Utterly mad Tempest-style game from industry pioneer Jeff MinterOn the one hand, the game is bursting with infectious joy, and it's hard not to get wrapped up in it ( Read more... )

Had a decent time at Post Mortem last night; I think I'm going to make a monthly habit of it. An open but passively advertised event (I honestly don't recall how I originally heard about it), it's much less crowded and stressful than certain other pub-based nerdly events I could name. Arguably its industry focus helps keep the number of attendees ( Read more... )

I read a good article in Game Developer last night about building weak AIs (automated opponents) that maximize the fun for the human player. The upshot was a recommendation to rely less on stunting the AI's allowed computation time, or clouding its actions with random variances, and more on having the AI intentionally and subtly providing the ( Read more... )

JONATHAN STRANGE & MR NORRELL was my train-riding book today because I had no other, and I found that the very next chapter addressed the continuing fates of the characters I had taken for forgotten. I stand by my earlier criticism, because there is a very real difference between a reader anticipating missing characters' return, and wondering if ( Read more... )

The new Penny Arcade XBox game takes its gameplay cues from Final Fantasy, and is $20 despite being the first chapter of a downloadable episodic series. I find both of these facts surprising; I guess I was expecting something more like the Sam & Max games. Well, good for them that they're trying something new (sort of), but that's a double sawbuck ( Read more... )

I finished the main quest in Oblivion and then immediately threw away all my fortune and glory to fight in gladitorial combat in the Imperial Arena. I got a real kick out of this - I felt like the CRPG Andy Kaufman.

But then I finished that quest-line and still I kept playing, so I gave the disc to classicaljunkie to hold in escrow until further notice. I have ( Read more... )

Or anyway, most of them; I roll my eyes every time someone puts forth the argument that you only kill hookers and run over little old ladies if you want to play the game that way ( Read more... )

In other news ( Read more... )

I didn't think I'd like Super Smash Bros Brawl, and I'd surely like it a lot less if classicaljunkie and I didn't live around a lot people who love to play chaotic button-mashy fighty party games, but we do, so I do. CJ might dig it more than me, actually, since she's also into the single-player modes and the trophy-collection hook ( Read more... )

I've been letting myself play Half Life 2 in measured doses, and just finished it. Great game. I have the next two episodes, by way of the Orange Box, but I don't feel particularly driven to fire them up right away. Soon enough I'll be like Oh, dude, I can play Episode One and that will make me so happy. Probably after I conquer some territory iRL ( Read more... )