The pitch for Republic of Pirates is straightforward enough: It’s a very light Anno, with a pirate theme. That should make it a pretty safe bet for a lot of folks out there, especially when it’s also priced as a very budget-friendly Anno. I’m not usually one to talk about…
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I’m sorry for being many hours late, lovely readers. Saturday was insane and I hit a wall yesterday. This article got delayed entirely because of where it falls chronologically, not because the games are lacking. They aren’t. It was actually quite difficult to narrow it down to a handful to…
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I have two things to say before I get started on my highlights of the Xbox Games Showcase 2024. One: screw Call of Duty, I’m not watching that or writing about it past a release date. Two: I don’t care if this was a showcase for Xbox generally speaking, this…
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Here’s a note for all developers out there: If you’re going to locate your game in a period of history or legend, and especially if it’s one where there isn’t an abundance of choices, then make sure that you actually do something about that period of history or legend. Earlier…
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You know that feeling where a game leaves you feeling totally satisfied? That you enjoyed every single second of it, and it left you wanting more, not because it was incomplete but simply because it was just that good? And that there was not a second where you felt like…
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My very first Warriors game was Samurai Warriors 3. I know, I came to the series late. The critics kept calling them “button mashers” in reviews and that made them sound very unappealing to me. Stupid, naïve me. I only played Samurai Warriors 3 because Nintendo decided to publish it…
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Schools are creepy places, and it doesn’t seem to matter which country you’re talking about, they’re going to be one of the most common settings for horror stories. The Bridge Curse 2: The Extraction is Taiwan’s turn to haunt a place of learning (in this case, a university), and it’s…
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Kogado Studio, one of the veterans of the Japanese industry, will be releasing its next game in a week, and it looks like it’ll be a good one. One-Inch Tactics promises a streamlined, elegant, and yet challenging board game-like tactical experience. There will be a wide range of tactical mechanics…
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4X strategy is a particularly challenging genre, given the number of dynamics at play. It’s not just that you need to give players a good military strategy experience. You also need to make the economic system interesting and strategic in its own right, implement a diplomacy system that isn’t easy…
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There is massive money on the table for the first localisation outfit that can produce high-quality translations of Chinese-developed games for their Western release. Unfortunately, we don’t have that localisation infrastructure yet. It has only been in the last decade or so that games from Taiwan and/or China have started…
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