No, not ‘game idling’, that’s leaving TF2 running on an empty server because you’re desperately trying to get a hat as cool as my heavy’s purple-super-awesome-fuzzy-hat; it’ll never happen, so you should probably stop trying now. 

In the past week I’ve once more returned to ‘Cities: Skylines’, which may not be the most catchy name, but I guess the developers decided against calling it ‘Cities: The Game That SimCity Reboot Should Have Been’. I first tried my hand at this gentle brand of city planning back in 2015 when it made the list of top 5 games I played that year and, despite rarely being touched since the close of that twelve-months, it remained installed on my PC; a worthy achievement as I tend to clear space pretty regularly to make way for new titles. Working on the ‘Field of Dreams’ school of thought the player lays out roads, infrastructure, designated zones, and the population, like ballplayers through a cornfield, arrive to live, work, and shop. It’s a tried and tested formula that, in all the important ways, has remained unchanged since the first SimCity hit consoles and home computers in 1989 (if you can believe that!). ‘Cities: Skylines’ brings back all the important elements and adds a few more for good measure; along with overall budgeting the player can designate districts within their virtual utopia specifying local bylaws and incentives; for example you could designate a district which gives tax breaks to small businesses, or distribute smoke detectors to residents of a specific residential area. Along with this the game allows you to place certain landmark buildings as you reach gameplay milestones which in broad terms bring in more tourism and act as some kind of indicator of ingame progress. Continue reading “Cities Skylines: Idle Gaming”

Spoiler Warning: Whilst I havn’t intentionally included spoilers, this game is best enjoyed going on entirely cold

It was a rare treat last year when, one dreary evening, I discovered and played the freely available short title, ‘The House Abandon‘ by No Code Studio. Every aspect of the game appealed to me from the ‘Spectrum inspired’ loading screen of the ingame hardware to the tension created using only the lightest of touches. I had assumed that it would remain an enchanting ‘one-off’; a short exploration of what might be possible. No Code proved me wrong earlier this year by releasing ‘Stories Untold’, a fully fleshed out four-part drama in which ‘The House Abandon’ features as Act I. I picked it up a little while ago, but decided to save it for a few consecutive evenings where I could put my headphones on, dive into it, and become immersed in this chilling tale without interruption.

My chance finally came last weekend where, over the course of two evenings, I tentatively made my way through ‘Stories Untold’, both captivated and un-nerved. Part of me is tempted to just stop typing here.

If you have an interest in this game then go and play it, the less you know going in the more you will enjoy the experience.

Unfortunately that would be an unsatisfying post to write (or read), so I’m going to cautiously pick through the game and say what I can about it without spoiling the plot.

Continue reading “Stories Untold: Antiquated Hardware”

Even disregarding my own skewed interest in space exploration I think we’re due a resurgence of alien based sci-fi. Where the space race ignited the public’s interest in travel beyond our planet in the 50’s and 60’s, recent remote exploration in Mars and the discovery of exoplanets such as Trappist-1e has been trickling down into the public’s imagination and sparking that interest once again. In contrast to last year’s controversial ‘No Man’s Sky’ which attempted to generate an entire galaxy’s worth of planets, ‘The Signal from Tölva’ focuses on providing the player with an insight into one such imagined exoplanet.

Continue reading “The Signal from Tölva: Sci-Fi Ambience”