Bethesda Softworks and 2K Games Announce The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion to Ship March 20

Quintessential RPG for the Next Generation Coming to Xbox 360 and PC

Rockville, MD – March 2, 2006 – Bethesda Softworks® and 2K Games, a publishing label of Take-Two Interactive Software, Inc. (NASDAQ: TTWO), today announced that the highly-anticipated role-playing game, The Elder Scrolls® IV: Oblivion™, has gone to gold master and will be available in stores in North America and Europe during the week of March 20. Oblivion will be available for Xbox 360™ video game and entertainment system from Microsoft and PC in both regular and collector’s editions.

“Our most ambitious project ever is finally done,” said Todd Howard, executive producer of Oblivion. “We’re excited to get the game into everyone’s hands and let them experience it for themselves. We hope they enjoy it. I think it’s our best game yet.”

Oblivion is an epic, open-ended single-player RPG for the next generation providing gamers with one of the most life-like gaming experiences to date. The powerful combination of unprecedented graphics and freeform gameplay allows gamers to unravel the main quest or explore the vast world at their own pace. Oblivion is the fourth chapter in the award-winning Elder Scrolls series that includes Morrowind® (2002 RPG of the year – Computer Gaming World), Daggerfall™ (1996 RPG of the year -- PC Gamer), and Arena (1994 RPG of the year – Computer Player).

“Oblivion will set the new standard for next generation gaming and change the way role-playing games are viewed forever,” said Vlatko Andonov, president of Bethesda Softworks. “We set very high goals and ensure they are reached because that is what our fans deserve and have come to expect from Bethesda Softworks. We are very proud of our team’s accomplishments with respect to Oblivion.”

Oblivion has already garnered numerous awards and an impressive collection of accolades, including being voted “RPG of Show” in 2005 by the Best of E3 Game Critics Awards. Oblivion ranks as one of the “Most Anticipated Games of 2006” according to PC Gamer, GameSpy, IGN, and Yahoo Games among many others, and has been featured on nearly thirty magazine covers worldwide.

“Oblivion is one of the most anticipated video games of 2006 and its release will be a milestone for the Xbox 360 and PC,” said Christoph Hartmann, Managing Director, 2K Games. “A shining example of next-generation role-playing, Oblivion breaks new ground in the genre with unparalleled graphics, revolutionary gameplay and an expansive RPG world.”

Oblivion for Xbox 360 and PC, co-published by 2K Games and Bethesda Softworks, has been rated “T” for Teen by the ESRB. For more information on the title visit the official web site at www.elderscrolls.com.

- Elder Scrolls Forums

And just in case you don't know the req;

Minimum System Requirements:

* Windows XP

* 512MB System RAM

* 2 Ghz Intel Pentium 4 or equivalent processor

* 128MB Direct3D compatible video card and DirectX 9.0 compatible driver;

* 8x DVD-ROM drive

* 4.6 GB free hard disk space

* DirectX 9.0c (included)

* DirectX 8.1 compatible sound card

* Keyboard, Mouse

Recommended:

* 3 Ghz Intel Pentium 4 or equivalent processor

* 1 GB System RAM

* ATI X800 series, Nvidia GeForce 6800 series, or higher video card

Supported Video Card Chipsets:

* ATI X1800 series

* ATI X1300 series

* ATI X850 series

* ATI x800 series

* ATI x700 series

* ATI x600 series

* ATI Radeon 9800 series

* ATI Radeon 9700 series

* ATI Radeon 9600 series

* ATI Radeon 9500 series

* ATI Radeon 9000 series

* NVIDIA Geforce 7800 series

* NVIDIA GeForce 6800 series

* NVIDIA GeForce FX series

0.104u4

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IMPORTANT CHANGES FOR OSD DEVELOPERS:

 

1. osd_pause is no longer called directly. Rather, your osd_init function should register the osd_pause callback (if necessary) using add_pause_callback.

 

2. osd_die is now handled by the core; you should remove this function from the OSD layer.

 

3. logerror is front-ended in the core; it calls to a new OSD function osd_logerror which handles the OS-specific file and/or debugger logging.

 

MAMETesters Bugs Fixed

---------------------------

memwindow0104u3red [Aaron Giles]

i9600104u2ora [Aaron Giles]

dietgo0104u2red [Aaron Giles]

st0016_0104u3red [Aaron Giles]

8751MCUgames0104u3 [Aaron Giles]

warriorb0104u2gre [Pierpaolo Prazzoli]

cheat0104u3ora [ian Patterson]

 

Source Changes

------------------

Added comments support to the debugger. You can now dynamically add comments that are visible next to the disassembly view. Comments are saved to an XML-based.cmt file in a 'comments' directory by default upon exiting. [Andrew Gardner]

 

Added "wb+" disposition to osd_tool_fopen. [Nathan Woods]

 

Fixed cheat timer to fire at the correct rate. Also fixed initialization order to work around dependency on the video/UI system. [ian Patterson]

 

