E3 Announcements??

[LORD BLACKFIRE]

Microsoft, Sony, and Nintendo have now finished all of their conferences. I don't think I saw a single Eidos game at any of them.

Will Eidos be making announcements tomorrow?

[LORD BLACKFIRE]

From TeamXbox:

Key Features

Combined Real-Time Strategy, Flight, and Naval Action gameplay: Command the air, sea, and sub forces. Launch full-scale attacks and at anytime switch to and take full-control of any plane, ship or sub. You command, fly the attack, fire the battleship’s 15-inch guns, and submerge the mini-sub anyway you choose throughout the battle.

Two Massive Campaigns: 28 full-scale battles across two unique campaigns. The historic American campaign begins after Midway and goes to Guadalcanal, Leyte, Iwo Jima, Okinawa, and more. The “what if” Japanese campaign begins at Pearl Harbor and goes to the Java Sea, Port Moresby, Midway, and beyond.

100 War Machines: Fighters, bombers, carriers, battleships, cruisers, destroyers, subs, mini subs and more. 17 US planes including the new Corsair fighters and Curtis Helldivers, and 20 Japanese planes including the Mitsubishi J2M Raiden (Thunderbolt), and the night-fighting Nakajima J1N1 Gekko.

Innovative Online Multi-player Battles: Huge multi-unit battles for up to eight players (four on each side) on Xbox Live and Games for Windows Live. The largest battle involves over 100 units. And five all-new online gameplay modes: Island capture, Duel, Siege, Escort, and Competitive.
New & Improved Features:

New Kamikaze attacks: The deadly attack is now fully integrated. Also features the manned Ohka, rocket powered kamikaze aircraft.

New Island Capture: Capture and hold islands. Support the landing forces and take over artillery, radar stations, and airstrips.

New Cockpit View: Go inside the WWII cockpits of fighters, dive bombers, torpedo planes and more.

New Skirmish mode: Team up with a friend against the AI and expand your single player and multi-player experience.

New Level of Realism: Greater detail and depth of field. New plane and ship destruction effects. Bullet tracers. New smoke and fire effects.

New Interface: Improved command and control map screen, artillery, and repair controls. New hints and tips feature for new players.

[Zero-Sen]

Even though there was very little discussed at E3, I have seen the gameplay videos and have read all the E3 previews that were posted for Battlestations: Pacific (BSP) and I must say that it is looking very good!

In fact, (as the post above me has noted) it seems as if the much asked for skirmish mode has been confirmed for BSP, a feature which at the moment has my purchase of the game guaranteed - as long as the gameplay is as good as Midway and one other thing, which brings me to my real question:

The press release (in the above post) in some ways makes it seem like this skirmish mode may REQUIRE one to play against the AI co-operatively with a friend, via split-screen or otherwise. Co-op is fantastic as well, but I would like to know for certain whether or not this skirmish mode can be played with only a single player against the AI? (And you know, if any DEVELOPERS are lurking amongst us, it'd be great if you could provide some answers in your infinite wisdom...)

Afterall, for those who like Battlestations' unique blend of action and strategy combined with WWII's epic Pacific theatre (myself included of course), we would really love to indefinitely extend BSP's lifespan by being able to plug it in whenever and jump into a skirmish match customized to our liking and just play the game without having to replay story missions or find someone to play co-op or to compete with in multiplayer matches.

Sorry for the length here, but it's just because BSP is looking so good and them much wanted Skirmish mode seems so close that I just had to ask. Thanks again, all.

[Zero-Sen]

Hmm... I guess it just looks like I'm in a posting kind of mood. If anyone was looking for Pacific gameplay/developer walkthrough videos you can find them at www.gametrailers.com. Search battlestations pacific, of course.

Additionally, I had also seen the brief developer interview video for Pacific over at www.g4tv.com and noticed some interesting bits of info. It seems that the skirmish mode will just be the online multiplayer modes made available for offline play - does this mean that the Skirmish mode won't have the customizability that some had wondered about?

Now, of course I am already happy as long as the Skirmish mode is definitely confirmed and that you can play it with only a single player (and hopefully with AI controlled allies if we so choose) against the AI, but there have been some legitimately good ideas for the single-player skirmish mode I've heard circulate like:
- map size scaling (ie. control how large the battle map will be),
- weather, time of day controls,
- assigning/including allied AI squads/fleets, and
- selection and customization of what type, number, armament, etc. of ships, planes, etc. to include or NOT include in the match.

I for one would be totally on board for playing a maximum sized map with just one fully armed carrier per side desperately trying to search (with seaplanes, no doubt) for and sink each others' carrier with only bombers and fighter escorts.

And - one last question right now, which so happens to be the magic one: any tentative release dates? If you watch the gametrailers' developer walkthrough, they say Pacific is slated for winter 09' - I sure hope 'winter' suggests Jan-Mar/Q1 2009 here!

[David603]

Welcome to the Battlestations forums.
As you may have noticed, there is now an official Battlestations: Pacific forum, so there is some more information (and a lot of speculation) over there.

Unfortunately, the rather draconian contracts Eidos has with its employees prevents developers from commenting on these forums, but our community manager Keir can help out in certain cases, and nearer release there should be an official "questions for the devs" thread that will again be answered by Keir.

Since the devs can't help, I'll do my best to answer your questions. Apparently, one of the points Eidos has been working on is customisability, and this does extend to scaleable maps, so you can have a big version of a map with 1 player on each side or a small version of the same map with 4 players a side, and anything in between. I don't know if this customisability will extend to being able to choose your own and the enemy fleets, but I hope so. All maps will be playable against the AI with as many or few players as you wish on the player side, so you can team up or go solo against the AI.

Release is, according to most of the game sites, supposed to be early 2009, but we don't as yet have official confirmation of this.