REVIEW: The Binding of Isaac

Feast your eyes on this, the new game developed in part by Edmund McMillen; indie hero, father of Gish, mother of Meat Boy and author of that largely unsexy game about ladies’ private parts. This time we enter the world of Isaac and if your bible is well read, you'll either appreciate the reinvention of this twisted tale or, I'm sure, abhore it. Personally, I think it's an original and suitable setting for the game, but I’m not in a position to judge whether it could be perceived as a middle finger to those of certain faiths.

Quick précis? Little Isaac's mother hears the voice of God, and it demands that she purify her child of all his sins. One thing leads to another and the booming voice above eventually asks that she end her son's life in a typically grizzly demonstration of her belief in the big man. To escape his knife-wielding mother, Isaac enters the basement of the house through a trapdoor in his bedroom floor. From then on, he becomes involved in a bloody quest to kill the nutty bitch, arcade shooter style. Naturally.


The Binding... is in many ways like a top-down take on Spelunky; all randomly generated rooms, item shops and enemies. For this reason, it appears infinitely replayable, even as I enter my thirtieth turn in its grizzly underworld. There are no second chances here - you have but one life with which to make the endgame. Really. Have I beaten it yet? No. But I'm not done trying.

It can be a cruel and vicious game, punishing the player in its thirst for variety. You may pick up an item that causes insta-death, or you might come across room after room of monsters with nary a power-up in sight. Sometimes you'll be locked and loaded from the get go with a handful of bombs and a damage buff you've picked up in the second or third chamber. It's never predictable and there is always that sense of unwrapping a gift each time a new game is fired up. Will it be a glistening jewel when I begin again, or a box of steaming poo? To be honest, just like in real life, either way is fun. You make of it what you can, even when lady luck does happen to boot you in the balls.


The game consists of layers of dungeons that you'll descend through as you progress. The maps on each level are non-linear so you get to choose where it is you’d like to go whilst exploring, but you’ll always need to face one super-baddie in a particular room before you’re allowed to reach a lower stage. It’s a simple goal, but you’re constantly weighing up the odds of survival, checking the map to see whether you should get the level boss over with, or risk some more basement rooms on the off chance some newly discovered loot will turn you into the teary-eyed murderer you always wished to be.

Isaac kills with tears, it’s true. He also wears his mothers heels to gain range and can, on occasion, call in a missile strike from above. The combinations of passive perks and power-ups are practically limitless. You’ll unlock more and more as you progress through the game and, as you become accustomed to them, you’ll also be learning the strengths and weaknesses of each enemy you encounter. It’s a great little hook and ensures that with each death both your practical experience and your ability to survive increases. It’s another step in maintaining the 'one more play' player attitude that this game thrives on.


If there is anything to pick at in criticism it would likely be the configuration options, notably the control scheme. Although the game has recently been updated to support joystick use, that support only extends to instructions on downloading JoyToKey, a third party button-binding app which isn't ideal when you're after plug and play with a standard Xbox controller. Considering Super Meat Boy implemented joypad support so well, this surprises me, and I will always be more willing to play a game like The Binding of Isaac whilst slouching in a chair, madly bashing buttons, rather than sitting upright at a keyboard.

This, though, doesn’t take away from the fact that McMillen has once again displayed his talent for creating absurdist pantomimes within compelling cartoon worlds. The Binding of Isaac is full of filth and depravity, but with enough comic value to negate any serious sense of doom and gloom. For the price of a pint of ale, you’d be crazy not to pick this up.

REVIEW: Orczz

If anything, it makes for a nice change of pace to slip into some casual indieware at a time when videogame blockbusters aren’t blinding me with all their many polygons and loud bangs and flashes. Quite the opposite to all this, Orczz is a fairly unassuming affair. There is very little fanfare when diving into this cute, if simplistic, tower defence game.

The theme is unabashed comic fantasy. You lead the knightly good guys on an eastern island - all swords and castles - in defence against the Orcs (or Orczz?) across the channel to the west who have decided it’s about time they attack the purer race, not to gain access to your swords and castles, but, indeed, to pilfer your mead. Why are they after your mead? I don’t know, I haven’t picked that up, but I can totally accept it’s the kind of shitty thing that Orcs would do.

Fair enough. So far, so tongue in cheek.


Orczz is accessible enough for those familiar with this style of game. It’s tidily presented. You buy your units prior to each progressively tricky battle. In combat you slap them down feverishly on the copy/paste battlegrounds in an attempt to keep the evil green hordes at bay (entering from the right of the screen). And there are some basic mini-games to break up the pace.

But what instantly sticks out like a gnarled green Orc thumb is the sight of these character sprites in motion. It doesn’t add up to the cartoon flair of the art design. Battle animations are so awkward as to be obstructive of the player’s perception of the action; each time one of your archer’s arrows hits home, there’s no physical reflex from the enemy, no loss of limb, just an ungainly clip-art sprite to depict contact. Indeed, the only indication of how much damage you’re actually inflicting on a foe is the slight shade of red they turn just before their death slump is sketchily depicted and a single coin of reward floats up from their body for you to harvest. It’s not the end of the world, it’s just... lacking in shine when the game seems to set itself up for some bonkers comic antics. Most importantly, it doesn’t make it easy to gauge the sway of the fight.

The actual meat of Orczz is mildly enjoyable if overly tricky (seemingly whichever difficulty you play on). On two separate ‘casual’ playthroughs my cash reserves between battles fell so low that I was unable to purchase any units prior to the next encounter, thus ending my game. Even the supposedly free ones were off the menu due to some knuckle-chewing bug. It’s unforgivable. It also means that I still haven’t played the game through to completion.


When things do occasionally go your way there can be value in winning fights for the upgrades you’ll accrue, but there never seems to be any room for experimentation due to the constant pressure and rigidity of the game’s available actions. To explain, my biggest gripe, aside from the above mentioned game ender, is one that takes a lot of getting past.

You’ll often be rewarded with newer, better units when you win battles. That’s fun. You might imagine that this means you can drop an elite unit onto the battlefield to take care of a particularly nasty group of attackers whilst building up simpler, cheaper defences in other, less hectic spots. Right? Well, no. For some inexplicable reason, each time you drop any unit onto the battlefield you have to wait for all units to recharge from scratch before making another selection. Naturally the bigger, badder units take a long time to become available, but in practice not so much longer than their weaker counterparts to make it worth placing a cheap unit and sacrificing another twenty seconds without your strongest army asset.

The upshot of this is that all lesser units become redundant and your battle is only as good as your strongest fighter, not your finest strategic approach. When I twigged this fact my enjoyment of Orczz unfortunately took a decisive tumble. The entire game teetered off-balance, keeping it from being approachable in a playful and creative manner. It could be said on this understanding that the only input required of a player is to click the mouse wherever the meanest enemy soldiers are approaching from. The rest is down to luck.

