Year Walk - Simogo - PC (2014)

A Year Walk, as developer Simogo describes, is a Swedish Tradition where a man would lock themselves in a dark room for the whole day with no food or water and, at the stroke of midnight, would walk to the closest church to understand what the New Year would bring. The practice is thought to be dangerous, all kinds of creatures and myths were said to accompany the Walker on their journey. The Walk was set to show the future, good or bad and could be known to show the Walker an almost binary set of visions. Either vastly positive, or terribly negative.

The setting for Year Walk is a reserved and greyscale forest, Simogo have done a great job creating this aesthetic of the winter’s evening. There’s an overlay of snowfall that doesn’t obstruct your view and the snow on the ground seems to give off a tainted glow, it’s pretty much perfect for the title. This had to be done right or else the game runs a risk of not being taken seriously. The game itself is a First Person 2D affair. The control system for the PC version translates as well from the iOS original as you would expect.

The overall gameplay is a series of puzzles and exploration with the occasional jump scare. In my opinion jump scares can often cheapen a title, but they are used sparingly and well. The puzzles are tough without being mind-numbing and the way the world has been created keeps you interested in exploring it further. There’s plenty of side puzzles and intricate touches that will keep you asking questions and be left wondering if there is any further story to be found within the white wasteland of the forest.

Its music and sound use is also solid. Simogo use sound and music as a gameplay mechanic in some parts of the game. In one particular section I was following a beautifully horrible siren song through the forest and wondering to myself. “Do I really want to know what’s making this?” The sound and music are menacing and when you couple all of its elements together, the sum of Year Walk’s parts is a handsomely developed project. It’s a game that grabs you and holds your attention through its solid use of its elements and I really feel that they had a plan in place, stuck to it rigidly and never questioned their convictions. This is especially true when looking at their case of creatures who inhabit the world.

When you are on your Walk your character will encounter creatures from, what Simogo claims, is Swedish Mythology. Without giving any spoilers away, these beings are well-written and interesting and each come with their own myths attached to them. The stories are creepy and unforgiving and some of them are exceptionally brutal. I find it difficult to believe that what Simogo have said is Mythology is true however, as after a pretty lengthy search online I have found absolutely zero information on these creatures. Left with a feeling of being cheated, I came to realise that if these are entities created by Simogo I tip my hat to them. The reason I went digging for more information was to learn more about these Myths, as they all seem deep. The quality of the myths and the writing that describes them found in the in-game Encyclopaedia is fantastic. To the point where I thought they had just pulled these characters straight out of Folk Tale books!

If I could present one criticism to the title it would be that it is very short. I have the feeling that it was developed with replayability in mind but when one of your achievements is to complete a full walk within 20 minutes, it does make you question the amount of content present in the game. Simogo can be almost forgiven for this considering how nice their world is, and it was originally developed for the tablet market. It’s frustrating that, as a gamer, I would like to experience more of this world. I can’t help but wanting more, it might sound like an entitled rant but I loved this world so much that I feel it needs to be fleshed out more to fully appreciate their vision. Of course, this does run the risk of diluting their, seemingly, own mythology. The lack of a volume slider is also a critical part of the PC port that has been missed. It’s not a huge problem, but it is easy enough to incorporate and clearly has been forgotten about due to the nature of iOS devices.

I applaud Simogo for trying something just that little bit different. There’s not many games that dabble with any sort of Mythos, never mind create their own and feel that this developer has a lot of creativity present in their studio. If you don’t believe me then take a look at another other critically acclaimed iOS title they developed by the name of Bumpy Road. This is a developer who isn’t scared to make the games they want to make and for me, are realising titles to an exceptionally high quality and originality.

If you have a bit of cash sitting there and feel like something a little out of the ordinary I would certainly recommend Year Walk. It might only take you a few hours to work through but I’m sure it’ll be memorable for some time to come. 

Review written and published on Universal Gaming

The £1 = 1 Hour Principle

How much is the price of entertainment? I’m a 26 year old guy, working in an ok paying job with full time hours. I do alright for myself. Rent’s always on time and the bills are paid, but I’m not exactly Mr.Monopoly. I have a budget for what I can spend on myself each month, not only a monetary budget, but a time one.

