired. We started anew, and with the fresh start came the Game Central Podcast; we opened the gates for first episode  mere days after the site went live.

The coming months saw a concentration on the community, building it up and securing a great place for people to talk, discuss our platform, and just generally enjoy PC gaming.  The forum and the Ventrilo server were integral parts of establishing a social gamer gathering.  Some of us were friends with a chap named “Snoman” who was greatly skilled at organizing gaming servers and digging up the capital to keep them going.  He was instrumental in cementing the “Punishment Portal” as the place to be for online gamers.  A great man of the people, Snoman constantly supplies servers for the public with little or no financial help.  It’s true that the community provides some much needed auxiliary help with donations and assistance on the servers themselves, but it’s safe to say that without Snoman’s ardent dedication, Game Central would not be where it is today.

In late December of ‘08 and January of ’09, Keenan and Ryan burned the proverbial midnight oil slaving away to rebrand the site and bring a great new service to the readers. And in March, the fully-featured completely reborn site took its first worldly breath. Overall, it was a great success.  A large multitude of articles and editorials were released to the general populous, as well as a few reviews. Since that day, fresh, new content has been flowing out on a regular basis.

Recently, in May to be precise, the GC team got together for a prophetic meeting and decided to assign official job titles, more complex and regular duties, as well as instigating a plan for a more continuous delivery of article and review updates.  We at Game Central are dedicated to providing a quality experience of interesting and informative editorials, all intimately related to our beloved PC gaming.

And the GC Podcast is no exception. It’s only grown stronger and stronger as time has progressed.  It’s been constantly refined and streamlined for optimal presentation, with Chris as the host, Keenan as the producer and editor, and Tom, myself and Kirill as the regular contributors.  The GCP has enjoyed a wide variety of industry professionals and varied guests, including Ex-Ziff Davis 1Up Show founder Jane Pinckard, the good folks from Pandemic, Evan Lahti from PC Gamer magazine, David Murphy of Maximum PC fame, and many others.  The podcasters routinely discuss details and nuances that are near and dear to PC gamers’ hearts. Topics range from game music, to narrative debate, to retro gaming; we’ve even had a few of the oh-so-rare females on for their perspectives of PC gaming.

Game Central is entirely funded by the staff and community donators.  There is no omnipotent company forcing us to place ugly obtrusive ads on the site, and as such, we can ensure the reader with an enjoyable visual feast, minus the headache of a typical gaming site’s cluttered neon mess. The ads that we do permit are for products we believe you would appreciate in your possession, such as certain choice gems from the wonderful vault of Good Old Games (GOG).

Speaking of GOG, we now have an amicable partnership where we can recommend and review games, to you, our devoted readers. With this connection to GOG, we now receive a commission for all the games you purchase that are linked from us (only if you registered an account through our ads).  So if you want to help support the development and infrastructure of Game Central and you wish to purchase one (or more!) of the GOG classics, please navigate to the ad!

While we cannot 100% predict what lies ahead for us, we are dedicated to keeping the site as clean of unsightly banners as possible, which will in turn only permit advertisement of goods and services that are pleasing to the PC gamers’ fine-tuned eyes. And on the note of quality products, we’ll soon be instigating the sale of Game Central merchandise, starting with T-shirts. Check the forums often for updates.

While I cannot delve into the exact minutia and detail about our future plans (as that would ruin the surprises), we’ll be spearheading the site’s vidcast component like a bunch of crazed ancient Greek hoplites.  Eventually, our goal is to have the vidcasts become as regular as our written editorials.

And for all those possibly seeking to take that extra step, Game Central is not an elitist “closed shop” site where outsider contributors are commonly rejected. We welcome every person’s contributions and talents, whether it’s with finances, gaming servers, articles, reviews or even suggestions for new areas.  If you wish to pitch an editorial or review for yourself, then please do so (but it’s always safer to describe your idea first before actually writing it). Email your reviews to Samy Masadi, and all other editorials to Tom Conroy.

We will soon have a page with all freelancer guidelines and regulations.

Feel free to follow us on Twitter, and join the Facebook, Xfire, and Steam groups and please express your opinions of our articles using the commenting system found below them. And last but not least: register on the forum and become a full-fledged member of the community!

