Wondering what ever happened to Microsoft's original plan for Live Anywhere? For some, it's been taking the company a while to fully finish the integration of the service across many platforms. Xbox Live Executive John Schappert said that the service is till going to push through. Know more after the jump!

Although not especially high in Epic Games' priority list, interconnected multiplayer sessions between PC mouse-twitchers and PlayStation 3 analog-fumblers may be more than a probability now. Next Generation has reported that IGN's GameSpy has just signed a licensing agreement with Epic Games.

 

As a result, GameSpy's online multiplayer technology will now be incorporated into Unreal Engine 3, permitting the connectivity of PC (and therefore, also Mac) gaming's online infrastructure with that of the PlayStation 3's open network infrastructure. Along with the interconnectivity features, additional online helper applications, which include communication, statistical, and competition tools, will follow.

But more importantly, the licensing of GameSpy tech will now allow all other UE3 licensees to cross the Mac-PC-PlayStation 3 gap. That's a list that includes Codemasters' Turning Point: Fall of Liberty and Ubisoft's Brothers in Arms: Hell's Highway.

GameSpy now joins a slew of other companies in Epic Games' Integrated Partners Program, while offering the quick solution to Epic Games' Unreal Engine 3 networking capabilities. Director Todd Northcutt of GameSpy Technologies told Next Generation that Epic decided not to develop the engine's networking technology and searched for a third-party solution instead.

And yet the interconnectivity scenario continues to broaden. Despite the fact that Midway's Unreal Tournament III (Mac, PlayStation 3, Windows PC on DVD, Xbox 360) will not be supporting Microsoft's Live Anywhere initiative, GameSpy added that it would offer its own solution to bridge the Xbox 360, PC, Mac, and PlayStation 3 gap.

"We're huge believers in cross-platform play. It's something gamers would love to see, to be able to play with one unified community no matter what platform they're on. We certainly have the technology to make that happen," said Northcutt.

Now the only hurdle left is whether Sony and Microsoft would even agree to such a move.

This could probably be old news to cult followers behind Unreal Tournament since it released back in 1998 (Game of the Year by 1999). But just in case there are still people hoping for console first-person shooters to tag along with seamless online Unreal Tournament III (Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, PC, Mac) play on PC, we thought this might interest you.

 

Lurking around the official Unreal Tournament III forums, we've found that Mark Rein himself stated that they will be looking into what the PlayStation 3's open-network technology and the PC's already-established networking capabilities could add up to:

We have not decided about cross platform play between PC and PS3. We're not 100% sure that users want that feature but if we get time we'll play around with it and see how it works. In the mean time we plan to be able to serve the PS3 from PC servers so that should help us gets lots of great servers going.

Unreal Tournament Classic, UTGOTYE, UT2003 and UT2004 have all been hosted upon various dedicated servers around the world, and thanks to the Sony's open-network infrastructure for the PlayStation 3, fans on the console won't run out of servers to join online. 24/7 coverage, while amazing, may not even cover half of the Sony camp's excitement over this development.

The question of whether these servers will be viewable on PC gamers' server lists is still left unanswered, while concern for accidentally joining a match for PlayStation 3 players still looms over the horizon. If Epic does pull through with PS3-PC play, such a case would no longer be an issue. They might have to resort to control balancing issues instead, which will likely spark from the PS3's control handicap - a viable aimbot that's considered cheating to professional UT players.

From here on end, however, things look bleak for the Xbox 360, as Epic Games reiterated that Unreal Tournament III will not utilize Games for Windows LIVE for obvious reasons and critical repercussions that could stem from the loyal PC gaming community.

If Microsoft and FASA Studios' Shadowrun was any indication of cross-platform play between PC and Microsoft's next-gen console, things may not be 'going anywhere' for the Live Anywhere initiative - at least in the PC gamers' perspective.

For sure. When Microsoft seemed bent to advocate Live Anywhere to game developers in order to connect console thumb-flippers to PC twitchers on what might have been the modern gamer's World War I, they probably didn't expect to be stopped dead cold by Infinity Ward's two-lettered dumb-founder: "No." Activision's Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare ain't going Live, says Infinity, and that's that.

 

But Infinity Ward's Grant Collier did reveal in an interview with IGN that CoD4 (for the PC, Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3) was not going to be a sandbox destructive game. Instead, they've put more focus on producing better frame rates on the game than creating a world that's "totally destructible."

