To The Moon

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To The Moon is the most gripping non-game videogame you've never heard of. To The Moon is an Indie title developed by Freebird Games. The game is basically a interactive story and for some reason the developer decided to throw highly unnecessary puzzles on top of it. Without those the game might be no longer considered a game by most, mind you it's still hard to call it a game right now, but that's not necessarily a bad thing. Interactive stories are just fine without tacked on puzzles all over the place. It's not that I think the gameplay is ruining the rest of the game, they just don't really fit and I'm uncertain as to why the developer decided to add them. So by now you might be wondering why I'm even discussing this game, but I actually consider this little non-game the best Indie game of the year and one of the best games of the year in general. To The Moons story is so incredibly good and it tells its story so well, which is even more amazing if you consider it's made in RPG maker, that it doesn't matter that the gameplay is tacked on. The story is heartbreaking and heartwarming and one of the best game stories ever written. I'm not even going into the premise of the story, just GO and buy it, recommend it to everyone including non-gamers and buy a couple extra copies just for the heck of it. It is that good.

Promising Titles: Starfarer and Xenonauts

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Hello again everyone!

Today I'll be doing a double update on another two promising titles. Let's start with Starfarer. Starfarer is a space strategy game with RPG influences. Eventually the game will have an sandbox galaxy in which you can raise a fleet and go on mining operations, trade or fight your way to richdom and fame. The game's graphical style looks quite a lot like SPAZ (Space Pirates and Zombies) which was also a (somewhat) sandboxy space warfare title. While fun, SPAZ doesn't have the in depth fighting mechanics that Starfarer has. There is a alpha version available right now at a discounted price and you'll receive any updates for free. I would've liked the combat to be a bit slower, but that's mostly because I just prefer heavy shootouts with very bulky ships and loads of lasers. The game will have mod support for new weapons, ships and mission so we might even see slower and bulkier ships in the game that way. There is a video below which will explain and show you more.

The second title is Xenonauts which is basically an improved remake of the original X-Com. For any of you that don't know X-Com, it's one of the best turn based strategy games ever made. Xenonauts has been in development for some time now and it was one of the very few games to look forward to as X-Com fan. Especially since 2K announced the new X-Com game to be a FPS (bloody idiots). Only recently Firaxis decided to make a true new X-Com game. I'm not sure if this will hurt the sales of Xenonauts since they are now not the only X-Com game out there and the one made by Firaxis will have a much higher production value. So make sure not to ignore the great work done by the guys behind Xenonauts. Xenonauts also has a alpha version available at a lower price right now. There's also a video below showing you more about the game. Both videos are from TotalBiscuit which is quite possibly the best youtube channel for PC gamers.




Promising Titles: Kenshi

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I hope to make this a recurring feature in which I talk about upcoming titles which I deem promising. Today I'll be taking a look at Kenshi. I won't blame you if you haven't heard from this game, I also won't blame you if the screenshots don't attract you. The thing about promising titles is that they might not look all that great at the time I'm writing these blogs. Kenshi is mostly promising because of the not yet realized concept. Kenshi is all about freedom and a large amount of options. You're not the Dovahkiin, you do not have magical abilities. When you start out you actually have no advantage over your enemies at all. You can start travelling and trading around as a merchant or rob merchants in order to make a good sum of money. Hey, why not do both? Not a fan of trading or robbing? You could become a mercenary, join the army, join a faction, create a faction and more. When you have enough money you might want to buy a house. If that is too small scale for your taste maybe building a fortress is more to your liking? The possibilities aren't endless, but they are pretty damn huge. The game will be quite in depth, already having a medical system in place in which all your limbs can be hurt seperately and will affect your stats. There will be a crafting system in which you'll have to invest in research in order to get to the better gear. There will be factions, dynamic missions, mining, farming, a good amount of combat options, sieges, dialog system and so much more. It doesn't just end with your one character either, you can control groups of soldiers and you'll have to train and equip each one individually. As you might have noticed I've used the word "will" quite often, because most of this just isn't available in the game right now. There is just one man working on this title and he'll need all the help he can get in order to make this work. Be sure to go over to the official site and support Kenshi by buying the alpha version. It's the same setup as Minecraft used, so if you buy it now you'll have it at a lower price, support the developer, receive all the updates for free and be able to play the alpha version right now. That last point is not really interesting though, because the game in its current state doesn't offer all that much content. I'm really looking forward to this title. If it can fulfill on its promises this will be an amazing title. Not only does it go against the current norm of making games less in depth and more lineair, but it is also really upping the ante in the amount of options available. The freedom given in a game like Skyrim is pretty subpar compared to Kenshi. The only game right now that comes close is Mount & Blade (which is an amazing title by the way). So I'm really looking forward to this title. It'll probably take quite long before it's actually finished though.

