A few days back Paradox Interactive released the latest DLC for Crusader Kings 2, entitled The Old Gods. The primary focus of this expansion is the Pagans, most especially the Norse, hence the name. After eagerly snapping it up I’ve spent the last few days playing it pretty intensively and I can safely say now that it’s my favorite of all CK2 DLC and I don’t want to ever play without it again.
The big change you’ll see right away is the new start date – 867 AD, when Ragnar’s sons are leading the Great Heathen Army out of Jorvik and seeking revenge upon Ælla of Northumbria, the Pagan faiths remain mighty across much of Northern and Eastern Europe, the Umayyads control most of Iberia, Charlemagne’s descendants control the Frankish Realm, the Magyars are migrating westwards, and a few small territories cling to the ancient faith of the fire, still following the words of the Prophet Zoroaster. Given that the game used to run from 1066 to 1453, adding another 200 years extends the game time by 50%. The new starting date gives a completely different set of possibilities and the world can go in radically different directions as a consequence.
Even the words of Mani can revive. The AI did all this by the way.
There are many new features to play with as a Pagan, especially the Norse, who got the most love in this expansion. Perhaps the most fun is the raiding mechanic. You grab your lads, toggle them into being Raiders, load them onto the longships, and then you sail off to find some rich, fat provinces to loot. You can claim a percentage of the province’s loot just by standing in it, or you can stick around to win the siege and you’ll get whatever wealth was behind the castle walls as well. It’s exceedingly powerful in the early game, especially as the Vikings can navigate major rivers. You can sail up the Elbe, or the Danube, the Vistula, the Rhine, and so on, and pillage inland provinces as well as coastal ones. However, as forts grow mightier, rivers start becoming impassable, cutting your options – and as provinces develop, they grow richer, but can summon larger armies in their defense as well.
You can also do such things as taking captured maidens as concubines, raising runestones to yourself or your parents (and if you have the lustful trait you can insist the runestone makes reference to your massive cock), hold Blots at which you sacrifice people to the Allfather, find magical +2 axes that boost your martial score, and try to reform and standardize your faith in order to help it stand against the very convincing missionaries regularly sent by Christian rulers to try to convert you.
In short, with The Old Gods installed, Crusader Kings 2 becomes the greatest Viking Asshole Simulator ever put to code and if you like CK2, or grand strat games, or Vikings, or just generally being a massive troll to the Christian rulers of medieval Europe, this is the DLC for you. It also bears mentioning that Paradox are one of the few who get DLC right – you actually get regular, significant content additions for very fair prices, and the other stuff like portrait and music packs are entirely optional and in no way required for you to enjoy the game.
Recently, a game called Waking Mars went on Steam sale for a steal (and it still is on sale, by the way!) Because it had “Mars” in the title, I decided to snap it up. This, my friends, was a very wise decision. This game is more than worth the $2.50 I forked over for it. Basically, this is how you make a casual game.
It’s sort of a platformer, except you have a jetpack. And it’s sort of puzzle game, but none of the “puzzles” ever leave you frustrated. Basically the game is about exploring underground Martian caves, learning about (and growing and breeding) bizarre alien species, talking to your AI bro, and in general being comfy. Yes, this is a comfy game.
We are gonna get comfy.
This isn’t a triple-A title by any means and the game is easy to pick up and learn but this by no means makes it shallow. You actually have an neat little story going on that keeps you interested throughout, and between this and the research you can do on various lifeforms (and the subsequent notes you can read), the game has a surprising amount of depth for what it is. Humor is here too, thanks to your AI companion, and so is a certain amount of thoughtfulness thanks to the main character. Speaking of the main character, he’s Chinese, and the only other human character in the game is a black woman. This isn’t made a big deal, it just… is, like any other normal thing, and I like how it’s done like that. It reminds me of Star Trek and it’s nice to see some variety in games.