It’s maddening, and a little depressing when you consider that this fumble could so easily be solved. It’s baffling, in fact, that another game - a spiritual predecessor if you will - has so many of this game’s traits, but doesn’t make the same design mistake.

If you were in front of me right now, you’d be subject to a lot of suggestive nudging and winking.


All right, you got me, we’ve an elephant in the room. Can you guess it? Are you blind? Take another look. It’s Plants vs. Zombies. There, I said it, and everyone else was thinking it but were too afraid to say anything, but it really can’t go unnoticed and I absolutely refuse to let it go unmentioned.

My thoughts for this game ultimately boil down to the following: Unless you’ve a particular aversion to simulated horticulture and/or the walking dead then I can’t honestly recommend that you play Orczz over that big eared, tusky bastard in the corner over there. In fact, even if you’ve already sampled Popcap’s finest hour, just boot it up again. And then, when you’ve had enough of it, perhaps turn to this game for a refreshing interlude before PvZ 2 inevitably sees the light of day in a year or so.

The Great Escape: Bad Company 2

I have never wanted to go to war. I’ve never imagined that I will risk my life for anything other than very personal - and perhaps entirely selfish - reasons. I’ve never actually wanted to kill another person. I may have casually fantasised about murder in certain social situations, but I'd really rather not give it a go unless my own life or that of a loved one truly depends on it. Yet I love Battlefield: Bad Company 2. I love it in spite of all it encourages me to do in contradiction to the above statements.

This likely says something important about my emotional connection to certain violent video games, to those games that outsiders - non-gamers - may deem subversive or amoral. I love war movies in the same way. Show me the aspects of human existence that I will hope never to have access to and I’ll drink them down until the glass is empty. It's part of the fun.

What’s the reasoning behind this? I guess it’s just personal taste, partly morbid fascination. I can’t quite trace it to a single source, but BC2 in particular feeds my desire for the simulated horrors of war like nothing I can remember. Perhaps being stranded in a situation so entirely alien to my personal experience of reality, but so fundamental to that of humanity, is what starts my heart pounding and makes me duck and dive in front of the screen in the same way that your parents might do when playing something frivolous on one of those video-game-console-thingies.

So, am I simply addicted to the frantic bloodlust? No. It doesn’t make me feel as emotionally barren as that label suggests. I play games for several reasons, not only because it burns my adrenaline more than anything else I’d dare to do.


Put it this way: I'm aware that the multiplayer portion of BC2 fulfills on several levels. The main one, the skeleton frame, is the abstract achievement of scoring more points than your opponent, of being better at something than somebody else. Like tennis. Then, at the other end, is the spectacle of the thing. The explosions, the gunfire, the ear shattering ‘WOOMPHHH’ that occurs every time a shell hits the ground beside you and the constant screams and radio chatter. Not at all like tennis. I like this sort of thing, I can only assume because this is exactly what manly men like me are instinctively drawn to.

Sitting somewhere in the middle of these two superficial hooks, between the mechanical and the visceral, is my empathetic response to all this. That’s where the heart of the game lies - that desire to fight the good fight with my brothers in arms, to protect their lives and vanquish the enemy so that the world may become a better place inhabited by a lesser amount of things that go ‘WOOMPHHH’ (although admittedly this would be a bit of a shame).

You may think this perceived association to be suspect. After all, little scene-setting occurs when you’re dropped into these sorts of games. There is little context besides the terrain and the weaponry of your battle - it’s all you can initially take in. You are the good guys. Those with the red markers above their heads? They’re the bad guys. Go kill. So you do and despite this being the only information you ever receive in terms of setting, it’s all you need to take part in your own personal war movie. And in BC2 I find glorious defeats can often be just as enjoyable as kick-ass victories, when kill ratios become obsolete and all that matters is the dirt beneath your feet and keeping those feet attached to a serviceable pair of legs.


A case in point:

In one of the many battles in which I have fought over the past few days, I spawned near the frontline and was immediately pinned down by heavy incoming fire. It’s easy in these situations to go into shellshock and quiver for a good thirty seconds before making a decision that will most likely end your life. This time, however, a friendly jeep pulled up about fifty yards to my right. Seeing a couple of my buddies in transit immediately relieved my anxiety. I had back-up. I felt safe. In addition to this relief, I noticed that the driver had actually spotted me and was waiting to give me a ride.

Now, this is not a gesture to be taken lightly in the frequently hostile environments that internet gaming supports. This sort of action is the equivalent of a total stranger stopping you on the street one day to tell you how beautiful a person you are, without any sense of irony. In effect, an instant bond is made.

So I ran towards the squad in acceptance of their offer and about five seconds prior to my behind being comfortably parked on a vacant seat within the truck, an RPG streaked in from the left of my vision and impacted with the vehicle. It exploded immediately. I stopped dead. The scene had grabbed me. It could have been scripted, yet it was not. My vision was hazy, my hearing was lost and I was at once hit by the spectacle and the sacrifice, imagined or not, that those men had made to lend a hand to a weedier member of their crew. So much so that I nearly forgot to rejoin the safety of my previous cover and shiver out the last minute of my miserable life, thinking all the while: without me they might have lived.

And this is why I love BC2, for these frequent little moments that the developers can’t possibly program but happen nonetheless. It doesn’t entirely explain my tolerance for virtual violence, but without that almost tangible relation to the very real horror of armed conflict, I’d be lying if I said a little blood and guts didn’t enhance the effects of my favourite past time.

It's that time again: Rollercoaster Tycoon 3

A trip to Alton Towers always puts me in the mood to revisit Rollercoaster Tycoon 3. The English Heritage site (all right, it's not, but it bloody should be) was sickeningly busy and wonderfully hot last Saturday, but it didn't smell one bit. It was a shame then, that we didn’t have enough time to complete a full circuit of the rollercoasters - I attribute this to the fact that half of the country turned up to experience the joys of the thrillingest place in England. It was magical. Really magical. Right up until to the point at which we noticed a family group, pushchair and all, lugging on a joint on their way to the entrance.

I always forget how much I enjoy RT3. I can’t remember ever completing a scenario or finishing a theme park and being satisfied by its well-rounded layout, but I enjoy it all the same. Coming back to it this time, older and wiser perhaps than last year, I’m going to put my all into it. Definitely. 100%.


Look at this path. Get a man there, clean it up. Make sure that mechanic is working the rides. Check the accounts - nice profit margin - it’s building. Jesus. What just happened? Ah, no worries - forgot I built that ride in May. That son of a bitch best make me rich.

The fine pace continues.

The cleanest park awards roll in. Yes. I get a message informing me that my park is the most scenic in the land. All right! Hell, they’ve even pushed me up to the tycoon objectives. This is going swimmingly. I spend time opening new toilets, placing bins and benches strategically, minimising the vomit-sweeping, backbreaking work for my poor underpaid employees.

