Open-world adventure, forma.8, comes to mobile

June 16, 2017 David Neumann 22

iOS Universal, PC/Mac • Being old and lazy, I hadn’t heard of forma.8 until yesterday. It’s been on Steam since February, but that’s Alex’s domain, and I hate stepping on his toes. Plus, did I mention I’m lazy? Searching Steam for new games just isn’t my bag. Luckily, forma.8 has arrived on what is exactly my bag: the App Store. Retitled forma.8 GO, it brings the open-world exploration and action to our small screens. Oh, and it’s on sale.

Short Cuts: The Surge

May 19, 2017 Alex Connolly 1

PC, Consoles • The Surge is out, and by a piston’s hiss, is it grand. For good or ill, Deck13‘s futuristic brawler will be known as ‘that robot Dark Souls‘, and if it helps cut to the chase, then I’m all for it. FROM Software’s punitive dark fantasy has laid the groundwork for what has now been coined Soulslike, a tidy riff on the descendants and pretenders to Rogue. Soulslike it is. Industrial body horror Soulslike, even better.

Short Cuts: Toukiden 2

April 3, 2017 Alex Connolly 0

PC, PS4, PC, Vita • You can say you were there, but the fact remains whether you were, like, really there. I packed a PSP from Day One, and while I built a portable library deemed by esteemed colleagues to be the UMD equivalent of the Royal Navy, I never quite grokked Sony’s portable software saviour. Monster Hunter. Responsible for atrophied extremities numbered in billions, the talons of Capcom’s fantastical neolithic beast-mincer never found true purchase in my soft, sallow flesh. But I think, years later, I might have found friendship in a genre descendant. Something clicked here. The formula has been shaken up, a story has been injected, and it’s by those Dynasty Warriors folks. It’s Toukiden 2. And it’s pretty good.