Tech Olive

In honor of QuakeCon 2010, Steam has announced that they will be offering many awesome discounts on Bethesda and Id games over the next four days. To kick off the event, Steam has slashed Oblivion GOTY and GOTY Deluxe prices by 66%. Each new deal is posted at 12:00pm EST.

And, if you don’t feel like spending the next four days waiting for the deals to go live, you can just purchase the entire QuakeCon 2010 Pack. It’s fantastic deal, but remember that you won’t be getting the special discounts as they go live.

[News Release]

Irrational Games, the studio that gave us the amazing original BioShock title, unveiled their next project today. Titled BioShock Infinite, the game continues the series’ name despite having absolutely nothing in common with the previous games in the series. Ken Levine (Creative Director) justified this concern with the following quote:

“When we completed the original BioShock, we felt we had said all we wanted to say with Rapture, but we weren’t done with the idea that is BioShock.  BioShock is so much more than a story of a single place or a single time.  We had so much more we wanted to say.”

Hit the break for a game’s reveal trailer and storyline synopsis.

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Treyarch announced today the plans for Black Ops‘ special edition release packages. The Hardened and Prestige packages (as with Modern Warfare 2) offer differing perks at two pricing levels. While this is all good and jolly, their announcement seems to only offers pictures and details of the PS3 and Xbox 360 bundles. So, unsurprisingly, it seems PC gamers are screwed out of yet another special edition release of a blockbuster game. Hit the break for bundle details and a reveal video.

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Epic Vid of the Week is a weekly series that showcases an awesome video that we or our readers discover. Some you may have seen before and others you may have not. If you’ve discovered any videos that are worthy of an Epic Vid of the Week title, let us know!

This is what happens when a group of engineers have nothing better to do…

Mafia 2‘s demo hit the internet today. Weighing in at 1GB, the demo only offers a small glimpse into the game’s feel, story and characters. It also serves as a great benchmarking tool (spoiler: it performs far better than GTA IV) and gives us some time with  the game’s fantastic shooting and cover mechanics.

So, if you want a nice taste of Mafia 2 before it releases on the 24th of this month, then head over to Steam and start downloading!

When Google and Verizon got together last week to discuss net neutrality, people went ballistic and pretty much thought the internet was going end. Yesterday afternoon, the two companies held a joint press conference call and ended up discussing the exact opposite of what people were expecting. Both Google and Verizon are supporting a plan to maintain net neutrality and they want the U.S. government to support it too. They’ve broke it down into two main goals of theirs:

1. Users should choose what content, applications, or devices they use, since openness has been central to the explosive innovation that has made the Internet a transformative medium.

2. America must continue to encourage both investment and innovation to support the underlying broadband infrastructure; it is imperative for our global competitiveness.

Google goes into much more detail on their blog, but pretty much, we’re looking at an open internet system where we, the consumers, will have all the power and the FCC has the ability to protect us from ISPs. This includes the ISPs being more truthful about their advertised speeds on different plans. I’m all for it, how bout you?

[Google Public Policy Blog]

Treyarch surprised fans today with the release of in-game Call of Duty: Black Ops multiplayer footage. As expected, the game is packed with new weapons along with plenty of features that made Modern Warfare 2 great, but improved upon (and hopefully with less hackers). Most notable of these advancements is the graphics engine, with this footage showing some impressive smoke, particle and weather effects.

One of the more interesting points is the “Theater Mode” (briefly shown at the end) that seems to offer gamers the ability to view and edit replays and save them. Hit the break to check out the footage!

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The Bargain Bin is a weekly feature that helps out gamers in the tough economy. How does it help? Once a week, it offers a great and cheap game ($10 or less) to keep you going until your next paycheck.

In a shocking continuation of the free game combo, The almighty Bargain Bin brings gamers yet another free game to help them through this most evil Monday. The best part? We’re also providing an education service of sorts. No, this isn’t some lame “edutainment” game that belongs in the classrooms. No sir! This is Privates!

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The past week’s best news and featured content…

Codemasters Debuts DiRT 3 Trailer
- It wasn’t that long ago when the second installment of the DiRT series hit store shelves and Codemasters is already showing us some details of the third game in trailer form. This past weekend, Codemasters debuted their first DiRT 3 trailer during X Games coverage on ESPN.

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Flash Game Friday is a weekly feature that provides gamers with (uh…duh) a free, browser-based flash game. You may have played it before and you may have not, but it’s always worth checking out. We’ll be bringing you the latest, time-wasting, challenging, lose-sleep-into-the-wee-hours type of flash games.

This Friday we venture into the realm of combat and tower defense with Penguins Attack 2. It’s a strategy game where you place different towers (bullet, bio, shock, flame, flak, and plasma) in a configuration that best gets rid of the attacking penguins.

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