admin

The Video Game Kickstarter Report – Week of April 19

Apr 192013

Telepath Tactics – $41k. Finished.
Shovel Knight – $311k. Finished.
Divinity: Original Sin – $548k. 7 days left.
Battle Worlds: Kronos – $205k. 8 days left.
Revive Retronauts – $52k. 2 days left.
Camelot Unchained - $1.23 million ($2 million goal). 13 days left.
C-Wars - $36k. 22 days left.
Chasm - $77k ($150k goal). 22 days left.
Frozen Sword - $4k. 7 days left.

Not a lot this week, but there were two projects that caught my eye.

Among the Sleep is a survival horror game from the perspective of a two-year old. It’s got a decent amount of buzz already from various major gaming sites and it’s off to a good start with $44k of its $200k goal raised with 29 days left to go.

Road Redemption is a spiritual success to the Road Rash games – motorcycle racing + combat. It has $50k of $150k goal raised with 22 days left to go.

That’s it for this week!

Cloud Saving support added to our Steam Games!

Announcements 2 Responses »

Apr 182013

We’re pleased to announce that Cloud Saving has been added to all of our Steam Games (Windows versions only). Now you can save the game on one computer, log out, and resume right where you left off on another computer!

Cloud Saving should be automatically enabled next time you log into Steam (you may have to log out and then log back in for the update to take place). If you want to adjust the Steam Cloud settings on any of our games, go to the Library section, right click the game, and select properties. Under the Updates tab, there should be a section for Steam Cloud (if there isn’t, log out of Steam and log back in). Mark the box if you want to enable Steam Cloud Saves or leave it unmarked if you want to disable Steam Cloud Saving.

Hopefully this will prove to be of some use to those of you who like to play our games across multiple computers. And if you don’t have all of our games yet, we’d like to remind you that they’re currently on sale this week for dirt-cheap – Penny Arcade’s On the Rain-Slick Precipice of Darkness 3 for $0.99 as well as the Breath of Death VII/Cthulhu Saves the World double pack for $0.99.

Happy gaming!

Screenshots of Breath of Death VII remade in Precipice of Darkness 4! Demand for full-blown Vita remakes?

General 36 Responses »

Apr 162013

Precipice of Darkness 4 has a number of little bonus dungeons scattered here and there where you can gain some extra XP & items so we thought it would be fun to have one of them be a reference to the initial cave in Breath of Death VII.

Here are some comparison shots:

Screenshot Comparion #1

vs.

Screenshot Comparison #2

vs.

Screenshot Comparison #3

vs.

Screenshot Comparison #4

vs.

On the process of converting the map into Precipice of Darkness 4′s style, Bill had this to say:

“It took less than an hour to rebuild the Breath of Death cave in Rainslick4. To do so I simply took tiles I had from another cave dungeon, as well as some from Cthulhu Saves the World. After tweaking the hue and adding some detail and touchups, I was able to rebuild Breath7′s first dungeon in the quality of Rainslick4 in less than an hour.”

Of course, this got us to thinking, it might be fun (and not too difficult) to do remakes of Breath of Death VII & Cthulhu Saves the World for the Vita as a learning experience in working with the Vita hardware. Obviously the visuals would be revamped, but we’d probably also add some new content as well. What do you think?

Soul Hackers 3DS Impressions

Game Reviews 2 Responses »

Apr 162013

Soul Hackers comes out today and Atlus was kind of enough to send a free copy my way as thanks for being such a long-time fan (and writing the first walkthrough for the game way back when). I’ve only been able to play a few hours on the 3DS version so far but between that and my experience with the Saturn version of the game, I feel like I’ve got a pretty good grasp of the game’s quality.

Let’s get the bad stuff out of the way first – this is a mostly straight port of a game that first came out in Japan in 1997. And though the art designs are quality, the actual tech running the graphics aren’t. The 2D art ain’t bad (though of limited animation) but the 3D exploration & the animated cutscenes are pretty laughable. The story can also be laughable at times but in a charming sort of “This is what people in the 90s thought the future might be like” sort of way.

