After many many months of negotiation it seems a deal between British Internet service providers and entertainment industry bodies to combat piracy in the UK has finally been agreed to. Don’t panic just yet though, it’s no where near as restrictive and intrusive as it could have been.

This discussion between the two groups has been raging since 2010 when the controversial Digital Economy Act was introduced, which included such measures such as the possibility of cutting off ‘repeat offenders’ from the Internet. However the ISPs protested the new measures, saying that it was forcing them to take on responsibility for policing their users and others raised questions about how only certain users could be cut off when IPs can be shared among people. Proposals have been worked on since then, with what seems to be considerable compromise mostly on the side of the entertainment industry bodies.

According to a document leaked to the BBC the new measures will begin in 2015, and will consist of letters or e-mails by the four involved ISPs (BT, Sky, TalkTalk and Virgin Media) being sent to the addresses of users who are detected engaging in behaviour that infringes copyright. The system will run for 3 years with periodic reviews on performance and the numbers of people detected. More ISPs will also opt into the system after it has begun.

This is considerably less than the content owners had originally wanted. They had wanted letters sent to contain details of possible punitive measures and to have access to a database of known illegal downloaders, opening the possibility of further legal action against individuals. However, there is the possibility that if these new ‘soft’ measures are not seen to be working, they could push again for the ‘tough’ path of tackling piracy, this time armed with the data gathered during the 3 years this system runs.

There is no doubt that piracy is a big problem to those who make media, but equally that the thought of heavy-handed measures could end up doing a lot of damage. This system seems to be a compromise that leans more towards ISPs and users than the content owners, and we can only wait and see how effective it turns out to be.

Good news for the players of games set to lose their multiplayer servers with the closure of Gamespy: another company has stepped into the breach to scoop up and restore multiplayer services to them all.

Gameranger, a service started originally to facilitate multiplayer on Mac computers, is filling the gap to allow players of games like Grid and Battlefront 2 to continue to play online after Gamespy closes on the 31^st of this month. And what’s more, they aim to make the experience even better than it was before. They’re dedicated to fixing as many bugs as they possibly can for their new players.

Scott Kevill is the creator of Gameranger and says that his service can dig into the internals of the game to fix bugs, game-breaking or small, and also to hopefully improve on the overall performance of the games they now host. It was also developed to allow support for games, without the need for updates meaning players can just hop in and play. Kevill hopes that by taking on the task of supporting the games that he can keep their communities together instead of letting them fragment.

Gamespy closes at the end of the month, but it seems despite the questions about how the games that weren’t going to be moved to new servers would survive, everything is going to be okay. The remaining games are now in safe hands. Here’s hoping that the move can be made with minimal disruption to players.

“We are making a new Unreal Tournament”. Seven words that will make many a gamer either punch the air with excitement or give them cringing reminders of just how much the more recent entries sucked and hopes this won’t be another of those. Epic Games’ community manager Stacey ‘Flak’ Conley used those very seven words to confirm the company’s plan to build what they’re already describing as their “next-gen competitive shooter”, which is planned for Windows, Linux, and Mac.

However, this time the game is taking a whole new approach, with a different business model and more focus on the Community. The Unreal series of games have maintained a long tradition of mod support, which is partially responsible for its enduring reputation; and now, the company wants to involve its loyal community from the beginning, letting them contribute ideas from the very first line of code, using forums and Twitch streams to keep in touch. As for modding itself, Players will be able to make maps, weapons, and near total-conversions to add into the game even if they can’t get them into the main code.

“Unreal Tournament is the perfect kind of game to do this with,” project lead Steve Polge said. “It’s always had a very open community.”

To facilitate the distribution of mods in the new game, the new Unreal Tournament will feature a marketplace from which they can all be downloaded. Modders will have the option to make their mods available for free or at a price, letting mod authors get recompensed directly for their work for the first time. The biggest news however is that Epic Games won’t be following suit and using the marketplace to implement micro-transactions into the game. In fact, the company don’t plan to make money from the game directly at all if reports are to be believed – not only is the new Unreal Tournament going to be free to play, but all Epic Games-published extra content will be offered freely as well!

The studio warned that the game will take many months to be playable, and will start off with a focus on standard Deathmatch only. Other series-standard modes like Capture the Flag and Onslaught will be added over time. Not that long-term series fans shouldn’t be used to waiting: The last major title in the Unreal series of shoot-em-ups was seven years ago, when Unreal Tournament III hit stores in 2007 releasing on PC, Xbox 360 and PS3.

You might have heard a while back about a special monument that CCP were planning to erect in Iceland. The Reykjavik-based monument has been up only a short time and contains the names of many, many players of their long-running game, EVE Online. So to have had it defaced within a week really seems to have struck a nerve for them.

A few days ago, a name was scratched off the monument and CCP are not pleased to put it simply. “What’s happened is absolutely disgusting. It’s an insult to the entire community and is clearly the work a person who believes that behaviour in a virtual world is a valid reason to make a real life personal attack on someone, and deface public property.” they wrote, making clear that they do not condone acts of real-life vandalism especially for reasons of personal grudges developed within the game.

A good deal of the EVE community seem to share this viewpoint, and apparently several players, including some from the culprit’s alliance have come forward to provide information. While CCP are reviewing footage from the monument, they invited the offender to come forward and make themselves known before they are caught. They would count this as a ‘gesture of good faith’ even though they still plan to take action anyway.

Three players have since been identified to have been involved with the incident and have had their accounts in both EVE and DUST banned, while a further fourth player has been suspended for six months for indirect involvement. All four have also been banned from future Fanfest events, but CCP have decided not to make the account names of the players public due to the community’s reaction to the vandalism of the monument and fear of backlash against the four.

It’s quite the reaction, but even if you think the incident is being taken a bit too seriously, you can’t deny that the defacing of a monument dedicated to a number of long-term players of a popular game is a very sad reflection on some gamers.

The Indie Game Show with DJs Digmbot and PredictedCyborg
Sunday night, 6pm til 9pm GMT, 1pm til 4pm EST.

On the Indie Game Show this Sunday…

Projector Games!

Indie developer of FortressCraft, they are now working on the follow-up: FortressCraft Evolved which is currently in Steam Early Access.

The game is a voxel-based sandbox builder game with Creative and Survival modes and allows for quick builds which can be easily duplicated and shared.

Projector Games Website: [x]

The Game: [x]

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