From myself and all of us at Game Central, “Game On.”

I’ve had problems with every operating system (OS) on the market and I’d like to explain why. Microsoft has done a wonderful job of cornering the market and making a user-friendly and very compatible OS, however they have also produced buggy, glitched OSs that are open to hacks, viruses, and trojans. I remember the first time using Windows 3.1 and thinking, “This is simple and easy to use.” I remember wondering how they could improve upon this. Of course, Microsoft produced Windows 95, which was so different that I was just blown away. It was radically different from Windows 3.1, which I thought was already great. Then I started to noticed bugs and glitches, then viruses started to appear when I was using the Internet. The Blue Screen of Death was my constant companion over the next 5 to 6 years. Yes, Windows 98 fixed many problems and was actually quite stable and reliable but it was still lacking in the secure department.

Then comes Windows XP, (I’m ignoring Windows 2000 as I never really used it), a shining beacon of light in the world of operating systems, or so I thought. Windows XP has been the one OS I have always gone back to, and indeed it is the one that I have found most reliable and secure. Even so, I have still had many problems with it. Lack of DirectX 10 support, for one, and a poor way of managing system resources, let alone the limited use of RAM. However, most annoying of all, is the lack of plug-and-play ability (yes: it works for some hardware, but not for most). I can’t leave out Windows Vista. It, in my opinion, is the worst OS. Vista has been the bane of my computing existence. I have a love-hate relationship with it. At first, it looks sweet as anything but for some reason it always hates my hardware and goes really slow; it always seems to hate the one game I want to play the most. As soon as I have finished playing it on my XP partition it then starts to work on Vista. Then Vista always seems to take up such a huge amount of space it’s ridiculous. I have the upgrade version of Vista Premium and it’s not a huge hassle to install an OS and then upgrade to Vista, but it’s almost double the normal size of Vista. You’d think that an upgrade to Vista would simply delete the old files or at least put them in a place where you’d be able to delete them, letting you choose if you wish to do so. The most annoying thing about Vista, in my opinions, is the fact that Microsoft has put in so many fancy things that the OS is one of the slowest I have ever experienced.

On the other hand, I know most will not use Mac OS (as the majority of us are probably PC users) but I have to say I like it. I like it a lot. In fact, if Mac OS allowed you to use all the PC programs and games then I’d be using it. Now, I understand why Steve Jobs has decided not to make the Mac compatible with PC games, even if I do disagree with him. Mac hardware is now essentially the same as PC hardware and yet the parts are at such a high price it has become a joke. I have seen some hardware selling for over triple the price of the PC version.

Now Mac OS is secure and pretty easy to use, it’s not as easy to use as the PC but it’s very close (although Mac lovers would disagree with me there). Mac’s huge advantage (and huge problem) is the fact that it’s ultra-restricted.

Linux, the one OS that seems to show some hope and alternative, is virtually useless. in gaming terms, its inability to run Windows programs without an emulator brings the usefulness of this OS down so much. Yes, Linux has many different versions and few viruses seem to be found on it, but again: these things may be the case because nothing overly intensive is used on it.

To me, the perfect operating system is an amalgamation of all these. I’d like you to imagine an operating system with virtually no useless extra fancy features, like trails behind the mouse and the ability to fade from one window to another. Indeed all these features make for a great looking OS but every single one slows the computer down. I dream of an OS that is essentially the bare bones of an OS. Windows installs a vast number of the standard drivers onto the hard drive, taking up valuable space. Why not keep these pesky drivers on a DVD and when you want to plug-and-play a device? Simply insert the DVD or CD into the drive and it will automatically pull the drivers from there. It may be a little more annoying but the amount of hard drive space saved would be in the gigabytes.

With a very basic interface that uses icons and a start bar and menu system a great OS can be clean, small and simple to use. I understand the desire for fancy things but there are some of us who would much prefer a computer that is quick, easy to use and never crashes. At least those of us who look beyond the superficial side of an OS would like this simplistic and reliable version. I say close off the OS; make it as simple as possible and therefore more streamlined.

I imagine a day that we have an OS that can run virtually every program around, one that is small, ultra fast, and has absolutely no fancy rubbish. We currently have many different variations of Windows Vista, including: Starter, Home, Premium, Business, Enterprise and Ultimate. Why not add a version called Streamlined? I, for one, would buy it. The extra speed, space, simplicity, security and lack of programs that just get in the way would quite simply become a great new OS version.

