There’s no doubt about it, I’m ten times more excited about Battlefield 3 than I am about Modern Warfare 3. However, my favourite part of Modern Warfare 2 was the two-player spec-ops missions where you got to fight masses and masses of enemy AI soldiers, and of course, where would the newest installment to the series be if it didn’t include a similar or even better rendition of the same feature… Well goody goody gun-drops, look what we have here! The following trailer for MW3 Spec Ops mode gives plenty of explosive and bullety footage of a TON of cool things happening during a lengthy battle between players and AI bastards who simply won’t leave you alone. Also, how clever are they, spelling WW3 with an upside down M; they’ve definitely used their smarts right there.
Yes, there are weapon drops, weapon upgrades, MAN drops (as in, call in friendly AI soldiers via helicopter to help you fight the battle!) and, best of all, sentry turrets (possibly the best thing in the world, seriously, that scene in Alien is like one of the coolest scenes ever). I enjoyed this trailer, and if I could actually afford it, I would totally buy this at the same time as BF3.
Dome Keeper is an excellent little spin on the tower defense game, in which you play the role of a jetpacking miner defending his base from swarms of aliens, whilst searching for a hidden relic buried somewhere beneath him. And now, with this huge free update, you can play it with friends.
I want to talk about Cloudpunk, a game where you get to be a flying-car delivery driver in a futuristic cyberpunk city. Its world is an incredible achievement of environmental design, and while the gameplay itself may be basic, the city of Nivalis is a thing of beauty to behold. Nivalis is built out of hundreds of hand-modelled cuboid buildings; there’s nothing procedural about it. Apparently it took 3 years for the devs to design the city, and it really shows.
I do love me some quality pixel art, and it doesn’t get much better than this. Cast n Chill is a cozy side-scrolling fishing game by small indie dev team Wombat Brawler, with absolutely gorgeous visuals. It’s simple to play, and you you can dip in and out of it at your leisure, making it a fine addition to our collection of coffee break games.
I’ve played many versions of Mario Kart, first on the Snes at a friend’s house, followed by my own copy of the N64 version. The Nintendo DS edition got a lot of play during the various anime conventions that I attended between 2006 and 2011, where you could LAN it up via Bluetooth with anyone else in the vicinity. But the version I truly have the fondest memories of has to be Mario Kart Wii.
You might have heard of Pokémon. I can’t quite believe that date. 1996!? Holy crap. 21 years ago, apparently, I got well into this strange Japanese game about collecting made-up animals, stuffing them into balls and training them to fight each other.
Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 is a depressing game. It’s epic and majestic, but undoubtedly bleak. Luckily, it also has some hilarious moments timed with comedic perfection, which somehow never feel out of place. It’s a credit to the writers, and the performances of the voice actors. These are my favourite funny moments of Expedition 33.