PC Gamer - February 2014 USA

7/21/2019 PC Gamer - February 2014 USA

1/100FEBRUARY 2

THE MOST POWERFUL PC WEVE EVER BUILT PG.1

CallofDuty:Gho

sts

AssassinsCree

dIV

XCOM:EnemyW

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Blizzardwagesw

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andLeagu

eofLegendspg

.48

HUGEREVIEWS

IS BACK!

pg. 18

WoW

BioShockInfinite

TombRaider

TotalWar:Rom

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SaintsRowIV


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#249FEBRUARY 2014

PC GAMER (ISSN 108 0-4471) is published 13 times a year, monthly plus Holiday issue following December issue by Future US, Inc., 400 0 Shoreline Court, Suite 40 0, South San Francisco, CA 94080. Phone: (650) 872-1642. Fax (650) 872-2207. Website: www.futureus.com. Periodicals postage paid in

4BO #SVOP $" BOE BU BEEJUJPOBM NBJMJOH PGmDFT /FXTTUBOE EJTUSJCVUJPO JT IBOEMFE CZ 5JNF 8BSOFS 3FUBJM #BTJD TVCTDSJQUJPO SBUFT JTTVFT 64 %JHJUBM 1SJOU $BOBEB %JHJUBM 1SJOU *OUM %JHJUBM 1SJOU $BOBEJBO BOE GPSFJHO PSEFST NVTU CF QSFQBJE 64 GVOETPOMZ $BOBEJBO QSJDF JODMVEFT QPTUBHF BOE (45 3 1." 4VCTDSJQUJPOT EP OPU JODMVEF OFXTTUBOE POMZ TQFDJBMT 1045."45&3 4FOE DIBOHFT PG BEESFTT UP 1$ (BNFS 10 #PY 852, Harlan, IA 51593-1352. Standard Mail Enclosure in the following edition: None. Ride-Along&ODMPTVSF JO UIF GPMMPXJOH FEJUJPOT /POF 3FUVSOT 1JUOFZ #PXFT 10 #PY -POEPO 0/ /$ # $BOBEB 'VUVSF 64 *OD BMTP QVCMJTIFT !(BNFS $SPDIFU 5PEBZ .BD]-JGF .BYJNVN 1$ BOE 5IF 0GmDJBM 9CPY .BHB[JOF &OUJSF DPOUFOUT DPQZSJHIU 'VUVSF 64 *OD "MM SJHIUT SFTFSWFE3FQSPEVDUJPO JO XIPMF PS JO QBSU JT QSPIJCJUFE 'VUVSF 64 *OD JT OPU BGmMJBUFE XJUI UIF DPNQBOJFT PS QSPEVDUT DPWFSFE JO 1$ (BNFS 3FQSPEVDUJPO PO UIF *OUFSOFU PG UIF BSUJDMFT BOE QJDUVSFT JO UIJT NBHB[JOF JT JMMFHBM XJUIPVU UIF QSJPS XSJUUFO DPOTFOU PG 1$ (BNFS 1SPEVDUT OBNFE JO UIF QBHFT PG 1$ (BNFSBSF USBEFNBSLT PG UIFJS SFTQFDUJWF DPNQBOJFT 130%6$&% */ 5) & 6/*5&% 45"5&4 0' ".&3*$" 8F FODPVSBHF ZPV UP SFDZDMF UIJT NBHB[JOF FJUIFS UISPVHI ZPVS VTVBM IPVTFIPME SFDZDMBCMF XBTUFDPMMFDUJPO TFSWJDF PS BU B SFDZDMJOH TJUF

SUBSCRIBER $6450.&3 4&37*$& 1$ (BNFS $VTUPNFS $BSF 10 #PY5852, Harlan, IA 51593-1352 0OMJOF XXXQDHBNFSDPNDVTUPNFSTFSWJDF 1IPOF &NBJM 1$(DVTUTFSW!DETGVMm MMNFOUDPN #"$, *446&4 XXXQDHBNFSDPNTIPQ PS CZ DBMMJOH 3&13*/54Future US, Inc., 4000 Shoreline Court, Suite 400, South San Francisco, CA 94080. Phone: (650) 872-1642. Fax (650) 872-2207. Website: www.futureus.com.

Winners CircleEDITORIALExecutive EditorEvan Lahti

Senior Associate EditorTyler Wilde

Managing EditorCory Banks

Computer Large Pixel Collider

ContributorsMarsh Davies, Tony Ellis, Andy Kelly, Matthew

Gilman, Ben Griffin, Jack Hacket, Cassandra Khaw, Rick Lane,

Emanuel Maiberg, Craig Pearson, Chris Thursten, Phil Savage, Tom

Senior, Tim Stone, Phillipa Warr

ART

Art EditorJohn Strike

Contributors Natalie Jeday, Julian Dace, Andy McGregor,

David Lyttleton

BUSINESS

Vice President, Content & Product

Kelley Corten, [email protected]

Vice President, Sales & Business Development

Nate Hunt, [email protected]

Director Of Partnerships

Isaac Ugay, [email protected]

Associate Sales DirectorStacy Gaines, [email protected]

Senior Sales Manager

Jen Doerger, [email protected]

Regional Sales Managers

Brandon Wong, [email protected]

Tad Perez, [email protected]

Austin Park, [email protected]

Jessica Reinert, [email protected]

Senior Manager Sales Ops & Monetization

Michael Grinde, [email protected]

MARKETING

Vice President, Marketing & Sales Development

Rhoda Bueno

Director, Consumer Marketing Lisa Radler

Newsstand Director Bill Shewey

PRODUCTION

Production Director Michael Hollister

Production Manager Larry Briseno

Project Manager Jennifer Lim

Production Coordinator Jose Urrutia

Production Coordinator Linh Chau-Ward

FUTURE US, INC.

4000 Shoreline Court,Suite 400, South San Francisco, CA 94080, (650) 872-1642

www.futureus.com

President Rachelle Considine

Vice President, Finance & Business Management Lulu Kong

Vice President \ General Manager, Digital Charlie Speight

General Counsel Anne Ortel

Director, Human Resources Eric Buksa

Future Plc

Non Executive Chairman Peter Allen

Chief Executive Mark Wood

SUBSCRIPTIONS

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Picking our favorite games of the year is a mixture of Skype, math, and

warfare. It begins as a lot of our projects do: as a collaborative Google

Doc. Every member of the global PC Gamerteam submits a list of their

five favorite games, which we then tally and redistribute as a ranked list.

This ranking doesnt determine the winnersits merely

a guide to what we liked most that we use to inform

the yelling, pleading, and threats that follow.

This year we wanted to call attention to the games

we collectively loved. Instead of trying to fill every genrecategory like Best RPG, we worked backwardsby

choosing the games we loved the most and finding an

award to match. There wasnt an MMO or a racing

game we were passionate about in 2013, for example,

so we decided not to shoehorn those genres in. Our

hope is that this method gives you a firm sense of the games we adored

most in 2013, and of what we value as critics of PC gamesopenness,

moddability, fidelity, story-driven experiences, innovation, and more.

Be sure you meet the newest member of the

PC Gamerteam this monththe Large PixelCollider, a gaming rig of uncomfortable power.

Go read about why we built this monstrosity on

p. 12, and then shake hands with our own

personal demigod atpcgamer.com/lpc.

BRINGING YOU THE SCOOPS THIS MONTH...

Tyler Wilde@tyler_wildeReviewed both Call of Duty: GhostsandXCOM: Enemy Withinfor thisissue. He is a champion, and sleepy.

Cory Banks@demiurgeMade a cameo in TylersXCOMreview as a cold, unfeeling robot.Thats how he is in the office, too.

Chris Thursten@cthurstenCame back from BlizzCon withnew info on WoWand Heroes ofthe Storm, but forgot souvenirs.

Future US, Inc. is part of Future plc Future

produces high-quality multimedia products whichreach our audiences online, on mobile and in print.

'VUVSF BUUSBDUT PWFS NJMMJPOT DPOTVNFST UP JUTCSBOET FWFSZ NPOUI BDSPTT mWF DPSF TFDUPST

5FDIOPMPHZ &OUFSUBJONFOU .VTJD $SFBUJWF BOESports & Auto. We export and license ourpublications.

Future plc is a public company

RVPUFE PO UIF -POEPO 4UPDL&YDIBOHF TZNCPM '653www.futureplc.com

Chief executive Mark Wood

Non-executive chairman Peter Allen

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5FM -POEPO5FM #BUI

EVAN LAHTIEXECUTIVE [email protected]: @elahti

4 FEBRUARY 2014


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7/100FEBRUARY 2014 7

18WOW: WARLORDSOF DRAENORBlizzard is going back in time to Warcrafts orcs-

and-humans rootswill it secure WoWs future?

64XCOM: ENEMY WITHINMechs, gene mods, and terroristsinvade one of our favorite strategy games of last

yearfind out why the expansion is essential

48HEROES OFTHE STORMA new name marks Blizzards entrance into the

no-holds-barred MOBA ring

8SENDYourletters,our responses

12NEWS

Introducing theLarge Pixel Collider, acomputer of uncomfortable power

14PCFTWThree Monkeyschallenges your ears

16THE SPYClues about Mass Effect 4, and is Telltalemaking aGame of Thronesgame?

MONITOR

36Games of the Year What a great yearfor PC games! Relive all its highlights as wediscuss and honor 2013s finest

48Heroes of the StormHow Blizzard istaking on Dota 2and League of Legends

FEATURES

52

Assassins Creed IV: Black Flag58State of Decay

60Call of Duty: Ghosts

64XCOM: Enemy Within

68Deadly Premonition

70 Redshirt

74 Ace Patrol: Pacific Skies

74 Contrast

76BioShock Infinite: Burial at Sea

REVIEWS

#249FEBRUARY 2014

18 WoW: Warlords of Draenor

22SOMA

24Diablo III: Reaper of Souls

26Gorogoa

28Frozen Endzone

30Crypt of the Necrodancer

32Jazzpunk

34Dropsy

PREVIEWS

91BUYERS GUIDEPick the right motherboardfor your next PC

92GROUP TESTSeven Haswell motherboards reviewed96THE RIGA special high-end rig, built to be a beast.

