The Binding of Isaac is a disturbing roguelike shooter based loosely on the Bible story for, uh, the binding of Isaac. It’s also one of the most creative and addictive games I’ve played in years. Now it has DLC.
You know when someone comes up with one of those really good ideas you wish you’d thought of? Brian Kent and Matt Clark are two such people. Their podcast, Late to the Party, considers games in pairs, comparing an older classic to a recent game. They invited me to join them to compare Dead Rising 2 and Resident Evil 5. But, you know, zombies. Zombies are way too big to confine a discussion to two games. For instance, this Qt3 Games Podcast, with freelancer writer and fellow zombie aficionado John Brownlee, hits the three hour mark. Like zombies themselves, zombie discussions just keep on going. Listen to the latest Late to the Party here.
So how is everyone else playing Diablo III? Blizzard offers some stats:
* On average players have created 3 characters each
* 80% of characters are between levels 1 and 30
* 1.9% of characters have unlocked Inferno difficulty
* 54% of Hardcore players chose a female character
* The majority of Hardcore deaths (35%) occur in Act I Normal
* The most common level 60 build in the game is only used by 0.7% of level 60 characters of that class (not including Passive diversity)
* The most used runes for each class at level 60 are Barbarian: Best Served Cold, Demon Hunter: Lingering Fog, Wizard: Mirror Skin, Monk: Peaceful Repose, Witch Doctor: Numbing Dart
Blizzard’s design update explains what to expect in the next two patches. It also has some comments on tuning inferno difficulty, legendary items, and this tidbit on balancing skills:
If any single skill or rune feels absolutely required to progress, it means that skill is working against our goal of encouraging build diversity — and those “required” skills need to be corrected.
Of course, that’s how I feel about pretty much every skill I’m using, but that changes as soon as I experiment with another skill. I can’t begin to imagine what Diablo III’s balance looks like to Blizzard, from a high level looking down at the reams of data they’ve collected. But from where I’m sitting, down in the trenches of nightmare mode, only starting to scratch the surface of the game’s tougher choices, one of my favorite things about Diablo III is its sense of tuning. From my perspective, the most powerful class is whichever one I just got done playing.
You know that annoying thing your buddy does when he pulls up in his car to pick you up? As you reach for the door, he lurches the car forward so you have to run and catch up. Then he does it again. And again. And it’s not funny, but what are you going to do, stand there until he backs up? That’s the situation with Dirt Showdown, which was supposed to be out this week and has instead lurched forward to June 12. Actually, it’s already out on the PC, but who plays a game like Dirt Showdown on a PC?
Maybe Dirt Showdown didn’t want to compete with this week’s Mad Riders, an ATV racing game from Techland that has a totally different name than the last ATV racing game from Techland. The one they released last year was called Nail’d. This one is called Mad Riders. See? Mad Riders is available for download for the PS3 and 360.
Also out this week is the Harley Quinn DLC for Arkham City, which is more than just a new skin to use in the combat challenges. The press release promises “more than two hours” of gameplay as you alternate between Batman and Robin, which should delight Robin fans, assuming there is any such thing.
I’m mostly pretty good at marshaling the appropriate amount of fury for things like always-online DRM, in-app purchases, and free-to-play design compromises. But when games are as good as Lord of the Rings Online, Anno 2070, and Diablo III, I eventually just shrug and feel grateful that I’m playing a game this good (see also the extra box office take for The Avengers because it’s in 3D). At a certain point, you have to accept defeat, let go of your anger, and be glad when good things are successful, even if you don’t like aspects of their success.
In the case of Jetpack Joyride, that point involves cute dogs.
Having recently decided that hardcore is the way to go in Diablo III, I love this video. I think of it as a light-hearted primer to prepare myself for the inevitable moment of my character’s death. Because hardcore Diablo III is like real life in that it’s not a matter of if you will die, but when you will die.
NSFW, naturally.
(Thanks charmtrap!)
Zen Studios announces Kickbeat for the Playstation Vita:
The game combines beat-matching mechanics with an acrobatic style of martial arts, turning every song into a raucous battle.
I just hope this isn’t eating into the time they should be spending on one of these. I still shake my head sadly to think what pinball tables I’m not playing because of Zen’s minigolf game.
To quote stylist Tyler Durden, you are not your fucking khakis. Neither are you your Socketed Silk Britches of the Bear. With that in mind, let’s try to look our best while we’re fighting the minions of Diablo, lord of whatever he’s lord of. I couldn’t hear when they explained that part because my ensemble was too loud.
