Your girlfriend just got some competition. In this Windows Virtual Reality Game build and compete against Virtual Women with full artificial intelligence, choose ethnic type, personality, location, clothing etc. Throw away solitaire forever! Features 3-D graphics, Sound and Digital DNA support. Must try to believe.

As this is a beta test, some features are restricted or currently unavailable. They will be added shortly. Special Features: Artificial Intelligence Engine, Synthesized voice for opponents, support for Digital DNA files, Intelligence updates via the web, powerful customization options. Testing the parameters for a unique virtual human file format (Digital DNA) that will allow these files to be customized and traded over the web via file trading services.

Just spotted this bit of news at Planet Halflife.

A fan by the name of Kamakiri mailed Valve's Gabe Newell about those "pay to play" rumors, and received the following response (which has been confirmed as being legit):

Take-Two Interactive today posted their financial results for the third quarter 2003! the most interesting bit about their financial results is:

Future Publishing Highlights

Gamer's Hell reports that in an unexpected move Cidiverte, italian publisher for Chrome, Techland upcoming action/FPS title, released a playable demo. The demo is completely in english, including speech and features tutorial as well as single player missions.

DiscGamer.com recently put Strategy First's latest RTS (Real time strategy) Nexagon: Deathmatch through it's paces and wrote up their thoughts on it.

"When I first saw the previews of this game, I thought "Oh! That could be cool! What they?re going to need to make this game unique from the other real-time strategy games are some great graphics, unique view perspectives and really cool weapons and gameplay that doesn?t get boring quickly." Does that sound like a tall order to fill? Well, with so many Warcraft-like games out there with no end in sight, a publisher would have to come out a pretty unique game to catch new audiences and gamers who are tired of 'the same-?ole thing.'"

A playable demo of Midnight Outlaw: Illegal Street Drag Nitro Edition is now available, offering the opportunity to try out the recent enhanced version of last year's street racing simulation by Canopy Games and ValuSoft. This trial version allows you to play for up to a generous 60 minutes, but also includes all content of the full game that you can activate after purchasing a license key online.

NVnews have thrown up a quite interesting article on the gameplay performance of Call of Duty! Here's a rip.

World War II games are a plague, but it's been very hard to find one with a good exhaustive gameplay. MOH:AA was an exception, but this title has been played in and out for quite some time now. What about Battlefield 1942 and Return To Castle Wolfenstein: Enemy Territory? Although both games exhibit WWII events, they do not necessarily maintain the atmosphere of those happenings.

Here's a few mods that have been updated for BF1942!

BF1942 HydroRacers v1.0c Patch BF1942 Pirates v0.21 BF1942 Interstate 82 A1.1 BF1942 Siege v0.24 BF1942 Linux Server new beta 2 of the version 1.45

Just spotted this bit of news at Gamer's Hell.

Thanks to Blue's for noticing that a tech video (so called "machinima" - engine rendered movie sequence) of Epic's Unreal engine is now available on NZone. The movie runs for 8:10 minutes and was displayed this year at the GDC.

Just spotted this bit of news at City 17! Scroll down their page if you?re interested in taking a peek at the Half-Life 2 Preview Boxes.

We found this photo from a German Games store clearly with Half-Life 2 preview boxes on display. That's one more piece of evidence in the case for a 30th September release..

GamesFusion have snagged three UT2004 gameplay videos taken at ECTS 2003!

Video #1 - Video #2 - Video #3

Unreal Ops has released a video of the UT2004 Battle Tank.

Gamers Hell have posted some Shacky-Cam movies from this year's Gaming Convention 2003 in Leipzig and have also snagged some movies from ECTS 2003 in London:

The Sims 2 GC ShackyCam Movie SmackDown GC ShackyCam Movie CS Condition Zero GC ShackyCam Movie UFO Aftermath ECTS 2003 Trailer Good and Evil ECTS 2003 Movie Shade ECTS 2003 Trailer ECTS 2003 Trailer: Korea Forgotten Conflict Need for Speed Underground ECTS 2003 Trailer

Monolith Productions and Buena Vista Games have issued a new "launch" patch for TRON 2.0, This release upgrades the game to version 1.02, and adds dedicated server code, enables online compatibility between all language versions, adds the option to skip light cycle races in the single-player game, and improves graphics and multiplayer performance.

Activision has now released the eagerly anticipated playable demo for Call of Duty, allowing you to experience this squad-based World War II first-person shooter in the works at Infinity Ward. This is a single-player demo, containing the Burnville mission.

Digital Illusions has now released new client patches for Battlefield 1942, bringing their 3D multiplayer action game to version 1.45.18. This release adds compatibility with the imminent Secret Weapons of WWII expansion pack, introduces 3 new AIR controls, makes a couple of other enhancements, and fixes a handful of bugs.

Gamers Hell have posted some Shacky-Cam movies from this year's Gaming Convention 2003 in Leipzig and I've added some more movies that might be of interest.

Far Cry GC 2003 Shacky-Cam Age of Mythology - The Titans GC 2003 Shacky-Cam Gothic 2 Addon GC 2003 Shacky-Cam LOTR - The Return of the King - GC 2003 Shacky-Cam XIII GC 2003 Shacky-Cam Singles GC 2003 Shacky-Cam Rogue Squadron 3 Trailer #2 Half-Life 2 Tech Videos

BluesNews reports that Activision sends along news that the Call of Duty demo at the center of last night's firestorm , will be released this evening all across the internet, with no exclusivity. Here's the deal:

Strategy First have now released their single-player demo of Etherlords II, allowing you try out this turn-based 3D fantasy role-playing strategy game being crafted at Nival Interactive. The demo offers a Combat Tutorial and two missions from the full game.

Gamers Hell have posted some Shacky-Cam movies from this year's Gaming Convention 2003 in Leipzig and have also snagged some movies from ECTS 2003 in London:

Halo GC 2003 Shacky-Cam Movie Chrome GC 2003 Shacky-Cam Movie STALKER ECTS 2003 Movie Metal Gear Solid 3 ECTS 2003 Movie Perimeter ECTS 2003 Movie

Thanks to Philibob for the info ... The first video shows model animation using XSI and the second video shows a way of using normal maps to reduce polygons but still giving a realistic 3D effect.