Bundle Stars – The Indie Adventure Bundle
PC games website Bundle Stars has just released a new Stellar Bundle, bringing gamers five indie adventure titles and a game audio soundtrack for $3!
The Cerebral Bundle – Impressions Part 2
Here’s the somewhat delayed follow-up to The Cerebral Bundle – Impressions Part 1, with Banov’s Phantasmaburbia, CBE Software’s sci-fi epic J.U.L.I.A., Phoenix Online Studios‘ point-and-click thriller Cognition, Episode 1: The Hangman, and the undead-ridden innovative puzzler Vampires! by CBE Software.
Asylum on Kickstarter
Senscape‘s psychological horror adventure Asylum now has a Kickstarter.
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5RXVgv-QZKQ] (more…)
Playing PISS
Yes, PISS. I spotted this over on RPS, and thought it just some clever title for an article.. but it turns out to be a rather interesting point and click adventure game called PISS, created by Ben Chandler and the Falling Skywards team as part of the Summerbatch collection. It’s not on sale at the moment, though a download link was made available for RPS.
PISS is the story of a mercenary called Moira, who suffers from nightmares and drinks to forget.
The Indie Royale – The Replay Bundle Vol. 1
The Indie Royale have now re-released some of the greatest hits from previous Indie Royale bundles in the Replay Bundle Vol. 1..
[youtube http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c3pQhysaJQA] (more…)
Our Wii U and Nintendo Land
Tim brought home our Wii U last night, and as he’d done the tedious hour-long update at work, it was just a matter of setting up our user accounts.. individual accounts linked to the new Nintendo Network this time.
I decided not to bother importing my old Mii yet.. the transfer from the Wii is easy enough but both consoles have to be connected to the internet to do it.. and besides, there was a new Mii Maker to play with!
Marvel Super Hero Squad Online Celebrates 4 Million Players
Marvel Super Hero Squad Online has now surpassed 4 million registered players worldwide since its launch in 2011.
Terraria
A new game appeared in my friends’ group over the weekend – Terraria. As I have a silly number of unplayed games in my collection, I was going to give it a miss.. but they kept talking about it with such obvious enthusiasm that I started to feel a bit left out..
Terraria is a 2D scrolling adventure game which has a few similarities to Minecraft.. you start in a randomly generated world, with trees and other resources to gather. Once you have collected enough goodies, you can craft items: weapons, building materials and decorative items.
There are monsters, ranging from coloured slime with little health, right up to some fairly tough bosses, which you can summon when you’re ready to take them on. Unlike in Minecraft, the appearance of monsters is not limited to the night-time.. so while you could build a shelter and hide, it’s far better to get out there and fight!
As you find better resources and loot, you can craft stronger weapons and armour.. you can also level your character up with items which increase your total health and add a mana pool.. and you will need to do this if you’re going to take on the bosses! 🙂
Another dissimilarity to Minecraft comes in the form of the NPCs you can attract, should you build shelter for them to live in, and met a few requirements. The merchant has a range of items for sale, the nurse can heal you, the Arms Dealer sells guns, and the Guide.. well..
The Guide got me into trouble.
I started out in the world knowing very little about the game, as I wanted to experience and learn as I went along.. and seeing the Guide, I expected I’d have to follow him along a little way before getting into the game properly.
However, he led me off the grass and onto a manky grey surface with spiky weeds.. Corruption, which I’m told is not normally this close to spawn. The spiky weeds hurt, so I decided to leave the Guide to his wandering and go back to the grass.. but before I got back I met my first monster, the Eater of Souls!
I found I could take one point of health from him with my pickaxe, but before he was dead another appeared.. this was too much to handle on top of the damage from the weeds in the Corruption, and I managed to die within one minute of spawning! So much for an easy game at lunch 😉
After respawning I tried to explore to the left, but met Slimes, as well as a rather high mountain.. then night came, bringing zombies, so I went to dig down and instead met some kind of worm.. more death!
Eventually I went after the Guide, hacking away the spiky parts of Corruption so I could walk there.. I found him trapped in water above his head, still alive apparently, and as soon as I’d made a path he headed back up the hill. I cut a path down into one of the caves, and trapped him there!
I was surprised how quickly the corruption spread across the dirt tiles.. I came to take screenshots at the end of play, and found it had grown like this.. 😮
Terraria also has a multiplayer mode, and after a friend set up a server I joined them. Multiplayer allows co-op and PvP, which you can toggle on individually.. you can also form teams which adds a little indicator to show which direction and how far away your friends are.
Both friends had played for a while already, and as characters keep all their equipment and resources when they enter a world, they already had some decent gear. As I was now on my home PC, and the game has no Steam cloud support, I had to start from scratch, but I didn’t mind as I’d barely collected or looted anything yet.
