If revenge is a dish best served cold, then put on your Sunday finest. It's time to feast!
If there's one thing we've had a lot of over the past couple of years it's tower defence games, we've had them on the PC, on our consoles, and even our mobile devices. Some of them are terrible iterations of the style of game that we've grown to love and some of them are shining examples of what games can be when a little bit of thought is put into their creation. Amazing things can be accomplished when just a little bit of design philosophy is applied to an already established video game genre.
.jpg "Since when does the Reddit mascot have lazer eyes?")
A coursemate recently pointed me in the direction of an article on GamesIndustry.biz which reported that smartphone and tablet gaming now secured 8% of the US Games market. The abstract read: "The traditional home console business is quickly losing revenue share to the smartphone market."
At this, my face screwed up. For revenue share to be lost, the two must be comparison goods: the purchase of one directly reduces consumption of the other. Is this true? Are people NOT buying console/PC games because they’ve got Angry Birds? I’m not convinced. One could argue smartphone games are a gateway drug drawing in new gamers to console games, particularly casual-focused consoles like Wii and (3)DS. This would in fact make them complimentary goods, where the growth of one would positively, not negatively, impact the growth of the other. Mobile games might represent a widening of the gaming market, rather than a new rival muscling out console and PC gaming.
14 years ago, Duke Nukem Forever was announced to the world. Over the next few years, 2D Realms would tease its faithful fans by releasing screenshots, trailers, and other information on the game. I am happy to announce that hell has finally frozen over, cracked, thawed, and frozen over again. Strap on your skis ladies and gentlemen; let’s rock!
"SHOOT THE GENERATOR TO DISABLE THE MANTIS!" Gee, thanks for telling me, Red Faction. You know -- in the old days, like the Contra days, you had to replay a level multiple times to figure out exactly what to do. It wasn't easy, and often resulted in limitless fits of rage, but inevitably ended with the most glorious victory ever felt by gamer-kind.
All of the modern hand-holding restricts a player's natural ability to connect the dots between -- oh, gee, I dunno -- a massive generator with glowy lights hanging from the ceiling and the big enemy under it without the whole "Hey, shoot that thing!" indicator flashing across the screen. You know, this one:
The most controversial question in every Miss USA pageant isn't that of whether or not science should be taught in schools, rather, it is whether or not the genocide of an entire alien species (from Mars, no less) would make a good game.
Volition and THQ say yes, yes it would.
If you're a developer, then you should know that your brethren send us hundreds of press releases monthly (if not thousands). The press releases are often groan-inducing and uninteresting; they're over-inflated with text, and at times, even downright ugly to scroll through. However, on occasion, there are press release emails that grab our attention enough to write up entire features (and eventually, reviews) on the posts. Believe us, many releases get ignored for very basic flaws that could be fixed easily -- take it from the journos, this is our how-to guide for impressive video game press releases.
It's been a while since PAX and ECGC, but nVidia left a lasting impression with its ambitious plot to take over the world advance video gaming and graphics rendering possibilities by 1000%. We've recently joined forces with nVidia to unveil the triumvirate of 3D gaming rigs -- starting at $1200 and going all the way up towards -- yes, for real -- $8,000. That's a lot of BF3 guns.
Three core archetypes, each with multiple off-shoots, will be presented in our upcoming posts regarding 3D gaming; the first will be a starter kit, the second a mid-level gaming kit, and the third and final kit will be focused on the (rich) hardcore gamer. Although, I've heard that 'rich' and 'gamer' are not necessarily mutually exclusive.
No reason to give anyone a heart attack just yet; we'll set you off with our $1250 3D Gaming Starter Kit. This build includes a 3D compatible monitor, video card, and 3D vision glasses; all other components are recommendations, but not entirely necessary. Some components will have different options below to comply with the wide array of wealth out there.
Just when you thought it was safe to go back into the skies...
Since the dawn of video games there have been top-down vertical shooters. We've grown up playing and loving them, and that love will probably never stop. Video games have obviously advanced quickly over the years with the introduction of 3D graphics, among other things, but one device of which you can be certain is that developers will continue making the same style of games we all loved all that long time ago: the kind where you're looking down on your character and wondering what bully or teacher made him into such a badass before going back to slaughtering aliens.
You mess with the dishwasher, you get the soap!
The Dishwasher: Dead Samurai came out back in 2009 to a slew of awards, focusing mainly on game design and development for its one-man army of a developer, James Silva. When it was announced that there'd be a sequel to that game, fans started trying to figure out where the small team could take the title in order to make it even more visceral, while still maintaining the same level of fun... and sheer madness. The time has finally come, and The Dishwasher: Vampire Smile is finally among us. We find out if it surpasses its predecessor or simply sits in the shadow of its older brother.
The final episode in the Alien Breed series of games is finally here; it's been about a year since we saw the very first episode back when it was an Xbox LIVE Arcade exclusive game, and since then we've had Steam and PSN versions -- like Impact and Assault -- both of which have continued the snowballing awesome effect that the series has had since conception. Now we're getting to the end of the current storyline (who knows if Team 17 is planning another story line in the future) and we've recently gotten news that Alien Breed will be coming to retails stores in the near future as a complete package. The ball hasn't stopped rolling just yet.
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