Destructivator.

The aim of Destructivator is to kill everything on the level. Simple, yes? Well, not really.

Timing is key in this game as everything moves pretty fast. Combine that with not being able to shoot upwards or in mid-air and you've got a pretty tough game - especially in the latter levels (even the first few levels are hard).

Seriously, you'll feel like you're on speed playing Destructivator.

Download it here.

I Was in the War.

I Was in the War is a simple game with a neat concept. You control the white guy in the picture above and your aim is to move along a platform, whilst avoiding the various things coming from all around you. You can hit 'A' to flip onto the other side of the platform to avoid the things on the top, and vice versa. You can also hit 'S' to jump, which I did not actually realise at first, and it makes it far easier to avoid things - until the missiles start dropping anyway.

As you progress the screen becomes increasingly packed with things, such as missiles, helicopters and giant tanks. It's increasingly wacky but increasingly hard and my highest score is a measly 10355. Can you beat it? Most definitely.

Download it here.

Battlefield Heroes Delayed.

The upcoming cartoon style free-to-play World War II game Battlefield Heroes (that's a mouthful) has been delayed until the end of the year. It was supposed to come out this Summer but EA has stated that the delay is due to the addition of new "social networking features".

It's probably for the best as Summer is obviously a dry time for games. Since the game is aimed at the more casual gamer it makes complete sense that these people are out enjoying the sun rather than staying in their bedrooms like the rest of us nerds.

I'm looking forward to this as I never really was a hardcore Battlefield fan (I started out on Battlefield 2 but didn't play too much. I ended up putting more hours into Battlefield 2142), but I'm always looking for something simple - and fun! - to play when I can't be bothered firing anything else up.

Check out the Wikipedia entry if you want to know more about the game.

A Brief Updated Look at all the Upcoming Spore Games.

We all know that Spore is coming out pretty soon (if you don't you must have a pretty nice rock to live under) but, until know, we've known little about the spin-off games that will be accompanying it. E3 has given us a lot of new information so I've took some time to go over it and posted the most important things here. Stay informed!

Spore (PC/Mac)


First up there's been new information about the main game itself, especially as it was available for play testing at E3 this week. Most of the coverage seemed to concentrate on the tribal and space exploration stages of the game but there was also new information about the advanced editors.

The space exploration stage allows you to design your own spacecraft using an editor much like the creature creator already released. After your civilisation has celebrated the spacecrafts creation you go through a brief flying tutorial and then off into space it is! In space you can do various missions that extend from discovery (such as finding a downed spacecraft) to diplomacy with other races. Let's not forget the previously seen tractor beams that can abduct other lifeforms, which can then be dumped on other planets. Once you've completed your primary goal (to discover the centre of the universe) you have half a million other planets to explore according to EA. This all sounds well and good but I'm wondering if it will have enough depth to keep you interested in the long-term. There's only so many weird creatures you can take.

The advanced editors include the vehicle editor, which works the same way as the creature creator and allows you to morph and stretch your vehicle's chassis and then add wheels, wings, weapons etc. IGN, for instance, flew around in a spaceship which looked like a magic school bus. There seems to be no end to the creativity allowed and, apparently, this was also extend to buildings allowing you to create magnificent (if you're creative) cities.

There's a lot more to get into so you can check out these previews and impressions:

IGN - 'Next I discovered a world that had a fairly advanced society. It still hadn't reached space stage, but it did have cities full of tiny little Chinook people (the demo was using user-created content pulled from the Internet, and someone had actually made a creature that looks like a Chinook helicopter).'
Gamespot - 'When we first made our jump into space, we noticed that our home planet had a small moon orbiting it. By heading straight to this moon, we were given a brief mission to follow our onboard radar (a toggle-able power in one of our ship's ability menus, which also includes weapons and miscellaneous tools, such as tractor beams that can be used to abduct other life-forms) to a crash-landed spaceship, which we then scanned for data.'
Gamespy -
'For instance, our tribe was prospering and making new friends, but it was time to start dressing like future world leaders. The tribal clothing editor allows players to outfit their creatures with primitive attire. I decided our fish creatures needed a giant gold ring through the nose. And some feathers. With armored shoulder-pads. So far so good: My creatures started to look like extras from the "Road Warrior" movies.'