Overall this is a fun and extremely relaxing romp through a mysterious and alien world and I really cannot stress how much of a steal the current sale price is. The game is also available for Mac, Linux, iPhone/iPad, Android, and probably an old toaster too, so you really don’t have an excuse not to snag this game. I mean, really, look at this and tell me this doesn’t make you want to explore strange new worlds, seek out new life and new civilizations, and boldly go where no one has gone before:
Yeah I went to see Iron Man One recently it was a pretty great conclusion to the trilogy AAAAAAAAAAAAARRRRRGGGGG WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU MICROSOFT. Anyway with that out of the way we’ve had our presentations on the next gen consoles, the PS4 and XBox FUCKING THREE. The WiiU also exists I guess but that’s “next gen” in a strictly chronological sense only. But don’t let that scorn mislead you – I’m not insulting Nintendo because I prefer one of the others. No no, this coming generation doesn’t seem to be offering an obvious place to plant one’s flag, and if you’re an idort who gets every console then you’re just getting suckered out of even more money – the difficulty choosing doesn’t stem from multiple excellent options. Quite the opposite.
XBox VI’s presentation a couple of days ago was maybe a little better than the PS4 presentation that took place awhile back, because they actually had a console to show and the whole thing seemed to hang together a bit more professionally than the Sony affair. Unfortunately they didn’t leverage that into provoking even the tiniest bit of excitement about the thing!
If you’ve not yet seen it, here’s the Microsoft presentation in full:
They did mention a sports game that wasn’t Cawladooty, but it was something weird called Quantum Break that provided no information whatsoever on what the hell it is. At first I actually thought it was some crazy successor to old-school FMV games which would admittedly be rad as hell, but the confusion doesn’t exactly serve to sell games or consoles.
Microsoft did announce 15 exclusives in the first year of release, of which fully 8 are new IPs – and that part is interesting and positive. Perhaps among those will be some good games that make genuinely innovative used of the new hardware. But between the pseudo-always-on requirements and the shenanigans to fuck over used games, I’ve got very very little interest in getting one of the things. I’ve got very little interest in any of the new generation in fact – someone’s going to have to impress me at E3 if they want my moolah because otherwise I’m just going to upgrade my PC.
What do you folks think about it all? Am I being too harsh on the next generation? Are you similarly dissatisfied with the state of console gaming today? Do you, like me, already have an XBox One sitting right there in your house WHAT ARE YOU DOING NO MS I WON’T CALL IT THAT, I WON’T
A small game which came out recently hit the headlines for a reason that wasn’t to do with the game itself so much as the game’s response to piracy. It’s pretty hilarious! But let’s have a word about the game itself before we get into that.
Game Dev Tycoon takes its cues from Game Dev Story, an iOS/Android game wherein you control a videogame development house with the intent of making money and great games. I’ve not played GDS but GDT is a very enjoyable little game that’s well worth the few bucks it costs to get – in fact it’s got one of the better money-to-time ratios of games I’ve recently shelled out for. The game starts you out in around 1980, working out of your garage, making games for the C64 era – you decide on the theme and genre, hopefully ones that go well together (Although I did once put out a Fashion RTS that sold surprisingly well) you choose various base options such as whether the game will be text based or 2D or what have you, and then you assign time to various aspects of development, so you can spend loads of time writing backstory at the expense of graphics. Then you watch your little girl or guy beaver away as the game gets made, and it gets sent out for review and release – your choices in development influence how well it does, and high review scores translate into high sales, and that means money – allowing you to invest that much more into your next game!
Where GDT triumphs is that it is constantly tantalizing you with some new aspect you can work with in your games. Your first few games will be very simple affairs but soon you’ll be able to knock together an engine that affords you more choices, better graphics and sound options, and so forth. New consoles will start to come out, loving parodies of real ones such as the Vintendo Super TES, and different systems tend to appreciate different genres and so on. Then you’ll move into a small office, which is where the game really opens up as you can hire new staff, train yourself and them, and start making bigger and better games. Ultimately you can create MMOs, put out your own consoles, invent a Steam-equivalent, and spend tens of millions on Triple-A games that take your team a year to make only to result in 5/10s across the board and imminent bankruptcy.
>mfupon being offered a loan with a 100% interest rate.
