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Visit us at Gamedrone.net!
2007-09-05 20:22:00
You might have noticed a slight lack of new content for the past week... that is because I've been moving The Game Drone to it's own .net domain, and onto the Wordpress platform. None of the old content has moved over, so this blog will remain online for the time being, but there won't be any new content anymore.So, update your bookmarks to http://www.gamedrone.net and check out the new blog! You'll have to resubscribe to the new blog if you had subscribed to this one, but I'm sure you'll prefer the cleaner look and faster loading of the new Game Drone! So go on, check it out. The first bits and pieces of content have already made their way to the blog....We've had some good times here on Blogger, but it's time to move on.See you on Gamedrone.net!
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GW:EN Sneak Peek Screenies!
2007-08-28 22:38:00
It's been two weeks since the last biweekly screenshot entry, and this time I've got a massive collection of great shots from the Guild Wars: Eye of the North sneak peek weekend for you! As you probably know, this sneak peek weekend was a short preview for people who had already pre-ordered this upcoming expansion pack, and provided a small section of the new game world. You can read more about all that here, but basically these are in-game screenshots of a game scheduled to be released this friday. If you've been wondering what the new areas look like and how much better the game looks, without having to rely on ArenaNet's sparse pictures, then you've come to the right place!The following is a batch of shots I made myself, so they're completely untouched. These are slightly larger than usual, so that you can actually see something, and they're a bit darker than the game itself, because my monitor's brightness settings suck. I've added some commentary to put the pictures in...
More About: Sneak Peek , Peek , Cree

My new rig has arrived!
2007-08-27 19:26:00
Ok, so it's actually been here since thursday last week, but I didn't really have time to post this weekend in between testing all there was to Guild Wars: Eye of the North and properly reinstalling and reconfiguring everything on this new system. That black, Antec P182, case you see to the left is how my new monster PC looks. This is the rig I'll be using to provide you with the latest on PC gaming for the coming years, and I'm happy to report that thus far it's been performing really well.But first things first. Let's get to a quick recap of the new hardware in my system so you know what the heck it is I'm talking about:Antec P182 caseAntec TruePower Trio 550 Watt PSUASUS P5KC motherboardIntel Core 2 Duo E6750 processorKingston PC6400 2x1GB RAMSeagate Barracuda 320GB HDDSparkle Geforce 8800 GTX video cardMy old 160GB Western Digital HDD and ASUS DVD playerI set it all up that day and after a fresh Windows XP (no Vista here! ... yet) install it was all ready to go. Rather th...

The wondrous north opens up!
2007-08-26 12:44:00
During the past couple of days major cities across the world of Guild Wars have been shaking with tremors as cracks opened up in the surrounding lands. These cracks have now, temporarily, granted access to a new region of land entitled the 'Far Shiverpeaks'. Over this weekend many tens of thousands of fans with preorder kits have logged in and started exploring this new northern region of Tyria, including myself. It's only a short sneak peek into a small portion of what Eye of the North , the upcoming expansion pack, will offer, but I'll share my first impressions nonetheless.Having resumed playing Guild Wars only a few weeks ago it might seem a bit premature to already preorder the expansion pack, but with Eye of the North's expansive list of new features it just seemed too good to pass up on. The main points of interest for me were the Eye of the North itself, the Norn and the mini-games... however, over the course of this weekend I've found many other, more impressive, innov...

Eye of the North preorder key!
2007-08-24 09:51:00
That's right: I still have one Guild Wars: Eye of the North preorder key to give away! The sneak peek event has already started, but you can still get in - all you have to do is send me an e-mail (address in left sidebar) and the first one who mails gets it. Aside from granting access to the sneak peek event it also provides you with 10 hour trials for the other campaigns as well as three unique maxed weapons. I've already done my first bit of exploring in the Northern Shiverpeaks - and I can tell you: it's worth it. So go on, open your email client and send me one to receive your key and participate!Update: The key is now taken, no use mailing anymore!
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An amazing weekend!
2007-08-21 18:37:00
The coming weekend is gearing up to be an unusually good one for PC gamers across the world as many long-awaited game demos and retail copies are finally making their way into our hands! It all started off this week with the BioShock PC demo - and in case you hadn't noticed, BioShock has been getting some good reviews - but after a slew of recent announcements it seems like it will even pick up further later this week!Perhaps most obvious is the actual retail release of BioShock, which is expected to hit store shelves across Europe this friday. Seeing as it's been getting a 9.6 out of 10 average this seems like a genuine must-buy for shooter fans, and if you still want to give it a testrun prior to playing then scroll on up and download that demo! You'll have to wait, possibly quite a while, before I have my own demo or retail-impressions up, because tomorrow I should be assembling my new PC and I might be rather busy in the coming days.Of course that's not the lot of it. Anothe...
More About: Weekend , Amazing

