A Walk In The Park With: The Hunter (free download inside)
 

Ever since I downloaded the Crysis demo, I thought that for the first time a commercial game has engine has reached the point where it could be a viable option to not just make games upon it, but interactive holiday trips, sight-seeing tours or maybe even schooling software.

Yesterday I started Avalanche Studio's The Hunter, and this comes out on top of Crysis. The Hunt is - nomen est omen - a hunting sim, think The Deer Hunter sporting some rather unique online features and a business modell that includes free-for-all play.

But most of all: the environment is a game in and on itself. So far there's two islands to wander, but updates are planned to be added all the time. Be it new landscapes, new deer or equipment. Anyway, I haven't fired a single shot, yet wandered around for what must have been hours. I listened to the birds when the sun went up, winched as fat beetle buzzed by my face, and took a walk in what must be some of the most beautiful woods, trails, hills and valleys ever created by mankind.

You don't need to like guns at all, you might as well detest hunting virtual deer entirelly, you could be a hobby biologist, a tourist or just somebody looking for a place to relax in for me to give you a recommendation. Avalanche could skip all the deer hunting stuff and sell this as an interactive sight-seeing tour. It's breath-taking. And it's well worth a look either way.

http://www.thehunter.com/

Hokey smokes! This looks incredible!

It sounds as much! Put on some headphones, get a cup of tea ready, put the in-game clock to 5 am and visit White Hart Island. If you're not looking for rampant action and thrills, you'll love it. You don't need a super expensive high end machine - in one of the lower resolutions my sub-standard GeForce 8600GT does pretty fine. It's hard to believe that the download weighs in at less than 400 megs. Screenshots might look great, but they don't do it justice when the sun casts its beams through the foliage, causing an amazing play of light and shadow. This is technology I'd love to see spreading amongst people not being involved with traditional games at all. Not that a deer hunting sim is what I consider to be gaming at its most traditional, mind you.

Imagine being able to travel the World's most beautiful places at any time you like to without having to worry about time and money, jet lag and sunburn at all! Bliss! ;)

- No elks yet. :frown:

Thanks for sharing! I've never heard of this, but it looks and sounds incredible. I've been waiting for a good hunting game for sometime......wait, why does the name sound so familiar?

My nickname is kadjisan, add me if you'd like.

Anybody spotted an animal so far? I mean, besides birds, flies, mosquitos, butterflies etc. :D I tried to find a mule, but even after an hour of tracking I couldn't find it. It's apparent that this is meant to be a real hunting sim, and it's even more apparent that I've never hunted in my entire life. But I found a nice thread on the topic at hand.

Ah what the heck, who needs to spot deers anyways if you've got shorelines, woods and lakes like this to feast your eyes on? :D

I managed to take down a mule, and decent one at that. I've never been hunting, but I have played/own every single hunting game of note, and many that should have been avoided.

They key is knowing where to look at what time during the day. Early in the morning animals deer and so forth tend to be on the outer edges of the map, and towards noon to maybe 4 or so when it gets hotter they will likely migrate to the middle of the map if it's got a lot of trees, and will almost always be found near a source of fresh water.

i'm in the process of downloading the game right now because of this thread. however, i'm very sceptical to say the least considering its only 400mb but i'll "give it a shot" (had to).
there seems to be a kind of multiplayer component to this? is this restricted to chatting on the website or can you go hunting with a friend?

Edit: Okay I've just walked around in it for a while, and yes I'm convinced, this is the best forest I've ever seen in a videogame. now this makes me mad, because "real games" haven't implemented anything on this scale yet and they should have. I'm thinking primarily about the upcoming Arma2