BLGaming Index

PerfectReign kicking it with BLGaming!

Sun, 12 Feb 2012 04:00:04 +0000

Hello BLGaming! I am PR_Kumatei and I'll be your semi-regular newsmonger and general reporter, pleased to meet you. /smile.gif' class='bbc_emoticon' alt=':)' />

You might be wondering what the staff change is going to mean for you, the viewer, as well as BLGaming as a high-quality gaming news website.

In essence, not very much.

You can still expect the information on the games you enjoy the most to be reported on with utmost professionalism.

Although we may not have the same focus points as the previous owners (ergo, we have greater focus in League of Legends-based news as opposed to Bloodline Champions), we will continue our obsessive hunt for the greatest and latest with the intensity of a horizontally challenged individual in sight of a cheeseburger. #professionalism

You can also expect new life breathed into the community, with Perfect Reign Network's freakishly loyal (see:Daunn) fanbase following them about.

Personally, I hope to see you enjoy what Perfect Reign has to offer as much as I enjoy it already.

You'll soon see more of my inane chatter, but for now, I bid you adieu.

PR_Kumatei

Big Changes on the Horizon

Sat, 11 Feb 2012 05:23:15 +0000

There is going to be big changes around here. There's a new staff on the task of making this place YOUR Place for e-sports news, entertainment and giveaways.

We will be covering all the major games, throwing you streams and videos of games still in beta and other exclusive content.

To start us off, we have a $40 Bloodline Champion Punisher pack to give away on Valentines day! Lots more to come, so stay tuned!

The Girls of ComicCon

Wed, 26 Oct 2011 13:16:01 +0000

What do ComicCon, E3, PAX, Gamescom, and a handful of other expos have in common? Aside from hordes of gaming enthusiasts, the natural answer would be GIRLS! Two weeks ago, BLGaming spent the four days of New York ComicCon looking for the most amazing girls on the floor, and amazing girls we found! Be sure to check out the rest of the photos after the break!

Death by Ninja has never been so appealing:

If warriors dressed like this, we would never get any fighting done:

[readmore]
What would ComicCon be without a Leia:

Katarina is deadly AND beautiful:

There is no antidote for this poison:

Alice might not be smiling, but does she really need to?

Moooooon Prissssm Poweeeerrrrr:

There should be more redheads in gaming, here's why:

I think I am finally interested in Jedis and Superheroes:

Igromir 2011: Full Throttle into the Gaming Zon...

Tue, 25 Oct 2011 08:46:23 +0000

Hello, gamers.

Another couple of days have passed and it’s time for another part of gaming madness from Igromir!

Today we won’t talk about several games, but only about one particular game called Prime World.

Before we’ll start our small discussion about the game (yes, I want your feedback after you read this), I’ll drop us a year before this moment back to Igromir-2010. Last year I wasn’t a BLG employee, and all I wanted is just to play some awesome games. One of these was a “closed alpha invitation” for some game I had never tried, and prior to Igromir 2011 I could never even remember its name. Images flashed inside my mind and I realized that it was Prime World. I could have played the game for a year now, but I didn’t due to my lazyness.

I even found a mail in my mailbox with a letter dated 06.11.2010, which gave me access to this closed alpha. Well I should have tried it. I really should have but I can’t roll back time as I just did for you in this article, so we are coming back to 2011 and to what happened to me at Igromir.

First of all I was stunned with this game. I guess I have played all well-known MOBA games: DotA, HoN, RoI, LoL (I could have added BLC in this row as many people on the net do, but I won’t and we all know why), but PW is something really new. Some will like it, some won’t, but I guess the majority of players will at least try it out as soon as it’s available.

I was a bit skeptical about this game and while I was just taking photos of PW spot at Igromir (I wasn’t planning to actually try it), a girl in red approached me and asked if I would like to try the game and answer few questions for their short poll.

I couldn’t have [readmore]resisted that, and while it was free from gamers (business day actually helps you to try all you want) I went to the play stand. I must say Nival did a great job preparing everything at Igromir as every player had his own personal assistant, who helped him to learn the basics of the game. I know some of you will say now that you are pro and don’t need basics, but trust me there are some things that requires some learning. Oh, and here is my personal assistant (yes you can be jealous now):

This got me hooked. I mean when you start playing and you get hints, not from the screen but from a real person who really wants to help you, it’s great and gives your final opinion a solid plus. But enough talking about what happened to me: let’s get down to the game.

Why this game is unique?

I guess I’ll start with 10 differences I found just from start:

1.) You don’t but anything at the shop during the match. You can say that only noobs don’t know what to buy, and most of the games even have starting hints on items, but I have my own opinion now after I tried the game. The system is that you have talents that you can prepare before the battle: 36 talents in total divided into 6 tiers of 6 talents each. You gain more talents after you play more battles, so it won’t be a trouble to get a bunch of talents that actually fits you. Talents themselves are divided into four quality categories: yellow – normal; green – good; blue – rare; purple – EPIXX. Some talents are core for your characters (their abilities), so actually you have a bit less slots for droppable items, but still. Good thing about this system is that you can actually tune your character any way you want: there are no restrictions like [this character only], meaning that you can give ranged a lot of hp and hp regen talents if you feel like so etc.