Added save states to 3 more drivers: arkanoid.c, system1.c, and taitosj.c, and to the SN76496 sound chip for system1. [Adam Bousley]

 

Fixed a couple of small memory leaks and a crash bug found by valgrind. [Lawrence Gold]

 

Added save state support to the tetrisp2 driver. [Nathan Woods]

 

Added save state support to Cloak and Dagger, Mario Bros, Crazy Baloon, and the SN76477 sound chip. [Adam Bousley]

 

Hooked up the R4650 properly in the MIPS recompiler. [R. Belmont]

 

More Namco System 23 progress: [R. Belmont]

- Further hardware work

- Hooked up H8/3002 MCU and sound system

- Many notes added

- Final Furlong 2 (World and Japan sets) added

 

Added sanity checking to the set_visible_area() call to ensure it is not set larger than the screen bitmap. [Nathan Woods]

 

Added decryption of the BIOS for the Namco System 10 games using MEMN ROM boards. [smf]

 

Changed the ROM banking of the Bellfruit 'Adder' card to the new standard, as well as tidying up the MPU4 emulation with some new information. [El Condor]

 

A bit more progress on Raiden 2 sprite decryption. [Olivier Galibert]

 

Added save states to Namco Classics Collection 1 & 2, Taito B System, and fixed save states in Operation Wolf. [Adam Bousley]

 

Debugger changes/updates: [Aaron Giles]

- added new streaming text buffer system

- rewrote the console window to use the streaming text buffer

- added new log window (Ctrl+L) which displays live error.log output

- added disassembly view menu to control comments versus raw or encrypted opcodes

- added disassembly menu to the main console window as well

- now detect expressions with assignment or ++/-- operators as commands, do you can just say "pc=0" to modify registers instead of needing to type "do pc=0"

- fixed bug that would sometimes lock the disassembly view to the top line

 

More global system cleanup: [Aaron Giles, Atari Ace]

- remapped osd_die to fatalerror, which cleans up behind itself and returns to the osd code by returning from run_game

- removed a number of unnecessary includes from driver.h

- moved logerror into the core

- moved 68000-specific build rules to cpu.mak

- new function skip_this_frame, should be called by drivers instead of osd_skip_this_frame

- removed includes of osdepend.h and osd_cpu.h from drivers; only the core should include these

 

More initialization/reset/pause cleanup: [Aaron Giles]

- new function add_pause_callback can be called by other modules to register a callback for whenever MAME is paused/resumed

- converted all existing pause hooks to use the new system

- new function add_reset_callback can be called by other modules to register a callback for whenever MAME is reset

- converted all existing reset hooks to use the new system

- removed machine_reset; replaced with mame_schedule_soft_reset

- new function mame_schedule_exit to force an exit cleanly from external events

- removed all the "trying_to_quit" crap from the Windows code

- moved save/restore system out of cpuexec.c into mame.c

- moved core game loop out of cpuexec.c into mame.c

- added hard reset support (complete tear down and re-init)

 

More core file shuffling: [Aaron Giles]

- split sndintrf.c into sound.c, sndintrf.c, and sndhrdw/generic.c

- added #include vidhrdw/generic.h to mamecore.h, and removed all explicit includes elsewhere

 

Added save state support to the BSMT2000 sound emulator and the dcheese driver. [Aaron Giles]

 

Fixed missing save state data in the dkong driver. [Aaron Giles]

 

Updated the 68000 disassembler to use the new interfaces. [Aaron Giles]

 

New games added or promoted from NOT_WORKING status

------------------------------------------------------------------

Fred Flintstone's Memory Match [Aaron Giles]

 

New clones added

--------------------

Dragon Breed (M81 pcb version) [Pierpaolo Prazzoli]

 

New games marked as GAME_NOT_WORKING

--------------------------------------------------

Crazy Fight [Pierpaolo Prazzoli]

Search for the Magical Error [David Haywood]

Final Furlong 2 [R. Belmont]

Gekitoride-Jong Space [smf]

Mr. Driller G [smf]

Kotoba no Puzzle Mojipittan [smf]

Star Trigon [smf]

http://www.mamedev.org/

Derivative Builds:

MAMEplus!

Dats:

Mameinfo.dat v0.104u4

Notes:

2006-03-01

 

Two are better than one.

 

This release features the addition of the second CPU (ARM7TDMI). Touchscreen access is still faked in the same manner as in earlier versions, and not all parts of ARM7 memory are handled correctly yet.

Note that earlier versions of the plugins are more or less incompatible with this version.

 

* CPU:  Added emulation of the ARM7TDMI 

* GPU:  Modified the hblank/vblank code to handle both processors 

* MMU:  Added the ARM7TDMI memory space (incomplete) 

* MMU:  Added some support for the WRAM control register 

* GUI:  The disassembler can now be used for both processors 

* GUI:  The disassembler now shows the CPSR mode bits 

* GUI:  Fixed overwriting of program code for programs loaded at 0x02000000

>> Get it HERE.