OK, I’m stupidly busy playing a bunch of games in my to-do queue (including of of the biggest surprises of the year, VBlank’ Games’ spectacular and hilarious Retro City Rampage for the Vita & PS3, coming soon to more platforms – BUY IT! ) and getting some Holiday Gift Guide products reviewed, but I may as well give you something to look at, so here you go: A lovely piece of art done for the classic PC game Another World (or Out of This World if you live in North America). For some reason, this game popped into my head (probably due to reading p a few too many posts about adventure games making a comeback this year when they never really disappeared in the first place) and I did a quick search to see if there was a site still up for this classic. Turns out there is and if you’re running WIndows XP, you can get a nice demo of that version to try out. It’s one of the all-time great (and hard!) adventure games that still brings back some find memories for me. OK, enough wistful nostalgia – back to the salt mines. Lots of updates to come this weekend!
Tag Archives: PC
Of Orcs & Men Launch Trailer: The Big Guy, The Little Guy And The World Against Them
OK, Of Orcs & Men is pretty much here already, so it’s all up to you out there to decide if it’s worth a buy. Tfe concept alone makes me want to drop the money on it, Yeah, yeah, orcs have been in PLENTY of RPGs and other games, but not quite like this and not with a goblin thief/assassin sidekick – and both are the main characters. If Spiders and Cyanide Studios can pull it off (they already have the great-looking visuals), it’s a surefire sleeper hit. If not, it’s a bargain bin special in a few weeks (a sad fate for a game that took a while to make and looks so solid). As always… we shall see…
Divinity Anthology Collector’s Edition: Sheer Heaven For RPG Fans
Larian Studios has a keen sense of humor as you can see above, but this is one serious collection you may want to grab from the Larian Vault before it’s sold out completely. A measly thirty bucks gets you three great RPGs and a ton of bonus content, meaning you’ll be trapped inside your home this fall and winter, calling in sick from work or something similar. All the best excuses are taken, by the way – just tell the truth and maybe get your boss hooked on these games as well, I say. Even though I own all three games on disc (and I have both versions of Divinity II on the Xbox 360), I’m sorely tempted to grab one of these CE packs before they vanish forever…
Anyway, click HERE to check out the complete listing of fun, fun stuff in this SIGNED retail (YES!) package that’s also available digitally (and unsigned) for those of you who like to pretend you have a game collection. Yeah, that’s right, I said it – you can take your Minority Report grabbing at air and pulling invisible files and stick that nonsense in the trash folder. Me, I want something that will fall on my hard head if I put it on the shelf wrong. Then again, I take care of my games, so fat chance of that happening…
October 16, people – get to the clicking and buying, already. Larian needs a new boat or car or string of polo ponies or something.
Evochron Mercenary: That Final Frontier Again, But A Hell of A Lot More Thrilling
I’m wrapping up my review for Endless Space (yeah, it took a bit longer than I thought, but I got hooked) and someone sends me a link to this video. Great, ANOTHER space sim to get tractor-beamed on for too long! Actually, Evochron Mercenary is a different bird in a number of ways I like and I’ve been hearing some great things about StarWraith Games, so on the to-do pile this one goes. I guess I’ll finally get to it in a few months, given all the games I still need to play. I’m actually afraid to go near something this deep again, as my free time has dwindled to just about zero or something below that. Then again, the weather is getting really chilly lately, so I may at least download a demo at some point sooner…
Spellshard Would Indeed Have Been An Awesome NES RPG…
Here’s a neat bonus from the OHRRPGCE game, Spellshard (yup, you should go grab it if you’re a retro RPG fanatic like I am). The guys behind the game even put together a fake color manual PDF that looks as if it was photocopied from an original (very clever) and even has a back cover with a piece of tape covering a small “tear” – that made me smile.
Anyway, I’ve only put about an hour into the game so far, but it’s definitely a nostalgic blast from the past. Granted, most of the games I’ve played using this engine have the same combat systems and menus, but they get the job done in delivering the feeling of camping out on the couch on a rainy weekend immersed in a nicely sized fantasy world.
Need For Speed Most Wanted: Criterion Clearly Hasn’t Burned Out Yet…
It’s been a ton of fun playing this upcoming competition-based racer at press events and it’s equally fun watching people play, especially those new to the crazed competition Criterion has created. You’ll be fighting for every challenge, as the game’s non-stop pace, open world and constant need for, well, SPEED n the bulk of the events will keep your fingers on their toes constantly. This could be the perfect party game for many and it’s definitely going to get people obsessively checking their Autolog scores or fearing the updates with their former best times smashed by someone else (probably within seconds or minutes). Naturally, if you hate being beaten, you can always play the game offline against the AI, but this is exactly the sort of game that encourages you to dive in with as many other live players as possible.
