Rock, Paper, Shotgun

Felt a little mean writing this one. Whilst Rossignol quite liked the demo of Indie-RTS Project: Aftermath, I really didn’t enjoy it at all. Still, brutality is sometimes the job. It’s not all fun and games this fun and games. Anyway – review go!

This feels like the polar opposite of what I should be doing, which is playing ultra-graphics RTS World In Conflict. Don’t Look Back is a simplistic, but very tricky, pixel-art platformer by Terry Cavanagh. It’s really well done, and escalates into insanity. You can play it over on Kongregate, and I found it via the mighty TIGSource. Right, time to get back to listening to this and writing about the apparently endless march of strategy games.

This latest huge documentary from Bioware/LucasArts (below) features of tonnes of new information about the upcoming Star Wars MMO, although the in-game footage is somewhat lacking. The piece mostly looks at the story and player experience, heavily illustrated with concept art, whilst also exploring some of the context for the Old Republic – the treaty between Sith and Jedi that creates the tense period in which the game starts out. It’s pretty interesting – suggesting more and more than this might just be the Star Wars MMO that works. Go take a look.
Read the rest of this entry »

It would be fun to extrapolate a kind of superheroic Splinter Cell from this new stealth-action trailer, but I don’t suppose the reality of Arkham Asylum will be anything like as precise as Ubi’s military infiltrations. Nevertheless the BatAction does look fairly entertaining, with plenty of swooping and batarang-ing. I’m wondering whether this or Wolverine will win out in the third-person action stakes. I guess we’ll find out on June 9th, for that is when Arkham Asylum is release on all formats.
Read the rest of this entry »

After last Sunday’s peek into the peculiar world of German simulations, I thought I’d go mainstream this week and draw attention to a free Portuguese-language action-adventure featuring swordplay, art appreciation, and conversations with Voltaire and Rousseau. Having stumbled through about twenty minutes of Tríade so far, I’m convinced it’s both “The finest Brazilian-made game about the French Revolution I have ever played” and also “Probably not worth downloading”. 
Read the rest of this entry »

Or “I’ve got something stuck in my wormhole.” This is only likely to be of interest to Eve players, or people interested in the exploits of Eve players, but I think it’s worth a post. Beyond the jump is a video tutorial for the new exploration system for Eve Online, the probe cleverness that allows you to find wormholes, and other exploration sites. There’s also some detail on this developer blog, and also this one. Via Massively.
Read the rest of this entry »

Sundays are a day for organising hook ups with brothers and sisters in arms. Can I arrange two meals with friends in a day? It seems unlikely. So instead of even trying that stuff, let’s just compile a particularly bountiful list of intelligent game pieces from across the week while trying to avoid linking to the free single Art Goes Pop gave me for attending a gig on Monday.

• Probably the big talking piece in serious videogames this week. The Rapeplay debate continues to cross over to the mainstream with ally-of-RPS Leigh Alexander’s even-handed piece on it for serious-big-boy site Slate. Which gets picked up all over the place. Leigh adds some thoughts on the whole situation here.
• Tangentially connected, CNET on whether the videogame industry is losing the PR battle. Primarily, noting the industry has always done very little to stand up to those who want to demonise gaming, both in terms of the impact to health and morality. I think I agree with this one, and the don’t-cause-a-fuss-isms is increasingly embarrassing. There’s certainly developers I wonder whether I can be bothered defending when they don’t do so themselves.

Read the rest of this entry »

You people like bargains, right? Well, have some bargains. SavyGamer‘s LewieP has kindly compiled the most agreeably cut-priced PC gaming deals to be had on this fine weekend – most of which can be downloaded right now, thus saving you from the tragic perils of a listless Sunday. There is no rhyme or reason to our picks, beyond simply pointing you at some fine games you might have missed out back when they carried a full-fat pricetag. So, what’s in the bucket this week?
Read the rest of this entry »

We’ve begun exploring the unknown systems of wormhole space in Eve Online. I had my first encounter with the freaky Sleeper alien ships last night. I then returned to normal space slightly richer, and slightly wiser. The wormhole – an unstable, temporary gate to an uncharted region – was still open when I logged out of Eve, and so I let my corporation chums know it was there. About an hour later one of them IM’d me: “We’re trapped. The wormhole closed behind us.” His account of the event is posted below.

Read the rest of this entry »

As well as offering some splendid desktops – the image above is from one of them – the Stalin Versus Martians chaps have been busy. In a cultural alliance between creative beings of a similar artistic muse, the game will feature the video of the Gogol Bordello-meets-Teutonic-metal of ANJ song “Gorbachev”. You’ll find the video beneath the cut. You’ll want to watch it.
Read the rest of this entry »

‘Tis the season to be inundated with World War II real-time strategy games. The most recent is this: the dusty North African sequel to the original Theatre of War, and what the creators claim is the “most realistic WWII game ever”. So realistic it’ll leave sand in your tea, or something. The 786mb demo features a tutorial level and what is apparently a single level from the US campaign, “The Battle of Sidi Bou Zid”. I’ve not had a chance to play it yet, so perhaps someone who has will kindly share their thoughts on it below.

The full game is out in the 24th of April, and there’s a whole bunch of money-saving pre-order shenanigans going on over at there developer’s online publishing portal here.