This is a barely legible meditation of how chasing Hollywood audience and Hollywood dollars (but without having the advantage of Hollywood accounting) is absolutely killing AAA games. At this rate, there won’t be any left mid-next generation. Remember, you read it here first.
Retro City Rampage is the Meet the Spartans of video games.
The Twitch TV stream from PAX East this year included some coverage of a little-known fighting game. The game is called Divekick. It looks like a joke. It kind of is a joke. It kind of isn’t.
Divekick. Dive, Kick. Dive dive dive kick kick, kick dive, Divekick. Kick, dive.
I chat with the developers on the floor. “Everyone says this is either the most ridiculous game they’ve ever seen, or the most brilliant.”
Thirty minutes later I’m siding with “brilliant.”
Our own Mat C reviewed Alan Wake in 2010, producing a definitive, thoughtful piece of work. I agree with basically everything he said and the way he said it, so I don’t mean to just regurgitate. Mat took care of a lot of the heavy lifting for me by doing the Reviewer’s Job; my intent is to look with the space of years, a platform change, and perspective between the game’s 2005 announcement, its 2010 self, and its now self. Alan Wake is an exceptional effort that could have been even better. Yet to reject it as just a missed opportunity is unfair. There’s more to it than what we got, but what we got is still a superb game.
And I made a video! You gotta watch my video. Click the button! CLICK IT!
Point-and-click adventure games have been pronounced a “dead genre” time and time again.
And Phoenix Online Studios has a name synonymous with rebirth.
Phoenix’s first released game was The Silver Lining, the King’s Quest-inspired adventure that earned them both a loyal fanbase… and a cease and desist. In 2012, I started following their work on their first commercial episodic series: Cognition: an Erica Reed Thriller. In my review, I visited the ups and downs of the game’s first episode. The “ups” were enough to encourage me to give the second episode a try… and, at PAX this week, I got a chance to chat with Phoenix’s Katie Hallahan for some previews of the third. We also talked about some of Phoenix’s other upcoming projects in the adventure game world.
I’m going to start this feature off without any real spoilers, but if you like dark supernatural mysteries, it would be worth your time to check out the Cognition series before reading. The second episode in particular gets … amazingly gruesome, and I must say some late-game twists warmed my sociopathic heart.
With Bioshock Infinite only days away and the recent re-release of System Shock 2 on Good Old Games I figured now would be a good time to dredge up this article from the darkest depths of my drafts.
When I was writing my Games of 2011 there was one game I wanted to include but couldn’t because a) it was released in 2010 and I’d restricted myself to 2011 releases, and b) I’d already written most of this as a separate article. That game was Bioshock 2.
I picked it up on Steam for £3.49 during a summer sale and in truth I didn’t expect an awful lot from it because, while it had generally been well received, it apparently didn’t measure up to its much lauded predecessor — a game which I didn’t share such a glowing fondness for. Whatever expectations I had however, where blown out of the… uh, yeah, I’ll leave that pun in my head where it belongs.
The experience of the Penny Arcade Expo is often one of line-waiting. If you want to see what the hot previews are, get in a line. If you want to check out a popular panel, there’s also a line. And at the start of the expo, there’s a line to wait in so that you can be at the front of the lines on the expo floor.
I did a little waiting today so I could try out some games that looked interesting. After the jump, two hands-on plays, for Red Barrels’ horror title Outlast, and Capcom’s Remember Me. I will preview both the games, and, review both of the lines, so you feel as if you got the true PAX East experience.
Hi, Tappers! Guess where I am! Wait, did the headline give it away? Or maybe the blurry photo of people’s heads as they rush through a crowded convention hall?
That’s right; I am at PAX East, and oh my god you guys they’re making a new remastered DuckTales game.
Below the jump: a Day One grab bag of a few indie games that caught my eye, the not-indie and sadly hands-off preview I saw of Saints Row IV, and did you know they’re remaking DuckTales? no seriously
It’s on the books, people: EA CEO John Ricitiello is out. The #2 publisher isn’t going to hit its numbers for the quarter and has been underperforming for some time, even as it endures a hailstorm of ongoing negative press. In his memo to employees, Ricitiello takes the high road, assuming all the blame for EA’s revenue problems and stating unequivocally that the buck stops with him. I respect that, and I’ve always had at least some respect for John Ricitiello. He may not have been God’s gift to CEOs, but there’ve been worse in this industry; the truth is EA’s suffering can’t all be laid at his door – though the culture that allowed it probably can.
I’ve been on the road near-constantly since my trip to IndieCade in New York City, so a comprehensive trip report is a bit late in coming. However, I did want to share briefly with everyone the games I saw at the show. This is far from every game, just the games I personally engaged with on Saturday when I stopped in. Maybe there’s something on the list that will interest you, too!