How could Epic Games fail?
2007-08-19 19:19:00
As you probably already know, Unreal Tournament 3 is one of the most highly anticipated games set to be released this fall, November to be precise. After all the interviews, previews, screenshots and videos it seems to be getting better all the time... but it's still possible for Epic Games to screw this up, like they did with Unreal Tournament 2003. What are some of the foreseeable pitfalls that Epic Games must avoid and which features truly need to be added? Let's explore that in this entry...Of course this entry will be limited to some of the sneakier, less obvious, pitfalls. So there will be no mentioning of silly stuff such as not releasing a demo prior to retail date, or unreasonable system requirements, because Epic Games simply will not let that happen, and has proven that with every game they've made prior to UT3. Additionally some of these potential issues cannot be solved by Epic Games themselves, but are problems that could plague the community and need to be resolved...

A clean slate!
2007-08-18 20:49:00
As you might know I've recently ordered a bunch of new hardware, which should be arriving early next week. With all of my old hardware, with the exception of one hard disk and my DVD drive, moving on to my Aunt, I've been using these past few days to slowly prepare for the coming of my new hardware. After all: what better time to clean up my hard disk, and make all the files easily accessible, than right before a fresh Windows install on a brand new PC!?You see, when it comes to sorting the files on my PC, I'm not exactly the tidiest person (contrary to my room, before you ask). It's not just that my files are all over the place, such as several seperate game patches folders on the same partition, but also that I have loads of duplicates sucking up precious storage space. Although that might not be quite the worst of it, you see: it also extends to my desktop. Just to give you an idea of how messy it is: I've been using 1600x1200 (well above average) as my native resolution for...
More About: Clean , Slate

World in Conflict Beta Impressions
2007-08-16 18:53:00
With Massive Entertainment's (Ground Control 1 & 2) latest RTS game mere weeks away from release, the time is right for me to share my experiences with the beta test build which was made available to tens of thousands of players in July. As a true fan of the fresh new RTS gameplay style introduced with the Ground Control games, I was eagerly anticipating this game, so I had set the proverbial bar rather high as I downloaded the latest beta build and prepared to play my spare time away. If only I had known then how massively (excuse the pun) World in Conflict was going to obliterate my expectations...But first things first! World in Conflict isn't nearly as well known a title as a Command & Conquer 3: Tiberium Wars or Starcraft 2, so a quick introduction for the 'less informed' (or less obsessed) is only proper. This new real time strategy game from Massive Entertainment is a continuation upon the successful and innovative non-resources, non-base building gameplay formula of thei...
More About: Beta , Impressions

Your upgrade status & new poll!
2007-08-15 17:13:00
A couple of weeks ago I asked what your upgrade status was, but unfortunately only three people actually responded by voting in the poll. Regardless, here are the results: one person upgraded recently, one is upgrading soon and the last one is waiting to see what kind of hardware comes next. This automatically means no one voted for 'not going to', not that I particularly expected anyone to...I'm still waiting for my new hardware to arrive - and quite a few of my friends have either recently upgraded or are waiting for their new hardware to arrive as well. It seems that the record low hardware prices haven't gone unnoticed, as many online retailers are also indicating vast supply shortages, so clearly quite a lot of gamers are using their funds on a PC upgrade this summer. With good reason of course, because there are a lot of interesting and demanding games scheduled to be released later this year!Anyway, on to the new poll question for the coming two weeks: 'Which is your fav...
More About: Poll , Status

