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Remember many moons ago when we first reported that Fable 2 would be shipping without a vital component? Well, it looks as if the gang at Lionhead Studios may just have pulled it out in the last moment. Should all go according to plan and the patch passes certification, the feature should be available at launch. See what we get for worrying?

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In a move that's unlikely to surprise anyone acquainted with the works and words of Peter Molyneux, Fable 2 will ship without online co-op play. 

People with real life friends or no friends at all will be unaffected due to the fact that the split screen and single player modes will be entirely functional in the disc release.

Those of you who happen to yearn for interaction with distant friends still have the silver lining that the online co-op mode will be functional via a patch that will be made available within the first week of release--probably. 

Let's hope that Molyneux delivers, as it would be horrible to see such a promising game marred by the temporary occlusion of such a heavily touted feature.

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The Game Developers Conference 2008, which is currently scheduled for February 18-11 in San Francisco, has published a list of featured speakers and topics under discussion for each. Here are some big names for the curious:

Peter Molyneux (Head of Studios, Lionhead Studios), on (surprise!) Fable 2 - The Big Three Features Revealed.

• Peter Molyneux's stated ambition as a designer is to make FABLE 2 a landmark game. In order to achieve this three big design features have been added. The inspiration and rational behind these features will be discussed along with their evolution throughout the development process. The wider context of their impact and influence on the RPG genre with also be examined as the ambition is also to evolve the genre itself. The talk will be supported by retrospective videos as well as live game examples.

Ken Levine (President/Creative Director, 2K Boston) on (bigger surprise!) Storytelling in Bioshock: Empowering Players to Care about Your Stupid Story (sign me up).

• Game stories can matter, even in first person shooters. But first we're going to have to give up a lot of our preconceptions about what people care about when playing a game. For too long, games (especially first person shooters) have been stuck in a "game sequence followed by story sequence" mentality. Ken Levine will tell the tale of how the BIOSHOCK took a pointy-headed idea about a pseudo-objectivist utopia and turned it into one of the most compelling and succesful game worlds in recent history. What were the tools used? What compromises had to be made? Where did the shooter end and the story begin? How did we make people give a crap? How did we use story and narrative to become perhaps the most talked about game at the super-crowded E3 2006? What does this all mean for stories in games? And must of all, what hell does "Mise En Scene" mean?

Chris Butcher (Engineering Lead, Microsoft/Bungie) on E Pluribus Unum: Matchmaking in Halo 3.

• The online multiplayer mode of HALO 3 features an automatic matchmaking system to place players into games. Players may join individually or with parties of friends, and are quickly matched into groups. This presentation describes the algorithms behind the peer-to-peer matchmaking model, and its implementation over Xbox Live. It examines the impact of matchmaking on the HALO online community, and provides techniques for shaping the player experience and discouraging cheaters. The tradeoffs of an automatic matchmaking system compared to traditional multiplayer game browsers will be discussed, and illustrated by some results from the first months of HALO 3's operation.

Cevat Yerli (Managing Director, Crytek) on Crysis in the Making.

• This session will offer a look into key areas of CRYSIS development that markedly depart from Crytek's first project, FAR CRY. Main topics include Nanosuit design and gameplay, creating a rich, destructible/non-linear world, and peopling it with dynamic, believable AI enemies that challenge and entertain the player.

You can view the full list of featured speakers here. If you're interested in the keynotes, however, you can find that here.

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This review was originally published on Gaming Horizon, GameBump's predecessor. Its format does not match our own but we support its content. It was written by John Godfrey.

Video games based on movie franchises. Yeah, I know, nobody really wants to hear about them because unfortunately, the majority of games based on movies are cheap cash-ins designed to pocket even more money for the movie studio based on whatever blockbuster is getting a lot of buzz from the gaming demographic. However, things are changing, as movie directors are realizing more and more that the interactive medium can be used to further the experience from the films and be more involving, immersive and expressive as technology continues to evolve. They’re just beginning to realize that this is no longer the Pac-Man, Pong and Space Invader era. Peter Jackson had a big hand in the Peter Jackson’s King Kong game, making sure that his vision was adhered to the entire way, but does it make for a good game?