Indeed, the main failing I can point to in this game is that there’s just not enough of it, which is hardly fair to say of something made by a two-man outfit and is faint damnation anyway. But I do hope they think about an expansion pack or at least some more patches, just to increase your choices and options. Anyway as I said it’s an enjoyable little game and if you’ve got a few bucks and want something that doesn’t strain the brain but will keep you engaged for awhile, there’re worse choices than this.
Now, let’s talk about how I heard about the thing – as an indie game it’s obviously going to struggle to get much media attention, but a very clever little play on the devs’ part got it out there like whoa. See, the devs – brothers Patrick and Daniel Klug – were well aware they would suffer from piracy when this game hit the torrents, but rather than making a lot of bluster or seeking out an attackdog lawyer they did something subtler and cleverer. What they did is upload the thing to torrent sites themselves. Crazy, right? Well the thing is the version they uploaded played normally up to a point, but after awhile in-game you would start getting messages about how all your games are being pirated and you’d start losing money due to it no matter how good your games are. You wouldn’t be able to finish the game due to this, instead going into ignominious bankruptcy.
So, this is a pretty neat solution anyway because it’s essentially a fairly decently sized demo that might encourage a few purchases they wouldn’t otherwise get. The real comedy gold started when people on the forums began to complain about the pirates in-game, as apparently self-awareness is something some people utterly, totally lack. Perhaps the greatest line I’ve seen written is the simple, plaintive question, “I mean can I research DRM or something?” Beautiful. You can take a proper look at the whole story on the dev’s blog here if you’re interested, it’s well worth a read if you want a laugh!
“You’re late to the party, Pike!” Yes, I am, and I’ve no real excuse. But if you’re like me and slow when it comes to playing new games and haven’t hit this one yet, then read on.
Very recently I played through the original Deus Ex in its entirety. I went even further than that, though: I played it in full pacifist/stealth mode, avoiding encounters when I could and using darts or my prod when I couldn’t. I’m relatively certain I managed to get through the entire game without killing a soul aside from maybe a couple of bosses. It was fun. And challenging. And long. If you have never played the original Deus Ex, rest assured that it’s an incredibly long game. Worth it, though.
From there the plan was to move on to Invisible War but it decided that it wasn’t going to work on my computer. Undeterred, I decided to jump ahead to Human Revolution.
And damn, I had a blast with it. As soon as I got into it I hardly stopped playing, often going on for six or eight hour stretches. It really did hit a lot of things right on the head correctly. The atmosphere, the story, the questions it raises– oh, and of course all the little love letters to fans of the first game. Seriously, every time a radio started playing the UNATCO theme I’d stop and listen.
I was also fond of the character development of Adam Jensen and how you, as the player, get to influence this. Like Adam, you as the player are learning about using your augmentations as you go along, and like Adam, you get to see both the positive and negative effects that these can have.
Mostly positive, of course.
The game also came with some neat mini-games in the way of the hacking mechanic and being able to influence people with your pheromone aug (which isn’t really a mini-game but it reminded me of Oblivion’s speech minigame, so.)
Anyways, this was a highly enjoyable game all around and I think it’s easily one of the best AAA titles to hit gaming anytime in the last handful of years. I highly recommend it for anyone who hasn’t played it yet, regardless of whether or not you’ve played the original Deus Ex– although if you haven’t played that yet, well, get to it!
Hey everyone, Pike here! Yes, yes, I know. I’m scared too. Anyways, let’s get down to business, shall we? By which I mean VIDEO GAMES! Always video games.
I’ve played quite a few games over the past couple of months and at the moment I’m trying to get into Dark Souls. Trying, but I don’t know if I’ll succeed. See, I’ve put a few hours into it and after spending the bulk of those hours trying to figure out the controls (which seem rather unintuitive to me), I have come to the conclusion that this is, in fact, not an action game. Rather, it is a puzzle game that happens to be dressed as an action game. It’s a puzzle game that requires an intense amount of trial and error and repetition to learn patterns and muscle memory and that sort of thing.