Spore: Origin


Spore: Origin is the name given to the iPhone version of Spore. With the iPhone apparently as powerful as Sega's old Dreamcast it's fast becoming the perfect casual gaming platform (most portable games are played on a mobile phone) so it makes sense that EA would want a piece of the pie. This is where Spore: Origin comes in and it seems like it will be a decent casual game for those away from their PC's/Mac's or even for those who aren't aware of Spore.

The game itself is a bit like the primordial stage in Spore, in that you direct a cellular level organism around and gobble up the smaller creatures. Controlling your little cellular creature is done by using simple tilt controls on the iPhone. It also infuses the creativity available in the main game you get to evolve your creature every few stages (the game allows you to use the iPhone's pinch controls to morph your creature). However, you have to watch out for the bigger creatures that will reduce the DNA metre you have to fill to complete the stage.

Spore: Origin sounds like Sony's previously released PS3 title flOw but with a little more customisation. While the iPhone will sport the best graphics and the tilt controls the title will also be available for other mobile platforms - meaning that they'll always be a way to get your Spore fix!

For more info check out this short IGN preview.

Spore Creatures



The DS version is taking a unique approach to the creature creator aspect of Spore. Due to the DS' inability to host a creature creator on the advanced scale of the PC version the solution is to piece together body parts. You can still stretch and move these parts around the body but it's nowhere near the freedom allowed by the main game. You can also colour and texture these parts so you're still allowed a fair deal of creativity. Your 2D creatures then move around in a 3D world (similar to Paper Mario) and more body parts can be found through exploring and taking on quests.

The stylus is put to novel use by being used in fights with other creatures. Creatures are taken out by effectively 'slashing' the monsters with your stylus. If you want more creatures to 'slash' you'll also apparently be able to share creatures with your friends over wi-fi.

For a bit more information check out these short IGN and Gamespot previews.

Anything Else?

Despite the insistence of a rather annoying girl on Livejournal there has been little information about what's happening with the Wii version (that means there's NO release date yet). It's not a port so this was not the reason for the PC delay but Will Wright did say they're currently in the planning stages.

Other than the Wii Xbox 360 and PS3 versions are still under consideration.

The Sims 3 E3 Trailer

While this trailer for The Sims 3 may look like an episode of Laguna Beach I'm surprisingly looking forward to the game. You see, not only does the game allow your Sim's access to the entire town without those pesky loading screens (and the ability to see what's going on elsewhere at any moment) but it also deals with the problem of one family aging while the others stay frozen in time - something which has always annoyed me.

I'm the kind of guy who loves to create stories so The Sims franchise has always been a favourite of mine. Unlike other people I don't actually care about the constant expansion packs because, hey, it's new content and at least EA are continuing to support the game. Couple that with an excellent community with literally millions of creations and you can have endless fun! Although that endless fun is sometimes pretty mundane...

The Sims 3 E3 Trailer - YouTube.

Zombie Shooter.

Regular readers of this blog (if I have any) will know that I’m very fond of anything to do with zombies, be it films, books or games. I even compiled a post of a few zombie browser-based games you can play on your coffee break. So, it’s with great enthusiasm that I dived into yet another zombie game on the market, which is simply – but appropriately – titled Zombie Shooter.

Well, I say dived but I only touched the waters with my little toe. Due to being a poor graduate I could only play the free version of the game, which only allows you an hour to play around with it. However, an hour is more than enough to experience the massive slaughter of zombies that you will partake in. The best feature of all this slaughter? The blood and zombie corpses don't disappear and continually cover the level in gore! All in lovely isometric glory!

There are three modes in the game; your usual Campaign mode with some sort of story, a mode called Survive mode in which you stand off against increasing numbers of zombies and bosses, and finally a mode called Gun Stand which is like Survive mode but you take control of a fixed gun gunning down the constant hordes of zombies. In this final mode you often end up with something like this:


Told you it was gory, and you'll be knee deep in the undead before you know it.

