Yearly Archives: 2018

Don’t Starve Mega Pack Arrives in Retail Outlets in April

Don’t Starve Mega Pack is the original Don’t Starve experience, Don’t Starve Together (multiplayer add-on) and the game’s expansions, all bundled neatly together! It’s coming to retail stores for Playstation 4 and Xbox One on Tuesday, April 17th in North America, and Friday, April 20th in Europe. Survivalist enthusiasts can also look forward to a discount for Don’t Starve Mega Pack, as it will be on sale for 25% off (29.99) over purchasing the game and it’s expansions separately. Play as Wilson, a German Scientist, who is trapped in a mysterious world by demons. He must learn to exploit their harsh, unforgiving environment and the inhabitants of it, in order to return home. Randomly generated worlds filled with dark and eccentric visuals await, as well as a full range of hazards that only a full year of seasons can bring.

The Don’t Starve Mega Pack expands upon Don’t Starve‘s already content-rich gameplay with the following:

 Don’t Starve Together – A standalone multiplayer expansion to Don’t Starve where players must team up with their friends to gather resources and craft survival items, or strike out against their own, to last the nights.

  • Reign of Giants – An expansion pack that brings new characters, environments and beasts to the worlds of Don’t Starve and Don’t Starve Together! Reign of Giants brings new mysteries, scientific innovations, resources and massive creatures of the wilderness to either help you or kill Wilson and his companions;
  • Shipwrecked — A single player story expansion in which players will find themselves stranded on a tropical archipelago and must learn to survive all over again with new biomes, seasons, creatures, resources and recipes to discover, craft and survive against.

 The Don’t Starve Mega Pack also includes a custom controller skin (retail value $9.99) featuring high quality, full-color art of the distinctive creatures and inhabitants from the beloved franchise.

Playstation 4 survivors who purchase the Don’t Starve Mega Pack will also get two PS4 dynamic themes to enjoy as they play:

 The Shipwrecked theme:

  • Set sail and head to the tropical high seas with Wilson who has found himself in troubled waters. This fully animated theme from Don’t Starve: Shipwrecked is scored with official music and drawn in the game’s signature style.

Autumn Theme:

  • Wilson survives in Autumn in this animated theme from Don’t Starve. Scored with official music and drawn in the game’s signature style.

Broomstick League Mode Coming to Citadel: Forged with Fire

Citadel - Broomstick League  News

It’s almost time to get on your broomstick and compete with the best of them in Citadel: Forged with Fire!  Starting on March 7th, the Broomstick League mode will teleport players to an arena where they will be organized into teams of up to five, and take place in a sport for bragging rights that is similar to soccer. The matches will last five minutes, and players will have access to new passing and shooting mechanics to allow for nimble plays and dramatic moments. Goals scored in the large main net will be worth one point and goals scored in a smaller horizontal net will be worth two points. Score the most points to win the match! Probably the coolest part of this update, beyond fully playable brooms and armor, is the ability to unlock the Net and Ball Pedestal structure items, so you can have your own unique, special arena.

Huge Free Update to Dragon Ball Xenoverse 2 Now Available

The world of Dragon Ball Xenoverse 2 continues to grow and offer more options and customizations with this free update. New battle technologies have come to the game like Limit Burst (Temporary increase in strength to get an upper hand in a tense situation) and Flash Revive (Sacrifice hit-points to revive an ally). You can also now access the powerful SSGSS Transformation, as well as new Awoken Skill. Partner customizations have increased, along with additional outfits for player characters. Your Masters can also now become a partner in battle to unleash devastating combos and techniques with, once the friendship level is maxed out. More Figures and Scenarios are on the way to the Hero Colosseum, and there are even more updates coming in the form of 2 vs. 2 bouts for online battle!

Final Fantasy XV Windows Edition to Receive The Sims 4 Content

Square Enix has teamed up with Electronic Arts and Maxis, the studio behind The Sims to bring exclusive The Sims 4 content to Final Fantasy XV Windows Edition. From launch day (March 6th) through May 1st, players who purchase Final Fantasy XV Windows Edition via Origin will unlock a unique Sim-themed outfit, featuring the famous The Sims 4 Llama Suit and Plumbob for us by Noctis in the single-player campaign, and for players’ avatars in the multiplayer expansion, Comrades.

Players who pre-order the game from Origin will also receive the bonus “FFXV™ Decal Selection,” containing an array of colorful decals for the Regalia car celebrating Gladiolus, Prompto, and Ignis, along with the men and women of the Kingsglaive. The Sims 4 owners will also be able to download a special crowned prince Noctis Lucis Caelum outfit for their avatars to celebrate the launch of Final Fantasy XV: Windows Edition, starting on March 8th.