Hey, Jimmy Dogger, you look sad. You want a pay rise? Go on then. His emotions are now signified by a tiny grinning smiley that melts my heart. Those who serve me well are rewarded, Jimmy, remember that.

Now, to my food and drink stands. Up the prices, pop a few extras into the mix. Do you like that, peeps? Of course you do. I’m the curator of the finest park in the land and this is my talent - to keep you happy and full.

All wonderful, really wonderful. I observe the grounds from a distance and rejoice at the carefully grouped range of rides that fulfill many of my visitors’ needs: the merry-go-round, the spinny-wheel-thing, the dodgems, the coaster in the corner...

And then I realise.

Holy fun-park! I haven’t built my own coaster! I haven't even considered it and now the yearning to build the world’s grandest, fastest people-thriller boils inside of me. Good sense be damned, I will not hold back.

So I redraw my loan, previously paid off, upping my budget to £15,000.

Watch this.


The first mistake comes in the testing. No biggie, but I accidentally let a very real coaster car shoot from the track like a wingless microlight. It explodes in some trees towards the east end of the park.

The second mistake comes from trying to construct a combination of loops and twists that would make the designers of the deadliest coaster in the world go weak at the knees.

My third mistake comes from my inability to reign in my imagination. My money runs out on the fifth corkscrew.

This is where reality drips through the polygonal cracks in this virtual world. In about half an hour my dreamland has transformed into a nightmare. My uber-coaster is a piece of unfinished codswallop. I have no money, but also refuse to demolish my hard work in what would be an admission of my failure.

And so she stands now as a testament to my own stupidity until I can find the cash to finish her. But somehow I don’t care about the little people anymore.

I guess I’ll give it another year.

Chilly bits: Frozen Synapse

I had previously thought Mode 7 Games' newest development to be a fairly unassuming title based on a few screenshots I'd seen posted about the interwebz over the last few months. To me it had looked a little sterile. The art design seemed initially striking, but also perfunctory, as if it had fit the bill for visual functionality and was then painted blue for no very good reason (blue=future?). I was afraid that the game might lack depth of character, that it would turn out to be a one trick pony.

Preconceptions sure are funny things.


Seeing Frozen Synapse in motion is entirely at odds with what shots of the game appear to represent. The turn-based tactical combat is not as coldly functional as the blueprint stylings suggest, but compellingly graceful. When two opposing sides really get down to it - teasing each other out of cover or desperately attempting to predict their competitor's next moves - it quickly evolves into a carefully choreographed game of cat and mouse in which neither side knows who plays the cat or who the bastard mouse until one of them invariably ends up all dead.

If you've ever played Laser Squad Nemesis, you'll be instantly familiar with the various components that bond together to form the main multiplayer experience. If you haven't played that particular gem, then here's a quick precis: It's a turn-based team deathmatch strategy game in which two players simultaneously plan out their moves for the following game turn from a top-down perspective. Following this, both plans are submitted and played out together in real time... for just five seconds. People die. The process repeats. More people die. You win! Hopefully...


Admittedly, this summary doesn't quite do justice to the wealth of tactical options available as you progress from one procedurally generated map to the next. The controls are genuinely a piece of cake to figure out, but pulling off stupendous double-bluffs does require time to learn. The old adage of being easy to learn, but difficult to master has never been so true tediously shoehorned into an article about some game or other.

Multiplayer operates across a number servers on which you can find a game through a fairly speedy matchmaking service. Most of the games you join won't be finished any time soon because people are welcome to post their turns and then find something to do that isn’t meticulously planned virtual warfare (fools!). Any subsequent turns are then resumed at their leisure and you'll be notified by email when another five second snippet of bloody battle has been agreed on.


Surprisingly enough, there’s a fairly decent single player campaign included with the game. I was aware of this prior to purchase, but was pretty certain that it would amount to a number of increasingly deadly AI face-offs with little attention paid to what might drive a lonely player's interest. Happily, I was wrong. Mode 7 Games have worked hard to give this portion of the game some personality. Cyber-punk is the order of the day plot-wise and sure, it's derivative and contrived and fits snugly inside the simplistic visual stylings, but it's also well written and fleshed out enough to provide a welcome breather between firefights. The missions are varied and often surprising: straight fights, hostage rescue, escort and protect missions or the classically underrated slaughter-all-civvies crapshoot (here's looking at you, CoD:MW2) form but a handful of what you can ultimately expect. Delightful stuff.

So, to the serious part: It’s important to mention that the game, although functional and offering full single and multplayer options, does require some more work from the devs. It’s not game-breaking stuff by any means, but in terms of streamlining the UI and ironing out the various niggling bugs or total omissions, Mode 7 clearly have tasks to perform in evolving this promising and addictive TBS into something truly unmissable for a wider audience. Any annoyances are worth working through though, because Mode 7 appear to be entirely on the ball, taking commentary from the community as to how the game should grow and implementing changes accordingly.

Truly, any faults aside, I can’t express how happy I am that a talented team has reborn this crusty old genre and made it so absurdly accessible and compelling. Hats off and all that...

When worlds (and tanks) collide: World of Tanks

The most recent issue of PC Gamer pointed me in the direction of a free online tank simulator entitled World of Tanks. Something about their review turned me onto the idea of measured tactical combat across vast battlefields, a massively multiplayer online shooter that rewarded strategic planning over twitch accuracy. I downloaded the client last weekend and I haven't played any other game since.

So, how do you hide a tank in open field? What is the best way to judge trajectory of your shells over considerable range? And when do I actually get to knock a tank out of action? All of these questions and more will remain unanswered as you dive into World of Tanks and try your hand at piloting some metal murder-machines.



Be warned: the game can initially appear overwhelming. It's as loose an RPG as it is a military simulator, but the tech trees and the amount of vehicles available to you across three different nations (American, German and, ahem, USSR-an) can cause you to spend a good deal of time fumbling over stats in order to put together the best setup allowable for your pet pain-maker. The game currency and research system also has the potential to baffle until you’ve bought your first set of upgrades.

For the most part play is free, but to increase your XP revenue or form a clan you'll need to cough up the bucks. Those who refuse to, however, will not be disappointed. The fantastic matchmaking service ensures that battles are fought on a level playing field and any player who has cheekily modified their tank through paid perks is no more likely to survive a sustained assault from an organised platoon than any of any freeloaders on a particular server.

