iOS, Android • Handelabra Games is well known around Stately Play as the creators of the always entertaining (and growing) port of Sentinels of the Multiverse. For the last couple years, that’s all Handelabra has been known for, but that’s changing. Coming soon we’ll also have them to thank for a digital version of the baseball dice game, Bottom of the 9th.
iOS, PC/Mac• Failbetter Games just completed their Kickstarter for Sunless Skies, the spiritual sequel to indie smash-hit and certified (by yours truly) best game of all time, Sunless Sea. They blew past their goal of $125k, raising almost four times that much and unlocking stretch goals for Sunless Sea and Fallen London as well as Failbetter’s forthcoming spacefaring adventure. The only disappointment of the campaign was that it was conducted neither in pounds sterling nor the Echoes approved by the Masters of the Bazaar, presumably because the only thing riskier at the moment than raising capital in a fictional currency would be relying on the pound post-Brexit. Residents of the rebel colonies can take some small satisfaction in the estimation of the USD to be momentarily more stable than the currency of the crown, but they should have a care – there have been whispering of late that Mr. Iron has been seen in the Forgotten Quarter and, stranger yet, at the Cumaean Canal, working an abacus with inhuman speed and chuckling softly.
iOS, Android • There are a lot of great puzzle games for mobile, but even amongst the best we can separate them into The Room titles with everything else a step behind. Fireproof Games blazed onto the mobile scene back in 2012 with The Room and showed everyone how to utilize a touchscreen. Not only were there beautiful graphics and a creepy tone, but puzzles were solved by flipping switches and turning knobs, all done by manipulating items with your fingers. It was incredibly tactile, and made The Room the best puzzle game on the platform. It was followed by the shrewdly titled Room 2 and Room 3, both of which raised the bar by expanding the size of the titular room(s) and bumping up the number of puzzles. Earlier today they announced that The Room series isn’t finished, and the next version The Room: Old Sins will be on our devices by the end of 2017.
iOS, Android, PC/Mac, Consoles • With their game-changing take at Fighting Fantasy, Sorcery!, and their globe-trotting mega-adventure, 80 Days, inkle Studios has yet to swing and miss. As such, we’ve been waiting patiently (mostly) to see what they might be working on next. The wait is over. Yesterday at GDC inkle announced their next project and, unsurprisingly, it looks completely unique. It’s called Heaven’s Vault and is coming to mobile, PC, and consoles.
iOS, Android, PC • Last week, big news ’round these parts was the announcement that the farming/war board game, Scythe, was coming to digital. At the time all we had was a little art and a rough release date of 2017. Using the bat-computer, I was able to log into every cell phone in Gotham and track down the developers, The Knights of Unity. Using an elaborate scheme that involved getting arrested and surgically implanting a cell phone bomb into one of my lackeys, I was able to get some face time with Sir Lucas, one of the aforementioned Knights. If you’re wondering what the hell’s wrong with me, I also rewatched The Dark Knight yesterday. That’s on top of the staggering mental deficiencies you’re already aware of, so it should all make sense now. Sort of.
iOS, Android, PC/Mac/Linux • I was breezing through my Twitter feed the other day and stumbled on a tweet from occasional contributor, gaming genius, and friend of the site, Matt Thrower. He was asking if anyone was making classic adventure games like we’d find back in the 80’s and 90’s. Classics like Monkey Island, Maniac Mansion, Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis and dozens like them. The only reply he received was from the wonderful Wadjet Eye Games, but today I stumbled onto Thimbleweed Park and I think it will make our British friend very, very happy.
iOS, Android, PC/Mac • If you’ve played the physical version of Terra Mystica, you’re aware that the game comes complete with enough chunky wooden pieces to heat a small home through an extremely bitter winter. Every building you can plop on the board is made of wood with the small individual houses all the way up to massive strongholds and temples. That’s just the wood, there’s also about 30 pounds of cardboard in the box to account for the 14 different factions, each one playing completely differently than the others. Each time a copy is purchased, there’s a copse in Germany that sheds a tear. Lucky for Gaea, there’s a digital version on the way and it’s coming sooner than we thought.
iOS, Android, PC/Mac • One of the highlights of last year’s Gen Con was seeing North Star Games‘ fantastic take-that euro game, Evolution, in digital form and looking like it was near ready for release. Turns out, the version we saw wasn’t fit to survive and, dare I say, is still evolving. That’s the word from inside North Star’s digital group, and it sounds like it might be a while before Evolution actually climbs from the primordial code-soup and onto our tablets.
iOS Universal • Ever since Tinytouchtales arrived on the scene back in 2015, we’ve been wondering about their next big project. That’s what happens when you release one of the best mobile games ever created, which is exactly what they did with Card Crawl. We shouldn’t have to wait long to experience what they’ve been working on, as yesterday they announced that Card Thief has been submitted to Apple and it’s release is imminent.
iOS, Android, PC/Mac • When I wrote about my love for Fantasy Flight’s latest foray into the Lovecraft universe yesterday, I seem to have opened a gate allowing news of other Cthulhu-themed games to ooze into my inbox like the tendrils of a great otherworldly and indescribable beast. Yeah, it was pretty cool. The developer playing Nyarlathotep in this scenario is a new one, Strange Matter, who came together last year in France. Their first game is currently in development and, more importantly, now on Kickstarter. It’s called Rise of the Elders: Cthulhu and promises the tactical feel of XCOM, the globe-hopping adventure of Eldritch Horror, and the RPG depth of Call of Cthulhu. It should come as no surprise that I was interested in hearing more.