Ubisoft launches 'Far Cry 3'

Ubisoft on Tuesday released a new installment of hit videogame "Far Cry" that turns a carefree island vacation young hipsters into tourist nightmare on a lawless land.In the opening moments of "Far Cry 3" players go from swimming, dancing, skydiving and otherwise cavorting with friends to escaping the clutches of vicious and arguably psychotic pirates.
"Far beyond the limits of civilization lies an island, a lawless place ruled by violence and human suffering, where your only escape is through drugs or the muzzle of a gun," Ubisoft said in a description of the game setting.
"This is where you find yourself, stranded in a place that has forgotten right from wrong, a place where you must live by the principles of violence to survive."
Positive reviews of the open-world, first-person shooter game quickly stacked up at game evaluation website Metacritic.com, with GameSpy and The Escapist each giving "Far Cry 3" ratings of 90 points out of 100.
"When Far Cry 3 invites you to come stay with it for a long vacation, take it up on its offer," said a GameSpy review posted at Metacritic.
"This is a great example of how to do an open-world shooter right, and for me it's been one of the nicest surprises this year."
Posted player reviews overall praised the game and the rich immersive graphics but some expressed disappointed with glitches or the seeming lack of smarts in artificial intelligence programmed into virtual enemies.
Versions of "Far Cry 3" were available for play on Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 videogame consoles and on computers powered by Windows software.
The console version was priced at $60 while the title for play on personal computers cost $10 less.
"Far Cry 3" was developed in the Montreal studio of France-based Ubisoft.

 

Adobe releases cloud-based game development tools

Adobe late Monday release a free tool kit to make it easier for developers to create Flash-based games to ride the growing wave of playing on smartphones, tablets, and in Internet browsers.
Game Developers Tools made available were the first tied to the Adobe's "Creative Cloud," providing computing muscle from Adobe's online datacenters.
"For anybody who wants to develop a game that targets the Flash player it will be a lot easier," said Diana Helander, group product marketing manager for Gaming Solutions at Adobe.
"For people who want to try their hand at being a game developer, this allows you to play around and target a bunch of different marketplaces," she continued. "That really opens the door for revenue and for discovery, even if you just have a free little game you want to put out there."
Flash-based games can be found in among the top titles at social network Facebook as well as those popular for play using personal computer browsers.
Adobe said it tools enable games to be crafted more efficiently to work across the sometimes challenging array of device screen sizes and operating systems.
Flash software can enable a desktop computer version of the game be shifted to suit smartphones or tablets which are becoming increasing popular devices for play.
"Gaming companies are becoming more like media companies," Helander said. "Gaming as a whole is definitely increasing in popularity."
Adobe envisioned the free tools boosting the number of rich, immersive games available including many based on characters or franchises that have been hits on videogame consoles.
Japan-based Square Enix and France-based Ubisoft are among videogame industry titans working with Flash tools, according to Helander.