RPS Feature Rats in the walls
When Great Warlord Queek Headtaker fell in battle, it wasn’t a particularly heroic end. Nor was it especially brave; he was fleeing from the battlefield when an enraged dinosaur trampled him. But the Skaven, Total War: Warhammer 2’s [official site] long-teased and recently revealed fourth race, don’t have much use for bravery or heroism. They’re sneaky, untrustworthy rodents, and for 30 turns of the campaign, I led them to several unchivalrous victories and one devastating defeat.
I’ve taken some flak for how much I like the first Project Cars. No, it’s not iRacing, but iRacing also doesn’t have AI that is ready to start a race at precisely 1:33 AM on a Tuesday night, pause halfway through because the popcorn started popping and the pan needs to be jiggled, and then resume after a light snack. I’m busy, and often the last thing I want to add to my gaming is scheduling.
The first game was a solid experience with a good simulation, and it had a ton of options that allowed you to play in pretty much any way. Oh, and it was bloody beautiful. Project Cars 2 [official site] is an evolutionary step forward. It’s much the same game, but the issues present in the first are getting some serious attention paid to them, and it all really comes down to better tire physics. Read the rest of this entry »
RPS Feature Surely shanked, no redemption
I didn’t spend long with the first The Escapists – time off for good behaviour, perhaps – but nonetheless, playing early code for its upcoming sequel was like slipping into an old jumpsuit. Nothing like as serious as Shawshank but not as catastrophically stupid as Prison Break, this was and is, essentially, a mash-up of simulation, roleplaying and crafting in which you had to devise a DIY Get Out Of Jail Free card for your little pixel-person.
The Escapists 2 [official site] eschews traditional sequel-strategies such as flashier graphics in favour of being a reworked, expanded and ante-upped version of the first. The result is a sandbox puzzle game of impressive scope and with copious shower scenes.
RPS Feature Hands-on gameprey
Behold the Quillshot – a living manifestation of ether, the mystical substance that keeps the flying archipelago of promising Monster Hunter tribute Dauntless [official site] aloft. It’s a majestic hybrid of stegosaurus and porcupine, the Quillshot, made up of wayward primal energies that must be freed lest the island beneath us crumble away. It’s also a bit of a dick. With Phoenix Lab’s Nick Clifford and Ian Tornay distracting the monster from the front, I try to land a few hammer strikes on its sweeping, icicle-covered tail. The Quillshot flops on its side, like a dog asking for a belly rub, and treats me to a fusillade of enormous spines from its rump.
As I limp away, frantically glugging a healing potion, it continues to spew spines in an arc, puncturing the earth all around me. If we’re going to fell this beast – or behemoth, to use the game’s parlance – we’re going to have to read its behaviour a little better, and work as a team.
RPS Feature Baby, it's cold inside
In the first week, we put the children to work. They weren’t forced into dangerous jobs, so we told ourselves, but when you’re living on the brink of extinction, what work is truly safe? One afternoon, a man collecting coal complained of numbness in his arm. Frostbite had taken hold. We could have left him to die but instead we opted for an experimental treatment.
He lost the arm and he’s no longer capable of contributing to our dying society. One more mouth to feed with no body of work beneath it. What should we do?
Frostpunk [official site] is a city-building survival sim from the studio that brought us This War of Mine and it is beautifully bleak.
RPS Feature Ptolemaic or break
During the Assassin’s Creed: Origins [official site] demo I played at E3, I pressed the wrong button and thought I’d broken the game. I was trying to switch to my bow while sneaking and I accidentally meditated, causing time to fast forward. The sun wheeled around the sky, sank below the horizon, and night fell. The developer guiding me through the experience – an environmental artist – was slightly taken aback, but we rolled with my mistake and I got an accidental peek at the nightlife of Ptolemaic Egypt. Colour me intrigued.
RPS Feature Waiting for dogot
Far Cry 5 [official site] is a Far Cry game. It’s impossible for me to say whether it’ll be a great Far Cry game, an adequate Far Cry game or a poor Far Cry game, but after playing it at E3, I can definitively state that it is a Far Cry game. Clearing out a town of angry cult members, I sniped, shotgunned, stealthed and ‘sploded my way through a bunch of buildings, and had a jolly good time.
You know about this though. You’ve played a Far Cry game, right? So let’s assume all of the vehicles and guns and missions are working fine, and if not we’ll figure that out when we have review code and can take a proper look. For now, it seems best to talk about the dog. Read the rest of this entry »
RPS Feature Warhammer is changing
Lizards riding dinosaurs. Almighty spells crackling through the sky. A dragon swoops down from above and collides with a stegadon as elves are torn apart and consumed by carnosaurs at its feet. Total War: Warhammer 2 [official site] brings even more spectacle to the battlefield, particularly with its lizardmen armies, but the campaign is looking like the most exciting part of the game.
Strategy games have a habit of petering out as you move toward the endgame. Anyone who’s played Civ (including Civ V designer Jon Shafer) knows the tedium of pushing end turn to watch the numbers grow, as your inevitable crawl toward victory or defeat plays out in turn-based slow motion. That’s partly because so many victory conditions involve watching the correct resource pile up in sufficient quantity, or painting the entire map in a certain colour. Discovery is a thing of the past, diplomacy has run its course, and there is nothing new under the sun. Creative Assembly are looking to change that.
RPS Feature Choose life, choose a fucking big mag cannon
Fallen cities swarming with the dangerous remnants of their human populations, alien battlefield commanders who resemble fantastical heroes, new rulesets for friendship and fear, and an actual active resistance out on the Geoscape. XCOM 2 [official site] is changing.
