Torchlight

Game: Torchlight
Developer: Runic Games
Platform: PC
Release Year: 2009
Stephen's Rating: 4/10

Basic Plot

The story revolves around an adventurer who travels beneath the town of Torchlight into the Ember mines. A story unfolds which reveals how the Ember (a rare and magical ore) is corrupting the land around it.

Gameplay

Torchlight is an action-RPG similar to Diablo or Titan Quest. The player picks one of three character classes (Destroyer, Alchemist, Vanquisher) and dungeon crawls their way through a rough story.

The player gains levels and assigns skills as they progress and use them to engage more and more difficult enemies.

One original mechanic was that every character had a pet which could be used to assist you in combat, and also go back to town and sell items for you. The player could also fish in ponds and water, and feed the fish to their pet to transform them into other creatures.

Positives
 
The game is extremely affordable. I think I picked it up for $5-10 on Steam. It provides a fairly well rounded action-RPG experience for anyone who isn't patient enough to wait for Diablo III.

Negatives

Having only three character classes was a big minus for me. On top of that some of the skills for one class were often duplicated for another character class, meaning they weren't even unique.

The skills themselves felt weak. The abilities you could learn didn't scale well with the difficulty of the game and often held up the natural flow of gameplay and the story.

The cartoony look of the graphics wasn't a good thing, and the story was really an afterthought.

The items were pretty uninteresting and generic. There was nothing with the "wow" factor you got in Diablo II when finding a unique or set item (or building a runeword).

NO MULTIPLAYER!

Memorable Moments

I played this because of my impatience for Diablo III and my unwillingness to go back and play Diablo II again...

Battle Realms

Game: Battle Realms
Developer: Liquid Entertainment
Platform: PC
Release Year: 2001
Stephen's Rating: 5/10

I must apologise for not posting in a very long time. My wife and I are expecting our first child in 3 weeks time and I've been rennovating the baby's room... but I'm back for now in this brief window before she is born!

Basic Plot

The story follows Kenji, the last heir to the Serpent Throne. Right from the start the player is presented with a choice whether he will confront some bandits who are attacking some peasants, or join them in doing so. The choice impacts the game and two different storylines emerge; either Kenji works to bring good to the world and follows the path of the Dragon clan, or he can follow in his predecessors footsteps and lead the Serpent clan.

The story then revolves around trying to obtain an artifact called the Orb of the Serpent before the other clans.

Gameplay

Battle Realms is a real time strategy game similar to Age of Empires or StarCraft. The aesthetics and story are based on Oriental mythology which is unique for games of this genre. The game included four playable races (clans):

• Serpent Clan; uses stealth, trickery, and brutality.
• Dragon Clan; honourable warriors who value honour and justice.
• Wolf Clan; former miner slaves who fought for their freedom.
• Lotus Clan; sorcerers who delve into dark magic.

Each clan had their own fighting style and aesthetic. Like other RTS games the player needs to gather resources to build their structures and units. The two resources in the game are rice and water which are gathered by peasants.

Another resource is either Yin or Yang (depending on the faction). These are obtained by winning in combat, by the size of your army, and how far the army is from your base and can be spent to summon Zen Masters. It can also be used to research some fighting styles and upgrade a Zen Master.

A player starts off only being able to produce peasants. He or she is then able to research new fighting styles in one of their three main structures in order to unlock new units.

Zen Masters are hero units which can be summoned at the cost of Yin or Yang.

Another unusual aspect of the game is that peasants are built automatically and at no cost, but the rate at which they spawn is inversely related to the population of the player. The more units the player builds, the longer it will take to spawn a new peasant.

Positives

For the time this was a fairly complex RTS with a bunch of interesting mechanics which were refreshing.

The aesthetics of the game were strong and engaging.

Negatives

The resource system was somewhat confusing. The peasant spawn system reminded me of "upkeep" in Warcraft III, and really put me off playing it.

Memorable Moments

My memory of this game is that it was kind of oddball and unexpected. I'm not sure why I didn't commit and play it to completion.

Alien Swarm

Game: Alien Swarm
Developer: Valve
Platform: PC
Release Year: 2010
Stephen's Rating: 5/10

Basic Plot

A swarm of aliens has invaded a colonized planet. A task force is sent to the planet to look for survivors but ends up finding none, and is forced to destroy the planet with a thermonuclear bomb.

Gameplay

Alien Swarm is a top down shooter similar in style to the indie game Dead Horde. It is a remake of the Unreal Tournament 2004 mod with the same name, created by the same team. Unusually the game was released as freeware by Valve on their Steam platform.

Players can play single player or up to four player co-operative over the internet. Gameplay and the story is the same regardless.

Each player picks a character class to play as. These include:

• Officer: Has an aura which gives nearby units a bonus to damage output and resistance.
• Special Weapons: Has access to the most powerful weapons, has autoaim, and can hold more ammunition.
• Medic: Can heal allies and themselves with healing becons and a healing gun.
• Tech: Is the fastest and setting up sentry guns and welding doors. Is the only class capable of hacking some control panels.

Each character class has access to class specific weapons which only they can use.