Tactical Monsters Coming Soon to Xbox One

Tactical Monsters Game Profile Banner
Camex has announced today that their tactical strategy game, Tactical Monsters will be coming soon to the Xbox One. In addition to bringing all of the legendary monsters and tactical gameplay, as well as DLC content fans, are familiar with, it will also offer Cross Play for people no matter what platform they are on.

Tactical Monsters has been well received by PC and mobile players, and we are excited to bring the quick strategic depth of the game to Xbox One,” said Michael Tseng, COO of Camex Games. “With over 1.5 million downloads and the new cross play capabilities, gamers will have even more opponents to challenge around the world whether they play on PC, mobile devices, or the Xbox One.”

Tactical Monsters features include:

  • Collect Unique Monsters – Battle through Adventure Mode to recruit unique monster cards and build an unstoppable army.
  • Train and Bring the Pain! – Gain experience in a variety of modes and level up your monsters to unlock ridiculous powers and destructive skills.
  • Survival Mode – Take on the Guerrilla Warfare Mode and run the gauntlet against a lineup of never-ending BOSSES.
  • Practice Makes Perfect – Sharpen your tactics and perfect your new monsters’ abilities by visiting Training Grounds.
  • Online Multiplayer – with more than half a million matches taking place every day, there’s always someone to battle in real-time live PvP as you fight to be the best in the world!
  • Tenacious D – Set your optimal defense formations and layouts inMine Defense.
  • Be Part of the Community – Ally with your clan mates to chat strategy, to share cards and be the #1 clan in your country.

Final Fantasy Awakening Launches for iOS

Final Fantasy Awakening on iOS

Final Fantasy Awakening, the game produced in the Final Fantasy Type-0 worldview has officially launched today on iOS. Already out for the past two weeks on Android has already surpassed 137,000 downloads. Authorized officially by Square Enix, was produced featuring high-quality work of many talented Japanese voice actors. Based in the world established by Final Fantasy Type-0, it features the games 14 classic characters, as well as many well-known story elements, such as Eidolon, Moogles, Magitek Armor, and much more. Interested iOS owners can acquire it right here.

Retro Review: Ogre Battle: March of the Black Queen (SNES/PSX)

by Jason Parker (Ragachak)

Retro Review - Ogre Battle - So Many Squads

It looks complicated. And it is! But it’s worth it. Promise.

Ogre Battle: March of the Black Queen was really a diamond in the rough, a real strange title. It was strange in that it instead of being a SNES/Sega Genesis title, it was a SNES/Playstation title! I cannot, off the top of my head, think of any other game that fit this qualification other than Romance of the Three Kingdoms IV: Wall of Fire. It was certainly a rare occurrence, at any rate. They’re the exact same game, but one is on a cartridge and one is on a disc. Are there any major differences? Before I talk about the game, there is something to be aware of, for those of you who collect retro cartridges/discs. The SNES game is identical in every way, except some of the aesthetics. In the Playstation version, unique characters keep their unique aesthetics/color palettes when they upgrade their classes, but they do not on the Super Nintendo version. If that really matters that much to you (and it can make finding characters a little easier in your menus, I’ll grant) then get the PSX version. The SNES version shines in that while its graphics aren’t quite as sharp or clean, it has no horrific load times and it won’t ever scratch!

Retro Review - Ogre Battle - Cutscene

They mean “Lodis”. Oh, 90s translations.

That’s a big difference for me. The 3D look of the battlefield is very nice on the Playstation version, and that’s the one I actually played first, thanks to a good friend who owned it. Now that we have that out of the way, what is Ogre Battle? Ogre Battle is a part of a series of RTS/RPG games, known in some circles as the Ogre Battle Saga. There are Ogre Battle games, which combine turn-based action with real-time strategy, and the turn-based strategy RPGs, the Tactics Ogre series. Today we’re going to focus on the first Ogre Battle, March of the Black Queen. The sequel was Tactics Ogre: Let Us Cling Together, though I did not see this until it came to the PSP. Fun fact, Ogre Battle was also available on the Sega Saturn! Curious that it did not appear on the Genesis. Maybe “Genesis does what Nintendon’t” isn’t so accurate after all, huh? Stay mad, Sega nerds.

Retro Review - Ogre Battle - Questionaire

Choose wisely. Or not. I’m not your mother.

