Star Trek is often listed as one of the factors that led a good many game developers to begin dreaming of doing wonderful things, especially for those people who would eventually go on to make wide open-world space games such as Eve Online and Elite: Dangerous. So the passing away of Leonard Nimoy who played the popular and fondly-remembered character Spock has understandably prompted tributes from studios across the industry.

Upon hearing the news, most studios took to their Twitter accounts and other social networks to post the news and their condolences to his family and friends.

o7 Mister Nimoy, you will be missed. pic.twitter.com/Ah0Bn0LNGP

— EVE Online (@EveOnline) February 27, 2015

RIP Leonard Nimoy #LLAP and Thank you! pic.twitter.com/hUbXDg2GiD — Konami (@Konami) February 27, 2015

Peace and long life. #LLAP pic.twitter.com/2YS1DwmKoV

— World of Warcraft (@Warcraft) February 27, 2015

A blast from the past with Leonard Nimoy. LLAP http://t.co/klK4abC6YB — Star Trek Online (@trekonlinegame) February 27, 2015

The last of those above, Star Trek Online by Cryptic Studios obviously did a bit more than tweet though. Nimoy had been involved with the game, helping to announce it back in 2008, and recording lines for the game although Spock doesn’t appear in the game himself. Shortly after the news had been announced they requested that players join them in-game on the planet of Vulcan for a solemn vigil in which to pay respects. Many players flocked to stand around a fountain on the planet, with many instances of the location having to be created so while for players it seemed that they were only one of about 20 people in reality across all created instances there were over a thousand players standing in tribute for Nimoy.

The news was also announced last night on the game’s forums that Cryptic will be adding a memorial to the game this Thursday as part of the game’s weekly updates.

I want to once again express my heartfelt condolences to the friends, family, and fans of Leonard Nimoy. Everyone at Cryptic Studios was saddened to hear of his passing and we want to make sure we never forget the cultural impact of the man or the character he played. To that end, the Star Trek Online team will implement a standing in-game memorial to Spock and Leonard Nimoy this Thursday March 5th with our regular weekly maintenance.

In this way, we hope to keep his memory as alive in our game as he is in all of our hearts.#

LLAP

Steve Ricossa
Executive Producer

Elite: Dangerous has also announced the addition of a tribute in-game for Nimoy, planning to add a new space station to the LHS 3006 system orbiting the game’s version of the planet Vulcan. It will be named ‘Nimoy Station’.

Leonard Nimoy’s passing had an effect on many other types of media besides gaming. The tributes inside of games are all still to be announced, but plenty of other mediums have made their tributes.
 
Firstly, in television SyFy is planning to run a special 5 hour marathon on Sunday, March 1st (tomorrow), starting at 9 am ET. It will include an episode of the original Twilight Zone that he featured in, both parts of the Star Trek: The Next Generation story he starred in; Unification and the final Star Trek movie that featured the original cast; Star Trek 6: The Undiscovered Country.
 
Channel Epix is also paying tribute today with two special airings; “A Conversation with Leonard Nimoy” and Star Trek Into Darkness.
 
On their Facebook, TBS Network posted the photo below with the caption: “In loving memory of the only man special enough to leave Sheldon speechless. #LLAP”. Fans of The Big Bang Theory have also asked that an episode in future pay tribute to the deceased actor.
 

 
Another sort of tribute came from an artist in Dallas. Rob Wilson created a piece of art in tribute to Nimoy and his most famous role, simply captioned “Beam Him Up”.
 

 
And of course, many people have been tweeting out their tributes from actors who worked with Nimoy to President Obama of the United States of America to even metal music artists.
 

“I loved him like a brother. We will all miss his humor, his talent, and his capacity to love.” -William Shatner http://t.co/U8ZN98tVYp

— William Shatner (@WilliamShatner) February 27, 2015

It is with sadness that I heard of Leonard Nimoy’s death. I was lucky to spend many happy, inspiring hours with him. He won’t be forgotten.

— Patrick Stewart (@SirPatStew) February 27, 2015

“I loved Spock.” —President Obama #RIPLeonardNimoy #LLAP pic.twitter.com/vmwjnQ3Zm3

— The White House (@WhiteHouse) February 27, 2015

HERO. RIP. Leonard Nimoy, Spock of ‘Star Trek,’ Dies at 83 – http://t.co/cdHm7h9dfZ http://t.co/iAVM2qpSPK

— Scott Ian (@Scott_Ian) February 27, 2015

 
The most simple and probably touching tribute to Nimoy and how much he meant to people is probably the photo that Good Morning America posted on their Facebook. Nimoy’s star on the Walk of Fame with a single rose laid next to it, capturing the visual representation of the actor’s accomplishment along with a reminder of the fact that he is now gone.
 