It’s a neat idea and I wholeheartedly support anyone who’s into it! But I’m not sure if I am. There’s only so much trial and error that I can take before I get bored. This is the reason why I’ve yet to beat some really neat (and mostly indie, oddly enough) games like Super Meat Boy and Braid which I think are brilliant but which bore me when I get stuck at a certain level. I can only do repetition in small doses.
Average day in Dark Souls right when you think you’ve got a section figured out
Does this make me a “casual” or too willing to give up? Maybe. That’s cool, though. My backlog is getting bigger by the day so rather than banging my head against a game that I can’t get into, I think it’s better to move along. I might continue to pick at it every now and again and see what happens.
Still, I can see the appeal if you really like testing yourself like that, so if it sounds like your sort of game and you like dying, then go check it out. Mister Adequate has a lovely and optimistic post about it so go check that out too!
Introversion, makers of widely-acclaimed games such as DEFCON and Darwinia, are currently working on their newest game, called Prison Architect. In another case of games being accurately named, in PA your job is to design and run a penitentiary, somewhat in the vein of Bullfrog’s Theme Hospital. But the comparison isn’t totally accurate because although Prison Architect has a fairly goofy graphical style it plays the prison theme fairly straight, unsettlingly so at times.
The basic premise is as you’d expect from any such management game – you need an array of services (divided into rooms in this case) such as cells, kitchens, canteens, admin offices, etc., and you need to plan these out in a way that is efficient with regards to the space you’ve got to work with, your finances, and to ensure things run smoothly. This last point is where Prison Architect is clever and differs from a lot of similar games. Prisoners, of course, are not there by choice. Many of them are there for violent offences, and the stresses of prison life will mean they’re often close to breaking point and minor provocations can set them off. Prison Architect is rare, perhaps even unique, in that rather than designing a theme park people want to visit or a hospital people want to move through easily, you’re fighting against your inmates insofar as you’re trying to keep them in the prison and out of trouble.
Shape up Hennevig or you’re back in Solitary!
This creates a lot of interesting dynamics that work against each other to create tension. You want a prison that keeps your inmates in, but you also want one that minimized time spent moving around and which your staff can navigate easily. You want to keep your prisoners out of trouble, but the same gentle hand that might reduce their propensity for it will also make it more difficult to rein in if trouble does start. Conversely if you’re a brutal sonofabitch that seems fine to begin with, but your inmates will find a way to express their anger and then you’ll have to repair their toilets or replace their beds or even inform some guard’s family that he’s a goner.
Part of the reason PA is a fascinating game is of course the subject matter. Introversion have said they intend to tackle most of the issues which might arise in a prison – violence, gangs, smuggling, and so far that does seem to be borne out. It stands in contrast to games like Theme Hospital, as disease and death are serious issues but can’t be taken terribly seriously when the diseases are things like Bloaty Head Syndrome and Hairyitis. In this game your inmates are there for crimes like armed robbery, murder, and assault, and the tutorial revolves around a repentant man being sent to the chair. It’s rather affecting stuff and it’s going to be very interesting to see how the game tackles these issues at it continues to develop and more mechanics are implemented.
You may also be interested in watching this presentation by the Introversion devs; it’s a fascinating look at where PA came from and what they’re hoping to do with it.
Prison Architect is still in alpha, and it’s rather pricey for an alpha, but it’s already a very enjoyable and playable game and it’s from an eminently talented developer. If management games of this sort are your thing then rejoice, because there’s finally a good new one in the works.
I don’t want to know where Lim was hiding that knife whilst naked.
Hello all! No, you’re not seeing things, you’ve actually just got a little message on twitter or whatever telling you your very favorite videogaming blog of all time has updated. Let’s get right to business and start talking about some videogames!
So chances are good that you’ve heard of the game Dark Souls which was made by From Software. It is the successor to Demon’s Souls, a game which wasn’t released outside Japan but thanks to having English-language options managed to become a cult hit thanks to importation. Sadly it’s only on the PS3 so nobody has actually played it because who owns one of those, but Dark Souls has been released on 360 and PC as well, and it’s on the latter of these that I’ve been playing the game.
Dark Souls is infamous for its difficulty and this is not a reputation it has gained without reason. This game is difficult in the old-school sense, in that it’s uncompromising and you’re going to have to learn things like enemy attack patterns, how to block and parry and dodge, and level layouts to progress.
