Another catch to Battleswarm is its pay-to-play system called MetaTix – the latest endeavor of former Atari headman Nolan Bushnell, plus Mark Hood and Mike Williams of Reality Gap. It's basically a microtransaction system that uses small payment increments (i.e. pennies instead of dollars) that supposedly lowers the gamer's natural aversion to entering credit card information and reduces the risk for developers to try new and weird ideas.

Like Battleswarm – it's kind of new and weird.

What Is It?
Battleswarm: Field of Honor is a war game where two factions fight for control of various maps. The human faction functions like an FPS with an alternate third-person shooter view. The insect faction works like an RTS with the ability to zoom in to almost third-person action view. On each map, players can accept missions (like kill x amount of y) to win special items that they can then use or sell in the consignment shop (which costs MetaTix) and the overall goal is the level up and graduate to the expert server.

What We Saw
Christopher Mahnken, Senior Producer at Reality Gap gave me a crash course on MetaTix, the store system and both factions before turning me loose for a rookie match. I chose the insect faction because I heart RTS games.

How Far Along Is It?
The game will enter open beta next week and go live sometime in September.

What Needs Improvement?
Steep Learning Curve For The RTS Faction: Not to knock on the complexity of shooters, but strategy games typically have a steeper learning curve. This is especially true in Battleswarm because the RTS faction doesn't function the way many contemporary RTS games do – there's no base to level up, no resource points to whore and the map is entirely visible to both factions at all times, so scouting is a waste of units. The only constraints to work around are the unit number caps (e.g. 200 on the field at one time) and the geography of the maps which sometimes creates good choke points. It takes some getting used to even if you are an RTS buff.

Concept of Ownership: You don't buy weapons and keep them in Battleswarm – you lease them and then customize them with chips that you find or earn in the game 9which revert to you when the lease on the weapon is up). Something about this bugs me because even though I have proof leveling through the chips, I don't feel like I own my equipment. That could just be a weird nuance of mine, however; and there may be some merit to a system where you can rent only what you need for a certain map. Time will tell.

What Should Stay The Same?
Crazy-Intimidating FPS View: The human faction plays like a typical first person shooter, but there's something to be said for having an entire horde of insects around you, battering you and shooting you with green slime. The screen turns red and a blood splatter effect obscures the screen the closer you get to death – and still the bugs keep on coming and the satisfaction of killing on is hollow because you know it's not your opponent. It's just a piece of his enormous horde. The overall effect is visually overwhelming and somewhat different than dying in other shooters.

Interesting Concept That Could Go Somewhere: It seems to me like the developer deliberately kept the RTS and FPS gameplay on the shallow side so that every gamer could go back and forth between the two factions. Also, it probably helped them balance the factions by not giving the RTS faction too much to babysit and not giving the FPS faction too many ways to kill. However, it would be interesting to see what would happen if a higher level RTS faction where bases and resources points were in play fared against a more complex shooter faction that had a cover system and so forth.

Final Thoughts
Microtransactions make me uncomfortable only because there's an assumption with pay-to-play games that the richest gamer will automatically be the best. Mahnken heard as much from playtest users and even gave one a ton of MetaTix to see if that user would prove the point – but he says it's just not true of Battleswarm. The smarter players are the better ones, he said, and there's nothing in the game you can't buy with gold as well as MetaTix.

Battleswarm seems to be coming along well for a game we only heard about just last month. That's probably because the title, being developed by Gameworld Tech Co, LTD, was already released in Taiwan. The USA Today article the original story came from seems to credit Bushnell for development, but in reality it's the company he co-founded, Reality Gap, Inc., that will be performing publishing duties in worldwide English.

Online titles ported to North America generally move into beta rather quickly, as is the case with Battleswarm: Field of Honor. Anyone interested in pitting their RTS skills against opponents' FPS skills and vice-versa can visit http://www.battleswarm.net/ to give it a go.

Bushnell has been out of the game making business for quite awhile, but he's coming back with Battleswarm, an online PC game that allows players to switch between the roles of strategic commander and front line fighter, much like S2 Games' Savage. Instead of having different roles on the same team, however, one side plays the RTS-controlled alien bugs, while the other team is tasked with their extermination in first-person format.

The inspiration for the genre-mixing title comes from wanting to play games with his five sons.