GW:EN Screenshot Galore 2!
2007-08-14 11:12:00
As release day draws ever closer for Guild Wars: Eye of the North, more and more media is being released. I recently displayed an armada of screenshots already, but with even more beautiful shots of this new expansion becoming available across the web - I decided to do a follow-up and share some of the newer shots as well. The sneak peek weekend for pre-order players is going to start soon and I'll try to cover that with some nice entries as well, having pre-ordered GW:EN myself.On a side note: if you're a Guild Wars player yourself then by all means add 'Aeroth Firebrandt' to your friends list. It's my main Warrior/Necromancer character, which now has some nice and shiny 15K Sunspear armor. Perhaps we can do some missions or quests, or maybe explore the sneak peek weekend together. Heck, my Guild finally has a few active members again, so who knows: maybe you'll want to join. Anyway, enjoy the screenshots!A wallpaper depicting Jora, a Norn Warrior. Download here.Those pesky C...
More About: Screenshot , Galore , Cree

Most Impressive Games of July 2007
2007-08-12 20:02:00
Many new PC games are released every month, but which ones are truly worth purchasing? I'll be giving an answer to that question every month, with this recurring 'Most Impress ive Games ' feature. The games mentioned in this feature aren't necessarily the greatest of titles ever released, but they're certainly the best, or most talked about, PC games that were released in that particular month. Regrettably there were very few new games released in July , which means this entry is a tad shorter than usual.July 2007 Civilization IV: Beyond the SwordThis was by far the best received new release of July: a very impressive expansion pack to the most popular turn based strategy game in recent years. Aside from adding the standard new races and a sizable amount of new units and wonders, it also introduces a lot of new gameplay elements such as the expanded space race which now includes the actual travel to Alpha Centauri. Beyond the Sword also offers twelve new custom scenario's for fan...

The 200 Day Mark!
2007-08-11 21:45:00
That's right, today, Saturday the 11th of August, marks the 200th day of operations for this blog! As I predicted 100 days ago, the blog's layout hasn't really changed much since then, but it has changed quite a lot in terms of writing. Regrettably I haven't been able to stick to a rigid one post a day schedule, but I intend to make it work in the coming weeks. There is plenty to write about and I actually do have quite a few concepts lined up, although most of them are rather lengthy and will take some time to sort out.As for some statistics... in the past 200 days this blog has seen roughly 30000 pageviews and 21000 unique visitors. At over 100 visitors per day, 107 to be precise, those are some pretty impressive numbers. Hopefully the coming 100 days we will continue to see an increase in pageviews and unique visitors, as this blog matures and slowly edges it's way towards it's first anniversary!
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More on the new GW favor system...
2007-08-11 20:34:00
After the entry I wrote yesterday on the newly implemented favor system for Guild Wars, I've played a bit more and noticed something peculiar: the new system actually appears to be working. I played for a couple of hours yesterday as well as a few minutes today and have yet to see the world not have favor. As such the new system essentially ensures non-stop favor for everyone, which makes it rather odd to have such a cumbersome system in place rather than simply removing the entire favor system altogether and opening up Underworld and Fissure of Woe all day long.In any case it's a good sign for the new system, as well as the game itself. The fact that you can't go 5 minutes in Lion's Arch during prime time without seeing someone attain some great new title clearly shows that Guild Wars is a lot more popular than some people would have you believe. In fact, during a recent press event for Eye of the North at ArenaNet, apparently it was also revealed that the Guild Wars franchise ...
More About: System , Favor , Stem

