Category Archives: The Android’s Kickbacks (Gog/Bribed)

Waking Mars is On Sale and Worth It

Right now you can get a little game called Waking Mars for $1.99 over at GOG (or $2.00 over at Steam). This is a steal. I’ve talked about this game before and I recommend reading that article for a good overview.

Basically it’s sort of a puzzle game and sort of a platformer and sort of Metroidvania but mostly it’s about exploration and being relaxed.

And look at this friggin artwork and tell me this isn't great.  (Hint: You can't.)
And look at this friggin artwork and tell me this isn’t great. (Hint: You can’t.)

purchase Pregabalin TLDR: GET IT ON GOG or GET IT ON STEAM or GET IT ON THE ITUNES STORE. Not even kidding you guys: this is a good one.

Waking Mars Is How to Make a Good Casual Game

Recently, a game called Waking Mars went on Steam sale for a steal (and it still is on sale, by the way!) Because it had “Mars” in the title, I decided to snap it up. This, my friends, was a very wise decision. This game is more than worth the $2.50 I forked over for it. Basically, this is how you make a casual game.

It’s sort of a platformer, except you have a jetpack. And it’s sort of puzzle game, but none of the “puzzles” ever leave you frustrated. Basically the game is about exploring underground Martian caves, learning about (and growing and breeding) bizarre alien species, talking to your AI bro, and in general being comfy. Yes, this is a comfy game.

We are gonna get comfy.
We are gonna get comfy.

This isn’t a triple-A title by any means and the game is easy to pick up and learn but this by no means makes it shallow. You actually have an neat little story going on that keeps you interested throughout, and between this and the research you can do on various lifeforms (and the subsequent notes you can read), the game has a surprising amount of depth for what it is. Humor is here too, thanks to your AI companion, and so is a certain amount of thoughtfulness thanks to the main character. Speaking of the main character, he’s Chinese, and the only other human character in the game is a black woman. This isn’t made a big deal, it just… is, like any other normal thing, and I like how it’s done like that. It reminds me of Star Trek and it’s nice to see some variety in games.

Overall this is a fun and extremely relaxing romp through a mysterious and alien world and I really cannot stress how much of a steal the current sale price is. The game is also available for Mac, Linux, iPhone/iPad, Android, and probably an old toaster too, so you really don’t have an excuse not to snag this game. I mean, really, look at this and tell me this doesn’t make you want to explore strange new worlds, seek out new life and new civilizations, and boldly go where no one has gone before:

SignalChamber-Approach

Yeah, I thought so.

Buy it on Steam or at the website!

A Not-So-Indie Bundle

Hey friends, Pike here.  Long time, no post… from me, anyway.  I do apologize, but writing… and of course lots of gaming… have been keeping me quite busy.

Anyhow!  Today I come bearing news that you may have already heard.  Basically, there’s a new Humble Bundle in town, and it’s a little different.  It breaks away from Humble Bundle tradition in more than one way: The games are certainly not “indie” ones, for starters, oh, and Steam and Windows are both required.

A few people are questioning the wisdom of this move.  People don’t like taking the focus away from indie games, and Mac and Linux users are certainly not impressed, either, since Humble Bundle has traditionally prided itself on offering games to users of all “major” operating systems.

As for myself, well, I see little to complain about.  It’s still cheap games, money is still going to charity (heck, you can give it all to charity if you want), and honestly with THQ in the financial trouble it is currently in, they may as well be their own charity case.

As a self-professed Linux fan the lack of Linux support does bother me a little, but ultimately if you are a Linux gamer you should probably have accepted a while ago that there are a good many games you’re going to be missing out on.  I’m not saying that this is right, necessarily, but I am saying that this is reality.  We’re getting a big ol’ bone tossed to us in the name of impending Steam support, and honestly that’s got me happy enough.  In the meantime I’m willing to dual boot in the name of vidya gaems.

So anyway, do give it a look if you haven’t already.  It’s a solid lineup and worth getting for Company of Heroes alone, not to mention the other games.

FTL: Faster Than Light

Recently released was a small indie game named FTL, or Faster Than Light, and after an eight-hour stint of WoW yesterday (WHY) I grabbed it and began to play. Then I went to bed very late. This is some SERIOUSLY addictive stuff right here.

