The personal blog/portfolio of Adam M O'Neill.
The sea was choppy and our venue looked worryingly like a modernist fish tank, kept afloat only with the darkest of majiks, but on Thursday evening 150 lucky souls, myself included, embarked upon the Starship Sydney for the Super Mario Galaxy 2 launch party.
I usually don’t bother with weekly release schedules but there are a few releases in here I’m just too excited about not to share.
First we have the SPECACT kit upgrades for Battlefield: Bad Company 2. Available for all four classes either individually or as a bundle they each contain three new camouflaged skins, one each for the Russian (no more red-hatted medics) and American soldiers and a camouflage paint job for the M16A2, UMP-45, MG3 or M95, depending on the class. While the new skins may not be all too exciting, each pack adds four new pins and a new achievement, which is why I’ll be picking them up straight away.
Next up is The Passing for Left 4 Dead 2. The new campaign will see Coach, Ellis, Nick and Rochelle meet up with at least three of the original survivors, plus a forth in the form of a ‘Fallen Survivor’, who will drop usable items for use by the newest crew of fearless zombie killers. In addition the pack will also contain;
Last of all we have The Dishwasher: Dead Samurai. Built using XNA for the 2007 Dream-Build-Play game development contest, the dishwasher is a stylish little beat-em-up featuring cyborgs chainsaws and, of course, the Dishwasher. I’ve been getting into this game a lot lately and although the difficulty curve is steep, the game play, art style and game modes make picking this up for 400
a no-brainer, especially with the sequel, Vampire Smile, releasing some time this summer (probably).
Expect the downloadable release schedule to remain full for a while, between Live’s ‘Summer of Arcade’ promotion and the scramble to get XBLA and PSN games out before the major releases of the holiday period, it’s going to be a good few months for downloadable games.
Check after the break for a full list of releases.
When I created this site my intention was to both give myself a forum in which to vent my frustrations with games, TV, films, technology and other aspects of popular culture and also to get some words out there so that (hopefully) I can pick up some freelance writing work. In both of these aspects I believe I have failed.
Firstly; my posts, at least the few I have written, have all been focused on games, which isn’t terrible, it’s just not what I had in mind, secondly; most of them have been of questionable quality, and thirdly; there have not been enough of them.
To remedy this I’m changing the format of the site, nothing major, just adding a formal structure to my reviews, shifting the focus of the blog to solely videogames, at least until I become comfortable enough with the formal structure, and adding some small news pieces when they are interesting, relevant or I feel I have a unique perspective on the article. Once I feel that I have a handle on both quantity and quality I’ll re-shift the focus of the blog back to the entertainment medium as a whole.
There are maybe five or so people who read this site on a regular basis and I’m extremely lucky to have each and every one of you. Please comment with opinions on the new/reviews or on the quality of the articles themselves.
Piracy, restrictive DRM, casual games, console ports, dwindling sales and other pitfalls currently await players, developers and publishers of AAA PC games. Is it worth $50 to $60 of consumer’s money to buy a game their DSL connection may not allow them to play? Will Ubisoft release future AAA single player titles if the DRM for Assassin’s Creed II is cracked? Will all future AAA PC games just be ports from the console editions?
Well, none of that really matters anyway, as developers and publishers probably don’t want anything to do with you anymore. Why put up with your whining when Facebook users, casual gamers and console owners prove to be so profitable a customer base? Enjoy that copy of Bioshock 2 that you pirated in ‘protest’ of 2K using SecuROM, ‘cause it’s the last single player game you’ll be seeing on the PC.
Here’s what you’ll be getting instead.
Continue reading ‘The future of PC gaming or: “how I spent $500 on a collector’s edition box set”’
Mention the name ‘Dyson’ to the most of men and their minds will immediately turn to the manufacturer of vacuum cleaners and space age looking fans. Mention the name ‘Dyson’ to the average Star Trek fan and they’ll prattle on for hours about the Dyson sphere. But it was mathematician and theoretical physicist Freeman Dyson’s concept of a Dyson tree that inspired Rudolf Kremers and Alex May to create Eufloria (once ‘Dyson Game’ but changed to prevent confusion with the aforementioned manufacturer.)
Wikipedia defines a Dyson tree as;
…a hypothetical genetically-engineered plant, (perhaps resembling a tree) capable of growing in a comet… He (Dyson) suggested that such plants could produce a breathable atmosphere within hollow spaces in the comet (or even within the plants themselves) utilising solar energy and cometary materials, thus providing self-sustaining habitats for humanity in the outer solar system.
A Dyson tree might consist of a few main trunk structures growing out from a comet nucleus, flowering into branches and leaves that intertwine, forming a spherical structure possibly dozens of kilometers across.
Torchlight is definitive proof that good things indeed do come in small packages, and with an installed HDD space of a little over 800MB plus system requirements that make it’s peers look like the line up from ‘Biggest Loser’, Torchlight is one hell of a small package. But don’t let it’s size fool you, like your grandma’s pet chihuahua,Torchlight packs more attitude than one would think possible.
At first glance Torchlight looks remarkably like a Diablo clone, and, being developed by Runic Studios, a team which consists of the creators and designers of Diablo I andII, Fate and Mythos, it’s an easy (and not entirely unfair) comparison to make.
The graphics have improved and the visuals, storyline and enemies are much lighter in tone but this is still very much the game you sank so much time into. Town portals, scrolls, potions and loot drops are all right out of the Diabloplaybook as is the quest structure – which will have you killing Lieutenants and fetching magical items all while progressing further into the mines below the village of Torchlight.
The art style…is the glue to everything. It allows us to embrace what our game actually is and man, when we had that epiphany…we were like, “shit man… this game is about having fun.” – Mikey Neumann
Borderlands, I adore you. You’re Diablo for a generation raised on first person shooters. I want a Claptrap statue. – @therealcliffyb
Welcome to ‘the bear reviews’. My intention in creating this site was not only to have an avenue in which to express my opinions on games, films, gadgets, bars, cafes and whatever else I come across during my daily pursuits – but to use as a supplement in my studies of Communication and Media.
If there is any content on this blog that belongs to you or you believe violates copyright or if you need to contact me regarding submissions or review packages please feel free to contact me.
Email: admin (at) thebearreviews (dot) com
