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Remember Digital Homicide? Remember how they recently started the process of trying to sue 100 Steam users, then when Valve responded to attempts to get those users by removing the studio from Steam they announced they’d sue Valve too?
Well, seems like the story might finally be coming to some sort of an end – according to Digital Homicide’s founder the studio is closing down for good along with the dismissal of the lawsuits. Don’t all cry out in anguish at once.
The cause of the studio’s demise has been put down to both the removal of their revenue from Steam, as well as funneling all the money they did have into the lawsuits they were running (with possibly the exception of the one against Sterling, which as far as I know is still being ‘crowd-funded’). Founder Romine has had an interview in TechRaptor in which he also claims that some of the harrassers on Steam he was going after were part of competitor studios.
“At least two were competitors. The case dismissal was only due to financial reasons caused by the removal of our games. I believe the case was very solid. There were in excess of 140 false statements by the 11 steam users, tens of thousands of posts harassing myself and my customers, three direct interference with written contracts with third parties by steam users (some of which were competitors), and much more. A combined in excess of 25 reports were filed against the worst users of the 11 with no resolutions being found.”
“As far as digital homicide? It’s destroyed. It’s been stomped into the ground from a thousand directions and use is discontinued. I’m going back into the work force and watching what’s really going on. Not gaming media gossip – the real stories are in the legal documents. Not talking about mine.”
While I doubt too many of you will be upset by this news, it is worth saying that Romine does at least have some point about online harrassment. As I said in my last article, death threats and threats against people’s family are not cool; regardless of any intentions to carry them out or not.
Somehow though, I’m not sure if this is the last we’ll here of Romine and Digital Homicide in some shape or form… but let’s hope that for a while no more ridiculousness emerges.
In recent times game studio Digital Homicide have become more famous for the lawsuits they’ve been issuing than having good games (which they don’t). Last year they served one against outspoken critic Jim Sterling for ‘libel and slander’ asking for a $10 million settlement. Then about a week ago they issued another one, this time against 100 Steam users for ‘stalking harassment and criminal impersonation’. The only issue is that they only had access to the usernames of these users, so they served Valve with a subpoena for the identities of those users.
And how did Valve respond? By removing all traces of Digital Homicide’s games, both from the Store and from Greenlight.
To be fair, we can’t say that we’re surprised that Valve finally got fed up of Digital Homicide’s bullshit. They were asking for around $18 million in ‘damages’ in the lawsuit filed with an Arizona Courthouse, with co-founder James Romine being the one responsible for it. The users in question were involved with a Steam group called “Digital Homicides” and formerly “Poop Games”, which described itself as a “a dedicated consumer-advocacy group and censorship safe haven.” This was in light of Digital Homicide’s afore-mentioned incident with Sterling a few months back.
Valve’s response has hit all eighteen of the studio’s available games in the Store, and according to SteamDB’s history here more than thirty titles that were in Greenlight have been canned. A statement issued by Doug Lombardi, Valve’s communications director simply said: “Valve has stopped doing business with Digital Homicide for being hostile to Steam customers.”
Seems like a little taste of karma has finally hit. We’ll keep you updated on developments, because given the past of this studio there’s bound to be some.
The last DLC for Fallout 4 I reviewed was Automatron, and I gave that a 9/10 for the over 8 hour campaign storyline it gave me. So let’s take a look at Fallout 4’s 6th and Final DLC, NukaWorld!
Construction started on Nuka-World in July 2049, and Nuka-World opened on May 1st, 2050. On opening day, over 40,000 tickets were sold, and plans were made to expand immediately, as it featured only 2 lands at the time: Nuka-Town USA and Kiddie Kingdom. Dry Rock Gulch opened in 2058, followed by Safari Adventure in 2067. The last park area, Galactic Zone, opened in 2072.
In typical Fallout 4 DLC style, the DLc opens up after level 30 with a mission to listen to a radio signal… Unlike Far Harbour though, which needed Nic Valentine and a certain point in the core storyline completed, this is more like Automatron, you can go straight there, although the devs admit at 30, you’re in for one hell of a challenge (although if you don’t all the other DLC already, you’re more than likely more than ready to get started. Especially if, like me, you’re using any mods aswell.
