PC

Gray Matter Preview

Back in the 90’s, the point and click genre of PC gaming was all the rage.  It was a time when four megs of video RAM was state of the art, so shooters and real-time strategy games were still rather primitive.  The technical requirements for adventure games, on the other hand were minimal; just enough horsepower to show a static background image, and one moving character.  Unlike the glut of mindless Doom clones that filled retail shelves, adventure games emphasized story-telling, writing, and characters. One of the most popular franchises was Gabrial Knight, which had three installments that ran from 1993 through 1999.

Weekend Sales January 14

Steam has a nifty little offer right now; they’re selling The Chronicles of Riddick: Assault on Dark Athena for five dollars.  Don’t be fooled by the tepid reviews, this is actually a worthy purchase at full price.  Remember, this includes TWO Riddick games, the mediocre Assault on Dark Athena which came out in 2009, but it also includes a next-gen re-mastered version of 2004’sEscape From Butcher Bay which was one of the best games to hit the original XBox.

Weekend Deals January 13

Although 2011 has yet to offer PC gamers a really great weekend sale, there are still a few nice little price breaks going around the net this weekend.  ImpulseDriven.com has their usual Weekend Impulse Buys.  This week’s selection is 50-70% off for Dawn of War Collection ($24.99),Burnout Paradise Ultimate Box ($14.99), Armada 2526 ($14.99), Star Ruler ($14.99) and big discounts on Star Wolves 3- Civil War ($8.99) and Avencast Rise of the Mage ($5.09)  Impulse driven also has a sale on everything in the Need For Speed franchise.  You can get any of them for half off.

More Dragon Age II Pre-Order Bonuses Revealed

Bioware and Electronic Arts have been tantalizing gamers with vague offers of special bonuses if players pre-order Dragon Age II. First was a new quest and companion if you ordered by January 11.  But, if you missed that cut off date, you can still get some free stuff if you order the game between now and its release date of March 8^th.

Starcraft II Patch 1.2 Is Live

Starcraft II is improved yet again with the latest patch from Blizzard. Protoss players will be quite happy with Starcraft II Version 1.2, as many of the Protoss balancing has been changed in their favor. Specifically, the Observer costs less, and the build times for Phoenixes and Hallucinations are shorter. Protoss aren’t the only ones to miss out, though, as Blizzard has finally included player created chat channels, bringing Starcraft II in line with it’s 1998 predecessor. Besides that, there are the standard bug fixes of course, but there are also two new leagues; the Master and Grand Master League. The Master league has the top players from every region, while the Grand Master league has the top 200 players in the world. Kudos to you if you can make it in there. Here’s the exact list of changes if that’s your thing: 

Electronic Arts to Publish The Secret World

Ragner Tonrquist is highly revered among fans of adventure games.  He was the designer behind The Longest Journey; widely regarded as the finest example of the point ‘n’ click adventure genre. Tornquist went on to write for that game’s sequel, Dreamfall; and his next game is the MMO The Secret world, which will be published by Electronic arts.  The news about the publisher was just announced, but the existence of The Secret World has been known for close to four years.

Publisher and Release Schedule Set For Gray Matter

The long-delayed adventure game Gray Matter finally has a North American publisher, Viva Media.  Although the game has already been released in Europe, until now the possibility of it coming to America was uncertain. 

Gray Matter was written and designed by Jane Jensen, the creator of the hugely popular Gabriel Knight series which defined the adventure genre for much of the nineties.