Is ArenaNet ruining Guild Wars?
2007-08-10 15:23:00
Yesterday ArenaNet, developers of the popular corpg Guild Wars , unleashed the most extraordinary update notes the game has seen since it's release, over 2 years ago. Ok, so most of it is just a long list of skill-changes, but there's one tidbit in there that marks a very dramatic change in Guild Wars 's core game mechanics. ArenaNet has, at long last, altered the favor system which unlocks access to elite PvE areas (The Underworld and Fissure of Woe). Certainly Guild Wars players are celebrating, now that their number 1 complaint since release day has been addressed? If only it were that simple ...I've played Guild Wars since the E3 Open Alpha Event in May 2004 and as such have a multitude of old characters with plenty of play time in, so I know Guild Wars and it's population quite well. Right now the community is split in between the (few) supporters of the new favor system and those who disagree with ArenaNet's new favor mechanic. I'm one of the latter and I'll explain to ...
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Biweekly Gaming Recap
2007-08-09 22:20:00
As I said roughly two weeks ago the plan is for all weekly features to be extended into bi-weekly features, so that there's more time and space for proper articles, reviews, previews and whatnot. As such here's the first 'Biweekly Game Recap ', which will be replacing the former 'Game of the Week' feature. Hopefully this will end up a little more compact and easier to read through - as well as a lot more varied than the old format. So by all means, read on!Week #31 - #32(26th of July - 9th of August)This first feature in the new format is certainly varied - as we've got no less than 4 games to cover! So what is it that I've been playing over the past couple of weeks? Perhaps most notable is the World in Conflict beta test, which ended in July. I also spent some time playing the free mmorpg CABAL Online, which I covered in this blog earlier. As of late I've been getting back into my Unreal Tournament 2004 rhythm as well, but most of my gaming time these past two weeks was spe...
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July/August 2007 - Release Date List
2007-08-05 18:01:00
Welcome to the latest, most up-to-date, list of release dates for all the most interesting upcoming PC games on The Game Drone. As I do every month I've uploaded a fully updated release date list with some entirely new games and many changed dates corresponding to current press statements. Do remember that these release dates are subject to change - depending on the decisions the developers/publishers of these games make along the road. Also note that these are European release dates and the North American release can be a couple of days (or even weeks) earlier or later in some cases.As usual a couple of games dropped from the list because they were actually released on schedule - and others were added because they were recently announced. In fact, a whole lot of new games have been added to the list - such as Sim City: Societies and Worldshift - and you should be able to find just about anything you might be anticipating in there now. Interestingly a few estimated release dates we...
More About: List , Release , July , August , August 2007

Eye of the North Screenshot Festival!
2007-07-31 12:50:00
With the release of Guild Wars: Eye of the North around the corner (31st of August), I think the time is right for a little screenshot festival to get everyone pumped to return to the continent of Tyria once more. You could think of this as an extended Screenshot of the Week feature, with an armada of screenshots focusing around a single upcoming game. Don't expect any elaborate background stories or game descriptions, just a bunch of cool pictures and artwork from the new GW:EotN fansite kit with a couple of accompanying phrases.But before all that - let's first go into why GW:EotN is the subject of choice for this second (UT3 sort of had one earlier) screenshot festival. There are many reasons, for instance the fact that I'm finally pumped for a new Guild Wars game again after seeing the stunning E3 trailer. Additionally my Guild finally regained activity yesterday, with 5 out of 7 members online for the first time since Guild Wars: Factions (over a year ago). I also finally ma...
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Layout Alterations
2007-07-31 12:41:00
You might not have noticed, but I made a couple of changes to the site. I've moved around a few of the items in the sidebars and changed others to better suit the design and I've also removed a few unnecessary features (such as the slow-loading mybloglog bar). A new blog has been added to the blogroll as well - you'll really want to check this one out: Aelon.net. It's a general gaming blog which hosts an armada of sizable entries ranging from first impressions to just general gaming-related articles. It might not be very frequently updated, but the entries it does have are always worth reading!
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Most Impressive Games - June 2007
2007-07-28 22:03:00
Many new PC games are released every month, but which ones are truly worth purchasing? I'll be giving an answer to that question every month, with this recurring 'Most Impress ive Games ' feature. The games mentioned in this feature aren't necessarily enjoyable for all, but they're certainly the best games that were released that month. This particular entry is quite a bit late, but filled with a large quantity of long-awaited and otherwise decent games released in the month of June . You can expect the one for July to be up by the end of the month, although it'll likely be a fair bit less lengthy, because June was a particularly good month.June 2007 Colin McRae DiRTThe best received game released in June was this racing game. It's by far the prettiest racing game you can play on PC, with incredibly realistic and cool damage models and a load of options to play the game however you like (including realism sliders) and multiplayer. If you're into racing games - which I am not - t...