I will admit, I started streaming this one and I enjoyed it SO MUCH, I forgot to NOT play anymore and played stuff I SHOULD have done on stream… oops… But you can see my first NukaWorld stream below:
So, what IS Nukaworld?
As the description says, it’s Disney World, but for Nuka Cola, cos why the hell not?
The map is HUGE too, it’s made up of more than 8 zones, all run by various raider factions and depending how you play the storyline, you can end up running the raiders too. I kinda of wish I had too, as I’ve seen some amusing videos of old companions reactions on how you play it, especially Preston Garvey, who is not AT ALL happy with your choice leading to some relaly amusing videos.
The zone is nicely spaced out aswell, the theme park being in a big dust bowl type area, nice and flat, you can see to the horizon and get some beautiful vistas for screenshots from most angles.
I initially thought the park would have a few typical zones, what I was really surprised to find was there is a TON of areas around the outside fo the park aswell, including trash areas, a junkyard full of bots (which give some cool new parts for your Automatrons aswell), a Zoo full of some of teh CRAZIEST monstrosities so far in this game, inclusing the gruesome Albino Gatorclaw that tried ripping my face off a few time and the terrifying Feral Ghoul Gorillas and even, one of my fave parts of the park, a Haunted House.
The Grandchester Mystery Mansion was a special fave, I honestly spent well over an hour following the route through (stuck in a room until the voice over finishes, typical haunted house style) and working out how to survive the various traps on the way through as I go and I honestly got a fun jump scare from it near the end too, which was a great little touch.
I have so far played MORE than 8 hours in the park and I have only done, AT MOST, 2 zones so far and barely scratched the raider storyline. I have loved every minute of my exploring and just talking to all the wierd and whacky people and droids I’ve met in this DLC and it’s honestly given me a crisis of conscience on how I want to go… Do I stay quite stand up with the rail Road and Minute Men, helping rebuild the Commonwealth and society, or do I run the raiders and take over the whole place as the Overboss… decisions… decisions…
Seasons After Fall is a 2D puzzle-adventure game that will let you dive into a captivating universe and explore a land governed by magic and nature.
We’ve had a lot of beautiful looking games over the last few years, one of which, Ori and the Blind Forest, was a favourite here at teh station. Seasons After Fall looks like it will be slotting itself nicely into that group in September when it releases on STEAM and later on consoles.
The game is beautifully hand drawn and has lots of puzzles and effects like changing the seasons in teh game to make the terrain change and thats how puzzles work.
It’s going to be fun to watch on stream for sure and we’re all looking forward to trying this one!
Seasons After Fall is out on 2nd September on STEAM and consoles later on.
Check out the trailer and tell us what you think in the comments below…
Mother Russia Bleeds is an ultra-violent co-op brawler overflowing with an unmistakable style and unforgettably brutal action for up to four players at once. Set in an alternate U.S.S.R, the story centers on a desperate crew of imprisoned street fighters that must overcome an oppressive criminal authority and crippling drug addictions through any means necessary. Battle solo or alongside friends locally and online in an exceptional story mode campaign or harden your resolve in a multitude of formidable challenge and versus modes.
In an interesting hark back to teh games I grew up with, Le cartel, a small indie in France has teamed up with Devolver digital to bring us Mother Russia Bleeds, a side scrolling beat’em up in the style of final Fight or Streets of Rage.
Showing off gameplay today at GamesCom, we got to see some of the graphically violent gameplay that immediately felt natural for those of us that grew up on those iconic side scrollers.
The graphics are typically pixel based but incrediblt detailed, and the game play flows really quickly.
The game allows for 4 player co-op with the difficulty increasing/decreasing based ont eh number of players in game aswell.
This looks like a really fun game for a few freinds either on console or pc and is out on PC/Mac/Linux via STEAM on September 5th, with console versions coming a little later