However, the gameplay in Soul Hackers is gloriously sophisticated in an old-school way. 6 party slots (2 for your human characters, 4 for your summoned demons). Lots of fun equipment to mess around with. Software add-ons for your gun-computer (yes, this is a thing) that you can install for various bonuses. Monster negotiation (complete with little smiley faces to indicate which monsters might be swayed over to your side with the right persuasion techniques). An ally AI & alignment system. Demon-infused sword crafting. Spirit Quests where you take control of new characters for special mini-scenarios. And so on and so on.

Besides the obvious change of “THE GAME IS FINALLY IN ENGLISH WOOHOOO!” most of the changes in the 3DS version are quality of life improvements. There are some basic 3D effects. Load times have been dropped to basically nil. Combat is super-fast even on the default setting. The bottom screen of the 3DS is used to show off typical useful information like maps & enemy stats. Additional options have been added to the game to let players customize their experience and make the game easier (or harder) than it originally was. A streetpass feature has been added that lets you trade in streetpass coins for new allies. One improvement that was a bit of a welcome surprise is the voice acting – it’s both of high quality & there’s more of it than I expected.

Now that it’s in English, I think Soul Hackers has overthrown Shin Megami Tensei: Nocturne as my favorite Atlus game that isn’t Persona 4 Golden. Yes, the visuals are dated but if you can look past that, you’ll find a game that’s at the pinnacle of the 32-bit RPG era. Highly recommended.

Mega-Sale on Steam for our RPGs! $0.99! Penny Arcade’s On the Rain-Slick Precipice of Darkness 3! Cthulhu Saves the World & Breath of Death VII!

Announcements 3 Responses »

Apr 152013

We just started a week-long mega-sale for all of our games on Steam!

You can now get Penny Arcade’s On the Rain-Slick Precipice of Darkness 3 for $0.99 (80% off!) here.
You can get our Cthulhu Saves the World/Breath of Death VII combo pack for $0.99 (66% off) here.

Please spread the word!

Go Home Dinosaurs! Review

Game Reviews No Responses »

Apr 152013

Go Home Dinosaurs! is a tower defense game with a Tetris-twist. You see, each of your “towers” has a certain shape to it and you’re only able to place them where you have enough room on the level map, thus forcing the player to mix up their strategies from level to level. In addition to your towers, you also have an avatar who can move around the map to collect coconuts (your tower-buying currency), act as a weak mobile tower, and who can be temporarily upgraded with power-ups if you need a sudden burst of power to take down a particularly difficult wave of dinosaurs. The visuals are clean and colorful, the music is inoffensive, and the voices of your fighting force are mildly funny at first before becoming annoying (but luckily, you can turn them off).

Go Home Dinosaurs! is a lot of fun while it lasts which unfortunately isn’t very long. Most tower defense games have high score competitions, higher difficulty levels, endless modes, and sometimes even all-new bonus modes, but there’s none of that here. According to my Steam client, it took me about 6 hours to complete every level in Go Home Dinosaurs with the highest score. I could probably stretch out another hour to that playtime if I wanted to get the 6 achievements that are gained by beating certain levels a specific way, and a few more hours if I cared about getting the more grind-heavy achievements (like buy all of the stuff in the store & defeat over 10,000 dinosaurs) but there’s no denying that Go Home Dinosaurs is a lot shorter than other favorite tower defense games like Plants vs. Zombies, Pixeljunk Monsters, Defense Grid, and Defender’s Quest.

Still, better short & sweet than long and boring, right?

Go Home Dinosaurs! can be bought from Steam here.

The Video Game Kickstarter Report – Week of April 12

General 2 Responses »

Apr 122013

Torment: Tides of Numenera – $4.1 million. Finished.
Shroud of the Avatar – $1.9 million. Finished.
Telepath Tactics – $33k. 3 days left.
Shovel Knight – $258k. 1 day left.
Divinity: Original Sin – $469k. 13 days left.
Battle Worlds: Kronos – $185k. 15 days left.
Revive Retronauts – $48k. 9 days left.
Camelot Unchained - $1 million ($2 million goal). 19 days left.