The Hard Stuff

78NOW PLAYING

Cory is more Batmanthan well ever be, Evantakes his place atop the Nuclear Throne

82TOP 10 DOWNLOADSWalk a dark but brilliant Path of Shadows,and go back in time to Blizzards first game

86UPDATEHowGuild Wars 2sbi-weekly updates keepit alive, and dauntingly time-consuming

EXTRA LIFE

THE

GAME

OF THEYEAR

AWARDS

2013

36

91MOTHERBOARDSLearn what to look for and find the bestcircuits for your budget as we test and review

seven Haswell motherboards


8/1008 FEBRUARY 2014

EMAIL

[email protected]

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@PCGamer

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FORUM

pcgamer.com/forum

WRITE

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SPK UR MND

THE HOT MAIL

Jurassic sharkIn his preview of The ElderScrolls Online, T.J. Hafer statesthat a particular clandestinemission made him feel likeplaying a high-stakes pokergame against a pack ofvelociraptors. What is going onin the world today? I knew that

Powerful things: velociraptors, the Large Pixel Collider, and 64-player war

these deadly dinosaurs cancoordinate attacks on perilousprey, utilize advanced huntingstrategies to flank fearless foes,and even use their capable clawsto open doors, but now theycan also play card games forcommercial gain? Do NOT goto Vegas, folks. It isnt safe.Daniel Hendrix

Youve hit on something a lot ofreaders miss: all our metaphors

are based on real events. T.J.won the velociraptor poker game(how else would he be here towriteTESOpreviews?) with a

full house, aces high. After aseries of expressive snorts, hisopponent removed his sunglasses

and quietly conceded defeat.Velociraptors are surprisingly

good sports, and the rate ofmissing persons reports in Vegashas only gone up slightly.

PCG

Qwerty queryDo you think that the Qwertykeyboard we all know and love(not that Dvorak nonsense) willbe left in the dust for a standardcontroller (compatible with theOculus Rift), especially withValves upcoming Steam box?Zach Howe

Nope. The QWERTY keyboardand mouse may not have beendesigned for gaming, but theywork and we like them. ValvesSteam Controller might be a

good mouse replacement, but

even then we dont seetraditional desktop gaminggoing away. Weve even usedmouse and keyboard with theOculus Rift and had no

problemsyouve surelymemorized your favoritekeyboards layout by now, sotheres no need to look down.

Maybe one day a new inputdevice will send our old weaponsto the scrap heap, but its notlikely to be soon. For better or

for worse, PC gamers are asgood at innovating as they are

at clinging to the past.PCG

Battlefield bluesWhat would be better,Battlefield becoming an annualfranchise or sticking with itsexpensive DLC scheme whereyou pay for two games to getone...just with more maps?Tommy Fink

Battlefield 4plus the Premiummembershipto get all the map

packscosts $110, which is justa little less than buying two $60games. Its a lot of money to

Q Have thePC Gamerpodcasts beencanceled?GarrisonAbsolutely not! Ourpodcast room wasbriefly inhabitedby poker-playingvelociraptors, but werepretty sure theyve

been cleared out andwere going right backto regular weeklypodcasts. Were onlyslightly concernedabout the noises in thevents. They sound alittle like ebony clawstwiddling a pair of pokerchips, but its probablyjust the buildingsettling.

Q Is it wrong that Imsexually attractedto the Large PixelCollider? [See p. 12]grumpytrooper

No, but its not righteither. Its somewherein between, in astrange purgatory fullof thoughts whichare simultaneouslyapprpriate andinapporpriate, and onlymanifest as one or theother when observedby a wizard. Find thewizard, grumpytrooper.Or just watch moreultra high-res gameplayfootage and learn toaccept your feelings.

QUbisoft is on a

redemption path withme after playingAC4.James AlexanderWe like Assassins CreedIV: Black Flagtoo, asyou can read all aboutin our review. The shortversion is Hey, neat, Ima pirate! I have a ship!

Q Horror gamesbasically exist only onPC these days.Ron BaslerUnless you count actiongames with scarymonster faces andgurgling sounds, you

may be right about that.

Early AccessI just finished an Early

Access review ofGodus

by Marsh Davies. While I

agree with everything he says and

appreciate him warning others not to

buy in right now, I cant help but feel

that a different format might make this

whole Early Access thing easier for

reviewers, creators, and consumers.

I propose that you make fourcolumns of bullet points. Good, Bad,

Promises, Progress. Good and Bad are

pretty clear, but Promises should tell a

reader where the game is supposed to

be heading and (hopefully) address

some of the Bad. Progress should

include frequency of major updates

and bug fixes at a bare minimum, and

could include development highlights

so far. Pay particular attention to the

Promises category and see which items

are met or on their way to completion.

I think this format would be more

helpful than gameplay impressions

when it comes to Early Access. For

alphas I know the game is going to

be busted. Whats important to my

investment dollar is that the developer

is working on the Final Product that

attracted me to the game in the first

place. Investing early and being a part

of the game by giving feedback that is

actually taken to heart is the real joyof Early Access.Dave Tooley

Thanks for your thoughtfulsuggestion, Dave! Were glad thisconversation is happening. We stilllike our current system because itoffers critique of something youcant get without a purchasethe

game itselfwhereas promises arethe devs word, and progress isvisible in update notes.PCG

Primal Carnageis whathappens when you cheat.

Will the owl eat the mouse?


9/100FEBRUARY 2014 9

David SheaCurrently playing:Gunpoint

SPK UR MNDYOURE PLAYING

spend, especially if you bought induring the unfortunately poorlaunch. But at least youre notpaying for a second campaignyou dont wantyoure just

getting maps, vehicles, andweapons, and a lot of them. Soif those are our only two options,well stick with the DLC.PCG

How do companies like EA getaway with launching games asbuggy as Battlefield 4? Im barelyplaying the game I boughtbecause of the constant crashesand it feels like they never haveto learn a lesson. ShouldntSimCityhave been a clue?Marty B.

I cant stop playingTom Francis gloriousgumshoe game,

Gunpoint. While smacking doors intounsuspecting light-switch happyguards is rewarding in ways I neverknew before, I think this is the firstgame I can recall that has made meguffaw out loud thanks to itspitch-perfect humor.

With beautiful pixel-visuals thatfit the seedy urban nightscapesperfectly, gameplay mechanicsthat defy logic on purpose for the

sake of having actual fun, andSteam Achievements that now setthe bar for clever titles, this is an indiepuzzle game that begs you to enjoy itin the playstyle you choose, whetherthat is Clancy-stealth or Ramborun-n-gun (or door).

Add to it an original music score rifewith jazz that would make a 90ssmoke-filled nightclub proud, andyou have a bargain-priced game thatfeels everything but cheap. Gunpointis so enjoyable it could only be better

if it came sandwiched inside a bottleof cheap bourbon.

Like a target thats a foot awayfrom the unflinching barrel of aDetective Special, it should notbe missed.

At leastBattlefield 4doesnt crashas often as we crash helicopters.

An illustration of Tom Francis escapefrom thePC GamerUK office.

I just discovered this amazinggold add-on that automates themost powerful gold makingstrategies in WoW. So far itsmade me a fortune and I

suggest you check it outimmediately.Cash F. Surveys

Were talking aboutBF4in thissection, Mr. Surveys. Come on,get with it. Also, are you a timetraveler? If so, please returnwith some Jolt soda. We cantfind it anywhere.PCG

Whats your favoriteBattlefield 4map? Wondering which Ishould get to know first.William James

Tyler likes Rogue Transmissionfor the interesting toilet bowleffect the satellite dish creates:not only is it a literal bowlshape, troops seem to swirlaround it on their way to thehighly-contested central point.(Heh heh, troops in a toiletbowl.) Evan prefers not to makesuch immature jokes, and likesZavod 311 for the multi-tieredbuildings and extendedstalemates. Also, Tyler is nowbanned from answering letters.PCG

Q Wow,BF4has aone headshot kill bug?

Rising Stormhas thatsame problemitscalled REALISM!Will their next bug befree DLC?

John GibsonRealism doesnt equateto better, and hasnt everbeen what Battlefieldisabouttheres nothingwrong with Kevlarheads! Though in thecase of your RisingStormexample...well,we shouldnt spoil therest of this issue. A freeDLC bug would certainlybe welcome, though.

Q Some players arereporting issues is theunderstatement of theyear when it comes to

Battlefield 4.Hector SanchezWere sure some

players are alsoyelling about issues,or possibly typing veryloudly and waking uptheir loved ones aboutthem. We do love

mechanical keyboards,but they make writingstealthy rage emailsterribly difficult.

Q Just wondering,how much did theLarge Pixel Collidercost overall?

Ellis KenyoWhen you add it all up,it actually only comesout to three mortal

souls and a case ofbeer. (Please do notlook for the interns.We never had any.)

Theyre selling products peoplewant badly enough to sufferlaunch frustrationsagain andagainso the lesson theyrelearning isnt the one we want.

