No Signal Input Has Never Looked Better!

Being the awesome guy that he is the amazing artist Deitrix created this beautiful header for my blogs name. I'm extremely grateful that he put the time in to do this so, thanks again!

He's also done the same trick with some other wonderful blogs that also happen to be (I hope!) regular readers of mine. To see these and the rest of his amazing artwork then just pop over to his blog.

The Endless Forest.

Like most gamers I love video games due to the ability to disconnect from reality and enter worlds that we can only dream of. Whether it's defending Earth against evil aliens or becoming the world's greatest Formula 1 driver there's something for everyone. Now, if you would have told me that there was a game that involved you playing the part of a deer and doing nothing more entertaining than running around a forest a few years ago then I might have been surprised. These days I've been on the Internet long enough to have grown accustomed to seeing things a little out of the ordinary. Did I know about furry culture before the Internet? Nope! Do I understand furry culture? Not in the slightest! However, I know there are a large number of people (If games like Furcadia and Second Life are anything to go by) who enjoy playing the part of animals. Outside of dressing up as one I guess this is the closest a furry can get to becoming an actual animal.

I'm not going to rant on about how odd I find furry culture and, to be honest, I'm not sure you can even use it as a context for this game. However, the fact the deers have human faces not only strikes me as a little freaky but also establishes a furry connection in my mind. No doubt furries will cream themselves at the possibility of acting out the part of a deer but, for the rest of us, you have to wonder what the appeal of The Endless Forest really is.

The Endless Forest is a massively multiplayer screensaver (that's a first) by a small Belgium games development studio called Tales of Tales. The studio has a few games in the works but The Endless Forest seems to be the one generating the most curiosity. As we've already established you play the part of a deer whom - predictably - runs around in a forest.

So, why is it a screensaver? Well, the game pops up whenever your screensaver is supposed to pop up and, thus, lets you have a jaunt around a peaceful forest while you take a break from whatever you were doing. The trick is to play it in short bursts to appreciate it the most since, as you'll quickly realise, there really isn't much to do.



Describing it as an MMO is a bit of an exaggeration since you'll rarely come across another player. When you do, however, you'll quickly realise that you can't even talk to them. Why? Because deers don't talk of course! Ok, so now we're getting less furry like but we still have the odd idea of giving the deer a human face. Instead you interact with the world and other deers through a series of actions. You can make a strange calling sound, stand up on your hind legs, bear your antlers (no fighting with other deer though!) and even take a nap. Taking a nap is what most of the deer seem to do but that's largely because that's what your deer gets up to when you exit the screensaver. Occasionally you'll spot more than one active deer and go for a run through the trees with them. This may not sound terribly exciting but it's strangely alluring.

The fact is that the game isn't supposed to be exciting. It's supposed to fill in those small gaps of time you find during a busy work day. It's supposed to help you relax by spending a few snatched minutes in a beautiful forest. Those who love fighting to the death or insulting and griefing other players will bore of the game extremely quickly (as members of the Age of Conan forum discovered). It's not a game you'll play constantly and it will never have a large audience. However, there are those who may grow to love the game and appreciate it for what it tries to do.

It's a nice attempt at a truly frustration free game and it's something different. For someone like me (who enjoys shooting someone's face off) it's a nice little distraction that I'll quickly tire of.

Download the game over at the Tale of Tales website.

Got a game you want me to take a look at? Email me or comment in the comments section!

Real Lives.

It's not often a game makes me really think about how lucky I really am. In a world full of misery, poverty, and war to live in a warm house full of food, access to a TV and the Internet, and stacks of commercial products I have it good. When you're confronted with the plight of the majority of the rest of the world (remember if you're reading this you're most likely amongst the top 10% richest people in the world) you find it hard to complain when you can't find a McDonalds near you. Real Lives succeeds in showing you just how harsh life is for most of the worlds population and, in the end, it's all a tad bit depressing.

The basic premise of Real Lives sees you being born at a random location around the world into a completely randomised family. Since the game uses real-world statistics you'll most likely be born into a third-world country or a family that doesn't exactly have it great. This makes sense as the games aim is to educate you about the world's plight without just handing you a pamphlet filled with hundreds of statistics (the game provides a bit of information about each occurrence - which makes it all the more interesting.). However, you will sometimes be born into a fairly well-off country/family. In any case you can emigrate to any country you wish as long as you have the cash.

