A Random Look at Vlambeer
Vlambeer, a small (two people!) Dutch game studio, released their latest game earlier today. Serious Sam: The Random Encounter is the most recent in Croteam’s series of indie versions of their Serious Sam franchise, and can be had for only five dollars from Steam. Their games have a strong history of being innovative changeups of familiar genres, and The Random Encounter is no exception. Thoughts on this, and their past games, below.
Rage: Explaining the Plot
Well, I finished Rage last night. I liked it overall.
Overall.
Id’s latest effort has been a tricky one for me to get a handle on. So many of its components are absolutely humming with perfection and tightness. Other parts felt like waxen imitations of better games. I can say that Rage is one of the few games I’m going to play through again. Unfortunately, it’s an uneven experience.
I’ll illustrate with a conversation I had with my sister.
RPS Ascension: White Candles (Winter, Year 1)
With peace brokered between Yomi and Marverni, Akenbei’s reign is secure for the time being, allowing him to turn his attention to resolving the war of faith with Nerae of Oceania and expanding south as quickly as his army will march. As winter begins, Nanvather the Demon Priest announces the construction of a temple in Cynaphe, the first temple dedicated to Akenbei outside of the capital. Soon after, Akenbei’s army, led by himself, Raidon the bandit, and Ichiro the prophet, conquers the meager defenders of the wasteland-province of Boggiton.
Winter begins
The Reason for my Rage
I’ve been anticipating id’s new game, Rage, for some time. Now it’s out, and I can’t bring myself to play past the first level. Here’s why:
On the left, half-loaded textures; on the right, even less-loaded ones (click for full resolution)
RPS Ascension: The Autumn Accords (Autumn, Year 1)
After the long summer campaign and successful conquest of Histyra, Akenbei is so swollen with confidence that he returns with his army to Yomi for a month of feasting and reinforcement. While there, his researching sorcerers inform him that they have completed their first forays into the lost science of Alteration — the school of magic concerned with bending the physical world to the will of the caster. Akenbei immediately decides to forget that he ever bothered with the useless Twist Fate spell, and sets to practicing one of the new Alteration spells being passed around Yomi: Personal Luck. This trick grants him immense fortune in combat, making enemy ankles catch in molehills as they charge, and swords slide uselessly off his rough hide.
But while Akenbei is delighting in his new powers, he receives some bad news, both from Rai in the south and the watchposts along the borders of Yomi.
Marverni, a nation of druids and allied tribesmen
RPS Ascension: Relearning Warfare (Summer, Year 1)
Akenbei is an imposing god. He stands fifteen feet tall, is gifted in earth and astral magic, and is a veritable battering ram of a warrior. He has marched north to the modestly wealthy independent state of Talito with a mind to expand his power. His army — more a band of ruffians at this point, but Akenbei reminds himself he is a patient god — is enthusiastic. How much trouble can the defensive forces of such a small state be, anyway?
Akenbei and his glorious army
Unfortunately, Akenbei’s long slumber has left him drowsy in the tactics department.
RPS Ascension: The Awakening (Spring, Year 1)
And so the RPS game of Dominions 3 begins, with the awakening of a pretender long dormant: Akenbei. Akenbei has risen from his long sleep in the fissured netherworld beneath Yomi, where he was laid to rest during the rule of the Pantokrator, the Old God. Long did Yomi-backs bend before that foreign king — and to think, he called Akenbei “pretender”! — but now the jubilant cries of all the creatures and cultists of Yomi have fallen upon ears no longer dumb with slumber. Akenbei has been made to stir, focus lidless eye, and shudder throat and tongue with speech long forgotten.
Antopeos, abandoned by its patron.
RPS Ascension: Setup
So I’m going to be squaring off in dire battle against a few chaps from the forums of Rock, Paper, Shotgun. Our poison of choice is the excellent Dominions 3: The Awakening, a title from 2006 that is even more expensive today in the distant future than it was upon release. I imagine it’s still selling well because it has a tendency to sneak up on people — it’s a firecracker of a game, the kind that surprises you right at the moment you’ve got it all figured out.
You should see it in motion! It looks about the same.
SPACE-BIFF! 