But as long as they can sellconsumers on being a part ofthe launch excitement and thebig conversationeven if thatconversation is all complainingabout bugs and crashesthereslittle incentive to lose money bydelaying games for extra testing.We regularly advise readers towait before buying a game, butsometimes even we dont likewaiting. Its fun to be there atthe launch of a big game, andEA continues to bank on that.PCG

JOIN US

Fight alongside uson thePC Gamercommunity servers

Counter-Strike: GO

8.6.75.144Battlefield 38.6.74.43:25330

Minecraft184.164.131.181:25566

Rising Storm66.55.158.174

Our game serversare provided byGameServers, PCGsstaff-approvedhosting service. Visitgameservers.com


10/100


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12/10012 FEBRUARY 2014

Meet the LargePixel Collider

Tremble, mortals, asPC Gamerbuilds a gaming rig of obscene, ungodly power

THE TOP STORY

Standing tall and monolithic, theLarge Pixel Collider is ourmighty demigod of a gamingPC, handling 4K resolution withease. Under the hood we have

fourNvidia GTX Titans on a quad-SLIsetup. Thats 24GB of GDDR5 muscle,so we can runArma 3on max settings at4096x2160, or Battlefield 4 at 7680x1440.Yes, really. Those are numbers that exist.

If that wasnt enough, we have eightsticks of Corsair Dominator PlatinumRAM, totaling 64GB, running at

other games with every graphics settingmaxed; massive screenshots of BF4;hilarious experiments withL4D2andother moddable games to see how many

zombies we can pour into a map withoutbreaking our CPU. Youll see all of thisas it happens on lpc.pcgamer.com, wherewell also be charting the progress of theLPC build itself, swapping, tuning, andupgrading whenever we can.Well also be bringing the LPC to

trade shows like PAX so you can try ityourself or take a photo beside it likesome sort of mall Santa Claus that canrun Crysis 3on two 4K monitors. Thefuture is here, and itsludicrous. It even hasits own Twitter account: @pixelcollider.Evan Lahti

2400MHz, and a custom cooling loopfrom Digital Storm that could cool thesun. Holding this all together is an AsusRampage IV Extreme boardone of thefew able to handle all those Titans, aswell as supporting Intel Turbo Boost forour 3.6GHz Core i7-4960X (which wethen overclock).

But what good is $10,000 worth ofhardware if we keep it to ourselves? Ourgrand scheme with the LPC is to do useit to make insane content: high-resolutionvideo ofArma 3, modded Skyrim, and


13/100FEBRUARY 2014 13

Faildogs

Winners

FREE RANGERUNDEAD NEW TOLKIEN GAME SET

BETWEEN HOBBIT AND RINGS

Monolith says that Middle-Earth: Shadow ofMordor, its new open-world Lord of the Rings

prequel in which you play as a ranger brought backfrom the dead who embarks on a quest for revenge,will ensure that the settings, characters,

and story align authentically withincanonbut some Tolkien fansdisagree. Being undead doesntfit the mythos, says Ambaryernoon fan site The One Ring. Theresnothing in the lore to support aman being brought back from thedead. The release date is still TBD.www.shadowofmordor.com. AK

MINECRAFT MOVIEWATCH MINECRAFTDOCUMENTARY

NOW FREE ON YOUTUBE

After a successful Kickstarter earning$60,000 more than they asked for, 2 Player

Productions put together this charming,fascinating documentary about the rise ofMinecraftand its creator, Notchandnow you can watch free on YouTube. Itfollows Mojang as it prepares to takeMinecraftout of beta. Theres even acameo by erstwhilePC Gamer editor TimEdwards. See it atwww.tinyurl.com/

minedoc.AK

Cyan WorldsMystcreator raises $1.5 million for its follow-up,

Obduction, on pretty much just promises.

ThiefEidos Montreal removes all quick time eventsfrom its forthcoming reboot after fan outrage.

SteamSteam celebrates 10 years of being excellent by

reaching 65 million users, eclipsing Xbox Live.

HEALTH BARCHECKING THE GAMES BIZS PULSE

InSomniaDieselpunk tactical RPGs Kickstarter is canceled

due to no one understanding what it actually is.

Deadly PremonitionShoddy PC port of cult hit, with locked resolution

and no controller support.

Next-gen consolesStruggling to output games at 1080p, which PCs

have been doing foryears. Catch up.

30kraised26k 4GTX Titans

Its said that the LPC can healchildren and small animals.

Weve rammed 64GB of 2400MHzmemory into the beast.

Opening up the Aventum II caseso you can see the sexy guts.

Blizzard fans


14/100

TALES OF GAMINGS GLORY

FORTHEWIN

Philippa Warrhearswhat she wants tohear. On an unrelatednote, why was ThreeMonkeysconstantlyoffering her a cup of

coffee and anavocado bagel?

PC GAMER MONKEYSAn office-based audio RPG

The game is set in a world cursedinto darkness by an evil witch.

The aim of the game is not to scare players bytaking visuals away, it is to empower theplayer and show them what you can do justusing your ears.

Robert Allen is explaining the drivingphilosophy behind Three Monkeys, an audio-only gamedesigned to sidestep the association between lack of sight

and the horror genre.The game is set in thecursed land of Byzantiawhere a White Witch hasextinguished the sun. Youplay as Tobar, a blindcharacter who must lift thecurse, assisted by foul-mouthed sprite, Yoska. Shesits on your shoulder offeringassistance, but the teambehind the game is keen tostress she is accompanyingrather than directing you.

See no evilThree Monkeysgrew out ofAllens and composer Stephen Willeys shared interest ingame audio. The pair researched the subject while incollege and were curious to explore how it could be usedas the driving force of a game. They started small, butgradually their project expanded into a decent-sizedadventure RPG. Incus Games, a collective of peoplealready working in the games and audio industries, wasformed to support and develop Three Monkeysfurther.

Before we even started building anything, the teamdiscussed the project for about 18 months, says Allen.

The development process ended up needing to beexperimental as none of the team had worked on a projectwithout visual information before.

The main challenge is creating an environment theplayer feels comfortable in, he says. The team uses 3Dsound recording and processing to immerse the player.The goal is creating an interesting and dynamic game

world that never overwhelms or disorients.For sighted players, justrelying on your ears can bequite daunting, so makingsure that there is instructionand familiarity in the audio isanother key aspect. Our aimis that once the player hasbeen with the game for a littlewhile, they will feel confidentin their listening ability andbe able to navigate aroundthe maps with as littleguidance as possible.

Composer Kevin Satizabalhas been consulting on ThreeMonkeys. Being visually

impaired himself, he has a lot of helpful advice and ideaswhen it comes to accessibility, says Allen. It has beengreat having him on board to ensure that the game sitsnicely within the audio-only game genre while stillstanding out as a large and ambitious new project.

All the work thus far has been done in the developersown time but Incus is now looking into crowd and privatefunding options. If all goes well, youll be able to hearThree Monkeyson PC and Mac by the end of 2014.Philippa Warr

Just relying on yourears can be quite a

daunting prospect.THREE MONKEYSis an experimental audio-only RPGdesigned to be played by blind and sighted gamers alike

The sound of a lot of metal

avalanching to the ground.

Someone is trying to find

something on Tylers desk and has upset

the collection of Diet Coke cans he leaves

behind to ward thieves and pirates.

A machine whirrs into life, hissing,

spitting and dribbling. Someone

is using the office coffee machine.

Clearly they are new and do not realize

thatno oneuses the office coffee

machine. At least not more than once.

The word echo echoes through

a hallway. And again. Echo!

Capture echo! You capture

points to win! Mechanical keys clack

violently. Evan is playing Battlefield 4.

Footsteps can be heard. The

footsteps echo like emptiness of a

spreadsheet cell. Cory has come

to check on your deadline. You draw your

sword and turn toward the sound...

14 FEBRUARY 2014


15/100

COPYRIGHT@2014 THERMALTAKE GROUP ALL RIGHT RESERVED

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16/100

he Spy understands that dreamsdont always come true. Some do, ofcourseusually the dreams that are

beamed into The Spys head byenemy operatives. What other explanation is there forthe events of Operation: Ive Forgotten My Pants orthe time The Spy hijacked a nuclear submarine becausehe was sure he had an exam the next morning? Dreamsabotage. Its a real thing.

In any event, no game series has the power to shatterthe collective dreams of millions of fervent fans quitelikeMass Effectdoes at the moment. However you feltabout the ending, the trilogy doesnt need a sequelbut itll get one, because nothing motivates creativityquite like a bag of money. Which isnt to say that thefourthMass Effectgame will be bad, necessarily. Its justthat it will be surprising if it isnt.BioWare has to prove that the entire

enterprise isnt pointless before they doanything else, and that isnt traditionally aposition of strength. See, er, every otherbusiness-mandated sequel ever made.

Details are starting to emerge. Rumorhas it that substantial clues about thegames setting leaked out during privatesessions at PAX. Revealed were two newtypes of aliena skeletal race withglowing eyes and a frilly neck, plus spacegolems that look a bit like Reapersaswell as beautiful hi-def shots of Asari, Salarians,Humans, and Krogan running in Frostbite. Thatsuggests that its not going to be set during a previousgalactic cyclealthough that was always unlikely,because BioWarell want to have humans in it.

According to the rumors, BioWare led by asking thequestion, What does N7 mean to us? This isprimarily interesting as an example of branding atwork. N7 was the designation of the class of specialforces soldiers that Shepard belonged to, and over thecourse of the series it went from being a minor detailto a huge part of the games iconographyparticularlywhen it came to multiplayer. If Electronic Arts andBioWare are unwilling to lose it as a symbol, that

suggests that Shepard will still have a role to play. TheSpy is calling it:Mass Effect 4will be set after theevents of the trilogy, and Shepards legend will berepresented by N7 logos plastered everywhere. Expectgalaxy-spanning retcons to make sense of it all.

Theres also talk of explorable planets, land vehicles,and recreating a sense of strangeness, however, sotheres still hope. The Spy wants to believe. But thenhe also wants to know where his pants are, and youcant always get what you want.

