Join RF Generation Playcast hosts, Rich (singlebanana), Shawn (GrayGhost81), and long time RF Generation member and front page contributor, Addicted, as they discuss a popular, point-and-click PC title from 2002, Syberia. This month's Playcast travels through Old World, European communities inhabited by humans and marvelous, mechanical, masterpieces called automatons. In this month's podcast, we take an in-depth look at Syberia's fantastic narrative, beautiful, steampunk art style, and its stripped down game mechanics. This title has received praise from point-and-click enthusiasts, but how does it set on the palates of our fine, gaming connoisseurs? Did this game's messages find their way into the hearts and minds of our participants, or are they simply muddled due to other shortcomings? And can the boys ever figure out how to line up a call correctly? The answers to these questions and many more in this month's episode of the RF Generation Playcast!
As always, we are happy to hear your thoughts on this game on our discussion page (linked below). We will respond to your comments and are always happy to discuss the game more. We hope you enjoy our show. Please be sure to rate and write a review of the show on iTunes to help us increase our listenership. Thanks for the listen!
RimWorld is an early access game developed by Ludeon Studios that has been available for purchase since 2013. Updates are steady, if a bit slow at times. It is the winner of multiple Indie Game of the Year awards for 2016, despite being in early access alpha, so there has to be something to this unfinished game, right? While I'm sure most by now have long been turned away from the idea of early access, there are still exceptions where games have plenty of content. Whether or not the content is polished or finished is another question. For Rimworld, each implementation of new features with every major update are actually functional, if a bit buggy for a few days post-release. RimWorld is in many ways easier to digest than Dwarf Fortress, and while Dwarf Fortress' simplistic graphics, archaic UI, high learning curve, and incredible depth are bound to turn off most would be players, RimWorld's simplistic art style at least adds flavor and something to look at.
Join RF Generation Playcast hosts, Rich (singlebanana), Shawn (GrayGhost81), and YouTuber, RF Generation and Cartridge Club member, and co-host of the Retro Fandango podcast, Kevin (BuriedOnMars) as they discuss a big league developer's title that has a very indie look and feel. This month's Playcast ventures into a magnificent, limbo-like world of fantasy where a young lady struggles to get back to the world of the living and save her dying father. In this month's podcast, we take an in-depth look at Ubisoft's Child of Light. This title has received overwhelming praise from reviewers, but is it a meal fit for our finicky co-hosts' palates? What mechanics make the gameplay of this super, compact RPG so distinct? And even though they all scream, does anyone actually get any ice cream? The answers to these questions and many more in this episode of the RF Generation Playcast!
As always, we are happy to hear your thoughts on this game on our discussion page (linked below). We will respond to your comments and are always happy to discuss the game more. We hope you enjoy our show. Please be sure to rate and write a review of the show on iTunes to help us increase our listenership. Thanks for the listen!
Warning: This review contains mild spoilers. I've tried to keep it as vague as possible while discussing things in game, but this article may divulge too much information depending on how much you already know. This is your only warning!
The latest release from Electronic Arts and Bioware is finally here...and they probably should have waited a few more months! Mass Effect: Andromeda had a rocky review cycle, but as we know, some reviewers wouldn't know a good game if it bit them on the face and asked them to collect three parts of an encoded message. However, in this case, the reviewers were right.
Join RF Generation Playcast hosts, Rich (singlebanana), Shawn (GrayGhost81), and former Playcast co-host Steven (Disposed Hero) as they discuss one of the most well-known and genre-defining PC titles of the last 20 years. This month's Playcast crawls deep into the bowels of Hell to seek out and destroy it's formidable caretaker during March's site playthrough discussion of Diablo. One of Blizzard's first entries that helped establish the famed developer, Diablo thrilled fans of action/adventure RPGs during it's time. But, how does this game hold up after 20 years, and will this retro pick impress some of our more modern gaming centric hosts? How do the PC and PS1 versions compare, and which should you play? And does The Butcher still make us s#%t our pants just as he did in days of yore? The answers to these questions and many more in this episode of the RF Generation Playcast!
As always, we are happy to hear your thoughts on this game on our discussion page (linked below). We will respond to your comments and are always happy to discuss the game more. We hope you enjoy our show. Please be sure to rate and write a review of the show on iTunes to help us increase our listenership. Thanks for the listen!
I Have No Mouth and I Must Scream is a point and click adventure horror game. It skips the typical jump scares and gore and goes straight for an unsettling look at human suffering...and machines that rise up to kill us all! It's based on the story by Harlan Ellison and he even voices the misanthropic computer, AM, who is responsible for humanity's downfall and the suffering of the game's protagonists. This is a grim game, but one with excellent writing and characterization.
Back when the Wii U and PlayStation 4 and Xbox One were all announced, I took a serious look at each and decided that I just didn't need a new console. Oh sure each system may have had a few games that would pique my interest, but the bottom line was that as a PC gamer I had become totally happy with the (nearly never-ending) selection of games that were available to me there. Basically the whole idea of 'consoles' had become antiquated to me. It had been almost a decade since I even played games on a TV rather than a monitor. To me, sitting on a couch across the room from the TV wasn't nearly as comfortable as sitting at a desk in front of my (far better) gaming monitor. But something weird happened a few months ago: I bought an Xbox One. And what's even weirder is that it's turned out to be a pretty great addition to my PC.