Random Unfinished Indie Game of the Week: DOOM RPG: Evil Unleashed
Even if you’re not a fan of turn-based RPGs, DOOM RPG: Evil Unleashed should be on your list of games to play before you’re worm food. Why? Well, between the intentionally retro visuals, great use of music (from a few sources) and reworked art assets from the original game and a solid level of difficulty, the game is a pretty nice surprise that will eat up your free time. Created by thespazztikone in the nicely versatile open-source game engine O.H.R.RPG.C.E. (Official Hamster Republic Role Playing Game Construction Engine!) and hopefully going to get polished up a bit more and updated with more episodes, the game hooks you in right away with a surprising amount of voice acting and a nice, slow buildup to the actual gameplay. Once you get into the combat and hear that familiar level end tune when you’re victorious, expect a grin to spread as the hours fly by.
XCOM: Enemy Unknown Launch Trailer: “Our Last Hope” Keeps Those Aliens’ Days Numbered…
2K Games and Firaxis are about to make a ton of gamers happy campers indeed with this upcoming reboot of the turn-based strategy classic and this should be one of those games that becomes highly regarded among new and old genre fans. Sadly and not so amusingly enough, rumors have it that the highly stylized FPS origin story (which has vanished off the radar for far too long), has been whined and focus-grouped dined into a watered down (and probably DLC-only) version of the turn-based game above with squad-based third-person gameplay. Talk about a developer not being able to do the game they set out to do in the first place. Great. Score another “victory!” for those who want to piss on creativity because they think one genre is “inferior” to another or ONLY caters to ONE type of player. System Shock, Thief, Half-Life, Arx Fatalis, Anvil of Dawn and other excellent POV titles are more that solid examples of smart “shooters” that were classics of their times is all I’ll say…
Anyway, I hope we at LEAST get something like a demo pr something PLAYABLE made available of the old version of this game before it got sent to development hell. Granted, it probably would have been dead at launch only to be rediscovered as one more “Hey! This game isn’t bad at all!” bargain bin special, but I guess 2K doesn’t want to deal with that factor (even after so much has already been spent on development). Feh. Sometimes, fans aren’t the smartest sticks in the shed because they hate things that may actually work well in a certain context they can’t wrap their heads around until they actually PLAY it. Same old hamburger and fries again? Sure!
Of Orcs & Men “Buddy” Trailer: On the Road to Sleeper Hitsville? We shall see…
With about a week to go before launch, I really haven’t seen much about this one. That may or may not be a good thing depending on who you ask. While it’s going to be buried in the juggernaut of more hyped launches this month and next, i think that if the game is good, it will no doubt find an audience over time (the way many of these RPGs do with fans who like seeing fantasy games that try to do things differently). If, on the other hand, the game is being skipped into stores like an assassin’s blade through the ribs of some unsuspecting target because it’s rough around the edges, then it’s a quick trip to the bargain bin or worse, a slow death as yet another fine game that took a lot of people a long time to do goes under appreciated. Hopefully, Focus Home Interactive’s PR folk here will be willing to let some of us interested types see what’s what and let you know, but I have no qualms about shelling out full price for a game that’s interesting enough to keep my interest for longer than some FPS or overblown titles with bigger budgets and less to do at the end of the day…
Tomb Raider: The Final Hours #2: Crystal Dynamics Gives Lara More Lift…
Second part in the “making of” series collaboration between Crystal Dynamics games journalist Geoff Keighley and hosted Zachary Levi (one of those actor/gamer types you probably know from some TV show or movie. I don’t know him, as I’m too busy playing too many games to pay attention to Hollywood types). This time out, it’s a look at the game’s story and what went into creating it. The “survival adventure” element and new take on the character will be the draw for me (OK, the amazing visuals are nothing to sneeze at) and I hope that this “reboot” gets the appropriate praise for what it does right and the proper amount of criticism for anything it misses. Of course, if poor Lara misses those jumps too many times, it’s back down to the depths of the bargain bin, right? Then again, I’m betting this will be light years better than some of the lesser games in the series older days. Angel of Darkness, anyone?
