Gather round, children, It’s time uncle Jeff told you about a dark period in his life.  A period in which he sat, a huddled, unblinking mass, completely oblivious to the outside world, observing with rapt attention the subtle shifting and moving of colored shapes in front of him; alternately laughing and weeping at odd intervals, screaming with joy and agony at seemingly no one in particular.  Now I know what you’re thinking, children, and no, uncle Jeff didn’t have a heroin addiction.  Uncle Jeff was addicted to a game.  A game called Puzzle Quest.

Continue Reading…

When a very excited man in full desert combat dress runs up with something to tell you, it’s generally good practice to give him a listen.  At PAX East, the man in question was David Tractenberg, PR representative for Atomic Games, and the message in question was all about their upcoming XBLA title: Breach.

Atomic Games, who have previously worked on simulations for the military, are making the jump to the 360 with this 16-player shooter set for launch in early summer.  Much like Battlefield 1943, Breach is a “discount” title at $15, with a handful of initial maps and plans for expansion later on down the line.  To anyone who has played Modern Warfare or Bad Company, the basics of Breach will be very familiar: players choose from a variety of classes, each with their own weapons and abilities.  The more you play, the more experience you gain, which unlocks new classes and weapons.

Continue Reading…

Among the games that have occupied the most hours of my life, I am pretty confident in saying that the Civilization series takes the #1 spot overall.  Since I first had a 5.25″ floppy thrust into my hands by an excited friend on the back of the school bus right up through yesterday, Civilization games have always had a place on my hard drive and in my heart.

Continue Reading…

Just got out of the IF discussion panel led by some of the heavy-hitters in the field such as Andrew Plotkin and Emily Short.  All in all, it was an illuminating hour and led to some fascinating examinations of how players relate to player-characters, levels of interaction in games, and how moral choices need to evolve beyond halos or horns in modern gaming.  I’ll have a longer write up of the panel later, but for now it’s off to a look at how Indie Games need to fight dirty to make a name for themselves in the market.

Greetings from the press room at PAX East 2010!  We’re at the con, and are getting the lay of the land.  We’ve got the Wil Wheaton keynote this afternoon, and we’ll be talking to the designers of Puzzle Quest 2 as well.  We’ll also be putting up reports and photos from the con floor all day, so stay tuned!

After a grueling journey through the mountains of New England, we have arrived in Boston and are settling in.  With badges in hand, we’re ready to get down to some serious business.

Later tonight we’ll be heading over to the Playstation Move event, so we’ll be sure to get you live coverage from the scene!

Jeff, Chris, and I will be hitting the road tonight to head up to Boston for the first inaugural PAX East.

We’ll be bringing you live stories from the show for the next several days, and you can follow the stories here or on our twitter feed @spectaclerock for more instant updates.  There will be plenty to see and do, and we’ll be bringing you some sneak peaks of GAMES OF THE FUTURE, so stay tuned!

There comes a point in most RPGs where the player, upon opening their inventory screen and looking at the piles of things within, sits back and ponders to themselves “what do I do with all of this?”  Perhaps it is a stockpile of old weapons that have since been replaced, or bags full of different pieces of animal bone and other knick-knacks that were once destined for the crafting screen; in any case, you’ve got a list full of things and a lot of decisions to make.

There was a time, in the early days of JRPGs, when it was quite simple: if you got a new weapon, you could sell the old one and be done with it.  This held true through your Final Fantasies and Dragon Warriors for many years.  Sure, there might be a time when you’d decide to hold on to a Fire or Ice sword just to have around in case of the appropriate elemental enemy, but for the most part your choice was clear: old equipment was destined for the “used” bin at the local weapon shoppe.  For other items, like Potions, the system was also pretty clear: as soon as you started getting “Hi Potions” or “Super Potions” or whatever, it was time to stop buying the old ones.

Continue Reading…

I hate sequels.  I really, really do.

This isn’t going to be a rant against sequels in general, and how I believe that instead of endlessly iterating titles, studios should be working on new intellectual properties.

I do believe that, but this isn’t about that.

When a high-profile title comes out and is successful, a sequel is inevitably announced and my trepidation begins.  I’ve been burned in the past by sequels, “updates,” and remakes, and even though I knew that the game was going to be a trilogy when the first one came out, the announcement of Mass Effect 2 gave me pause.  ME1 was a solid game, with a dynamic story and a well implemented morality system – one that actually gave weight to your choices in the long term.  I picked up the game hoping that ME2 wouldn’t suffer from the same case of “sequelitis” I had seen in previous games, but knowing that it probably wouldn’t be nearly as good as the original.

As much as I hate sequels, I love being proved wrong about them even more.

Continue Reading…

Manuals, as I’ve mentioned before, have been in steep decline for many years.  Now, as manuals generally serve the purpose to telling the player how to play the game, it’s pretty clear that something needed to take their place.  By and large, the in-game tutorial has stepped up to the plate to fill this void.

In-game tutorials have taken many forms in my experience – some are as plain as a big ol’ “Tutorial” button ala Civilization IV, where a guide takes you step by step through the various concepts you need to understand to play the game.  Some take the form of introductory levels that aren’t called tutorials per se, but introduce game concepts one step at a time, such as in the Advance Wars series.  Sometimes the tutorials are even more ingrained in the game, popping up only when needed to introduce a new mechanic to the player (Shadow Complex takes this approach).

Continue Reading…