Although the two modes are fun you'll quickly bore of them. It's the campaign mode where the real meat of the game lies and the few levels I played were pretty average. I say average because of the awful AI. Once the zombies and other enemies see you they'll track you across the level, but if you go through a door and down the corridor in the opposite direction they'll follow your movements while forgetting that there's a wall between the two of you. This results in the zombies constantly walking against walls and other objects, or the latter enemies shooting at walls. It's pretty dumb and it takes a lot of the fun away from what could be a pretty good game. I also suffered a glitch where I got stuck on a piece of scenery and had to restart the level.

With the AI problems it's an average game at the best. If these problems were sorted out I'd say that it probably is worth the £10 price tag, but I'm saying that without actually knowing how many levels the game has.

You can download the free demo or buy the game from its homepage.

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

Totem Destroyer.

Physics based games often annoy me. It's not the game themselves, in fact I always love novel ways of making use of physics in games (which is part of why I enjoy the Half-Life 2 games so much), it's the act of having to use your brain. Yes, I'm just lazy at heart.

Thankfully Totem Destroyer isn't too tough and it's actually pretty enjoyable through the act of having to discover just how you're going to get the golden totem down without breaking it. In each level you have to decide which block you want to destroy with your handy bomb. Each level gets increasingly more complex (although some of the complex levels are too obvious) but I often found that you can complete the level through sheer luck and frantic clicking. For example, the totem may luckily land on one of the indestructible black blocks which you honestly didn't mean to happen. Like me, however, you'll probably just shrug your shoulders and move on to the next level.

You can play the game over at the Armor Games site.

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

Dino Run.

Take a long loving look at the above image. Go on, I'll wait here....

......

Now doesn't that look peaceful and tranquil? Doesn't that yellow blob that passes for a dinosaur look cute? Yes? Good. Now take a look at the image below.


There, my friends, lies DOOM!!! MASSIVE BOILING BLACK DUSTY DOOM!!!! (which I'm apparently running into)

Phew, now that I've got that out of my system let's talk about the game that inspires such rage.

Dino Run's name tells you all you need to know. You're a dinosaur and you need to run, simple eh? Well, not when you're running away from certain extinction as evidenced by the picture above. Along the way you have to avoid various obstacles such as dumb dinosaurs who won't get out of your damn way.....yes, this made me hate dinosaurs! Fortunately your 'cute' little blob of a dinosaur can eat the smaller ones, which gives you points and some sort of DNA upgrade (although this only happened once to me) that allows you to upgrade your dinosaurs stats. You also have to save eggs so, obviously, you can continue your species even when the whole frickin world is covered in a thick black cloud choking the life out of the Earth. See, I don't see what the dinosaur has to gain from running away as it'll eventually catch up to the little dude.

Anyway, you go through the normal routine of levels and different environments while the impending doom gets increasingly faster behind you. For you social types there's also a multiplayer where you can race against friends or strangers.

It's a neat little game, but my poor skills prevented me from seeing the end. So, I hand the task to a good gamer to see if the little guy makes it. I have become attached to Rex, even if he is now burning to death at the bottom of a lava pit.

You can play the game here.

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

Sporepedia Is Now Live!

You'd be forgiven for thinking that Spore was vaporware because, after-all, we haven't been hearing all that much about it lately. This makes it all the more surprising when, seemingly out of the bloom, the previously announced Sporepedia is suddenly released by EA.

The Sporepedia is basically an encyclopedic collection of the millions of creations that players have made in their own copy of the Spore universe - well, that is what it's supposed to be eventually. For now the Sporepedia is only populated by the creations the people of Maxis have designed but, once the game is released, you'll eventually be able to easily download them and add them to your own copy of the game.

The release of Sporepedia comes just a week before the Spore creature creator will be in the players hands (on June 17th). I for one can't wait - especially now that the system recommendations show that my aging PC can handle it!

Sporepedia - Maxis/EA

Tobioriya (Or, Um, Something to do With Arrows).

Now here's an odd one. In Tobioriya you fire arrows at naked people jumping from a building. Yup, and that's about it. There's some sort of score system but because it's in Japanese I don't actually have a clue what any of it means.

Oh well, pinning some naked people to a wall is a nice way to kill five minutes. You can download it from here (it's the second from the top).

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

WolfQuest Now Live!

