Dimebag Darrell Murdered On Stage

It is being reported that Pantera Guitarist Dimebag Darrell and another member of his band Damageplan were killed while playing on stage tonight at about 10pm in Columbus, Ohio. A third person identified as the shooter who ran up on stage and opened fire was also killed.

Here is a little more information.

Update to the story posted last night from the associated press:

The guitarists brother, Vinnie Paul Abbott, the drummer for Damageplan, was rushed to safety offstage and tearfully tried to learn his brothers fate from officers who couldnt even tell him which hospital he was taken to.

Read a lot more information here.

Be sure and read our more informative news story here

Video Games Show #34 – 2 Hour Christmas Extravaganza!

Hello all you shoppers out there. Its that time of year again when we take out the checkbooks and credit cards (and aspirin) to buy our loved ones the things they need or that we think will give them a little joy. And what brings joy to peoples lives more than anything? Video Games! Thats right, Video Games! For those of you that cant decide what game or games to get for your family or friends, you definitely dont want to miss this show. Weve got two jam packed hours of information and entertainment coming your way this week.

Our first hour starts off with all the news from the past couple weeks, and theres a lot since we didnt do a show last week. In this trip through the news headlines, youll get updated on some of the forthcoming releases for Nintendo as well as the upcoming Video Game Awards. Also in the news, well discover what some analyst say are the most violent games out there. Weve also got a warning for you users of the Sony PS2 demo disc.

With all the news we had to go through, theres only a little bit of time left in hour one. So, what better time than this to get to the Reviews Of The Week. In preparation for the special holiday part of this show (coming up in hour two), we wrap-up hour one with not 1, not 2, not 3 but 6, yes, 6 games going under the knife this week! The games of choice this week are Leisure Suit Larry: Magna Cum Laude, Texas Holdem, World Championship Poker, Fight Club, SpongeBob Squarepants: The Movie and ESPN NBA 2K5.

Now that the first hour is out of the way, we can move onto what youve all been waiting for, its the Holiday Special part of the show. Its a good time to be a gamer, and to prove it we start things off with a conversation about the biggest thing to come out this season, the Nintendo DS. Hoss and Rich have gotten there hands on this new portable and put it through its paces. Theyll give us the lowdown on how it handles and tell us about some of the games that are available for it.

Once we get through talking about the DS, its time for the guys to go through each system and give you some picks to consider getting those on your list. First up, the Xbox. This is by far Richs preferred system for gaming, but Hoss has some input on it as well. Moving on, we set our sites on the GameCube, which has some of the best exclusives on the market, and the Game Boy Advance. Last but not least, the boys will go through their picks for the PS2.

If you think thats the end of this show, youre wrong. To end things with a bang, Hoss and Rich will us give their top 5 games for the year. The freak will even chime in and tell you a couple of games that you should avoid this holiday season. And just to prove that were equal opportunity gamers (ok, maybe not equal), the guys will give you a couple picks for those PC gamers on your list. This is without a doubt one of the biggest shows yet, so click the links below and arm yourselves with the info you need to get through this tough time of year. Enjoy!

Showtimes for this 2 hour special are as follows:
Tuesday – 9pm-11pm CST
Saturday – 1pm-3pm CST
9pm-11pm CST

Linux Server Patch Available Soon for BF42 and BFV

Good news from the EA Battlefield Vietnam Website:

“12.3.04 – Community Update

Listen Up Soldiers,
News from the front lines tells me that Linux server versions of the latest update is coming early next week. While I can’t say exactly when it will hit, I can tell you that you won’t have to wait too much longer for it. Both Battlefield 1942 and Battlefield Vietnam will be supported with an update.

Punk Buster
EvenBalance has resolved any issues that were occurring between PunkBuster and the latest Battlefield 1942 and Battlefield Vietnam updates. To this point, you shouldn’t be seeing any further issues with the update and PunkBuster.

Until next week, this is EAComMike signing off for the rest of the Battlefield team!”

New Patch for both BF42 and BFV

EA Released patches for both Battlefield 1942 and Battlefield Vietnam today to address what is being described as an “undisclosed exploit”. These are must downloads and installs. These are all relatively small files with the largest weighing in at just over 10MB.

Battlefield 1942 1.61b (6.41MB)
Battlefield 1942 Server 1.61b (3.16MB)

Battlefield Vietnam Client 1.21 (10.1MB)

Battlefield Vietnam Server 1.21 (4.07MB)

On the BFV forums at PlanetBattlefield people seem to be having mixed results with the patch including crashes and mass server kicking. One user discovered what is thought to be the exploit in question and it appears to be a server crash/privacy vulnerability. More information can be found here

Ed – After reading more on the PBF forums everyone is having trouble with this one so far. I would hold off on installing it for the moment. – Sarge

Korn Covers EP, New CD

Billboard reports: While touring behind its recently released “Greatest Hits, Vol. 1,” Korn is already looking forward to its next studio project. According to guitarist James “Munky” Shaffer, the alternative metal acts seventh album is slated for a late spring/early summer 2005 release.