I know I’m asking a lot. I know I want an OS that takes the best of all three and combines them into one. Mac OS could become my favorite if they allowed PC games to work on it, or if Linux became compatible with any Windows programs, or if Windows streamlined their OS and made it much less computer-intensive and more stable.

I’d like to think I’m not asking too much. I know Mac OS will never allow all games, and I know Linux is for the techies amongst us, which leaves the great powerhouse known as Microsoft to produce a streamlined version for those who would rather have stability and speed over fancy menus and fading windows.

I think there could one day be a perfect operating system, however it requires us to go back to progress further. Go back to a simpler way of accessing your programs and games.

So dream the dream of a perfect operating system. Who knows: one day we may get one.

The movie industry has had nearly 100 years to perfect its medium. It started with a very simple black and white film with the only sound produced by a piano that was played in the theater itself. They had virtually no script and even less in the way of props.

Today the movie industry is one of the biggest entertainment mediums around. With entire teams of concept designers and script writers, not to mention the directors, props managers and makeup crews, there is virtually an entire army of people working to produce a blockbuster film. Each one of these people make a huge contribution to the film and the movie would not be a big hit, if each one didn’t put his or her ‘all’ into the production.

The same cannot be said about the games industry. The games industry does often have a team of people working to produce the script, concepts and storyline of a game, however they are rarely professionals in that area. I’d like to point out that each games company has a small army in itself working to produce a game, from the design team to the modellers, to the animation team, level design staff, sound techs, lighting crew, motion capture team, programmers and not to forget the quality and assurance staff. Each has a vital role to play in the making of a game.

The problem lies in the fact that a common misconception is that the models, animations, levels, programming, and sound are the most important part of a game. To a certain degree this is true, each game must have a strong design team otherwise the scripts etc. will be found lacking.

The design team starts off by producing a ‘treatment document’, while the terminology may change the essential elements of this document are the same. The ‘treatment document’ is a small two to four page document that is supposed to sell the idea to the financial backers. With a brief outline of the storyline, gameplay elements, characters and even some concept art, the ‘treatment document’ is arguably the most important document that is produced, without it there would be no game. It sells the game to the publishing house and is the base for the ‘design document’.

Once a game concept has been approved for production, a team is assembled to produce the primary ‘design document’ that will show every element of the game from beginning to end. It will contain the detailed storyline, script, characters, model types, level layout and many other important elements for each of the designers can follow. There are also many concept art images so the character modellers can follow its direction, as well as landscape and model images for the level designers and props modellers. The ‘design document’ is one of the largest documents around. I remember doing a very limited ‘design document’ for part of a level, for my degree and it was over 40 pages long (double sided). If I had a lot longer I could easily have tripled that figure. The 40 page document only gave details to the end of the first level as well.

Let’s just say that the design team has their work cut out for them. However this is where the problem lies. A design team should really be comprised of professionals in each of the fields involved. There are a few game companies that have hired professional script writers for their games, and those games often become the blockbuster hits. Often the script writer, in game companies, produced substandard work and we, the players, can easily see the poor work produced by the design team. Each design team needs to be made up of professionals in their field, a person who has worked on TV or Movie scripts, is a huge advantage. As an example: for character creation and wardrobe there should be a professional costume designer to produce a great idea for the characters and their wardrobe, which is then sent to a concept artist who’ll stylize the costumes, all of which can then be sent to the character modeller.

The quality of a game has to be consistent throughout its production, from the design team to the coders, modelers, animators, sound and lighting crew, and then to the testers. Each part of the production is vitally important. There must be a balance to producing a game, if even one element is not up to a professional level it can turn a blockbuster game that sells millions of copies to a game that is considered fun however struggles to make it out of the gutter. Until game design companies work this out we are going to be surrounded by many games that fall short simply because they have lost their understanding of how important balance can be. Each element of making a game has to be as important as each other, forming a balance that makes each part of the design process as important as the each other. This is not to mean that they should slack on everything but to excel at every part of the game!