They're all avid gamers and like first-person shooters. The problem is, as you get older, you lose some reaction time, and as a result, I'm getting slaughtered by them. A real-time strategy [RTS] game, however, is more my [preference], a good resource game is what I love. Battleswarm is both an RTS and a shooter, a mash-up between StarCraft and Starship Troopers, if you will. You can switch sides, too, if you feel like an RTS instead of a shooter, or vice-versa.

It actually sounds like an interesting solution to bridging the age gap, giving those of us slowly losing our reflexes a fighting chance against our young nephews...or whatever. Not that I am losing my edge or anything. It's just that kids these days can see forever, and might have psychic powers.

'Father of electronic games' on his next project, the state of the industry [USA Today]

Nolan Bushnell will be inducted into the BAFTA Fellowship at the 2009 award ceremony on March 10th in London, England. The Fellowship is the highest honor that BAFTA can bestow on an individual, and this year they're giving it to Bushnell for ushering in the era of the video game. Bushnell is understandably ecstatic.

“I am humbled to be selected for this honour from the British Academy of Film and Television Arts. The British people are not only great game players but have historically been some of the best game creators. The pub culture and country house drawing room environments have been instrumental in spawning games and game players through the centuries. I am very grateful to receive an award from the people with a history of creating and embracing this type of entertainment.”

In other words, they love him...they really love him. Good going, Bushie.

GameWager is a service founded in 2007 and in public beta since July 2008, that rewards players who sign up with tokens for completing certain objectives in various online games. Get a kill in Team Fortress, get a token. Players can then redeem tokens for chances to win prizes, such as Alienware Laptops and Nvidia graphics cards. So far the list of supported games is tiny, but World of Warcraft, Left 4 Dead, and Red Alert 3 support is currently in the works.

I am assuming that this particular press release was issued in order to tie Nolan Bushnell to the project, perhaps drumming up more interest in publishers to help get their games supported. Is this a smart move? Judging from some of Bushnell's past projects, his endorsement might be more akin to nailing a dead rat to the front door of your new restaurant.

Atari & Chuck E Cheese founder has “third coming” with GameWager

AUSTIN, TX - January 26, 2009 - Nolan Bushnell, the founder of Atari & Chuck E Cheese, aims to combine the success of both into a new service that is introducing similar dynamics to existing PC games with its’ unique online platform called GameWager.

Designed for gamers of all skill levels, GameWager’s platform introduces a reward system that lets gamers earn virtual tokens for completing in-game actions like kills, objectives and team wins in multiplayer PC games like Counter-Strike and Team Fortress 2. Earned tokens can be redeemed for a chance to win sponsored prizes like Alienware laptops, Nvidia graphic cards, a Hypernia hosted server for 1 year and much more. Nolan serves as an “executive advisor” to the company that has seen over 60,000 gamers earn 25 million tokens since its’ launch last July.

For the hardcore, GameWager allows gamers to directly wager tokens against each other in real-time to settle virtual trash talking; a first of its kind in the video game industry that is desperately looking for new revenue streams to offset exponential development costs studios now face.

GameWager also offers interactive social tools that allow gamers to brag, share and compare all of their aggregated game stats across hundreds “GameWager enabled” of servers worldwide.

The free service has made it very easy for all gamers with nothing to download or install and the sign up process taking less than ten seconds. The company has many titles in development that span the industry’s genres from World of Warcraft, Call of Duty 4 and Red Alert 3 to casual games on site.

About GameWager
GameWager is an online platform designed for gamers to get more out of their gaming experiences. It currently offers a reward system and wagering platform built on a virtual token currency in addition to a suite of interactive social tools. Founded in 2007 by Thomas Marriott and George Giannukos, GameWager is advised by the executive direction of Nolan Bushnell, backed by Todd Wagner and headquartered in Austin, Texas. Please visit gamewager.net for more information.

Now, now it's not. According to PennLive.com, the amount of violence (among adults!) at Chuck E. Cheese continues to be high. For example, there were 13 arrests for disorderly conduct at the Susquehanna Township restaurant alone. The year before, police had to respond to incidents 18 times at the same restaurant.

Susquehanna Twp. Police Chief Robert A. Martin explains that the reason for these incidents is often people with ongoing disputes bump into each other at Chuck E. Cheese. "They see each other at Chuck E. Cheese, and before you know it an argument turns into something physical," says Martin. "It's madness, absolute madness."

We think there's too much Chuck in that Cheese.

Perhaps it's divorced parents at a kid's birthday party, Martin added. Last spring, a man slapped his estranged wife in the head at their child's party.