 
We’ll be following this article up with news of tributes that are to be put into games, such as the station Elite: Dangerous is planning to add that we covered earlier.

Following the news of Leonard Nimoy’s death yesterday, players of the game Elite: Dangerous soon came up with a petition to ask that the station in New Yembo that was funded through a Community Goal be named after the actor, most famous for his role of Spock in the original Star Trek series.

Today both on the topic about said station on the E: D forums, and through the official Elite: Dangerous Twitter page, Frontier have confirmed that they are going to name a station in Nimoy’s honour but not the one in New Yembo. Instead a station in the LHS 3006 system will be named for him, where the game’s version of the planet Vulcan orbits. The station will be close to the planet in question.

Speaking on the forum Executive Producer Michael Brookes said: “Just a heads up that there’ll be a Nimoy Memorial station added in the Wings update (1.2), so the Yembo station is still open for other suggestions.”

The news has been fondly greeted by players both on the forum and through social medias across the net. Frontier said on their Twitter that right now they’re looking for the “most respectful way possible” to implement the in-game tribute.

.@ChrisUK27 @SciFiHour @katerussell that’s right. Working out how to do it in the most respectful way possible!

— Elite Dangerous (@EliteDangerous) February 28, 2015

We are now within a week of Nintendo launching not only the next entry in the Mario vs. Donkey Kong series, Tipping Stars, on the Nintendo eShop; but with it, the first ever cross-buy promotion – with Nintendo offering to give free download codes for the Wii U version of the game to anyone who downloads the 3DS version – and vice versa! However, if you live in a territory served by the American version of Nintendo’s eStore and can’t wait to get your next fix of Donkey Kong action – and you’re one of the handful of people who DIDN’T already get Donkey Kong Country Returns or its sequel when they first released on Wii and Wii U respectively – Nintendo have you covered.

In a deal that so far seems restricted exclusively for American eShop Users – i.e. Nintendo gamers using Nintendo 3DS or Wii U consoles registered as being in America, Mexico or Canada – starting today and lasting until 8:59am Pacific Time on March 3rd, Nintendo are offering 30% off Nintendo eShop purchases of either Donkey Kong Country™: Tropical Freeze (Wii U) or Donkey Kong Country Returns 3D (Nintendo 3DS), when you purchase one or more of six qualifying Donkey Kong Virtual Console titles. These are any of the three Donkey Kong Land titles from the 3DS Virtual Console (priced at $3.99 each at time of writing); or any of the original three Donkey Kong Country titles from the Wii U Virtual Console ($7.99 each at time of writing).

The usual catches apply, of course: The same Nintendo Network ID must be linked to your Wii U and Nintendo 3DS systems as well as your eShop account prior to purchase in order to be eligible for discount; and all of the games must be purchased before offer’s closing. For those of you serviced by the Nintendo eShop in other regions – sorry to disappoint. But if a similar offer comes your way, we’ll be sure to update this as soon as we hear it!

The single purchase model of acquiring a game seems to be making a slight resurgence as of late. Guild Wars 2 used it in MMOs and recently The Elder Scrolls Online followed suit with it; Apple also made a point of giving such ‘pay once and play’ games a starring role on the front page of their App Store. It feels good to see it coming back.

Even games that aren’t fully released yet are beginning to adopt the system, with the latest being Nival who are making a little game called Blitzkreig 3. The game is still undergoing closed alpha testing and was previously announced to be going to have a premium account system, dropping all in-game currencies and microtransactions from the game. There will be additional campaigns for the game though, available through the form of DLC.

“The pendulum is swinging once again when it comes to how consumers want to pay for their games. The market is shifting back towards a cleaner, simpler and more transparent model of one-time payments. This trend inspired us to return to the classic distribution model of the series, thus honoring the series’ traditions.” said Nival CEO Sergey Orlovsky in a statement announcing the change.

The single payment model is not exactly innovation, after all those of us older than a certain age remember it fondly (sort of) as the way all games used to be priced when we were children. A return to it after the years of freemium scare stories has to be a positive for the industry though.