"We are very excited to see the uptake of UDK cross over the 50,000 mark in only one week, and we're looking forward to seeing amazing games and applications come out of it," said Mark Rein, the vice president of Epic Games.

Rein added Epic was "thrilled" to offer the kit to schools and students and that Unreal Engine 3 would be part of their education and training in games development.

GamesIndustry.biz reported that the training firm 3D Buzz, which has already made more than 100 Unreal Technology video tutorials, will release a free tutorial series specific to the UDK.

50,000 Grab Free Unreal SDK In One Week [GamesIndustry.biz]

That narrows it down to about 75% of the company's product line, meaning it could be related to Epic Games' Unreal Engine, the Unreal franchise or the Unreal Tournament franchise. Or it could be a new Unreal product altogether. Or Epic Games is screwing with us. What we're relatively certain it's not is a proper Unreal Engine 4, as Epic prez Mike Capps said that next-gen engine is still years away at this year's Tokyo Game Show.

So. Which is it? Best guesses in the comments!

Thanks to Jos for the heads up.

"Mainly I've used an x-acto knife and three tiny screwdrivers to do most of the carving," ceemdee said in an email. "I used some wood carving tools to scrap out the bigger areas on a few of the pumpkins and a needle is used to trace the image. They were all carved in the last four weeks. It's actually only four pumpkins (one a week) with three carvings on each. :)"

You can check out unlit views of the pumpkins here.

Got any more? Send pictures of 'em my way!

The two got sponsorships from nVidia, XFX, and others, and of course the backing of both universities, so this is a pretty big deal. Oregon State's gamers got into Reser Stadium's club level for their party. (Saturday's game will be played there). Oregon's in the Erb Memorial Union. They're playing tournaments on seven games, including CounterStrike, TF2, Unreal Tournament, Warcraft 3 and others.

In all, it sounds really cool, and hats off to OSU Gaming and the UO Cultural Forum for getting this together. I'm gonna be in Eugene for Thanksgiving; kinda wish I was there already.

Civil War LAN [camera]
Civil War LAN [site]

Maxim has video clips over at their website representing all seven of their choices, from "Elf shot the food" to the unforgettable "Headshot" from Unreal. The only real glaring omission I immediately notice is the announcer from the Bloody Roar series, who sounded like a Swedish guy imitating a Japanese guy imitating an American.

The 7 Greatest Faceless Announcers in Video Games [Maxim]

“Epic Games redefined the first-person shooter with the Unreal series, and we’re very happy to welcome them to the growing list of companies that share our vision of digital distribution,” said Adam Oldakowski, Managing Director of GOG.com.

A lovely catch for the folks at GoG, to be sure, but still no BloodNet? Come on guys.

Epic Games on GoG.com [Good Old Games via GI.biz]

Said Capps:

"We've got Unreal [Engine] 4 in production right now... it's going to be in the next console generation - our rough guess is 2012 [to] 2018."

Tim Sweeney also has a guess about what the platforms will be at that time, and in what order Epic will address them:

"Version 4 will exclusively target the next console generation, Microsoft's successor for the Xbox 360, Sony's successor for the Playstation 3 - and if Nintendo ships a machine with similar hardware specs, then that also. PCs will follow after that."

Epic's Capps: Unreal Engine 4 Due For 'Next Console Generation' [Gamasutra]

I'm sure that at some point in our future we will make another Unreal, single-player, story-driven game. I'm sure at some point there will be one...[however] there are no plans to do one today.

As Microsoft explained before, there's nothing illegal about creating or downloading such mods. But that doesn't mean Epic will pay you $1,000,000 for one. Their Make Something Unreal Contest bans the use of "third party intellectual property, including, but not limited to software, images, characters, logos, names and trademarks." Still, some pranks are so good, they're worth the free work.

Character - Samus Aran [UT3Mod via PS3Fanboy]

The full release is below, with guest quotes from Gabe Newell and Jay Wilbur.

EPIC GAMES NOW ON STEAM

Award-Winning Library Available Via Leading Online Platform for PC Games

March 17, 2008 - Epic Games, Inc. and Valve, two of the PC industry's leading technology and content development studios, have inked an agreement to bring Epic's award-winning titles to Steam, a leading platform for PC games and digital content with over 15 million accounts around the world.