The game involves moving through various compounds, engaging alien enemies and progressing to various checkpoints.

The feel of the game reminds me a lot of the movie Aliens. The combat is in close quarters, the lighting is dark, and the gameplay intense.

Positives

Great that they released this as freeware. Anyone who downloads and installs Steam can play this game. Unusual gameplay, especially considering it used the Half-Life 2 Source engine which was designed for first person shooters.

Negatives

The view angle and controls are confusing and hard to get used to. I can't think of how else they could have done it, but it's painful to start with. The game also gets pretty repetitive but simultaneously over-difficult quite quickly.

Memorable Moments

Had some good 2-4 player games online, never completed it but spent a good few hours testing it out.

Prince of Persia 2: The Shadow and the Flame

Game: Prince of Persia 2: The Shadow and the Flame
Developer: Brøderbund
Platform: PC
Release Year: 1993
Stephen's Rating: 5/10

Basic Plot

The story begins 11 days after the plot of the original Prince of Persia. The prince asks for the princesses hand in marriage and the Sultan agrees. As he enters the palace he finds he has been transformed into the visage of a beggar, whilst someone else who has taken on his form (Jaffar) orders him to be thrown out. The prince escapes through a window and boards a merchant ship, and the game begins.

The story takes the Prince to distant lands where he encounters strange and magical creates. He gains the ability to turn into a shadow form, and uses this to defeat Jaffar and rescue the princess.

Gameplay

Prince of Persia 2 is a platform side scrolling game with elements of combat, acrobatics, and puzzle solving.

This game had a greater emphasis on combat than the original.

As with the original game the player had to beat it within a certain real world time limit.

Positives

More detailed and advanced graphics, more diversity in terms of environments. Decent gameplay mechanics.

Negatives

Fairly unmemorable.

Memorable Moments

The plot sounds pretty intricate, yet none of it was obvious when I played the game.

Titan Quest: Immortal Throne

Game: Titan Quest: Immortal Throne
Developer: Iron Lore Entertainment
Platform: PC
Release Year: 2007
Stephen's Rating: 6/10

I never played the original Titan Quest without the expansion so I will only mention the two together.

Basic Plot

The player takes on the role of an adventurer in mythical times who ends up assisting the Order of Prometheus in restoring balance to the world. The scene is set around the time human beings lost contact with the gods.

The player battles through four "acts" including ancient Greece, Egypt, the Orient, and finally the Underworld in the expansion.

Ultimately the player must defeat the titan Typhon and then Hades to complete the story.

Gameplay

Titan Quest is an action role playing game similar to Diablo. The player has a top down isometric view of the game world and their character and the interaction is primarily pointing and clicking on enemies to engage them, and also using keys to select different abilities.

Titan Quest utilises a fully featured 3D physics and graphics engine in contrast to Diablo II which used isometric pseudo-3D graphics.

A lot of the game mechanics are similar to Diablo II but the differences are worth mentioning.

The skill system is quite different. Every character starts the same - without a character class, and at level 0. From memory when you reach level 1 you get to choose your first character class. The options are:

• Defense: A melee warrior build for "tank" characters which focuses on a shield and weapon.
• Dream: A multi-purpose build with auras which can be used for melee or casting. Only available in the Immortal Throne expansion.
• Earth: A caster dps and summoner build.
• Hunting: A ranged or melee weapon build.
• Nature: a summoner/healer build with some magic dps and enhancement capability.
• Rogue: A melee weapon build with utility skills.
• Spirit: A caster dps and summoner build.
• Storm: A caster dps and summoner build.
• Warfare: A melee warrior build focusing on wielding two weapons at once.

Each of these skill classes had a tree of skills that you could advance as you levelled up. Some skills synergised with others. The unique thing about Titan Quest was that at level 9 (from memory) you got to choose (optionally) a second skill class for your character. This meant you could pick skills from two trees and combine them in a way which was complimentary. Each combination of skill trees was a character class and had a unique name. For example, if you choose Warfare and Dream your character class was Harbinger. Using Harbinger as an example of complimentary skills; I had a harbinger who raised Warfare skills to increase his dual-weapon fighting abilities, and then mixed that with the health regeneration aura of dream + some of the flashy finishing moves to become a vanishing/Wolverine-like/spinning ball of death.

Dream skill tree.

Weapons were very similar to Diablo 2 in that there were different colours for different grades. Yellow and green for normal magic items, blue for rare, and purple for epic items. Any colour could be part of a set, and set items gained bonuses if you wore multiple items from the same set.

There were also runes and sockets for enhancing your equipment. Multiplayer was accessible over LAN or the internet.

Positives

Great engine - fun to play in. I like the the skill selection quite a bit although I think they could have thought more about how skills from different skill classes could compliment each other better. Good multiplayer support.

Negatives

As with pretty much every action-RPG that has ever come since Diablo 2 there were some major issues which stopped this game becoming legendary.

