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Pyro lights the TEK Christmas tree By Chris Williams. Published: 17th Dec 2002, 20:09:03 | Permalink | Printable"Jingle Bells, jingle bells, jingle all the way. O' what fun it is to ride in a laser armed tank, O.." Games aren't normally our thing and while we'd rather leave such matters in the usual capable hands of AcornArcade (and the original AcornGaming), it appears that on this occasion, for the moment at least, the aforementioned portal appears to be appreciating past treasures instead of this week's exciting news from Artex. It's as if the RISC OS games house has donned a ridiculously huge red Father Christmas suit, handed out generous helpings of sugar and E-number packed sweets and merrily declared how we've all been very, very good little boys and girls this year.
 Developed by Artex, TEK 1608 is a strategic war game released in May earlier this year, around the Wakefield 2002 show. Seven months on, winter has well and truely enveloped us and you may be wondering how to pass the time during these long, cold winter nights. This is where Artex's Pyro hype comes running into shot. As announced this week on Artex's website, Pyro is an update for TEK that will feature new laser and rocket weapon systems among other improvements. To be honest, when we think of "hot", "fire" and "RISC OS", we get reminded of stories of Acorn monitors doing log fire impressions but that's another story.
Having picked up a top 5/5 rating from AcornGaming's review as well as "congratulations from fans", Artex have been busy updating TEK using a mix of player criticism amd their own ideas and features. What's more, this Pyro update will made available completely free to TEK owners via the Artex website and we're told the release date is sometime next week. Artex feel this is an excellent time for users to purchase TEK, if they have not yet already done so.
Jan Klose of Artex kindly sent us an email about the Pyro Update, highlighting the follow features:
- The AI for the units has been given a dose of added competence; they can now help each other in more cleverer ways and as a result of being totally rewritten, the new wayfinding system enables units to move around other units and obstacles in ways smarter than their predecessors.
- The 'fog of war', the game mechanic that hides unexplored areas of the map, is now much smoother which enhances the visual appearance of the game.
- The game is more stable with most of the previous stability issues being resolved.
"Due to a new missile and laser system as well as more colourful bullets, mixed with some more explosions, battles become much more vivid and tactically challenging", Jan tells us. "For example, tanks which are outside the visible area can use their long-range missiles to attack targets that are seen by their allies."
Ho, ho, ho. Who needs mistletoe when you can have a TOW Missile?
Links
Artex Software
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