By Jim Rossignol on January 8th, 2013 at 8:00 pm.
Death Inc. is a marvellous, horrible, brilliant, horrible idea. It’s this: “Guide Grim T. Livingstone, freelance reaper, through 1660′s England spreading fear, pestilence and most importantly, the bubonic plague.” You play a reaper in a cartoon 17th century, and your job is to harvest… people. Horrible, eh? But it looks so cute! Death Inc. is currently being developed by a team of former Lionhead, Media Molecule and Criterion devs – called Ambient Studios – and their mission is to create a “streamlined strategy, with no micromanagement or complex menus.” Their first game boasts a bunch of intriguing ideas, including the idea of “painting” your commands: “Paint with pestilence: Create routes to travel, areas to defend and flanking manoeuvres with simple mouse strokes.”
We’ve contact ambient for more information, because we suspect we’re going to want to keep a close eye on this one.
08/01/2013 at 20:19 eartsidi says:
like Laura answered I’m blown away that any one able to profit $9377 in one month on the internet. did you read this page http://www.Cloud65.com
08/01/2013 at 20:22 Berzee says:
Too soon.
08/01/2013 at 20:31 RedViv says:
First War of the Roses, now this. Dreadful.
08/01/2013 at 21:30 Sleepymatt says:
Wait for the sequel, Death Inc 2: The Great Fire. Still raw in the memory…
08/01/2013 at 22:54 Kingmarzo says:
Well played sire
08/01/2013 at 20:30 RedViv says:
That sounds rather Galcon-ish to me.
08/01/2013 at 20:30 razorramone says:
“streamlined strategy” – has there ever been a game calling itself this which has turned out well? The whole fun of strategy is the depth and breadth it offers.
08/01/2013 at 20:31 RedViv says:
Accessibility does not necessitate simplicity.
08/01/2013 at 20:36 Hoaxfish says:
I’m hoping it’s less boring than Tower Defense “strategy”. The game looks lovely.
08/01/2013 at 20:42 Chris D says:
Seeing how you asked there’s Swords and Soldiers, Atom Zombie Smasher, XCOM(new version), Unity of Command and we haven’t even started on board games yet.
I love a good in depth strategy game too but easily the most common cause of death in the genre is collapsing under it’s own bloated weight. Sometime less is more. More is sometimes more too but if you’re going down that path you need to be really good or really lucky to get away with it.
08/01/2013 at 21:06 Tiax says:
DEFCON and Multiwinia would like a word with you…
08/01/2013 at 21:35 Berzee says:
Were those self-dubbed “streamlined”? Or were they just streamlined?
08/01/2013 at 21:38 Zenicetus says:
Sid Meier’s Pirates!, Spore (flawed but still some neat ideas), and Darwinia, to name a few.
I’m a fan of deep strategy games too, but there’s room for more than one approach to strategy games. Especially when the theme is fairly light-hearted like Pirates!… and possibly this one also, based on the graphics and potential comedy in the idea.
09/01/2013 at 03:50 Berzee says:
Sir, I think people chose to disregard the “calling itself” bit of your post (it might apply to some of the crushing counterexamples that were supplied, but I suspect it was not considered).
09/01/2013 at 13:04 Chris D says:
I may be wrong but isnt Razorramone’s point that being streamlined isn’t something games should aspire to but embrace theircomplexity instead? In which case it’s not particularly significant whether a game is actually streamlined or merely describes itself as such. Both require an intent on the part of the designers that he would disagree with.
08/01/2013 at 20:35 Hoaxfish says:
http://www.pcgamer.com/2013/01/08/death-inc-plague-spreading-strategy-from-the-makers-of-fable-burnout-and-littlebigplanet/
08/01/2013 at 20:52 wodin says:
looks fun..
08/01/2013 at 21:12 FurryLippedSquid says:
Love the sound of this.
It’s got me all nostalgic for Ecstatica for some reason…
08/01/2013 at 21:54 webwielder says:
>We’ve contact ambient for more information
Proofreading?
08/01/2013 at 22:36 Kefren says:
Is the title a reference to a PWEI song on their last album, Dos Dedos?
08/01/2013 at 23:08 Lambchops says:
Nope (I say with hopefully not misplaced confidence!). It’s this absolutely amazing tune (which I loved playing in Rock Band, even though my drumming friend hated the change in time signature!) :
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AUO_5EALZoM
I clicked on the article because of the reference and stayed because the game looks rather lovely. Though it could perhaps do with more cowbell.
08/01/2013 at 23:15 webwielder says:
I guess people make Don’t Fear the Reaper references a lot more in the USA…
08/01/2013 at 23:43 Lambchops says:
I wouldn’t know being from the UK. I just really like the song and remembered last minute there’s a sketch about it!
09/01/2013 at 20:55 Kefren says:
Ah, of course, I know that song from Rock Band as well, it is great. I play Rock Band regularly with friends!
09/01/2013 at 20:55 Kefren says:
It’s obvious once you pointed it out! :-)
09/01/2013 at 04:39 2helix4u says:
So… its Plague Inc. but 3d?
09/01/2013 at 06:54 Xzi says:
It doesn’t sound much like Plague Inc at all. Which is too bad, because I’d love to see a fully rendered version of that game, in which you can zoom into regions or even cities and have stuff to do, as well as watch people puke their guts out.
09/01/2013 at 05:14 luckystriker says:
Their homepage was irresistibly cute to me. It was almost tomb much.
09/01/2013 at 10:39 solidsquid says:
There’s the scything wit I was looking for
09/01/2013 at 06:44 Harlander says:
Getting a similar vibe to that game where a cutesy papercraft London is swept up in a cutesy papercraft welter of destruction and chaos in riots – the name of which I can’t place right now
09/01/2013 at 09:29 jatan says:
do you mean wildfire
http://wildfireworlds.com/
09/01/2013 at 10:52 Harlander says:
That’s the fella
09/01/2013 at 08:46 RogB says:
tilt shift FTW
09/01/2013 at 11:39 lordcooper says:
This looks pretty interesting,
09/01/2013 at 12:52 SuicideKing says:
Looks like Jim Rossignol is a Blue Oyster Cult fan.
09/01/2013 at 05:00 Wreckdum says:
^ This fucking retard forgot to put their keylogger link. lol
09/01/2013 at 12:11 lordcooper says:
Uh, what?