Hussars Gaming Group

The children go back to school, the new wave of programmes hit the television channels and the shops start gearing to towards that winter festival that we shall not speak of for a couple of months yet.

But not only that, it looks to be an expensive month or so because of the number of very interesting PC games, many of which could be very big from a Clan multi-player perspective. Want a reminder? Here goes:

RECENT RELEASES:
Deus Ex Human Revolution (single player)
Crysis 2 (reduced price)
The Witcher 2 (single player)

Coming in September
[ 9th] Warhammer 40K: Space Marine
[ 9th] Dead Island
[16th] Red Orchestra 2: Heroes of Stalingrad
[16th] Men of War: Vietnam
[30th] Driver: San Francisco

Coming in October
[ 7th] RAGE
[21st] Batman: Arkham City (single player)
[28th] Battlefield 3

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Okay, so Activision is apparently spending more money than ever before to market the next iteration of what was once a lovingly crafted PC FPS game.

MW3 promises lots of things that look flashier, more action packed and containing more explosions than the latest Transformers movie. But just like that same film, you have to look back at its predecessors and shake your head sadly at what could have been and what it became.

With extremely stiff competition from the PC-focused Battlefield 3, will PC gamers chance their arm once again on a franchise that is clearly console-focused?
Will the new campaign settings of England, France and Germany be enough to hook us?

Something to ponder anyway.

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No, not a departure from our normal hatred of all forms of campiness in games, this is actual physical camping with tents and everything.
Last year we headed to Ledbury and this year we are aiming at somewhere in Wales.

Hopefully we will see a number of members for the occasion, even if it is unlikely that any of our non-UK members will be able to attend this time.

The weekend is the 8th-10th July. The venue – to be confirmed.

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Having discussed the tools we have available to check and join each other in game (in tandem with Teamspeak of course) we have decided to adopt Steam as the tool of choice, as most people own at least one Steam game that requires an online presence.

This means that we will no longer be encouraging Hussars to use XFire. Everyone should start using Steam and anyone within HGG should join up with the 1st Hussars Steam Group.

See our forums for full details.

In one of the most significant announcements of the year, DICE have finally revealed a bit about the next full Battlefield game.
Details are scarce so far, but what we know is:
– Will be released Autumn of this year.
– PC platform will lead, with game being modified to run on consoles.
– PC version will use dedicated servers.
– PC version will have a maximum of 64 players (24 player on consoles)
– Game is modern day and settings will include Paris, Tehran and New York.
– Will include the normal array of vehicles including jets.
– Will use the Frostbite 2 engine (with some destruction)
– Will include a single player/co-op campaign.

So, are you excited? What with Homefront, Red Orchestra: Heroes of Stalingrad, Crysis 2, Bulletstorm, Brink and now BF3, this is going to be a very interesting FPS year for us.

Because some things never change ….

Happy new year everyone!

2011 should be another interesting year for PC gaming, with games such as IL-2 Storm of War: Battle of Britain, Bulletstorm, Dragon Age 2, Shogun Total War 2, Deus Ex 3, Dungeon Siege III, Men of War: Assault Squad and Brink all due out before the end of March ….

The Battlefield Bad Company 2 digital expansion Vietnam has been released as of last Saturday – but only on the PC. Today it is released to our console cousins as well.

PC gamers were pleasantly surprised to discover that they (for once) were the beneficiaries of a platform exclusive and spend much of the weekend grenading, shooting and burning each other out of the four (for now) atmospheric maps that form the expansion.

Overall impressions are good and the weapons have been very well handled.
Criticism (such as there is) involves difficultly in picking out the enemy because of the subdued colours used and the highly chokepoint-focused nature of the maps.

Yes, the latest Battlefield: Bad Company 2 client patch (R9) is upon us and with it come four brand spanking new maps; two from the BC2 single-player game and two from the original Bad Company game.
So, download the patch, fire up the game and explore the lovely new open maps – assuming the blasted snipers haven’t beaten you to it!

Rejoice oh jungly ones – Can you hear the music?
We also (finally) have confirmation that the BC2 Vietnam expansion will be hitting our download queues on 21st December – just in time for the Winter Solstice for all you militaristic pagans out there.
So once again you can announce your presence to the world by playing period music as you speed along in your selected mode of transport.