I enjoy being entertained, it sounds silly, but really that’s all I really work for. I’m pretty carefree, don’t really any dependencies except a pet cat, so I like to enjoy myself. Let’s face it, I’m just 26. What’s the best way you can get the most out of your free time whilst still working to a budget? If you said “Make a rule” then hey! You were right!

This is where the £1 = 1 hour principle. Netflix is £6 per month. At first I asked myself: “Well am I going to get 6 hours of entertainment out of Netflix every month?” Yes, yes I am, and then some! Sky Movies is say approximately £18 a month. Am I going to watch 18 hours worth of movies, whilst working full time? Probably not. Do I go to the gym for 19 hours a month? YEAH….no, but that’s not really entertainment and it’s more like work! Anyways! This is where the principle comes in, you don’t want to waste your money on time you’re not going to use. It doesn’t just apply to TV and movies. In fact, that’s usually a small example. I mainly apply this to games.

Let’s take World of Warcraft for example. A game I played for hours and hours and hours over many years. As soon as I realised I wasn’t going to play it for 9 hours a month that subscription got shelved. To be fair though, I got several more hours out of Warcraft than I did on the £1 = 1 hour principle. Sometimes I was playing at least 40 hours a month, apply it to the rule, its well worth the cash.

It’s why I don’t tend to buy games on release. At the moment, I would love to purchase South Park: The Stick of Truth. It’s as good as £40 on Steam right now. It looks a lot of fun, it’s a turn-based RPG, it’s based on a world I tend to enjoy, but, I don’t think there’s 40 hours of gameplay there. You have to be patient, you have to wait for the sales and the mark-downs. It’s not an exact science, and of course there will be times were excitement will get the best of you. Let’s take Bioshock Infinite, a game that my partner Jenni purchased for me, £40 at retail on release. I got maybe 25 hours tops out of it on two playthroughs. The fact of the matter is this, I love Bioshock. I would have expanded the rule to £5 = 1 hour, I just love it. That’s fine, as long as you let your head rule your mind the majority of the time. Do however be careful of the sale.

Steam sales are the devil. Really. Your poor poor wallet. The deals are sometimes so good it makes you think, I shouldn’t miss this. I need more games. You might do, there might be that one little gem you’ve been waiting on going on sale, and if there is, then go for it. If it’s just “Ack, I might as well” then stop it. You’re probably not going to play it, it’s going to sit there, staring back at you like the remains of a kebab from the night before. A waste of money, not a lot of money, but a waste nonetheless. I have several titles that fall into this category of cold kebab. Keep in mind, these games haven’t been played due to my own tastes: Dead Space, Mirror’s Edge, Risen, Supreme Commander 2 and Warlock: Master of the Arcane. These aren’t the only games, but they are all games I thought I’d reach my hourly quota based on their price and I’m either no way near it, or they’re sitting un-played.

It’s a principle that has served me well. Makes me play the games I want to play at the price I want to pay. Granted, it might not be the best way to support Triple A developers, but when was the last time you looked at a Triple A and thought “That is truly ground-breaking. I will play 60 hours of that title with no doubt”. Unless you are a fan of the games franchise already, it’s doubtful that you’ll find that. I’m not a huge FPS fan, I’m not a big FIFA player, and I’ve never been the type of guy to need the latest gadgets, so for me it might be easier than others.

It brings me to a sticking point. I despise Early Access and Pre-Orders. My opinion, please note the use of the word opinion, is that you are paying full price for a game that is not finished. How do you know that you’re going to enjoy it? It’s not done. Unless you’re a huge fan of the franchise, developer or if it’s a remake of a previously released game, you’re stepping in blind. There’s hardly ever any critique or information available. You are paying to be a beta tester. If we stop this practise and become less accepting of games with horrendously buggy games on release, this might push developers to be as stringent as they were in the “Good ol’ days”. When the majority of games were near perfectly optimised, bug free and localised well (with a few exceptions, naturally)