Remember WolfQuest? That strange yet alluring game that allows you to play as a wolf and pee on others? Well it's now live!

I haven't had a chance to play it yet (hectic Christmas preparations) but apparently demand led to a server outage on December 21st. I'm looking forward to trying it though and, if you do try it, let me know if it's any good.

In the mean time you could always go back to the deers.

WolfQuest.org

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

Game of the Week: Orange Box (Half-Life 2: Episode Two Edition)

The Orange Box has much to answer too in view of the lack of posts around here lately. I could say that it's because I'm back at university and I'm drowning under a flood of incredibly dull work but we all know I'd be lying if I tried to use that in my defense. It was just too damn hard not to get wrapped up in the hype surrounding The Orange Box and it's such an amazing deal that you'd be a fool not to take advantage of it. By all rights I shouldn't even own the game because it's not out in the good old UK until October 18th, but I've fully embraced the future and Steam can always have a place in my bed (a woman would be preferred, of course).

Although you could spend all year reading the opinions and impressions of this excellent deal around the Internet - and anyone calling themselves a gamer would have played them to death already - I'm still going to offer my brief impressions anyway because, well, I know you love it really!

First up it's Half-Life 2: Episode Two.



Pimp My Ride: Half Life 2: Episode Two.

Wow.

I could just give you that one word and that would sum up everything I feel about this amazing experience but - because I'm nice - I'm going to give you a paragraph or two anyway. Episode Two is just so intricately designed, each nook and cranny given undue care and attention by the masterminds at Valve, that you can't help but open your mouth to utter such a statement. From the very beginning when you crawl out of a train wreck to be confronted by the ever lovable Alyx and the breathtaking sight of the open portal in the distance you know you're in for a good ride.

Admittedly throwing you straight into the tight confines of a mine seems like a bit of a tease when you start your journey in the 'open' countryside but Valve is merely making sure you don't get a taste of all the good stuff to come in one shot. Putting you up against Antlions is also presenting you with a familiar enemy so you already know how to deal with them, although there is some variation in Antlion Workers which spit toxic acid at you from a long distance, forcing you to take cover. When you finally escape the mine and see combine troops and striders traveling along a bridge in the distance you know the real journey is about to begin.

Still, it all feels a little too familiar. Until you get the car (see above) all the enemies are recurring, if still welcome, faces who'll you'll be able to deal with in no time except, this time, they seem to be in abundance compared to the previous games. The hunters supply a welcome, if terrifying, release from this familiarity and eventually you get your first taste - and a damn lot of it - of fighting the striders. When you put the two together you get one of the best parts of the game but it's still a common staple of any FPS to throw a horde of enemies at you and let you're trigger finger do the work. Where Episode Two slightly differs from this is the frantic race from point to point as you struggle to take out both the hunters and striders on meager resources while also giving you the 'freedom' (there's no actual freedom in the car since the game still has a set path you have to follow to continue the story line and trigger new events) to tear the dirt apart in your pimped out ride. It's an amazing climax that the game spent a lot of effort building up to.

Where Episode Two really shines is it story and it's enough to rival any Hollywood blockbuster. In Half-Life 2 I was never totally impressed by the story but my opinions have, like the storyline, evolved. The acting, especially Merle Dandridge (Alyx Vance) and Robert Guillaume (Doctor Eli Vance - my favourite!), is superb and the plot points shocking enough to fill you with genuine emotion. Facial animation has improved and emotion is readily apparent on each of the carefully crafted characters features. There's a sort of Lost-esque spin to the storyline (Episode Two even has a few homages to Lost) in that we're presented with more questions then we get answers (or the answers just form new questions). Some hate this type of story telling but I love it because it keeps you engaged and talking about the game and it also guarantees Valve a sale on Episode Three if it's true when they say we'll get all the answers there. You watch the next episode of Lost because you want answers to the cliffhanger from the previous episode so when you're confronted with what happens at the end of Episode Two there will be few people who don't want to 'Finish the Fight'.

God, I do babble on don't I?

That Valve took so long to put the second episode out was disappointing to say the least but you can see they used that time extremely wisely. Even though the game can be beat in seven hours you can bet you'll have an awful lot of fun in those few hours and the storyline will keep you hooked enough to finish it either way. Superb!

