Progress on Octaforge

One of the newer engine/game projects I have been following closely is Octaforge. It is basically a fork of Tesseract, which in turn is an graphic improvement project by the makers of the well known Cube2 engine.

The main difference with Octaforge is that aims to become a game SDK and platform for easy creation of mods; And one of its prime new features for this is full scriptability with Lua.

Read about their progress on the latest beta here, which also includes this nice video showcasing the new player model and an test map:

Warhammer 40,000: Dawn of War II

Developer: Relic Entertainment

Publisher: THQ

Played on: Dawn of War 2 Complete Collection

The original Dawn of War was a fun game though a bit low on content, but, once all three expansion packs were installed, the sheer ammount of content coupled with the perfectly balanced gameplay turned into one of my favorite games in the genre.

Now, rather than making yet another expansion (which I'd be perfectly fine with) they decided to launch a full-fledged sequel... which I'm also perfectly fine with.

The story is completely unrelated to the previous Dawn of War games, here, you assume the role of a silent character commanding a different chapter of the Blood Ravens who must battle an invasion from Orks, Eldar and for the first time ever in the series, the Tyranids. I didn't care much for the plot itself, but I definitely enjoyed the character interactions as your squad leaders didn't always see eye to eye with their comrades or other outside forces.

Plot isn't the only aspect where Dawn of War 2 breaks away from the prequel as the gameplay is now radically different, especially in the single player campaign. For starters, there's absolutely no resource collecting or unit production in the campaign mode, they are however available in the multiplayer modes, but even then there's still no base building. instead, when tackling the campaign, you will control a limited number of squads in a gameplay mix of RTS with dungeon crawler. This means each squad acts as a different 'class' as they level up, are assigned stats and equipped with better gear. 

You can assume a total of 6 squadrons though you can only take four with you, this army size limitation forces you to think tactically as you try to complete each objective and I was very surprised at how flexible your teams were. Depending on the gear, teams and stats chosen, I could easily shift between a heavy attack force capable of dealing high damage to most enemy types, or change to a nimble and stealthy approach. Should one of your squads be destroyed you can easily revive its sergeant, though you'll have to capture specific points if you want to recover any other lost soldiers.

I did get to play a bit of the campaign through co-op, but I didn't much care for this mode. I was expecting the second player to bring in squad reinforcements, but instead, all it does is halve the available units for each. Needless to say, if you're not perfectly in tune with your co-op buddy chances are the game just got a lot more difficult.

At first I found the game quite boring, but the campaign really picked up in intensity as you're given sets of story based missions coupled with randomly generated side-missions that need to be completed in a certain amount of time. Unfortunately, there aren't there aren't a lot of maps or objectives to accomplish so repetition does set in quite quickly as you find yourself running through the same locations killing the same enemies over and over.

Over on the multiplayer side of things the game changes to a more somewhat typical RTS style. While there is still no base building, you can capture various points throughout the map that automatically collect resources which can in turn be used to purchase or upgrade units. Despite this gameplay change, you have a population cap of a mere 10 squads per player, and considering there are no modes featuring more than 3 on 3 skirmishes, the battles will always at a small/medium scale. 

Dawn of War 2's most dire issue isn't in the game though. Instead it's in the online services it uses, namely Games For Windows Live which will be shut down in July of 2014 and with it goes any chance of online interaction with other players.

Overall I quite enjoyed Dawn of War 2, though the game is far from perfect. The campaign is fun but it becomes a bit repetitive, you can play it in co-op if you want but I'd really advise against it. The competitive online portions on the other hand are very fun but feel like an entirely different game altogether. Unfortunately as stated before, Games For Windows Live will shut down next year and with it, any chance of online play, so yes, I'm making the decision of including the end of GFWL as a con in the review.

Pros:

- Fun and enticing tactical gameplay that's easy to learn and hard to master
- Campaign is a nice mix of RTS and Diablo style gameplay
- Competitive Online modes feel entirely different, but are still very fun

Cons:

- Campaign gets repetitive after a while

- Co-op mode isn't very fun
- When Games for Windows Live shuts down all multiplayer mode will be gone forever

Final Grade: B

Packaging review to come soon

Zelda can now be free as in freedom

Not only from the clutches of Ganondorf, but also from the dominion of proprietary software. All thanks to the magnificent Solarus Engine, a GPLed, SDL-based, 2D action RPG engine. This amazing project aims to provide a stable and easily customizable platform for users to create their own Zelda-like games, and so far, I must say, I am darn impressed by what I've seen. The engine already has two incredible launching titles, named The Legend of Zelda: Mystery of Solarus DX, and a parody of the former, Mystery of Solarus XD. Both are true love letters to the classic SNES RPG, The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past, and amazing and enjoyable games on their own.

Mystery of Solarus DX

But hark, the mere words of a mortal make no justice to the grandiosity of this undertaking. Sheathe thy sword, get thy green cap and ready yourself to adventure! You can start by marching straight to the Solarus download section, or, if your intentions are more creative, you can check the various sources here, and the quest editor here.