Each talent costs prime to acquire and this is the price you pay during match – instead of gold you gain prime to activate preset talents. Which one to get first is your decision. You can simply pop all low lvl talents for levels (yep 1 talent = 1 level. Only exceptions are high tear talents which can give you 2 levels) or you can save up for more useful but expensive talents. Stuns, regens, group buffs – anything you need for every single particular character.

2.) Account genders. Game is bound to social networks (I will talk about this later on) and male and female account have separate start characters and special buffs. Girls get bunch of female characters on start and male chars are really expensive to buy and vice versa for male accounts. This is not the only thing about this gender thing in-game: different genders can save each other in battle. One of the unique talents on tear 1 gives you an ability to save opposite gender player in combat, when his hp is low: females are getting healed to 100% instantly, while males get 4 seconds invulnerability. Get your girlfriends and wifes to war and you’ll succeed!/smile.gif' class='bbc_emoticon' alt=':)' />

3.) Factions. There are two different factions: Kingdom of Adornia and Dokts Empire ( I never found English names so I just translated them, as the game currently available only on Russian language). If you pick a faction you are bound to it and you can’t switch faction (well for now. Probably there will be a payed service later on). Each faction have unique architecture, story and heroes, so choose wisely (for the Kingdom of Adornia!)

Here in the middle of the article I would like to share a small trailer:

Hope you enjoyed it J

4.) You can level up your heroes to improve them even further and you actually can distribute stats anyway you feel. Give your tank more hp, or more damage or even more toughness – it’s only your choice.

5.) Heroes get tired. This mechanics prevents you from mastering just one particular character and gives some unique things for future incoming tournaments. After 3 matches played your hero is exhausted and needs some rest.

And talking of heroes here is a preview for some of them:

6.) Yes, you can multipick characters within the team, but some abilities have shared cooldowns, so you can’t spam enemies to death.

7.) Your base has some unique things as well: first is that base itself can hit your butt hard with both fireballs and stomp. Stomp helps to prevent creeps only kills, and give team some additional time to retreat and defend. Yes more creeps will come anyway, but like every 3rd wave will be completely destroyed by base itself. Second thing is that base have two tear 3 towers instead of one and those towers can only be attacked from atop of the platform, so sorry skilled ranged players – no more abusing with your unique skills.

8.) Zuma! Super awesome mini-game that can change everything on the board.

You don’t miss any exp while playing. Well actually you can level even faster than those guys out at the field and you collect scrolls from the game that will help your team: hp regen, phantoms, meteor shower and many more. Good team always will have a zuma player on start that will help team to get first blood and first tower storm bonuses with wise scrolls distribution.

9.) Social aspect. Game will be very social and will have its own applications for Android and IOS. You will need to improve your castle to help your heroes train, rest and many other things. At the moment castle is almost ready for testing and building options will be available in game pretty soon (at least devs hope so).

Have a look at what castle will offer you:

10.) PvE mode and guild are coming as well. Yep you don’t need just to PvP like a pvp-crab, but you can also fight for your epics in really epic pve fights against bosses and monsters.

Game is only in the open alpha phase at the moment, but it’s already a really promising game. Community manager from Nival already told me, that English version is almost ready for testing so it’s just the matter of time you all will be able to test the game and we at BLGaming for sure will shoot down some weekly tourneys for your amusement as soon as we will be able to (hope Nival will help us with that).

At this point of the article at least 50% of our skeptical readers should think, that they need to try this game, but I know what others need from this article to say “yes I will try it” – MORE GIRLS:

Now that should be 99% yes and Mr. Sobione says NO, because his wife is nearby and he just can’t say yes.

One last thing I would like to mention today is that one popular Russian author Vadim Panov already released a book about this unique universe called “Primemachine”. So universe of Prime will be interesting for everybody: pro-gamers, casual gamers, RP lovers (do we have any?) and all other categories of boys and girls.

You can get some more information at official English page of the game: http://en.playpw.com/ and for sure I will make sure you, our daily readers will get information about the game ASAP.

/Cyber.

Sobione Featured on Beyond the Rift eSports Vid...

Fri, 21 Oct 2011 01:06:03 +0000

If you have not heard of Perfect Reign's 'Beyond the Rift' videocast, an eSports panel with a mid level production and some of the most influential guests from the competitive gaming scene, then you are missing out on some amazing insights from the MOBA world. The most recent episode featured our very own Mike 'Sobione' Wiston, co-founder and CMO of BLGaming - so check it out and leave some comments!

Expect to hear discussions on League of Legends, Bloodline Champions, Counterstrike: Global Offensive, and more (plus Asian women, guns, samurai swords, and cowboy hats - go go press play!)

