The oft-delayed Crysis 1.1 patch is finally available, according to GameBump. Despite the surprisingly hefty 139 MB file size, the patch doesn’t really do a whole heck of a lot. Besides the performance tweaks and bug fixes typical for initial post-release patching, Crytek also snuck in a few balances changes that are easily summarized as “ROCKETS AM NERFED!!!11113″

Seriously, 139 MB for a handful of bug fixes and UI updates? I realize broadband Internet is thankfully pervasive at this point, but what kind of crazy future tech is Crytek dealing with? Tuesday’s World of Warcraft patch, which accomplishes about as much as Crysis’ 1.1 patch, clocked in at just over 5 MB. Clearly, either Crytek is doing something very, very wrong or, judging by the unprecedented technical achievement present in the ugliest Crysis screenshot, they’re simply working on another level entirely. Frankly, my money’s on the latter option. Maybe in a few years when the rest of the PC market has caught up with CryENGINE2, we’ll finally understand all this crazy voodoo.

Those eager to download the patch can find a lengthy list of mirrors at inCrysis.

Hit the jump for full patch notes in all their copy-pasted glory.

More …

Certainly not an everyday happening, loads of World of Warcraft players banded together to march in support of their favorite political candidate. Ron Paul has a strong internet following, and this is the latest stunt pulled by his followers to draw attention to his policies.

As expected, many players taunted or even /spit on the marchers according to the excellent coverage by Gamepolitics.com. The march may have went smoothly, though the actual effect seems rather useless. Would you change your thoughts on a political candidate because people playing a MMO banded together in support of him? Should Blizzard even allow this given the influx of users suddenly causing lag for those just trying to play the game?

If anything, those players not marching seemed to be annoyed if message board postings and comments are any indications. In something like Second Life, these things are expected, but in World of Warcraft, they feel out of place. It’s perfectly reasonable for someone to speak their mind when they want, but if it begins to cause problems for others or disturb them, it needs to stop. The message is lost in the controversy.

Chris Taylor has always been on the cutting edge of RTS design, having birthed both Total Annihilation and the recent Supreme Commander. Gas Powered Games’ newest title, however, promises action on a significantly smaller scale. 1up has the scoop on Demigod, a DotA-inspired online PC game that puts players in control of a single powerful unit, requiring you to play nice with allies in order to raze the opponents’ base.

If you’ve somehow managed to avoid the largest user-created gaming phenomenon since Counter-Strike, DotA is short for Defense of the Ancients, and is a wildly popular Warcraft 3 map. So popular, in fact, that it’s virtually impossible to play any other type of non-ranked Warcraft 3 game over Battle.net. If DotA’s continued success is any indication, it looks like Gas Powered Games has another hit on their hands. The uninitiated should check out the map’s official site and welcome their new gaming addiction with open arms.

No word yet on when Demigod will get its very own Swedish techno hit.

Regardless of how you feel about the game itself, World of Warcraft’s strength as a movie making tool is undeniable, having elevated the medium to heights never imagined in the days of The Marathon Vidmaster Challenge. Our own love for WoW machinima is already well documented. After nearly two years in production, the second episode of the Illegal Danish series is finally available, and while it is only twenty minutes long, it was certainly worth the wait.

Like the rest of Myndflame’s excellent library of WoW machinima, Illegal Danish 2: Escape from Orgrimmar is funny, slickly edited, and features a wealth of impressive special effects. It’s hard to say what’s more impressive: the movie’s hilarious dialogue or the gorgeous visuals. Any movie that leaves us too tongue tied to say anything snarky is worthwhile fare indeed.

As terrorist and counter-terrorist activities continue to dominate the news, and as game developers continue to exploit current events as the basis for new games, more and more players are turning to the original to live their escapist fantasies. According to Online Gaming Zeitgeist, Counter-Strike is still the most-played first-person shooter on the PC and is now actually more popular than at any point in the previous three years. Its technological update, Counter-Strike: Source, is also wildly popular, second only to the original. Battlefield 2 comes in an extremely distant third.

Of course, this stands in direct contradiction to Nielson’s numbers, which places the PC versions of Halo and Halo 2 well above the big little Half-Life mod. According to Nielson, 0.19% of PC gamers are playing Halo 2 in the average minute, while just 0.10% of them are playing Counter-Strike. Clearly, someone’s data is incorrect.

Though Nielson may have ratings gathering experience from years of television work, they’ve only been covering video games for a short time – less than a year, in fact. Online Gaming Zeitgeist, on the other hand, has been watching you play games for three years now. I know many people that still play Counter-Strike online on their PCs, and not a single person that even owns the Vista-exclusive version of Halo 2. In this case, I’ll believe OGZ until I have reason not to.

The FPS has always been seen as the poster child of PC gaming. Innovative titles that pushed game design and game hardware to their limits established the first-person shooter as the go-to genre for the hardcore PC gamer. Wolfenstein 3D and Doom established the rules of the genre; Duke Nukem 3D pushed them to their limits; Quake popularized polygons, capture the flag, and mods; and Half-Life set the standard for in-game storytelling. The first-person shooter has long since tried to make a go of it on consoles with varying degrees of success. Golden Eye and Perfect Dark were both perfectly playable in their time, but have aged terribly. Halo, of course, set the stage for a console FPS revolution, and in 2007, six years after Halo’s original release, plenty of fantastic first-person shooters took the consoles by storm: Halo 3, The Orange Box, Call of Duty 4, and Bioshock, to name some of the best.