Pre-Orders are the exact same, you’re paying ahead of a release for a game that’s likely to be available wherever you shop. Especially if it’s purchased digitally. Why would you pre-order a game on digital distribution unless it was at a discounted rate and you know you’d enjoy it based on (Again) that you’re a huge fan of the franchise, developer or that it’s a remake of a previously released game. Boxed collector’s editions aside, my opinion is to wait for the critique then apply the £1 = 1 Hour principle. Don’t just think, yeah. £40 for the game and a free exclusive weapon hits the mark. Do the same with DLC, it’s a different discussion for another time entirely, but wait for it to be reviewed. I’ve heard the new Last of Us DLC is 2 hours of gameplay. 2 hours. For £12. That’s what. £6 an hour. That’s a footlong subway on top of what you, in my opinion, should be paying for entertainment!

Developer Sit Down: Matt Roszak - Kupo Games

I recently caught up for a quick chat with Matt Roszak about games, inspirations, programming and the future.

How long did it take you to develop Epic Battle Fantasy 4?

About 12 months for the web version, and another 3 months for the Steam extras. That's if I were working on the game full time, but I've been working on it on-and-off for 2 and a half years, probably.

What would you say to someone who's never played a game from the Epic Battle Fantasy series?

Check it out if you liked 16-bit JRPGs or just like games with a silly sense of humor.

There's quite a few references to old school RPGs in the game, can you give us your top three?

Dead Pikachu. Moogle snowman. The Triforce.

Can you give us three of your favourite characters from RPGs?

Zidane from FF9. Anyone from FF9 really. I felt that FF9 had better character development than any game I've ever played.

Was there a specific game that made you want to learn how to make games?

Specific game? Nah. But the Zelda games have probably inspired me more than any other series.

What's next for Epic Battle Fantasy?

Bullet Heaven 2, probably. Maybe.

Can you give us an insight into your agenda for the remainder of 2014?

I don't usually plan more than a month ahead. I'd say it's impossible to predict things any further than that. But the To-do list right now is: Tidy up launch issues with EBF4, look into selling it on other stores, tidy up launch issues with Cat Cafe, publish Cat Cafe on iOS. (Cat Cafe is my first mobile game)

Are there any developers out there that would pull you away from Kupo Games?

Nope. Not until I get old and might need a stable income, anyway. But I'm planning for that to never happen.

What's been your biggest programming problem?

Debugging really obscure and specific bugs.

What's been your favourite moment as a developer?

Successful game launches!


You can purchase Epic Battle Fantasy 4 right now on Steam and keep up to date with Matt at Kupo Games

Epic Battle Fantasy 4 - Kupo Games - PC (2014)

Look past the name and give it a closer look.

Epic Battle Fantasy 4 is the 4^th game in the series of flash driven, turn based RPGs by Kupo Games. Its tiny development team, headed by Matt Roszak (Whom is credited for design, art, story and programming) should be praised, at the very minimum, for the amount of effort put into this title. It isn’t a once and done game, this is a well realised and full RPG experience.

The game retains enough nostalgia from old school RPGs but still manages to feel fresh and new. If you’ve ever played any Final Fantasy title, excluding the MMOs, you’ll be familiar with this format. Each of your characters is, usually, given one action to carry out each turn, the enemies are also given a turn. It has all the usual elements you’d expect, being able to cast magic, summon other creatures, use items and attack and it does this as well as any turn-based RPG does. Its appeal for me was that this is a finely tuned machine of a game. Usually with turn-based RPGs you eventually become so powerful that nothing is really a challenge, except maybe some bosses. Epic Battle Fantasy 4 keeps you on your toes and makes you think a little bit.

This is my first foray into the world of Epic Battle Fantasy. I’ve always loved turn based RPGs. RPGs in general, but turn based more so than Action, and the reason being is that it brings an element of strategy. Epic Battle Fantasy 4 makes full use of the strategic element of the genre.

