I do not typically travel a huge amount, but over the past month or two I have found myself on planes, trains and automobiles as I attempt to move my life from my current base in the middle of England down to the country’s capital, London. For what it’s worth I’m also on the way back from Dundee to Birmingham. It is an 8 (EIGHT!) hour journey. That’s a lot of time to be alone. Well “alone” isn’t quite true, but I won’t talk to anyone. So as such I have my headphones on, Chromebook open and I am listening to podcasts.
The one that I tend to listen to, well there is a podcast network that I listen to that houses a lot of different podcasts about various different things; mostly nerdy things. They talk about TV Shows, Board Games, Books and, the one I’m listening to, is games. The people who host it work within the industry across various fields; journalism, development and music to name but three.

Published by: Luke

When Sim City drastically declined in quality, with the studio responsible for the game shutting almost immediately, there was a huge hole in the PC market. There were no available series that allowed people to create and run their own cities to the finest details. There were some series that allowed the management of transportation, but no more. That was until Cities: Skyline was announced.

 

The game allows the kind of management that fans of the Sim City were accustomed to. The micro management of systems was present, but the kind of control over transit that other game series allowed was also in the game. Such was the appetite for a game of this ilk that when Cities: Skyline released it sold over one million copies in the first week. Fans are hoping that the success of the game could well see a resurgence in the genre, with hopefully more games in the Cities series following soon to correct any flaws in Skylines.

 

Published by: Luke

After Left 4 Dead 2 had come and gone people wondered what that studio might go on to make next. After key personnel left the studio following Valve’s decision not to continue with the franchise they went on to look for a new studio and a new publisher, but kept their ideas firmly in place. They wanted to make asymmetric multiplayer experiences that were a little out of the ordinary. They had done it twice before, could they do it again? Evolve was born.

 

This game wasn’t the standard 4 vs AI and 4 vs 4 multiplayer that the studio had pioneered with Left for Dead. Instead this was 5 player multiplayer, exclusively in a 4 vs 1 scenario. Expanding on the Tank gameplay from Left for Dead Evolve pits one monster against 4 players. The monster starts weak but, over the course of a match, can get extremely powerful. It’s very tense and very strategic.

 

Published by: Luke

One surprising turn that games have taken over the past few years, specifically in the last one, is that text is coming back into games in a big way. As games have become more modern they have taken on more lavish visual effects, leaving behind any need for player imagination and spoon feeding every last detail as intensely as they can. However indie games have slowly began to bring back a little more exposition; after all the best writers in the world can convey emotions and feelings and moods so easily with a few simple words, but the best animators and designers struggle endlessly to match it.

Elegy For A Deal World is a game about writing. You take on the guise of an adventurer who is visiting four worlds, each named after a famous, classical poet. You explore slowly on a two dimensional plane and, when prompted, write the history of the world. Using your own words you write about you see, what you thought happened and what might have been.

Published by: Luke

The indie game movement has been slowly brewing over the years; way back to when basement developers were a real thing. However, with the release of the Xbox 360 and Playstation 3 independent games became mainstream affairs, releasing on home consoles for the first time via the Playstation Network and Xbox Live architectures. One of the first major, breakout hits was Jonathon Blow’s Brain. A 2d platformer like Mario, Braid featured several mind bending mechanics; like rewinding time when you move to the left, and fast forwarding time when you move to the right – Braid proved to be incredibly popular, and incredibly challenging.

Braid also proved to be one of the first indie games to have a wonderful AAA worthy soundtrack, and beautiful hand painted graphics. Braid was instantly recognised by players and critics alike as a wonderful, unique game worthy of everyone’s attention. Even now, a few years later, Braid is still seen as one of the best indie games of all time.

Published by: Luke