Everyone’s sure to have a favourite from among Death end re;Quest’s all-female cast. And I imagine a popular choice will be Clea.
A great example of how the game sets and subverts expectation with regard to character tropes, Clea might initially seem like your common-or-garden ohohoho-ing ojou-sama, but over time it becomes abundantly clear that there’s more than meets the eye here.
Let’s take a closer look!
The Shu campaign of Warriors Orochi is now well underway as Zhao Yun kicks off his efforts to find his lost master Liu Bei.
Well, I say that; I kicked him out of the party in favour of trying out newcomer Ginchiyo Tachibana, who I unlocked at the end of last week’s mission; turns out she’s rather fun, so sorry Zhao Yun, but you’re on the bench for now.
Hit the jump to see today’s mission… featuring a guest appearance from the biggest wannabe pimp in Sengoku-era Japan.
Continue reading Warriors Wednesday: One Foxy Lady – Warriors Orochi #32
With my Sunday Driving playthrough of Black Rock Studio’s excellent Split/Second now at an end, it’s time to take a final, summative look back at one of my favourite racers of all time.
Split/Second, like its contemporary and rival Blur, was a victim of a combination of factors: poor marketing, arrogant publishers and an overall gaming landscape that was somewhat in flux. As such, while those who took a chance on it back in the day tend to look back on it rather fondly now, it doesn’t get nearly the recognition it deserves.
Let’s change all that, shall we?
Here’s one I vividly remember from back in the day… but for which there’s a surprising lack of information about online!
Fire Chief was developed by Tim Huntington and released through English Software, who we’ve already seen a couple of times on Atari A to Z. Beyond the fact it was included on one of English Software’s Atari Smash Hits compilations (number 4, to be precise), there’s not a lot more that can be said from a historical perspective — even its original box art (and/or if it was ever released as a standalone title!) remains seemingly lost to time.
Oh well. We’d better just take a good hard look at how it plays then, huh? Hold on to your hats, this one goes like the clappers!
Find a full archive of all the Atari A to Z videos on the official site.
In the same year as the excellent Vanguard, SNK’s 6502-based “Rockola” hardware played host to an altogether different kind of game.
Fantasy was a rather unusual game. Eschewing the usual spaceships and aliens in favour of a distinctly more “human” setup, the game actually made an effort to tell a story as it progressed. An extremely simple story, yes, but exceedingly ambitious considering this was 1981.
HOW ARE YOU? I’M FINE, THANK YOU. AAAAAAHHHHHH.
This is it! This is what it’s all been building up towards: the season finale of Split/Second!
Despite some occasionally questionable performance, I’ve managed to make it to the final episode on the top spot of the Championship table… question is, can I finish the season and maintain my winning position?
Hit the jump to find out how it all ends…
Continue reading Sunday Driving: Out With a Bang (Finale) – Split/Second #12
If, in 1978, you ever entertained any childish fantasies of being a fireman, then Atari had the video game for you!
Fire Truck was an unusual spin on the top-down driving game in which you took control of a distinctly retro (even at the time) fire engine on its way to deal with some sort of flame-related emergency. The fire truck has limited fuel and thus is unable to ever get to its destination, but at least you can score some points along the way! Because as we all know, real firemen are rated according to how close to the emergency they got.
Obviously this is mostly made up; the “fire truck” concept is actually an excuse to provide some interesting and unusual two-player cooperative driving gameplay, in which one player steers the cab of the truck and the other the trailer. You can play it single-player too, but for maximum amusement, bring a friend.
Find a full archive of all the Atari A to Z videos on the official site.
This article is one chapter of a multi-part Cover Game feature!
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One of the things Compile Heart’s Galapagos RPG project has been keen to do ever since its inception is experiment with mechanics, particularly when it comes to combat.
Death end re;Quest is an excellent example of this, featuring several layers of mechanics that keep things consistently interesting as you play through the main story and the optional side content. It’s also one of Compile Heart’s better balanced games to date, featuring a smooth incline in challenge factor rather than sudden, unexpected spikes.
Let’s take a closer look at how it all works.
It’s time for our weekly visit to the kingdom of Arland, as our New Game Plus runthrough of Atelier Rorona DX on Nintendo Switch continues!
We’re well into the game’s second year now, and all sorts of interesting things are happening. Rorona is still devastatingly overpowered, however; can no-one provide her with a decent fight? She’s the Lu Bu of the Atelier world at this point.
Hit the jump to see how today’s crafting, gathering and Puni-splattering went.
Continue reading New Game Plus: Ghosts Don’t Have Feet – Atelier Rorona DX #8
As you may have noticed already, early-days pre-Neo Geo SNK is a real treasure trove of classic shoot ’em ups. And few come more classic than Vanguard.
First released in 1981, Vanguard was another game of “firsts” for the fledgling SNK. It was not, as some sources claim, SNK’s first colour game — Sasuke vs. Commander predates it by a year — but it was their first to incorporate something that would become a mainstay of their later titles, including Bermuda Triangle and World Wars: multi-directional shooting, independent of movement direction.
It also featured some delightful synthesised speech and gratuitously, shamelessly stolen music. And it’s a lot of fun to boot. Let’s take a closer look.