According to internet detective Superannuation, EACanada is gearing up to produce an open-world actiongame set in the Star Wars universe. Now, theres every

chance that this is being timed to tie-in with the new,J.J. Abrams-helmed movies. In that event, its got aboutas much chance of being good as third-party tie-inStar Wars games ever had. But think for a moment:what other studio does EA own in Canada? A studiothat is currently turning its RPG properties into open-world games? A studio that has made a Star Warsgame before, and rather successfully? Thats right.S-foils in hype position:Knights of the Old Republic 3! Isprobably not going to happen.

Its probably a movie tie-in.Of course, theres precedent for tie-in games working

out well. Just ask Telltaleit made a Walking Deadgame that is a better adaptation of the comic than theTV show is. If rumor has it right, Telltale is currentlyat work on a game adaptation of Game of Thrones. Lastyears disappointingGame of Thronesgamedemonstrated that the series needs a careful touch towork in an interactive format, but Telltale could be a

fantastic fit. Imagine! A quick-time event where you

hammer Q and E to honorably decapitate desertersfrom the Nights Watch. A puzzle where you USEdirewolf puppy ON Joffrey! Pick any line ofCersei dialogue you want, as long as its thinly-veiled threat! Theres a lot of potential here, iswhat The Spy is saying.

Perhaps thats where your hopes and dreamsshould reside: not in some enormo-publishingcorporation but in a creator of adventure gameswith a proven talent for turning books and TVshows into interactive entertainment. Werewitnessing Telltales rise and this is the time toget excited. See you in a few years, when itannounces the fourth Walking Deadsequel, andwe can talk about what happens next. Spy out.

The Spy

S-foils in hypeposition:Knights ofthe Old Republic 3!

TThe Spydreams ofelectric sheep.Little known fact:sheep dream ofelectric spies.

BUT WHO WATCHES THE SPY?


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PLAYED IT The MMO juggernaut rolls on, without changing direction

WORLD OF WARCRAFT

WARLORDS OF DRAENOR

World of Warcraftis nine yearsold. If you want to take amoment to let that sink in,thats perfectly under-

standable. It has remained the biggestsubscription-based MMO in the worldthroughout that period: itsstillhuge, evenif the prevailing narrative surrounding it isof an empire in gradual decline. 7.6 millionplayers doesnt really feel like decline: morelike erosion, in the sense that a mountainerodes.

Warlords of Draenor is the first of a newkind of expansion for World of Warcraft. Itsleaner, in some senses, than the expansionsthat have come before. It adds a newcontinentthe orc homeworld of

Draenor, pre-destructionand newfeatures, plus tweaksto raids, the UI, andthe game engine, butno new classes orraces. On the surface,it appears moreconsidered andmodest than Cataclysm

orWrath of the Lich Kingand, inreturning the focus to the orcs, its less of atonal departure thanMists of Pandaria.

Blizzard is gearing up production onWorld of Warcraftwith a view to putting outboxed expansions every yearrather thanevery 18 months-ish as it was before. Ittalks about having plans for the WoWexpansion after this one, and the one afterthat, and the one after that: a salvo of

erosion-slaying magic bullets loaded in arevolver, with Warlords of Draenorsittingready in the first chamber.

At least, thats howWarcraftboss ChrisMetzen put it, announcing the expansionat Blizzcon. I asked WoWproducer JohnLagrave about it laterhow possible is it,in reality, to plan for the needs of a gamingcommunity that far in advance?

Let me continue the analogy, he says.

First we have to build the bulletandwere building a bullet for a gun we dontknow the caliber of yet, so theres a lot ofgive and take. We have a plan for Warlordsof Draenorthats in the chamber. For thenext expansion, were in talks about it. Wefocus, initially, on the story were going totell. Once weve got that, we try to figureout a sentence or two about what the vibeis. Whats going to be engaging? Whatsgoing to be fun? What is interesting aboutit?

Warlords of Draenoris intended torecapture the feel of orcs-and-humans-eraWarcraft, and to reintroduce the charactersand conflicts that fans have followed fordecades but that recent WoWacolytesmight have missed among the pandawarriors and world-consuming dragons.Its a time-travel story, and the Draenor itfeatures is one that has been referenced butnever actually presented in a Warcraftgame. Its the same place as The BurningCrusades Outland, but this isnt aCataclysm-style overhaul: its a fullalternative take on the planet with entirelynew zones to explore.

READ ME

DEVELOPER

Blizzard

PUBLISHER

Blizzard

LINK

www.battle.net

First we have to build

the bulleta bullet for agun we dont know thecaliber of yet.

RELEASE

2014

The discovery of camouflage ruinedthe glowing mace industry forever.

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As players, our dimension-skippingadventure will be prompted by the escapeof rogue horde warchief GarroshHellscream following his arrest at theconclusion of the Siege of Orgrimmarupdate. Chasing his dream of an all-orchorde to a new extreme, he binds himselfto a mysterious time-traveling ally andjourneys to Draenor before the orcsbecame corrupted and invaded Azeroth.There, he stops the orcs from drinkingdemonic blood and, in its place, gives themloads of technology from the future andsets about building his own portal to

Azeroth. So give a little, take a little, then.Both factions have an interest in stopping

Garroshs Iron Horde, and that leadsthem to Draenor. An initial suicidemission tutorial experience will take theAlliance and the Horde to TanaanJungleformerly Hellfire Peninsula. Afterthat, the Alliance will help defend aDraenei temple in Shadowmoon Valley, atemperate zone of rolling hills trapped inperpetual night. The Horde head toFrostfire Ridgeroughly where theBlades Edge Mountains will eventuallybeto help the Frostwolf Clan defeatsome local ogres.

The ogre empire is in decline.Youre slightly to blame.

Orc architectureorchitecture,if you willhasnt changed.

The Frostwolf Clan in this case is led byThralls dad, Durotan, and the sequence Iplayed through involved helping both ofthem lay siege to an ogre fortressatwhich point, throughPandaria-stylephasing, it transitioned into being theHorde base of operations on Draenor.Blizzard has had a lot of experiencebending and twisting the WoWengine intonew shapes, and its work here displays thesame inventiveness and attention to detailthat marked out the best bits of Wrath of the

Lich King. Post-conquest, the player isasked to free some orc scouts from anearby ogre village. The path takes youback out of the ogre fortress, pushingthrough a crowd of Warcraft-style peonscarrying stones and lumber back up thehill. Its a nice little nod to the past, and itmade me smile.

Youll have to take the long way around,by the way: flying mounts are disabled in

Draenor until some point post-launch.The journey to the new level cap of 100will be made on foot.

In addition to seven new PvE zones,Warlords of Draenorwill add sevendungeonsthree at max levelas well astwo raids with sixteen bosses betweenthem. Blizzard is also taking a pass atUpper Blackrock Spire as part of itsprogram of classic dungeon reboots, andtherell be a new set of world bosses, too.There will also be a full PvP zone onDraenor, called Ashran. Its intended torecapture the old days of World of Warcraft

battlegroundsthe skirmishes overAlterac Valley that took days to resolve.Combatants will be drawn in frommultiple servers using the cross-realmtechnology also used to fill out parties inthe dungeon finder.The current structure ofWoWPvP is

being revised. Blizzard regards the currentsystem as too deterministic, leading playerstoward fixed rewards through a longgrindit wants to shake it up, and itsapproaching the problem from multipleangles. PvP matches will now grantrandom rewards on completion, frombind-on-equip items to rare PvP

Draenorwill add

seven PvE zones andseven new dungeonsthree at max level.

Its intendedto recapture

the feel of orcs-and-humans

eraWarcraft.

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equipment and bonus Honor. The idea isto surprise players with rewards theywerent expecting, to lead people towardupgrade paths they might not haveconsidered by adding a degree of chance.

The other approach to freshening Playervs. Player is the exact opposite.Warlords ofDraenorwill introduce Trials of theGladiator, new arena events where playersuse standard, balanced gear, creating acompetition about skill.

On the PvE side, raid sizes are beingreworkedagainto create a moreaccessible experience. Raids will be

available in Raid Finder, Normal, andHeroic difficulties for any number ofplayers between 10 and 25, theirencounters scaling on the fly to match thegroup size. If someone drops out, youwont need to wait for a replacement. Thebest rewards, however, will be available toguilds who crack raid encounters onMythic difficulty, which will bebalanced forand require20 players. Itseems like a smart compromise betweenthe needs of the hardcore set and weekendwarriors who just want a chance to seedungeons theyd previously been lockedout of.

Blizzard walks a thin line between givingits community what it wants and telling itwhat it needsbut the team seems to walkit confidently, at least in Warlords ofDraenors case.

We want you to stay engaged in thegame and not become dispassionate aboutit, says John Lagrave. We have our owninternal testing sessions, and Ill tell youthe session for our Blizzcon build wasbrutal. Were very critical, and theres lotsof things that we will be doing and

changing from our own criticismpluswhat we get from the community. Its aconstant process.

Some of the biggest cheers I heard atBlizzcon were for Warlords of Draenorfeatures that seem innocuous from theoutside. WoWs inventory is being updated,so that youll be able to easily set filters foryour bags and sort them quickly.Collectible items such as heirlooms, toys,

and tabards are becoming part of thecollections systemas opposed to takingup bank spaceand quest items will nolonger go into your inventory at all. Youllbe able to craft using materials that are inyour bank,Guild Wars 2-style. Thesequality-of-life improvements will likelyshave off millions of hours busywork acrossthe breadth of WoWs audience.

No one feature received an outpouringof approval quite like the update tocharacter models, however. Vanilla WoWsoriginal races are all getting upgraded withmore detailed models, high-res textures,

and new animations that include facialexpressions for emotes. Blizzard isrecording new voice work, too, so expect tohear a bunch of new variations on ungh!and I cant cast that now! The BurningCrusaderaces are set to be updated shortlyafter this expansion.

