Ritualistic

The development duo known as The Colonists, makers of the award-winning Colony7 mod, have released a new single-player mod for Elite Force II with the lengthy title "A Gate, Two Birds and the Beautiful Sky" or Gate-Birds-Sky abbreviated.

Gate-Birds-Sky places you in the role of Illia Ericcson, "a former agent of Section 31, the Federation's most secret intelligence agency. Illia's final mission proves to be her most dangerous one yet, as she faces impossible opposition in Romulan space." Forum member Tempest estimates that the mission takes 4 hours to complete.

Gate-Birds-Sky is a completely open-source mod with all source files from the script to maps available. Hazard Modding has already modified some of the source files to create a small patch that fixes a few map glitches. See this forum thread for more details and download links.
 

I've been thinking for several days about how to write this post. This site has been a substantial part of my life for over 7 years and as I look back on that, it's hard for me to sum up that time in a simple blob of text. But, for the sake of everybody's sanity, and to go easy on those prone to seizures, I've decided to forego the animated gifs I had planned and do the written word thing instead. And doing it this very moment allows me to steal Stylsy's thunder one last time. Huzzah!

First, let's get it right out of the way: Yes, I'm leaving Ritualistic, as well as Ritual Entertainment. Now, if you're hoping to bust out some popcorn in anticipation of a juicy story buried in a giant pile of dirty laundry, I'm sorry to disappoint. But let me try and explain the how's and why's anyway.

Ritual went through some pretty substantial transformations in recent months, stepping away from the kind of material that intially drew me to the company. I have no doubt that the games we'll see coming out of Ritual in the future will be twisted and put a few new spins on established conventions, but I had a hard time settling into this new world order.

A couple of weeks ago, another studio contacted me and asked if I was interested to shake multiplayer things asymmetrically, and as I reflected on that opportunity and the possibilities it was going to offer me, both personally and professionally, it was just too good a fit to pass up.

So, long story short, it's not you, it's me. Or something.

As for Ritualistic, this site is coming up on its 10 year anniversary and it makes me incredibly proud to see it reach that milestone. Other fansites have come and gone, but this one's stuck around. Sure, it's had its up and downs, as did Ritual, but overall I look back on those seven years with satisfaction and enjoyment. Ritual made some cool games during my time here and the community has always been great. We've had some colorful personalities stop by the boards and I met a lot of cool people and great new friends, including the Englishman below who really doesn't know wtf when it comes to livestock.

We've also had a lot of very dedicated staff members over the years who really helped turn this place into what it is. These guys don't get anywhere near enough credit, so I want to extend a huge "Thank You" to everybody who has invested their spare time into this site. I'm passing the torch on to two of them today - LeftE and Scarcrux - and they will continue to cover all things Ritual Entertainment and abuse people in the forums by giving them ridiculous titles and randomly deleting posts.

Last, but certainly not least, I would like to thank the guys at Ritual. People like to throw "they're an incredible bunch of people" around while not really meaning it, but these guys really are incredible. Ritual was a fantastic and fun place to work at and I have nothing but fond memories. And though it's not always evident, they do read the boards very regularly to see what's going on in the community and what you guys are up to. So behave, you're being watched!@#

Anyhow, time to wrap this puppy up. Gentlemen, it's been an honor. I'll see you around.
 

One thousand and forty days ago, whilst lost in a field among some excitable looking sheep, I blackmailed badman into getting a role on this site and in return I would never reveal what he was really up to that day. Since then, I've had the good fortune to interact with the developers, community gamers and spam bots whilst covering Star Trek: Elite Force II, Counter-Strike: Condition Zero and SiN Episodes, three games I thoroughly enjoyed.

However, all good things must come to an end and as Ritual transitions into a new era with a new direction it is time for me to complete my time here at Ritualistic, but before I do I wish give the obligatory thanks to the visitors and forumers who have made it a cool place to stay for the last three years. Also, thanks go to badman, my boss and gaming nemesis I've built a great friendship with - despite still not understanding the whole sheep thing.

Keep campaigning for boobs in games, the world is better with them than without them!
 

If you haven't picked up SiN Episodes Emergence yet — you sad, sorry sack, you! — GoGamer has it on their Madness sale for a mere $3.90, not quite enough to keep Ritual from going casual, yet enough to get you to enjoy some great gaming.
 

Aeon has developed a Secrets of SiN Emergence FAQ which details all the in-game secrets, easter eggs, in-jokes and the like with a heavy amount of screenshots for you to find them in game for yourself. A lot of effort has been put it together, so be sure to check it out.

After doing so, leave some feedback for Aeon in this forum thread.
 

A heartfelt 'Happy Birthday!' goes out to our very own Andrew "Stylsy" Styles, who turns the big 2-0 today. It's all downhill from here, friend! sorry

And now let's all pile into a cake and jump out at a really inappropriate moment.
 

According to my really smart calendar, it's been three years since Valve released Counter-Strike: Condition Zero to us mere mortals, blessing us with a digital amalgam created by no less than 15 different studios. We're even told that the game did, at at some point, feature counter-terrorists on some sort of mission to stop evil - Stylsy never made it past the first level, so we're still unsure about this.

If you now feel the urge to investigate this mystery, Condition Zero is still available on Steam, both by itself and as part of several compilations. The truth, as they say, is out there, along with AWPs, 'newbs', and countless mom jokes.
 

