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PC Reviews

Tormentum – Dark Sorrow Review

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It may have been Rock Paper Shotgun that recently posted an article along the lines of “Why Isn’t There More Surrealism In Gaming?”. I certainly didn’t read it, but the title posed an interesting question. Surrealism is something I admire, Dante’s Inferno being one of my favorite games visually, and though the style sees some success in smaller titles, “mainstream adoption” isn’t exactly in its vocabulary.

Maybe it’s for the best, as a plague of mainstream games that are even more troubling and confusing than they already are isn’t something I’m clamoring for, but it’s still something I appreciate seeing when it comes along.

Tormentum – Dark Sorrow is a game that revels in its boundlessly dark imagery and compelling surrealism. It’s the same sort of thing Dante’s Inferno was going for. Where Dante’s Inferno was a deliberately and shockingly twisted depiction of hell, Tormentum takes that same mission statement and applies it to a point-and-click adventure game set in an oppressive, nightmarish wasteland.

Continue reading Tormentum – Dark Sorrow Review →

News

At Some Point, Asteroids Outpost Went On Steam

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I’m not sure when this happened, but that Asteroids MMO people were talking about for an hour is under Steam’s Upcoming section. It’s going to be an Early Access release, and these screenshots look certainly a bit like space. And this guy certainly looks a bit like Destiny:

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Now maybe this page was here all along, but I didn’t know about it. Maybe if I had joined that mailing list.

Check it out here.

News

Etrian Odyssey 2 Untold: The Fafnir Knight Dungeon Crawls On 3DS This Summer

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Etrian Odyssey 2 Untold: The Fafnir Knight is not only a mouthful, but an upcoming entry into the famed mobile dungeon crawling franchise. Specifically, it’s the next in the line of 3DS remasters of the original Etrian Odysseys. This time it’s a remake of Etrian Odyssey 2 for the DS.

The Fafnir Knight boasts hammered-out systems that make this game “one of the most approachable Etrian titles to date”, and two ways to play. Classic, the remake of Etrian 2 sporting updated graphics and features to bring it in line with recent entries, and “Untold”, a brand-new story mode with full voice acting, animated cutscenes and a fixed party.

The game will also feature the adjustable difficulty options from the original Untold and the recent spin-off Persona Q: Shadow of the Labyrinth. Players will be able to lower the game to Picnic mode for an easier time experiencing the story, or raise it to Expert mode for a much more challenging experience.

Etrian Odyssey 2 Untold: The Fafnir Knight is coming to 3DS digitally and physically this summer at the rather hefty, but probably worthwhile, price of $49.99.

3DS Reviews

Excave Review

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Back when the Gauntlet reboot was coming out, I didn’t understand why everyone was getting riled up calling it a Diablo clone, as if a game that was actually like Gauntlet could work even a little bit nowadays. My thought back then was that the next pure Gauntlet experience wasn’t going to come from the franchise itself, but from somewhere smaller than fucking Warner Bros.

Excave is really only interesting for one reason: it shows us what a “true Gauntlet game” is like in 2015, warts and all.

Continue reading Excave Review →

PC Reviews

A Druid’s Duel Review

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Some kinds of games I enjoy, some I don’t, and some just make me sad. Not sad because of a tragic ending, plot twist, or circumstance, just sad for the game itself. Destiny made me sad because of its wasted potential (and budget), Hohokum made me sad because its heart of gold was in the right place all along, and Gauntlet made me sad because it was doomed for mediocrity at the most.

A Druid’s Duel makes me sad because it’s a perfect talking point for what belongs on a PC and what doesn’t, and it doesn’t deserve to be.

Continue reading A Druid’s Duel Review →

News

There’s A New Warhammer 40k Game – This One’s A MOBA

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Dark. Nexus. Arena. Perhaps the video-gamiest title I’ve ever heard is being applied to the next game set in the Warhammer 40,000 universe. You may remember Something Something Vermintide, based in the Warhammer fantasy universe, an equally generic-sounding thing at first but sort of interesting once you consider it.

Not much is known about Warhammer 40,000: Dark Nexus Arena besides its genre and what you can deduce from the teaser trailer. My main hope (and it’s not like I have any basis for this seeing as it’s not Relic making this game) is that Dark Nexus arena is able to do for me with MOBA the same thing Dawn of War did for me with RTS – use the violent nature of the 40k universe to make a MOBA that’s a different shade of complex than they usually are.

My macro and base-building skills in RTS games are not exactly primetime, so I had a pretty great time with what I played of Dawn of War. A really great time, in fact – the brutal competition that game places you in removes everything I didn’t like about StarCraft 2 and replaces it with everything I wanted to like. I hope Dark Nexus Arena is able to live up to that and not create a MOBA for MOBA people (they have League of Legends and Dota 2), but a MOBA for the sane.

Greek Letters

Greek Letters: Dirty Bomb Closed Beta

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There’s a few classes of free-to-play first person shooter. There’s the old and the ugly, usually trying to ape Counter-Strike in some way… your BlackShots and Sudden Attacks. Above that there are the high production value splashes of yesteryear, your A.V.A.’s and Genesis A.D.’s (rest in peace).

Nowadays with things like Warface and Blacklight Retribution being free and making that whole Korean age look so quaint, there’s a whole new tier. Based on my time with the Dirty Bomb closed beta, I’m willing to bet that it will come to define that tier.

Continue reading Greek Letters: Dirty Bomb Closed Beta →

Opinions

A Bit Of Opinion: Pokemon Shuffle

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Choices for free-to-play games are slim on the 3DS. That may make sense considering phones are a much more ubiquitous device, but when Pokemon Shuffle was announced my interest was piqued. The concept of a free, match-three Candy Crush type of thing on a 3DS wasn’t something I’d considered before, and for whatever reason, I was pretty excited to try it out. Continue reading A Bit Of Opinion: Pokemon Shuffle →

PC Reviews

Wickland Review

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In this age of so many throwback arena shooters coming out of the woodwork that no one really wants them anymore, Wickland stands apart by calling back to Hexen. Or… looking like it. It sets itself apart with unique fantasy-textured maps and an at least thought-provoking central mechanic, but doesn’t do the most important thing it could do to differentiate itself from the flood: it isn’t a very good game. Continue reading Wickland Review →

News

Well, Um, There’s A New Trapped Dead Game

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Remember Trapped Dead? No? Good. It was shit. They’re trying another one though, and it seems to be a different sort of thing. Bigmoon Studios is billing Trapped Dead: Lockdown as a straight up hack & slash RPG.

Five characters are detailed, including the marine, the butcher, the assassin, the marshal and the exorcist. Each character is connected to the zombified town in question in their own way, and have their own motivations to discover in their respective campaigns.

Each class will have different abilities and skill trees. Obviously.
Each class will have different abilities and skill trees. Obviously.

The press release details a two-weapon system, allowing you to wield two weapons to your tactical liking, or use a larger two-handed weapon. They may be overselling the significance of this system a bit, but they seem fairly excited about it. It does also say, however, that there are hundreds of weapons and also some vehicles, so I believe them when they say that combat is going to be diverse at least.

Trapped Dead: Lockdown will be releasing on March 20, 2015 on PC, Mac and Linux.

My thoughts: This is interesting, considering how really bad Trapped Dead was. Lockdown sounds ambitious at the very least. I like the thought of five different characters being fleshed out through individual campaigns, though we have yet to see if they’re actually being fleshed out at all. A five-player hack & slash does sound like a neat thing to have though, so we’ll see. Boy, does that interface look like shit though.