World of Warcraftis also, at long last,getting a form of player housing. Youll beable to create and manage a garrison onDraenor that works a little bit like a base inthe original strategy games. Youll pickfrom plots of land, and build and upgradestructures that provide game-widebenefits. You might build crafting

VanillaWoWs

original races are allgetting upgradedmodels and textures.

The Draenei will have a large roleto play in the expansion, too.

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buildings that give you limited access toprofessions that you dont otherwise have,or buffs that you take with you into thewider world.

Garrisons will also act as the basis for anew kind of daily quest. Through yourtowns inn youll build up a party of NPCadventurers who can be sent on adventuresthat take hours of real time to complete.Theyll have their own traits and levelingpaths, and sending the right people on theright jobs will yield rewards such asexclusive items, mounts, and randomizedchests. Its a substantial extension of the

Tillers farm system fromMists of Pandaria,with much further-reaching implicationsfor your daily life within the gameandfor your free time. Its also equivalent toPet Battling, in that its an addition to anexpansion that looks a bit like a non-sequitur on the surface, but which willprobably end up being the most strikinglynew-feeling addition for players who havehad almost a decade to get used to thegame its attached to.Your garrison will be a part of the open

world, separated from those of otherplayers usingagainseamless phasing. Ifyou want to invite a friend over, thatll be

Some parts of Draenor will bemore familiar than others.

...even purple foreststrapped in eternal darkness.

Player-built garrisons canbe set up anywhere...

possible, but its unclear at this stagewhether or not itll be possible to discoverother peoples towns or followers in a moreinformal manner.

Every purchase of Warlords of Draenorwill, additionally, give you an account-bound token that lets you boost anycharacter you like to level 90. Its a measurethat Blizzard is taking to give new orreturning players a chance to skip straightto the new stuff, but its likely to be possiblewith veterans too. Havent finished a full

set of max-level alts yet? You just got onefor free. These insta-90s will start with a setof equipment and some level-appropriateconsumables.

I imagine that some dedicated playerswill feel their investment has beencheapened by letting total newbies skipnine years worth of content, but its apragmatic move by Blizzard and theres agood chance itll be the last little push

required by those of us who are at anypoint only a few clicks from resubscribing.Blizzard makes changes like this from aposition of authority: World of Warcraftisstill the game to beat, and even when a newcontender improves on this or that system,its like can be replicated within WoWandimproved uponin no time at all. Thisexpansion modernizes the game across theboard without a doubt.

Warlords of Draenorstrikes me as anattempt to level the playing field inanticipation of the future. Its varied,certainly, but safe in the sense that it in no

way reaches deep into the crust of the gameto find something new. Even its narrativemoves backward rather than forward tofind something fresh to present to fans. Atits most radical, the expansion rethinkssystems like raiding without ultimatelychanging the purpose theyve alwaysserved. Lapsed players and dedicated fansalike might have expected something alittle more dramatic, this long into thegames lifebut then again, perhaps its nota surprise. Blizzard is still sitting at the topof the mountain, and its got no reason toshake the foundations.Chris Thursten

You can build a party

of NPCs to send onadventures that takehours to complete.

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22 FEBRUARY 2014

FIRST LOOK Probing the robo-brain of Frictionals follow-up to AmnesiaSOMA

Swedish indie studio FrictionalGames has been making horrorgames on the PC for six years, soit knows what makes us tick, and

its newest game,Soma, will exploit that.It is, naturally, a first-person horror

adventure, but the foggy, turn-of-the-century Lovecraftian setting of the studios

previous games,PenumbraandAmnesia,has given way to a dark, hard-edgedscience fiction straight from the prescientpages of Philip K. Dick and Isaac Asimov.Like those writersand all the best

sci-fiSomawill askimportant questionsabout existence,consciousness, and themost effective way tohide from scarymonsters in the dark.

When a game takesplace in the past orsome fantasy world,

youre not personally connected. It takesplace in a reality separate from the oneyou inhabit, says Frictional Gamesco-founder Thomas Grip. But when youdeal with a futuristic setting, its a aboutthings to come. This makes it easier forplayers to accept the scenarios theyre put

into, and its harder to outright dismissthings. So even if there are some fantasticelements to the story, it becomes muchmore rooted in reality.

Set in a stricken research facility calledPATHOS-2,Somapits you against strangemachines who are beginning to becomeself-aware and take on human traits.Youll go on a journey that asks deep

philosophical questions about the self andfree will. When immersed in a game likethis, the boundary between yourself andthe protagonist gets slightly blurredsomething well take advantage of. This,combined with the ominous horroratmosphere, will make the game reallycreepy and disturbing.

LikeAmnesiabefore it,Somawontfeature any direct combat. Youll be able todie, and there are enemies, but youll haveto evade rather than attack them. Thedifference is that, unlikeAmnesias flappy-mouthed monsters,Somas mechanical foeswill behave unpredictably. This is to createa constant sense of uncertainty, so younever feel comfortable.

InAmnesiawe had a global sanitysystem that lasted throughout the game.Somawill have something similar, but on amore local basis, says Grip. For example,therell be creatures that mess with yourhead in various ways, but this will only

READ ME

DEVELOPER

Frictional Games

PUBLISHER

Frictional Games

LINK

www.somagame.com

It pits you againststrange machineswho are beginning to

become self-aware.

The key to goodhorror is that as much

as possible happens inthe players head.

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happen in the areas theyre present in. Wenever really want you to figure out theunderlying systems, though, to keep theexperience feeling fresh.

Storytelling is important too, andFrictional has learned a lot sincePenumbrawith regards to player agency. Youllactively take part in every importantmoment, experiencing all the plots majormoments first-hand. You should be doing

things instead of being toldthings. Wewant you to say I did this or I did that,and not just describe what happened incutscenes, says Grip.

Well have things like audio logs too,but what I think sets us apart from mostother games is that we go to great lengthsto make sure that everything is consistent.So if the player listens to a log or reads anote, they should be able to ponder why itwas placed there. You can pull a lot ofnarrative from the game simply byconsidering the physical placement of thiskind of story material.

Whether its voices from the creatures

RELEASE 2015

The research facility containsstrange alien constructions.

Afraid of the dark?You should be

you encounter, posters or objects scatteredin the environment, we go to great lengthsto make sure that everything makes sense.You will be able to think of our world as anactual place, and not be constantlydistracted by elements that remind you itsjust a game.

Frictional has only shown us a fewtantalizing glimpses of the game. So far

weve seen a corpse being reanimated bythe protagonist sticking a macabremachine into a hole where their brain usedto be, and a bizarre environment that lookspart organic, part mechanicallikesomething out of an H.R. Giger book. Ithas a very different ambience to thegloomy halls of Brennenburg Castle, but itstill feels like anAmnesiagame.

Youll actively takepartyou should bedoingthings insteadof being toldthings.

The basic controls are the same. Youcan pick objects up, physically interactwith doors. Anyone who has played anyof our previous games should feel right athome, says Grip.

I finish by asking him what makes a greathorror game. The key to good horror isthat as much as possible happens in theplayers head. If you encounter a dark holewith some mysterious sounds coming from

it, we want you to use your imagination toanticipate what may lie ahead. We wantyou to act as if whats in your imagination isreal, and to let this guide the experience asmuch as possible.Somais asking some very big questions,

and it remains to be seen how well a first-person horror game can tackle themes likethis. Expectations are high, based onFrictionals back catalog. A heavy focus onstory over traditional game mechanics is astep in the right direction, and the idea ofmachines thinking theyre human iswonderfully evocative.Andy Kelly

FEBRUARY 2014 23


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.

PLAYED IT Adventure Mode brings variety and peril back to Blizzards RPG

DIABLO III

REAPER OF SOULS

Diablo IIIs randomly-generatedspecial monsters were myfavorite thing about the game.They also made me want to

break my keyboard over my knee fromtime to time. They are regular monsterswith a series of traits attached and, basedon the type of monster and collection oftraits, youre looking at anything from aroadblock to a serious source of terror.Want to make a dedicated dungeon-crawler shudder? Just look them in the

eye and whisper, Lacuni Huntressfrozen, fast, fire chains.

Reaper of Souls Adventure Mode is a top-to-bottom rethink of Diablo III that takesthe principle of randomization and runs

with it. Everywaypoint in the gameis available from thestart, and theres noplot to play through.Instead, youre givenBounty missionsclear this dungeon,complete that hiddenevent, hunt this boss

monsterand then sent out into the wildto complete them.

We shouldnt take everything from thepast, says Diablo III designer KevinMartens, discussing the way AdventureMode breaks away from the seriestraditionally linear campaign. Sometimestraditions should be broken.

Completing Bounties earns you access toanother break from tradition: Nephilim

Rifts, special portals that you activate intown to access entirely randomizeddungeons. Every environment, enemy, andboss in the game is a possibility, with fewlimitations on the resulting combinations.

I got tired of the way Diablo IIIs endgamemeant running the same few acts over andover, and smashing through NephilimRifts is a great alternative. They vary inlength from a few minutes to a much more

substantial adventure, and encounteringenemies in new environments makes themfeel new all over again. In a Diablo IIIpost-Auction House, Adventure Mode is thereto get players out of the loot grind.

At one point Im tiptoeing along as thenew Crusader class when I come acrossone of the Rift-exclusive features:randomized buff shrines. Unlike therelatively tame shrines from the surface,these dramatically change the way youplay. Suddenly I find myself with all of

my ability costs and cooldowns reduced tozeroa previously cautious dungeon runbecame an all-out dash to kill as manythings as possible before my ability to spamHeavens Fury ran out.

