Review by MrLipid Pure Hidden Developer OUAT Entertainment Publisher OUAT Entertainment Released July 2009 Available for PC Time Played Long enough to fall in love…repeatedly Verdict: 5/5 Gold Star PC game development is a herd sport. If a game catches the buying public’s fancy with a new play mechanic, it doesn’t take long for the buying public to be confronted with a wide range of modestly different variations, each attempting to bring its own spin …
And now you all know what my living room looks like. Yes, the PS3 Slim price drop, not to mention the promise of Demon’s Souls and The Last Guardian and Heavy Rain all conspired to see me at Best Buy yesterday, being lectured by a 19-year old about the importance of paying $129 to have the Geek Squad set it up for me. I was able to accomplish the task myself (though I can’t get …
Massively multiplayer online role-playing games are all the rage now-a-days. But here comes one that threatens to change the world of MMORPG gaming? …so say the producers, at least. Supposedly a big hit in Asia for the past few years, Aion will soon be dumped, if it hasn’t been already, onto servers in the U.S. Word on the street is that there have been over 300,000 pre-release orders placed in Europe alone.
Listen up, kids: Edge and others report that a leaked document from SEGA strongly suggests that Sony intends to sell all PS2 games as downloads for the PS3 on the Playstation Network. Why SEGA? Well, the document suggested that Sony is courting them as well, to sell Dreamcast games on the system. We all know that Sony patented a software emulator for the PS2 a couple months ago, and that given the Cell architecture’s computing …
Hello all, and please welcome back Steerpike’s older and more successful brother as a Celebrity Guest Editor! Marcus Sakey is a famous crime novelist – complete with awards and movie deals – and a wonderful guy to boot. His latest novel, The Amateurs, just came out in early August and is already garnering rave reviews.
Unfortunately the transition from FFC to Tap somehow ate up Marcus’s first Celebrity Guest Editorial, and he graciously offered to do another one. A lifelong gamer like his brother, Marcus is always looking for ways to integrate his beloved hobby with his increasingly complex life. Today he discusses the challenge of finding a good game to share with my kickass sister in law, who is hardly opposed to games but doesn’t find much appealing in the mainstream stuff. Marcus visits Tap often under the moniker “Marquez,” so be sure to leave some comments and suggestions for the lad. Thanks Marcus!
— Steerpike
Intrigued by yesterday’s Rock, Paper, Shotgun writeup of two highly unique mods for Half-Life 2, I scampered over to ModDB to get them for myself. The first, Dear Esther, didn’t work correctly on my computer, so I set it aside until I have time for troubleshooting. The second, Korsakovia, it worked fine. I kinda wish it hadn’t, because despite the fact that 30 minutes with this mod had me gelatinized with fear, I have a …
Take-Two has finally announced a firm release date for the highly anticipated BioShock 2. February 9, 2010. Checking my calendar and I see nothing else booked that date so I just made a big X for the whole day.
As I am not too sure how I would do a review of a free, Internet-based game that strokes both my basest gaming urges and my basest sexual urges, I decided to forego a classic form of a review and just do a freeform take on Taboo Snaps, a game that tickles and giggles amusingly but never strays towards uncomfortable.
It’s in vogue these days after Kris Graft eloquently defended the various malignancies of Activision/Blizzard CEO Bobby Kotick to support the man, claiming he does all he does as an effective executive officer and not as an imp of Satan himself. Of course, then Kotick goes and does something like giving a speech to the Deutsche Bank Securities Technology Conference, during which he said – didn’t imply, said – that his goal is to “take …
Tap reader and good buddy Igor Hardy of A Hardy Developer’s Journal clued me into his latest interview, this one with Andrej Bevec of Clever Hans Productions. The two-man team’s been hard at work on a new click adventure called Briefcase Romanin, a Microsoft Dream Build Play contestant. Hand drawn and lavishly detailed, Briefcase Romanin won’t be limited to the 360 platform, either – there’s to be a PC release, and the luscious HD trailer …
Ben Heck continues his reimagining of gaming hardware with this nifty little laptop version of the Atari 800. This is making me seriously reconsider my upcoming iPhone purchase. Too bad there is only one of these in the world.
GamePolitics.com reports that Dennis McCauley, longtime overlord of that site and tireless fighter for free speech protection for the games industry, is stepping down as of today to pursue another opportunity. McCauley was also a freelance journalist for several more traditional outlets, but has indicated that he will be leaving the profession of journalism entirely. GamePolitics is owned by the ECA and as such won’t be shuttered; we’re expecting the announcement of a new editor …
Part 3: The Third of the Great “Imaginators” In this, the final installment of “Literature, Gaming, and Tomorrow,” (first two articles here and here), I will examine the final of my three proposed “Great Imaginators” – that is, authors, dreamers, and creators of literature who in their so-called “fiction” actually proposed a world that has come to pass nearly in lockstep with their vision. Our third imaginator is almost a contemporary of ours, and his …
I know, I know, I am perhaps a little over-enthusiastic about STALKER and its follow-up. Flawed though they were, both games captured atmosphere like essentially no other, and as such I am enthusiastic over the looming release of GSC Game World’s latest Chernobyl-drivern installment, S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Call of Pripyat. According to GSC, the team listened carefully to the complaints about Clear Sky, and have put some degree of effort into correcting them.
The H1N1 piggy flu has struck at the Penny Arcade Expo, reports… everyone. At a gathering that attracts something like a bazillion people, this could be a major issue, and PAX organizers are taking it seriously. Penny Arcade has a list of known-to-be-infected flights and rail lines relevant to PAX, and while all medicos agree that the flu is comparatively mild when gotten by healthy people, anyone feeling symptoms are encouraged to stay home (or …