New Rage Details

Arcane · 22 Jul 2009 at 15:57

Link

Game Informer said:
A whole host of details are revealed in the article, including the following features:

An engineering system to craft devices including sentry turrets and RC car bombs, if you have the blueprints and parts.
Your health regenerates--a gift connected to your history.
Races and missions are available from hub towns.
Vehicular combat is a big part of racing, with power-ups and ammo placed around the courses.
Weapon upgrades, such as a scope and aiming stabilisers for a crossbow.
Alternate ammo types, including a crossbow bolt which allows you to briefly control victims before they explode.
Stealth is an option in combat too.
A gladiatorial game show named Mutant Bash TV offers big prize money.
A car parts system allows boosts to areas such as acceleration, traction and suspension.
Other car upgrades include bombs, a magnet to draw power-ups, tire shredders and EMP shields.
Multiplayer modes are currently not finalised.
One weapon is a three-tipped boomerang called the 'wingstick,' which will return.
The PC version will offer higher resolutions, more anti-aliasing and faster texture page-in times, but the three versions are essentially the same.
Rage is currently being designed for controllers because "the largest chunk of our market's going to be on consoles," id's John Carmack explained, echoing comments made by CEO Todd Hollenshead earlier this year. "I mean, yes, you can use the mouse for it but it's critical that the controller be the way that we design the game."

Ideally, id would like to ship the Xbox 360 version on three DVDs, but is facing difficulties splitting the game into three parts. "We've got two large wastelands on there," explained Carmack, who added that "we can cut it into two pieces" but "couldn't make an arbitrary cut." Meanwhile, he reveals Doom 4 is "structured" so that it will "almost certainly going to be cut up to 3 DVDs versus one Blu-ray [disc on PlayStation 3]."

Early-game Rage spoilers follow, so avert your eyes if you are of a sensitive disposition.

As had been previously revealed, the player character is one of the lucky few who escaped a terrible disaster--an asteroid strike--safely in suspended animation inside an 'ark' deep underground. An earthquake cracks your ark open early, and you awake to find the crew dead and databanks ruined, so you stumble out into the wasteland.

There you find the tattered wastelands living in fear of a mysterious group called The Authority, who for whatever reason offer a hefty bounty for turning in ark survivors. Your mission naturally involves discovering just who The Authority are and what they want.

Rage is due to arrive on PC, Xbox 360 PlayStation 3, and Mac "when it's fun and when it's done," which definitely won't be this year but might be before 2011.

KNiVES · 22 Jul 2009 at 15:59

I'm really looking forward to this. It sounds like it will have a tremendous amount of substance and variety. All those little combat things, plus the racing, and a plot that hasn't been retread all that much before.

arc@css · 22 Jul 2009 at 16:02

Thanks for the info, really looking forward to this and you know its gonna be a well polished effort by i.d.

uv · 22 Jul 2009 at 16:07

Arcane said:
A gladiatorial game show named Mutant Bash TV offers big prize money.

"I'd buy that for a dollar!"

Gerard · 22 Jul 2009 at 16:46

Arcane said:
Rage is currently being designed for controllers because "the largest chunk of our market's going to be on consoles," id's John Carmack explained

I remember figures a while back showing that doom 3 and the expansion on pc sold tons more than the console versions. So hows he come come to that conclusion? According to valves info theres around 260 million online pc gamers, yet the bigger chunk of the market is on consoles? ummm......

Rage looks good graphically but with the racing etc its ids first attempt at something like that. I just hope with the multi rage is not the same archaic crap thats been about for going on 2 decades now, do something new not just bouncy bouncy deathmatch.

KNiVES · 22 Jul 2009 at 16:53

Gerard said:
I remember figures a while back showing that doom 3 and the expansion on pc sold tons more than the console versions. So hows he come come to that conclusion? According to valves info theres around 260 million online pc gamers, yet the bigger chunk of the market is on consoles? ummm......

Rage looks good graphically but with the racing etc its ids first attempt at something like that. I just hope with the multi rage is not the same archaic crap thats been about for going on 2 decades now, do something new not just bouncy bouncy deathmatch.

Doom sold far more because it was first and foremost a PC release, with only an Xbox port happening a very long time after the fact. You are referencing a wildly different era to today's - the Xbox was just one console, and didn't even sell that much. Now we have 360s and PS3s which have sold by the bucket-load, and are seeing major PC franchises being released on them simultaneously. As for 260 million online gamers - how many of those could potentially run Rage? How many are just flash browser gamers? And how do you know all 260 million recorded players are all unique instead of repeated?

There are many PC gamers undoubtedly, but the potential market for the most demanding games are fast becoming a niche segment.

Gerard · 22 Jul 2009 at 17:01

KNiVES said:
Doom sold far more because it was first and foremost a PC release, with only an Xbox port happening a very long time after the fact. You are referencing a wildly different era to today's - the Xbox was just one console, and didn't even sell that much. Now we have 360s and PS3s which have sold by the bucket-load, and are seeing major PC franchises being released on them simultaneously. As for 260 million online gamers - how many of those could potentially run Rage? How many are just flash browser gamers? And how do you know all 260 million recorded players are all unique instead of repeated?

There are many PC gamers undoubtedly, but the potential market for the most demanding games are fast becoming a niche segment.

We dont even know what it takes to run rage, if its running on a 360 or ps3 then most likely a gaming pc thats a couple of years old can run it.

The survey never mentioned what kind of games, it was just a quote about a survey another company did. Id doubt they would count repeat users in that kind of survey.