Game of the Week: Team Fortress 2

To be honest I was hesitant about making Team Fortress 2 my game of the week. Firstly it's only a beta (although all levels from the final release are included) that you get access to by paying for a pre-order. Secondly, well, this is the killer. The game has been crashing on me so many times that the stress of having to restart my computer everytime it freezes has taken all the fun out of the game (a problem that's pretty widespread, it seems). With that said the game is, when it works, incredibly fun.

I didn't play the original Team Fortress so I can't really compare the two but, from what I've heard, it's nothing like the original. The cartoon style presentation is instantly appealing and breathes far more life and humor into the game then a more realistic looking game would. Also, the varied classes means there's someone for everyone and the lack of grenades helps new players avoid the 'nade spam' thats present in many online FPS games.

At the moment my favourite classes are heavy, spy, and the engineer although all classes have something that appeals to me. The great thing about the classes is that everyone has their own part to play in a match. For example, the heavy teamed with the medic can create a temporarily invulnerable killing machine that can slaughter an entire team in a few seconds.

One thing I find annoying is constantly being stabbed in the back by spies but I also believe it adds to the suspense because you never know whether or not the guy in front of you is actually on your team or a spy disguised as one. On servers with friendly fire off this can create a bit of a problem for spies as some people will resort to shooting their own team mates (knowing full well they can't be damaged) to figure out who's actually a spy.

It's an amazing game that rarely gets boring but the crash issue means I (and many other people) can't play it as it should be played. Of course it's just a beta and problems are to be expected but since this particular issue (freezing and a sound loop) has been around since Episode One many people are not counting on Valve being able to fix the issue.

The Apocalyptic Game About Penguins.

What's better than penguins?

Penguins with guns of course!

Ok, so the games nothing more than your generic side-scrolling shooter complete with power-ups, bosses, and more enemies on-screen than you can shake a stick at (which, in this situation, probably wouldn't help).

It's still fun though (maybe it's the penguins) and, hey, it's free!

Get it here!

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

Pack-ing Heat and Bad Jokes.

Remember the deers? Well, if you're going to have a game about deers then why not make a game about being a wolf? As far as I'm aware there's not many games out there that allow you to live the life of a wolf so this one is finally plugging that gap. When you think about, however, maybe these games didn't exist in the first place because they didn't have much of an audience in the first place. Anyway, this is where WolfQuest enters the picture.


What better way to describe a game about wolves than showing one urinating? In fact, establishing your own territory through 'raised-leg urination marking' something I'm pretty sure makes this game unique already. Other features include finding a mate, following scent trails, taking part in a hunt and, erm, eating stuff. The game actually has missions but the website doesn't really say anything about them. However, since the game is a role-playing game and you actually do earn experience then the missions must be something more than lying around all day or bonking your mate.

Multiplayer is also available, allowing you to form packs with other players who are wondering why they're playing a game about wolves.

To be honest it sounds a lot more interesting than The Endless Forest because, unlike that game, there's actually something to do. It's not out at the moment (it'll be free when it is) but check out the site (and the cheesy video) for more information leading up to it's December release date.

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

Gridblaster.

Looking at the description and screenshots I was looking forward to giving Gridblaster a go, that is until I realised it was extremely hard.

The aim of the game is to navigate your way around the maze avoiding traps and the lasers fired at you by your enemies. You have your own laser to shoot those pesky things including, much to my delight, the lasers themselves. Once you shoot an enemy they respawn outside the map as a different colour and you have to repeat your task of killing each and every one of them three more times on the same level. Sounds easy right? Well, it's not.

The main problem I have is that the first level is just too damn hard. Three lives seems ok but it really isn't when the slightest movement sees you dead. You can only shoot the way your traveling so you have to be extremely quick to get that enemy that's just come up behind you yet, at the same time, its hard to avoid crashing into it. Everything just moves too damn fast on the first level. You can pick up bonuses like rapid fire but they don't last all that long and any one of them could actually reverse your movements. If the enemies started off slow and got faster with each level then that would be more to my liking. Plus, killing each enemy four times on the first level seems a bit overkill to me.