That experience of venturing into theunknown will get me playing Diablo IIIagain. Blizzard hasnt just shaken off seriestradition: its made a major attempt toshake off the problems Diablo IIIintroduced. The best expansions dontjust add more, Martens says. They dobetter with what they already have. I hopethat were doing both.Chris Thursten

READ ME

DEVELOPER

Blizzard

PUBLISHER

Blizzard

LINK

www.battle.net

Its a top-to-bottom

rethink that takes theidea of randomizationand runs with it.

RELEASE 2014

The new playable Crusader class wears heavyarmor and has a wide range of weapons.

There are new quests, newmonsters, and loads of loot.

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FIRST LOOK A new kind of adventure game

GOROGOA

Alittle boy is standing next to astreet sign, looking dejected.The source of his sadness isobvious: the sign shows an

archway leading to a lush garden, but thewall next to the boy is blank.

Im playingGorogoa, an illustrationpuzzler (sound the new-genre klaxon!)built around seeing connections betweendifferent pieces of Jason Robertsbeautifully drawn game world.

When I click on the sign, it expands tofill one of four game tiles. You can nowseparate the sign from the archway anddrag it onto a blank tile. Zooming outfrom the now-empty sign, youre backwith the dejected boy. You drop thearchway onto the plain wall and he perksup, scampering through into the garden.

The idea began a long time ago assomething more like an interactive comicstrip, whose panels could move around andinteract with one another, Roberts tellsme. I was also mulling over strangevariations on card and tile games.Somehow all of that slowly boiled downinto the design you see now.

The demo ofGorogoaI played involves

collecting colored apples in response tothe sighting of an ornate dragon. I askwhether this is a snippet of the final story.Its certainly more than a proof ofconcept, says Roberts. Most of what

you see in the demois intended to be inthe final game, butsome details havechanged and a lot hasbeen added.

However, he isreluctant to talk aboutspecific plot elementsjust yet. There are

many scenes and narrative signpostsinfact, whole dimensions to the storythatare absent from the demo. But even whenits all in place, it should take until the endof the game before the structure reallyreveals itself.

Ive played through the Gorogoademoa number of times. The first foray wasmarked by an appreciation of the tileinteractions and the artworkillustrationfans may note traces of ChristopherManson and Arnold Lobel in the scenesbut the story was less apparent.

This is because, while progression isrelatively linear, its occasionally unclearhow you should move forward. With only

four tiles to play around on, you cant gettoo lost, but the occasional pang offrustration disturbs the games flow.Pleasure is greatest in a seamlessplaythrough and so I began almost

speedrunning the demo once Id learnedthe sequences.

The sensation, I felt, is closest to beinga child and listening to an adult read youyour favorite book, whose contents youhave memorized. Misclicks cause the sametension as mispronunciations or missedpages. Its a peculiar but ultimatelycharming experience.

Roberts is now working with composerAustin Wintory (who also worked onJourney) and sound designer EduardoOrtiz Frau, and aims to release GorogoaonPC and Mac in mid-2014.

Philippa Warr

READ ME

DEVELOPER

Jason Roberts

PUBLISHER

Self-published

LINK

www.gorogoa.com

Meticulous and beautiful, Gorogoais a different type of puzzler.

Its closest to beinga child and listeningto an adult read youyour favorite book.

RELEASEMID-2014... And each window also playsas its own separate game.

Each tile is a window into another

part of the game world...

Tiles can be selected, moved, and evenlayered on top of one another.

The whimsical hand drawnart style is a delight.

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28/100

PLAYED IT At last! Play-by-email robotic football

FROZEN ENDZONE

How refreshing to play a sportsgame thats not aboutpersonalities.Frozen Endzoneisfootball from the far future, a

chrome and neon world where robotschase eggs in randomized levels. It trimseverything down to a few decisive tossesand last-second swerves, more likea highlights package than anythingresembling the Superbowl. There are nobinders of tactics, no field goals, and nohuddles. This is notIron Madden.

If youve playedFrozen Synapse, youllrecognize bits of Mode 7s brilliant tacticalcombat game; here, the team dropped theemergent violence to make a turn-basedsport. If both players are online it plays out

almost in real-time,or you can play it byemail, waiting for thattelltale ping fromGmail to tell youwhen a pass has beencompleted. You arethe guiding handthat turns the staticcollection of

emotionless, non-steroidal husks into aswarming machine of football. Each playercontrols a quintet of bots, with oneattacking and the other defending the endzone. Each robots position is determinedby a series of waypoints that you drag out,so youre basically making live notes ofyour plans right on the pitch.

Its a slighter version of SynapsesPlanning mode, and is used to steer the

players around each other in a deadlydance of robo-sports, with randomlyplaced walls causing further trouble.There are two types of walls: squat wallsblock your path but not the ball, and tallwalls block both. The random positioningof theseand the robotssparks offstrategies in whatever bit of your brain isused to contemplate procedurallygenerated turn-based sports.

Its the rules thatll get you. On the firstturn the attacking side grabs the ball, whichspawns a few feet away from one of therobots. With it in your possession, you havea choice: if you move at all with the ball,youve committed to it being in that playershands for the entirety of the match: theyhaveto be the one to score. Its a rule Iveforgotten several times, which means Iveset plans in motion that just crumble anddie. Flagging the robots current state moreclearly would fix this, and would come in

handy given the potential to be playingmultiple games at once. You can even havemultiple games of different modes (thedefault Endzone is classic NFL; the othersare Handball, where the rules arentenforced, and One Play where theres onlyone round) against the same opponent.

If you throw the ball, play becomes a lotmore open. Most of my tactical planningsettles around fake-out strategies, sendingthe ball off in one direction whilemaneuvering into odd positions to keepthings off-kilter. A few key changes ofdirection in each move are enough tocause some confusion in the opposition.

Each player controls

a quintet of bots, withone attacking and theother defending.

READ ME

DEVELOPER

Mode 7

PUBLISHER

In-house

LINK

www.frozenendzone.com

Mid-zone win! A cheapbut hollow victory.

Static opponents willblock moving players.

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The robots will automatically take care ofcatching, intercepting and blockingyoullmostly fuss over their movement, tryingto trim steps off a run, or trying tosqueeze into space. If a moving robotmeets a stationary opponent, the opponentwill block, and two moving opponents willpass each other.

Its not as minutely malleable asFrozenSynapse, and so is less of a story generator.Ive had a few games, and aside from aclever shimmy that left me free to runhome, or a scoring toss that traveled thelength of the map, there hasnt been a huge

number of moments that Ive celebrated,nor have there been awful mistakes thatIve wanted to share. In Endzone mode,when the ball is caught or a runner isintercepted with it, its game over. It justclamps down with indecent haste. It can gothat way if you score in the mid zone aswell: get a player with the ball into one ofthe large, glowing squares in the middle ofthe map, and theyll end the match at areduced score. Losing in Synapsewas anevent because the myriad ways it could gowrong made it fun, andEndzonecould dowith something to make losing spectacular.But when it goes well its still satisfying,

If the opposition gets between a throwerand a catcher, the ball is intercepted.

Not many NFL players need toworry about chassis rot.

You can see how your tacticswill play out before committing.

particularly if youve gamed it a littleyoucan boost your score by drifting throughmarked tiles on the ground with the ball,collecting points that could turn a series inyour favor. Its not a huge tactical triumphbut it is a vital part of the game, and if youjust focus on the end zone theres always achance youll lose on points.

Theres some tuning to be done here:like most sports, its the winners who havethe most to talk about. But this is the beta,and theres still a full year of tweaking

before the final release, so theres room forfeedback to shape the game. Mode 7promise that therell be variable stats(blocking, speed, catch radius), customleagues, and the ability to customize thelook, feel, logos and animations of players.I think they need to work on the end game,and turning everything up to 11, but thefoundation seems strong.Craig Pearson

Its not as minutely

malleable asFrozenSynapse, and so is lessof a story generator.

RELEASEDECEMBER 2014

The map is randomizedfor every game.

Uh oh! Hes activatedrobo-twerk mode.

FEBRUARY 2014 29


30/100

PLAYED IT Indie roguelike turns dungeon into dancefloor

CRYPT OF THE

NECRODANCER

Feed me two beers and youve gota very good chance of hearing a20-minute diatribe about how themajority of games would be

better if they were musicals. Music isalready used extensively to let the playerknow what they should be feeling:combine it with game mechanics and theprinciples of performance can be used tolet the player know what they should bedoingas well. I also really like musicals.

Crypt of the NecroDanceris a 2D dungeon-

crawling roguelike starring Cadence, ayoung woman who has her heart stolen(in the surgical sense) by a monstrouslich called the NecroDancer. You mustnegotiate a series of randomly-generated

dungeon levels toretrieve it, all the whilemoving to the rhythmof her detached butstill-beating heart.

Its essentially aturn-based game, inthe sense that timeonly advances whenyou take a step, and

combat is a matter of positioning yourselfso that you move into an enemys tile whenthey are moving away from you. Thedifference is that moving on the beat buildsup your gold multiplier, so you grow inpower much more quickly by effectivelydancing through the dungeon. As yourcombo multiplier kicks in, the dungeonfloor turns into a neon dancefloor andmelees turn into massive dance numbers.

This encourages you to make decisionsquickly, to respond instinctively ratherthan tactically to each monster-filled room.Boss battles with dragons and minotaursbecome quick-fire dance-offs that rewardyour ability to think on your feet. Yourealso equipped with an upgradable shovelthat lets you dig tunnels, allowing you tomanipulate enemy movement and uncoversecret areas.

The games soundtrack is by Danny dBSoundworks Baranowsky, whose workincludes Canabalt, Super Meat BoyandBinding of Isaac. Of those, his work onNecroDancerreminds me most of SuperMeat Boya very good thingbut with astronger emphasis on danceable beats. Itsfantastic stuff. A particular boss encountertakes place over roiling digital bass thatbursts out into synth-heavy metal, whileanother draws influences from samba.Elsewhere youll encounter house, electro,

and disco. You even have the option ofimporting your own musica relativelyconvoluted process, but the devs promise amore streamlined system for the gamesrelease next year. Playing the game tofaster or slower music is a way for playersto customize the difficulty on the fly, anovel idea for a roguelike.