And according to Collier, full destructibility is just another fad in the shooting genre that could end sooner than later. While everyone is else is requesting for such a feature, Infinity Ward doesn't feel that it delivers fun in any of the games that are being designed with that concept in mind, like EA's Battlefield Bad Company. He added:

I think it's a buzzword, it's a badge, it's a bullet-point option, but a lot of games they get in there and they try to do that and then they're like 'okay we have the sandbox, now why don't we try to make the game fun'. And total destructibility, you can really ruin the gameplay. ... So I think right now it's a fad, and the fad will pass, we're not going to be bite on in it - we want the game to be fun first, and destructibility comes second.

Oh and Price is coming back. Again. Revived for the modern era, the lovable Brit is going to get new shoes to fill, with arch-nemesis Zakhaev. Collier said that a foiled assassination attempt has your paths cross with Zakhaev and Price and much of their history gets revealed through flashbacks set in Ukraine.

And even though facts have been tossed around that Call of Duty 4 was set in present-day Iraq, it actually revolves around conflict touching the four corners of the modern world. And enemies aren't under-equipped, cowardly Guerrilla types; they've got the technology and the tactics to take you and your band of brothers (circa 2007) out.

Roughly a month ago, we reported that Halo 2 Vista was going to be sporting a new achievement system to appease the cravings of the more Gamerscore-conscious players among us. As an update to that teaser, we're reporting that we've picked up a comprehensive list of the said achievements possible in-game.

The achievements list will detail tasks you need to do in both multiplayer and single-player mode, and should give you guys something to plan ahead for before the game launches this mid-2007 for Windows Vista. Forewarned is fore-armed, all the more when you start competing on Live Anywhere. Read on for the list below.

• Cairo Station (30 GS) - Complete Cairo Station at Normal, Heroic, or Legendary
• Outskirts (30 GS) - Complete Outskirts at Normal, Heroic, or Legendary
• Metropolis (30 GS) - Complete Metropolis at Normal, Heroic, or Legendary
• The Arbiter (30 GS) - Complete The Arbiter at Normal, Heroic, or Legendary
• Oracle (30 GS) - Complete The Oracle at Normal, Heroic, or Legendary
• Delta Halo (30 GS) - Complete Delta Halo at Normal, Heroic, or Legendary
• Regret (30 GS) - Complete Regret at Normal, Heroic, or Legendary
• Sacred Icon (30 GS) - Complete Sacred Icon at Normal, Heroic, or Legendary
• Quarantine Zone (30 GS) - Complete Quarantine Zone at Normal, Heroic, or Legendary
• Gravemind (30 GS) - Complete Gravemind at Normal, Heroic, or Legendary
• Uprising (30 GS) - Complete Uprising at Normal, Heroic, or Legendary
• High Charity (30 GS) - Complete High Charity at Normal, Heroic, or Legendary
• The Great Journey (30 GS) - Complete The Great Journey at Normal, Heroic, or Legendary
• Warrior (100 GS) - Complete the game on Normal difficulty
• Hero (50 GS) - Complete the game on Heroic difficulty
• Legend (50 GS) - Complete the game on Legendary difficulty
• King of the Scarab (20 GS) - Acquire the Scarab gun on the Metropolis level, any difficulty
• Silent but Deadly (20 GS) - Kill 7 opponents from behind in a row without being spotted, any level, any difficulty

The complete Halo 2 achievement list is available at the Full Article.

After knowing more about Left 4 Dead from Valve's project manager Eric Johnson and marketing manager Doug Lombardi, we now focus our attention to Turtle Rock Studios' founder Michael Booth and his opinions about their game bound to hit the Xbox 360 and PC.

FiringSquad was able to secure a chit-chat with Mr. Booth and various topics were raised, including main human characters and how different they are in terms of gameplay. To that, he said:

In Left 4 Dead, players may assume the role of any of the four Survivors or one of four "Boss Infected." Our AI technology allows games of 1 to 8 players - bots will assume the remaining Survivor and Boss Infected roles when human players are not available. The four Survivors have the same abilities and weapons available to them at the beginning of each campaign. However, it's the weapons you find and the tactical choices you make that define your role on the Survivor team.

He also mentioned the types of zombies in the game. There are the mobs of AI-controlled zombies (or as Booth calls them, "infected"), then there are five "Boss Infected" (the higher, more powerful zombies) - Witch, Boomer, Hunter, Smoker, Tank.

All of them, with the exception of the Witch could be played by human players. When asked about the main goals in each round of the game, he said:

Similar to Counter-Strike, the goal of the environments and objectives are designed to present immediately recognizable situations that also allow for unique combat, even when played multiple times. In this case, each of the four campaigns included in the first release are of the "Escape and Survive" variety for the Survivor team. However, each mission is set in different geographic places which naturally lend themselves to varied play styles and challenges.