Turns out they occasionally do make ’em like they used to
So here’s the thing: Until you have done some of that and get a handle on what you’re doing, this game can be really unfun to new players. It takes time to get into it, to find what works for you, to get into the flow of it. For me I didn’t really ‘enjoy’ the game until a few hours in, in fact I put it aside for a few weeks before being convinced to go back to it. And I’m glad I did, because once I did pass that stumbling block I really got into it – it’s a game that really rewards your investment and is one of the quintessential examples of “What you get out depends on what you put in”.
Of course any game which takes that long to get into is a flawed game, and I won’t say Dark Souls is perfect by any stretch. I enjoy the exploration and learning immensely but I’m not a tremendous fan of just how obscure the game can be about some things. But if you’re looking for an amazing experience and something to really get your teeth into then what you’ve heard about Dark Souls is pretty much all true – it’s a seriously great piece of software which does a great many things right and very few things wrong, and of those things it does wrong much is a matter of taste.
Basically what I’m trying to say is Dark Souls is superb and if you’re not already on the bandwagon you need to join it.
IMPORTANT LINKS FIRST
Here’s hype: http://www.gordonmcneil.com/VGCW_Orch.mp3
Here’s the Twitch: http://www.twitch.tv/bazza87/new
Here’s a Wiki: http://vgcw.wikia.com/wiki/Video_Game_Championship_Wrestling_Wiki
Here’s a guy uploading prior matches with chat: http://www.youtube.com/user/VGCWclem/videos?flow=grid&view=0
Okay so here’s the deal: Every now and the a dude named Bazza (AKA Baz McMahon) streams something called Video Game Championship Wrestling on Twitch. The idea is that he sets up matches in THQ’s WWE 2013 where all characters are AI-controlled, and then he lets it go from there while he plays appropriate vidya music and chat goes insane.
If this sounds incredibly stupid, good, because it is. It’s also incredibly entertaining and amusing, but it’s really hard to convey it without watching it, but I really suggest you do so because it’s the highlight of my day when it comes on. Bazza’s got an irregular schedule but he confirmed that there’s a show tonight (Season 2 finale!) that’s going to be seriously epic. So if you like the idea of Donkey Kong and Duke Nukem beating the hell out of each other while Vegeta jobs and Adam Jensen rides into battle on an augmented teleporting motorbike, then THIS IS FOR YOU!
This is Captain Falcon FALCON KICKING Protoman off the top of a cage and through the announcer’s table.This is Ghost Nappa superplexing Gaben so hard the goddamn ring breaks.
Look just take my word for it: You want to get comfy and watch this. Pre-show starts at 10pm UK time, which is 5pm Eastern/2pm Pacific. The show proper starts an hour later.
I hear you groaning, dear reader. “Another Morrowind post? Pike, you need to start playing something else!”
And perhaps I do, but not before I write up a little treatise on it and what makes it so special. I mean, it’s far from a perfect game. The actual gameplay itself, in fact, is somewhat flawed. It’s certainly not bad, but it’s not astounding, either, and the combat system is almost universally criticized. Just what is it about Morrowind, then, that draws you in?
For me, it’s the in-game culture. You see, while other people bandy around the idea of less-generic fantasy, Morrowind pulled this off with aplomb ten years ago.
It’s really an anomaly not just among the general fantasy genre but within the Elder Scrolls series itself. The first two games in the TES main series were called Arena and Daggerfall, and although they both achieved cult classic status there’s also a reason why most people today haven’t heard of them, so don’t feel too bad if you haven’t, either. Anyways, these two games set the general tone for the series as a very Dungeons and Dragons inspired medieval fantasy. Arena took you across the entire continent of Tamriel and every province could have been lifted directly from Lord of the Rings, if Lord of the Rings had been built in Minecraft. Daggerfall limited you to a smaller area (in theory, anyway– its random map generation was nearly limitless), but the overall style was still the same.
Then Morrowind came along. Morrowind is populated by Dark Elves, or Dunmer in their native tongue. And that is where all similarities to traditional western fantasy end.