NecroDanceris an unassuming-lookinggame thats worth keeping an eye on. Itunderstands the role music plays in makinggames exciting, and offers a novel take onthe rhythm-action formula. Also, its prettymuch a musical. Whats not to like?Chris Thursten

READ ME

DEVELOPERBrace Yourself

Games

PUBLISHERBrace Yourself

Games

LINKwww.necrodancer.

com

All those hours you spent playingDance Dance Revolutionfinally pay offyou can play with aDDRdance pad.

You must negotiate

a series of dungeonlevels while movingto the rhythm.

RELEASEEARLY 2014

Ugh, the dance floor isfull of slimeballs tonight.

Time to stick on some speedcore.

30 FEBRUARY 2014


31/100

2013 NVIDIA Corporation. NVIDIA, the NVIDIA logo, GeForce, and GTX are trademarks or registered trademarks of NVIDIACorporation. All Rights Reserved. All other trademarks and copyrights are the property of their respective owners.

This is extreme gaming The Way Its Meant to be Played.

Up your game at GeForce.com

Designed for the most demanding gamer, the GTX 780 Ti offers a pure gaming

experience. Lightning-fast, with smooth, whisper-quiet, cool performance, GTX 780 Ti

is the ideal choice to take on your favorite titles in true next-gen gaming.

EFORCE

TXTM

780 Ti

THE BEST PC GAMINGGRAPHICS CARD ON

THE PLANET


32/100

PLAYED IT A Cold War cyberpunk spy adventure, with robots and frogs

JAZZPUNK

This first-person adventure crosses60s spy movies with cyberpunk,and its a funny game. Not thekind that elicits a wry smirk or

the odd snort, but one that made meactually, properly laugh. Its humor isstraight out of an Abrahams and Zuckerfilm. ThinkAirplane!or The Naked Gun: arapid-fire parade of sight gags and puns.

Its vivid, colorful world is incrediblydetailed, with jokes and interaction hiddenin every corner. One minute youre in a

cinema blowing cigar smoke into peoplesfaces, the next youre helping a frogwhois inexplicably a hackercross the road inhomage to Atari classicFrogger. In anotherscene, you cover an arachnophobic chef in

spiders to access hiskitchen. Its a mix ofminigames, arcadeparodies, and littlevignettes that serve nopurpose other than tomake you laugh.

The atmosphere issupremely weird. Themusic, composed by

developer Luis Hernandez using vintagetape machines and homemade synths,mixes jazz and electronica with samples ofchirpy 50s music. Characters speak witheerie, distorted voices that sound parthuman, part machine. Its hard to tell. Andthe story is abstract and vague. It recallsBlendo Games Thirty Flights of Loving, butwith more defined elements like simplepuzzles and sidequests.

Youre probably still confused. I dontblame you.Jazzpunkis a game that defiesdescription, but in the best possible way.The build I played had two levels: a Sovietembassy surrounded by conspicuous ColdWar-style spies in brown macs and trilbies,and a series of neon-lit streets straight outof Blade Runner. Each one has a primaryobjectivefor example, stealing top secretdata from the embassywith plentiful

distractions. You can breeze through alevel if you go straight for the objective,but the dense, gag-packed environmentsreward exploration.

Im not sure if theres a runningnarrative here, or if each level is its ownself-contained story. Between missionsyoure given a briefing by your boss, whofalls asleep afterward, leaving you to pop apill that makes you black out, then themission starts. Objective text appears inthe world itself, similar to recent Splinter

Cellgames. Sometimes you walk into theletters and they smash and crumble into apile. There are so many clever littletouches, moments, and details that Icouldnt stop grinning as I played.

I cant wait to see more of this. Its one ofthose games that reminds you why this issuch an exciting hobby. It showed methings Ive never seen before, in a game orotherwise, and it had me hooting like anidiot. The self-conscious weirdness wontappeal to everyone, and its notchallenging, but give it a chance, and youllfind it hard to resist its charms.

Andy Kelly

READ ME

DEVELOPER

Necrophone Games

PUBLISHER

Necrophone Games

LINKwwwnecrophone

games.com/jazzpunk

It is one of those

games that remindsyou why this is suchan exciting hobby.

RELEASEEARLY 2014

I didnt realize I couldread Russian.

The game is filled withreferences and in-jokes.

Objectives are quick and simple to finish,but thats not the point. Take your time.

32 FEBRUARY 2014


33/100


34/100

FIRST LOOK A deeply weird, and weirdly deep, open-world adventure game

DROPSY

Dropsy is a mute, terrifying clownwith no hands, but creator JayTholen, an experimental artistand musician, wants us to fall in

love with him. Loving the unlovable isone of the games most prominentthemes, he says. Instead of reacting tothe worlds apprehension and fear of himwith hatred, Dropsy responds with aseemingly naive, childlike love. When heencounters the bitter or hateful, he seesthem as hurting and in need of a friend. No

one is disposable.After a fatal fire at Dropsys circus, he

becomes an outcast, living in thestitched-up remains of the tent with hisfather and dog. The game follows him as

he tries to discover thetruth behind the blaze,during which we piecetogether his past. Aswell as exploring thismystery-filled openworld, we also delveinto the bizarre other-world of Dropsyssubconscious.

Classic LucasArts adventures are a clearinfluence, but Tholen says his take on thegenre will be more about exploration andstory than those notoriously convolutedrubber chicken with a lever in it puzzles.The challenge lies in exploring andunderstanding the game world more fully.After obtaining clues throughenvironmental details, NPC interaction,and simple puzzles, the players perspective

of the world shifts; a system that lends itselfto a series of rewarding eureka moments.

This marriage of the traditional withthe abstract and exploratory is just one ofthe many ways in which Dropsyis awonderfully unconventional game.Tholens influences only add to the surrealquality. The idea of a small town withsecrets, and the dreamlike elements ofDropsy,are heavily inspired by Twin Peaks.

Im also influenced by crazy, theatricalprogressive rock from the 1970s.

Dropsyis an odd game, but its alsosurprisingly accessible. A picture-baseddialog system designed by Tholen ensuresanyone can play it regardless of language.Characters communicate using icons.The player may not always understandthem, which is entirely intentional. Youllmake assumptions based on your ownpersonal interpretation of the symbols,which incorporates the fact thatDropsy

cant speak into the gameplay.What at first glance looks like an

homage to LucasArts heydey is in fact oneof the most fascinating and curious indiegames Ive encountered in some time. Itsdark and sinister, but has an incrediblypositive, inspiring message. Its alsoambitious, its freeform structure at oddswith its adventure roots. Ill be interestedto see how it all comes together, but mostlyI just want to learn more about its unlikelyhero. I know it sounds kinda depressing,says Tholen, but trust me: its probablythe happiest game youll ever play.

Andy Kelly

READ ME

DEVELOPER

Jay Tholen

PUBLISHER

Self-published

LINK

www.jaytholen.net

Im also influenced

by crazy, theatricalprogressive rockfrom the 1970s .

RELEASE2014

Subtle clues lead you around theworld, rather than explicit objectives.

The visual dialog system inaction. Whats this bird saying?

Exploring Dropsys subconscious isas weird as you might expect.

34 FEBRUARY 2014


35/100


36/100

THE

GAMEOF THE

YEARAWARDS2013

36 FEBRUARY 2014


37/100

Its been a wonderful year for the PCjoin usas we celebrate the greatest games of 2013

eve gone back to thedrawing board for this

years Game of the Yearawards. With theexception of the grandprize itself, all of our awardcategories have been

rethought to ensure were celebrating all thegames we really cared about this year. Eachof our judges nominated up to five games,and from that long list we chose nine that we

feel are deserving of an official accolade fromPC Gamer. The result is a dynamic cross-

section of PC gaming in 2013 that rangesfrom triple-A blockbusters to indie, hardcoresimulation, browser games, mods, eSports,and more. A further eight games have beenchosen as our Personal Picks, which youcan find out more about below.

Congratulations to the winners, and wehope you enjoy this new take on our end-of-year awards. Its a testament to the health ofPC gaming as a hobby that weve been ableto assemble a list this diverse, and were very

much looking forward to what the year aheadbrings. See you in 2014!

Andy Kelly@ultrabrilliant

I dont play games for thechallenge, or to be competitive. Ilike being told a good story, and tobe transported away from reality.

Evan Lahti@elahti

FPSes and teamwork. Crafting astory with your friends (preferablyone of total, annihilative victory) isprecious fun.

Ben Griffin@gamegriffin

Im an unashamed connoisseur ofthe blockbuster, devouringanything big-budget. For me thatrepresents the industry at its peak.

Phil Savage@octaeder

I like sandboxes. That can meaneither big, open worlds to explore,or collections of AI systems to playaround with.

Chris Thursten@cthursten

I like games that respect my timeand provide me with plenty ofinteresting decisions to make. I amvery competitive.

Tom Senior

@pcgludo

Ill play any genre, but I demand aflexible approach and a sense ofauthorship from games. I preferco-op to competitive action.

Tyler Wilde@tyler_wilde

I like telling stories more than I likebeing told stories, and I really, reallylike shooting things from far away.Thats a kind of story too!

Cory Banks@demiurge

I love a challenge, and Im notafraid to fail. Im a sucker for awell-told story, and I really loveexperiencing something new.

Tony Ellis

Whats a Twitter?

My time is limited, and Ive alreadyplayed the game where you shootpeople. I like games that do thingsnone of the other games do.

THE PANEL

There are always nominees that mean a lot to just one or

two judges. In past years these might have been included as

runners-up, but this year we wanted to recognize them in a

more substantial way. In addition to the main awards, youll

also find Personal Picks on every page.