Ogre Battle is based around the Tarot card system, and all of the Major Arcana (The Tower, The Fool, The Lovers, The Hanged Man, The Chariot, Strength, et cetera) play a role in the game. The story is a fairly standard medieval fantasy, built around a group of rebels trying to overthrow a corrupt Empire, and their struggles and woes. You’ll liberate towns, do battle with evil forces, and perhaps become a greater evil yourself. As it starts, you answer a series of questions based on these cards, and that will factor into what kind of character the main one is. You can come out with several options, and there are multiple FAQs online to help guide you to the character archetype you want if you want to cheese the system. Or you can answer in whatever moral fashion you see fit, and let God take the wheel. These cards also appear in the game as items you can use, to deal damage, help your units and so many other things, collecting them is not “important” so much as it is “useful”. This also plays into your Reputation, whether you’re good or evil. Certain units can be recruited this way, and some cannot. Liberating towns (determined by your parties average Reputation and class makeup) can increase Reputation, though Roshian Temples and Hidden Towns (maps you cannot see on the map) have no effect on this. Certain cards also raise your Reputation when drawing them after liberating a town. This can be lowered by dialogue choices, and drawing particular cards after liberating a town.

Retro Review - Ogre Battle - Deneb

Oh, Deneb. You and your silly pumpkins.

Fun fact: If you idle on the map too long, to farm Tribute and gain money, it will also lower your reputation. Reputation factors into your endings as well, being one of the first games on a console with multiple endings, some of which are terribly awful (such as the Demon possession ending). The gameplay is pretty simple, while also being infuriatingly complex. You move sets of units (set into squads) around a map, to complete particular objectives. You liberate shrines, towns, and recruit units and unique NPCs to your cause. As they grow in power, they can advance down trees, acquiring new forms and new abilities. Here’s where it gets complicated though. Each unit, monster or human, has a front row and a back row power. Depending on the party makeup, you can have a certain amount in the front/back, depending largely on the size of the unit I believe. This even extends to the main character, who has X power in the front and Y power in the back. So you have to figure out which teams work best together, and if it’s worth it to have 2 attacks from this place or just 1 from that spot on the team. Actual combat might look confusing as there really isn’t much information on the screen. It’s very much a learn-by-doing style.

Retro Review - Ogre Battle - Battle

Ogre Battle is the Dark Souls of RTS. Kidding, kidding, please don’t get mad.

Combat’s simple though in that regard. They auto-attack, using whatever power they would have for that spot on the team, and the initiative system takes care of who should attack when. You can use your Tarot cards in battle to interrupt the flow of gameplay and swing things back into your control, but you have no other ability to control what is done in power. Liberating these towns gives you tribute, as I said earlier, and that means more money! Money is great. Though movement on the map is very slow, (though some aquatic units felt faster on the water, and flying units overall felt faster). Enemies can take back towns from you, and can/will be aggressive when the time is right. Everything you do matters in Ogre Battle, from the decisions you make to the cards you draw and whether you re-take a town or not. There are hidden, powerful units you can acquire (such as the witch Deneb, and the Demon Galf), and recruiting some of these can also change your ending. A fine example is recruiting Galf will give you the Devil Ending, but to recruit him you must have certain specifications, like a completely empty Reputation meter. There are 13 endings, each named after one of the Major Arcana in the Tarot deck. This came out a full two years before Chrono Trigger, which also had tons of hidden endings.

LIBERATION! 5/5

Ogre Battle (Devil Ending) by Dragondarch (RPG Limit Break 2017 Part 25) - YouTu

What is the cost of freeing a Devil?

Ogre Battle is a true classic and one that most people when I was growing up had never heard of. The N64 Sequel was (in my opinion) absolutely awful, and if that was your first exposure to the franchise, you really would potentially miss out on something great. Though the SNES cartridge is frightfully expensive in some circles, it also saw a Virtual Console release on the Wii, and had a Playstation release which appears to have a cheaper cost overall. If you’re looking for an early/potentially unknown strategy game, you could not do better than Ogre Battle. It has tons of stuff to learn and unlock, absolute hordes of replay value from the endings to simply making your main character, and different team compositions/squad builds. Each time you play this it will be different. The game had wonderful music, a really stand-out sprite style, and was a tactical RPG in a time when they were neither popular nor plentiful in the US. The fact that you did not have to worry about actual combat was kind of nice, only preparing for it in advance (and using Tarot cards when needed) was certainly a fresh idea.

Subscribe and Punch

Subscribe and Punch is a 2D multiplayer fighting game packing their roster with Youtube gaming celebrities. Find out once and for all which Let’s Play’ing star would win in a bare knuckled brawl! Available for Windows.

Features:

Hey What’s Going On Guys?: Choose from one of the several personalities including Pewdiepie and Markiplier.

Vibrant as the Cast: The gorgeous animations and coloring work is a delight for the eyes.

Round 1 of Many: Enjoy a suite of gameplay options including a dialogue packed story mode, tutorials, versus, ranked, casual, replays, training, arcade, team battle, and a wacky physics arena.