Code License: GPLv3
Mystery of Solarus DX Artwork License: Mixed  (original Solarus assets under CC-BY-SA, but the game also uses spritework taken directly the A Link to the Past rom)

Candle Quest keeps selling out at Amazon.com

When Candle Quest is in stock on Amazon, you can find it here. In the meantime, you can still buy it here, here, here, and here (UK).

I just sorted through my Magic cards and separated out the rares I have accumulated over the last few years. I'm happy to trade them for recent non-rares in bulk. I don't usually buy magic cards ... *dramatic pause* but when I do, I buy commons.

The only game I expect to receive this Hanukkah is from my secret santa. There was some scrambling around on his/her part on how to deliver it inexpensively, but I am assured that something will arrive.

Saarya finished the army service part of hesder and has returned to yeshiva (Yerucham). Tal is starting psychometric with the eventual aim of teaching. I continue apace.

Happy Hanukkah, boys and girls. May your flames burn strong, may your latkes be tasty, and may your gifts be received with joy.

Linux Game Awards voting open now!

Quietly in the background a group of open-source and Linux enthusiast websites (full disclosure: including FreeGamer ;) ) has developed a new platform for promoting open-source games: http://www.linuxgameawards.org/

One of its regular features will be a monthly award and a related promotion drive for the winner on all affiliated sites.

As a start, our community came up with the first 10 nominees for the January 2014 award and you can now vote for your favorite game of those here.

P.S.: One of the nominated projects, SuperTuxKart, had a new release today also. Don't forget to check it out and vote for them if you like it.

Holiday Racer 2.2 released (aka Stunt Rally)

Obviously someone is having a hard time with the winter in the northern hemisphere right now:

More awesome screenshots of Stunt Rally 2.2 here, and don't miss the details of the new version in the full change log.

Last but not least, discuss it on our forums :)

Lips of Suna 0.8.0 released

And another great new release :)

Our favorite work in progress & not quite serious anime RPG Lips of Suna bumps its release number to 0.8 (change-log).

I know what you are thinking...

Most notable changes:

• New player model and animations contributed by gruntunbur.
• Lots of sound effects contributed by qubodup.
• More powerful animation blending.
• Performance improvements.
• Better eye, face and hair color customization.
• Fixed the AI not being able to use many kind of weapons correctly.
• Procedural map area placement and planning system.
• Procedural dungeon generation with corridors, rooms, treasures and monsters.
• Balanced the movement speed and physics behavior of player characters.
• Terrain chunks close to the player character load much faster.

Comment away below or in our forums.

Addition (2013-11-21): Now there are also windows binaries available.

MegaGlest 3.9.0 released

Since I am having internet troubles as of late, I'll keep it short and hope it will actually come through:

Megaglest 3.9.0 was released today, see changelog:

v3.9.0
- we hopefully now really solved the last out of sync problems for cross platform games.
- animated tileset object support. ( like trees moving in the wind )
- new tileset texturing possibilities
- new tilesets birchforest, desert4 and updated mediterran using animated objects and new texture system
- greatly improved textures and animations for the roman faction
- new maps
- better network game performance / management to handle slower clients.
- easier ability to download game content from host and masterserver( if available there ).
- new arranged options menu with several sub menus
- menu gui improvements
- attack hotkey toggles through all attack types
- single player games can be sped up incrementally in steps.
- color picking is greatly improved and the default selection mode now for better compatibility
- greater ability to translate game content into your native language. (including techtrees)
- Added Hebrew, Arabic, Vietnamese (and others).
- screenshots for savegames without annoying menu in screenshot.
- addition of google-breakpad to better track down bugs.
- many new lua functions for scenario modders.
- cell coordinates are shown in the mapeditor
- tilesets can set default air unit heights
- added ability for stand alone mod's to customize more of the engine like about screen.
- performance improvements.
- and as always many bugs were fixed
- improved textures for tech faction

The Benefits of Playing Games with Others

The following is a guest post from Kathy Flute:

Games have a proven track record of bringing people together, whether through family game-nights or team-building corporate retreats. While games are designed to be entertaining, they also provide a considerable amount of developmental, physical social and mental benefits, especially when games are played with others.

Developmental Benefits
Playing games with others encourages the development of logic, critical thinking, coordination and spacial development, especially in children. Games force the brain to solve problems, as well as utilize association and recognition skills, especially when playing word games like Scrabble or strategy games like Monopoly. When a game requires the movement of game pieces, or requires participants to draw or act out key words or phases, this benefits hand-eye coordination and dexterity. Playing games also forces players to focus, which can help to increase attention spans. Games like Cranium or Pictionary also help people of all ages to develop creativity, innovation and imagination.