With all that said it's one of those games you'll end up wasting hours on through determination to beat it. If you like a challenge then this game is for you - just don't play it during your coffee break or you'll probably end up never getting back to work!

Gridblaster - Videogame biscuit (Via Rock, Paper, Shotgun)

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

Game of the Week - 'Ya'll Be Mining In Space'.

In the midst of a gaming slump - and since there's still another month left before I return to the long hard slog of university - I decided it was time to put things right and get my gaming ass back into gear. However, to become a gamer again there's always the question of just what should I play? Pretty much every new game was out of the question due to lack of funds, an aging PC and the fact that I have no 'next-gen' consoles in my possession. I wanted something that I could really get into and occupy my ridiculous amounts of free time. So, in light of this, it was back to MMO territory!

I didn't actually think I'd be going back to MMO's anytime soon (discount the free browser-based game Urban Dead) because I'd got terribly bored of the grind and, in my experience, 95% of current MMO's are one big gigantic enormous *insert other words for massive here* grind! However, I know that there are fun parts to MMO's like World of Warcraft and most of this comes through interacting with other players which - at the core - is what an MMO should be all about. I never really got into WoW because I felt like I couldn't engage with the game and spent most of my time in Azeroth on my own. I found (and already knew) a few decent people but, for the most part, they were so far ahead of me that I couldn't be bothered trying to catch up. Also I wasn’t exactly looking forward to the end game content of constantly repeating raids and PvP seemed to be full of angst-filled spotty teenagers every time I tried it out. Yes, I know a lot of people have fun with WoW but I never found anything I enjoyed and I’ll never be persuaded to go back. I’m not saying that the game I’m about to talk about doesn’t have it’s boring parts because – by god! – it does, as do many games, but I feel like I can engage with it more than I ever did with pointy eared elves and getting ganked by a dwarf.

The game? EVE Online.



If you play EVE solo then I think you’re far more likely to get bored quickly. Obviously EVE is an online game (which only uses one server for everyone) so interaction with other players is a key aspect and, with EVE, I think this is more important than anything else. The players run the game world, from the economy to the territory divided up between the largest and most successful player corporations that then group together into various alliances. Mining some ore and selling it means you’re contributing to the raw materials other players will use to build battleships that will then be destroyed in a war meaning the cycle begins again (in effect you’re contributing to the ‘war effort’). Mining has been accused of being a glorified screensaver (if you’re afk mining anyway) but there’s a thrill to be had from mining in low security space and having to constantly watch your back due to the constant threat of player pirates attacking you.

I’ve been told that joining a player corporation is where the fun really starts – especially since everyone works together. Speaking of co-operation I find the EVE community incredibly helpful and it’s extremely rare that a question will go unanswered. This may be because the average player age is around 25, which means the immature crap you tend to get in games like WoW or over the mic on Xbox Live games doesn’t tend to happen. Yes, you’ll still get ganked by pirates but those players are just following a different career path to you and if you’re going to operating in low security space then it’s really your own fault if you don’t have adequate protection.

I love the fact that skills carry on training when you log-off but this is necessary due to the incredible amount of time some of the higher skills will take the learn. All-together EVE’s skills will take over seven years to learn so you can see why I say you’ll never be stuck for something to do.

There’s so much I want to say about EVE and I’ll defiantly be writing about it a lot more in the future but, for now, EVE Online is my game of the week. It’s a massive game and you’ll be sure to find at least something you enjoy doing. Give the 14-day free trial a try and see what you think. If you don’t like the game then fair enough, but at least try out more than one aspect of it before you complain.

Urban Dead & The Meta-Game.

Bill Radcheck was once a regular Joe working the 9-5 shift that commonly drives people to the brink of insanity. When his home in Malton city became overrun with zombies you could be forgiven for saying that now was the time to go insane but - for Bill - this was the turning point in his life. Now he travels around the stricken city offering help wherever he can. Primarily a scout his job is often dangerous but extremely rewarding as the survivors of the outbreak come to rely on whatever information they can get about the state of the city. To be happy in such times may end in you becoming labeled as insane but, for Bill, he's happy because he's finally found his purpose in life.

