The latest version of the awesome cavalry/siege sim Mount and Blade has been released, offering a slew of improvements, including new character models and animations, new towns and cities, new quests (with rehauled dialogue and descriptions), better AI, and more video options. The developers are claiming that v0.950 contains most of the features they want to add for v1.0, which will be published by Paradox Interactive later this year.
For a more complete list of changes (which is being compiled by players), click here. For more gorgeous screenshots, click here!
As before, you can still buy and play the game now for $25, which will also grant you access to the $39 full version when it comes out.
Stalin Vs. Martians is being developed by no less than THREE Russian game studios – that could only be a good thing or a bad thing. Set in the 1942 Soviet Union, you must lead the Red Army to repel hordes of Martian invaders. Toward the end of the game, you may even be able to control Stalin himself – a “huge colossus, five times higher than any other creature.”
Other than the fairly entertaining premise, SVM promises to deliver a very simple, action-based RTS experience. The only resources you’ll need to worry about are the various power-ups, dropped by defeated Martians. These power-ups can be collected to bring in reinforcements or upgrade your troops. But no city-building or technology trees.
So! I like the “zany” storyline and the idea of a simple RTS. The screenshots look just okay, however. We’ll see if they can pull this one off by Fall (the planned release time)!
Posted by Jordan Magnuson
Sat, 26 Apr 2008 16:46:00 GMT
One of my all time favorite “Click” games. You play the White Wizard, residing in a medieval fantasy fortress where you create and unleash hordes of minions onto a 2D battlefield with one goal in mind: defeat the warlord across the way. If you ever played Three-Sixty Pacific’s Armor Alley, you’ll find that the premise is similar, but this game might just be better than its classic counterpart.
The mechanics are fairly simple: use the keyboard to move blocks of resources around to form combinations which produce troops, then unleash those troops to the battlefield where they fight automatically as best they can. The game blends strategy, tactics, and dexterity in a really interesting way.
On the strategic level you will have to decide which Warlord to play (each has their strengths and weaknesses), and what your general plan of unit production is going to be: a cheap mix of foot soldiers and archers, with an occasional battering ram thrown in? Or perhaps you will rely on more advanced technology and an air based assault? Or how about trying to infect your opponent’s troops with the Black Plague?
On the tactics level you’ve got to respond to the situation at hand, both in terms of the resources you have in front of you, and the current state of the battlefield.
Finally, on the dexterity level… well, the game is played in freakin’ realtime, and you better get good at moving those blocks of resources around!
Siege has a couple of flaws, like its tiny 320×200 resolution and some imbalances that I’ll let you discover, but these small detriments are small next to the fun of madly mixing resources and watching your miniature troops fight it out to the death in front of you, with your arch-nemesis pounding away on the keyboard beside you.
The game supports human vs. computer and human vs. human play. I don’t have to tell you which is better.
P.S. You may need to run the game in Windows 95 compatibility mode; and remember to copy cncs32.dll to your system32 directory if the game doesn’t work.
Posted by Jordan Magnuson
Tue, 18 Mar 2008 13:13:00 GMT
I have a knack for covering things that aren’t new. I’m sorry. But these Lux expansions haven’t been mentioned here yet, and I only got around to trying them out recently, so voila this post.
If you aren’t familiar with the original, Lux is the definitive computer version of a world domination game (in my humble opinion). Beautiful graphics, fast play, a lot of online players, etc. etc. You can see what I had to say originally here.
But enough on the original. These expansions, which are stand alone games, add some wonderful historical flavor to the original game. Ancient Empires lets you control 58 different nations in 11 original scenarios, while American History lets you play through 10 of America’s epic wars, from the French and Indian War to the Iraq War.
I wasn’t sure what I was going to think of these expansions heading in, as both games are arguably only slight variants on the original: the gameplay pretty much continues to follow the standard rules of Risk, and the maps are not that different from some of the hundreds of fan created offerings. However, Sillysoft has impressed me again: the production quality is high, the themes are well implemented, and the games feel much more complete and cohesive in their historical flavor than any of the maps you can download for the original. I give both of these a thumbs up, though I think the prices ($15 and $20) are perhaps a bit high relative to Lux Delux.
Kriegspiel, or “War Game,” is a digital remake of a board game developed by French avant-garde writer, film maker, and activist Guy Debord.
Inspired by the military theory of Carl von Clausewitz and the European campaigns of Napoleon, Debord’s game is a chess-variant played by two opposing players on a game board of 500 squares arranged in rows of 20 by 25 squares.
