The Thinking Person’s Shooter – Eximius Inbound

May 21, 2018 Alex Connolly 2

PC • Though age hath wearied my nerves and reaction time isn’t what it once was, the siren song of the shooter still manages to kindle the old fascination. Eximius: Seize The Frontline is aiding and abetting this month, due to running headlong into Pandemic Studios’ luminary Ken Miller’s proposition that FPS players don’t want to think, and RTS players don’t want to die. If the idea of commanding, ahem, and conquering appeals — and why we aren’t enjoying a glut of these hybrids is one of gaming’s more mystifying vacuums — then give this a look-see.

Better Stately Than Never: ParaWorld

April 30, 2018 Alex Connolly 9

PC • As the axe fell on the RTS after the turn of the century, and we all realised that the late Nineties RTS arms race had an unfavourable signal-to-noise ratio (sideward glance to this current battle royale malarkey), a name rang out in the wilderness. Spieleentwicklungskombinat. But if a dinosaur roars and nobody hears it, is it really there? Behold, the enigmatic ParaWorld.

Tannhäuser Great – Tempest Citadel Out Tomorrow

April 16, 2018 Alex Connolly 0

PC • Every once in a while, I’m bum-rushed by a seriously polydactyl concept, one that presses all the buttons. Tempest Citadel is this month’s most fabulous of ambushes. Science fantasy. Offworld expedition. ALIENS meets Milton. Dante’s Bespin. Aartform Games, the tiny outfit behind Spice Road, is dropping Tempest Citadel in a few hours on Steam, and it looks very, very intriguing.

Dungeons 3 available now for PC/Mac/Linux

October 16, 2017 David Neumann 0

PC/Mac/Linux • Over the weekend our intrepid reporter, Zac, mentioned a title he’d been playing called Dungeons 3. Having never heard of either Dungeons or Dungeons 2, I assumed that this was the first game in a series but Realmforge added a “3” to the title to make it seem more seasoned. My assumption turned out to be incorrect, however, and there is a Dungeons and Dungeons 2, further confirming that I’m an utter dunce. Jumping into Dungeons 3 this weekend made me a little upset that I only discovered the series now. I’ve wanted a new Dungeon Keeper for ages, and it’s been there, under my nose, all along.

Review: Iron Marines

September 21, 2017 Zac Belado 0

iOS, Android, Kindle • You don’t need to be Fred Allen to know that mobile Real Time Strategy games are seldom well-done. Sadly a phone or tablet doesn’t have the requisite number of easily accessible input devices to allow for standard RTS play. Not that people haven’t tried to reproduce the Command and Conquer or Starcraft experience, but the results have been less than spectacular. RTS games that have succeeded on mobile–Rymdkapsel, Autumn Dynasty, and Alien Tribe 2 come to mind–do so by either reworking the concept of an RTS or creating new control schemes to simplify what’s possible with a keyboard and mouse. While these are all good games, none manage to create the same tension that desktop RTS titles are famous for. And so, into this peculiar gaming niche comes Iron Marines from Ironhide Game Studio. Is it the grail RTS we’ve been waiting for?