Perfect Reign is:
DeamonMachine (Twitter: @DeamonMachine)
RevilZero (Twitter: @RevilZero1)
FourCourtJester (Twitter: @FourCourtJester)
Vaniel (Twitter: @vanielmage)

Igromir 2011: Full Throttle into the Gaming Zon...

Thu, 20 Oct 2011 12:37:16 +0000

Hello, gamers.

I hope that you liked first part of this series of articles and will enjoy this part even more. Information is getting old pretty fast in gaming industry, but I hope everybody still will find something new in this diary.

We will increase the number of Igromir coverage articles from the original three, because our site limits the number of photos you can post per article, but this means you will see new articles almost every day.

I still have around hundred of photos to share with you and I promise, that all of them will be added to gallery, even if some won’t fit into this article. That's enough for the preview text: Let’s get down to gaming!

Counter-Strike: Global Offensive

Our next short stop will be CS:GO. I haven't played any CS in the past 5-6 years, but I still have a lot of memories of the old days, when CS was played in every single computer club.

I must say I was pretty amazed with what they have done to the game. On one hand it is still the nice old counter-strike and looks pretty much the same. On the other hand, it looks so much more professional and eSports oriented, so much so that [readmore]I was could only say: “WOW!”.

We were limited on time, so I was just enjoying the game. Here is a short list of what I’ve found:

1.) Do you see those avatars on top? Yep, that shows who is still alive on which team – streamers should be happy now, no more self-made overlays on this part.

2.) Maps got changed just slightly to encourage players move more. For example, on dust you can know see a ladder from under the bridge straight to the tunnel side entrance and you can also move directly from that corner to counter-terrorists “balcony”, from which players normally camp under bridge way.

3.) New weapons that can really improve your scores as they match any players’ style.

4.) New grenades! Molotov cocktail is so great!

I mean I can count to 10 easily, but I will leave that to you (remember we still give away beta keys!), so I will just stop on where we are now with a mark of 6 out of 5 for CS, so we can proceed forward.

Aliens: Colonial Marines

Actually I can’t say much about this game, because even developers weren’t able to give me all the information that I wanted to know, but what I can say about the game:

1.) Game will be both singleplayer and multiplayer.

2.) Platforms for the game will be: PC , PS3 and XBOX.

3.) Devs plan to get game released in 2012, but they can’t give any estimates, and are not sure on when there will be a beta.

Actually that’s all I can say for now about this game.

E3-alpha level didn’t impress me much, neither I was impressed with a video we saw as a second part of presentation. Will give this game 2 out of 5 just because they used a well known universe of aliens vs predators.

Let’s continue our journey! =)

The Elder Scrolls V: SKYRIM

I’ll be straight forward: this is “a must” game for everybody next year. I really think that Skyrim is super impressive, and world looks so real.

The game will be launched on Creation Engine, which will make it more dynamic while helping players do almost everything they want to.

What do you normally want from these RPGs? Move anywhere you want? You will be able to do so in Skyrim! See that mountain over there? No problem you can get there, but it will take you quite some time. When you get up into the mountains you will see how not only the weather changes, but all that surrounds you.

Everybody asked to make next Elder scrolls both 1st and 3rd person point of view, and here you go! You can now look at your char any way you want. The character itself is much more customizable as well: you do not choose a class, but you just level skills you need and become a master of that art. You can customize what you carry in each hand: sword and shield? No problem; dual swords or axes? As you wish; Sword + magic spell cast? Yes you can do it; Double spell casting for strong spells? Of course this is possible; Double shields. What??? Yep you can use two shields for both defensive and offensive actions now.

The game has a brand new menu system where you can see a model of everything: weapons, armor, and even herbs you collect! It offers you few hundred detailed item models, and there is no way you will find two items with the same model.

Your character will be able to use strategic magic: rune-traps and battle shouts. Traps will help you in tricky combats and shouts will buff you for certain conditions you require: for example increase your metabolism so you will see world slow down for a little bit.

There are 5 main cities in the game and few dozens of small villages. Each big city will still contain a guild house, while guilds are still the same: warriors, mages, rogues and dark brotherhood.

Every single boss monster has a unique AI, which will allow him to fight you differently every try.

Straight 5 out of 5 for upcoming hit Elder Scrolls V.

What would a gaming expo be without girls? As a conclusion for this part enjoy some photos folks and see you around in few days as we still have at least 10 good games to talk about.

Prime World: Adornian Stealthier

Prime World: Dokts Empire Fire Foxies =)

Kings Bounty: Warrior of the North

Ozon.ru girls

That’s it for today =)

/Cyber

CS: GO Beta giveaways by BLGaming and Buka Ente...

Fri, 14 Oct 2011 19:33:45 +0000

Hello gamers!

