It’s a big one this week, so you might want to go and get something to eat while you read. Not a big meal or anything, nothing that might make you sleepy, but something to munch on, some kind of vittles (which MS Word says isn’t a real word but it totally is).

You know what’s really good? A couple of scotch finger biscuits dunked in a jar of Nutella. But don’t try and scoop with them, only dunk, otherwise they’ll break.

The Big News

You know, I was literally lying awake at night wondering what was going to be my big lead story this week now that we finally have a week of no new game shows. Then I found a message in my email from an old friend that merely read: SYNDICATE REMAKE!!!!!!

Holy buttons, Syndicate is finally getting a remake. Okay, first we’ll tackle the ‘what the hell is Syndicate crowd?’.

You uncultured swine, how the hell can you not be familiar with Syndicate. It was a game for the PC and Amiga 500 that was doing cyberpunk and human augmentation back in 1992, a good eight years before the original Deus Ex was giving game reviewers geek boners. It was made by Peter Molyneux’s old company Bullfrog and was huge fun.

 Pyromania is always fun (in games! ONLY in games, okay?)

You ran a global corporation for which you chose the name and logo, then sent a team of up to four Agents on missions in a variety of dystopian locations from Blade Runner cities to enemy company facilities. You outfitted your agents with a range of bionic abilities and weapons and bought new gear by taxing regions you had conquered. You were also more than welcome to kill the hell out of every civilian or policeman that got in your way. Agents were controlled like a real time strategy game by clicking on locations to move to, or enemies to kill. Some target individuals needed to be ‘persuaded’ to join with the Persuadertron, a hypnotising gun, that had them follow you around. A fun tactic involved ‘persuading’ dozens of civilians who crowded around you, providing a human shield from angry police men or enemy cyborg Agents. The game had an isometric view point similar to my other favourite game of the era Xcom UFO Enemy Unknown, which is also getting a (much crappier) remake.

 Ruh roh. Is that an on rails shooter bit pictured above?

The first details of the new Syndicate out of EA by way of Starbreeze Studios, they of Riddick and The Darkness fame, have just leaked. But I can’t say I’m entirely delighted. That’s because the mission based, real time strategy layout has been swapped our for… yes, you guessed it, a, “visceral first-person shooter experience”.

 I have no idea what's happening here. The Perfect Syndicate Storm?

They got the setting right at least, a future where armed corporations have surpassed governments as the global powers. You play as an Agent for Eurocorp  with cyborg enhancements and a chip implant that lets you see through walls, slow time and access the worlds internet like datasphere (which I assume is also caused the pause menu). Ho hum.

 Either these are enemies viewed with some special vision, or you fight heavily armed sentient circulatory systems. Probably use a cholesterol gun to stop them

Below is the actual leaked information yanked from the Neogaf forums:

Syndicate is the re-imagination of a cult classic franchise from 1993 – a unique action shooter set in a not too distant future, where Business is War.

2069 — No longer governed by politicians, the developed world is divided up into regions controlled by megacorporations known as Syndicates. These Syndicates have revolutionised how the consumer interacts with the digital world. No longer does the consumer require a device to access the world¡¦s data and control their technology, they can do this at the blink of an eye via neural chip implant.

Civilians flocked to be ‘chip’  and enjoy all that their selected Syndicate has to offer; housing, medical, banking, insurance, education, entertainment and jobs. One complete package. One complete lifestyle. In return, the Syndicates gained unprecedented insights, and control, over the individual and their behaviour. With little governmental oversight, business has become war. The Syndicates will stop at nothing for ultimate market dominance. At the front line of this war are the Agents, the Syndicate’s bio-engineered and chip-augmented enforcers. They can breach anything in the wired world including their enemies, their weapons and the environment that surrounds them, making them the most efficient and deadly technological weapons in the world.

Take on the role of Miles Kilo, Eurocorp¡¦s latest prototype agent, and embark on a brutal action adventure of corruption and revenge.

• Chip Enhanced Gameplay: Slow down time, see through walls, and breach your enemy and everything digital in the world with Dart vision — A neural DART6 chip implant that allows you to interface directly with the Dataverse.

• 4-Player Online Co-op: Assemble your Syndicate for global domination. A 4-player, online co-op experience like no other, with chip enhanced gameplay and 9 missions re-imagined from the original Syndicate.

• Visceral FPS Experience: utilise an upgradable arsenal of futuristic weapons, armour and gear to annihilate your enemies and harvest their chip technology for personal advancement and sinister corporate greed.

• Sci-Fi Fiction: Immerse yourself in the world of Syndicate 2069, with a world-class sci-fi story experience, written by bestselling author Richard Morgan.

