Games 10/07/16
I decided to unwind last night by trying some games on Steam. I thought someone might be interested in an impression of them.
RUSE: This is Steam's weekend freeplay right now, so if you'd like to try it, there's may still be time to try it free. It's an RTS in the vein of TA and C&C. You play on a tabletop war room map of the battlefield, and you can command a number of different unit types. The difference with RUSE is that you get a number of ruses with which to modify the battle, from fake units to psych warfare to camoflage nets.
I give the concept an A+. It is a fresh approach to well-covered ground. You can build prototypes (which could have been explained better in-game).
Unfortunately, I can only give the execution a B-. I played this on a 2GHz machine, and it still lagged. Also, the units react in funky ways when you try to select them at a far-away zoom level, moving when you want them to shoot. This could be avoided by using a box select, but this is far inferior to the # group selects of others in the genre. That said, it was still playable and enjoyable. But given the choice, I would be more likely to buy a game in the C&C series than this. They're just more well refined.
Light of Altaire: This demo lets you play the first few levels of a colony building game. You place buildings on hexes and try to balance power, food, happiness, and other needs to succeed in your colonies.
I give the concept an A. It has some fresh ideas, but the overall level of creativity is on par with other games in the genre. If you're looking for something new, you won't find a lot of it, here. The little you will find new, however, is of extremely high quality. Just don't expect much of it.
I give the execution an A-. Everything about this game is well executed. The only flaw is that the learning curve may be (I only played the demo, so I can't say for sure) a little steep between the beginner levels and the advanced level I played. A number of things were not explained well in-game, and I had to discover them as my "boss" required them. Also, the money seemed a little unbalanced: I'd often run out of money and be handed a pile of cash from my bosses. It might have been better to have a better balance of economy and no instant safety net. I also would have liked to have more building options and spent more time on one colony, but that's a slightly different kind of game. On the whole, though, very impressive. I never had to wait for the graphics to catch up to the actions I'd commanded, and it felt like I was playing a game with tight, clean code.
The Maw: This demo was very disappointing. There's no point in getting this game.
I give the concept an A. Nothing in it was very new, but it put these stale elements together into a game that looked fairly interesting.
Unfortunately, whatever good there was in this game's concept is overwhelmed by the attrocious execution. I give the exeuction an F. The game required a new version of DirectX(tm) and immediately on loading slowed my fairly powerful system down enough that Windows(tm) asked me to turn off fancy color schemes and go with the basic scheme. I didn't even know I'd had anything fancy on until now, and I've played some pretty intensive games on this partition. Once I got into the game, it ran slowly. I was constantly waiting for it to respond to my commands, and the control structure was not precise enough (You only have four directional keys, so getting the character to face where you want him to is a challenge). It uses a loose forward, backward, left, and right from the player's perspective, rather than a more usable forward, backward, rotate left, rotate right from the character's perspective. Also, it was often unclear when the cutscenes started and ended, so that I was often sitting waiting when I could have been playing.
RUSE: This is Steam's weekend freeplay right now, so if you'd like to try it, there's may still be time to try it free. It's an RTS in the vein of TA and C&C. You play on a tabletop war room map of the battlefield, and you can command a number of different unit types. The difference with RUSE is that you get a number of ruses with which to modify the battle, from fake units to psych warfare to camoflage nets.
I give the concept an A+. It is a fresh approach to well-covered ground. You can build prototypes (which could have been explained better in-game).
Unfortunately, I can only give the execution a B-. I played this on a 2GHz machine, and it still lagged. Also, the units react in funky ways when you try to select them at a far-away zoom level, moving when you want them to shoot. This could be avoided by using a box select, but this is far inferior to the # group selects of others in the genre. That said, it was still playable and enjoyable. But given the choice, I would be more likely to buy a game in the C&C series than this. They're just more well refined.
Light of Altaire: This demo lets you play the first few levels of a colony building game. You place buildings on hexes and try to balance power, food, happiness, and other needs to succeed in your colonies.
I give the concept an A. It has some fresh ideas, but the overall level of creativity is on par with other games in the genre. If you're looking for something new, you won't find a lot of it, here. The little you will find new, however, is of extremely high quality. Just don't expect much of it.
I give the execution an A-. Everything about this game is well executed. The only flaw is that the learning curve may be (I only played the demo, so I can't say for sure) a little steep between the beginner levels and the advanced level I played. A number of things were not explained well in-game, and I had to discover them as my "boss" required them. Also, the money seemed a little unbalanced: I'd often run out of money and be handed a pile of cash from my bosses. It might have been better to have a better balance of economy and no instant safety net. I also would have liked to have more building options and spent more time on one colony, but that's a slightly different kind of game. On the whole, though, very impressive. I never had to wait for the graphics to catch up to the actions I'd commanded, and it felt like I was playing a game with tight, clean code.
The Maw: This demo was very disappointing. There's no point in getting this game.
I give the concept an A. Nothing in it was very new, but it put these stale elements together into a game that looked fairly interesting.
Unfortunately, whatever good there was in this game's concept is overwhelmed by the attrocious execution. I give the exeuction an F. The game required a new version of DirectX(tm) and immediately on loading slowed my fairly powerful system down enough that Windows(tm) asked me to turn off fancy color schemes and go with the basic scheme. I didn't even know I'd had anything fancy on until now, and I've played some pretty intensive games on this partition. Once I got into the game, it ran slowly. I was constantly waiting for it to respond to my commands, and the control structure was not precise enough (You only have four directional keys, so getting the character to face where you want him to is a challenge). It uses a loose forward, backward, left, and right from the player's perspective, rather than a more usable forward, backward, rotate left, rotate right from the character's perspective. Also, it was often unclear when the cutscenes started and ended, so that I was often sitting waiting when I could have been playing.