There is also one element that is very often lacking in the design process: the testers and quality monitors. These people are supposed to test the hell out of a game to make sure there are no bugs, graphical glitches and to make sure each elements of the game looks and works perfectly. These people are supposed to report any problems with the game mechanics as well as flaws in the script. However, this is often the one element upon which a games design company spends the least amount of time and money. Sony has entire facilities dedicated to testing games and reporting each and every failure. Valve have a great testing department, where they check every single element and area of a game to make sure everything from the character animations, models, levels and so much more, are perfectly aligned with the game and its original intent.

Each element of a game is supposed to be at a strong balance with the other aspects. One day game companies will realize they are supposed to use the same type of people to make their games, as who are making the films and movies. As an example I have seen many games that are based on blockbuster films and the storyline element of the game is terrible. Yes, it follows the film but, that in itself is the problem. Films are set up very differently to games and a game that has come from a film should be designed like any other blockbuster game. From scratch they should decide if the current storyline of the film is appropriate for the game. If not, then they should redesign it for the game, using the same major points but not being tied down to the exact scene by scene movement of the film. The designers shouldn’t be afraid of introducing new scenes to the game or putting in levels that you don’t see in the film.

Game designers need to look closer at the movie industry and utilize the skills that are involved there and to ensure that each element of every game uses the best person for that field. As game companies employ people from the film industry we’ll be seeing a much stronger and more solid games industry.

As the train of thought of game designers becomes more in keeping with film designers, there will be a blurring of the lines. One day you’ll look at a trailer and wonder is this for a game or for a film. When you play the game you’ll be thinking this would work great as a film and you’ll enjoy the game itself just as much as if you were watching a blockbuster movie.

The day will come that games will have the same hype as films and people who would not normally play games would be playing them simply because of the quality that is put into making the game. This is the day I long for!

Let me start by explaining something about films. Movie special effects are streamlined and rendered on PCs and Render Farms, places where lots of PCs are connected together to speed up rendering of each frame. The fact that games essentially render the frames in real time is what gives movies their advantage. I know that if we had a PC that was fast enough to do the same rendering process that are used in the movie industry, in the same time frame that games produce and display them, then we could quite easily get games that look as good as the movies. I have also seen some rendered images of characters in games that could be mistaken for real people, with the addition of realistic models, we are well on our way to games and movies being alike.

There are a few games that are currently ultra realistic and if it wasn’t for the perspective used by the player, you wouldn’t know it was a game. I am referring to games like Need for Speed, games that use very realistic car and street models and use very few character models. So we are well on our way to a game looking like a film.

The games industry is primarily held back by the lack of speed in the average PC and the poor quality control within many of the design companies themselves. Games with poor graphics or inadequate sound or simply a terrible script are pulling the games industry down.

Many people see computer games as a medium that is warping the minds of our young but I can see how one day games will become so realistic they’ll look like movies and there’ll be a control system that allows people to interact in a much greater way, making the average person who would normally watch a film, go and play a game instead; an interactive movie instead of a traditional one. My mind wanders to a few Star Trek episodes, Voyager to be precise. In a couple of the episodes the crew are interacting with characters on the Holo-Deck. Instead of watching a movie, they are in the movie and acting as the movie’s characters. That to me is a computer game. Yes, our holographic technology is a long way behind this but there are many things we can do to copy this concept in a limited way (head-mounted displays, virtual gloves, etc…).

There is also an episode in Star Trek when the Voyager goes back in time to earth and some of the crew are watching a TV program and are getting all excited about it. This brings me to the idea that yes: watching a film or TV program is exciting and gripping, but wouldn’t it be better if you could actually be in the major blockbuster film? You would be physically acting out the characters’ roles, making choices, all based on what is going on at a given moment. I recently played Rise of the Argonauts, and it is a fairly good game graphically with a few bugs and a script that really could do with a redesign, but the way you have choices to pick when in a conversation, leads it very well to become an interactive movie.

With PC technology increasing as it is, computer games are only going to get more realistic and more like movies. One day it would be good for people to say, “Let’s go to the Interactive Movie Center” instead of: “Let’s go to the cinema.” A place where you go and you put on a VR headset, pick up a weapon and stand in a little chamber wearing a motion sensor suit. This would be where you become the player and watch the movie though the eyes of the primary actor. You would become the hero and fight and talk your way through the movie/game.