It may sound interesting at first - and it is - but it's so damn depressing. For example, on my first attempt I was born as Rafiki Mayat in Senegal. From the start I had my growth stunted from inadequate protein and then I had a whopping cough. A year later I'd caught measles and was suffering from malaria. At the same time I also had schistosomiasis and by the time I was nine I was a famine victim. Later on I found out I was gay, got chlamydia and died at the ripe old age of forty-two. You may think this is going a bit overboard but the sad fact is that people actually live lives like this somewhere in the world.

Even when you're born into a family doing well you can have major problems. Born as girl in South Africa I was incredibly gifted academic wise. After graduating college with a physics degree and attending graduate school to receive an advanced degree in physics I became a doctor and tried desperately to find some romance. Even though my appearance score was high I suffered rejection after rejection. Even when I started seeing someone we eventually broke up. There was even one guy who was such a bastard that he dumped me after I'd been raped.

After shunning men and becoming a lesbian I moved to London and found a nice woman to settle down with. Unfortunately I died at forty-five in a road traffic accident.

Damn, life is hard.

Download it here (the evaluation version is free forever. The only thing missing is the character creator where you can customise your own character. Everything else seems to be included in the free version so you really don't have to spend $25, but I'm sure it all goes to a good cause.).

(Found via TIGSource.)

EDIT: I've just noticed that in the evaluation copy the number of lives you've lived is the number of seconds the game will take to load up. I knew there had to be a catch somewhere.

Got a game you want me to take a look at? Email me or comment in the comments section!

Review: SimCity DS.

Before we go any further I’m just going to come right out and say it; SimCity DS is a highly addictive game. If a game keeps you up to the wee small hours playing it (in this case, around 6am) then you’d be hard pressed to argue that the game has no redeeming qualities. Redeeming? You ask? Well, as addictive as this game may be it, like many other games, suffers from a number of problems that annoyingly snatch a ‘must own’ title out of it’s cowering hands.

For those of you who have never played a SimCity game before - which, if this is the case, you deserve to be shot – the game is all about building a city. Of course, you don’t need to be a rocket scientist to figure that one out but it’s not as simple as it may sound. Your city planning will be split into three different zones; commercial, industrial, and residential – and it’s up to you to come up with a plan that will hopefully present you with a working city and a nice amount of profit coming back in return. Still sound easy? Well, on top of that you have to supply the basic necessities of water and power, figure out a good transit route consisting of roads and railways in order for your Sims to get to work without being stuck in traffic all day, and keep Sims happy with police stations, hospitals, parks and schools to name but a few. If you haven’t played a SimCity game before and are trying to figure out how this can possibly be fun then let the detailed tutorial guide you through the basic aspects of the game or you’ll find that being in constant debt doesn’t make for the most entertaining gaming session.

So, now we’ve got the basics out of the way I’ll lead you on to the first frustration of the game. It doesn’t say so on the box but you’ll probably want a spade handy if you’re going to play this game. No, you won’t be digging any holes with it; you’ll be whacking your advisor repeatedly over the head. After the random personality test has matched you with an advisor you’ll be, at first, happy with the company. You see, the advisor can be pretty helpful at times. You’ll be notified about what your city needs through the advisor and the various ‘important’ guests she calls you back to the office for. At first you’ll be happy that some Grandma came and informed you that the city needs more hospitals but, after the hundredth time and having just placed ten hospitals down, it can get annoying – especially since your advisor tends to agree and makes you feel bad like shooting them when you decline. Unfortunately you can’t fire the advisor but I suppose the game would be a lot harder without some kind of guidance.

When the advisor isn’t bothering you with some Fireman who thinks the city needs yet another stadium they’re screaming that there’s a fire or similar disaster somewhere in town. Blowing into the mic can put out fires but, in my experience, there’s little point because the fire tends not to spread if you’ve got a few fire stations. This leads me on to the various mini-games that will constantly interrupt your labours. Whether it’s tapping fireworks to make them explode or poking Santa in order to make him drop presents it makes you wonder just why these are in the game. Sure, the developer is probably just making more use of the touch screen ability but when the whole game is built around touching the screen there’s little point in them being there. I say this because SimCity DS is simply too hard for kids. The game retains the basic aspects of expenditure, income and taxes that will seem very much alien to children. For anyone else the mini-games are fun at first but quickly become pointless. I realise the DS is all about innovation but the game would have been fine without them.

A game like SimCity may sound perfect for the DS but touch screen control does have it problems. For some unknown reason the developers put in a undo action for building things by accident but opted not to let you undo demolition. Anyone who’s played on a DS knows that it can be easy to slip from time to time, especially if you’re traveling in a car or on a bus. Due to this it’s quite easy to destroy half your city just because a sudden movement made you slip. This means you have to be extremely careful when you want to demolish something or, as the games advisor unhelpfully points out, plan your city well enough that you don’t have to demolish something in the first place.