What do you remember of Counter-Strike? Let’s get back to history a bit:
• 2000. Counter-Strike 1.0 released
• 2003. Counter-Strike: Condition Zero released
• 2004. Counter-Strike: Source appeared on the scene

In 2012 Counter-Strike will be back on a track with a brand new Counter Strike: Global Offensive. We all wait for it, we all know that it will be even better than before and we all want to try it as soon as possible.
Tonight is your lucky chance, as we are giving away 10 (!) Counter-Strike: Global Offensive Beta keys!
[readmore]
Thanks to our friends from Buka Entertainment and personally to Vadim Zhuravlev we are offering you a chance to get your key tonight.

(yep that's the guy you need to thank)

All you need to do is show us, that you really deserve to be in beta, that you live to play counter-strike and you know how to do it: show us an article in any online magazine or gaming portal, that describes your team win on any tournament, or just show us a great counter-strike video, made by you or about you.

In a week we will choose 10 players which will show us the most interesting articles\videos and will give them their well deserved keys.

GO GO GO! =)

Igromir Expo and Game Previews - Part 1 of 3

Tue, 11 Oct 2011 17:13:22 +0000

Igromir 2011: Full Throttle into the Gaming Zone (Part 1)

Hello, gamers. Igromir 2011 in Moscow is now over and we will begin to deliver our coverage from the exhibition. This is part 1 of 3.

There will be few big articles, written in a journal style, about almost every single game you would have seen if you attended the event. First of all we would like to thank the administration of Igromir Expo for giving us a chance to participate in the exhibition as Press.

Now to begin the journey into Igromir - as prepared by Cyber of BLGaming.

On the way to game zone
So here it comes – Igromir 2011. I was really pumped for this event as I was waiting for it the whole year. This year's exhibition was moved to Crocus Expo Exhibition Centre and I must say that it was the right move. Even in Crocus, every single game zone was overwhelmed with gamers on non-business days and the ventilation system (made especially for such massive events) was failing during the second half of the day, so surely Igromir was a really “hot event”.

It was only +10 degrees Celsius outside when I arrived at Igromir's business day, so I was happy to get into normal temperatures inside the building. I must say, as always, organization was [readmore]top notch and nobody had any problems finding out how to get into the main building: street signs, girls with advertisements, and of course all needed info including a map on the Igromir-expo.ru site. Also it took me only about 10 minutes to register inside and to get my press badge.

Now we are inside. For 30 minutes I was running around to photo as much as possible before the VIP-gamers arrive for the business day, but I won’t just post all photos as I was taking them – I will post them while writing about specific games. Welcome to Igromir, my friends. Let’s start our magical journey, that took me several days and I hope you will enjoy it as I enjoyed preparing this article for you.

Diablo III

Our first stop of course will be Diablo III. I’ve already told my dear boss Sobione, that I will live there to get my chance to play, but it took me only couple of minutes to get into the universe, as I was one of the first press employees inside.

Blizzard always does a great job preparing everything at exhibitions, so everyone would feel as comfortable as possible. This year wasn’t an exception – everything was pretty perfect. There were at least 25 spots prepared for every game they brought in, but we’ll start from Diablo III for now. Enjoy some views on the most popular spot from this year’s Igromir from my perspective:

Everybody loved the idea of two monitors for each spot – even while in queue you can enjoy watching gameplay and learning the game. Talking of queue – during business day you could have played almost non-stop. I mean, yes, there was a queue, but it was like 20-25 minutes of wait time, while during normal days queue became hour+ instantly after gates opened.

Now about game itself: I’ve played it twice, so 40-45 minutes in total and, as I guessed, you just forget about reality while you are playing. I loved that blizzard did not change the interface concept, so anyone who played at least one of the Diablo series games will feel comfortable with it. Of course there are some amazing improvements: you can say good bye to ten million clicks while looting, as you autoloot all around you now from only one simple click (but you still can take only one item if you open your inventory and then click loot). I won’t talk much about this game as you simply need to play it.. and play it.. and play it.. If there will be anyone who says Diablo III is bad, I will happily add him to my ignore list because this game just can’t be bad: It’s Blizzard game and it’s Diablo series, so it’s an instant hit even during the beta stage.

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 3

My Second stop of the day was CoD:MW 3 presentation, that involved 8 players at once and we managed to get inside with 8 press members (sorry VIP-gamers, but we need to do our dirty work and write about it, while you are enjoying gameplay).

I must say big thanks to Mike, who was our host for the presentation and to Activision in general for giving us all needed materials for future articles.

Now let’s talk about what we saw there:

It was all about the multiplayer aspect of the game. Modern Warfare 3 introduces new social and competitive features that deliver unprecedented innovation in the multiplayer experience, allowing gamers to connect and Play Together Better: players now have the ability to identify Facebook friends and fellow Elite members in-game, leading to another level of social and competitive gaming. Additionally, for the first time ever, players will be able to sync custom load outs to game, engage in daily live competition to win real-world prizing, rewards and more.