Morrowind is not medieval Europe. Morrowind was actually inspired by Egyptian, early Japanese, and Middle Eastern cultures. And the keyword “inspired” is very important, here, because the developers and artists didn’t just take those cultures and transplant them, wholesale, into Tamriel. Instead, they used these cultures as inspirations to create their own very vibrant land and people.
Let’s start out by talking about the world. There are no horses in Morrowind. There are, however, giant dinosaur things which are used as pack animals.
Say hello to a Guar.
There are also flying reptile things
Lots of them.
And gigantic fleas the size of elephants (or larger) which are used to travel from town to town.
Insects are actually a major part of society here on Vvardenfell, where various giant bugs are farmed and ranched. The are no sheep or cows here, only giant floating jellyfish.
Now let’s talk about the inhabitants of this strange land. Traditionally the Dunmer are nomads who live in yurts. Yurts. There are major characters of this game who spend the entire game quite happily living in a yurt. When was the last time you saw that in a fantasy game? They dress like nomads do, too, wearing different types of clothing depending on where their tribe is currently located, based on what resources are available to them. There has been a shift from this traditional style of living toward living in buildings in cities like the Empire does, and the traditional nomadic Dunmer– called Ashlanders– are not particularly happy about this development. Still, these city-dwelling elves don’t live in anything that we would remotely identify as a traditional house. They live in these:
Or these:
Or these:
So we’ve got a bunch of elves who ranch bugs and wear clothes made out of insect shells and giant jellyfish leather wandering around and living in houses that may be inspired by Middle Eastern or Asian architecture or may also be a giant mushroom. This just gets better and better, doesn’t it?
Let’s keep going. Traditionally the Dunmer worship the Daedra, powerful demonlike gods whom most of civilized Tamriel won’t touch with a ten-foot-pole. But for the past several generations the citygoing Dunmer have been worshipping three “mortal” gods who make up what is called the Tribunal. The Tribunal consists of a powermad and ruthlessly intelligent woman named Almalexia, a reclusive wizard building himself a literal clockwork universe named Sotha Sil, and finally Vivec, a bi-colored warrior-poet who may or may not be both male and female at the same time.
Needless to say, they’re a pretty fantastic trio.
They’re watching you, scum.
Much like the Dunmer themselves, the gods are neither good nor bad. They exist in a constant state of gray between the two extremes and they are capable of much good and also much evil. The Morrowind universe is not black and white. The Dunmer are intensely xenophobic. Slavery is legal. So is assassination. And yet, as you play the game, you come to care for this place and its people anyway. And that, readers, is the true triumph of Morrowind and how its very non-standard and non-Western culture is used as a fantastic narrative device. Your character isn’t the only one to come into this world as an outlander– you do, too. Then as you come to know and love the land and its inhabitants, you can decide whether or not to save it. You learn about this strange new world as you go along and then travel through an arc much as your character does. Would this have worked out as well in a more traditional fantasy setting? Maybe, or maybe not. I’m leaning toward the “maybe not”.
Unfortunately, although the series continues, The Elder Scrolls has yet to achieve another setting as intensely unique as Morrowind’s. Although originally established as a rainforest, Talos conveniently showed up and turned Cyrodiil into an idealized medieval England just in time for Oblivion. (This is what that guy in Whiterun is always yelling about, by the way.) While this is a neat piece of lore, it does mean that Oblivion was largely set in a very traditional fantasy setting. The next game, Skyrim, went for something slightly more exotic by making everything Nordic-themed, but that is still an overall very “safe” Western setting. The upcoming TES Online has the potential to do some interesting things with provinces like Elsweyr and Hammerfell, but seeing as they’ve already retconned out the aforementioned Talos story and cemented Cyrodiil as an Idealized Medieval England simulator regardless of time period, my hopes for anything beyond fleeting oddities aren’t very high.
So here I am, waiting. Waiting for more elves that live in yurts and adorn themselves with tribal tattoos and crazy piercings. Waiting for more games that take their fantasy out of Western Europe, and not just for one throwaway setting or expansion pack.