It's not just this one Chuck E. Cheeses that is going bonkers, but other franchises as well. Other incidents include a man yelling that he had hepatitis C as he ran around the restaurant spitting or 17 year-old girl that was dragged by her hair in the parking lot.

According to Chuck E. Cheese, all the restaurants have security cameras to protect customers, restaurants employees and the poor schmo who dresses as the chain's mascot.

First Atari turns to crap, and now Chuck E. Cheese goes apeshit? Nolan Bushnell is truly King Midas in reverse.

Conduct at Chuck E. Cheese described as 'madness' [PennLive Thanks for the tip Yokai Attack!] [Pic]

But as game site Multiplayer quickly found out, the ordering system was buggy, drinks didn't show up and the games kept crashing. "The meal started out entertaining enough," Multiplayer writes. Both "[We] were entranced with the touch-screen interface and the ability to peruse our lunch options as though we were playing with a giant iPhone or Nintendo DS. We were both giddy over the high-end concept behind uWink, but it all went downhill after we sent our order away." You know what would be a great idea for a restaurant and bar? Here's the pitch: Imagine an establishment with every retro Atari arcade game, greasy food and booze. Oh, and add some animatronics. Why do people always have to mess with things?

Our Disastrous Visit To Atari Founder’s High-Tech Restaurant [Multiplayer]

Here's an exclusive sneak look at tonight's episode of ABC Family's The Middleman. To bring everyone up to speed: The scene features the show's heroine Wendy Watson and her new boyfriend Tyler, who's completely in the dark about her job fighting aliens and bad dudes. But! They're both totally into zombie films and video games. Oh, and Nolan Bushnell gets name dropped. Tipper Gore, too. And the Dalai Lama.

Barack Obama is a politician. He's running for president! In a probing interview with Entertainment Weekly, the publication has a hard-hitting and probing interview with Obama. Things like what Obama thought of Shrek 3, his favorite sitcoms and what's on his iPod. Here's the obligatory video games question:

What's the last videogame you played?
Pong. That gives you a sense of my age. I loved that game.

So there ya go, one of the guys running for president used to play Atari's Pong. Somewhere Nolan Bushnell is doing fist pumps and going yeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeesssssssssssssss.

Barack Obama: My Pop-Culture Favorites [EW via GamePolitics] [Pic]

Well, you know, I've always had a dream of architecting the reversal of fortune. The real problem that Atari has really had for the last 15 years is that it hasn't stood for anything. I think a name and a brand has to stand for something, otherwise it's not a brand. It's a logo. I think that the people who have been running it have never had a core vision.

I always had a core vision of what Atari was going to mean, and I believe that without that, you're just flopping around, and you will end up having a hit and then a miss, and you're not creating any value. So I strongly urge them to have some core values, hopefully, that are going to be important in the future.

Words of wisdom!

Nolan Bushnell: What The Game Industry Misses [Gamasutra]

I think the Wii by Nintendo is getting games that once again are fun for people who don’t want to make a career out of figuring out how to run a 47-button controller... I think that the business right now should be much, much bigger than it is. If it were evenly spread over all demographics and age groups, it'd be huge. But it’s not. It's basically an 18 to 28 year-old male dominated business of about 15 million. That’s where most of the traffic is. Casual games on the net add to that, but they're all network-based.

Wait, wait, wait. Back up, Bushnell! A 47-button controller? Oh man, would we love to see that! (Playing it, well, that's another matter.)

Bushnell Interview [Next-Gen]

And Bushnell estimated the number of games he'd be able to serve through uWink at 600 trillion games across 100,000 restaurants Ambitious - but hey, it's Nolan Bushnell, right?

When we covered Bushnell's recent talk at Wedbush Morgan's annual management access conference, we heard him say that he misses the idea of gaming as a social activity, since the decline of arcades, and that part of what he hopes to do with uWink is to revive that group spirit and keep multiplayer that's actually in-person alive.

In the GameDaily interview, he cited an example - Pong used to be a hot tool for chicks to pick up guys at bars?

"What's the essence of that game experience?" Bushnell asks, pausing before answering his own question. "The essence of that game experience is the social experience."

And there's a precedent for such things. "Pong was highly social," he reminds us. Bushnell recalls the early days when the game was introduced to bars. "It was okay for a woman to pull a guy off the bar stool to come and play with her, because it was only a two player game. And so it was like a constant girl's choice in a bar. And it was right at the point of women's liberation...and the number of people who said they've met their husband or wife playing Pong over the years, you know, I bet over a thousand people have said that."

