XCOM: Enemy Unknown is a turn-based strategy game, the return of a classic franchise that has laid dormant for over a decade. Developed by Firaxis Games (perhaps you've heard of Civilization V), XCOM is a tactical romp that pits your grizzled, heavily armed soldiers against a seemingly never-ending horde of alien invaders. And that sudden chittering sound means a rather graceful mission has just gone sour.
Things were going so well too; I'd marched through this abandoned shopping center like a well-oiled machine, tearing through alien scum with nary a scratch to show for it. Just one storehouse left, one last possible hiding place before I can pack up and head home. So I send the rookies in to investigate, with my prized high-ranking sniper standing guard by the door in case they bit off more than they could chew.
David Daw has studied the history and future of television and has a master's in Broadcast and Electronic Communication Arts from San Francisco State University along with a BA in genre fiction from NYU. More by David Daw
In honor of the 2012 Interactive Fiction contest we’ll be featuring text-based games in this week’s Free Game Friday roundup. Not all of this week’s games come from the competition, but they all feature the written word as their main gameplay mechanic. We also didn’t have space to feature all the great games in the competition, so here’s a list of all the web playable games in the competition if you need more interactive fiction. Text-based games are having a real renaissance right now, and the quality of interactive fiction has never been better.
Mike Lata has been covering consumer electronics, gaming, cloud computing, mobile apps, and other topics related to tech for several years. More by Mike Lata
Razer’s CEO and Creative Director Min-Liang Tan, confirmed via a tweet Thursday that the company's Project Fiona gaming tablet, first discussed at CES 2012, is in the design stages and will eventually be released.
He sent out a Facebook update Wednesday asking for 10,000 likes in seven days to gauge interest and to see if the hardware was worth releasing. As of this writing, he’s gotten 10,788 likes on the update and has decided to proceed.
The Razer executive's Facebook page asked for suggestions and user feedback when it comes to the tablet’s design. “We’ve been working on it since [CES] and have narrowed down a couple of key concepts/designs. We would like to reach out to the community to see the level of interest before we actually launch it,” the post reads.
Remember Morrowind? The third chapter in the popular Elder Scrolls series remains one of the finest roleplaying experiences available, but time has not been kind to the game’s aging engine. Fortunately, enterprising fans have stepped in. The newly-released Morrowind Overhaul is a compilation of mods, programs and files that intend to drag the 10-year old roleplaying game into the future with a slew of upgrades. Designed by the folks at Ornitocopter, it’s a rare treat: the sights and sounds of Morrowind’s Tamriel have never been so stunning, and there’s no better time to dive in – perhaps while you wait for The Elder Scrolls Online to surface sometime next year.
Here's what Morrowind looks like through the lens of the Morrowind Overhaul project.
The Overhaul project has been in development for 5 years, and the latest version cleans up a lot of bugs, adds new updates, and features an auto-installer that should take a lot of the guesswork out of getting everything running. You’ll need a fresh, mod-free installation of Morrowind as well as the Tribunal and Bloodmoon expansion packs – the Game of The Year edition includes everything you need, and will set you back $10 on Steam. The process is lengthy but straightforward: download the 2GB file, unzip its contents into your Morrowind directory, and run the “MO Installer” executable. If you’ve acquired Morrowind by way of Steam, the game will be in the Steam folder, under steamapps/common/Morrowind.
David Daw has studied the history and future of television and has a master's in Broadcast and Electronic Communication Arts from San Francisco State University along with a BA in genre fiction from NYU. More by David Daw
As I’ve played the new WoW expansion this week and journeyed through the lands of Pandaria I’ve been struck by two seemingly contradictory facts: Blizzard has crafted the best expansion for World of Warcraft yet, and if I didn’t have a ton of friends playing the game I would likely never open up WoW again.
A lot of the coverage of Mists of Pandaria has implied that WoW has finally lost whatever ineffable quality made it the MMO juggernaut, but that’s both too mean to Mists and too kind to WoW in general. Objectively speaking it’s hard to argue that Mists isn’t the best expansion World of Warcraft has ever seen; there’s more features here executed more deftly than anything we’ve seen before.
The storytelling is a vast improvement over the last expansion, Cataclysm. Leveling, raiding and just adventuring in general have been retuned to provide something to do at nearly every skill level and point of progression. The new Monk class and Pandaren race are both great additions to the game, but it’s hard to escape the conclusion that WoW has entered a point in its lifecycle where big advancements involve from smoothing off the rough edges instead of shaking up the game.
David Daw has studied the history and future of television and has a master's in Broadcast and Electronic Communication Arts from San Francisco State University along with a BA in genre fiction from NYU. More by David Daw
After the last few weeks of game jams drowning us in free games we’re back to the regular schedule of small, indie developers making games for your thrifty pleasure. These games are still just as good (if not better) than what we've previously shown you, but they’re a bit harder to collect into one big theme. In other words, this week's games are kind of all over the place. Sometimes that’s nice.
