Tonight's biggie: I'm trying a demo for a game called Space War Commander .  I think I will probably wind up buying this.  This game seems like a streamlined RTS done with simple 2D graphics: by some amazing coincidence, recently I was actually putting on my game-designer hat and pondering the same concept! (Actually, I was inspired by a little joke-game called The Linear RPG , which streamlines the gameplay of a Japanese-style linear RPG to the point where you are walking a stick...

I was just at a Gamestop, and I saw Demigod sitting on the PC games shelf.  I asked a salesman if this was out already, and he said "it seems to be."  Odd. 

Cutting to the chase: my favorite gaming podcast is "Three Moves Ahead".  There's one big reason for that: this is a gaming podcast that actually is about gaming.  On occasion, I do enjoy the informal a-couple-of-friends-together joking-around-and-occasionally-talking-about-games podcasts, but lately I have found I lack the patience for them.  "Three Moves Ahead" talks about gaming, and talks about gaming in depth. This podcast, by the way, is responsible for two recent ga...

A little bit ago, I stumbled across a "game" called The Linear RPG .  I thought this was hilarious: it had the essense of the gameplay for most J-RPG's in the form of guiding a stick-figure person on a line.  I started thinking: how could other game genres be simplified to this form.  The other day, I was chatting with a friend about my thoughts of RTS's.  Here is what I came up with: First, here is my definition of the " Starcraft Model": the game gets super-popula...

As I wrote before, my intention this past weekend was to work on my rented-games-backlog.  Specifically, I wanted to get back to Dead Space .  I had the best of intentions, really.  On Saturday, I made the decision that I wouldn't bother with Demigod : I would concentrate on Dead Space .  I did that.  But, as I was playing Dead Space , I was thinking about Demigod .  It felt dirty to keep on playing Dead Space . I can always go back to Dead Space another ...

Okay, so why am I starting this blog? First, it's free.  Second, I rather like Stardock and Impulse.  I have Galciv 1 & 2 and Sins of a Solar Empire , and I can honestly say that Stardock has yet to have let me down.  Of course, I haven't tried Demigod yet (innocent whistling).  Impulse also works very well.  I especially appreciate the fact that it doesn't need to be running all the time, like Steam (which I also love).  Third, did I mention this ...

Again, I didn't have much time to continue with my Sins of a Solar Empire game last night.  I wasn't expecting much: I assumed I was at the "mop up remaining planets" phase.  Well . . . not quite.  I had one colony's loyalty dropping: I wasn't expecting that.  The pirates are gone and can't launch huge attacks, I was expecting a somewhat more relaxed pace.  Nope: now the other empire has noticed me, and has been pretty regularly launching huge attacks.  I won...

I didn't have much time tonight to really go at it with my current game of Sins of a Solar Empire .  I think I'm now in the mandatory "I have a huge fleet, plenty of planets generating tons of ships, and now I'm going from planet to planet mopping up" phase.  I wiped out the pirates and now I've taken an enemy planet: damn those were some huge and spectacular battles! In many ways, Sins reminds me of Kohan .  Kohan , for example, was the first RTS I remember where you coul...

I don't know what it is about Sins of a Solar Empire .  I dabble in the game, fire up a random map and mess around for a bit.  Then, I save it and say "I'll get back to that game later."  The next time, I start again.  I have yet to have actually finished a game of Sins .  Maybe it's that these random maps take so long.  I'm trying again: let's see if I can make myself push through small random map.  I'm about 2 1/2 hours into it, and I'm now at the point whe...

I've had a few good Demigod matches (by "good", I mean that I didn't suck and my team actually won), but I find myself haunted by a little question . . . was I actually playing multiplayer?  Does anyone out there know if there is an easy way to spot if other players are AI?  Anyway, I've been mucking around with Empire: Total War .  At this point, I have determined that I am playing altogether too many strategy games, and perhaps this would be a good time to go back to FPS's...

I just played a really exciting match of Demigod .  It didn't take long to get in to the 2 vs. 2 match (matchmaking has improved, it would seem), the connection was smooth, my team won, and I actually felt useful . . . in fact, I did really well! I think we need to deal with a little reality with Demigod : once they fix the matchmaking, this game WILL be the Game of the Year.  The gaming world for the rest of the year is suddenly a whole lot less interesting.

In a fit of apparent masochism, I have tried playing Demigod using my laptop's glide-pad.  It actually works, but . . . well . . . why?  Anyway, last night I encountered a bug, and I'm not sure if it is with Demigod or if it is some sort of "gotcha" with the glidepad-and- Demigod combination. Basically, the mouse cursor worked fine for clicking on, say, the Citadel or right-clicking to tell my character where to go.  No problem there.  The problem was that the HUD sto...

I decided to try Battleforge , as the idea sounded intriguing.  I've only played the first two single-player missions, so I don't really know what to think of this game.  So far, I'm seeing some interesting ideas that might or might not work . . . This is basically a combination of a trading card "Magic: The Gathering"-type game and an RTS.  Unlike other games of this sort that I've tried, this isn't a "straight duel".  Once you use a card to, say, summon a monster, the m...

The other day, I purchased a new laptop.  When deciding which-one-do-I-want, I did the "graphics adapter search", going down the shelf to see the cheapest one I could find that had a real graphics adapter.  I wound up buying the Asus G50VT-X5, which has a Dual Core 2 and an Nvidia Geforce card.  (So far, my only problem with this laptop is that when I boot up, it connects to my wireless adapter for "local only": I need to reset the wireless adapter each time in order to get Int...

Okay, I spent a week with Colonization .  Unfortunately, as with Empire: Total War , I have been a bit too busy to really give Colonization a real shake.  Strangely enough, though, this fact bothered me more with Empire: Total War than it did with Colonization .  I can't put my finger on why: perhaps it was Empire 's compounded load times (loading the strategic game, loading the battle screen, back to loading the strategic game); perhaps it was that I didn't feel "right" s...