You may ask: “How could we talk to characters in a game?” The answer is simple, there is the technology now that can read a person’s voice and allows the computer to know what he/she is saying. There is also an AI technology that you can have a conversation with and you would find it really difficult to determine if you’re talking to a real person or a computer. If a designer was to combine all of these technologies then you could create a voice interactive game, where you can ask any question you want and get a legitimate response back, just like in Star Trek when the crew call on the computer.

When the makers of Crysis sat down and decided to create a game that was as realistic as possible, they decided to go to a company that specializes in special effects and animation. They employed them to create a 30 second clip using their best techniques and skills. Once they had produced this video, the designers of Crysis decided to use that clip as the goal. They wanted to produce a game that while you were playing it, it would look better than what an animation company could produce. They didn’t just succeed, they in fact made a game that looked more realistic.

It’s going to be a long road for game designers, as technology improves and allows them to become more realistic, especially as the movie industry are also improving their special effects. However I can see that one day we’ll have a game that looks so good that it could be mistaken for a movie. With the addition of an Interactive Movie Center, there could be real competition for cinemas.

A time not too far from now, in a place fairly close…

Star Wars and The Old Republic

It’s a time of anticipation, with the soldiers of Bioware soldiering on building a game to stand the test of the fans.  The mighty Bioware, joining forces with the Galactic Lucas Arts, aim to produce a game that truly does not suck.

With a few previous games that did not live up to expectations, Bioware must fight the memories of the evil “Star Wars Galaxies,” to produce a game that can win back those loyal fans.

With the Galactic LucasArts financing them, Bioware has already produced a game that won the hearts and minds of nearly all Star Wars fans, and after the not so successful sequel (not produced by Bioware) the Emperor Lucas has commissioned the one company that all the fans love to produce a game that is not only immersive and huge, but also one that does not suck.

With the semi-regular updates and with the new release of a web comic, it looks like The Old Republic may be a success, only time will tell.  The web comic  plans to introduce the fans to the worlds and time set in the game.  With many of the characters in the game initially introduced in the comic, it is sure to be a huge hit with all Star Wars fans.

For those, like me, who are holding out hope that The Old Republic will not only look great, but also have a great storyline with an innovative gameplay style, I suggest keeping track on the Star Wars: The Old Republic website; I would most definitely suggest keeping an eye on the web comic.

It seems that I’m going to be saying “woo-hoo” to yet another game. Operation Flashpoint 2 looks like it’s going to be one darn good game. Yes: information  is still a little sketchy, but the plot seems good, albeit amusing.

About five to ten years ago a huge oil and natural gas field was found on an island (somewhere near China, Japan, Russia and USA). This island has more natural resources than the entire Middle East, so it has gained a lot of interest from all the surrounding major empires. Originally the Chinese held it, but the Japanese kicked them out during WWII, and they then granted it to the Russians. BP (the oil company) was there for a while, however the Russians sent them packing, and there’s a small U.S. backed company on the island defended by a small contingent of Marines to protect American interests.

With each country wanting control, a confrontation seems inevitable. The Russians, caught somewhat unawares by a Chinese incursion, ask for U.S. assistance. It’s at this point that you step in and start your fight. Just like in COD4, you take over a number of different people across the island, from fighting on foot, to piloting a helicopter or squeezed into a tank.

What I personally find amusing is the concept of the Russians asking for American help to defend against the Chinese. However, this does promise to be a good game with great graphics, and in the tradition of Operation Flashpoint’s gameplay which mimics real life.

While Codemasters published the original game, Bohemia Interactive actually developed it. However, Codemasters and Bohemia have had a breakdown in relations and so Codemasters will be developing the game in-house. Using the Next-Gen EGO Engine they plan on releasing a game with stunning graphics and brutal realism. Unfortunately there is little information on the technical spec of the EGO Engine.

Codemasters has decided to release Operation Flashpoint 2: Dragon Rising with a “Games for Windows” label. They will also be releasing this game on the PS3 and Xbox 360. Let’s just hope they forget to take the label off when doing the artwork for the console versions.

It’s expected to be released in May 2009, so we don’t have long to wait. So to all you OFP fans: start saving up your pocket money, you’ve got a game to buy soon.