FTL is described as a “spaceship simulation real-time roguelike-like”. This isn’t an inaccurate description. The premise is that you are the captain of a Federation starship carrying vital intelligence to put down a massive rebellion, and you’ve got to make it back to Federation space to deliver it. You do so by travelling across a number of sectors in space, jumping from star to star and investigating or dealing with whatever you find at each one, be it a station in distress, a trader, a pirate, a pirate disguised as a pirate, and so forth. Always trying to stay one step ahead of the rebels, who will sweep across each sector as you cross it and give you a serious incentive to press on.

But of course each consecutive sector is tougher and contains stronger threats, so you also want to explore and see what you can gather in order to upgrade your ship (Or just repair it after the inevitable damage you take), recruit new crewmembers, and so forth. When you’re in combat is when the real fun begins, and it’s the part that they mean when they say “real-time”. You have to juggle a number of things going on at once, directing your crew to the posts you need manned (Most things operate without crew, but they can make it work better and they can gain experience to increase this further) or reacting to various things occurring shipboard such as fires breaking out, systems taking damaged, or boarders teleporting over. Meanwhile you’ve got to decide how to use your various weapons against the enemy, what to target, whether to use or conserve missiles, and so on and so forth. It doesn’t look like much but once you’re in there it gets pretty freaking tense and engaging.

Things get way more frenetic than you might expect

At almost every star you visit you will be presented with a short text event requiring you to make a decision. Do you try and help that civilian ship under attack by pirates, or hope to sneak past? Do you want to investigate that abandoned station or just move on? These events form one of the cores of the game, and the whole thing depends on decisions you make in one way or another. They also tend to consist of the good old standbys of shows like Star Trek, so if you’ve ever wanted to deal with various unpleasant space gribblies, this is the game for you!

As for the “roguelike” appellation, well. This is some random shit right here. Your starting ship is predefined but almost everything after that, from the weapons you might find at a store to the events you encounter to the sectors within the galaxy itself is randomized. Some games will give you an easy time, some will bend you over and make you squeal like a schoolgirl on prom night. This is a game to be played and replayed, not played through once and put aside; each play will probably last under an hour and each time what you largely gain is knowledge and experience (You, the player, that is) although there are some unlocks that mix things up a good deal.

It’s also a game of hubris. Some boarders have teleported over and are attacking your weapons bay? Well we’ll just see how they like it if I vent all the air. Heh. Oh crap, their ship just blew up my O2 room. And now they’ve sabotaged my door controls so I can’t close the airlocks again. Now I’ve got to try and repair the O2 room AND door control with the air supply rapidly depleting and oh everyone is dead. The game explicitly tells you to be prepared to lose, and like any roguelike or Dwarf Fortress, that’s an attitude you’ll need to get very far with this. Losing is Fun. Still, Losing can Hurt as well, though funnily enough total defeat hurts less than losing a single crewmember can. Just between their name and a few experience-based stats you can grow attached to the little guys, and when one gets killed I tend to feel some guilt and sorrow – “Mattz was with us from the start, he saved the ship more than once! And I let him die!”

You can grab it now from Steam or GoG.com and I highly recommend you do so, it’s only the price of a movie ticket and you’ll get much more fun from this. EDIT: Thanks to commenter neothoron, who pointed out that you can also get FTL from the game’s official website for Windows/OSX/Linux, comes with a Steam key, and is DRM-free.

Europa Universalis IV announced!

Yes yes, I know. This happened last week and we’re slow. We apologize. Any-who!

Good ol’ Paradox has been dropping hints about a new game in the works for a while, now, and although I think just about everyone was hoping for a new IP, the result turned out to be a new installment in Paradox’s flagship series. Here’s the trailer they’ve given us:

Things I get from the trailer:

  • Okay, so what we’ve got here is a very Crusader-Kings-2-inspired map…
  • OMG THAT MUSIC IT MAKES ME WANT TO PLAY EU3 AGAIN

And that’s about it. Fear not, though! Paradox has also provided us with some screenshots:

spongebob wallet.jpg

Now I don’t know about you guys, but I really like the look of this screenshot. It does indeed look like a lovely mashup of Crusader Kings 2 and Europa Universalis 3 and I am very okay with this.