One of the fundamental strategies behind the game is to maintain various “lines of communication” across the map, while cutting off your opponent’s lines. These lines radiate from arsenals and relay points and allow your troops to move and attack. If a troop is not on a friendly line, it’s immobilized, but if it’s on an enemy line, it blocks the line at that point. The game is won when a player’s arsenals or troops are completely destroyed.
RSG, the developers of the remake, have chosen not to add a single-player component to the game, in order to preserve the “fidelity” of the original idea. Unfortunately, it makes the game, already in a niche, that much more challenging to get into. But for war/strategy buffs, I think it’s worth checking out what looks like an extremely elegant, Chess-like game (and a well-done remake).
Damn it, it’s another “tower defense” game, albeit a pretty good one. In Protector your “towers” are various mages, and knights (called “dexers”). As you can probably guess, your opponents have various strengths and weaknesses that can be exploited by strategic placement of your troops, who level up during battle. Unlike most TD games, this one lets you see what kind of enemies you’re going to go up against in a given scenario, letting you plan ahead a bit more.
This game’s strengths lie in its polish – the graphics are really nice and even though each scenario is tuned toward a certain strategy, there’s definitely enough flexibility to keep it fun. Unlockable skills that grant bonuses during battle and give you access to new troops add some incentive to keep going.
If you dig these types of games, you should get some enjoyment out of Protector. Otherwise, it doesn’t add that much new to the genre.
Man, I am a huge fan of Wendell Hicken’s classic tank game, Scorched Earth (which you can download here). I’m waiting for a true remake/sequel of this game that isn’t in 3d (nothing against 3d, mind, you, it’s just not the same). Something akin to what Pac-Man Championship Edition did for Pac-Man.
In the meantime, Atomic Cannon will satisfy. It’s definitely missing some of the spirit that made the original game so great, but injects some of its own. I miss my Funky Bombs, MIRVs, and Mag Shields, but the ability to build sandbags, drop automated sentries, and use any of the other new weapons definitely makes up for it. The added customization, various game modes (including network play), and much-improved controls (mouse and/or keyboard) are welcome sights, as well.
The graphics are kind of a hit-or-miss for me. It’s a mish-mash of realistic textures that are obviously lacking the kind of thought put into, say, Cortex Command’s terrain design. On the other hand, I really like the smoke trails, visual distortion, and other special effects that they used – stuff that wasn’t possible when Scorch came out.
As you can see, I’m of two minds about this game… mostly because I have this idea about what the perfect Scorch sequel would be (I’m sure that’s familiar to a lot of you), and this isn’t it. But the bottom line is that this version is pretty darn fun… fun enough that I might just treat myself to the full game ($20)!
Dylan Cuthbert, founder of Japanese-based Q-Games (which developed the PS3 downloadable game Pixel Junk Racers), talks about their latest game, Monster Madness, in this blog entry. The game is an RTS/Tower Defense hybrid made with Japanese gamers in mind.
The entry has some interesting tidbits, and I found this part to be terribly amusing:
The online rankings are going to be pretty competitive for this title and there are separate tables for cooperative and single play. The cooperative mode actually gets people to talk to each other as they play, and seeing as girls love this game (no, honestly, they do!), Monsters could become an important tool in every lad’s arsenal!
It’s true – video games can be a great way to break the ice with the opposite sex, men and women alike. The way I do it is using the NES Power Pad… World Class Track Meet, baby. They never expect me to get down on my knees and start pounding the buttons with my fists. Works every time!
Oh boy, I’ve wanted to cover this one for ages! Perhaps you’ve seen it on the list of IGF entrants...
Goo! is a new and strange action/strategy game from PillowFort (previously Amorphous Games), which is actually TIGS regular Aubrey Hesselgren and Tommy Refenes (Bezzy and Tommunism on the forums, respectively). In Goo! you control an amorphous blob of goo trying to overwhelm and absorb opposing blobs of goo as they try and do the same to you.+ Actually, that’s just one of the many play modes planned for the finished game, but whatever. Watch the video.
Now, this video isn’t a trailer exactly—it’s more of a live demonstration. It shows off some of the modes, skins, procedural effects… and touches on many coming additions.
Check it out!
This is definitely something to keep an eye on. Show some love, people.
SEXY UPDATE: Oops, nearly forgot—you can follow Goo!’s progress (and read up on its storied past) over at its development blog. Until the new PillowFort site goes up, that is!
Image by Vanemuine, via the TaleWorlds forums.