Your first few attempts at building a thriving city may end in disaster but you can be safe in the knowledge that you can come back to an older city later on to improve it with your new found skills, that is until you realise that you can only save one city. It’s probably down to memory constraints but the ability to only save one city is pretty ludicrous. One part of SimCity I always enjoyed was the ability to go back to an earlier city and be proud of my creation. Now any previous cities will become ghost towns lost in your memory, which severely depletes the games lifespan.

Stylistically the game isn’t the best-looking DS game out there but, as you can see by the screenshots, it isn’t terrible. The zoom function isn’t that great so don’t expect to see immense detail on the buildings yet some of them stand out well enough to give your city an air of originality. Don’t expect skyscrapers either. Although the game has as number of tall buildings these tend to be around the size of an apartment block or a small office, I suppose anything bigger would have filled the screen and blocked off anything behind it.

Once you’ve tired of the build-a-city mode there’s save-the-city. In this mode you have to accomplish tasks like rebuilding a city after a major earthquake or, on the more mundane side, solving a cities traffic problems. Save-the-city games can’t be saved and, as a result, are relatively short so perfect for a ride in the car. There’s also a mail mode that allows you to swap landmarks with other people who have the game. Unless your friend owns the game it’s a pretty safe bet that you won’t be using this mode as the likelihood of coming across anyone else who has the game (since you have to be near them) is pretty slim and the benefits are probably only fun for about five minutes.

At first glance putting SimCity on handheld sounds like an idea worth slaughtering a pig or two in sacrifice for and, for the most part, it is. However, SimCity DS is more likely to have a chicken slaughtered for it. While the ability to play SimCity on the move is amazingly cool you’ll often get frustrated through simple things such as trying to demolish a building. That said the game does offer a decent amount of playtime, even if you’re only allowed to save one city. SimCity DS is one of those games you’ll take with you on a long journey. For SimCity veterans – like myself – the games incredible amount of mothering will probably not appeal to you but it’s addicting enough to hold your interest for a few days and a welcome distraction from the PC versions. Is it worth a look? If you can get past it’s faults then it’s probably the best management sim fix you can get on the DS. If a game can keep me entertained enough to play for hours at a time then I'm willing to forgive some of it's faults.

Seven-out-of-ten.

Buy From Amazon.com!

New Spore Information.

Whatever happened to Spore? I hear you cry! Well, the game was notably absent from last weeks E3 and the throngs of journalists hoping to play the game were denied. In comes IGN with the reason.

IGN has a new video, screenshots and an interview with Maxis VP of Marketing Patrick Buechner. If you don't want to bother reading it (although if, like me, you're so interested in this game that you devour every last piece of information then you will) I'll summarise it here:

• The game is in the Alpha stage of development, meaning most of the games main features are done and it's coming down to tweaking and polishing.
• The team are getting extremely positive feedback from play testers (to be fair wouldn't a guy who's job is marketing say this anyway?)
• There are so many genres mixed into the game that the player has to adapt their play style and gaming experience of each genre to fit each one.
• Since the team are already committed to making the game playable at the Leipzig Games Convention in August they didn't want to fit it into multiple events by showing it off at E3 as well.
• The press will be able to play the game at the Leipzig Games Convention but it will be behind closed doors.

Patrick also talked about the DS version of Spore:

• The DS version of Spore will be out around the same time as the PC version.
• You won't be playing the whole evolutionary arc on the DS version but the main focus will still be customisation.
• It won't interact with the PC version in any way.
• Both versions should be out sometime shortly after April 1st 2008.
• The creature editor portion of Spore will be released several weeks in advance of the core game.

So, sorry Spore fans but it looks like we're going to have to wait until August for new information on the game. Let's hope it will be worth the wait.

E3 2007: Spore Update - IGN.

E307: My Thoughts on the Three Press Conferences.

E3 may not be as big as it used to be - or as flashy - but it's still an important date in the game industries calendar. Although the extravagant booths and the scantly clad booth babes may not be a part of E3 anymore the press conferences held by Sony, Nintendo, and Microsoft are still very much a highlight. After watching all three conferences I've come to the conclusion that each console has something unique and amazing to offer us all. At last I'm genuinely excited about this new generation of gaming.

If I had the money I'd own all three consoles but, for now, I think it'll have to be the 360 (mostly because I can hook it up to my monitor to get HD visuals without having to splash out on a new TV).

