Life just doesn’t get better than chainsawing and curbstomping (or getting ‘em done unto you) hapless virtual characters in Gears of War. PC owners, who will experience all of this come November 6th, now have a list of achievements to go with all their fun as well. With less than a month to go, Xbox360Achievements.org have gotten their hands on the PC Achievements for the game and, disappointingly, it looks like nothing’s changed, at least from the perspective of an Xbox 360 player looking forward to the Brumak fight. It looks like they removed 10 GS awarded to the “A Series of Tubes” achievement to make space for the new Secret Achievement, which is probably related to defeating the Brumak and the new Act, but that’s pretty much all there is. We’re still not sure if the Annex mode and the Hidden Fronts map pack will be made available for the PC as well, since the 250 GS for those achievements seem to be missing from the PC version, even though the promos say that the game will include three new multiplayer maps and a new multiplayer game type. Either which way, everyone but the achievement whores shouldn’t have a problem with this, I guess.

Think Evil. Breed Evil. Control All. Thats what the game’s tag line says and you’re all fired up to unleash all your rage caused from years of virginity upon anything that laughs at you. But you’re let down. Why? Read on, and I’ll explain in this very quick take on Overlord.

Overlord is an RPG that allows you to be truly and genuinely evil and piss off the world to no end. The objective here is to strike fear into the hearts of your enemies and make them tremble at your very name. The more people you successfully manage to impress with your evil-ness, the more powerful you become! To do this, in addition to your broke-ass weapon, you’re also given some cool magic spells and most importantly minions to do your bidding. Think of the minions as the Gremlins meets the small wise-ass, smack-talking Grunt dudes from Halo.

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“Mr. Frodo! Look! It’s an oliphant!” Well, no, not exactly. But we have elephants! After not having the awesome mammoth creatures to squish, gore and destroy enemies in Ensemble’s Age of Empires franchise for a long time now, the upcoming expansion to the third AoE game, The Asian Dynasties, is all set to bring the mighty elephants back in the Indian campaign. Being an Indian myself, I can’t put into words how awesome it is to see my 8th grade history lesson come alive on my PC and how, years after that forced-labor camp called school (I kid, I kid..) I am learning more history through a PC game made in the United States… hmmm.

With a new bunch of hi-def videos touching upon the Japanese and Indian civilizations in the game, Big Huge Games’ CEO Brian Reynolds talked about how players would get six different elephant units, two camel units and a number of other special units like the Gurkha, the double-sword wielding Rajput, the Mansabdars and the Sepoy musketeer to take the fight against the East India Company in India’s first struggle for independence. Talking about the elephant units, Brian detailed the mahouts, with their powerful “splash damage” melee attack, howdahs full of archers, flail elephants that take on buildings and siege units and the all powerful siege elephants, with cannons mounted on their sides.

The interview spills a number of details about the Indian campaign, including how it’s the last of the three campaigns in the expansion, (hence seeing some of the most dramatic and challenging chapters in the game) the unique Home City cards system for India and the Indian wonders including the Taj Mahal, the Agra Fort and the Charminar Gate. Age of Empires III: The Asian Dynasties is scheduled for an Autumn 2007 release date.

The Asian Dynasties Updated Q&A - Details on India [GameSpot]
The Asian Dynasties Updated Q&A - Details on the Japanese [GameSpot]
HD Video - The Indian Civilization [GameTrailers]
HD Video - The Japanese Civilization Featurette [GameTrailers]

Looks like Microsoft is finally waking up to the fact that its Xbox 360 almost hammered the nail into PC gaming’s coffin and now they want a piece of this big pie as well. While the recently launched Games For Windows program did good, the G4W Live service blew up big time with both Halo 2 Vista and Shadowrun doing horrendously in the markets. Not to be outdone, Microsoft is stepping up to the plate with even more bats, all of them G4W Live enabled, including:

• “The Club” (SEGA)
• “Gears of War” (Microsoft Game Studios)
• “Juiced 2: Hot Import Nights” (THQ)
• “Kane & Lynch: Dead Men” (Eidos)
• “Universe at War: Earth Assault” (SEGA)
• “Viva Piñata” (Microsoft Game Studios)

In addition, the games at E3 that will bear the Games For Windows banner include:

• “Age of Empires® III: The Asian Dynasties” (Microsoft Game Studios)
• “Bee Movie™ Game” (Activison)
• “BlackSite: Area 51” (Midway Games)
• “Clive Barker’s Jericho™” (Codemasters)
• “The Club” (SEGA)
• “Company of Heroes: Opposing Fronts” (THQ)
• “Empire Earth® 3” (Sierra Entertainment)
• “Fallout® 3” (Bethesda Softworks®)
• “Flight Simulator X: Acceleration” (Microsoft Game Studios)
• “Gears of War” (Microsoft Game Studios)
• “Hour of Victory” (Midway Games)
• “John Woo Presents Stranglehold” (Midway Games)
• “Juiced 2: Hot Import Nights” (THQ)
• “Kane & Lynch: Dead Men” (Eidos)
• “Nancy Drew®: Legend of Crystal Skull” (Her Interactive Inc.)
• “Operation Flashpoint™ 2” (Codemasters)
• “Rise of the Argonauts” (Codemasters)
• “Rogue Warrior” (Bethesda Softworks)
• “SEGA Rally Revo” (SEGA)
• “Sid Meier’s Civilization IV®: Beyond the SwordTM” (2K Games)
• “Sid Meier’s Civilization IV: Gold Edition” (2K Games)
• “Spider-Man™: Friend or Foe” (Activision)
• “Star Wars® Empire at War®: Gold Pack” (LucasArts)
• “The Witcher” (Atari)
• “Thrillville™: Off the Rails™” (LucasArts)
• “Turning Point™: Fall of Liberty” (Codemasters)
• “Universe at War: Earth Assault™” (SEGA)
• “Viva Piñata” (Microsoft Game Studios)
• “Zoo Tycoon® 2: Extinct Animals” (Microsoft Game Studios)

So what if Gears and UE3.0 have G4W enabled in them? I pay for Xbox Live anyway and I get this free! I don’t have any troubles. Its my sans Xbox 360 friends I am worried about.

And the information just pours in.. Barely hours after the E3 announcement that Gears of War will be coming to the PC this September, Microsoft has gone all out to promote the game with a slew of new details. Here’s all the official information straight from the horse’s mouth. Yes, you heard right, I said DirectX 10! So you can bet your bottom that the PC version will stomp all over the Xbox 360 when it comes to visuals, and thanks to the new content, even Xbox 360 owners who were simply looking at a better looking port job with Lost Planet last month now have a reason to pick this up for their PCs as well.

Check out more features, the first PC screenshots, the PC video and the larger box shot after the jump.

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At the E3 Conference being held by Microsoft right now, MS’ Shane Kim has just confirmed that Gears of War will indeed be coming for the PC, as will the cutesy sandbox game Viva Pinata. Gears of War head honcho CliffyB is demoing the game right now and the game is said to have five new chapters for people to play with, including new boss fights. So that explains the Brumak fight in the leaked video.

On a good note though, the game will come out for the PC “this holiday season” and will feature co-op using the new Games For Windows Live service. And thankfully, this will NOT require you to upgrade to Windows Vista to play it. Whee, what fun! Finally, someone at MS realized thrusting Vista down everyone’s throat isn’t such a good idea.

Great, bring out the big guns coz we will be taking the Brumak down soon this year!

(Click the image for a larger resolution screenshot)

Age of Empires III, the latest in the AoE series from Microsoft, is all set to expand again with a second expansion pack, The Asian Dynasties, later this autumn. Developed by Microsoft Game Studios and Rise of Nations veterans Big Huge Games, The Asian Dynasties will feature a number of Asian civilizations, along with new content and revamped gameplay elements, random map styles derived from the previous AoE games as well as 15 new Asian “wonders” for players to build or destroy.

The game, like the previous expansion, The WarChiefs, will be available as a Games For Windows title for PCs running Windows XP as well as Windows Vista, and will feature all the benefits of the GFW platform, including easier installations and support for the Games Explorer and Parental Controls features on Vista. We will have more on the game as and when news comes up. For now, just enjoy the first new awesome screenshot, showing off a Chinese port village. We wonder if we will get to see an Indian civilization and the Taj Mahal wonder!