PERSONAL

PICKS{ }

FEBRUARY 2014 37


38/100

process, but also keeps you detached enoughto listen out for approaching guards. Its aperfect balance of interaction andsituational awareness, creating tension andrewarding advanced planning.

The result is an improved and constantlyexpanding version of a game thats stillnotable for how enjoyable its stealth is. Idont often agree with the idea that the oldways were better, but the series remainsuniquely unmatched in its free-form, openended thievery. More of that is a fine thing.

CHRISIt makes for an interesting case studyof the point where triple-A, indie, andmodding converge. I like the idea that fan-generated games can act as a kind ofpractical criticism, a way of broadcastingthe desires of hardcore fans to publishers.Ive heard a lot of major game developersclaim that they covet the attention of thosecore audiences, but its a stance thatwarrants skepticism. Projects likeThe Dark

Modare a way for those fans to say if youwont make it, we willto lift what wasgood and meaningful about the games thatinspired us years ago and run with it.

as a Doom 3mod, its different enough fromthe Looking Glass-era Thiefgames to givethat community a sense of ownership. Thelore, setting, and systems have been tweakedjust enough to provide a framework for itscreators imaginations.

As a standalone download,The Dark Modis just a stealth tutorial and single mission,so imagination is the key to its success. Itsdownload page contains over 70 alternativemissions, each of which respects, and insome cases adds to, an expandingcrowdsourced universe full of rich detail,richer treasures, and cunning thieves whowant to enjoy and steal both.

Unlike other tributes to older games, themods makers also werent precious aboutreinventing Thiefs systems to make thembetter. Every developer with an interest increating professional pilferers should lookto The Dark Mods lockpicking system and,well, steal it. Its not tied to a minigame, butits also not a canned animation you have to

endure. Instead, you wait while your masterthief does the job, and use sound cues toidentify and mark the end of the sequence.The result makes you feel like part of the

CHRISThe first version might have comeout in 2009, but this year saw the release ofThe Dark Modas a complete, standalonepackage. Its a tremendous achievementadetailed tribute to the Thiefseries that addsadvanced object manipulation to the alreadybroad range of tools at the players disposal.When I first playedAmnesia: The DarkDescent, I wanted a Thiefgame made with itssense of physicality. The Dark Modis prettymuch that: the way you can reach out andgrab objects in the world is a fantasticaugmentation of the fantasy of being a thiefin a murky, dangerous, candle-lit world.

I love the way the mod team encouragesplayers to download, share, and build theirown missions. That sense of creativity andcommunity is a great match for theenthusiastic stealth game fanbase, and itssomething that wed never see from a majorpublisher. The future of Thiefmight lookuncertain at the moment, but the seriesspirit has a very good home here.

PHILAgreed: the community is the heart ofThe Dark Mod. What I love about it is that,as a Thief-inspired project originally created

T H E D A R K M O D

TOTAL WAR:ROME II

Tony Ellis

So Rome IIdidnt

fix the flaws of the

Total Warseries.

Heres the thing: it

didnt have to. The

original Romewas so damn good,

all they ever had to do was giveit prettier graphics and not break

it. Im still madly tackling armies

twice my size, because I know that

if I can just massacre thisunit and

thisone before they join up, I have

a chance. Im still dry-mouthed at

the sight of a wavering company ofHastati, because I know everything

is lost if they rout. When Rome III

comes out, thatll probably be my

game of the year too.

Thiefs spiritual successor is now its own modding platform

PERSONAL

PICK{ }

MODOF THE

YEAR

2013S FINEST GAMES

38 FEBRUARY 2014


39/100

activated thermal vision, and I spent 15minutes picking off enemies at range. It wasglorious.

I was skeptical, but now Im a believer.Arma 3is not only an impressive simulationof battle, but its an incredibly compellingco-op sandbox. Ive played some jankySteam Workshop content that was still funbecause of the group I played it with. Illprobably never playArmaalone, but Illalways jump in with some friends.

EVANEven if you dont set out to roleplay,you inevitably end up doing somethingmilitary, such as reciting compass directionsas individual numbers (like bearing one-eight-zero to indicate south), oracronyming everything, or freely yellingphrases like suppressive fire! Because itfeels like the appropriate thing to do. Itswonderful that something centered onrealism can stimulate suchplayfulness.

Beyond all that,Arma 3s Altis map was the

most detailed world in a video game thisyeara slab of Mediterrania jigsawed withsalt flats, jungle shrubs, solar power plantsand postcard-worthy beach resorts.

more boring to me than yelling out bearingsand scrambling to find 7mm ammo insteadof 6mm ammo. The UI is intimidating andthe level of detail is daunting. I play games toescape from realism, not embrace it.

Evans enthusiasm won me over, however,and he finally convinced me to join him on amission. With a little bit of guidance, I wasleaning around cover and markingcoordinates on the map likewell, not apro, but like someone who might actuallysurvive a mission. I marveled at howseriouslyArmatakes its systems. Evanshowed me how to move through all nine ofArmas infantry stances, when I was perfectlycomfortable with crouching the entire game.And after he showed me how to use Alt tomove just my soldiers head while movingforward, it became a feature I want in everyFPS.

Eventually, we had to defend a compoundfrom nondescript soldiers drivingcamouflaged, armored jeeps with grenade

launchers. Evan was pinned down in a guardtower, so he had me take over a downed jeepand use its HMG to hold off troops andvehicles at a distance. A quick keypress

EVANIt isnt any one piece ofArmasfidelitythe ballistics modeling, thevariegated land, the intricate military gearthat wows us. Its how the sum of thosereplicates the experience of being a soldier,something very distinct from being an avatarwho fires guns. Youve got to know how toread a topographical map. Youve got toknow how to communicate with brevity andclarity while being shot at.

You have to think critically about stuff likeencumbrance. When Im gearing up for amission, throwing a satchel charge in mybackpack may help me knock out a hardtarget, but the extra weight wilal tire me outmore quickly when I sprint. So maybe Illhave a teammate taxi me across the map onan ATV. But the sun is setting, so wellprobably have to drive with the headlightson and risk detection, since we dont havenight vision goggles. Unless we find and killan enemy who does. Again: its not theindividual realisms but how they knit into

each other and prompt thoughtful decisions.

CORYI scoffed when Evan offered to teachme the ropes inArma 3. Nothing sounds

A R M A 3

AMNESIA: AMACHINE FOR PIGS

Andy Kelly

I could never enjoy

The Dark Descent

because of the

sanity system.

For me, it got in

the way of the story. So I was

happy to discover that not onlywould the sequel not have it, but

it was also being developed and

written by Dear Esthercreators

The Chinese Room. As someone

who plays games for atmosphere

and storytelling,Machine for Pigsis

ideal. It spins a strange, compellingyarn, and the increasingly terrifying

depths of that awful factory will

stay with me forever. I havent

been able to look at bacon since.

A rich military sandbox supported by a prolific community

PERSONAL

PICK{ }

BESTSIMULATION

FEBRUARY 2014 39


40/100

dealt bad cards is frustrating, its mostly anopportunity for creative tactical problemsolving. Even drawing a purely defensivehand isnt disastrous thanks to the passsystem. By moving to defensible locationsand skipping my turn, I can ensure I get firstgo when the new, hopefully more powerfulcards appeareven using my apparentweakness as the basis for an ambush.

More interesting are the low-level cardsthat offer seemingly undesirable effects.What at first seems like a near-uselesscompromise can suddenly make all thedifference. If a Warriors bludgeon cantquite finish a monster, maybe that booby-trapped healing card can briefly turn yourCleric into an offensive unit, killing theenemy before the healing is applied.

Thats what I love about Card Hunter: thenecessity of invention. Experimentalstrategies arent about showing off, or tryingto be creative in the face of a more sensibleor more effective option. Theyre the result

of an intuitive deck-building system that isthen reduced down to a manageable andinteresting set of choices to be made on anygiven turn.

the designers baked into the various cardsand actions. Card Hunteris charming ashell, and I would have easily paid full priceto play its campaign. That its developers letyou log in for free and only want to chargeyou for the smallest of details is, frankly,unbelievable. Even if youre not into CCGs,you should give the first few single-playermissions a try. Theyre just delightful.

CHRISI played single-player for about adozen hours before graduating tocompetitive play, but Im glad that I did. Ilove the room it provides for creativeplaysthe Flying Wizard TelekineticDwarf Slingshot is totally a thing, because Iinvented it. The games CCG foundationsallow for turnarounds and upsets, too, andas frustrating as it can be to be on thereceiving end of one, they always make forgood stories. Card Hunteris easily the yearssecond-best wizard-em-up.

PHILAs someone who doesnt like CCGs,Im grateful to Card Hunterfor the way itmitigates random chance. Ive yet to moveup to its competitive modes, so while being

CHRISI really want Card Hunterto succeed.Its a free-to-play game with a fair andgenerous business model that never gets inthe way of doing what you want to do, whichis negotiate a series of D&D-style dungeonswith a party made up of individually-customizable CCG decks. It soundsconvoluted, but Blue Manchu has managedto marry two complicated genres in a waythat makes both more accessible. Thecollectible card game underneath helps tobreak down the principles of turn-basedstrategy into individual, easily-understoodelements, and the strategy game helps topresent card battling in a context thatgamers will immediately comprehend. Its aphenomenal bit of design.

CORYIts also an incredibly charming game.Right from the start, you can see the loveBlue Manchu has wrapped up in its art style.This is a game made by tabletop fans, peoplewho grew up sitting around, rolling

icosahedrons, and scribbling furiously ongraph paper. I love how it expresses itsmechanics through cardboard cutoutfigures, and delight at every D&D in-joke

SAINTSROW IV

Chris Th

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