The Official Site

The Quest

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Ladies (as if) and gentlemen,

Today I must make you aware of a magnificent quest that several thousands have begun to undertake. We want Dark Souls for the PC. Dark Souls is easily one of the best RPG's of this year. I haven't played it, but reading about and wachting gameplay of the game I can safely say it's an amazing game. One that would fit perfectly on PC, yet isn't on PC. Now before you sigh and you press that x on the top right of your screen, yes it's a petition and I know that petitions do not work 99% of the time. I still think every single self respecting PC gamer should sign that petition. Why? Because it shows developers that there is still a large amount of PC gamers. It shows them there is a market and that we want high quality games. Even if it doesn't work for Dark Souls, maybe some other developer will notice. For instance, after the announcement of XCOM the backlash against 2K was huge. Justified in my opinion, when you take one of the best turn based games ever made and completely ruin it by turning it into a shooter you've lost all my respect. Now a developer has decided to act on that and not just any developer, but Firaxis. The guys behind Civilization have decided to make a new and true X-Com game. Applause for Firaxis. If only someone would make a true Fallout and Front Mission game... I'm now ranting in the wrong direction though. Everyone make your way over to THIS site and start signing. You're doing the PC gamer community a huge favor.

The first weeks in a galaxy far, far away...

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Hello everyone,

In this entry I'll be giving you my opinion on The Old Republic. I'm a huge Star Wars fan and I love RPG's, so you'd expect this would be a match made in heaven... and you'd be wrong. I was a huge fan of Knights of the Old Republic and the second part and I probably would've loved part three as well if they hadn't decided to make it a MMO. I still like it, but it's not what I hoped it would be. Pretty much the only thing it has going for it, besides the whole Star Wars theme, is the story. Bioware has put a lot of effort into these storylines with everything being fully voice acted. Herein lies the problem. The stories just aren't all that interesting. The main storylines are all fine and dandy (I'm not that impressed with the Jedi Knights storyline actually, but it's not bad), but the sidequests are still those boring "Gather X of Y" quests which plague all MMO's. A necessary evil perhaps, but in The Old Republic there's just a too large amount of these quests. And while the main story is alright, the story on these sidequests always revolve around "Hey, the empire/republic has attacked. Can you fix this/gather that?" or "Hey, we are about to attack the empire/republic. Can you go do this?". There are some interesting storylines, but I'm afraid there are far too many which aren't. Also, for a guy like me who's more into singleplayer RPG's there's just not all that much this game offers. The PvP is enjoyable, but highly unbalanced. Which is to be expected from a recently released game, but still. The space combat is, well, not all that great. It's fine for a small break every now and then, but I don't see myself playing it often. The storylines are unique for each class, which adds replayability, but all the sidequests are the same for all classes. (Empire does have other quests than republic of course) So the sidequests are boring and you need to level up in order to do the more interesting main story quests. Which basically means that you'll be spending a huge amount of time on doing boring sidequests in order to get to the good stuff. Hell, I've already decided that my second character will only do class quests, flashpoints (which are enjoyable) and PvP in order to level. The rest of my PvP team won't be happy with that, but as long as they don't add level brackets or other ways of leveling I can't really be bothered by what they think. My first character is currently level forty and I've started on my second character because it was just getting so bloody boring to do all those quests and have the experience bar barely rising at all. Basically the only point that makes The Old Republic stick out from the rest is also one of it's downsides. I'm afraid these kind of MMO's are just not my thing. I don't care for doing raids and things like that, so all that leaves me is the leveling process, story and PvP. All of which The Old Republic doesn't do all that well. I think I would enjoy a more open MMO like Eve Online quite a lot, but I just don't have the time to truly play it. Oh well, I'll be playing some more Star Wars in the coming weeks. I just don't think I'll be sticking with it for a huge amount of time.

Introduction

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Hello readers!

I'm mostly making this blog to allow myself to share my opinion about games, write small reviews and just to write down my general gaming experiences. My name is Rau and I'm an eighteen year old gamer from the Netherlands. I mostly do my gaming on the PC, but also occasionally play on Wii, PS2, (3)DS, Android and PSP. I like most genres, with the exception of platformers. I do enjoy some platformers, but I'd much rather play a solid RPG or strategy game. I'll be updating the blog regularly (I hope), but I might sometimes be too busy because of my study. I'm looking forward to your responses on my blogs!