Wouldn’t you know it, but another tantalising videogame release is upon us once again, this time in the form of The Darkness II from 2K Games and Digital Extremes!

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We don’t mean to blow your mind here, but The Darkness II is an ultra violent game. If you’ve read El33tonline’s preview or hands-on preview of the game, or if you’ve played the recently released demo, you’ll know that the set of execution moves available to you is especially gruesome and vicious.

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Jackie Estacado may not have asked to be imbued with the dreadful power of The Darkness, but as this excellent launch trailer for The Darkness II shows, he’s very protective of the inhabiting force as he rends invading enemies intent on stealing it from him.

Watch below to see how Jackie deals with his foes as he duel wields destructive pistols and makes full use of The Darkness to make quick work of the encroaching danger.

For someone who acts like he hates The Darkness, Jackie sure seems to love it:

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2K Games recently let it be known that a demo for Digital Extremes’ The Darkness II is due for release next week on all platforms, which will effectively give everyone a great taste of the ‘Quad Wielding’ gun- and demon-gameplay that this dark, terrifically violent game has to offer.

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Jimmy. Shoshanna. Inugami. JP Dumond.

These names may not mean much to you right now, but when The Darkness II releases next year across Xbox 360, PS3 and PC, you’ll no doubt become very well acquainted as you inhabit each of these personalities in the game’s recently announced, dedicated four-player co-operative mode, Vendettas.

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At first, Johnny Powell may seem like a paranoid schizophrenic, but if you listen carefully you’ll soon be able to benefit from his valuable knowledge concerning the goings on in the dark criminal underworld of The Darkness II, as protagonist Jackie faces off against the powerful ‘Brotherhood.’

Even with the power of The Darkness, how will Jackie survive against this ever-encroaching enemy? By employing the help of four other just as ruthless allies!

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At an El33tonline attended gamescom presentation for Digital Extremes’ The Darkness II, 2K Games producer Seth Olshfski stepped us through the dark, twisted and hostile world that protagonist Jackie Estacado will need to fight through in order to get to the bottom of an attempt on his life by a rival mob gang.

Luckily for Jackie (and unluckily for those mobsters), players of The Darkness II will be able to wield the bloodthirsty powers of The Darkness itself, a legendary and terrible mystical force that lies at the centre of the conflict, and the game’s story.

Continue reading El33tonline’s preview of The Darkness II.

In a bit of bad news for anyone looking forward to first-person ‘quad-wielding’ action this year, 2K Games has delayed Digital Extremes’ The Darkness II into early 2012 from it’s originally announced launch days of October 4th and October 7th in the US and Europe respectively.

From the Twitter entry announcing the news:

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Worldwide release dates have been attached to the next quad-wielding first-person shooter from 2K Games, The Darkness II, but if you’re looking forward to slipping into the brutal and twisted personality of Jackie Estacado any time soon, you’re going to need to wait a few months yet.

You can still watch a stylish Nolan ‘Nathan Drake’ North-narrated debut trailer, though!

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At the beginning of February this year, 2K Games presented fans of The Darkness with a special surprise in the form of an announcement for The Darkness II.

To start letting us know more about The Darkness II, 2K has today kicked off a series of developer diaries discussing the next entry to the dark and ultra-violent first-person action game,

Watch below as Sheldon Carter (project director at developer Digital Extremes) and Tom Galt (lead designer at the studio) tell us about the improvements to the sequel over the original, the story setup for this new title, and why having ‘demon arms’ is so darn cool:

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A sequel to 2007’s The Darkness from Starbreeze Studios has today been officially announced by 2K Games, with development duties falling to Digital Extremes (Bioshock 2 multiplayer, Dark Sector).

Not a whole lot is currently known about The Darkness II at this point, but here’s what president of 2K Games, Christoph Hartmann, had to say about the project:

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Last year I wrote an article for videogame industry trade site Gamasutra entitled ‘The South African Game Development Scene: Past Present and Future,’ which attempted to look at the history of game development in the country and surmise how an industry may rise and move forward here.

The article was based on interviews conducted with a diverse, influential and talented group of developers both from and based in South Africa, but a lot of the responses were unfortunately not included due to the nature of the piece, so in an effort to share this potential goldmine of knowledge with aspiring game developers and gaming enthusiasts, I decided to start posting the interviews here on El33tonline, in full, continuing today with part five, and an interview with Damien Classen (you can read part one, part two, part three and part four at your leisure).

Damien Classen is (primarily) a graphics programmer currently working at ThoroughTec Simulation in Durban, South Africa, after having spent a year at Digital Extremes (co-developers of the Unreal franchise) in Canada working on Bioshock 2: specifically, Classen was a graphics programmer at the company working with the in-house Evolution Engine, while working with the part of the engine that handles rendering on the PlayStation 3.

In order to be working in the realm of graphics technology, Classen studied Computer Science in South Africa and received a Masters Degree specialising in graphics programming, and while tinkering with his own graphics engines and projects (like the brain-teasing puzzle game, Lyntheria), he entered into stints at Durban-based software developers Derivco and ThoroughTec, which lead to an opportunity at Digital Extremes in 2008.

Classen left Digital Extremes towards the end of 2009 and moved back to South Africa to be closer to family and friends, and has returned to work at ThoroughTec.

You can check out Classen’s impressive portfolio of personal work at his website.

Let’s begin the interview:

Continue reading The Lost South African Game Developer Interviews Part 5: Damien Classen

2K Games has entered a partnership with Digital Extremes to assist in the development of Bioshock for the PS3.

The PS3 version of Bioshock is scheduled to arrive on shelves this October and includes new features and content. It is being developed by 2K Marin, 2K Boston, 2K Australia and Digital Extremes.

Digital Extremes are the co-creators of Epic Games’ Unreal franchise and are also well known for the development of Dark Sector. They will help to optimize Bioshock’s performance on the PS3.

“By partnering with Digital Extremes, 2K Games is delivering a fully optimized experience that takes advantage of the PLAYSTATION 3 system hardware,” said Christoph Hartmann, president of 2K. “Bringing Digital Extremes on board allows us to continue to deliver the best experience possible to our fans.”

”When 2K approached us to assist with development on BioShock for the PLAYSTATION 3 system, it was a no-brainer,” said James Schmalz, CEO and founder of Digital Extremes.

“You really can’t ask for a more exciting, technically impressive world to work in than Rapture, and the incredible knowledge and talent between the 2K studios and our team at Digital Extremes is unprecedented. The collaboration on this project will make the PLAYSTATION 3 system sing with Big Daddy goodness and Little Sister thank you’s.”