It does this through its use of equipment and skills. The majority of weapons have an elemental effect which will assist you in tearing through enemies that are weak to that element. Lovely for burning up plants in the forest with your flame sword, but will also give you nightmares if you a decide to take this sword into a lava cave where there are enemies who are so masochistic that swing with said sword and you’ll find they love it and healing back up. It’s not a new mechanic but makes picking the right equipment for the right area a bit of a headache. Weapons can be swapped out but this will take up a valuable turn to do so. Not only that, you won’t be receiving that free ride through an area. Remember the fish we were slicing up, well this time they brought back their friend, Mr Flame Sprite.

The equipment also helps with the complexity of the title by questioning your strategy. You can stack certain items to make a character like a tank, throw some protection spells around and he’ll be the wall in front of your defences, but what’s stopping him being hit with an instant kill ability? The skill and specials pool is a very well implemented way of customising your characters and their skillset. Skills can only be learned by that specific character and specials can be learned by all, but only one character may have it at any one time. Once again, brings some difficult decisions forward. Do I have my tank take the healing spells? It becomes a bit of a puzzle, making sure all of your defences and offences are covered by way of weapons, skills and abilities. My only concern, and it’s a small one, is that a new player to RPGs might think it’s best to keep levelling that fireball spell that’s working so well in the forest and then struggle going through the lava cave. I’d have liked to see a recommended skill highlight to show players that are new to the genre a way to build a balanced character.

You can also equip the characters with items that will provide passive bonuses or abilities within battle, another little customisable option for balancing your team. Gone, in this game, is any idea of an “Ultimate” weapon. For me, that’s refreshing.

Epic Battle Fantasy 4’s forge system allows for steady progression to keep your weapons and clothing viable. As you collect item drops and open chests you’ll start to find enough items to boost the power of your equipment and weapons. It’s always good to see that, regardless of how far you go into the game, having a solid set of weapons and clothing can come in handy. I also like the feeling of having a new weapon that’s not great at first, hunting out those items to make it more powerful and then having fun with the new weapon.

The characters are well written and interact nicely. I get the feeling that they may be named after close friends of the developer, and that’s ok. The reason being is that you can take some of the developer’s personality from this. Some of the remarks and comments tend to have a personal touch you don’t see in most games. If they are close friends you can tell they have a lot of fun in each other’s company. This game is no doubt a labour of love, I can’t imagine how many hours Matt and the small team at Kupo Games would have poured into this game but looking at the polish and depth of the game, you can tell that it’s a lot! It’s nice to be given a flavour of someone’s personality through their creativity. The last game that made me feel like this was Super Meat Boy, my own personal opinion is that something creative is enjoyed best when you can take something about the designer out of the work.

You can also see the developers sense of humour shine through in the game. There’s a lot of small gestures and references that experienced RPG fans will appreciate. My three personal favourites where the suspiciously looking can of a popular Scottish soft drink being a consumable item. The snow covered Djinn from Golden Sun in Whitefall Town and the name of some of the achievements you can gain for obtaining certain persistent items to use outside of battle that reference a long running franchise that a lot of people don’t associate with turn based RPGs.

Epic Battle Fantasy’s achievement system comes in the way of medals. Small images you unlock when completing a certain task in the game. Some are very difficult to obtain, some pretty much laughing in the face at how ridiculous achievement systems are. Again, I found the humour to be well placed and fitting for the game. Having an overview of what medals I had still to gain was enjoyable. Coupled with the bestiary gives you that feeling of collection that a lot of RPGs look past. Epic Battle Fantasy wants you to complete everything for completions sense and it helps keep you engaged in that “one more battle” feel.

The only criticism I feel I can effectively levy at the game is that if you are not a fan of the genre or are new to it, this game will have a huge learning curve. It expects you to be familiar with its core mechanics. It expects you to know what a buff and debuff is and it expects you to know how to build a balanced character. But when all is said and done, there are other games out there that do hold your hand through this. This is a game by a turn-based RPG fan, for turn-based RPG fans.