Once you enter battle for the first time it’s hard not to be drawn into the drama. The game is played out for the most part from a third-person perspective, but also allows you to zoom your view in sniper-style in order to scout out any suspicious tree lines or to crack out some accurate shots over longer distances. The controls are incredibly intuitive and, if you become unsure, it's not as if you don't have enough time in most cases to ponder over which key makes which thing work. It’s a simulator in the broadest sense and the developer, Wargaming.net, have put most of the resources into recreating the feel of isolated and terrifying tank firefights rather than the detailed mechanics of actually piloting the bloody things. ‘W’ moves you forward, ‘S’ moves you backwards and left-clicking fires - you won’t need to know a great deal more than that in order to enjoy your first few skirmishes.



Certain realistic elements of this type of combat are preserved in the name of fun. Limitations are placed on speed and accuracy to keep the player cautious and reward a restrained approach to combat. You won’t be racing across fields to dominate your opponent in this game - you’ll be creeping through gullies and poking your turret out from behind buildings to secure deadly shots. This style of play means that any kills you do make give you that sensation of achievement that the Silent Hunter series gets so right. It’s so much a game of stalking your quarry and predicting their movements - just be prepared to play whole matches without even locking sights on an enemy vehicle before your whole world goes up in flames.

It’s a refreshing game that’s light enough to become instantly involving, but deep enough to reward repeat plays. I’d describe it as your Grandad’s Call of Duty. You know the sort of thing:

'Well, Jimmy, In my day we would 'ave to wait four whole seconds to reload a single shot.'

'Gosh, Grandad, four seconds? That seems like forever! Do tell me more.'

'Oh, well, we never used to have any of those respawn thingies that you kids like so much. No, my boy, back then when you were dead you were really dead. You have it so easy these days in those awfully violent first-person whatyamacallems with your airdrops and your backstabs. It doesn’t even bear thinking about!'

'Oh, Grandad, I do so love your tales of war. It’s such a shame that your memories are soon to be lost to the earth when your ashes are scattered upon it. Now, eat lead as I circle-strafe you like a crunked up ninja! KERPLOW!'

'Fucker.'

Metacritic: The people have their say

If you're anything like me when it comes to choosing on which games to spend your hard and bitterly-earned cash, the first place you'll head to is Metacritic.com for the lowdown. Why wait for demos that never come, or for your friends to cough up their own feeble critiques? Why bother placing any faith in your favourite gaming publication when you can get right to the heart of the matter with a quick glance at a reliably jumbled metascore?

Since I've missed out on reviewing anything for the past year and a half, I'm certainly not going to bother backtracking in the traditional sense in order to slap arbitrary numbers on every single blockbuster release that has passed me by. Instead, I'll take the easy way out and source everyone's favourite rating site for the goods. I'll even go one step further - since this is a site dedicated to words, not numbers - and provide the finest mash-up of bipolar user reviews for your prejudging pleasure.

In no particular order:-

Crysis 2

"Pheonomenal! Looks terrible, bored of it within 4 hours of an incredible great experience. A disappointing effort from one of the most finely polished, well-designed, and fun-to-play Crysis games. However the story is very weak. Less so than the usual run-n-gun and it takes a few times to get past the graphics.

Crysis2: An utterly disappointing sequel with a bad case of greatness. DO NOT BUY."

Mafia 2

"The game's plot is basically a mixture of the Godfather and long winded driving sections. This is supposed to be entertainment, and the strength of this game comes from its laggggg laggg freeze screen crash. The best game i have ever played hands down, great storyline, cheesy story line. How worse could it get?

Mafia 2 is good as movie, but as game it's BETTER THAN GTA! Poor Game Play, Worst Story, No Replay Value, Far Too Short. This is a great game!"

Dragon Age II

"After reading all the negative user reviews, I assumed people were dragons and dragons make me happy when i play my games. All the kissing is a significant improvement over Origins. I mean honestly, I enjoyed it more because its main character on the poster looks like Gordon Freeman. I feel cheated out of my silent awkward animations while talking. Females (even parents) are ridiculously sexed up in order to serve EA and Bioware.

Simply the best RPG but it is no Dragon Age. IF it was called something else it might be a good game."

Mass Effect 2

"Practically perfect. You press some buttons and that's because this game is EPIC. Can't stop thinking about playing it when I'm pulling you in as commander Shepard. Simply the best depth to be experienced even after hours of clunky repetitive movements. You'll yawn, and you might even cry. It gives me pretty much everything I could want but it's terribly overrated."

Well, I think you'll agree that the merging of these insane minds is pretty bloody decisive. Based on the above, I can categorically report that the 2010/2011 period of virtual fun has been the best-worst yet! What an unsustainable amount of digital frolicking! What a fantastically, brilliantly shitty bunch of wonderful games!

If you must have a number, I shall award all of the above -100% for effort, enjoyment and pure entertainment in equal measures of despair and flatulence. You have my word on that.

Botched cryonics: The Dead Pixel lives!

The plan was, of course, that this blog would reactivate several hundred years into the reign of the third order of Tra'al at which point those misanthropic bastards would have completed approximately 90% of their planned decimation of the human race. The Dead Pixel would knock the shit out of the Tra'al, no problem, and go on to claim the entire planet for itself.

Obviously something went awry. The whole project thawed. And here we are.

As it stands, Earth is still in very much the same lacklustre state as it was 21 months ago when the last post of this fine publication was fired forth from the cannon of despair into the face of who-the-fuck-reads-this-thing-anyway. The penny dropped, the trickle of strained gaming commentary subsided and my experiments to find out whether or not I was much more lazy than I had ever previously conceived were at an end. I tested positive. Laziness killed the blog like a slow rot when I had always hoped it would expire in much the same way that Sharon Stone did in Total Recall; I wanted action, a prolonged fight scene, a bullet to the brain and a postmortem quip. I received none of these.

But I digress. As always. I was intending to keep this swift.

In short, the blog is back in action on the condition that there are no conditions. I'm opening it up to cover all aspects of life in the hope that having my fingers in multiple pies will prove far more successful (and considerably more tasty) than gently prodding some stale tart with one malodorous digit. The gaming coverage will continue but remain limited only to those things I give enough of a shit about to put mind to matter. There will also be fiction. And facts.

Has it really been 21 months? Has it? Really? Has it? Yes. Quite.

REVIEW: Tales of Monkey Island: Launch of the Screaming Narwhal

As Telltale Games unleash their second brave revival of a cult LucasArts franchise it's hard not to imagine them ducking for cover behind their desks in anticipation of the uber-fan backlash. If the reception of the new Sam and Max games was anything to go by though, they should be fine. Take the bull by the horns I say, and so they have.


Saying that Monkey Island has a history is something of an understatement, but the ease at which this first episode, Launch of the Screaming Narwhal slips us back into the familiar world of Threepwood and co. is commendable. The instant insertion into a battle with Le Chuck minutes before the credits roll and the familiar sounds of the MI series kick in are stirring to say the least. It's like being held in the arms of your estranged wife years after she ran away to be with that Wookie-faced lover of hers. It doesn't even matter that she's only returned to you because she bled him dry, she's back you fool!

