I have a special love/hate relationship with game demos. I love the fact that they exist. I tend to think of it as good omen for a game if the publisher releases a demo as opposed to forcing you to make your purchasing decision strictly off screenshots and online reviews. Kinda like how bad movies [...]

Read the rest of That’s how you do it! God of War III Demo

Yes, it’s another article about stylized graphics. Perhaps I could just say “Stylized graphics age better than graphics that attempt to be photorealistic” and end this article here.
Naah.
I think I’ll show you some comparative screenshots to prove a point that likely doesn’t need a strong argument anyway.

Firstly, let’s start with games from this year. Red [...]

Read the rest of Thoughts on Stylized Graphics

I’ve been playing a lot of Darksiders the past couple of weeks taking a whirlwind tour through post-apocalyptic Earth as War, one of the four Horsemen.  Along the way I’ve killed many the demon, rode many the mile and amassed a collection of armaments and weapon enhancements to make Kratos proud.  I found the game [...]

Read the rest of Darksiders and the Lure of Easy Criticism

Most game settings are just fluff. Even some of the games I really like have dreadfully generic settings. When you read about Borderlands, the description of Pandora sounds really interesting. In the game, it’s beautiful to look at, but doesn’t have much character. The world in Dungeon Siege is huge, but kind of boring. Even [...]

Read the rest of My Favorite Game Settings

Just a quick thought on something I’ve noticed in Dragon Age: Origins. Downloadable content is nothing new, but I don’t think I’ve ever seen extra downloadable content marketed from within the base game before. In Dragon Age, there’s a guy in your campsite offering you a quest. But the quest he’s asking you to do [...]

Read the rest of Thoughts on DLC Integration

As I continue to play through Borderlands, after having completed the main quest, I notice more and more the external influences that must have affected the game’s design. For example, the pillar of light that appears when you activate quick travel looks very much like the pillar of light coming from City 17’s Citadel in [...]

Read the rest of Is Borderlands the New Fallout?

Since I first played Adventure Construction Set on the Commodore 64, I’ve been a big fan of games that let you create your own worlds. The more detailed, the better. After the fourteen-year-old me played through Rivers of Light and dissected it with the editor, I created many an adventure. I assembled fantasy worlds where [...]

Read the rest of Variations on a Theme, Part VII: Construction

So here we are at the fifth part of my series on the elements I enjoy most in games. This time, I’ll be talking about games that allow you to create and customize something. The two games that come to mind as having done this very well are the Mechwarrior series and the old Commodore [...]

Read the rest of Variations on a Theme, Part VI: Customization

This is the continuation of my series on the themes that I most enjoy in video games. Today, I’ll be writing about games that include really good tactical combat. It’s interesting to note that 50% of the games run on Dungeons and Dragons rules, and that 50% of them are turn-based, while the other 50% [...]

Read the rest of Variations on a Theme, Part V: Tactical Combat

In continuing my writing on a year-and-a-half-old Blogs of the Round Table topic, I come to the subject of gameplay variety. I wrote about this topic myself roughly a year before it came up on BoRT, but it may be time to revisit the subject.
The two examples I like to look at for gameplay variety [...]

Read the rest of Variations on a Theme, Part IV: Variety