I’ll be honest, completely honest, I did not expect much from Epic Battle Fantasy 4. There’s a few reasons. I was sceptical at first, as I usually am, about games predominately made by one person. In most cases, you’ll find there’s something lacking. For example, the collision detection is appalling or the art is woeful, or it’s just a poorly designed game. I was also a bit cautious of the game, my initial thoughts were that it’s a bit on the silly side. Lastly, when knowing this was the 4^th in a series of games, especially when knowing it was pretty much a one-man-band, my alarm bells started ringing. “This has been greenlit without anyone looking at it”, “These games are being thrown out of this guys room to fill a portfolio”

To quote one of my favourite Dwarfs of all time, Thorin Oakenshield “Never have I been so wrong”

Epic Battle Fantasy 4 is an absolutely fantastic game, made even more impressive by the huge contribution by Matt Roszak. It is a game that I had to force myself to stop playing, just to write the review, and it’s a game I will continue to play for many, many more hours to come. It’s a fun adventure, split into manageable chunks. The art style is soft and friendly, the enemies look menacing but not extreme. The mechanics are solid, the story is well written, the characters engaging and the experience is immersive. The fact that it has been localised into 4 other languages should also show you that this isn’t just for fun.

I still personally believe that the name of the title may put some players off the purchase, but I hope they do their research and don’t look at this game with the shallow depth I did before giving it a go. Well worth the £8.99 asking price. If you are even the smallest fan of turn-based RPGs go and buy this, you won’t regret it and keep an eye on what Matt Roszak is doing in the future. This developer has shown what he can do and I’m excited to see what’s coming in the future.

First Strike: Nuclear Dawn - Blindflug Studios - iOS (2014)

If you’ve ever sat on the bus, mucking about on your phone on your way to work and thought “I’d just like to blow the world up with nuclear warheads” this is the game for you! In all serious though, Blindflug Studios have created a pretty solid nuke-em-up.

First Strike: Nuclear Dawn is a bite-sized portion of the apocalypse. You take control of a nuclear superpower and are given the keys to the “Big Red Button”. Being developed for tablets and phones alike it seems to sit nicely in a market without too many real-time strategy games and uses the touch nature of input to its full advantage.

You can expand into another region with two finger taps. Build a nuke with two finger taps and launch an all-out attack against a rival nation with two finger taps. In fact, there’s not much you can’t do that will take more than two taps. You can pinch and rotate the world, set up your defences and quickly scout to see which regions your neighbouring rivals are invading. The developers have taken full advantage of their simple control method by making this a pretty fast paced title. Stall too long building your defences and expanding into other regions and you’ll quickly be feeling the wrath of your impatient neighbours. Expanding and building your resources is a very easily accomplishable task.

The UI is incredibly well suited to the title, one click on a territory will open a radial menu of up to 8 options and you always know how well equipped that specific region through a small overlay on each region. At all times, you know how well structured you are and you are also aware of how many nuclear warheads your rivals are. The feedback it provides when a nuke lands is satisfying, your screen will shake and that familiar image of a mushroom cloud will expand from the Earth. Couple that with the titles “First Strike” attack: which will launch a nuke, within range, from each of your regions at a designated area. You’ll be treated with a few seconds of admiring your handiwork before the warheads come crashing down on their poor victim. You can also improve your already devastating force with a solid research tree which allows for automatic launches of interception nukes, reduced build speeds and visible nuclear warhead trajectories. All very nice additions to the late game when things can get a little hectic.

It allows for some quick thinking strategic plays, for example, if you play as Europe, you’ll want to create some defensive nuclear warheads facing Russia and Korea, but might want to expand into Africa to launch attacks of your own, or you can take your chances and surprise the Americans. The game will continually keep you on your toes, if you think you’ve got enough fire power to take out a nation to your East you’ll probably soon find that you’re being bombarded from West, North and South. The AI doesn’t cheat, but the overlay will show you how well equipped your neighbours are, and the AI obviously knows how well you are doing. It’s a smooth balance between keeping pressure on your rivals to stop them moving into key locations and ensuring you have enough focus to stop enemies from stopping your own progression.

I wanted to blow my opponents away in quicker circumstances. I played with some of the smaller, more geographically challenged nations and even played through as a nation questioning their current political views. For example, as North America I initiated attack on North Korea. Let’s face it, in a nuclear war the American’s would go after the North Koreans before they’d attack Britain. My point here is that it has a message to provide.