It's not all sweetness and light though. Consistent with Telltale's past projects, the humour in the game can range from well-timed slapsticked to dialogue that just seems as if the writers were trying that little bit too hard to draw a chuckle. There are some great moments though, led by a new addition to Threepwood's physique, and if it's not all laugh-out-loud hilarity it is at least a well-constructed tribute to those games of old.

The puzzles in adventure games are naturally what keep things ticking along and here they're generally well employed. If I were to nit-pick then I'd say that the game does at times tend to scream 'I'M A PUZZLE!' at you when you were already doing perfectly well coming to your own conclusions regarding the dog, the blowtorch and the chocolate eclair. Despite these mild cases of patronisation though the puzzles are nicely thought out, often leading to that ultimate pay-off of striking a solid gold solution with an exuberant 'Ohhhhh... yeah!'.


The game looks crisp and colourful as well, realising the vivid cartoon tones of the series for the first time in full 3D. Wandering about the locales, conversing with characters and inspecting curious objects is half the fun and seeking out little interactions placed amongst such well laid scenes is always a joy. Telltale still haven't made the leap to truly reinventing the genre, but it does mean that the game is accessible to adventure pros and newcomers alike. The former, however, are more likely to be disgruntled with the lack of progression with the format.

Without a doubt there are some things to be improved on with later episodes in this five parter. If the characters evolve enough to become as memorable as those we already associate with the series then it really could become the game that the fans have been waiting ten years for. Most people who play Launch of the Screaming Narwhal are likely to enjoy it a great deal if only for nostalgic value. Others, of course, will refuse to see anything good in it. Personally, I feel that if anyone's up to the task of rejuvenating the Monkey Island brand, it's Telltale.

VERDICT: A fine start to a resurrected classic.

PREVIEW: AaaaaAAaaaAAAaaAAAAaAAAAA!!!

No, my spleen hasn't spontaneously ruptured, nor have I trapped my wang in the bedroom door again. I am, in fact, currently experiencing the thirty level pre-release of the utterly brilliant AaaaaAAaaaAAAaaAAAAaAAAAA!!! -- A Reckless Disregard for Gravity. Catchy, huh?


Dejoban Games, those of The Wonderful End of the World famousness - and if you've never heard of that game, walk this way - have created some kind of pleasure-giving software here that feeds off your adrenaline, combining the addictive qualities of extreme sports and flashing lights to contiually tempt you into having just... one... more... go.

So, each level begins with you on top of a tower or platform of ludicrous, unmeasured height with your main objective being to leap from it and reach the bottom not dead. Sounds easy? No? Well, you'll be happy to hear that a parachute has been provided for elegant, cushiony landings once you reach the bottom. Pay no attention to all the other towers and platformy death-traps on the way down though. They'll only break your body a little bit...

Djeeban's unique brand of infectious insanity has been implemented to great affect in Aaaaa!, marrying the sense of impending vertical doom with some sensational of-the-wall visual styling. It really is rather lovely to look at, but once you're careening downwards towards a sadistically placed points marker it'll probably be the last thing on your mind.


In line with it's arcade playability points are indeed the name of the game, unlocking levels and allowing access to certain abilities that will aid you in your quest to become the awesomest virtual base-jumper yet. Sticking close to walls and narrowly missing obstructions on your way down also boosts the payout at the end of each jump so it's up to you to replay and perfect your descents to really get the most bang for your buck.

Above all else, Aaaaa! will help you realise a kind of precision skill that you never knew existed within that pathetic brain of yours. So, I suggest you put your nerves to the test and jump right in. The game is now available on pre-order for just $15 from the developer's site and, with the thirty levels you'll be allowed access to once you put your money down, you'll find it eating up a sizeable amount of your time prior to Aaaaa!'s imminent release.

REVIEW: Trine

I feel that there's a common attitude held amongst veteran gamers these days that stems from a nostalgic perception of what we were playing ten or twenty years ago. I'll admit I'm guilty of it myself at times. Many of us at one time or another are prone to saying that modern games appear dumbed down, unimaginative, too focused on aesthetics or just plain dull compared to what we may have experienced back in the day. Of course, this sort of uncompromising generalisation can ring true as much it can seem complete codswallop, but nevertheless we're guilty of saying it from time to time.

What I'm leading up to in a rather convoluted fashion is that whilst playing Frozenbyte's recently released co-op platformer, Trine, I had a revelation of sorts. Something about the childlike nature of the game was appealing in such a way that it occurred to me that it's something I wish I'd been able to play when I was younger, being the sort of game with enough creative energy and style to draw you in and really stick in your head for a good while. So much so that I can imagine people in years to come might say: 'Hey, do you remember that game with the wizard and you could move stuff around to solve puzzles? And you could switch characters? Games just don't do things like that anymore...'

So, I'd like to preface this piece with a little advice to those as cynical as me: Remember that computer games exist for our enjoyment and that time can cloud judgements. Games like Trine are here to remind us of that.

Right. Now that the fluffy, over-sensitive babble is out of the way I'll get on with the review proper.


I'll go ahead and predict that one thing which will crop up in many reviews of this game is the word 'charming'. This is because Trine is charming to the core. From the introductory video through to the character design and the vivid variety of the visuals, playing through the game is like being read a fairytale before bedtime. What with the three noble heroes, the classical fantasy setting and a nasty skeleton horde to dismantle as you please, you may as well be rescuing a princess from a tower. Except you're not.

The plot, in fact, revolves around the discovery of a magical artifact called the Trine by three very different people. The Thief - all sarcasm and slyness - is the first to happen across the object, after which comes the womanising Wizard and finally the burly, oafish Knight. As their hands each touch the stone we discover that they've been bound together in one body with the ability to switch forms on the fly. Hence, we have our first major gameplay device.

All of the above is swiftly and seamlessly delivered by way of three short tutorials in which you control each character as they approach the ancient stone. From then on you're let loose on a quest to dispel the evil of the land and find a way to release your souls from the stone.

Before I go on, I need to point out that my first experience with the game was less than magical. Setting up the control system for two player co-op took a good half hour, mainly due to the insane default configuration of the gamepad controls. Admittedly, I don't have a 360 controller which I imagine most games are geared towards these days, but when a handful of essential button-presses are bound to several directions on the right thumbstick it's easy to become more than a little peeved by the trial and error approach required for controller configuration. However, compared to these initial issues, once you're actually playing it controls like a dream.

The actions are responsive, the controls intuitive and the visual feedback that you get from jumping and moving around is spot on, meaning that you rarely get caught out by tricky maneuvers. All of this is paramount for a game that is built around such kinetic use of simulated physics.