“On Jan. 2, were going to go back and finish writing our next album,” Shaffer tells Billboard.com. “Its definitely more of a progressive [sounding] Korn,” he adds, declining to divulge any tentative song titles.

After including covers on its Epic/Immortal set “Greatest Hits, Vol. 1,” Shaffer hints the Bakersfield, Calif.-based five-piece is working on a covers EP, with a tentative title of “Korn Kovers,” for a possible April release. [see full story for more]

Full Story – http://www.billboard.com/bb/daily/article_display.jsp?vnu_content_id=1000727642

Slipknot Go North

liveDaily reports: Masked metal marauders Slipknot brave the cold north of the border in early 2005 during a headlining run through Canada.

The group has planned a short stretch of shows throughout the country that runs from Jan. 7-16. [see full story for more, including dates]

Full Story – http://www.livedaily.com/news/7388.html

Half-Life 2 players call in sick

Hundreds of buyers of “Half-Life 2,” the hotly anticipated shooting game released last week, are reporting in developer Valve Softwares user forums that they feel queasy and often develop a bad headache after playing the game for as little as an hour.

From the comments, here is an itneresting take on the problem:
“Most First Person Shooter games have a fov of 90 degrees. The default in Half Life 2 is 75 degrees.

…Go into options and go to keyboard, hit advanced options and enable the developer console “~” then go back into the game and press the tilde “~” key to enter the console. Type these commands:

sv_cheats 1
fov 90″

More here at CNET.

Considering I had the same problem with HL, I fear I can not play HL2 either. 🙁 – Atomm

Show 33 – Have You Heard of the Nintendo DS?

Hello boys and girls! Its that special time in our lives when we get to welcome a new gaming platform to the fold. What am I talking about you ask. Well, Im talking about the release of the Nintendo DS! Were dedicating this show to what some say will be one of the best portables of all time. Of corse, were still going to inform you about the other major news thats come out the past week as well as entertain you with our off-the-wall discussions.

We start the show off by comparing the DS to some of the other big xmas items of the past. Moving on from there, we get to the news about Half-Life 2 and Gran Turismo 4. Have you heard about the trouble between EA and some of their employees? If not, then youll definitely want to listen to the debate Hoss and Rich have about this somewhat peculiar issue.

After the guys get through discussing the situation at EA, well get to the heart of this weeks show, the Nintendo DS. Segment two starts off with a little history lesson into the world of Nintendo. After our lesson, the guys will tell us what some of the specs and capabilities of the DS are. Well also go through a list of games that you can pickup at the time of the DSs release as well as a couple to come out in the future. After the roll-call of games, well end the segment as Rich tells us about his experience with the demo of Metroid Prime: Hunters.

Now that weve gotten through the bulk of the show, its time to get to the Reviews Of The Week. This week, Hoss tells us about his all-time favorite game character, Kirby, as he reviews Kirby & The Amazing Mirror. Well follow that up with a live in-show review of Are You All That, a DVD interactive game. This weeks jam packed show ends with a bang as we read and answer your emails. Dont miss out on the info and fun!

Showtimes for the Video Games Show on our Gamers Radio Station:
Tuesday: 9pm CST

Next week, we will expand our presentation of the Video Games Show to the following:
Saturday: 1pm CST and 9pm CST
Tuesday: 9pm CST

Plenty of opportunities to check out this great program on Console and Handheld gaming! Dont miss out!

BF2 Info and Movies

Not that this hasnt been posted elsewhere, but for those of you who depend on us for your Battlefield news, here is some info on the upcoming Battlefield 2 from the guys over at the Northern Brigade Clan:

“On Thursday 18th November some of us guys in Northern Brigade went to the DICE office for a little BF2 visit. We met the BattleField 2 crew, the EA folks and of course, we got to play the game 🙂
The purpose of this little drill was for DICE to get some external feedback on the game. They also wanted us to tell the rest of the community about how BF2 is shaping up. And guess what? There´s not one, but TWO movies recorded ingame as we play. All edited up for you by mr KOiN, so enjoy.”

There is quite a bit of information in this article as well as two movies
Article and Movies

To play the movies, you will need the DIVX codec which you can get here.

World of Warcraft Launch

Unless you have been living under a rock or something, you know that World of Warcraft launched yesterday. In my thinking of “ahh, I wont have any issues buying the game” I treked out yesterday morning at 10:00 AM to the local EBGames… Well, with the massive amounts of people waiting outside for the store to open, it wasnt hard to figure out that this was not going to be an easy task…

EBGames, close to where I work, was pretty much sold out before the gate opened three feet. With that, I drove to a GameStop close by… Umm… No go…

I moved on to a Best Buy and found myself i the right place. Best Buy had a large section for the game with people grabing copies left and right. By the time I grabbed my copy their inventory out on the floor had been reduced to half.

So, with saying this, go get your copy now! A lot of us on Gamers Radio and many friends were playing it all day yesterday and will be spending many hours in there over the next, ummm, for a while…

http://www.worldofwarcraft.com