Unfortunate Developments
2007-07-26 19:51:00
Some of you might recall a two month old entry regarding a Japanese online Gundam game called Universal Century.net. I stated how it'd be great if we were to receive an English version of this game in the West. Unfortunately it was recently revealed that Namco Bandai has decided to pull the plug on this project later this year. The reasons are as of yet unknown, but this pretty much guarantees we won't be seeing anything of the sort here in Europe or the States. It's a shame really, because the concept of an open-ended online Gundam universe is truly appealing and would be something well worth paying a subscription fee for.In similar news it seems that fans of Starsiege: Tribes will now finally be left in the dust, as Sierra is terminating support for it (and 20 other older titles) as of the 16th of August. This means you will likely no longer be able to play this freely downloadable game (since slightly before the release of Tribes: Vengeance) online in the near future. All othe...
More About: Nate

Video Spotlight - Woah DirectX 10 Goodies!
2007-07-25 20:02:00
It's been quite a while since the release of Windows Vista and Dire ctX 10 capable video cards, but we have yet to see any true benefit from this 'great' new technology. Certainly a couple of games 'support' DirectX 10 already, but none of them really came with any great performance enhancements or truly revolutionary visual effects. Fortunately for those gamers who've spend their hard cold cash on the latest DX10 cards: that is all about to change. Two days ago a new trailer for the widely-anticipated RTS World in Conflict was released - and it promises quite a bit for those fortunate enough to own a DirectX 10 capable PC.It's a fairly lengthy video which introduces the special effects Massive Entertainment has in store for those gamers with systems that support DirectX 10 - and contrary to previous implementations these innovations are genuinely impressive. Aside from that a couple of non DX-10 related features, which are equally impressive, are detailed as well. And of cour...
More About: Video , Spotlight , Goodies , Dies

A lengthy absence & new hardware!
2007-07-24 14:07:00
My apologies for the rather lengthy absence (pretty much all of July), but I had been rather busy as of late and couldn't really attend to the blog for a while. There's no need to worry - this blog isn't going anywhere! Starting today I'll be catching up with some of the great things in gaming that happened during the past month, of which there are plenty (thanks E3!). The Game Drone itself will also undergo a slight change, as I'll be reorganizing the 'weekly-recurring' items to become bi-weekly or monthly items. You might also notice a few more smaller entries appearing on this blog.In the near future I intend to release the articles I promised nearly a month ago: namely my impressions of the Enemy Territory: Quake Wars beta test and my review of the Razer Barracuda headset. You can also expect a bunch of other articles, including my World in Conflict beta test impressions and an entry on hardware upgrading. So by all means, do stick around! I'm not going anywhere this sum...
More About: Hardware , Hardwar

News of the Week #22
2007-07-02 18:55:00
Just like last week - it's been rather quiet on this blog as of late and I didn't get around to providing another News of the Week item until now. The next one aught to be slightly late as well, but after that this item should be back on track (and hopefuly the rest of this blog as well). Anyhow - on to the usual intro!The Game Drone might not be just another gaming news blog, but I do touch on the most interesting PC gaming-related bits of news every week in a feature known as 'News of the Week'. It's a regular feature on Thursdays every week (well not so much this week) - and all previous (and other news-related) entries can be accessed by selecting the 'news' category in the right-hand menu. Enjoy!Week #22(June 25th - July 2nd)Well it's only been 7 days since the last News of the Week item this time! That's better, even though it should've been online a bit earlier. Anyhow some of the great news you can read about this week includes the Guild Wars: Eye of the North pric...

Game of the Week #22
2007-06-27 21:54:00
A bit lite just like the other weekly entries, but here it is nonetheless: another new Game of the Week feature! In case you didn't know - every week I write up an entry about the games I played in the past week. Out of all those games one ends up receiving the title of Game of the Week . So if you're interested in knowing what this blogger played in the past week, in between writing blog posts then please do read on!Week #22(June 18th - June 27th)I finally got some more gaming time in again, so there's a bunch to talk about this week. That said, I still haven't booted up Guild Wars: Nightfall at all this week, so it looks like that one will stay out of the picture for the moment. Of course Unreal Tournament 2004 was featured heavily again this week and I got some more time in on those two browser based games of last week. New additions were some hours of Sword of the New World - as well as a lot of Enemy Territory: Quake Wars - both games currently featuring 'public' beta test...