Blindflug are a self-proclaimed politically interested bunch of developers and their views do shine through strongly in the title. The introduction to the title mentions that even in 2014 the world has enough power to bomb itself back to the Stone Age. If you nuke a landmark city an overlay shows you how many people you just killed, it doesn’t add anything to the gameplay or the mechanics but gives you a sense that there is no winners in nuclear war. Its summary screen after a game is complete will even provide you with the message of “You Win?” and will show you how many people you killed, how many nations you destroyed and how many megatons of explosives you dropped. I feel that those statistics are less of a pat on the back and more a demonstration of what could honestly happen if one of these nations decided that today was the day to let fly.

It does lack any multiplayer functionality, it’s not a huge gap when you look at what the game is trying to achieve, but I feel that it may even help to provide its message with an even bigger force than it already does. Picture you are sitting with two friends playing First Strike. You are Western Europe, your opponents are Brazil and The United States. They quickly form an alliance and blow you up quicker than you can say “What the deuce?” and in Nuclear War, that could easily happen, and just as quickly! It may take some doing but a multiplayer option would be a huge thumbs up for me for this title.

In all honesty, First Strike: Nuclear Dawn is one of the most well rounded titles I’ve played on iOS and for it to be used for this genre on the tablet/phone platform is a bold, but well thought move. The music is suited to the environment and the sound effects work well when coupled with the UI elements. All of these well-crafted elements create a very immersive gameplay experience that should keep you coming back for more.

My only real concerns are that I’m not sure exactly how much enjoyment you can generate from a game like this when it has been completed on the hardest difficulty, with no multiplayer support. It wasn’t incredibly stable on my iPad mini and crashed occasionally mid fight, but this can obviously be patched closer to release or afterwards. I’m also concerned about the price point, Blindflug haven’t mentioned it anywhere on their material and with zero microtransactions to purchase I’m worried that they’ll price themselves into the “premium” market and have to go toe-to-toe with games such as Final Fantasy VI. Only time will tell when it is released in March on iOS and Android.

First Strike creates an unsettling view of nuclear power in today’s world. As you play, you can’t help but think that this could honestly happen at any moment and that almost takes the fun out of the title. It does make you take a step back and realise that this is still a huge danger in today’s world. It’s one of those rare games where the developer has set out to provide a clear message and delivers on this without being preachy or obnoxious. I tip my hat to Blindflug, a solid and well developed game with a solid message.

I have an update from Blindflug saying that they will have an update for stability in the launch release. Also they’ll be adding a multiplayer option if the game is received well. Go get this when it comes out guys!

Bill Laimbeer’s Combat Basketball - Hudson Soft - SNES (1991)

What? I hear you ask. Yes, that’s right Bill Laimbeer’s Combat Basketball for the SNES. Allow me to explain.

Bill Laimbeer was part of the notoriously rough Detroit Pistons team that won two NBA Championships in 1989 and 1990. He then went on to become a coach in the NBA and won numerous other accolades. Unless you’re a fan of late 80’s NBA that’s not really important. What is important is that his name and “likeness” were used for the first ever basketball game to be released for the Super Nintendo. There was no fanfare, no rapturous praise installed and no Game of the Year awards. In fact, I struggled to find any historic reviews at all, only finding two links on Wikipedia in which one reviewer stated:

“Ill-conceived controls, annoying sounds, and a number of other faults mar what could have been a guilty pleasure”

However, load it up now, and you might be pleasantly surprised. There’s no denying that it looks awful, the music is terrible and the controls come in 8 movements only, but, it has an undeniable charm.

I came across this game when playing some old SNES roms with a close friend. We were just mucking about with 2 player stuff. The usual, Bomberman, Mortal Kombat, Street Fighter 2. He was good at Street Fighter, I was good at Bomberman, and we’re both bad at Mortal Kombat. It was a fun night, but little did we realise how much better it was going to get when we found the hidden gem that is Bill Laimbeer’s Combat Basketball. Having a bit of a chuckle at the name we loaded it up to its Blood Dragon-esq opening screen.