First, we have C-Wars – a more Action-oriented Plants vs. Zombies-style RTS/Tower Defense game with nice pixel art and a cyber-punk apocalypse setting for PC & Android. Looks rather fun. They have $11k of their $32k with 29 days left to go.

Next, we have Chasm, a 2D procedurally generated Metroidvania which also features appealing pixel art. They’ve been creating some buzz on Steam’s Greenlight service so it’ll be interesting to see if they’re able to translate that into funding. It’s currently at $4k of its $150k goal with 29 days left to go.

Finally, we have Frozen Sword. An Action/RPG created with RPGMaker, the game honestly doesn’t look to exciting but I think the story behind it is interesting – Frozen Sword is a school project led by a high school math teacher intended to interest students in game development and is going to be used as a pitch to the school for the creation of a Game Development elective class. The funds they raise will be used for the purchase of additional computers & relevant software. It’s at $3k ($1.5k goal) with 2 weeks left to go.

That’s it for this week!

Some more Precipice of Darkness 4 Screenshots!

General 3 Responses »

Apr 112013

Enjoy! (Click on Images for full size)

Some of the previous screenshots we’ve shared for the game can be found here.

Big Sony Indie Promotion for the month of April

General 2 Responses »

Apr 092013

Sony just announced today that their big Spring sale this year is going to have a focus on indie games. Namely, each week, a different indie game will come out with a special discount for PS+ members. The actual sales of these games aren’t much (just $2-$3 off each one except for the final one which is free for PS+ members), but it’s still a great move on Sony’s part to show their commitment to indie games.

The showcased games in question are Guacamelee! (which is getting rave reviews as one of the best Metroivania games in years), Dragon Fantasy Book 1 (a remake of the mobile RPG with enhanced visuals), Thomas Was Alone (port of the popular PC puzzle/platformer with minimalist visuals), and Zombie Tycoon 2 (don’t know much about this one other than that the first one did poorly in reviews).

My Long History with Soul Hackers

General 3 Responses »

Apr 082013

On April 16th, Atlus is releasing the 3DS version of Soul Hackers. But my history with Soul Hackers goes back to over 15 years ago.

In the late 90s, I was just starting college & was very interested in learning Japanese. Persona had come out a little while ago and was a true revelation – a dark RPG set in a modern setting with a heavy focus on psychology & philosophy. Most Saturn RPGs weren’t being released in the US at the time so when I heard about Devil Summoner 2: Soul Hackers, I thought why not import it? I’d get a game that sounded very cool that had a very slim chance of ever coming out over here and I’d get a chance to improve my Japanese.

Soul Hackers was indeed very cool although with my limited Japanese ability, I missed much of the nuances with the story & characters. I played a bit of the game and then decided I’d wait until someone wrote a FAQ before continuing. After it became obvious that no one was interested in writing an English guide for the game, I decided to write one myself. Thus began my first and only major FAQ/Walkthrough which you can still read on GameFAQs here.

My guide covers most of the game, but I never actually finished it due to a rather large annoyance with the Sega Saturn hardware. The Saturn was one of the first home systems with built-in storage for saves and they hadn’t quite worked out all the kinks yet. Specifically, the Saturn’s storage was powered by a lithium battery and if the lithium battery died, all of your saves went with it. Now playing through a game in a language that you’re not exactly fluent in is slow going and it’s even slower when you’re simultaneously writing a guide for the game that you’re playing. I wasn’t playing Soul Hackers full-time – I’d maybe go through a dungeon or two, update the guide, and then play some games in English before going back to it a few months later. Well, you can imagine what happened. I made it pretty close to the end of the game and then lost all my progress. Losing all that time & effort I had invested in the game was so annoying that I never went back and finished the game.

As you might expect, I was rather shocked and pleased when it was discovered that Atlus was creating a 3DS version of the game and even more excited when the US branch of the company announced that they were actually going to release it in English. The timing is rather poor (we’re right in the middle of finishing up our new game & I’d still like to complete Etrian Odyssey 4 before moving onto another dungeon crawler) but I can’t wait to finally get a chance to play Soul Hackers in English after all these years.

Older Entries Newer Entries