CABAL Online - Free to Play mmorpg!
2007-05-15 21:39:00
A little under a year ago a new company called Games-masters.com opened up beta testing for their European version of a very popular Korean mmorpg - CABAL Online . It gathered a small but dedicated fan base since release and has been growing in numbers ever since - only to now (well - in June anyway) all of a sudden be turned free to play! Apparently a new payment method was proving very successful for the Korean and Japanese versions, which inspired Games-masters.com to do the same.Yay - another one of them boring low grade item shop games right? Well... maybe not. I participated in the beta test for this game about a year ago and it was actually very good! Games-masters are also beefing up their servers before they roll out the free version, which will actually feature both a closed and open beta test. Best of all the item shop will feature only items to ease gameplay - not to give an overwhelming advantage against other players. As such, this might well become one heck of a free g...
More About: Play , Free , Line , MMORPG

Screenshot of the Week #16
2007-05-14 19:26:00
Just like every other week, here's yet another Screenshot of the Week feature! Once again I've managed to find an remarkable screenshot hidden somewhere amongst my collection of gaming pictures which I've decided to share with you below. The details regarding the when, where and why - are listed below the screenshot as usual - be certain to check it out! Of course you can expect yet another screenshot next week!Week #16RF OnlineStory: This screenshot was made during the RF Online open beta test. Game masters had organized a massive invasion of all the major faction towns - and this Cora outpost was certainly well equipped to handle the waves after waves of oncoming enemies. It was a very cool experience with hundreds of players going at it against hundreds of NPCs - in the middle of an ordinarily peaceful town. The huge battles are actually what made me buy this game immediately after release - but I ended up losing my internet connection for a month very shortly thereafter and d...
More About: Cree

Mod Review - NWN: Aribeth's Redemption II
2007-05-14 18:59:00
As promised here is my review of a mod sequel for Neverwinter Nights entitled Aribeth's Rede mption II. After playing through and reviewing the first chapter in this series by Daniel Muth, I immediately started playing this sequel - but got sidetracked about an hour away from the end. I only picked it up again just recently and played through the final segment in one go - and am awaiting the third chapter with eager anticipation, as I am writing this. But let's not get ahead of ourselves, we need to review this chapter first after all!So what's this module about anyway? As the name implies this module centers itself around the adventures of Aribeth de Tylmerande after the events of the original campaign (not Hordes of the Underdark!). It's a rather unusual module in that you aren't really the main character, but Aribeth is - which is a pretty neat concept. You are of course the character that you used at the end of the original Neverwinter Nights campaign - which should preferab...
More About: Review , Beth

Game of the Week #16
2007-05-13 22:40:00
Here's a new Game of the Week feature once more! In case you didn't know - every week I write up an entry about the games I played in the past week. Out of all those games one ends up receiving the title of Game of the Week . So if you're interested in knowing what this blogger played in the past week, in between writing blog posts then please do read on!Week #16 (May 6th - May 13th)There was a lot more gaming action this week than last. That's not to say I've played a wide variety of games, but I've certainly played them quite a bit this week. As always there was - quite a bit of - Unreal Tournament 2004 gaming being done and I even continued playing Guild Wars: Nightfall some more. Lastly I got some more time in with Neverwinter Nights custom modules - finally finishing up on a module I started playing in late March: Aribeth's Redemption 2! Yarr, finally something new to talk about!Most of my gaming fun this week came from Unreal Tournament 2004 - as usual. After playing ab...

News of the Week #15
2007-05-12 19:13:00
The Game Drone might not be just another gaming news blog, but I do touch on the most interesting PC gaming-related bits of news every week in a feature known as 'News of the Week '. It's a regular feature on Thursdays every week (although a bit late this particular week) and all previous (and other news-related) entries can be accessed by selecting the 'news' category in the right-hand menu. Enjoy!Week #15(May 5th - May 12th)Contrary to last week's News of the Week item there's actually quite a lot of news to talk about this week - although most of it consists of relatively small announcements. So what will we be covering this week? Well we have a wave of newly announced release dates for games like Civilization 4: Beyond the Sword and Shadowrun - not to forget the Lost Planet demo too! New websites for Aion: Tower of Eternity, Enemy Territory: Quake Wars & Unreal Tournament 3. Furthermore there's some free gaming to be had with Cellfactor: Revolution and CABAL Online. Lastl...