We've even got a potential box art image

First problem, okay who exactly decided out of any number, between say 50 and a 100, to set the game in 2069. Seriously, did none of the meetings involve someone putting their hand up and saying, ‘uh, given our core demographic is males aged 15 to 30, maybe we should round up to 70’.

As for the involvement of Starbreeze Studios, my feelings are similarly mixed. I have absolutely loved the pants of every Starbreeze game I’ve played so far, with The Darkness easily ranking in my top ten of all time list. But their games are always cinematic, story driven titles with a big focus on character. The original Syndicate had no character. You were playing a big faceless corporation trying to crush other big faceless corporations. If one of your cyborg Agents was killed you just kidnapped someone and made a new one. The game was about customisation, micro management and missions. It was made by the same people as Populous and Theme Park, games about management and missions, not spoon fed story.

 It looks like theyr'e fighting an off screen Iceman

The new Syndicate, assuming these leaks aren’t a massive red herring, doesn’t look like a game where you tailor your own experience. It looks like a dumbed down Deus Ex.

You know what? I really miss mission based games like Syndicate and the original Xcom. Games in which you managed a team and a base, then responded to alerts or chose missions rather than progressing on a linear plot path. The closest game I’ve played to any of those recently has been Dawn Of War’s second expansion. I love story in games, but what I love most in making my own story as part of the game.

Maybe appearances are deceiving and there’s a lot of depth here I can’t see but so far the Syndicate remake is making me a sad panda.

The MOD News

When the day comes that I impulse purchase a nice gaming PC one of the first titles I’ll be downloading for it will definitely be GTA IV. The number of mods for the game are crazy and many of them are pretty cool. Everything from adding movie cars to the game, to tweaking of the graphics, to letting you play as Superman. Amateur game designers are hard at work tinkering with GTA IV’s bits and pieces.

But this is a whole new level, witness GTA IV Vice City:

Vice City was by far the most lauded and beloved of the GTA games (San Andreas was my fave though, gangsta for life) and seeing it’s titular character walking down the street in GTA IV graphic glory is a sight to behold.

Created by a group called Team RAGE this mod will be available around Christmas.

Crysitastic (or, yes I am running out of ideas) News

Are you one of many gamers who moaned loudly and nasally about Crysis 2 giving in to the dollars and accommodating the console crowd with a crappy sequel (for the record I gave Crysis 2 high praise) that wasn’t nearly as awesome or open world as the original?

Well first, get a life. And second, good news! Crysis 1 is coming to consoles! Announced completely out of the blue on Gametrailers TV a few nights hence Crysis will be available to download from the PSN and Xbox Live marketplace sometime before the end of the year. Xbox people will be paying 1600 MS Points while PSN users will pony up the equivalent $19.95 in real money.

Disturbing News

One of the most broadly reported games news stories last week wasn’t even for a real game. Slavery The Game was a website promoting a non existent game that sent the regular media into a temporary tizzy.

The promotional website had game logos and other bits an pieces to pass it off as a real game, but the whole thing was a viral web campaign to promote a Netherlands TV series about the history of slavery.

Obviously it worked, Slavery the Game was all over the news. I imagine the rather twisted minds behind this campaign will have companies knocking down their door to provide them with a similar viral ad.

While many were quick to point out inconsistencies on the website that pointed to a hoax, it’s more than a little scary how many people were taken in that this was a real game.

Leaky News

The Minecraft makers have released, or as they’re calling it leaked, the huge 1.8 adventure update for Minecraft a few days early. I’m not sure why it’s called a leak as the people who made it are doing the leaking with no apparent malicious intent. But they’re calling it a leak so we should humour them I guess.

You can get the leaked 1.8 updated here http://assets.minecraft.net/1_8-pre/minecraft_server.jar

Or you can wait for the ‘official release’.

Massively Sucky News

No Last Guardian at the Tokyo Game Show. So that’s a full year of no shows for what is most likely my most anticipated game. Geddemmit!

On the Playstation blog they had some spin about how Team ICO couldn’t come to the Tokyo Game Show because they’re working soooo hard, "we can assure you that Ueda-san and the rest of the development team are hard at work to bring his lofty vision to life and deliver the very best gaming experience possible."

Well nuts to that, I want my hauntingly beautiful chicken legged dog monster videos.

Awkward Sibling Relations News

Relationships between brothers in law can often be awkward and fraught with tension. When the wife and sister gets killed and it seems to be the husbands fault, and both husband and brother are super powered Hindu gods, well that makes things a lot more awkward.

