Below you can see the very first published SoW2 player concept art!
Theese two guys are from AIM.

SoW ships of member to the game industry!
We are proud to announce that one of our crew members have taken yet another step up the ladder to a position in the commercial game industry. At Sands-of-War we have always been very dedicated to training every crew member.

He will working for Kongo(http://kongo.dk) on a HCA game which will be released later this year. Good luck with your work there Nimajneb!

If you also wan't to be a part of the SoW2 team then head over the jobs page, find a position, and then send in your submission here:
http://sow.hl2files.com/index.php?page=Sands-of-War

Contest reminder
The SoW2 history contest will close in 2 weeks, so there is still some time to send in your submission. Go ahead, grab the challenge to form the history of SoW2 and win a beta testers position!
http://sow.hl2files.com/forum/viewtopic.php?t=1037

Alright First of all I'd like everyone to welcome TotalVamp to the SoK team. He'll be doing some awesome maps so look for some updates from him soon.

Now onto some of SoK's recent publicity

Elemental and myself were recently interviewed by Mentalx of Half-Life 2 Files. Check out the intervew here.
Also, I was recently interviewed by Emanueru from 'Ultima Source Magazine.' Ultima Source Magazine is an up and coming E- Magazine and they are currently being featured on HL2files.com. I recommend checking it out. The interview will be featured in their 4th issue (coming soon), but until then check out their first 3 issues here.

Finally, we have a small media update for you.

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Half-Life 2 and New Team Member..

First off I'd Like everyone to welcome Ne0TeK to the Spirit of Konoha team. He will be doing some modeling and skinning for us. So lets hear it for Ne0teK.

Now onto the big update. The SoK team has decided to change to the Half-Life 2 engine. We came to this after a long team meeting and we felt that we could just make a much better game with the half-life 2 engine. We're currently porting everything that we can to hl2, aside from the models. Our modeling team in the next few days will be working hard to bring you our first models for Half-Life 2. So expect some media updates soon.

Also we've decided that in the near future we will be in need of forum staff, but we will not be taking applications for these spots. All forum Moderators AND Beta testers will be selected from active members of the forum. So stay active!

Welcome to GoldenEye Source. We have updated the website in order to provide more content to our visitors and fans. Please stay tuned as a massive public media updates will be released.
Also, continue voting for us in the MODBB Top 10. Once again, we appreciate any/all of the support given to us through these few months. Keep it comin!

Regards,
The GE:S Team.

This is just a quick announcement to let the community know that we are ready to ramp up production here at Badge of Blood, and we're in search of talented texture artists and 3D Modelers who would like to be a member of the team!

Requirements:

• Must be old enough to sign a legally binding NDA (18 years of age)


• Must present examples of past work


• Must be able to accept criticism and critiques from his or her peers maturely and intelligently. Prima Donnas need not apply.


• Please include a paragraph or two telling us why you want to be a member of the Badge of Blood team.

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As Fridge heads out the door, he passes a new team member on his way in! Porkchop, a very talented musician, composer, and prodigious consumer of steamed broccoli, has joined the team! He will be bumping brains with Khan Azul and Ghaleon4 while helping produce the soundtrack for Badge of Blood! Welcome aboard Porkchop!

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Sadly, it is my duty to inform the community that one of our coders, Fridge, is having to leave the team due to his taking on new responsibilities at work that require even more of his attention than before. That's what happens when you kick so much butt, Fridge! People notice and demand more of you!

So long Fridge! And if you get settled in the future and have time to take two breaths, we'll be keeping a seat warm for you!

We have start to begin working really in depth with our maps and the setting for Caliber. Here are some images of a map work in progress so you can get a general idea where we are coming from:


We are still seeking additional mappers, skinners, organic modelers, and an animator, so if you are good at any of those things, please contact us at join@calibermod.com.

Thanks.

An update is available for Counter-Strike: Source and the Source Engine. The update will be applied automatically when your Steam client is restarted. The specific changes include:

Counter-Strike: Source

• Enabled support for SourceTV


• Fixed a rare bug that caused some bullet impacts to be counted twice


• Improved map overview support


• The message of the day file is now required to be in the main game directory


• Fixed an issue with player names being out of sync with the server


• Fixed "purple checkerboard" problem for Message of the Day scrollbars


• Fixed some localization issues related to player chat


• Death notices are no longer displayed while blind


• Death notices retain the correct team color even if the player quickly changes teams


• Bots immediately change their names to match the bot_prefix when it changes


• Bots join dedicated servers immediately if the bot_quota is nonzero


• Fixed bug where bots would repeatedly fail to join with an invalid Steam ID


• Added mp_logdetail at the request of server administrators

Source Engine

• Player sprays now persist through round restarts. The number of rounds a spray survives is determined by r_spray_lifetime


• Fixed a bug causing the first message from a plug-in message to be colored incorrectly


• Consistency checking is now skipped during demo playback


• Added sv_visiblemaxplayers


• Fixed timing precision error causing slower framerates on servers running continuously for more than a few days

Quite a healthy bit of news this evening. To start, we'd like to welcome FryGuy and DrEvil on as code monkeys, further bolstering our bumper crop and pushing us that much closer to our end goal of cornering the market.

Secondly, the Trepids, while not trippin' (yo!) on whatever their drug of choice is (it's something potent, believe me), have been puttin' in countless hours on Hunted, of which we have four bran' spankin' new vestiges for y'all:


Thirdly, dr_nick has kept himself studiously and (quite apparently) dexterously scribbling out model concepts in his secret lair, seldom allowing for such human necessities as orange juice, curry rice, and Billy Wilder movies. This being the case, rebo, in an uncharacteristic show of good 'ole down-home American hard work and ingenuity, whipped up this here wallpaper:

Not quite lastly, astute visitors have probably noticed the new 'Developer Journals' menu up there at the top right. Our developers, having little else to do, obviously, will be keeping their adoring public abreast of every move made or unmade. Check frequently, these candid encounters are liable to pop up at any instant and we're hard up for traffic.