Interview: Nolan Bushnell's 600 Trillion Games [GameDaily]

In an interview with Multiplayer, Bushnell said that the writers Brian Hecker and Craig Sherman really seemed to get what Atari stood for and that despite the numerous pitches for similar stories, this was the first he's backed.

“There’s been a lot of books [about Atari],” he said. “Some correct, some incorrect. I’ve kind of gotten used to being portrayed by others. I kind of thought that this [a movie] might happen. I kind of thought that it wouldn’t happen until maybe after I was in the ground for a little while. [laughs]”

Hit up Multiplayer for the full interview with Bushnell and his thoughts on previous brushes with Hollywood fame.

Atari Founder ‘Thrilled’ To Be Played By Leonardo DiCaprio, Talks ‘Atari’ Movie [Multiplayer]

The Hollywood Reporter describes "Atari" as drawing on themes of "Mr. Smith Goes to Washington," and "Tucker: The Man and His Dream." I was hoping it'd be a movie adaptation of "Space War" — just two ships drifting to the center of the screen, shooting each other. Maybe a love interest. Somewhere. Maybe not.

Wherever the story ends up, it sounds like it's getting very serious treatment, and the outlook sounds favorable for a well made biography. Plus I love period pieces, even if I've lived in the period described.

Leonardo Di Caprio to Star in 'Atari' [The Hollywood Reporter, via ComingSoon.net, thanks reader D Elfman]

In addition to founding Atari, Bushnell also founded Chuck-e-Cheese's, and now he's into social gaming. His current project is UWink, a social gaming-focused restaurant chain with touch screen consoles at every table where users can not only order food and drink, but also play games together. UWink is set to open its second restaurant in Hollywood soon.

"Social games aren't sitting in boxer shorts in your basement," Bushnell said. "It's being out, having fun, being able to hi-five people around the table, and it's a bridge between traditional board games, which are highly social experiences in the home, and a video game. The idea is to create games in which the conversations among the people are as important as the gameplay itself."

One more thing on Bushnell's list of current projects? "Think of the holodeck come true," he said:

"It's an immersive game - totally revolutionary, totally new."

Lastly, Bushnell had plenty to add in a panel discussion that focused on the broadening casual and non-traditional game market. He sits on the board of NeoEdge, a tech company that enables advertisers to deliver 30-second spots in that casual gaming arena. And he thinks the industry has only begun scratching the surface as far as the amount of revenue available from advertising:

"People in the U.S. watch about 28, 27 hours of television per week, and they play about 7-8 hours of games per week. On a parity basis, that says there should be somewhere between 25 and 30 billion dollars of ads available for the game business... [but there's] less than a billion now," he said.

"We think there's a massive opportunity to get rid of that inefficiency with a lot more ad-supported gameplay... and not only should we be getting more revenue on a per game basis, but the gameplay should be significantly more valuable to an advertiser."

Also on the panel were Kathy Vrabeck, president of Casual Entertainment for Electronic Arts; John Koller, senior marketing manager for Sony Computer Entertainment America; Doug Clemmer, president of Valusoft & THQ Wireless, and WildTangent founder and chairman Alex St. John - and among other things, the panelists all agreed that greater ad support in games could accelerate the growth of digital distribution, free-to-play games, and ultimately, the death of that $60 retail box.

I don't believe those kinds of ads are very effective.

But In our research for a new book about the Atari VCS, Nick Montfort and I discovered that Death Race is in fact not the first film adaptation in games. That honor goes to none other than Shark Jaws, by Atari.

According to our sources, Nolan Bushnell tried to license Jaws for use in a videogame, but failed. Eager to take advantage of the shark fear hype after the release of Steven Spielberg's popular film, Atari decided to make the game anyway. As the flyer reads, "now you and your locations can cash in on the popularity, interest and profits associated with sharks."

The game is pretty simple. The player controls a diver trying to catch a fish while avoiding a shark. Graphics are raster, and black and white.

Like Death Race, this too was an unofficial game, and in that sense it's not quite right to use the word "license" — and Atari cleverly played up the illegitimate Jaws affiliation by making "JAWS" appear in huge letters on the cabinet, with "shark" in much smaller type beside it. In fact, Atari was so concerned about possible recourse that Bushnell created a whole other company, dubbed Horror Games, to market and sell the game. Ever the clever trickster, that Bushnell. And how times have changed.

Shark Jaws [Arcade Flyers]

I had to come up with a game people already knew how to play; something so simple that any drunk in a bar could play.