Shiny Entertainment, creators of the hotly anticipated MDK plan to create a multiplayer add-on for the game. MDK shipped 285,000 copies on day one of its European launch and U.S. publisher Playmates Interactive has announced initial shipping figures in excess of 100,000 for it's May 6th retail launch.

Already the playable demo has been one of the hottest downloads around and the game is about to be boosted by the release of a patch for 3Dfx graphics accelerators. This patch has just gone into testing and will be out on the Internet as soon as this process has been passed.

Multiplayer MDK was one of the talking points during development and Shiny boss Dave Perry commented that they would consider doing it if demand was great enough. That demand has flooded in and so the development begins in earnest this week. Perry told PC Games "this won't just be a tweak to MDK, we're going to make it a full retail disc [retailing around $29] that will be an add-on to the original". Although it won't feature any new single player levels, the multiplayer version will have a bunch of all new levels that utilize the sniper mode technology.

"We have to make Kurt polygonal" Perry commented "so we're going to take until Christmas to do it". Internet, LAN, serial and direct modem connection will all be supported although the number of players has yet to be decided, although Perry promises "whatever it will be, it will be impressive." Who's to doubt that? Shiny's positive response to consumer feedback has also seen them add a save game feature to the US version that is missing from the European release. The European game only allows saving to be done at the end of each level and after demand warranted, the May 6th release will feature a one-key press 'save at any time' feature.-Rob Smith