Director Carl Denham has happened across a secret map, to a place never believed to be in existence - a place that time has forgotten. What better place to shoot a movie, right? The game kicks off with a few explanatory scenes - actual footage from the 2005 Peter Jackson movie - of Carl discussing this; finding the leading lady; boarding the ship; and then crashing at Skull Island. The story is established in mere minutes and then you take the reigns controlling Jack Driscoll, the writer behind Denham’s film. You trek across Skull Island with a team comprised of Denham, the leading lady Ann Darrow, and Hayes and Jimmy, at first finding shooting locales and filming footage, until it’s discovered that a variety of dinosaurs, huge creepy-crawlies like bats, millipedes, crabs and scorpions also inhabit the island. There’s also an ancient tribe that’s not too happy about your surprise visit and a giant gorilla named... Kong. The game then becomes about gathering any crew you’ve become seperated from and leaving the island alive.

It’s only a matter of minutes into the game when you’re thrown into a situation of having to protect yourself from creatures and making sure the rest of your team is also alright, a gameplay mechanic that you’ll see carried across for the rest of the game. When the action starts you’re introduced to the games superbly simplistic control scheme. It takes a second to learn and it’s easy to use. A quick run-down is: L2 aims weapon, R3 zooms weapon, R2 does a double act of the action button and firing the weapon, R1 reloads your weapon and X lets you talk to other characters and take their weapon. It’s that simple, and it works like a charm. You can only carry one weapon at a time (after all, this is Skull Island, not San Andreas where you can find a gun shop and liquor store on every corner), ammo is rare on the island and whatever you find is courtesy of care packages dropped by the pilot in your team circling the island. You can carry a spear, which there are plenty of on the island thanks to the native tribe that inhabits it, or a bone which can also be thrown like a spear, at the same time as you carry a firearm, though the spear must be dropped before you can use the firearm again.

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Ubisoft has announced more titles they will be bringing to the Nintendo DS, they include Star Wars: Revenge of the Sith, King Kong, Bomberman and Tom Clancy's Splinter Cell Chaos Theory.

Star Wars and Splinter Cell are expected to release this spring followed by Bomberman this summer and King Kong around Christmas 2005. Yves Guillemot, CEO of Ubisoft said, "We are proud to offer one of the most diverse line-ups of any major editor. Racing, platform, stealth, or action - there is truly something for all tastes."

This follows Ubisoft's previous release of Rayman DS, Sprung and Asphault: Urban GT.

Stay tuned for more as we get closer to these Ubisoft releases.

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Originally written by Brian Mohr

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This preview was originally published on Gaming Horizon, GameBump's predecessor. Its format does not match our own but we support its content. It was written by Sean Kearney.

On the third and final day of E3, Gaming Horizon finally got a chance to check out a much anticipated title from Ubisoft: Peter Jackson’s King Kong, and we were very impressed with it, to say the least.

After waiting in line for about twenty minutes outside a giant compound made to look like something straight out of the upcoming film, we were ushered into a small theatre inside. The presentation began with a behind-the-scenes look at the game featuring interviews with Peter Jackson, the director of the new Kong film, and Michel Ansel, producer for the King Kong game, as well as the critically acclaimed title Beyond Good and Evil.

After the short behind-the-scenes featurette, representatives from Ubisoft treated the audience to a look at the gameplay elements of King Kong by playing through a few parts of some levels from the PS2 version of the title.

The game looked simply amazing. Despite the fact that the game is still a “work in progress”, the visuals were astounding. The jungle environment was modeled beautifully and the character animations were smooth and believable. Small details, like the fog rolling throughout parts of the game, looked great and added an ambience to the jungle. Even in an incomplete version, the graphics were some of the best we have ever seen on a current-generation systems.

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