The Epic hits now available on Steam include Epic's debut classic, Unreal Gold, as well as Unreal II: The Awakening and the Unreal Tournament series of games, including the recently released Unreal Tournament 3, which has shipped over one million copies to date.

All of Epic's titles available on Steam are offered in the Unreal Deal Pack, an incredible value for just $59.95. And, to celebrate the launch, all of Epic's games on Steam are available for 10% off their regular price.

"Epic is a leading developer of game engine technology and has produced some of my favorite games of all time," said Gabe Newell, president of Valve. "It's an honor to be working with them and offering their current and classic titles to the millions of Steam gamers around the world."

"Steam is a revolutionary technology that opens up an entirely new way to put our games into the hands of millions of PC gamers around the world," said Jay Wilbur, vice president of Epic. "Valve has changed the face of digital distribution for game developers, publishers and consumers, and we are thrilled to be a part of the Steam community."

For more information or to purchase Epic's games via Steam, please visit www.steamgames.com

About Epic Games
Epic Games, Inc., based in Cary, North Carolina and established in 1991, develops cutting-edge games and cross-platform game engine technology. The company has created multiple million-selling, award-winning titles in its Unreal series, recently shipping Unreal Tournament 3 for PC and PlayStation 3. Epic's breakthrough game, Gears of War, sold over 4.5 million copies and was awarded overall Game of the Year for 2006 by the Academy of Interactive Arts & Sciences, Game Developers Choice Awards, GameSpot, GamePro and many others. Epic is also responsible for the Unreal Engine, which is the underlying technology for a wide range of games including the Game Critics Awards' Best Console Game and Spike TV's 2007 RPG of the Year Mass Effect by BioWare and the 2007 BAFTA Best Game and Spike TV Game of the Year BioShock by 2K Games. Epic's Unreal Engine 3 is the current holder, and three-time consecutive winner, of Game Developer magazine's Front Line award for Best Game Engine. Epic was also recognized as 2006 Studio of the Year by Spike TV, 2006 Developer of the Year by Official Xbox Magazine and 2007 Large Company of the Year by the North Carolina Technology Association. Additional information about Epic can be obtained through the Epic Games Web site at www.epicgames.com.

About Steam
The leading online platform for PC games and digital entertainment, Steam delivers new releases and online services to over 15 million PC users around the world. For more information, please visit www.steamgames.com

Epic, Epic Games, Unreal, Unreal Tournament and Gears of War are trademarks or registered trademarks of Epic Games, Inc. in the United States of America and elsewhere. All other trademarks are the property of their respective owners.

There is a long life ahead for Unreal Engine 3. Version 4 will exclusively target the next console generation, Microsoft's successor for the Xbox 360, Sony's successor for the Playstation 3 - and if Nintendo ships a machine with similar hardware specs, then that also. PCs will follow after that.

10 performers outfitted in medieval/space/fantasy armor re-create Bruce Nauman's 1973 work "Tony Sinking into the Floor, Face Up and Face Down". Performed in slow motion and combined with movements based on computer game death animations, this piece is accompanied by a high volume binaural beats reputed to induce out of body experiences.

Performance Information [Machine Project via BoingBoing] [image]

...we're hopeful. Microsoft hasn't said "no" yet, but then they haven't said "yes" either. We need them to say "yes," and we need them to do it soon.

If it doesn't work out with Xbox 360, depending on sales of the game on that platform, I imagine we'll find a few of the best mods and get them on Xbox Live Marketplace. I don't think 360 users are going to suffer drastically - they're just going to miss out on a lot of crazy, cool fun stuff and the ability to exchange it among themselves. They may also end up paying for content that is free on other systems because Microsoft now has to host it and certify it.

The Epic folks will also be speaking at two sessions:

"Automating Regression Discovery: Finding the Wrenches in the GEARS OF WAR," will be presented by Martin Sweitzer, programmer, Epic Games. This intermediate-level lecture, to be held Wednesday, February 20, 12:00-12:30, in West Hall Room 3004, will be geared toward programmers, although production and management may also benefit from the talk.