Now I’ll follow up with some information from official Activision press-release notes we received:

ALL-NEW STRIKE PACKAGES: Killstreaks have been redesigned to reward different play styles and skill levels through unique Strike Packages. Completing game mode objectives now counts towards your Pointstreak progression. For the first time ever, kills are not the only way to earn Pointstreaks.

This also allows Pointstreaks to cater to more unique play-styles:
 Assault Strike Package – Pointstreaks within this package chain and are designed for more direct damage (Predator, helicopter, etc), just like in Call of Duty®: Modern Warfare® 2. Your streak resets on death.
 Support Strike Package – Pointstreaks within this package do not chain. However, streaks do not reset on death. Streaks are more support oriented (UAV, Counter UAV, SAM turret, etc)
 Specialist Strike Package – Pointstreaks designed for the expert players. Rewards come in the form of additional perks. A player activates additional Perks as they progress in a Pointsreak. These perks last until death.

Strike Packages include (not limited to):

Assault:
Streak count resets on death
 5 kills: I.M.S.
 9 kills: Strafe Run
 9 kills: AH-6 Overwatch
 10 kills: Assault Drone
 15 kills: Juggernaut
Support:
Streak count does not reset on death
 5 kills: Ballistic Vest
 5 kills: Airdrop Trap
 10 kills: Recon Drone
 14 kills: Stealth Bomber
 18 kills: Juggernaut Recon
Specialist:
Unlock one additional Perk at 2, 4, and 6 kill intervals for up to 3 additional Perks beyond the 3 Perks each player already has assigned to their custom load out at the beginning of a match

Death Streaks make their return in Modern Warfare 3 and include (but not limited to):
 4 – Juiced (run faster)
 5 – Revenge (last person to kill you is visible on radar)
 5 – Hollow Points (increased bullet damage for 1 kill)
 6 – Dead Man’s Hand (player falls into last stand with C4)

NEW WEAPON PROGRESSIVE RANKING SYSTEM: MW3 evolves your gun progression
 Modern Warfare 3 features more than 40 of the most high-speed weapons that are either in-use or being field-tested by special forces:
o Primary: Assault: SMG, LMG, Sniper Rifles, Shotguns and Riot Shield
o Secondary: Machine Pistols, Handguns and Launchers
 New weapon progression is designed to improve specific weapon leveling unlocks (attachments, reticules, and camos) and Weapon Proficiencies
 Weapon Proficiency allows players to specialize their weapons with new attributes (some unique to weapon classes)

Proficiencies (not a comprehensive list):
 Kick – Reduced recoil when firing
 Attachments - Two attachments on Primary weapon
 Focus – Reduced flinch when hit
 Stability – Reduced sway when ADS
Attachments (not a comprehensive list):
 Red Dot Sight
 Silencer
 Holographic sight
 Dual Scope (Close Range/Long Range Optics)

NEW PERKS
 Recon – Explosive damage paints the target on the mini map
 Blind Eye – Undetectable by air support/sentries
 Assassin – Undetectable by UAV, portable radar, thermal, heartbeat
 Quickdraw – Faster aiming
 Stalker – Move faster while aiming
 Marksman – Identify targets at longer range

NEW GAME MODES
Fan favorite game modes make their return (Free-for-All, Team Death, Match, Domination, etc.), and a series of new modes make their introduction to the Modern Warfare® series:
 Kill Confirmed – Collect dog tags from killed players. Prevent the other team from collecting yours
 Team Defender – Grab the flag and protect the flag carrier to increase your team’s score

NEW GAME MODES FOR PRIVATE MATCHES
 Infection – The infected kills enemies to recruit them for the infected team.
 Drop Zone – Hold the Drop Zone for Team Points and Care Packages.
 Team Juggernaut – With the support of a juggernaut, kill players on the opposing team. The first team to reach the score limit wins.
 Juggernaut – Kill the Juggernaut to become the new Juggernaut
 Gun Game – Be the first to dominate with every gun
 One in the Chamber – Gain ammo by eliminating enemies. Be the last to survive.

CUSTOMIZABLE GAME MODES FOR PRIVATE MATCH
 Private matches have been significantly enhanced to allow players to create new, customizable game modes in addition to the new modes for private matches (listed above) and share newly created games modes with friends.
 Through ELITE, subscribers can vote on favorite new modes and those modes could make their way into public playlists.

MULTIPLAYER MAPS: 16 Maps – including the maps shown at Call of Duty® XP:
 Resistance
 Dome
 Underground
 Village
 Arkaden

Having made its introduction in Call of Duty®: Modern Warfare® 2, Special Ops makes its return in Modern Warfare 3 with a bevy of additions that innovate as a stand-alone mode, but also serves as an effective springboard into multiplayer action.
 Survival Mode: – Making its first appearance in MW3, Survival Mode is the New Special Ops mode in which players face wave upon wave of attacking enemies. Acquaint yourself with all 16 MP maps by playing through them on Survival Mode – a great way for players to prepare for online multiplayer.
 Mission Mode: Mission Mode makes its return, allowing players to team up with a friend locally or online for 16 new time-trial and objective-based missions.
 Ranking/Progression System: An independent rank progression system within the Special Ops based on the rank progression players encounter in multiplayer.