Of course, that’s just talking about the visual direction. What about the actual gameplay? It’s probably too early to tell much at the moment, but this is what we’ve got so far:

Europa Universalis IV Main Features:

  • Make your own decisions: Nation building is completely flexible
  • Use your Monarch Power: In this new system, a leader’s traits will direct the ebb and flow of gameplay
  • Experience history coming to life: The great personalities of the past are on hand to support you as you make your mark on thousands of historical events
  • Turn the world into your playground: Enjoy over 300 years of gameplay in a lush topographical map in full 3D
  • Gain control of vital trade routes and make the wealth of the world flow to your coffers in the all-new trade system
  • Bring out your negotiating skills in a deeper diplomatic system
  • Go online and battle against your friends in an all-new multiplayer game mode that features hot-join, improved chatting, a new matchmaking server, and support for a standalone server
  • Create your own history and customize your game: Europa Universalis IV gives you the chance to customize and mod practically anything your heart may desire

So basically it sounds like EU3, except better. Again, I’m okay with this. The apple tends not to fall far from the tree with Paradox games, and truthfully I wouldn’t want it to in this case. EU3 is already a very, very solid strategy game, and if Paradox is basically just upgrading the graphics and adding some new stuff then I’m more than happy with that.

We’ll bring you more announcements and discussions on this as it occurs, so stay tuned! In the meantime, the Paradox forums have got a subforum going.

The Damage Thus Far

So lemme put it this way: I smashed through my entire “Steam Sale” budget by Day Five.  Obviously this hasn’t stopped me from buying anything further, but let’s just say that I’ve spent a rather lot of money so far.

It has occurred to me that I need to buy a Spongebob Wallet.

Of all the stuff I’ve gotten so far, here are some of the ones I’ve been enjoying the most:

The Legend of Grimrock: Fun dungeon crawling oldschool RPG that eschews silly things like maps in favor of you bumbling around lost and attacking giant snails.  All of the charm of old dungeon-crawls from back in the day.

Train Simulator 2012: No, I’m not kidding.  This game is great.  Especially if you’re a sim game grognard who gets excited by the thought of playing a travel game in real-time, so if it takes an hour to go from Point A to Point B in real life, you’d better believe it will take you an hour to do so in game.  With “Simple Controls” activated, this game is in the vein of classics such as Desert Bus, except you can pause and do things like start and stop.  This is more endearing than it sounds and this game easily devoured three hours of my time right after buying it.

Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic: A game which I haven’t touched since it launched almost a decade ago and I played it on the Xbox.  I’d really forgotten how much fun this game is and what was originally going to be an “I’ll dink around for an hour and feel some nostalgia feels” game has turned into several hours of a legitimate playthrough.  Let’s just hope Carth stops wanting to talk about his feelings at some point.  (He won’t.)

Orcs Must Die!: I’ve actually yet to play this one (the curse of buying so many games at one time), but my dear associate Mister Adequate swears up and down that this game is amazing and fun.  Considering his raucous laughter over Skype whenever he plays it, I’ll take his word for it.

What sorts of gems have you picked up with the sale?

The Steam Store is experiencing some heavy load right now. Please try again later.

If you’ve been living under a rock on Mars with your fingers in your ears you may not be aware of this, but the Steam Summer Sale just went live about an hour ago and everyone is hammering the service so hard it’s difficult to actually see the sales.

There is no relevant picture. Have a guide to rocks.

However, highlights so far:
Legends of Grimrock – 60% off (all signs point to this being a modern classic)
THQ Collection – 84% off (holy shitting jesus von nazareth, Company of Heroes, Dawn of War, Saints Row The Third, etc)
New Vegas – 40% off (holding off in case of a daily or flash deal)
SEGA collection – 89% off (loads and loads of Genesis games, as well as the Total War series)
Deus Ex: Human Revolution – 75% off but only lasting for another five hours as of 1900 British Time GO NOW
Paradox Collection – 75% off
Wargame: European Escalation – 40% off (have heard great things; another one I hope will get a daily)

There are votes on which deals are coming up next, and as well as the daily deals there are “flash deals” that only last a few hours, because Gaben hates us sleeping almost as much as he hates our having money.

Anything you’ve already bought or are hoping to see come down in price?

Guys!

As you know we are unofficial GoG.com mouthpieces because they sell loads of great games, but this is a particularly special one.

http://www.gog.com/en/gamecard/sid_meiers_alpha_centauri

Sid Meier’s Alpha Centauri. $2.99 USD. You know what you do.

Pike keeps this picture handy.