Finally, for those who may have questioned my counting tactics earlier (it was strategic!), mosey yourself on over to the media section and two more Hunted boys'll great you mighty kindly.

We have been working hard on the weapons and code this week. However, we do have some bad news. Due to certain circumstances the teaser will be pushed to later on in the project, and will probably be combines with the trailer. This however, doesn’t mean we aren’t going to show you some nice new weapon renders. We have completed a pistol and our first Light Machinegun. We are currently finishing up all the Rahmos military items. Stay tuned for a big update next week.

But for now, here are some more weapons :

Beta 1.3 is now available!

Head over to the downloads page and grab it now! If you are new to the mod or just want to see more, check out the media section for the latest screenshots!

What's new in Beta 1.3?
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Maps:

• Updated ctf_defrost


• Updated ctf_dirtwork


• Updated ctf_prisonriot


• Updated ctf_lambda_bunker


• Updated ctf_gunshot


• Added ctf_subway


• Added ctf_canals


• Added ctf_stinger


• Added ctf_storm

Features/tweaks:

• Added ready system


• Added map voting system


• Added notification of when you were auto-switched to balance teams


• Added 2 point scoring bonus for assists


• Added cl_redenemy which allows mouse over to enemy to always be red and mouse over friendly to always be green


• Team balance doesn't wait until death anymore and always switches lowest scoring player


• Added flashing text to indicate flag status


• Changed slam color to indicate team


• Increased SG clip to 8 shots and reduced max carry count


• Reduced Crossbow damage


• Players can now set their fov between 75 and 120 using "fov X"


• Removed starting 25 armor


• Removed RPG laser dot


• Allow the gravity gun to push other players


• Added game events for flag capture, flag return, and assist


• Tweaked scoreboard size


• Added CTF game options to menu

Bug Fixes:

• Fixed longstanding HL2DM underwater sound death bug


• Fixed auto team balance keeping you dead


• Fixed cl_autoweaponswitch not working in some situations


• Added sprint to the list of keybinds

Also, congrats to Team Flag, who recently won the first HL2CTF match in the GVLeague competition!

Avid Technology, Inc. today announced the “SOFTIMAGE®|XSI® Mod Tool Lock & Load” Challenge. The challenge – sponsored in part by HP, NVIDIA and Gamedev.net – gives gamers the opportunity to win over $25,000US in prizes for developing “mods” - modified content for popular video games - using the SOFTIMAGE|XSI Mod Tool v4.2, the freely available version of the company’s professional 3D animation software. Setting a new standard for gamers and modders alike, the SOFTIMAGE|XSI Mod Tool extends the life of popular games by giving users the power to produce their own characters, props and environments for export directly into a game. Current game engines supported by the Mod Tool include Source™ by Valve and Epic’s Unreal® Engine.

Judges will be looking for original, compelling characters created with the SOFTIMAGE|XSI Mod Tool and exported into supported games like Half-Life 2, Counter-Strike: Source and Unreal Tournament 2004. Criteria will include visual excellence and quality of animation. Quality and efficiency of the geometry, texture maps and animations will be taken into consideration. Credit may be awarded for unusually creative or original character ideas, provided they work normally in multiplayer gaming scenarios.

The top three winners will receive an HP xw9300 Workstation with a professional license of SOFTIMAGE|XSI software. The HP xw9300 Workstation provides customers with the company's most powerful 64-bit personal workstation delivering advanced performance and visualization for compute intensive environments. Supporting, for the first time, dual PCI Express x16 graphics and dual AMD Opteron™ processors, the HP xw9300 meets the combined needs for computational and visualization power and I/O performance while helping to lower total cost of ownership.

Additional prizes will include NVIDIA Quadro FX 3400 graphics cards, copies of XSI Foundation, Softimage® training DVDs and books. The “SOFTIMAGE|XSI Mod Tool Lock & Load” Challenge begins today, and entries are due no later that 12am EST, July 1, 2005. Judging will take place between July 11-22 and winners will be announced on stage during the Softimage User Group meeting held during SIGGRAPH 2005, and at www.softimage.com on Wednesday, August 3, 2005.
The panel of judges includes:

• Carey Chico, Art Director, Pandemic Studios


• Paul Marino, Executive Director, Academy of Machinima Arts & Sciences


• Garry Newman, Founder, Garry’s Mod


• James Rogers, Games Specialist, Softimage


• Ben Sawyer, Founder, Digital Mill and Serious Games Summit


• Mark Schoennagel, Sr Demo Artist, Softimage


• Danny Scot, Content Manager, Planet Half-Life


• Tommy Tallarico, Host, writer & co-producer, Electric Playground

A multitude of online communities exist around the world made up of thousands of interactive game development enthusiasts – known as “modders” – who regularly use the software development kits provided by game developers to customize the games they play, and share their non-commercial versions with other players. Modders develop their own rules, characters, and environments to alter various games, and game developers are offering increased access to their material to support this community. Softimage has been predominant within the Mod Community since the release of the SOFTIMAGE|XSI EXP for Half Life 2, and the follow-up version the SOFTIMAGE|XSI Mod Tool v4.2. Based on the professional architecture as SOFTIMAGE|XSI software, the Mod Tool includes multiple toolsets for creating, texturing and animating props and characters, designing and previewing real-time effects, and outputting the results.