As you can see game looks much better than it ever has been, and I must say I enjoyed playing survival co-op mode. Some additional information about this mode, that was not covered in the official Activision notes:
• After Wave 1 your team unlocks weapon crates
• After Wave 2 your team gets access to grenades, flash bangs, mines and other secondary weaponry
• After defeating 3rd wave you get access to Air Support units

But even tho you will have access you still need money to buy it, so you will need to save money for desired upgrades. I was playing on x-box for the first time in my life, but we still progressed to wave 6 by kiting enemy troops and dogs around and even dropped few choppers from the sky =)

In conclusion I would like to say, that this is a “must have” game for those who love to play shooters with friends on weekend and for pro players as well. This is another generation of shooters and for sure others will follow soon (well they did, but I never wrote about them yet /tongue.gif' class='bbc_emoticon' alt=':P' />).

Might and Magic: Heroes VI

Another short stop was Heroes VI. For sure this is the game you can’t describe much after 20 minutes of game play, but still I will try to and will include information from Igromir 2010 I gathered last year, so I will start from known facts:
• The 6th game in the series will be known as Might and Magic: Heroes VI instead of Heroes of Might and Magic VI, because of the trade mark issues – game is now part of Might and Magic universe.
• As it was planned year ago game is releasing this October.
• An event of the sixth part of game begins 400 years earlier than the event described in the fifth part of the game. Griffins Empire still do not exist and the world is ruled by separate families.
• Spells can be now accessed from hotkeys panel.
• Racial abilities will have four tiers, so when to use your ability is only your choice.
• Game now have fully implemented 3D cities, so you know actually can see what buildings exist in the city from world map.
• Instead of capturing mines manually now you gain access to them by capturing nearby cities.
• Game includes 10 big scripted bosses.
• After capturing city you can CONVERT IT to your faction city, saving all buildings built before converting. Only specific racial buildings will disappear.
• Characters will now have “Heroic Class”. Upgrading to your “Heroic Class” will be shown in a small cutscene.
• Game will consist of 6 campaigns, and 6th campaign will be unlocked after completing first 5 campaigns. Only 6th campaign will show you what actually is happening in the universe.

That’s it for Heroes. In conclusion I will say only one thing – play Heroes. It really worth it.

Hitman: Absolution

Another big shot this year was Hitman for sure. Yes it’s still not ready and we saw only the alpha candidate, but trust me – game will be superb.
It was an honor for us to be there, because game was demonstrated by Game Director from IO Interactive Mr. Tore Blystad.

Game starts in Chicago. Well not just Chicago, but rainy evening at Chicago. Our old friend Agent 47 is running away from police and task force troops. I must say, that this game will have more key points, where you need to play completely stealth, so if you would like a real shooter, that’s probably not the game for you, but lets get back to game.

You start the scene completely without weapons and need to think twice before doing any moves. Scene looks very dynamic as everybody doing anything – searching for agent, repairing electricity in the building, talking to each other etc.

This game will include a brand new instincts system, which you will use all the time. For example: you can see where your target is currently going – you see their schematic movements for next few steps, so you can hide before you have been seen. You can still kill people completely stealth, and other will think it was an accident: drop from second floor down, died from electricity cord and many many other types of accidents.
Game will be only single player, so all those rumors about multiplayer in Hitman are fake.

Getting back to demo: we have been seen action scenes with using cops as meatshields, helicopter run, some funny moments with drug dealers and instinct-based camouflage system, that help you stay hidden.
Game is coming next year, and I’ve already added it to my “to play” list, because I was hypnotized with what devs already done to this universe, and Tores’ energy while telling us about the game convinced every single person inside the Hitman zone to try it out next year.

I will finish my Igromir journal for now, letting you guys read this part up and give some feedback on what you think about those games.
/Cyber.

SW:TOR Release Date Announced

Sat, 24 Sep 2011 15:44:31 +0000

Star Wars: The Old Republic will launch on December 20, 2011 in North America and on December 22, 2011 in the European Launch Territories.

http://www.swtor.com...

[readmore]

Quote

Each copy of Star Wars: The Old Republic will come with 30 days of subscription time, after which you have the option to continue playing with one of the following monthly subscription fees:

1 Month Subscription: $14.99 (£8.99/€12.99)
3 Month Subscription: $13.99 per month (one-time charge of $41.97/£25.17/€35.97)
6 Month Subscription: $12.99 per month (one-time charge of $77.94/£46.14/€65.94)

Those who have pre-ordered the game and entered their pre-order code on StarWarsTheOldRepublic.com are eligible for Early Game Access.