Throughout the levels - besides the evil skeletons you'll want to be killing - are spread many blocked paths and seemingly impassable areas. The beauty of the game is the way in which you work around them using the powers available to your trio. The Wizard can move objects around in the world and construct boxes and the Thief's ability to grapple and swing from anything wooden makes her indisposable for certain tasks. The Knight, well, he's just a brute. Switching between characters to suit your needs at the press of a button is an excellent system and one of Trine's main selling points.

The puzzles in the game are certainly not mind-bending conundrums. The focus here is on using teamwork and inventiveness to bypass problems in the best possible way. The lack of chin-scratching is definitely a good thing though, allowing the players to be experimental and construct solutions on the fly without losing the excellent pacing of the game.

Taking all of the above into account as well as the ability to play through the game with company means that Trine is guaranteed to make you laugh a lot, most likely through your own ineptitude or that of your partner's. At some point you'll think you've concocted the perfect solution to a puzzle only to end up flying off the screen or dropping serenely into a vat of lava. Well placed checkpoints that revive your party ensure that these sorts of events never frustrate.

On top of the standard platforming you'll also be presented with a simple leveling system that allows you to advance by collecting experience points from downed enemies or finding potions scattered about the levels. It makes for a compelling reward system and if you keep your eyes open you'll also discover many chests dotted about that contain magical trinkets or armaments to enhance any character's performance.


Depite my love for Trine, I have to admit to one minor failing of the game. I played it through with my girlfriend and it took us around nine hours to complete. The first eight and a half were fantastic. It's fair to say we were completely captivated by the style, beauty and endless dicking about that it allowed us. The last half hour of play, however, stunk. After adventuring through such varied locations and making the most of the exploration that the game encourages we were confronted by the ultimate platormer horror: A RISING LAVA LEVEL.

We were horrified. Two days of gorgeousness for this? It was as if the game had collapsed under it's own brilliance, hurling everything it had at us from above whilst perpetrating one of the worst genre-cliches in the business. It was like a physics-vomit within the depths of hell and even after the satisfaction of finally succeeding and completing the game, we were left with a bitter taste in our mouths and angry beyond belief. For those who fancy a challenge then you may find it to be a cakewalk, but for us it was a disappointing departure from everything that had come before.

That said, soon after the infuriating finale, we did the best thing we could to cleanse those unhappy feelings, and started the game again. Bliss.

With Trine, Frozenbyte have come up with their own unique selling point. Three characters, three sets of abilities and three ways to solve problems. Despite the wealth of alt-platform games we've received in the last couple of years, Trine still manages to be a breath of fresh air. It may not have the ego or ambition of the competition but, as it is, Trine remains a consistently fun and beautifully compelling game. Playing it alone is enjoyable enough, but cooperatively the possibility of inadvertant comedy and a multitude of puzzle solutions just makes it so much better.

I may have knocked the game for the woefully generic final level and the control issues I encountered, but there's no denying that this is a game to be played and enjoyed in the purest sense. No mind-bending situations to puzzle over, no grinding for points or pixel-perfect jumps. It's just great platform gaming with a few neat tricks thrown in for good measure. So, take my advice - parents play it with your kids, girlfriends play it with your boyfriends and friends play it with your other friends. If this happens then I'm pretty sure we'll all look back at some point in the future with very fond memories of Trine.

VERDICT: Compellingly versatile, Trine is a platforming gem.

EDIT: Frozenbyte have contacted me since this review was posted to say that they're planning on releasing a patch for Trine very soon that will lessen the difficulty of the final level as well as allowing the difficulty setting to be changed easily on dying. This should go some way to relieving any frustrations.

It's been released? Oh, right: Battlefield Heroes

EA seem to have pushed this one out the back door, meaning that very few are trumpeting the release of aeons-in-the-beta-testing, Battlefield Heroes.


The game comprises of these things:

- Multiplayer shooting
- Cartoon graphics
- Unlockable weapons
- Vehicular combat
- Micro-transactions

Somewhere behind the garish, 'comedy' exterior lies a stripped-down, family-friendly Battlefield game. It's World War 2 gone slapstick and whether I like it or not, I haven't yet decided. Having dipped in and out of the beta once or twice I couldn't quite get to grips with the unresponsive controls and the matchmaking service. My God, I hate matchmaking services. If there is one way in which console gaming has detrimentally affected PC gaming it's with those idiot-proof, disconnection-prone, electronic waiting rooms. Dammit, I've gone off-topic.

I'll probably download the client tonight and have a bash at it, but whether or not it's any good will dictate whether I cover it again here. If I hate it I might just draw a big picture of a cock and balls and add it below.

Less Content, More Matter: Robert Yang's Polaris

Polaris was released earlier this month as part of a series of micro-mods for Half-Life 2 based around the unusual themes of a) not shooting things and b) not running around all that much. It's the first release emerging from the project's initial volume called More Matter, which in turn falls under the collective series name, Radiator. Unlike the confusing multitude of their titles though, the mods themselves are designed to be concise, with the intention that they become thought-provoking, original works of fiction.

This first part has your unnamed female character spend the evening standing at a bench in a forest watching and learning about the starry sky with her date. I won't go into it any more detail than that because I think it's quite important to experience it for yourself, unaware of what's to come.



On his website, Robert Yang, the creator of the mods, claims that they have 'unorthodox gameplay mechanics used to artistic ends'.

Having played Polaris through several times now, I am still undecided as to where exactly the word 'artistic' from that quote fits into the game. And I'm not knocking the developer. I just feel that in this time of burgeoning independent games production, some people are a little too quick to label something differing from the norm as 'artistic'.

Of course, if a game was created with artistic intentions then that, by definition on a base level, makes it art. You can't argue that, you can only say that you don't like it. The problem - in my opinion - with many 'art' games such as this lies with the workmanship that leads to the final product. Does it subscribe to the same elements of influence as already established art-forms? When you look at a painting, the visual aspect of the thing is the only sensual input you receive from it. It's set, never changing, but it can alter your perspective, provoking thoughts or feelings that leave you dazzled by the skill of the piece.

So, with games then, when there are so many facets to their development, why aren't they infinitely more affecting more often?

The answer to that question, I feel, rests with the age of the medium. Because it's such a complex combination of assets, we're witnessing the early stages of its life. We're finding our feet with the staple genres and taking our baby steps through experimentation with looks and sounds and interactivity. Perfecting all three in one glorious software application is not an easy task.

I'll end this tangential ramble swiftly by saying that, although Polaris hasn't deeply affected me, I do believe that this kind of gaming and the thought that is at work behind the creation of such a series is entirely the right direction for the medium to be taking.


