New Oni footage

As noted by Noctavis on the forum, Gamefan has new Oni footage at their website. The mpeg weighs in at about 8 MB.

Matt comments on blood effects

Matt Soell posted a reply to a question posed by Dan Rudolph on the forum concerning blood effects in Oni.

Dan asked: Some of us have noticed the lack of blood in the new Oni shots and movies. Is this because:

It's off temporarily while it's re-worked to look better.

These are from the PS2 version, where blood isn't implemented yet.

Blood has been dropped becasue it looked silly.

Blood has been dropped in order to get a T rating.

Blood is still in, just not used for throws and punches any more.

To which Matt replied:

>It's off temporarily while it's re-worked to look better.

Yep. Along with the marks left by bullets, blood will look much better than it used to.

Gamer's Republic article scanned

I acquired the June 2000 issue of Gamers Republic which has an Oni article (Oni Central noted this last week).

The article is an interview with Bungie president Alex Seriopian and Rockstar president Sam Houser. A lot of new information is in this interview accompanied by a batch of new screenshots.

ps2.ign.com posts Oni preview and movies

ps2.ign.com posted a preview of Oni that doesn't have a great wealth of info, but it does have movies, showing off new things in the game and smooth gameplay.

Interesting snippet: Oni is a massive game. It's both large in levels (17 environments), and in scale. The levels we saw were simply huge, showing transparent four-story floors, and well-constructed buildings and curiously designed cities. Even though Oni wasn't populated, Bungie's gameplan is to create a living, breathing world in which non-player characters play a significant part in Konoko's search for the truth. NPCs are both human and non-human.

Thanks to Dan Rudolph for the heads up on the forum.

New preview

gamersyndicate posted their own preview of Oni, no new shots, but a good batch of information and very nicely presented. Worth checking out!

Possible release time for Oni?

ps2.ign.com posted a list of games "guaranteed" to be out for the PS2 this year after it launches in the US. One of the games listed was Oni, which is "sure to arrive after launch day and before year's end 2000" and will be out "one week after launch".

This is presumably set by Rockstar, and not Bungie, thus it is pure speculation. Oni is set for simultaneous release on Windows, MacOS and PS2.

Archives re-done

If you take a look at the Oni Central archives, you may notice a small change in organisation and a lot more content. I added more files and made organisation smoother for the best viewing experience. Please let me know if you have any comments!

E3 flyer scan

Thanks to an anonymous source, Oni Central acquired a scan of the Oni flyer at this year's E3. Take a look at the new shot at the bottom of the flyer!

EGM scan posted last month

The scan of the small EGM article that rampancy.net posted was in the news in April here at Oni Central. It was sent in by Nijhazer.

More Oni at E3

More sites have post-E3 Oni previews, including Happy Puppy and Sharky Extreme.

Matt Soell comments on multiplayer

Matt Soell posted the following on the forum:

I very much doubt there would be any way of hacking the finished app to enable multiplayer.

The idea of adding multiplayer to the game at some later date has been discussed, but right now our priority is finishing the game. There is no definite plan right now for the addition of any major features post-release. I couldn't rule it out, but I can't promise it either.

Gamespot TV with Oni footage and info

Slade posted on the forum that Gamespot TV has Oni footage and info right over here.

Oni in PlayStation Magazine

Oni is featured in the "Coming Soon" section of the June 2000 issue of PlayStation Magazine. Bruce Morrison kindly submitted a scan of it.

Oni in Gamer's Republic

Spotted at Bungie's Oni site: Konoko on the June 2000 issue cover of Gamer's Republic. Anyone care to scan the article?

Fan art with humour

Dan Lacy sent in more fan art today, this time with a twist. It can be used as a desktop or simply for a giggle. Check it out.

Your thoughts on multiplayer

When the news of no multiplayer broke out, people responded with all sorts of mixed feelings. You can read those on the forum, or, you can vote in the new poll.

Bungie registers new domains

As noted on rampancy.net, Bungie has registered the 3 domains konoko.com, konoko.net and konoko.org. This happened way back in March, and the domain is theirs until 2010.

What possible use will Bungie have for this? Maybe situate all Oni content away from bungie.com? Time will tell...

Post E³ news

Yet another E3 has ended, and it has brought us a wealth of news and new information on Oni. Make sure you check out the Oni at E³ 2000 page here at Oni Central!

There is a Oni trailer at the All Games Network and some info on Oni at E3 here (thanks Claude), Butch made an interesting post here at rampancy.net, ps2.ign.com has 2 movies showing Oni on PS2 here and here (thanks Peter J.)

Stefan Lindbergh wrote in to point out this article at Macweek.com which says

Bungie offered no word on Halo's release date, but said that Oni, which has been painfully slow in coming to market, should be available by the end of October.

Oni also won a honorable mention in the best port to console category at Gamefan. Cool!

Take photos at E³!

From unnamed source:

Those of you fortunate enough to be attending E3, do ??? a favor and grab a bunch of stickers from the Bungie booth (whether Oni, Halo, or Bungie specific) and do your best ninja impersonation: Affix the stickers in the most unlikely of places (Blizzard booth? Lara's butt? [smile!]) and then whip out your instamatic and take some shots of said stickers... a record of the act of Bungie fandom! Keep those shots handy... more to come, soonŞ.

p.s. This is not related to the E3 Photo contest over at rampancy.net, but don't worry, we'll take those pics as well. :)

PS2 release date hints towards Oni's release date

As pointed out by Phaethon on the forum, CNET'S News.com reports about Sony setting the PS2 release date for the US at October 26, 2000 at a price tag of $299. This could mean we can expect Oni sometime after that.

Oni in playable form on PS2 at E³!

Matt Soell e-mailed me with news that at this year's E³ Oni will be playable on the Playstation 2!! It will be the first look anyone gets at Oni on the PS2!

What kind of fighting will you do?

That' what the new poll asks. You know where to go and vote!

New fan art

...by ZeroRage, who submitted a new desktop. Go take a look!

Release date alert list

Jim Ruiz from Bungie lets us know that he has an "alert list" for Oni and Halo. So as soon as Bungie has a release date for Oni, he'll send a message out to everyone on the list. E-mail him to get added to that list!

(Thanks haloplayers.com)

New bungie.net out for public testing

A public beta version of the new bungie.net site is out now for public testing. In the new bungie.net you can customize the page with channels which display news or info of your choice. Oni Central is a choice for a Oni news channel! Go check it out!