After the jump, barbarian makeover Continue reading →
Tentacle rape does not exist. It is a fantasy, like women wearing high heels in bed, hot chicks banging pizza delivery boys, condomless impersonal consequence-free sex, and orcs. Like many fantasies, tentacle rape will appeal to some adults. I don’t pretend to understand that particular kink, but as someone with his own kinks (Is it too much information to mention Sarah Palin here?), I’m not going to judge someone else’s fantasy.
Not all folks are that accommodating. For instance, Luke Plunkett at Kotaku and Brandon Sheffield at Insert Credit, both of whom are intelligent writers with lots of insight into and experience with the fantasy worlds of videogaming. According to circumstantial evidence, they were instrumental in getting Kickstarter to cancel the funding campaign for Tentacle Bento. Plunkett and Sheffield both objected to Kickstarter allowing the project, which is a tabletop card game with a tentacle rape theme.
After the jump, the writhing powerful clutches of moral outrage Continue reading →
This week’s wallet threat level is as low as it is mainly because Defender Chronicles II is so cheap and Mario Tennis is so specific. But they’re both quite good. Defender Chronicles II for the iPhone is a ridiculously generous and long-term investment in tower defense RPGing, even more generous and more long-term than the original. So one of the best tower defense games you can play on any platform just got better. Mario Tennis Open for the Nintendo 3DS is one of those games I like in spite of the Mario goofiness. It’s not just enthusiastic and colorful. It combines the slickness of Virtua Tennis with the finesse of the Top Spin series.
I find Dragon’s Dogma a real chore so far. Capcom has assembled a collection of bad choices, from ugly world building to awkward combat to a wretched party system to the very name. I haven’t played such a “what were they thinking?” game in a while.
Also out this week is Ghost Recon: Future Soldier.
To the unintiated, the above image just looks like a random hex party. But to folks who’ve played Neuroshima Hex, it looks like the turn from hell. Imagine trying to parse what’s going to happen in that turn.
Neuroshima Hex is a boardgame in which players take turns laying tiles representing post-apocalyptic armies. The tiles variously shoot, pin, cover, protect, enhance, and trump each other. At some point someone lays down a “go!” tile and then it all falls apart in methodically brutal and spectacular fashion. Well, as spectacular as a mathy but atmospheric tile-laying game can be.
The iPhone port of Neuroshima Hex is great stuff, except that it has a good AI. This is one of those games, like chess, that’s built for AI. AI that is better than you (me), even when it’s not very good. Neuroshima Hex is all about looking at patterns and anticipating how the pieces will interact over several successive moves. Since computers have an unfair advantage in that department, it’s too bad you can’t play Neuroshima Hex against your dumb friends on Gamecenter. Like me.
But all that changes soon. The developers at Big Daddy Creations just announced the long promised (free) multiplayer update has just been submitted to Apple! So if you’re dumber than me — surely there are a few of you out there — hit me up on Gamecenter and we’ll see whose mental capacity to look ahead is smallest.
After Diablo III’s first twelve hours in the wild, I can safely say this online only experience is not your Battlechest’s Diablo! Think of this as the new Diablo. Diablo 2.0, if you will. It’s a whole other thing. And as such, you might need some help.
After the jump, I bring you the wisdom that can only come from first-hand experience Continue reading →
I used to think I was above Kickstarter. That was about $200 ago.
After the jump, I blame Cthulhu and Louis XIV Continue reading →
This week sees the release of some shooter called John Hurt 3 or something. I think we also get a Throne of Games RPG or some such. Whatever. I can’t really see anything past midnight tonight, when Diablo III goes live.
I love a boardgame port that’s unashamed of its roots. Conflict of Heroes: Awakening the Bear — don’t think I don’t hear you snickering at that name — is a World War II tactical tabletop game that isn’t afraid to invoke a touch of Squad Leader’s complexity, but prefers to veer closer to the beer-and-pretzels of a Memoir ’44 match. The port just published by Matrix lets you play with wargaming chits (pictured) instead of the usual 3D low-rent models. Thank you, Matrix! Furthermore, all the rules, stats, and modifiers are at your fingertips with easy tooltips. It even shows you the results of every die roll.
But sometimes that’s not enough. Consider how often disgruntled gamers accuse computers of cheating the die rolls, usually because they remember that time they needed to roll a three or higher on 2D6 and, hey, snake-eyes? What the…? What are the odds? The computer must be cheating!
Conflict of Heroes has an answer to that. If you can angle your webcam in such a way to look down at a pair of rolled dice — actual, real-world, tabletop, analog dice, preferably white with black pips — you can tell the game to determine every die roll by referring to the dice rolled under the webcam. If your reaction to this rather adorable solution is ‘Well, hey, why don’t you just play the tabletop version instead?’, then I’m kicking you out of the boardgaming nerd club.