In the case of Asura’s Wrath, with its Street Fighter IV art style and over the top deicide, Asura has to share the spotlight with his antagonist bro in law Yasha. Playing as different characters in a game isn’t a new concept, but playing as two characters who want to kill each other is a nice twist. Asura’s Wrath is clearly not a game concerned about anger management.

No doubt we’ll see more of this epic looking smash em up title from Capcom at the Tokyo Game Show.

Noctunis Homini News

Of course the Skyrim bar ladies are looking a lot bitable if you did choose to be a vampire

For the gothic among you, yes, Skyrim will have vampirism as did previous Elder Scrolls games, transmitted through a communicable disease. So, you know, use protection I suppose.

As with Oblivion there will be both advantages and disadvantages. At a guess increased strength and night vision are likely, and taking damage in sunlight will be par for the course, like a PROPER vampire should. Hopefully dispelling the terrible curse won’t be so gosh darn difficult as it was in Oblivion. Stupid witch woman.

I Totally Called it News

Okay, maybe I didn’t actually say as much, but I did point out that The Sims Social was the most played game launched in August leaving the exceptionally awesome Deus Ex Human Revolution in the dust.

The latest in The Sims Social news has it at the number two spot on Facebook games, which is measured in DAUs (Daily Active Users). The Sims Social has recorded 9.3 million DAUs putting it ahead of Farmville. Don’t feel too bad for Zynga though, one of their other games Cityville is still in the top spot. But Sims Social is closing in fast. What? You didn’t know about Cityville at all? That Farmville is yesterdays news? Well you sir or madam, do not speak to your mother enough, go give her a call.

Surprising News

Max Payne 3 has emerged like a butterfly from development hell and Rockstar has locked in a release date of March 2012. The game will also have a multiplayer component.

The plot follows Max to Brazil where he attempts to protect a family in Sao Paulo from bad guys, probably drug involved bad guys. Hopefully this family doesn’t check his references when it comes to protecting previous families, it’s not a skill Max would likely list as a ‘Strength’.

Financial News

Beware Issac, the accountants are coming for you

As the USA media continues to trace every dollar spent by everyone in the USA in an attempt to appropriate blame for the economy, the NY Times has a five page attack on the tax incentives received by video game companies. The article also has a strange obsession with Dead Space 2, describing the game as, ‘advancing through an apocalyptic battlefield by killing space zombies’.

Yes, don't shout, I’m aware of the fact this is a description given by someone who only watched the trailer for it (for the record David Kocieniewski, if that is your real name, Dead Space 2 is set on a space station and features alien monsters called Necromorphs). The article then drops another pearler of a comment, stating games, 'main contribution is to create amusing and sometimes antisocial entertainment."

I’m not even going to pretend to be an expert on economics, finance or the US martketplace, but I do know journalism, and this article is a terrible example of it. The content veers wildly without nailing down a specific objective. On the first page is a huge attack on video games for taking advantage of a lucrative rainbow of tax breaks across the entertainment, software and technology industries, which the games industry advantageously ‘straddles’. Even citing (without referencing) a throw away query by the oil industry as to why the games industry gets more perks than they do.

The second page of the article however, admits that the major tax break games companies like EA enjoys is a deduction related to the stock gains on options exercised by its executives (translation from rich people talk: They don't have to pay taxes on money they make with their own stock... I think), which every listed company in the US can enjoy. It goes on to say that losing these tax incentives would see games industry jobs lost to Canada, which has even better tax incentives for games companies than the US. The following pages reiterate that games companies get lots of free money and you should be mad about this.

Given how often we hear about games developers and publishers closing down and sacking staff over the last five years I have a hard time to imagine them as the secret winners of the US recession, kicking orphan chimney sweeps and lighting cigars with hundred dollar bills. And the article does a poor job convincing me otherwise.

But if you have an interest take a read yourself http://www.nytimes.com/2011/09/11/technology/rich-tax-breaks-bolster-video-game-makers.html?_r=1

Law and Order News

Xbox has announced they’ve issued console bans to players for theft of games from the online Xbox marketplace. I didn’t even know it was possible to exploit the Xbox Live marketplace to steal content so this is surprising news to me.

I’d be curious as to whether or not someone has bought a second hand console only to discover the console itself has been forcibly blocked from the Xbox Live network. A console ban also seems like a light slap on the wrist for theft. The culprits can still play games offline merrily. I suppose it’s reassuring that MS is taking action against this sort of thing, now if they could just start console banning repeat team killers in Halo Reach.

And if you're still awake, that's it for another week. Thanks for reading!