Microsoft.



Every year I'm baffled by Microsoft's press conference. Not by what's on offer but by their insistence to hire people who'll sit in the audience whooping and hollering after every soundbite, video and new piece of information. If a company is offering genuinely exciting products then the journalists and general public don't need a few over-the-top antics to become interested.

The press conference opened with a band playing the theme from Halo, because we all know that Microsoft can't do anything without mentioning Halo (to be fair though the press conferences are all about promoting the things that are making them money). As with every E3 press conference, however, there's always something that makes you cringe. This time it was Peter Moore playing Rock Band with Harmonix and trying to sing. Still, the game looks amazingly cool even if I ashamedly admit I've not played Guitar Hero yet.

I've been planning to get an Xbox 360 for a while now but lack of money has proved otherwise. One of the main reasons I want to get a 360 is because I'm deeply interested in Mass Effect. As expected it looks absolutely gorgeous. I like RPG's that don't follow the 'normal' RPG formula in that you can shoot someone in the face without all the bother of statistics. It's also coming out in November so I best get a 360 soon.

A tonne of trailers were also shown, some of which you may have already seen (such as GTA IV). Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare is looking nice, but I always have been a bit of a Call of Duty fan. It seems the popular Call of Duty formula has translated well into the modern era (see charlieoscardelta.com for more details). It was annoying that no new footage of GTA IV was shown (they just showed the previous two trailers) but I expect we'll see some new footage soon enough. Microsoft seem to fapping over the additional content Rockstar will exclusively provide to the 360.

Assassin's Creed is also a game I'm looking forward to and a new real-time demo was shown during the press conference. I'm really loving the interaction with pedestrians (if you can call them that) and the free running.

I think I'm missed something....oh yes, that mostly unknown game called Halo 3. It's not all that important because the game itself isn't very popular (wink wink) but a new trailer was shown. Curiously it was a live action trailer that left many disappointed (probably connected to the Halo movie) . A new Halo 3 360 was also confirmed and shown, which also includes a 20GB drive. Just to be annoying another Halo 3 trailer was shown before the conference ended.

Obviously you can tell I'm not a massive Halo fan, but I always did think it was a bit overrated. Anyway, overall the conference was nothing special. Plenty of gameplay but nothing we didn't already know or anticipate.

Nintendo.


Some have said that the Nintendo press conference was disappointing but I both enjoyed it and thought it showed a lot of new innovation off. Granted, some of it we've known about for a while but it never hurts to get new details - does it?

Nintendo showed small films throughout the press conference showing how their innovation had been received in the media, especially the Wii-mote. You can't blame Nintendo for emphasising how popular the Wii has become and, if it were any other company, I'd be saying it can get tiresome. However, Nintendo has always prized itself on originality and innovation and they hardly ever (Virtual Boy excepted) fail to deliver. So, in my eyes, they're allowed to bask in their glory.

I was surprised when Reggie revealed 69% of industry growth this year came from the sale of Nintendo products. I realise that the DS and Wii are selling by the bucket loads but 69% seems like a bit of an overblown statistic to me.

The new Wii Zapper design was shown next, looking a bit more futuristic than it's earlier prototype and also a bit like a sub-machine gun. To be fair it's nothing new and it's getting more and more like the Wii is something you'd play in an arcade. Ignoring it's b-movie style name the price point, at $19.99 for North America, is very pleasing.

More games were talked about and shown off (such as Zelda: Phantom Hourglass, Metroid Prime 3 and that Mario and Sonic Olympics game that millions of people are looking forward to...) but I'm not going to concentrate on those because the Wii Fit is really something worth talking about. A new 'controller' (like a square board) is placed on the ground and you stand on the board doing the various exercises while the 'controller' picks up your movements. Various moves include push-ups, step aerobics, one-legged stretches, sideways twists and even heading footballs. More than 40 different exercises will keep you from getting fat. There's been various 'gimmicks' in the past that say we can use video games to exercise but I really see people (including myself) using this to exercise, mostly those who don't go to the gym though.

Nintendo always aim to please and I don't think they've let us down this time. Some said that the appeal of the Wii would quickly wear off but Nintendo are making sure that new innovative and fun additions keep people interested.

Sony.


I've always been a bit of a Sony guy (after my good old Sega consoles, of course) but the Playstation 3 didn't really interest me at first. These days, however, the PS3 has far more on offer than what was previously touted.