I touched upon Urban Dead a few months back in my look at browser-based zombie games but I don't think I gave it any of the attention that it deserves. Ever since I was introduced to the game by Gnome over in his post at Siliconera I've been having incredible fun with it. Many of you may question why this is the case, after all - how much fun can you actually have with a simplistic point & click game that really doesn't look all that much? Well, the simple look and feel to the game is what makes it such incredible fun. You see, in the world of Urban Dead the developer doesn't make the game, the players do.

In an interview with The Escapist the games creator, Kevan Davis, talked about his hands-off approach towards the game;

From a storytelling perspective, Urban Dead's simple interface and deep gameplay allows each player to tell his own particular tale. Despite Davis' interest in telling stories and designing games, he's pleased with the hands-off approach he's taking with his game. "I think it's good that every player has a chance to build their own story," he says. "By avoiding any big, official, ongoing plot, players have been able to project their own ideas onto the game without being contradicted by everything. Because everything outside of the official plot is reduced to survivor dialogue and graffiti, anything that doesn't fit with your perception of the game - perhaps your safe house has been invaded by a squad claiming to be time-traveling robot vampire hunters - can be just dismissed as another sadly deluded survivor cult." - The Escapist

The game itself started out with extremely little in the way of backstory. However, in the course of the games existence enough has been fleshed out that you actually feel as though your character is populating a world in which survival is a daily struggle (the daily AP limit of 50 makes you think about every single point before you waste it). This player concocted history, group politics and even the lengths of organisation zombie player groups go to in order to start a horde are all what's key to the game. I've seen people grow bored of the game because they've got all the skills and reached the highest level but what they really lack is an imagination. The simplistic graphics offer nothing more than a simple street map while text-based descriptions are what the player must rely on. Like the table-based role-playing games a lack of imagination will return little in the way of enjoyment.

For me the most enjoyment comes not from the game itself but from the game's superbly detailed wiki. This wiki is where survivors go for status updates on important buildings (such as malls or revival points - key to any survivor who's just been turned into one of the walking dead) and the state a suburb is in. Everything from maps, the condition of a malls barricades, player-created newspapers and information on the games various player-created groups can all be found here. However, without the players the wiki would be nothing as it relies solely on their input. My enjoyment comes from scouting out the dangerous areas that few people want to travel around and providing status updates through the wiki. It may seem a pretty dull task to those who don't play the game but for me it puts me in the shoes of a survivor who's willing to put his life on the line to provide information to his fellow survivors.

It's not only the wiki that supports the game. Urban Dead forums and group websites are everywhere. There's even a site dedicated to hosting the journals of survivors in order to further flesh out your characters and - as a result - you become further entrenched in the game's world. All these are what breathes life into a city made up of little more than colourful blocks. Without the extremely dedicated community that Urban Dead enjoys the game would cease to be fun after a week or two.

I used to find it amusing that people found enjoyment playing characters in games that you couldn't really see with your own eyes but now I see how deluded I was. Yes, I love games with amazing graphics and a decent enough storyline that I can engage with but once you've completed the game the connection (if any) you had with the games characters evaporates. When you use your imagination to create a character and the events they take part in the result is far more rewarding. The character is part of you, you created it and you own it. It's survival and backstory takes on far more meaning than the characters developers can come up with. Bill Radcheck is me and I am him. His story is my effort to add life to a city that looks bleak from the outside but is anything but boring what you engage with the stories of it's community.

People sometimes say that people take the game far too seriously but that's what role-playing is about. If you aren't acting like your character would act then the fun is lost. When I immerse myself in the world of Urban Dead I am Bill Radcheck until I log-off and return to my normal life. These days games are losing that kind of integration with the game's world (people must love being immersed in the game's world as sales of GTA games show that), we want to feel like we're really a part of that world and what we do makes a difference to the others populating the world with us. I've played plenty of MMO's and become bored because I never had any connection with the character I was portraying and I didn't feel as though my actions were having any impact on the world around me.

When you think about it Urban Dead is anything but simple; yet that, for me, is what makes the game so refreshingly fun.

Play Urban Dead here.

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

*Picture from Dawn of the Dead (2004).

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!