And decided to give it a go. The game told us that the year was 2023 and that Bill Laimbeer has become the new commissioner of the NBA and throws out the rulebook. Contact is allowed, mines, bombs and other weapons litter the court and anything goes. (Well, you can’t go offside for some reason because you know, that breaks NBA protocol, but I digress) We immediately started to play, the first few games were tame. Hits here and there, little bit of banter. Cheering the 3 pointers. 30minutes later and we had become hardened veterans of Bill’s sick twisted game. Expletives were echoed around the living room, celebrations shook the building and the anger level was high. You FIGHT when you play Bill Laimbeer’s Combat Basketball, you throw your minions around the screen attempting to knock the ball loose, you curse their entire families when they miss shots and you want to elect them as president when they manage to score that miraculous shot in the dying seconds. You are happy when you win, but you know that it came at a cost!

What made the 2 player experience of Bill Laimbeer’s Combat Basketball incredibly entertaining and competitive? It’s simplified control scheme. One button to launch yourself at the ball carrier when you are on defence, one button to pass if used with a directional key and one button to shoot. All bound to the same button. We were both beginners and experts within 5 minutes and it felt good. This wasn’t like going up against a StarCraft Pro, or some Counter Strike wizard. Winning or losing purely came down to strategy and understanding of how far your guy would dive for the other guy.

We played this for hours, and I honestly think we tied victories by the end of it, but it was a whole load of fun. Thinking back it does bring a few questions that I think merit discussion in the age of the PlayStation 4 and Xbox One.

Why do we focus on having our tie-in titles be so serious?

Granted this was the age of Shaq Fu, and that endorsed games were big business. What’s stopping us in today’s age. Why can’t we have games like Ron Burgundy’s News Simulator or Leonardo Di Caprio’s Quest for an Oscar? Instead, we’re told that games that star celebrities need to be serious. Beyond Two Souls and The Last of Us for example. I can appreciate that the industry has grown with the age of its audience but surely we need games for fun. I know that Bill Laimbeer’s Combat Basketball and Shaq Fu would have been developed to be serious titles, designed to generate revenue for their endorsed stars, but can’t we have a bit of fun with this?

Have we went backwards with mechanics and is this a good thing?

This is more of a concern outside the world of Bill Laimbeer’s Combat Basketball but I feel it merits mention. This is a game that could very easily be adapted to tablet or smartphone. It would work well on this platform given its simplistic controls, I just fear that we are becoming a world of tappers. For all that is good, just have a look at Flappy Bird.

When was the last time you picked up a 2 player game and were both good at it straight away?

Nidhogg is probably the closest game I’ve seen to having this effect, but let’s be honest. Give someone 5 hours on Nidhogg and put them up against someone that’s never seen it before, they’re going to get absolutely slaughtered. There’s no tricks with Bill Laimbeer’s Combat Basketball, no front flips over opponents, no speed boost abilities. Yeah, it might not be an in-depth title but for what it is, it works well.

Maybe I’m on my soapbox screaming about how I want my multiplayer experiences in games to be. Maybe I’m being far too nostalgic for my own good. Maybe, just maybe, we need more games like Bill Laimbeer’s Combat Basketball.

The Sun at Night - Minicore Studios - PC (2014)

The Sun at Night is a 2D action platformer developed by Minicore Studios and attempts to provide an alternative reality portrayal of a dog named Laika. Laika was a real dog with a pretty tragic story, she was involved in the space race of the late 1950s and 1960s between the Soviets and the Americans. After the success of Sputnik 1, the first satellite launched into low orbit around the earth, the Russians wanted to test the impact of spaceflight on living creatures. Laika was a stray dog taken from the streets of Moscow then trained and selected to be launched aboard Sputnik 2. Laika was the first animal to orbit the Earth, but at the time there was no planned re-entry and Laika’s return to Earth was never expected. The Soviets claimed that after day 6 of the mission after her oxygen ran out or, as the Soviet government claimed, was euthanized prior to this. The face is that Laika died within hours after launch due to overheating.