If so far I've given the impression that I didn't enjoy the game then I've gone about this article in the wrong way. I really did like it, mainly for its atmosphere and quaintly constructed puzzles. For such a short, restrictive experience there is a tremendous sense of belonging to the world helped along by the finely constructed scene, with an astronomical map spread across the bench and soft guitar music playing from an iPod, it's hard not to feel that you've walked into the early days of an uncomfortable relationship, aided by the writing that accompanies play. Whether or not it happens to be art seems to be of no consequence when you're playing Polaris and neither should it be.

The novelty of playing such a non-violent, reflective game in the Source engine is also a big part of it's appeal. However, the promise of further episodes offering differing stories from other perspectives has me rather excited. Traveling between different people's minds and experiencing a diverse selection of situations, locations and characters really has me wishing for the next instalment as this ambitious series could well become the definitive Quantum Leap of gaming.

You can grab the mod from the Radiator website and while you're there it's interesting to read up on Mr Yang's developer guidelines that form the basis of the series. Oh and you'll need to install Half-Life 2: Episode 2 to be able to run the thing.

Trine: Truly Divine?

Those who believe that platformers have no place in the PC market may want to re-evaluate their opinions now that Trine has arrived on the scene. Highly anticipated for its head-turning prettiness and unique three-way game mechanic, it could easily become the next big indie hit of 2009. Will they ever stop coming?

Finnish developer Frozenbyte have gone out of their way to create an enjoyable and diverse experience with Trine, making use of co-op play as a way to work together in solving puzzles and dispatching trad-fantasy foes.

Well, the main indie checkbox has been ticked anyway - that being the ten-foot-tall box marked PHYSICS. In their own words:

'The gameplay is based on fully interactive physics - each character's different abilities and tactics can be used to invent new ways to overcome obstacles and save the kingdom!'

Having played through the demo I can safely say that this will be no flop. The platforming is smooth and satisfying and the whole thing gels together in such a way that you could be fooled into thinking Frozenbyte have been making games for years. With their only other IP being the Shadowgrounds series it's a good indication that we may have a very talented young development team on our hands.

Anyway, I'll say no more because I'm hoping on a review copy of the game, in which case I'll post a lengthier critique. Until then you can try it or buy it via Steam, as always.

Relocated: Home of the Underdogs

So as not to turn the Dead Pixel into a Jagged Alliance masturbatorium, I figured I'd post something unrelated today.

What with all the job-losses and business liquidations spurred on by the death rattles of our mistreated economy, it's good to hear of a success story close to the hearts of those who like to game.

It's not exactly breaking news, but as one of the gems of the internet - at least from a gamer's perspective - it's great to hear that Home of the Underdogs has returned to the land of the living. No longer does it linger as a snapshot of better times, but has actually been revived and will be updated and cared for from now on just like the old mutt used to be. It will probably take a while to get back up to speed, but it's likely to reclaim its place as your one-stop-shop for retro recommendations, reviews and downloads.

Off you go then.

Jagged Alliance 2: Isometric Masterpiece - First Contact

The team touched down on Arulcan soil at 0700 hours, rappelling from the aged Blackhawk and pounding their feet into the dirt as the air from the chopper's rotor blades rushed about the dilapidated homes that stood all around. Immediately they whipped their weapons from their backs and set to work, scoping for any signs of movement, checking for shadows behind the window panes of the nearest buildings. Any flicker of life could signal imminent death.

The chopper was making a terrific racket above them, but it eventually tilted forward like they do and flew off in a direction that may have been due SSW.

Flinch raised her hand and, in one swift flick of the wrist, made some sort of signal that meant they were all to keep low and take up forward positions by the nearest wall.

Steroid grunted and muttered something derogatory about 'Little Miss GI Jane' under his breath before following through with the orders. He sternly reminded himself that he could be court-marshalled for disobeying his superior officer. Everyone knew that and it was apparently a really bad thing to happen.

All right! Andy McNab, eat your fucking heart out!

Okay, I'll cut that nonsense out now, but it is extremely thrilling to write in such a way and you can't deny that it makes for engaging prose. Admittedly, my entire military knowledge is limited to several war movies and computer games, but I can really see why Tom Clancy and co have spent their entire lives knocking out this sort of shit. Right away I feel infinitely more positive about settling any problems I may have by shooting people in the face.

Indeed, it's put me in the perfect frame of mind to continue. So I will...


In reality, the four of them were standing like lemons at the edge of the entry sector and would have continued to do so if I hadn't told them to hunch down and hug the side of the nearest building. There's no sense of self-awareness or self-preservation with these guys. It's all player-controlled so I could have left them standing there until the sun set or they passed out from exhaustion and they wouldn't have been able to shit without my ordering them to do so.

Note: Shitting is not actually an aspect of gameplay.

It's important to remember that JA2 will always inform you of any enemies inside a sector, but unless you're defending you'll never be sure of exactly how many baddies you're likely to face. It could be two plebs with rusty slingshots or you could be facing a twenty-strong deathsquad. In this case I guessed it would be closer to the former instance - bar the slingshots. The game isn't known for giving the player an easy ride, but I couldn't imagine that I'd be thrown right into the eye of the storm from the off.

THE SHOOTY BIT

First contact came unexpectedly from the same doorway that my mercs were foolishly huddled around. The guy had probably been busy making his lunch when the helicopter appeared and he was now standing stock still in the doorway surrounded by what must have been the most unnerving scene he'd ever witnessed.

Instantly, the game snapped into turn-based-war-bastard mode and I handed all responsibility to Buzz.


It took one shot to the skull at point blank range to take him down. He exhaled as he dropped to the ground. The first kill had been handed to me on a plate. If the rest of them were this easy I'd be laughing.

I instantly sent Buzz up onto the roof and crawled her to the southern edge to scout for more. After another goon was spotted making his way carefully between two other buldings I realised the battle was pretty much over before it had even begun. The enemy were seemingly caught off-guard by our sudden arrival and Buzz appeared to be the most efficient gunwoman in the world. Hence...

and

No one else had a chance to react, not even on my side. The woman took each kill on the first shot from a decent distance. I could have kissed her, but the limitations of virtual reality denied me such actions.

AFTERMATH

A small boy and his mother appeared from one of the houses.

[At this point I'll take liberty in cutting a long story short because I'm aware that this first part of the diary may now be appearing to be more of a gamefaqs walkthrough than recounts of an exciting expedition.]

The woman - Fatima - led me to the rebel base in the neighbouring sector and I chatted to the leader after proving my worth with a signed letter from Enrico outlining my business. I've neglected to mention the basic story details and my reasons for setting out to liberate this nation so, in short, Queen Deidriana is the evil woman in power. She loathes her people and has subjected them to awful conditions after denying Enrico - my employer - the throne. Therefore, she needs to die. It's a simple setup. As Ira puts it:


Oh dear. Ira. I'd forgotten all about her. Aside from that excellent opening statement, everything Ira says and does following this is always irredeemably awful. I hate her - probably more than I should - but let's have a run through her profile to see why:

NAME: Ira STRENGTHS: Shit all as far as I'm concerned. INFO: Ira is of American nationality, presumably from somewhere on the east coast due to the irritating New Yorkian whine of her voice. She came to Arulco as an aid worker and now lingers around like an elephant's fart. The woman is a five-foot-tall bullet magnet. It's incredible, her ability to suck bullets in and throw out only useless moaning in exchange. She endears herself to no-one and shoots like an old lady. A hateful person.

