Here’s a look at eight new levels for Quake Arena Arcade. The Arena Gate map, which came with Quake 3, is included in the 40 original maps from Arena and Team Arena will be included in the bundle. The latest generation of the classic first-person shooter is headed to the Xbox 360.

According to GamerBytes, Pi Studios is getting busy with a dedicated site for Quake Arena Arcade coming online soon. Unlike certain other titles that have turned out to be big teases, it looks like you and up to 15 of your friends will actually be able to duke it out to see who has the mad skilz.

In the past year or so, we’ve seen some big mergers and acquisitions in the gaming industry. Activision and Blizzard’s merger was the big news, but there have been others. Today, another newsworthy acquisition was announced.

ZeniMax Media, parent company of Bethesda Softworks, has acquired id Software. This acquisition puts franchises like Fallout 3, Oblivion, Doom, Quake, and RAGE under one roof. The best news out of all of this is that all of the principals at id Software have signed long term contracts, meaning that id will continue to operate under the same management going forward.

In discussing the deal, id Technical Director and industry icon John Carmack said, “This puts id Software in a wonderful position going forward. We will now be able to grow and extend all of our franchises under one roof, leveraging our capabilities across multiple teams while enabling forward looking research to be done in the service of all of them. We will be bigger and stronger, as we recruit the best talent to help us build the landmark games of the future. As trite as it may be for me to say that I am extremely pleased and excited about this deal, I am.”

So, what sort of speculation can we make because of this deal? Bethesda games driven by id engines? That would seem to be a logical step, wouldn’t you think? What do you think this news means to the future of the two companies?

You can read the full text of the press release after the break.

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The granddaddy of the modern shooter – Wolfenstein 3D is finally making its classic conversion appearance on the Xbox 360 and PlayStation 3 next week in preparation for the upcoming Wolfenstein game due our August 4th.  Activision announced that the classic title is getting the downloadable treatment on June 3rd for Xbox 360, and the next day on PSN. Gamers who purchase and complete the original game will also apparently earn unlockable rewards in Wolfenstein (the new game) once they play through it in August.

While using the classic game as a promotion tool worked well for me with Quake 4 and Doom 3 (Quake 2 was included as a pack in bonus on the 360 Quake 4 Collector’s Edition, and the original Doom was bundled with Doom 3 on the Xbox) I know I’m going to pick this one up just to relive the glory of killing cyborg Mecha-Hitler as B.J. Blaskowitz, Ultimate American Hero.

The downloadable version will include all 60 original levels and still maintains its original “M” rating – though I admit I still find the gunned down nazi blood animations rivetting its hard to see this in comparison to a modern violent “M” rated title.

After a renewed start we had an interruption these last few weeks but rest assured Filefront is still hosting and promoting all the great user created and hosted content contributed to us. We return with a double length post highlighting some great mods and files for quite a few outstanding games including usual suspects like Half-Life 2, the Battlefield games and of course one of my favorite series “that I am really no good at yet still enjoy” – Warhammer 40k: Dawn of War

Highlights from this week’s column include mods for:

• Doom III – Wrathchild Act I (not ROE compatible), Revised Alphalabs
• Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion – A Provost of the Nine Divines, More Nord Beards
• Battlefield 2 – Operation Peacekeeper, Allies Intent Extended
• S.T.A.L.K.E.R – Ballistics Mod
• Far Cry 2 – new maps: MP_Surf & Gold Rush

There are also links to other maps, mods and patches for many of your favorite PC modifiable games. Be sure to check it all out after the jump.

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The original Doom has been ported just about everywhere by now. It can be downloaded through Xbox Live, it can be played on your DS with a mod, and it can even be played as in RPG-form on your cell phone. Well now, the classic FPS has shown up in yet another placed: your web browser. One programmer on NewGrounds has now recreated the entire first episode of the series in Flash 10. It may not have music, and the controls are a little different, but now you can blast through the legions of Hell on almost any computer.

You can check out the Flash version of Doom for yourself here.

Earlier today we filed a report from the Austin Game Developers Conference in which id Software lead designer Tim Willits stated the storage capacity of DVDs on the Xbox 360 had forced id to alter content from its upcoming shooter Rage. During his discussion on storytelling and technology he mentioned that he “wouldn’t say the overall story was changed in any way in order to fit on the Xbox 360 version, but how the player experiences Rage’s story has been altered.” It wasn’t just disappointing to hear the game would be changed because of such an obstacle, but that it was also going to affect the PS3 and PC versions of the game. It didn’t take more than a quick glance at comments on the original story to see that gamers were none too pleased with the news.