Official BLGaming Ventrilo Server

Sat, 10 Sep 2011 16:43:26 +0000

Aside from raw skill, communication is perhaps the most important part of any competitive game. That said, services such as Teamspeak, Ventrilo, Axiom, and Mumble have given gamers a place to speak in real time with their teammates to ensure efficiency in instruction while in a match.

For the past 16 months, BLGaming has hosted a high capacity Ventrilo server for the competitive gaming community. There are a number of regulars from the BLG community, and a number of new people each day playing competitive games ranging from Bloodline Champions to League of Legends or Call of Duty: Black Ops.

Get more involved with the BLG community by dropping in and chatting us up! We are heavily EU based, however we do have a number of US and Canadian players as well. English only please!

Ventrilo: http://www.ventrilo.com
Server: 64.237.62.226
Port: 4274

And of course, follow us at [readmore]the follow locations if you are not already connected!

Twitter: @BLGamingcom
IRC: #BLGaming on Quakenet
YouTube: http://www.youtube.c...orderlandgaming
BLG Streams/VoDs Twitch TV or Own3d(VoD)

Igromir Expo 2011 in Moscow

Thu, 08 Sep 2011 19:50:11 +0000

Another big gaming event is coming and this time it will be in Moscow, Russia. Igromir Expo 2011 will start on October 6th and last until October 9th.

And now some information from official Igromir Expo website:

In 2006 at Igromir, Russia’s largest gaming expo, there were more than 45 companies, each an appreciable representative of the Russian industry including «1С», "Akella", "Buka", Nival Interactive, "SoftClub", «the New Disk», as well as foreign giants led by Electronic Arts.

In 2007 the quantity of exhibitors has increased more than one third. The exhibition area has increased from 9 to 12 thousand square meters at the expense of expansion of sections of games for РС and consoles, and also occurrence of an additional section, on-line. The exhibition lasted 3 days, while days back in 2006 it was 2. The number of visitors increased from 25 to 52 thousand.
[readmore]

In 2008 the exhibition of Igromir had run from November 6-9th, and had been visited by about 65 thousand gamers and press. About 80 companies and brands took part in it, and the general exhibition area has increased from about 12.000 sq.m. to 14.000 sq.m. Also, for the first time, the exhibition has fallen outside the limits of pavilion 57 with the opening of a street exposition.

The leading western companies/manufacturers of games have traditionally taken part in the exhibition, such as Electronic Arts, Microsoft, Sony, Nintendo, Sega, Ubisoft, and for the first time in history of the exhibition – founders of the most popular online game World of Warcraft – Blizzard Entertainment. For the first time, Igromir officially had business day, at which the expo was opened only for experts and press.

In 2009, despite an economic crisis, the exhibition of Igromir had collected more than 82 thousand visitors and more than 60 companies-participants during 4 days of operation, again having fully occupied pavilion 57 of the All-Russia Exhibition Centre. Business day had been expanded and passed from 10.00 to 18.00, giving participants a high-grade working day for business dialogue and presentations of products to journalists within the limits of an exhibition.

The fifth, anniversary exhibition of Igromir had passed on November 3-6rd, 2010. The record of attendance had again been beaten - for four days the exhibition had been visited by more than 90 thousand gamers. In 2010 Igromir has returned to pre-crisis sizes, having completely occupied pavilion 57 of the All-Russia Exhibition Centre and having collected more than 110 companies-participants on more than 13.500 sq.m. of exhibition area. Traditionally, all leading companies-manufacturers of games have taken part in the exhibition, including "1C-SoftClub", "Akella", "Buka", Nival Network, Mail.Ru and many other, including all largest western participants of the market - Microsoft, Sony Computer Entertainment, Electronic Arts, Activision Blizzard, Nintendo, Sega and others.

Feel free to check our gallery for some Igromir 2010 photos.

DreamHack Hosting Regional Event in Valencia!

Wed, 07 Sep 2011 09:37:09 +0000

DreamHack, the largest LAN in the world, will be launching one of their epic events in Valencia, Spain from September 16-17 to allow Mediterranean countries to more easily participate and attend.

From the official DreamHack Website:

Quote

DreamHack is proud to announce the first Regional Partner for DreamHack on Tour 2011. Canales Corporativos will host DreamHack Regional Finals in Valencia, Spain the 16th to 17th of September 2011.

DreamHack extends partnership with local partner Canales Corporativos in Spain to host qualifiers in four countries and host a live event in mid-September. During 2010 DreamHack hosted international qualifiers in 17 countries. In 2011 DreamHack will change the formula of the international eSports franchise DreamHack on Tour.
- Canales Corporativos as our first Regional Partner is a perfect match. Their high standards in professionalism and creativity make them in all sense and purpose a Spanish DreamHack, said CEO of DreamHack Robert Ohlen.

3 major changes in DreamHack on Tour 2011
1) One season with one Grand Final at DreamHack Winter 2011

2) Main games – Counter-Strike,Street Fighter and READ MORE...

Call of Duty: XP Stream

Fri, 02 Sep 2011 18:29:07 +0000

The Call of Duty: XP stream is LIVE! The weekend will kick off with over $1 million USD in prizes so be sure to check out the action!