Chriss Strahl has proved that there is even more to be played in Star Trek Elite Force II by releasing the first version of his Hazard Modding Co-Op Script, which if you know your scripting, will enable you to play any of the game's single player missions in co-operative style with a buddy.

For non-modders, this release will allow you to try out the co-op mode in one of the secret maps, so try it now by downloading it at Elite Force Files
 

Spitting in the face of the fact that the number of blogs is supposed to be going down this year, Sarkie, who also runs the League of Shadows in his spare time, has put up a weblog for his in-development SiN Episodes multiplayer mod, also known as USEMP. It'll allegedly be filled with screenshots, sample code, feature requests, and the occasional emo rant (followed by obligatory cutting), so keep your eyes on it. We will, too, of course, so expect it to be plugged every now and then.

In directly related news, Sarkie has also just added SiN's ever so delightful death messages to the mod, so that whenever somebody is gibbed, blown up, mowed down, or killed in another gratutious manner oh-so-despised by the mainstream media, the rest of the server is alerted via a potentially humorous line of text. And directly related to that, the Sarkster is looking for suggestions for these very lines of text, so if you've got suggestions, please leave them in the comments. Currently, the mod sports the Magnum, the Scattergun, the assault rifle, the chaingun, as well as a rocket launcher, so keep that in mind when thinking up new death messages. If you need (s)inspiration, check out the latest featured pic.
 

An explosion more significant than badman's brain farts is set to descend on Europe, according to MumboJumbo President Paul Jensen, who has given some casual comments to GamesIndustry.biz on the state of the Europe market.

Jensen reveals that casual games from the company are set to be localised in order to explode into European territories "in a big way". Expect to see casual games hitting formats such as the Nintendo DS and Sony PSP, and le crème de la crème (oh my god it's French), Xbox Live Arcade.

A sign of things to come for Ritual perhaps? For more, read the article.
 

GameIndustry.biz has a lengthy interview with former Ritual CEO Steve Nix and while it's mainly about his new gig as director of business development at id Software, it wraps up with two questions about Ritual - covering the acquisition by MumboJumbo, and the SiN Episodes series. Here's a slice on Ritual's newfound casualness:

So after I left, Ritual hadn't even been contemplating an acquisition by those guys. They said, "What's our best opportunity now?" It really happened very quickly after I left and I haven't really talked to those guys a lot, so they didn't really consult me on the acquisition. It helps that United Developers [MumboJumbo's parent -ed] is on the third floor of a three-story building and Ritual is on the second floor. [laughs] So it was able to work. I know for those guys, they were interested in getting off of the project to project treadmill and focus on having fun and making games. [...] There was a lot of interest in casual games even before that with the Weekend Games projects that Brian "Squirrel" Eiserloh was running, so there was a lot of interest in casual games at Ritual, so the move doesn't really surprise me.

Click here to read the rest.
 

Those of you craving more information about Sarkie's and former Ritual QA Oscar winner Michael Russell's upcoming multiplayer mod for SiN Episodes should head over to Michael's blog straight away and check out the informative FAQ posted there. Here's a snippet:

Q: What will be required?

Alphas and betas will require that a person own both "SiN Episodes" and "Half-Life 2: Deathmatch." The final release should only require "SiN Episodes" if all goes well.

Q: What will the initial release contain?

Vanilla deathmatch, the three weapons, off-hand grenades, one map.

Michael also guesstimates that we may see the alpha emerge (haha) before the end of March, though he cautions that this estimate may turn out to be "piss poor." Click here to read the rest.
 

Sarkie said not to post on this, but honestly, if I listened to him, I still wouldn't know what it's like to be part of a police line-up. Anyway, it seems the Sarkster and Ritual's former QA supermodel Michael Russell are working on a multiplayer mod for SiN Episodes: Emergence, as Michael's blog has been oozing with references to a project called USEMP. What's USEMP you ask? Well, I'll let this teaser shot of Blade t-posing his way around a multiplayer map do the talking. Those of you not suffering from mad cow may remember that a few months ago, Sarkie posted a thread in our forums saying he had gotten barebones multiplayer working in the game. Looks like the two of them have been making progress since - we'll see if we can get any more information out of them.
 

Kephren has returned to prove that resisting to post Elite Force II related news is futile, with word that he has released a feature length cut of his popular Borg War machinima movie, plus the maps and script files he used to create the project in the game.

To download the goodies, head over to this page, while I head back to sleep.
 

..well, mainly mumbo jumbo, really. Anywho, over the weekend, we had a chance to sit down with the Levelord and discuss last week's major news of MumboJumbo assimilating Ritual into its ever-growing casual collective. The interview covers how the deal actually came about, what this all means for Ritual going forward, why we should be excited, and, naturally, SiN Episodes. Here's a clip:

What kind of games can we expect from Ritual in the future? Most people associate casual games with Solitaire...

We’re starting simple, of course, and Mumbo Jumbo has a few projects that have been waiting for attention and we are also crafting our own new ideas. The casual games market is a relatively new one, and it is growing at a phenomenal rate due to its focus on the general population rather than the smaller hardcore, genre-specific gamers. We anticipate designing a wide spectrum of games across many different platforms. Like I said earlier, except to see our games on Xbox Live Arcade, the PlayStation Network, the Wii, handhelds like the Nintendo DS and the Sony PSP, and, of course, the PC.

Much will depend on the market’s demand, and also our own ability to set new trends and open innovative spaces within the casual game market.

Read the full interview to find out much more about Ritual's future.