However, following all the online reaction to the story Tim released a statement to Shacknews in which he clarified his statements, saying, “There was NO CONTENT removed from RAGE because of the 360–NONE AT ALL,” before adding, “We feel the 360 is a great platform and will provide a fantastic Rage experience.”

You could argue that first point isn’t entirely true, as id has said on more than one occasion that the Xbox 360 version won’t look as good as the PC/PS3 iteration due to DVD size constraints, but what did he mean by “Rage’s story has been altered” because of the Xbox 360 in his discussion earlier today, then?

“During my talk today I mentioned that we originally wanted to have around 5 or 6 smaller wasteland environments but later decided instead to have 2 larger wastelands,” he explained. “Mostly because we were going to be shipping on two DVDs for the 360 and felt that it would play better with one large wasteland on each disc so there would be no loading between wastelands.”

So while it’s reassuring to hear that no content has actually been removed from the game due size constraints (after all, degrading the graphical quality on the Xbox 360 is enough of a knock on DVDs), it’s interesting that a multiplatform game’s story and pacing is being dictated by one console’s technical specifications. We’ll be following up with id and Willits and try to bring you further details on this story as we can.

There’s no denying that piracy is a significant problem for PC game developers. While some overplay or downplay its significance, it is no doubt an issue. But consider the effect of piracy on PC hardware manufacturers. Without a top-of-the-line graphics card and processor, it doesn’t matter how many copies of Crysis you can pirate, you’re not going to do much without the hardware to run it.

In an interview with GamesIndustry.biz, id Software vice president Tom Bramwell floated an interesting theory that PC hardware manufacturers might not be the biggest opponent of the piracy scene.

“There’s lots of things that they could do but typically just they just line up on the wrong side of the argument in my opinion,” Hollenshead claimed. “They have lots of reasons as to why they do that, but I think that there’s been this dirty little secret among hardware manufacturers, which is that the perception of free content – even if you’re supposed to pay for it on PCs – is some sort hidden benefit that you get when you buy a PC, like a right to download music for free or a right to download pirated movies and games.”

Asked if he thinks the manufacturers are secretly happy about the the situation, Hollenshead replied, “Yeah I think they are. I think that if you went in and could see what’s going on in their minds, though they may never say that stuff and I’m not saying there’s some conspiracy or something like that – but I think the thing is they realise that trading content, copyrighted or not, is an expected benefit of owning a computer.

“And I think that just based on their actions…what they say is one thing, but what they do is another. When it comes into debates about whether peer-to-peer file-sharing networks that by-and-large have the vast majority, I’m talking 99 per cent of the content is illicitly trading copyrighted property, they’ll come out on the side of the 1 per cent of the user doing it for legitimate benefit. You can make philosophical arguments that are difficult to debate, but at the same time you’re just sort of ignoring the enormity of the problem.”

He certainly raises a good point. You can’t come right out and say this is true without some evidence, but it seems to make too much sense to be untrue. Either way, Hollenshead probably shouldn’t count on getting any Christmas cards from Intel, AMD and Nvidia this year.

The video above is from QuakeCon, and it shows off the newest IP from id, Rage, which will combine FPS and driving action with a post-apocalyptic setting. Looks pretty sweet, doesn’t it? Well, don’t expect the same quality of visuals on the Xbox 360 version. The game’s creator, John Carmack, recently revealed that the 360 version would have to be scaled back visually due to some storage issues. Apparently, the royalty fees for a third DVD were too high to make that a viable option. Instead, the developers will have to compress the game even further to fit it on two DVDs. On the flipside, the PS3 version will be shipping on a single Blu-Ray disc, while the PC and Mac versions will release in both Blu-Ray and DVD formats. So basically, if you have the option, you might want to skip the Xbox 360 version of this game whenever it comes out.

Via ShackNews

At QuakeCon, id decided to unveil a brand new trailer for the next installment in the Wolfenstein series. As you can imagine — this being one of the earlier trailers — it shows very little in the way of gameplay. Still, you can definitely tell it’s Wolfenstein. I mean, what other game would feature Nazis, the occult, and lots of shooting…you know, that was being developed by id. Regardless, I’m sure this game will live up to its heritage, and I definitely can’t wait to play some of the new objective-based multiplayer.