Sales for all four of the aforementioned games have been huge, with Halo 3 in particular setting sales records. Though, not just first-person shooters or similarly hardcore genres have been prospering; the entire console market has surged compared to previous years and the Wii continues to dominate beyond everyone’s expectations, including Nintendo’s. To combat the continued supply strain and unprecedented demand, Nintendo has even gone so far as to partner with GameStop and offer rain checks – essentially hardware pre-orders in the middle of a console cycle. And yet, as the consoles flourish, some of PC gaming’s most anticipated titles flop. Unreal Tournament 3 and Crysis have both failed to sell more than 100,000 copies.

So, are the analysts, critics, and loudmouthed message board posters right? Is PC gaming finally dying? Hit the jump to find out.

More …

Tales of the Past III is the 90-minute World of Warcraft machinima that’s been making the Internet rounds lately. The action-packed movie follows a host of well-known Warcraft characters, including Thrall and Jaina Proudmoore, as Alliance and Horde are forced to join together to face an impossible threat. You can download the movie from Warcraftmovies.com, but if you’re allergic to the 2.3 GB filesize, they also have a streaming version available.

Tales of the Past III is obviously a labor of love for writer/director Martin Finch. The film is incredibly impressive, using a combination of skilled editing techniques and clever use of WoW as a movie making tool to produce a slick, high quality movie that goes reel-to-reel with most summer blockbusters. Clearly, the machina bar has been raised.

Evil Avatar has a great new feature up detailing some of the multiplayer features in the upcoming Turok. It sounds like they came away impressed, and that Turok is on track to be the best game in the franchise yet (which, admittedly, wouldn’t take much). They praise the control, comparing it to Halo, which is a high complement indeed, as well as the assortment of over-the-top weaponry, including a pulse rifle that doubles as a grenade launcher and an oversized bowie knife that’s perfect for eviscerating the competition.

Most interesting is the news that multiplayer matches will include AI-controlled dinosaurs in addition to the players themselves, which should help keep things interesting long after the game launches in early 2008. Personally, I have the highest of possible hopes for this game, as I’ve always been a secret fan of the Turok franchise, having slogged through most of its terrible installments. Thanks for nothing, Acclaim. This new Turok title will be hitting the PC and next generation consoles shortly and baring any complete and total disasters, should be worth checking out.

The sequel syndrome continues. Personally, I am getting bored with the same games adding a few more features. Yet, as far as game developing companies are concerned, this is what keeps their profits up. It has been confirmed that Guitar Hero 4, Call of Duty 5, and the 11th Tony Hawk are all in the works.

Obviously, these title games are not anywhere close to their release date, since each game has recently released its predecessor. By the time they come out, these games should have more advanced graphics and other bonus features. Unfortunately, the concepts of the games are surely going to be the very similar. Like the movie industry, original thoughts are lacking. The difference is that a sequel in a video game goes over much better than a movie. However, when is enough, enough?

A year or so from now, I can bet that I will be buying these games and checking them out. The newer technology will cause me to lose interest in the old games for the better quality. Yet, the new games that I will favor are the ones with new ideas. Originality and uniqueness will be first on my list. So, I would like to just send a message to the gaming designers to please give us something different for a change. If you need ideas, I do offer my services as an advisor, and I am sure about 95% of all other gamers would say the same.

Only one shopping week until Christmas! And oh, what a forgettable week it is.

Pick of the Week: Rock Band Fear not, last gen supporters, the PS2 continues to soldier on with a downsized port of Harmonix’s excellent music game. While the PS2 version doesn’t support downloadable content (obviously) or online multiplayer (unfortunately), up to four friends can still rock out locally and live out their dreams of rock n’ roll super stardom vicariously through plastic instruments.

Runner-Up: Warhammer 40,000: Squad Command Already available for the PSP, this pint-sized RTS is opening up a second front on the Nintendo DS. The game makes great use of the DS’ touch screen as well as its WiFi capabilities, with local and online multiplayer modes. After Dawn of War and its two excellent expansions, it looks like the terrible Warhammer 40k video game curse may finally be lifted. Praise the Emperor!

Digital Battle is reporting that Valve has finally released its patented Ridiculously In-Depth Statistics for Team Fortress 2.

While most of the statistics offer few surprises (the sniper rifle is the weapon used at the greatest average distance?!), there are a few interesting nuggets of information here, such as the revelation that the scout is actually the most played class, beating out the engineer and soldier. Valve also has heat maps detailing the locations in which most players die. Our advice: Just don’t go outside on 2Fort; you’ll live longer.

After you’ve exhausted the Team Fortress 2 stats, be sure to check out the Episode 2 statistics while you’re at it.

Fury, the PvP MMO that already tried to coax potential subscribers by offering free, week-long trials, will be going completely free to play as of December 14. Free “Chosen” accounts will gain gold and essence more slowly than those with paid “Hero” accounts, but will still have access to all weapons, abilities, and game types. Auran, the Australian developer behind Fury, hopes the game will find a strong audience in China, but regardless, the failed MMO has cost the company a great deal of money. In fact, Auran announced that most of its employees would be losing their jobs as a direct result of Fury’s failure.

With Fury’s strict focus on player versus player combat, however, the game’s troubles should come as little surprise. While a purity of focus is unquestionably a good thing, sometimes a game’s focus is so narrow, it’s premise so simple, that there simply isn’t enough there to keep people entertained. In Fury’s case, it’s hard to imagine people being interested in paying a monthly fee for something that amounts to little more than a single component of other MMOs. World of Warcraft, the genre’s heavy hitter, for example, sports of wealth of soloable and group PvE content in addition to crafting and PvP. Some titles are too niche for their own good, and it’s sad to see a developer suffer so greatly for their missteps.