And she is now my guide. I recruited her for free and now she shall lead me to Drassen, my next destination and a town that I've been instructed by the rebel leader to take from the Queen. Righty-ho. I'll take care not to let my despondency rub off on the team.

Next time: I'll cover more ground in less text now that the introductions are over. It's shooting and adventuring from hereon in.

Jagged Alliance 2: Isometric Masterpiece - The Setup

MODDING

The most important thing for me to do before firing up the old girl was to give the game a quick injection of life from the community-made 1.13 patch. This is important because, unless your computer hardware hasn't received an update since the late nineties, you'll be working at a resolution much higher than the game's native 640x480 humongo-pixel res. Of course, graphics aren't everything, but it's nice to make use of an available visual upgrade and the wider perspective means much less scrolling when it comes to commanding troops on the battlefield.



Both the mod and its subsequent update are available from the game's wiki here and if you're having any problems getting it installed it's probably worth popping over to The Bear's Pit Forums - a Jagged Alliance community that is very much alive and kicking - for a bit of friendly advice.

Adjustable resolutions aren't the only improvements with this mod, but the hundreds of actual tweaks and add-ins are far too numerous to summarise here. In short, the AI has been improved, the inventory system has had an overhaul, a bazillion new weapons and items have been added and several experience-altering settings have been changed. Ah, yes. As I found out to my detriment, it's best not to play 1.13 straight out of the box as it were. several significant changes have been made that could result in you getting your arse handed to you and your game ruined very early on, no matter what difficulty setting you play on.

For info on what changes you might like to make, head to the mod folder on your hard-drive and open the .ini file for comprehensive instructions on which setting does what bad thing. For me, because I'd like to use varied tactics rather than put my back to the wall and shoot eighty grunts as they sidle through a doorway, I'm basically reverting to the vanilla style of play, but with the extra variety. Sure, I may get criticised for being ball-less, but at least I'll have fun. After all, this is a story-telling exercise, not a test of nerd-skillz.


LOGGING ON AND SETTING UP

The first thing you'll notice when starting the game proper is that Jagged Alliance 2 uses a mock-up of a laptop as your main control centre. It's an excellent narrative device that solidifies your role as the contractor tasked with organising and overseeing the entire operation. From this screen you're able to search the internet for guns or mercenaries, check your emails and keep track of your financial situation. It also provides a wealth of information on your mission and updates as you explore the game world, displaying tidbits of information about places or people and offering up several plot details that you may not pick up from simply observing cutscenes or having conversations with NPCs in the game. Most of all, it's always a giggle to work on a virtual computer within a virtual world. Even the in-game web pages take long enough to load for you to realise that JA2 was released several years before the word 'broadband' came into common usage.

And so, from this screen, I check through all my emails. There's a list of ones already opened from Enrico Chivaldori - my employer - that outline the proceedings so far, but the one I'm really interested in is the unread mail at the bottom. It's from I.M.P., the Institute for Mercenary Profiling. Using the activation code contained within I'm able to get onto their website and into what most people will recognise as a standard RPG character creator. Before patch 1.13 you were required to endure a ludicrously macho quiz that would supposedly tailor your merc's attributes to the answers you gave, but it was so woefully obtuse that it seems to have been thrown out of the window in favour of common sense by the current mod - thankfully.


From here I'm able to personalize a guy or gal to lead my soon-to-be bunch of hopefuls. Name, face, voice, stats and special skills are mine for the choosing. Anyway, here's what I came up with after a few minutes of tinkering:

NAME: Cassandra "Flinch" Morley STRENGTHS: Shooting, mainly. INFO: I'm not sure why I decided that the nickname 'Flinch' would be appropriate for a hardened killer, but I'd like to think that deep down inside it's due to an aversion that she has to loud noises such as, say, gunfire. Regardless of this possible flaw that I just made up, she certainly has enough strength and agility to lug herself across miles of rough terrain and rather fancies herself in camouflage make-up.

So there she is, my Boadicea, my woman of war. Leader of men and killer of, er... other men. At the moment I'll admit she's lacking in certain areas, but after offing a decent proportion of the military populace of Arulco I'm pretty sure she'll scrub up nicely. Anyway, she'll have the support of her team at hand, which brings me on to the next bit...

MEET THE TEAM

So this is the point at which I consider planning a well-rounded team with which to carry out my courageous liberation of the aforementioned third-world state. My method of accessing such files is the handily bookmarked A.I.M. recruitment website. Within this system is a selection of forty mercenaries that you can pick and choose, depending on ability and price and so on...

Playing the game on experienced skill allows me a starting fund of $35,000. This is about enough to bag me a five-man team of low-to-averagely skilled mercs. Usually I'd make a point of picking a medic, a sharpshooter, an explosives expert, etc., but from experience I know that the initial battles can be long and frustrating if you lack anyone who's able to hit the side of a barn from three feet. Therefore my focus here is on firepower and strength. I spent some extra cash that restricted me to only three more mercs, but I think you'll agree is was worth it:

	NAME: Bobby 'Steroid' Gontalski STRENGTHS: Er, strength. This man could break a crowbar in half with his forehead. He's a decent shooter and mechanic to boot. Also, his excellent one-liners could kill a man dead. INFO: An ex-firefighter, Steroid is used to getting hot and sweaty. He practically channels Arnie through his words, brute force and numb-headedness.
	NAME: Louisa 'Buzz' Garneau STRENGTHS: Buzz is a sharpshooter through and through and her inherent wisdom means she'll be quick to learn in the few areas that she lacks skill. INFO: Not only is Buzz brash and ballsy but she's also a militant feminist. She hates men to a point that makes me worried she won't think twice about backstabbing the two males in the group if they fall out of line. Meh. I'll take that chance.
	NAME: J.P. 'La Malice' Viau STRENGTHS: The ability to offend the entire French nation. INFO: I couldn't not pick La Malice after he's seemingly gained his entire knowledge of the French language from watching re-runs of 'Allo 'Allo!. I'm not entirely sure what his skills are, but my faith lies in the possibility that his absurd racial stereotyping may win the hearts and minds of any foe he encounters. Seriously, he pronounces the word 'oui', 'ooo-aye' . Sold.

NEXT TIME

So, the squad is picked, the scene is set and the game has just begun. Soon enough I'll see how these mercs fare on the battlefield...