Since the game is coming out on the Xbox 360 and PC, questions about Live Anywhere are inevitable. Unfortunately, Michael didn't want to talk too much about it as he mentioned that they haven't yet revealed any details regarding the 360 version just yet. Please stay tuned for more".

Stay tuned we will. Check out the word-per-word account of the interview by clicking on our read link below.

 

The advantage for Games for Windows Live, according to Xbox Live product manager Aaron Greenberg in an inty with Next Generation, is that most of its audience is already built in: Xbox Live. As revealed earlier, Xbox Live Gold accounts are essentially GFW Live Gold accounts. Aaron was able to reveal more details on the GFWL Gold/Silver differences that differ from XBL Gold/Silver differences:

• GFWL Gold is the one with cross-platform (360-PC) gaming, plus TrueSkill matching;
• GFWL Silver, obviously for free, has single-player achievements, text and voice chat, and free PC-to-PC online multiplayer gaming
• Next-Gen compares this to XBL Silver which "doesn't allow for multiplayer online gaming"
• Greenberg says that Microsoft included free PC-to-PC multiplayer as the incentive to draw PC players to Live - so that they "wouldn't have to make sacrifices to participate in this community." Then again, Greenberg also notes: "it's something that they're used to today on the PC" - so it only made perfect sense for MS to keep it free in GFW Live Silver.

And like Xbox Live, Greenberg notes that Microsoft will provide all the necessary Live "plumbing" to third-party PC developers to integrate Live into their games. Some ambitious PC-to-360 Live partnerships Microsoft theorizes (or proposes?) include hybrid strategy-action games, with PC owners playing the tactician generals and console players playing the part of frontline shooters. Think a PC Command & Conquer vet "advising" a Gears of War vet where the eff' he ought to be fraggin'.

And as for Cell Phone Live that puts the Anywhere in Live Anywhere? Greenberg only says: Stay tuned. Don't you mean: wait for the call to come in?

 

In a press con during GDC 2007, attended by GameInformer, Microsoft revealed the pricing scheme used for the Live for Windows Vista (or Windows Live, or Live Anywhere...) service. No surprise, it is the exact same pricing scheme used in Xbox Live, because Live for Windows Vista uses the same Gamertag and membership database as Xbox Live.

When they said Live Anywhere, they meant it.

The Silver Live package will be free, and the Gold package will retail for US$ 49.99 for one-year subscriptions, US$ 7.99 for one month, and US$ 19.99 for three months. And if you already have a Gold or Silver subscription on the 360, don't bother - except maybe to remember your membership details when booting up Windows Vista and logging on to Live from there.

Well, it worked on Xbox, right?

 

The Live Anywhere service (or is it called Live for Windows, now?) which was first unveiled at the E3 2006 aims to extend the Xbox Live service to multiple platforms so as players could move easily from one gaming environment to another while using a single player identity. It would also let PC gamers check out and access their Xbox 360 Gamertag. At the CES 2007, it once again made waves during its demonstrations. Now, what's up with Live Anywhere?

IGN reports that during a Games for Windows event at San Francisco, Live Anywhere was seen running with Uno and Shadowrun. Aside from this demo, no release date has been set and it is speculated that it will ship within the next few months along with the said games and Halo 2. Apparently, the files of Live Anywhere is pegged at around 5MB and will be shipping on the actual game discs.

It will only function while a supported app is open. Logging in will require you to enter your Windows ID and after that, you'll be able to see your friends list, send text and voice messages, game invites, file player reviews among many other things. A Home button brings up a guide blade which will allow access to all the functionality. Its first release would likely include the ability to update an application simultaneously on the X360 and PC so as both platforms are prevented from operating with different versions of the game.

Future Live anywhere updates may be rolled out simultaneously with Xbox Live updates while access to Gamertags on a PC outside of an application is still being worked on. Pretty much, they're gearing for an IM kind of atmosphere.

We'll dish out more updates as more info come our way.

We earlier reported the gaming lineup that will be following Windows Vista's release. And much to everybody's joy, Halo 2 will be joining the big move. Then comes the next question: How will the game look? Microsoft has apparently pre-empted this notion; they released a couple of gameplay videos demonstrating Halo 2's gameplay on Windows Vista.

From what we can tell, the game looks good. The graphics appear to be as smooth as they were in their original Xbox form, with no lag time detected in the demo's ensuing frag-fests. Given how many of us already own an Xbox, an Xbox 360 or a PC, we look forward to seeing how gamers will handle the cross-over, be it by controlleror keyboard. For now, we bring you the scenic fields of "Beaver Creek," and "Sanctuary."

The other vid awaits after the jump!