"UNREAL TOURNAMENT 3 Postmortem: ULTRA KILL!" will be led by Dr. Michael Capps, president, and Jeff Morris, producer, Epic Games. This postmortem, to be held Friday, February 22, 2:30-3:00 p.m., in West Hall Room 2001/2003, will cater to all developers, regardless of experience.

I hope they delve a bit into the whole Playstation 3 Unreal modding. It seems like it should be getting a lot more attention than it is.

Epic's Mark Rein dropped into the Epic forums last night to let people know that the PS3 cooker for the Unreal Engine 3 editor is in the final stages of testing and could be out as early as next week.

Folks,

I just wanted to give you an update:

We're very close to releasing an update to the Unreal Engine 3 editor, that comes with the PC version of UT3, that will allow UT3 mod-makers to cook their mods into the required PS3 format. We've been doing some internal testing and we're hoping to expand to a wider group tomorrow or Friday. If all goes well then we should see the update released next week which is what I expect will happen. Obviously the process works, as we put out a few mods before Christmas and people seem to be playing them, but it is the update to the editor that we're testing.

Happy New Year!

I can't wait until the mods start flooding the PS3, I'm hoping it could convince a lot of companies build in their own truly user-created content into console games.

PS3 mod cooking update [Unreal Forums, via Evil Avatar]

Then again, it's not like these companies are conjuring engines out of thin air. If you want a first look at the Unreal 4 engine, just take a glance at Unreal 3...and apparently a trip past Tom Sweeney's desk won't hurt, either. Because until we have Barbie's next adventure with real solid plastic boob physics, that much will have to do.

Unreal Engine 4 in Development [via destructoid]

"We don't think Epic's counterclaim has any merit," Holland told us. "We believe strongly that our claims in our complaint will prevail and the damages Silicon Knights has suffered in connection with its original complaint are vastly more, millions of dollars more than what Epic claims its damages are in its counterclaim. They've set forth $650,000 and our claims will dwarf that substantially."

So Holland contends that the claims of copyright infringement are completely unfounded, and it does seem to countersue for such a small amount in the face of potential millions in damages. It sounds to me like Epic lawyers spent the weeks between the suit and countersuit looking for anything they could throw back at Silicon Knights, and what they came up with does seem pretty skimpy.

The good news, I suppose, is that the lawsuit will in no way effect the development of Too Human

"The lawsuit itself will not have any effect on Too Human," Holland insisted. "The lawsuit is based on substantial delay and damage that Epic caused us, but through our own sweat and toil, we have created a new and better game engine, in our view, that we're utilizing now. We basically had to do ourselves what we paid Epic to do. As a result, we are back on track and this game is going to come out in a timely fashion."

Silicon Knights Responds: Epic Counterclaim Has No Merit; Too Human Development on Track [Game Daily - Thanks GamePimp]

This is, at its core, one of the simplest contract disputes. Party A promised to deliver a good in form X, and Party B alleges that good arrived in form X-1 and Party A never fulfilled their contractual agreement.

Assuming Silicon Knights can show that Epic neglected the licensees in order to work on Gears, the Gears profits will become some measure of damages. While it seems unlikely Silicon will receive all of the profits they demanded, a substantial award for Silicon would not be out of the ordinary.

Silicon Knights v. Epic: The Unreal 3 Engine Case [lawofthegame]

Marathon:Resurrection 2.0 Complete Release [Official Project Site, via BeyondUnreal]

As someone who has some slight... difficulty succeeding at even the most simple, AI-coddling, stealth-based gameplay, my natural instinct to see such a title is to douse it with kerosene, set it ablaze, and dance around the pyre. But this little paper fella is so cute my desire to destroy all things stealth has been noticeably softened.

The game Drawn To Be Alive isn't just about stealth, it seems. It's other draw is its clever 2D-character-in-a-3D-world platforming, plus what looks like a little bit of puzzle solving. Some of this 2D trickery has popped up in games like Paper Mario, but it looks cool nonetheless. The mod was built by a team of students on the Unreal engine as part of a school project at French design school Supinfogame, but is not yet complete. In a post to mod community site Mod DB, user and project contributor Vgadjo lets us know that we can expect to see something final around October.

In the meantime, I suggest you check out the official site (which is only in French) for more screenshots and take a few minutes to watch the full gameplay trailer.

Thanks for the tip, Amestris. Michael McWhertor