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There are many things that can make a good game. Visuals, sound, mechanics… but I do place a lot of value on the story of a game personally. I love a good story.
Amazu Media’s comic gamebook Light Apprentice depends heavily on its story. We received Vol. 1 of it for review, which included the first four chapters. We follow Light Apprentice Nate as he is awoken many years in his future by Tlob, a Blueling, and finds out that not only was he sealed away for years – so were the other Apprentices meant to prevent a devastating war. That war has been and passed now, and their world is slowly dying. Tlob is one of a group hoping to find the Apprentices and use their planet-given powers to hopefully stop this slow inevitable death.
The game is split between the comic book ‘story’ parts, and the gameplay ‘adventure’ parts of the game. The comic book parts tell the majority of the story and offer decisions in how you wish to progress it, while the adventure parts are where you do most of the game playing, represented in a point-and-click style where you tap what you wish to interact with. This part is also where you’ll do the majority of battles, and these two have a ‘choice’ element to them.
Battles can either be ‘won’ through defeating all your enemies by attacking them down to 0 hitpoints, or by enduring their hits until they stun themselves after which you can choose to ‘forgive’ them. Both require timing to hit a ring to complete a successful block or a powerful attack move. I personally chose to play it ‘pacifist’ but both ways seem equally viable in this game for progression. Each character also has a stock of special moves they can execute by using some of the team’s spirit point total, a shared value that restores by 1 for each attack made by either side in the fight. There is one signature move that can be used without taking up an entire turn, but most of them will replace the attack of defend action you could have taken for that round.
There are also items to be found, some special to progress your way through the adventure elements, some in the form of potions which the party again shares between them, and the rest in the form of equippable items such as helmets, armour, weapons and rings/baubles.
I really enjoyed this game. It is another mobile game port, but with the limited input those games could have they found a really good way to implement a system that works. The characters and story are wonderful, the visuals and sound design just add a lovely richness to it and I want to find out more. I want to see the rest of the tale.
Halo Wars 2 has been released and while some people have leapt at the chance to try it, others aren’t so sure. Halo isn’t generally an RTS series and Halo Wars itself wasn’t loved much, so the sequel has some ground to cover. Also, RTS games and consoles aren’t generally a match seen a lot.
Now a demo has been released for Windows 10 on the Microsoft Store so you can try before you commit money. It comes with both the opening mission of the single-player campaign as well as Blitz mode which combines a card game with RTS elements. It’s strange but people who have bought the game seem to enjoy it.
Be warned though, if you decide to download the demo you’ll need to have a chunk of memory free for it – 17GB. Chunky for a demo sure, but the full game just received a 10GB patch so the game itself is fairly large as well.
So give it a try if you’re curious. Maybe you’ll discover to your surprise that a console-RTS works fairly well after all.
However, there are also a few campaigns coming to an end that seem to be in trouble with 45 hours to 4 days remaining and a long way to go. These are Xenosis, Daymare: 1998, SmuggleCraft and FictionSphere. There are also two that have concluded having failed to raise enough and these were Aegis: Innocence and Deep Forest. The team behind Aegis say that the game will still be developed, just slower and have linked to a Patreon that can be donated too if you still want to support the game. Deep Forest’s team has made no update though.
First up we have a tabletop games set in the near future.
In the near future, big cities have been abandoned and now play host to a new type of sport – giant killer robot battling! This game is a board game with figures that uses a deck of cards to play the game. The game is for 2-4 players and involves some dice-rolling, and building your mech to take on your opponents’ mechs. Each team plays with one heavy hitter and three support unit in a bid to eliminate your opponents’ bots, or reduce four skyscapers to rubble first.
GKR: Heavy Hitters have already met its $100,000 6 times over. It still has 11 more days to run.
Next we have a game with a save-the-world central plot.
ENTROPY sets you as one of many creatures jettisoned from their world with the collision of many universes. Now you must be the first to locate and piece together the four fragments of your world so you can return home. The game is a card game, and can have up to 5 players at once. Each player has a hand of actions, but must be careful not to play the same action as another – that results in a cancellation ‘clash’ and only the reset card can refill your hand of spent actions. So if your reset clashes, you’re stuck!
ENTROPY has a AUS $4,000 goal, which it has met already with 6 more days to go.
Next up we have a game that apparently adapts itself to your actions.
An action adventure game set out in the wilderness, Pine’s boast to fame is that the ecology of the world around you is affected by the actions you take in-game. This world never had humans reach the top of the food chain and now Hue, your playable avatar, must seek out a new home for his nearly depleted tribe. You can choose to fight or befriend other species, which will also evolve or devolve along with the ecology as well as learning moves from you with its AI.
Pine has made €35,787 of its €100,000 goal and has 28 days to go.
Finally we have a game inspired by Chinese mythology.
This is actually an additional to another game, Monkey the Roleplaying Game, and indeed has a pledge level for backers of that campaign to allow them to get this new book cheaper. The Mandate of Heaven contains a story taking place in three locations inspired by Chinese myth – The Western Heaven, Chang‘an capital of the Tang Empire and the Ten Courts of Hell. This is also a special campaign that is running for just a week.
The Mandate of Heaven has a £2,000 goal and 5 days to go. It has made only £626 so far.
