November 2004
OXM prints Stranger advert
Issue 39 of the Official Xbox Magazine contains an advert for Oddworld: Stranger’s Wrath on pages 12 and 13. Many thanks go to REGNARTS for sending this to us.
Sources: REGNARTS
GameSpot provides Stranger goodies
Oddworld Universe found out some major updated over at GameSpot: they updated 13 hiress pieces of ArtWork and 2 new videos (introducing some new areas). They also updated a page about Stranger’s Character Profile. (Warning there may be some spoilers.)
Sources: Oddworld Universe
Spectrum 11 released
Spectrum 11 is out now! The 11th issue of Spectrum ‘The Best In Contemporary Fantastic Art’ features four images from Oddworld Stranger’s Wrath, plus some personal art by Raymond Swanland. (you can see some previews of the art inside over here.)
Oddworld Junkie scans EDGE
Esus of Oddworld Junkie posted some artwork scanned from Edge over here.
Sources: Oddworld Junkie
Charles Bloom speaks Stranger
Charles Bloom, lead programmer by Oddworld Inhabitants has some things to tell about Oddworld: Stranger’s Wrath:
Oddworld : Stranger’s Wrath is almost done. I think it’s a very good game. Not nearly as good as it could have been, not as good as Halo 2 or Half Life 2 (probably, we’ll see), and of course we’re just talking about the single player, they have great multiplayer and we have none, but still one of the better single player experiences in the last year. Our lovely friends at EA are doing almost zero marketting for us, so I thought I’d do some here—
Clearly the semi‐innovative thing about it is the 1st to 3rd person gameplay. This is the first game I know of that has a really fully functional 1st person shooter and a 3rd person platformer/melee/driving put together, and quite seamless and smooth where you can switch back & forth and it feels good and natural. You actually switch in combat to do various moves, unlike some games where you move in 3rd and snipe in 1st, etc. The 1st and 3rd are also actually different, it’s not like Heretic or Everquest or something where you can use either view, but the 3rd person is really just 1st person on a stick behind the axis of rotation.
In 1st person, the game is basically a shooter, but the weapons are a bit quirky. Many of the weapons are not basic damage weapons, they’re tools for manipulating the enemies, and you can combine them in sequences for “combos”. One of the basic combos is just to freeze a guy with bees so you can lay a thudslug or boombat on him. Another common one is to skunk a mob then drop a boombat in the middle of them. There are also lots of environmental traps that you can make use of; there’s lots of knocking guys through glass to their death, things like that.
In 3rd person, the game is like a platformer/adventure/driving/melee game. Here, you are fast, very fast, and control sort of like a car or motorcycle (actually the controls morph from standard walking at low speed to more like a car at high speed). You can ram and meelee. One move few people know is that if you jump before you ram a guy, you keep your velocity and go through him—very useful.
One of my favorite things about the game is the twist. I won’t give it away (we’ve asked all the press to keep it a secret), but part way through, there’s a big story twist. That’s pretty standard in movies and games, but there’s a difference—the play actually changes a lot as well. Unlike most games where you get a story twist, or play as the enemy, and the gameplay is basically identical, here the whole feel of the gameplay changes a lot, the pacing changes. It’s a cinematic thing, there’s a shift and suddenly the feel is different for the 3rd act building to the climax. In the beginning, you’re a bounty hunter, in the end?
Sources: Charles Bloom
New Stranger logo revealed
Worth Playing has posted 9 ‘new’ screenshots along with the new logo! (Warning, there may be some spoilers)
Sources: WorthPlaying
Movies of Oddworld bonus DVD revealed
GameSpot is very kind to us oddworld fans today, they provide us a new 2 pages preview, 7 ‘new’ screenshots and one Developer Interview with Lorne Lanning, Erik Yeo and Raymond Swanland… Thanx to Oddworld Universe and to Di$array.
Plus there is a special promotion if you preorder Stranger via EBGames: Receive a bonus DVD! The DVD consists of high quality cinematic from past and current Oddworld games!
Sources: Oddworld Universe and Di$array
Stranger’s final title registers
Some big game sites have reported the game name change and the final release date: GameSpot, IGN, TeamXbox, Voodoo Extreme, GameSpy, DailyGame, Game Asylum, TVG and EuroGamer…
EA publish Stranger game page
Alcar from Oddworld Universe points out that EA Games have finally published the Oddworld Game Page! 9 amazing new ScreenShots for you! (Warning they may contain some spoilers!)
The Oddworld Forums are back online, you can discuss this news over here!
Sources: Oddworld Universe
Oddworld Stranger’s Wrath title confirmed
Oddworld next game’s name is officially: Oddworld Stranger’s Wrath and will be released the 2005‐01‐25 according to Gamespot! The name has been confirmed by the EA info page (if you are a registred member you can also download the new box‐logo in high quality).
Sources: GameSpot
OWI at GDC ’05
Oddworld Inhabitants, Inc is going to expose at GDC 2005. Thanks to atusiya’s father for the head up.
Sources: Atusiya’s father
Lorne speaks against sequelitis
Lorne Lanning has contributed significantly to an article by The Hollywood Reporter on the overwhelming number of video game sequels and liscensed games dominating the charts.
Speaking about their new game’s break from known Oddworld, Lorne says ‘If I were to say to publishers that here’s a new Abe game, this is the new technology it’ll be running, this is why it’ll be great, they’d go for it much more quickly than if I say that you’ve never seen this character but it’s a far superior game. In that case, they’ll be far more skeptical.’
Sources: The Hollywood Reporter
New Stranger screenshots
55 new ScreenShots! Go look them, over at Xbox World. Thanks to Oddipus for the head up. Shots include some bosses, new environements, new enemies, and even a creature from the previous games don’t go look if you don’t want to see spoilers!
Sources: Oddipus
October rounded up
gamesradar.com have replicated EDGE’s recent chat with Lorne Lanning, as transcribed by Oddworld Junkie. The three‐page article is accompanied by new screenshots.
Oddworld Junkie itself has written a round‐up of October’s Oddworld news and attached a character drawing scanned from EDGE magazine.
Sources: Oddworld Junkie
No official site updates, November 2004
Oddworld.com posted a message on their homepage to tell us that there will be no big uploads this month because they are realy busy with the game. They also uploaded the Oddworld Stranger GamePage with some quotes from the press.
Sources: Oddworld.com
GameSpot interviews Lorne and Scot Bayless
GameSpot has made a very intresting interview with Oddworld magnate Lorne Lanning and EA executive producer Scot Bayless. The interview comes with 24 never seen screenshots! (WARNING: Some of them can be concidered as spoilers!)
Sources: GameSpot
EDGE transcribed
Jason (aka Esus) from Oddworld Junkie transcribed the 6 pages feature about Oddworld: Stranger from the December 2004 (№ 143) issue of EDGE. Very well done!
Sources: Oddworld Junkie