This real life tragedy makes for compelling subject material and Minicore have decided to answer the question of “What If?” What if Laika makes it back to earth? Would she seek retribution? Would she be hailed as a hero? Would she have changed the face of the Cold War? There’s real scope here to tell create a powerful experience through a game and to highlight Laika’s story.

The game begins with you being shown a very short video of Laika crash landing on Earth. I only became aware of the backstory after watching some videos of the developers on their Steam Greenlight page, there’s no scope for this in the game. No explanation of who you are or what your overall goal is. Armed with Laika’s robotic suit, laser beam and full grasp of English in hand. You move forward, well, kill everything she comes across really. It’s a confusing change to what should be a tragic story, the first scene of the game opens with you shooting a seagull out of the sky with your laser beam, only to be found by a travelling soldier and to jump straight in his truck.

The mechanics of the game work well. I played with keyboard and mouse but it will run perfectly fine using a 360 pad. The controls are pretty smooth, overall combat feels rewarding and it is a pretty challenging game. Laika can use a force-field type shield that will block incoming damage and regenerates over time. Fail to use the shield and Laika will be mincemeat quickly, generating the feeling that Laika is pretty weak and defenceless without the shield. Which is nice, because she’s a dog, not a Super-soldier, it’s the right method to take. There’s a pretty large upgrade system and the game is open enough to not hold your hand and send you down tunnels. You can explore to your heart is content but it’s always pushing you in the direction it wants you to go in.

The artwork works well, Laika’s appearance and the majority of the NPCs are well realised and apart from enemies, are mostly unique. The animation can sometimes leave a lot to be desired but it’s not enough to be game breaking. For example, Laika’s blaster attack moves as smoothly as you would expect. The weapon has a 360 degree range of fire and this leads it to clip through Laika at strange and unusual angles. Also the enemies die and fade out, leaving nothing behind. The way the game is developed can sometimes have you kill an enemy off screen, not see that you’ve killed this character and then when you go looking find that it was dispatched of and has disappeared without a trace.

To complement the upgrade system there is a consumable known as Nano, this can be converted to health packs and shield packs among other things but is more of a pickup from the ground than a drop from the enemy. I never felt that I was really progressing until I was lucky enough to find this in random areas of the world and not be rewarded for killing that big old bad boss. It would also help with the feedback that you had killed an enemy if it left this behind. The Nano system is a two sided sword as it lets you chose what’s best for the task at hand and how your inventory is shaping up. I rarely used the shield packs and found that I was mostly using Nano for health. As the game progressively got harder I was using more and more health packs to the point where there was no real option. Nano = Health.

The chiptune music fits compliments the overall tone of the game and really drives the atmosphere of each area of the game. It’s not really hard to do right, but it’s nice to know when an area is safe and when the difficulty just shifted up a gear. The sound could be drastically overhauled in my honest opinion. All of the Soviet guards die in an echoed groan, and the transitions between scenes are just not that believable.

My biggest concern when taking into account the emotion of Laika’s real story has is that you are expected to instantly sympathise with her character. This was a horrible thing to happen in real life but when you give her a laser beam gun and have her go toe-to-toe with genetically modified tigers and bears I don’t really see the difference? I don’t see why I should feel sorry for Laika but not for the tiger? They’ve turned a selfless, dependant creature into a savage killing machine with no emotion. It just doesn’t add up at all. I’m frustrated as there’s so much scope for this story. When the developer could have had us control Sputnik 2 by making its onboard computers become self-aware and have us micromanage the trip back to Earth, trying to save Laika at every moment, that’s a game I can buy into.

Unfortunately I can’t help but think that “The Sun at Night” is trying to be cool and edgy. It was initially known as "Laika Returns” a much more descriptive title, and I’m left wondering why it was changed? Its overall mechanics work fine, but the story and method of delivery are way off the mark. Unfortunately, there’s nothing unique enough here for me to want to come back to “The Sun at Night” and that’s a shame, as the material they chose to work with is very strong. It’s the Indie Dante’s Inferno. Strong material, way off target game.