I was given a better pickaxe, as well as some bombs and some other random items.. I went exploring for resources while one friend built a large tower and filled it with rooms.. this meant the NPCs started to arrive, though till I’ve earnt more money I can’t buy from them. 😉
He also went and summoned the Eye of Cthulu.. I got killed trying to take a look at him the first time, but after being given hearts and levelling up somewhat, I was able to take part in the second fight! 🙂
We fought him from a platform, so there was plenty of room to avoid him as he swung past. As well as attacking you by himself, he fires little eyes at you.. the magic boomerang came in handy for those, killing them before they got too close 🙂
The Eye’s second phase was a little creepier, as the pupil and iris were replaced by a mouth full of sharp teeth..
It wasn’t too much longer before we killed him though.. the flaming arrows, magic boomerang and Undoer’s spiky ball of win made sure of that! 🙂
Stacking
I just got my hands on Stacking, a puzzle adventure game based around the use of Matryoshka dolls, created by Double Fine.
The game is quite simple to pick up.. there are five sizes of doll, with each able to stack into the next size up, and when stacked, you are able to use the ability of the largest doll. Every doll has an ability, some which you’ll need to use to solve the puzzle at hand, and others which I think are just there for atmosphere, such as the little lady who sips tea. There are also plenty of hints in case you get stuck, though so far it looks as though you can find out all you need to know just by talking to everyone you meet. Each puzzle also has multiple solutions, and there are also some unique dolls to find as well.. reason to explore, which I love.
I absolutely adore the silent film effect used to tell the story too..
You play the role of Charlie, the smallest doll in the family. Times are hard.. your family have no money, and the evil Baron comes to take all your older brothers and sisters away to work in child labour camps..
Heading out to look for your siblings, you arrive at the Train Station where your brother Albert is being forced to shovel coal.. to free him, you need to stop the strike.. and to stop the strike you need to get the members of the Train Guild out of the Royal Lounge and down onto the platform to talk to the strikers.
There’s a guard blocking the doors to the Lounge, and he tells me that I can’t go in, or the host will throw everyone out. Well, that’s exactly what I want.. so how to get rid of the guard?
It turns out there’s a pretty doll here, The Widow Chastity, who has a rather effective ‘Seduce’ ability..
What I found funny was the reaction I got while trying this ability out on the nearby dolls.. another female let out a “Hmmph!” sound, and her top half tilted away as if in disgust! 😀
This doll isn’t just for looks though.. she is part of the first solution..
The guard is a sucker for beauty, and I draw him away from the door before unstacking with Chastity and jumping straight into the guard instead. After having him unlock the door, I go in and march right up to the host, who is suitably unimpressed and boots everyone out. Success!
The three members of the Train Guild are all quite happy to go and talk to the strikers now, so I stack into them all in turn. Engineer Ulysses has the ‘Full Steam Ahead’ ability, which lets me race through the platform like a little steam train..
Another doll I found wandering around in the Train Station was the socially unacceptable Meriwether Malodor.
His ability can clear a room.. and in fact, does! For another solution to the first puzzle, you can place Meriwether by the air vent leading to the Royal Lounge and ‘Flatulate’..
After clearing the Train Station, you can proceed to the Gilded Steam Ship, where your sister awaits rescue.
The Ball
The Ball is an indie action-adventure puzzle game using the Unreal engine, featuring an archaelogist who gets stuck in a cave and finds a mysterious artifact.. The Ball. This game started off as a mod for Unreal Tournament.. shows what hard work can do! Two friends have been playing this game, and both have come back with nothing but praise for it, so I thought I should try it out 🙂
The demo allows the first few puzzles to be played out in campaign mode, as well as trying out Survival mode, where you have to stay alive as long as possible against floods of enemies.
I started with the campaign and very quickly became twitchy, expecting bad things to come shooting out of every corner, or for something to come down from the ceiling and crush me. I only felt a little better once I found the Ball..
The first few rooms are all about teaching you how to play.. pressure plates for you to stand on, how to use the Hammer, and how to handle the Ball. There are several jokes in here, but I’m not touching them! 😉
As mentioned, I was rather twitchy while playing this, and the rather ugly monkeys in some of the first few rooms gave me the creeps..
I was being mocked by a friend for this, but I think it’s just as well I was twitchy, because when the first zombies appeared I was quick to fire the Ball at them.
I’d be tempted to get the game, as it’s easy to play, looks fantastic and solving the later puzzles in the demo was very satisfying.. but with all puzzle games, there comes a point where I find myself stuck, leaving it for a while, and then not completing it.. I have enough uncompleted games 😉