BLGaming will be in the stream room on the BLG Public Ventrilo talking about the matches, feel free to join us! Server: 64.237.62.226 Port: 4274

djWHEAT vs. Fishstix at Seattle BarCraft

Thu, 01 Sep 2011 14:08:44 +0000

djWHEAT takes on Fishstix from TwitchTV in a Starcraft 2 pickup game at Seattle BarCraft over PAX Prime weekend. With some amateur video by TiamatSC, some rockstar live casting action was caught on tape from none other than BLG's own Semmler 'The Riot'. Check out the vids and see some exciting BarCraft action!

Part 2/2 after the break[readmore]

First US Battlefield 3 Tournament at PAX

Wed, 24 Aug 2011 17:25:50 +0000

The first Battlefield 3 Tournament in the US will kick off this weekend at PAX Prime in Seattle, WA. Participants can expect over $20k in "Awesome Gaming Prizes"

More information can be found on the Official BATTLEFIELD 3 Event Page on NVIDIA's website. From the press release: [readmore]

Quote

Gamers who visit NVIDIA at PAX Prime this weekend will have a chance to play Battlefield 3—this year’s most anticipated PC gaming title—on MAINGEAR PCs powered by NVIDIA GeForce GTX 580 GPUs in SLI. Gamers can polish their tactics in the PC Freeplay Area on Level 6 at PAX Prime before they sign up onsite for the daily 12v12 single player tournament to win some great prizes—including full PC systems, cases, power supplies, gaming mice, keyboards, and headphones, GTX 500-series GPUs and much, much more. Prizes up for grabs are worth more than $20K USD.

“GeForce owners are the most passionate gamers on the planet,” said Drew Henry, general manager of the GeForce business unit at NVIDIA. “This free tournament and the ability to win some great prizes while playing Battlefield 3, is another way for us to provide a really fun experience for PAX Prime attendees.”

Gamers at PAX Prime can also win prizes by participating in the NVIDIA “Are You My Match?” contest. Simply match the tattoo sticker from the PAX Prime show bag to a t-shirt worn by an NVIDIA staffer on the show floor, and come to Level 6 to claim a prize. Additional prizes include 3D Vision kits, PC cooling systems and a whole lot more.

Various PAX Prime prizing is being provided by Antec, ASUS, Coolermaster, CyberPower, EVGA, IBUYPOWER, Guild Wars 2, NVIDIA, NZXT, Razer, and Zotac, and others.

Happy Birthday Fashioned!

Sat, 06 Aug 2011 11:40:53 +0000

Today marks the 30th Birthday of BLGaming's Chief Development Officer and Co-Founder, Derrick 'Fashioned' Allen! D has been gaming ever since the first computers hit the market back in the early 80s (yes he is that old!).

Just as gaming has evolved from Pong to Halo, so has D evolved from a young football player to a LvL 50 Warrior with Fire Resistance:

Drop some comments, and let's show Fashioned some Birthday wishes BLGaming style!

DOTA2 @ Gamescon

Mon, 01 Aug 2011 21:02:09 +0000

Valve basically one-ups the entire esports community and drops the hammer: a $1 million dollar prize.

If there were any doubts of whether or not the best players and sponsors would be moving to DOTA2, let this information dispel them.

Read more here

HoN Patch Preview & Exhibition Match

Fri, 29 Jul 2011 02:39:16 +0000

Tune in to Honcast Thursday, July 28 for an exhibition match between two of the best teams in the world, fnaticMSI and OnlineKingdom, as they show off their skills and the two new heroes,

Monkey King

and the Drunken Master

Here's the VOD of the match, enjoy!

Upcoming HoN Hero: Drunken Master

Thu, 28 Jul 2011 12:35:38 +0000

The second hero that will be released this Friday, Drunken Master. A strength based hero that guzzles liquor to unleash combos of inebriated fury, the Drunken Master looks quite formidable.
edit: link should work now

Technorati: Interview w/ DJ-Wheat

Tue, 26 Jul 2011 06:45:56 +0000

Technorati.com was kind enough to do a nice long voice interview about current eSports and its future with one of the pioneers in the eSport world, djWheat.

If you dont know who he is, take a look at this quote below from their article.

Quote

Marcus ‘djWHEAT’ Graham is a Video Game Host, Producer, Creative Mind, TV Show Host, Game Historian, Mainstream Enthusiast, Media Personality, and Geek. He hosted/commented hundreds of shows and he's one of the most known figures of eSports. djWHEAT is a globally recognized Broadcaster and Internet Celebrity. Having covered some of the most high-profile Pro-Gaming tournaments, djWHEAT has continued to push competitive gaming to the masses since 1999. djWHEAT has also put alot of focus into the ‘new gaming audience’ and building communities around them.

Go ahead and check out the interview at their site from the link below:
http://technorati.co...cus-graham-aka/