1. As with Diablo 2 you could play the game through 3 times on normal, epic, and legendary difficulty. Unfortunately the XP gain drops exponentially once you finish normal difficulty until you get to the point where you can play for hours and not level up once. I felt like it was a much better balance in Diablo 2... it dropped off too much to make me want to keep playing beyond normal difficulty.
2. The item pool was a bit limited and boring. There were only so many epic and legendary items in the game and after a while you start finding the same gear over and over. There were almost never any unique effects, it was always just about raising a stat on your character. In comparison, Diablo 2 had (for instance) a bow that had a "Fires explosive bolts or arrows" effect. This was interesting in that you could compliment it with a Paladin's holy aura for extra fire damage.
3. The enemies were very limited in type and very repetitive to battle.
4. The map wasn't auto-generated which meant replaying the game was even more tedious.

All and all it was a good game but it didn't have enough attention to detail and secrets to keep me playing beyond the normal campaign.

Memorable Moments

One day myself and three friends all sat down and started the campaign together multiplayer. It was very exciting appearing together at the start of the game, wearing nothing but some basic clothes. Mutliplayer was pretty fun, especially sharing items and building up sets and recipes.

There was a glitch in the game and sometimes enemies who died would "stretch" out due to the ragdoll like physics of the game.

Pokémon HeartGold & Pokémon SoulSilver

Game: Pokémon HeartGold and Pokémon SoulSilver
Developer: Gamefreak
Platform: Nintendo DS
Release Year: 2009
Stephen's Rating: 5/10

Pokémon HeartGold and Pokémon SoulSilver (terrible names) were generation 4 remakes of the original Pokémon Gold and Pokémon Silver released in generation 2.

Basic Plot

The story is the same as any Pokémon game. You play the role of a young person who goes out into the world to explore the world of Pokémon. On the way they help thwart the evil Team Rocket and eventually become Pokémon Master.

Gameplay

In its essence all Pokémon games are role playing games with elements of turn based combat and strategy. Rather than re-hashing the mechanics of the game here go and check out my entry for Pokémon Gold and Pokémon Silver here.

Differences from the Original

The graphics have been revamped for the Nintendo DS. This platform also provides the game with wifi and wireless multiplayer support including wifi events. There was also interactivity with other generation 4 games so you could trade Pokemon with owners of Pokémon Diamond, Pokémon Pearl and Pokémon Platinum. There was even some interactivity with generation 3 games if you had a Nintendo DS original or DS Lite as you could put the GBA game into the 2nd slot, and it would change the kinds of Pokémon you could find in game.

There were a number of functional and aesthetic differences including the layout of the Pokégear and the Pokédex but essentially the story and experience was designed to be the same but with modern technology.

At the end of the game there were advanced quests and areas which could be explored in order to unlock and obtain a lot of additional legendary Pokémon and items including obtaining all of the starter Pokemon from generation 3 (including the generation 1 remakes).

Positives

Well polished and built game and an accurate representation of the original for a modern audience. Good multiplayer support. I liked the ability to obtain the starter Pokémon prior to generation 4, as anyone with a DSi or DSi XL was unable to transfer them across any other way (because of the lack of a GBA slot).

Negatives

In terms of multiplayer the game only supported WEP authentication over wifi which was frustrating. This was fixed in Pokémon Black and Pokémon White.

Compared to Pokémon Platinum which was the other game I played from generation 4 there were some major flaws in the game which to me made it quite frustrating.

Firstly, there was no easy way to un-do EV's. This meant that the party of Pokémon you took with you through the whole game would more than likely end up with random EV's and therefore be quite weak. If you wanted to EV train this generally meant breeding or catching a fresh Pokémon after completing the game, which took many hours of effort and a lot of dedication and concentration.

Secondly, there was no easy way to re-battle trainers you'd already fought. The Vs. Seeker in Pokémon Platinum was ideal for this situation and greatly helped in gaining experience and EV training. In these games you had to wait for an NPC trainer to call you on your Pokégear, and then travel to them and re-battle them. You had no control over who or when you could re-battle so it became worthless as a method of EV training.

All in all the interface from the original games was clunky and unintuitive compared to the other generation 4 games. I didn't really enjoy playing the game much, it felt like I was fighting against it all the time. It greatly reduced the replayability after becoming champion as well.

Memorable Moments

I pretty much bought HeartGold just so I could get Mew on an wifi event.

F*ck Quest

Game: F*ck Quest
Developer: Richard Eter
Platform: PC
Release Year: 1998
Stephen's Rating: 3/10

Basic Plot

You play the role of Richard, a man whose sole goal is to have sexual intercourse with a woman.

Gameplay

The game played out much like a text based parser or point and click adventure. The style reminded me of Hugo's House of Horrors only the porn edition.

The game culminates with Richard actually having sex. This involves steering a large pixelated penis in and out... you get the picture.

Positives

Mildly humorous.

Negatives

Seedy and poor quality. Meaningless plot. The technology used was about a decade behind the times. 

Memorable Moments

I got this game from the internal file sharing network set up for the university halls. I remember we had house drinks in my room one day and one of my house mates booted up the game (he'd played it before) and insisted on completing it in front of everyone else. When the large penis appeared, everyone left my room. Awkward...