Despite a misleading advertising campaign, the original Dragon Age was a huge critical and commercial success. PC Gamers especially enjoyed it as it was a return to the style of old school Balder’s Gate gameplay that Bioware was originally known for. The sequel comes out next month and looks to be dynamically different from the first game. In anticipation of the game’s release I played through the new demo not once, but twice.
Epic’s new hyperviolent shooter Bulletstorm is built around the idea of the Creative Kill, and players are dying for the chance to mutilate some space mutants in this game. The only problem is that it doesn’t come out for HOURS! How will gamers fill the time until those midnight launch parties? Below is a list of currently-available shooters that allow you to gruesomely murder enemies with as much ingenuity as you can muster
Back in 2010, a Swedish independent developer named Frictional Games released a survival horror game by the name of Amnesia: The Dark Descent. It featured no combat, and rather, asked you to survive against unknown horrors in an eighteenth century castle by hiding, running, and general problem solving. It was a huge success for an independent title, selling over 200,000 copies on digital distribution sites, and winning several Game of the Year awards, including some over here at Player Affinity. To some, this is the first title from Frictional Games they’ve seen, those who have followed Frictional before Amnesia, know of their earlier series, Penumbra. Unsurprisingly, the Penumbra games are very similar to Amnesia, from the need for low gamma settings to the stealth gameplay. This is why it’s interesting to see just how similar these games are.
We all have that shameful backlog somewhere in our house; a stack of old games that we bought on impulse years ago, but never got around to playing despite the fact that we just had to own the thing. Then there’s all of those games we started playing and kept meaning to finish off, but were constantly distracted by the latest installment of Call of Duty. Well, Player Affinity’s PC crew pried open our chest of neglected classics and had another go at them to see whether or not we’ll ever play these old games.
These days most PC gamers have powerful rigs that can run Crysis with ease and although loads of companies are moving towards multi-platform development PC gamers are occasionally left out of options when it comes to playing a particular game on PC. Sometimes the game’s PC version is cancelled a month before release and in others the game doesn’t get a PC version at all, despite being perfectly suited for that platform, but in all cases PC gamers are left glaring at console gamers, wishing that they could be playing that brand new title on their dedicated gaming PC.
Men of War (MoW) is a very deep, difficult and
satisfying RTS that alternates between moments of jubilation and frustration. Co-developed
by Digital Mind Soft and Best Way, MoW is based on the early parts of
World War 2, allowing players to take control of authentic weapons, infantry
and tanks from each side of the conflict. With such control (down to the type,
and amount of ammo, fuel or weapons each soldier or tank was carrying) it
became an exercise in micromanagement, especially when granted dozens of units
to oversee at once. MoW: Assault Squad is one of several stand-alone expansion
packs that are on track to be released in the near future.
I’ve repeatedly said that the greatest advantage that PC’s have over consoles is that PC gamers get to make mods for our games, and play mods made by other fans. This often leads to us having to suffering through amateurish crap, but there are also some terrific mods out there that are better than many full-fledged games. In fact, occasionally a mod team will create a product so good that they will be noticed by a professional developer and their mod will get turned into a full game. An excellent example of this is the Half Life 2 mod Dear Esther.
If you’re sitting in front of a computer reading about video games on Valentine’s Day, then it’s just possible that you might need some dating tips. But that’s okay because there are plenty of video games that can teach you valuable lessons about being a better boyfriend or girlfriend
Rift is a new MMORPG developed by Trion Worlds Network that takes players across the fantasy world of Telara, in which a variety of parallel worlds called “planes” converge and often don’t get along. In fact, the core purpose of the game is to defeat invading forces that come through the gates that pop up on the convergence that link the physical lands together. These gates are known as rifts, and it falls to the player to join forces with other heroes to push back the enemies and ultimately close the rift. To do this, a player takes control of an archetypal class (Warrior, Cleric, Rogue, and Mage) and customizes it to match the particular role they wish to play, be it damage-dealer, tank or healer. Players need not join groups when participating in the world PvE against the gates but are rewarded for action depending on involvement, be it through attacking, healing or with buffs.
Yeah, PC games tend to be very awesome, with better controls, better graphics, and better communities. Sure, the power of our gaming machines far outmatches the consoles too. However, there are definitely some games out there that we want very, very, badly. The problem? They’re only on consoles, even if we feel they would be perfect for the PC. We may even be promised a PC version only to have it cancelled at the last second for some games.