I love FMV (Full Motion Video) games, even though I understand that most of them are not really good games, as much as interesting relics of gaming's past. However, there are exceptions and Under a Killing Moon is one of them. You play Tex Murphy, a PI modeled after Spade and Marlowe that lives and works in a future vision of San Francisco. In this adventure, you take on a dangerous cult striving for genetic purification. For me, the Tex Murphy games are the pinnacle of FMV adventure with a combination of good writing, decent acting and a good dose of (intentional) humour.
I have never considered myself to be primarily a PC gamer, but there was a time back in the late '90s and early 2000s when I did a considerable amount of gaming on the PC. During this time, I played such revered classics as Half-Life, Max Payne, and Deus Ex, all of which I would consider to be among my all-time favorites. Many excellent games were being released exclusively on PC, and when these titles were later ported to consoles, the results were often lackluster.
One such game from this era that I have always remembered fondly is Mafia. Releasing less than a year after the immensely popular Grand Theft Auto III, it may be easy to dismiss Mafia as a cheap knockoff. While Mafia may resemble the Grand Theft Auto series at first glance, I have always felt that it was the "anti-GTA" game. Although both games share similarities with their open-world environments, crime-based stories, and emphasis on driving and shooting gameplay mechanics, Mafia's more serious and less satirical tone, focus on realism, and larger emphasis on narrative rather than free roaming sandbox gameplay sets it apart from Rockstar's juggernaut.
As a hardcore fan of horror movies, there's something that I feel slightly embarrassed to admit. The truth is that I find many horror games actually scare me. Now you might be correct in telling me that that is exactly the point of those games. But it's still odd to me. It is extremely rare for a movie to scare me. I've even found that jump-scares in film have become less effective on me over time. And yet games that many of you play and have no problem with will often leave me totally stressed out.
So what is it about horror games that make me nervous while a movie may not? I've given that some thought and I think the best I can come up with is the way in which we interact (or don't) with media. Which is to say that watching a movie is a passive experience. Though I certainly may feel tense at times, I never really feel like I'm the one in the movie. But a game is an active experience. I'm the one controlling the character in the game. It's easier to put myself in the terror when my decisions matter. If I were to ever yell "don't go up those stairs!" at a movie, the actor wouldn't care less.
It's October, so it's time for spooky games. Phantasmagoria is a point and click horror adventure game by Sierra. It was controversial due to its depiction of graphic FMV gore and adult themes and became a best seller. But is it any good?
I remember seeing the box art for this game all the time when I was a kid. Though point and click adventure was a staple of my gaming history, I had never played this game before. I've always had a soft spot for FMV as well, though this wasn't quite what I was expecting.
Join RF Generation Playcast hosts, Rich (singlebanana) and Shawn (GrayGhost81), as they discuss the September playthrough of Lego Batman 2: DC Super Heroes. In this episode, we discuss our history with Lego video games, our childhood love of Lego and Batman, the ins and outs of the gameplay, and the differences in the handheld and home console versions. How does this game differ from other games in the Lego franchise? Is this rather cheap title worth your time as a fan/non-fan of in-game collectables? You won't want to miss this episode of the RFG Playcast!
As always, we are happy to hear your thoughts on this games on our discussion page (linked below). We will respond to your comments and are always happy to discuss these games more. We hope you enjoy our show. Please be sure to rate and write a review of the show on iTunes to help us increase our listenership. Thanks for the listen!
In recent years, I've gone from being a console gamer, to a mostly PC gamer, to a totally PC gamer. I could go on and on about why I finally decided to be a PC-only guy, but it doesn't really matter - at least not for this blog post. Instead, I thought we'd explore the many options that PC gamers have in the area of controllers. Truth be told, I probably end up using the mouse and keyboard for the majority of games I play anyway. And yet, I've got controllers scattered around this room everywhere I look.
Now this post can really only be as thorough as my own experience goes. I mean, ultimately the options are nearly limitless. Basically anything with a USB connection is fair game, right? And pretty much any Xbox 360 device is going to be plug-n-play on PC. Not to mention the fact that nearly every classic console controller has some kind of USB adapter you could use. However, for the purposes of this article, I'll just focus on the major controllers just to scratch the surface of the options available.
The Ys name, while notorious for its confusing pronunciation, carries a lot of weight in the JRPG world. Ys has been around since the 8-bit era, and new iterations are still being made today. Most games in the series are critically well-received, and the series as a whole has a large cult following. Despite all of this, I had never played a Ys game until very recently.
My first exposure to the series was the original Ys Books I & II. There are many different versions of the original Ys, sporting many ports and remakes across almost every console, but I played the TurboCD version, which is often considered the definitive release of the game. What I found was a unique "old-school" RPG adventure that I highly enjoyed despite being somewhat primitive and its sometimes awkward combat system. Ever since completing Ys Books I & II, I have wanted to dive into the rest of the series but have been confused about where to start next. Cue Ys: The Oath in Felghana.
Summer is a great time to get outside and play some sports. It's also a good time to stay inside and play some sports video games instead. For the past two years, I've taken the Summer as a queue to take a look at the landscape of sports games available on PC. In fact, I'm now going to call it a tradition around here. As a note, these outlines are not meant to be a thorough list of all sports games released in the year, but rather more of a guide to let you know about the best current options you can play for each sport. I've also intentionally left out the management sims like Out Of The Park Baseball, as those are really their own sort of sub-sub-genre. The 2016 edition of our survey actually has some pretty interesting entries that weren't around last year. But don't get your hopes up... there's still no Madden, and hockey and volleyball games are still nowhere to be found.