A big highlight for me is LittleBigPlanet. I prefer PC games usually because user generated content (such as mod's and new levels) plays a large part in a games community. User generated content for consoles has been a long time coming and now the three consoles of the infrastructure to support it then I think it's time it's rolled out in a number of games. LittleBigPlanet is exciting because it keeps us gamers hooked by allowing us to create our own content. A games lifespan can greatly increase if the power of creating new content is put in the players hands. I'm glad and excited that Sony has begun to recognise this.

Speaking of user generated content Playstation Home (Sony's 'social network/Second Life lookalike') was constantly emphasised, with Harrison and others speaking from it. You can always guarantee a bit of cheesiness at E3 press conferences and Sony didn't fail to deliver
(such as Chewbacca presenting the new white PSP design with Darth Vader's face on it) but Home is looking pretty nifty, even if I haven't really figured out it's purpose. I do like the ability to upload pictures taken on a mobile phone straight into Home, however.

The new PSP doesn't really look much different. Sure, it's lighter and a bit thinner but the re-design is nothing as drastic as the DS Lite was to the original DS. There's a new video output feature which allows you to watch videos and play PSP games on a TV screen. I don't think this is a good enough reason to buy the new PSP if you already have one though.

Some games that caught my eye include the incredibly tough looking puzzle-game Echo Chrome, Warhawk, a dark looking game called Infamous, and a new apparently real-time trailer of MGS4.

Killzone 2 was left to the end and, well, it was obvious why. Killzone 2 looks to be Sony's killer ap at the moment and, let's face it, it was going to be hard to regain people's confidence after the travesty that was the original trailer. I'm pleased to say that it's looking almost as good as the original trailer (see the two compared here). A Halo killer? It annoys me when people say that. The two games are vastly different so comparing the two is pretty pointless. Halo is a far more colourful game while Killzone 2 does look overly dark.

There's still a lot of things that Sony need to do in order to make me want to buy a PS3, and the PS3 also needs to get a lot more exclusive games. Still, my confidence in Sony has risen a bit, but I think I'll give it another year in order to make a good judgment.

Mario Love - Super Mario Pac.

I've seen a lot of Mario mods in the past but, usually, they're new levels that are so hard to beat you feel like blowing your own brains out. So, we need someone to do something different, something that can actually be called fun. Enter Super Mario Pac!

The basic premise (which is pretty much the entire game) is to build a pipe so you can escape from the non-scrollable levels. Mario is equipped with a FLUDD (basically a jet pack powered by water) pac which allows him to fly around the level. He's also sporting a FLUDD water cannon to defend himself from those pesky flying enemies that populate the levels. However, the player must not forget to refill his FLUDD pac (in the little pool) or Mario will drop like a stone (try not to run out on the right-side of the pipe because you're stuck for good then).

Upon completing the pipe you have to poison the pesky little flower that pops up out of the pipe by dropping purple propellant blocks on it.

Sounds easy huh? Well, no, not really. On my first attempt I lost three lives on the first level alone. Maybe it's a testament to my poor gaming skills that I'm having trouble getting past World 2-1 but I do think they throw too many enemies at you too soon. Fun? To a point, yes. Frustrating? When has a Mario game not been frustrating?

Still, I'd love to avoid the firing squad so listen to Comrade Stalin and go download the tiny 920kb file from Hermitgames.

Super Mario Pac - Hermitgames.

Got a game you'd like me to post about? Email me or leave a comment!

All Hail Comrade Mario!

Mario? A Communist? What do you think he wore that red hat for? Plus, the mustache? A perfect replica of good old Stalins, obviously.

In true Soviet propaganda style here's Mario taking on those nasty Goombas. For the people, of course!

The People's Mario - 88by31.com

Edge #178, August Issue.

I just received my copy of the August issue of Edge through the post today. Edge always has great looking covers but I thought this months was superbly designed!

The cover feature game, Mirror's Edge, is looking like a Matrix-esque FPS with wall-jumping and the like. I'm not about to provide scans so you'll either have to buy the magazine yourself or wait for more news at the upcoming E3.

Also in the issue is an article questioning if gaming can prepare you for real-life warfare which looks like it's going to be a pretty interesting read.

Edge Online.

Quick! We Must Contact The Boys At Nintendo!

I think I'm about to die...

Why?

A man cannot exist without his Nintendo DS!

The good thing is that I actually have my Nintendo DS but the bad thing is I have lost the valuable contraption that supplies it with it's life force.

Yes, my friends, my DS charger has been taken by the little people.

I think I'll go and cry in a corner until I suddenly realise I should get around to ordering a new one.