Early this morning, SCEA released an update for the MAG public beta bringing the version up to 1.30. This rather sizable updated saw about 8,000 updates and fixes - but the SCEA director of development, Seth Luisi, wasn't crazy enough to post 'em all at the PlayStation Blog. He did, however, give us a quick list of highlights from the changelog.

Surprise! SCEA's already been burning the midnight oil for the upcoming SOCOM: Confrontation v1.3 patch and guess what? They've actually also been able to squeeze in a new feature that wasn't revealed when the patch was initially announced: the Quick Match option! Go grab your buddies and spread the cheer - we're taking this to another level!

SOCOM: Confrontation's upcoming v1.30 patch update is looking quite a doozy. Better features, more fluid graphics, bug fixes, and the whole shebang. One of the biggest updates to be incorporated into the game will be the PS3 Trophy and SOCOM Awards system. Here's a bit of a preview on it from SCEA's very own Seth Luisi.

In another preview of the upcoming SOCOM 1.30 patch, Director of Development Seth Luisi noted the addition of a previously unannounced but very welcome feature to be included: D-pad lean-in controls. Videos were provided. Check it out in the full article.

SOCOM: Confrontation has already gotten patch after patch, but there's one feature that probably won't be making it into the game no matter how hard fans ask for it: joining a game in progress from a friends or clan list.

While SOCOM: Confrontation did manage to put up some big numbers since launch day, the game's online component hasn't been without its share of problems. To this end, SCEA Director of Development Seth Luisi has revealed that aside from rolling out server side updates to resolve the bottlenecks in the game's servers, there will also be a new client patch for client side stability issues.

Over on the official SOCOM website, Seth Luisi has revealed information regarding the public beta for SOCOM: Confrontation. Find out the full skinny on the Public Beta after the jump!

If you've already marked September 16 down for the release of Slant Six's SOCOM: Confrontation, you better get an eraser. The game's release has been pushed back a month to deliver "the best SOCOM online experience possible". More in the full article.

 

It's time for another of those "Inside the Developer's Studio" interviews on PlayStation Blog, and SCEA Director of Development Seth Luisi is on the hot seat. We'll be seeing a couple of games with him involved this E3: SOCOM: U.S. Navy SEALs Confrontation for PS3 and SOCOM: U.S. Navy SEALs Tactical Strike for PSP.

When asked what the PS3 can do to the SOCOM series that other consoles can't offer, he boasted of the machine's "[2.5-inch] serial ATA hard drive which allows us to use the hard disk drive for extremely fast data access." That said, Confrontation promises mind blowing graphics on the environment side.

Luisi stressed, "The environments are the real star in SOCOM: U.S. Navy SEALs Confrontation." Even so, other departments such as character appearance share the graphics spotlight. As proof, Luisi provided the images that you see above and below.

"The characters are also looking really good. The skin shaders, cloth shaders, normal maps, and highly detailed textures allow us to have extremely realistic characters in the game," he added. He also said that the game is still in pre-alpha stage, and improvements are bound to happen.

But on the question about his favorite part about developing games for a living, he answered, "That moment of relief and excitement when I finally see things working in the game as we meant them to be."

 

To see the full interview and discover Luisi's desire to sit with N'Gai Croal as much as his passion to make games, click on the read link below.

A lot of players have found the SOCOM series to be one of the best tactical shooters on the market today. It only makes sense that fans of the game are very interested to know the direction Sony Computer Entertainment America is planning to take this game. If you feel as passionately about this series as I do, then you'll want to read this.

In a recent interview, the director of development for Sony Computer Entertainment America Seth Luisi spoke about the upcoming SOCOM: Confrontation for the PlayStation 3. First off, he spoke on what they wanted to focus on and how they envision players playing it.

We want you to always be careful when you're going around a corner, because you may run into five guys coming at you the other way. We want you to really look at the environment and have to learn it to know all the different paths and different intricate ways that you can navigate the environment, so that you can find your own special routes and routes at different ways through it; so that you can really use the environment a lot more than we had in previously games. Because we kind of want the environment to be more of a part of the game in this one.

On a sadder note, fans of vehicles in-game may be a bit disappointed since it has been revealed the upcoming installment won't have any...initially. Some players might also be a bit apprehensive at the new approach that SCEE has taken with the game by going with a multiplayer-only format. Luisi gave the details on this, and why they decided to implement the game in this manner.

Well, I mean the configuration of the Playstation 3 was also a factor. PlayStation 3 is online out of the box. We're putting a big focus on the Playstation Network, the Playstation Store, so we really wanted to create a title that really took advantage of that, and having it be online focused allowed us to create this experience with a smaller team and within a smaller time frame and really--it just made a lot of sense for us for this title.

He gave so much information that we couldn't cover it all in one post, you can click on our read link to head over to the full interview.