The War of the Chosen is “definitely the biggest expansion we’ve ever done”, lead designer Jake Solomon told us at E3. Introducing unique enemy champions doesn’t strike me as an obvious move for XCOM, so I asked Solomon how the concept of the expansion had developed, and whether he’d drawn any inspiration from Shadow of Mordor’s Nemesis system. And whether we can expect any terrors from the deep in the future.
RPS Feature Ship shapes
Skull and Bones [official site] is a game I’ve wanted for a long time. That has nothing to do with its setting or style, though a Black Flag follow-up of sorts is an attractive proposition – but, no, the appeal of Skull and Bones is more abstract. This is the result of Ubisoft having one of their apparently specialist studios build an entire game around their specialism. Almost like a mega-bucks version of the animation experimentations of Grow Home.
In this case, it’s not procedural animation. Here, we’re with Ubisoft Singapore and the wonders of water.
RPS Feature Bullet sponge begone
Destiny 2 [official site] comes with a lot of baggage. It’s the PC debut of an enormously successful new series from a mega-developer, and the original is precisely the kind of multiplayer co-op shooter that even some die-hard fans are a little burned out on after nearly three years of DLC and grinding for gear.
Enter Adam. I came to Destiny 2, at E3 last week, with barely enough baggage to fill a pencil case, having only played the demo of the original, and am immediately greedy for more. Whatever more it might offer. Destiny 2 is colour and light and the majestic spectacle of a Saturday morning cartoon and a space opera fused into a punchily satisfying shooter.
RPS Feature A world worth fighting for
The early stages of Wolfenstein 2: The New Colossus [official site] show the same blood, guts and heart that were key to the first game’s success. Described by Bethesda’s Pete Hines as “fucking bananas”, it’s a game of extremes, but it’s the care that it shows for its characters and setting that stand out as unique in the field of alt-history Nazi war-shooters. Alongside the silliness, the gore and the pulp fiction roots, there’s a core concern for humanity and its loss.
RPS Feature A farewell to arms
BattleTech [official site] finally brings mechs and mercs back to their turn-based tactical roots, and if the combat is backed by a worthy campaign mode, it’s likely to be one of my favourite games of 2017. I’ve only played the skirmish mode, against AI opponents, so I can’t assess the quality of the campaign. But the actual mech clashes are absolutely glorious, and as spectacular as any turn-based battles I’ve ever seen.
RPS Feature Refreshingly fathomable
A message for Mr. D. Jones Esquire. Over the next few weeks, thanks to unlikely-to-disappoint Cold War sub game Cold Waters [official site], your locker is going to see a lot of action. I strongly advise you to make space, grease hinges, and evict endangered echinoderms in readiness for the imminent deluge of mutilated missile frigates and battered boomers. Read the rest of this entry »
RPS Feature Make it different every time
Jon Shafer has joined Paradox to found and lead a new team and make a new strategy game, but work continues on At The Gates, the project Shafer has been developing independently for years now. It’s a 4X game that casts off many of the recognisable patterns of the genre. Instead of building an empire, you control a barbarian tribe trying to tear down an empire, or to co-exist alongside that empire. In this case, it’s the Roman empire. To survive, you’ll need to exploit resources, move with the seasons, and build a relationship with the world as well as your neighbours and companions.
RPS Feature Not a god-awful small affair
During the opening hours, you won’t see a single person in Surviving Mars [official site]. It’s a bold choice, having impersonal robots out there laying the groundwork of a colony, but the benefits are immediately obvious when watching the game in action. There’s a certain Factorium-like mechanical satisfaction to the flow of metal, creating supply chains that stud the surface with structures. The great advantage is the gradual shift from a red planet to a green planet though, even if those bubbles of green are few and far between.
More than any other city builder I can think of, Surviving Mars has the potential to show the life of a settlement, and it does that by beginning in a dead place.
RPS Feature ULYSSES 31
The Long Journey Home [official site] is a game about being lost in space and being somewhat insignificant against a backdrop of elder species who aren’t quite sure what to make of these squishy bipedal nomads called humans. It’s tempting to describe the game by breaking down the list of ingredients that appear to have gone into its preparation. There’s a dollop of FTL, a pinch of Captain Blood, a healthy dose of Star Control and a little bit of Space Rangers 2. Season with the essence of Thrust and Lander, and there you have it.
Except, no. That’s not really it at all.
RPS Feature Cathedral Tycoon
The Pillars of the Earth [official site] is doing a lot of difficult things and based on a brief play session earlier this week, I reckon it might be doing most of them very well indeed. I wasn’t quite sure what to expect, having never been a fan of Daedalic’s previous point-and-click output, but I came away impressed by both the tone and the design of this upcoming adaptation of Ken Follett’s novel about that raciest of topics: cathedral construction in 12th century England. Read the rest of this entry »
RPS Feature Masters of the universe
Last week I spent a day playing with Divinity: Original Sin 2’s [official site] Games Master mode, and now I want to force everyone I know to play pen and paper RPGs with me. If this is what I’ve been missing in the years since I last went full goth with weekend Vampire: The Masquerade sessions, I’ve had a wasted adulthood.
The GM mode is separate to the main game, using the Divinity ruleset in campaigns either released by Larian or created by players, who can then share those campaigns online or with friends to recreate a tabletop experience digitally. At the press event, we built a chunk of Ultima VII and then started cannibalising the good guys. Read the rest of this entry »
RPS Feature The world is singing
Before I played Figment [official site], I knew very little about it. I’d heard that it was set inside the mind of a person suffering from fears, doubts and anxieties, which made me think it’d be creepy or heart-breaking, but the screenshots suggested something far lighter and perhaps even humorous. Having played a few levels spread across the game, I’m delighted to find that Figment’s finest qualities couldn’t show themselves in screenshots or press releases. It’s a musical and I found it utterly charming.
