Archive for March 11th, 2013

SimCity Societies: better living through knitting
, | Game diaries

SewCity

As you may know, Electronic Arts publishes one of the worst citybuilders you can play, and one of the best. I’ve been heartily enjoying the latter now that I’m no longer playing the former. SimCity: Societies, a 2007 game created by the folks at Tilted Mill who know citybuilders like no one else, takes a unique approach to the genre. Love it or hate it, you haven’t built a city like this.

Many citybuilders are based on a “gardening” model. You stake out rows for particular crops, make sure the conditions are right, and stand back while they grow. It’s an organic and arguably realistic approach to how cities develop. But SimCity Societies is nothing like planting a garden. It’s more like fitting together unique pieces to create elaborate clockwork systems with unique personality. And one of the game’s strengths is how much personality you’ll find in the different pieces.

After the jump, let me tell you about one of the pieces. Bring your knitting needle. Continue reading →

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Flight attendant saves the day in Mayday! Emergency Landing
, | Games

you_have_clearance_clarice

From the press release for Mayday! Emergency Landing:

Landing is that part of the flight, where an aircraft returns to the ground. Easier said than done: sometimes it’s not that trivial to pilot an aircraft through strong winds, a deep fog or a roaring thunderstorm. Mayday! Emergency Landing…challenges players to overcome the fiercest difficulties and have their planes touch the ground safely all by keeping the passengers as happy as possible.

I have no idea whether this iOS game, which includes “heartbreaking airplane failures”, is any good. But I love that the stewardess — I think I should be allowed to call her that if she’s going to dress so old school — is giving directions. Take that, George Kennedy!

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March 11: wallet threat level Kerrigan with dreads
, | Features

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I’ve been jumping back into Starcraft II and discovering it’s a muscle you need to exercise or it will atrophy. So what do I do after building a spawn pool? But regardless of how bad you suck, you can’t shuffle units around in this game without re-appreciating that it’s a finely tuned RTS that couldn’t possibly be more finely tuned. Or could it? We find out this week. And we also get one of those campaigns with crazily elaborate production values to distract you from the fact that you’re just flinging blobs of units at a mostly passive AI. But frankly, I think I care less about Heart of the Swarm being a Starcraft II add-on than I care about it being a Blizzard game.

Also out this week, a $10 add-on for Dead Space 3 called Awakened makes this almost infinitely replayable sci-fi shooter/meat stompin’ sim even more playable. You had me at telemetry spike, Dead Space 3. Just give me more weird things to shoot and new ways to shoot them.

Also, Sony’s taking one last half-hearted Playstation 3 stab at the God of War franchise. Remember that one? The angry bald guy with the tattoos who yelled “Zeus!” a lot?

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