Physical Benefits
Team games and sports that require movement have additional physical benefits. Active indoor games like Charades, or outdoor active games like tag increase physical activity, which increases exercise and burns calories. The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention recommends that all individuals get at least 150 minutes of exercise each week, and playing games can help meet those requirements when they involve running, jumping or other physical movements. The CDC recommends even greater amounts of physical activity for children, or about an hour a day. Staying active helps stave off obesity and a long list of conditions, ranging from heart disease to cancer. Over time, active team games help children develop healthy habits with benefits that will extend way beyond adulthood.

Social Benefits
Playing games with others helps build social and life skills, such as verbal abilities, teamwork and how to appropriately interact with others. These skills are especially important for developing children. Children can learn how to take turns and to talk appropriately to each other while playing. These skills help children build important relationships. Winning or losing activities also helps develop sportsmanship, and teaches children how to appropriately respond when things don't go as they want them to.

Mental Benefits
If you're more concerned with psychological issues, then playing games encourages social interaction, which can combat loneliness and reduce depression. Most games are designed to be entertaining and cause laughter, which reduces the presence of hormones that contribute to stress, such as cortisol and epinephrine. Even children experience marked mental health benefits from playing games, especially with outdoor games. In fact, playing games outdoors can help reduce symptoms of ADHD and emotional disorders in children, suggests Dr. Garrett Burris, a pediatric neurologist from the Baylor College of Medicine.

While any type of game provides benefits, look for those that include educational or physical activity elements for maximum benefit. Video games can offer some of the benefits listed above, though more physical and interactive activities are preferable. That said, every platform has its pros and its cons!

Kathy Flute is a mother of three earning her master's in special education who enjoys writing articles about family, teamwork, and the Top 10 Special Education Master's Degree Programs Online.

Everything is a Close Call

I tell this tired joke on occasion: "Just this morning as I was driving a car barreled by at 120 km/hour right over where I had been only a second earlier! I could have been killed!" Ha ha.

Though I laugh, there is a hidden truth to this joke. Real danger passes by us more often than we realize. We rely on the fallible reflexes, good intentions, and social contract obligations of tired and distracted strangers, or on being one of the faceless individuals in a teeming herd who happen to not be picked out by someone with evil intent on that day. We live in denial about this, because we have no choice.

Yesterday, I was tracking my girlfriend's El Al flight from Hong Kong back to Israel on a tracking website and it showed the plane passing over Iran (see above). I was expecting either of two things as I watched the plane crawl over Iran: a) news reports of a plane crash in Iran, or b) the display to update eventually with the correct route, since El Al planes certainly don't fly over Iran.

Sure enough, a little while later the map was redrawn with the plane 1,200 km further north, somewhere over Kazakhstan near the Caspian Sea. Well, at least I don't have to worry about a plane crash, I thought. A few minutes later there was a news report of a plane crash: in Kazan, Russia, about 1,900 km north of her flight.

Ok, the plane that crashed was a Boeing 737, the model with the most number of crashes (because it has flown the most number of flights, although earlier versions had a notorious rudder problem), while the El Al flight was a 777, a model with an excellent safety record. The Tatarstan Airlines plane was previously known to have problems and Russian airplanes are notoriously unsafe. Still, I was happy to hear when the El Al flight touched down safely in Tel Aviv.

I suppose my point is this: live every day as if it was your first. The world is full of wonder: trees, sky, joy, books, friends, working limbs. You were given the capacity to feel joy; use it whenever you can. And ... oh yeah: look both ways before you cross the street.

Movie Reviews: Ender's Game, Jobs, Thor: The Dark World

Ender's Game: Ender's Game - the movie - is about the possible immorality of resorting to violence as a proactive defense. This issue dominates any part of the movie that is not a video game walkthrough, which is about half of the movie. Ender's (Asa Butterfield) personality is just enough to sustain this theme; his comrades have nearly no personality, and, of his three mentors, Colonel Graf (Harrison Ford) and Major Anderson (Viola Davis) have one-dimensional personalities of devil/angel, while Mazer Rackham (Ben Kingsley) has none at all. But that's not really the problem: the problem is that this issue isn't interesting enough to sustain a movie. It's an overused trope and the movie doesn't have anything new to add to it.

In the future, Earth is attacked by bugs in spaceships, and they are beaten back by Earth's forces and the brilliance (?) of a guy named Mackham Razer. Children are then recruited to control Earth's forces in order to deal a blow to the bugs in their own system before they can regroup and send another invading force. Children are used because they are good at playing video games. Ender, in particular, is singled out because he has a tendency to kick harder than he has to in order to make a point.

The acting is fine, the sets are cool, but everything is rushed without follow-through. Ender is supposedly set up to be a loner during training, but a minute of screen-time later he already has a band of friends. He is supposed to be learning something in training, but there are only two or three training sequences and he seems to know everything he needs immediately.

I try not to let my knowledge of the book influence my review of the movie, but it's nearly unavoidable here. While a main plot point of the book is, indeed, the above moral issue about unnecessary violence as a form of defense, the great majority of the book is about Ender's training and transformation: his fear, his sleep deprivation, his isolation, his slow change from loner to leader, and the dozens of battles that slowly reveal how he learns to think in 3D and survive by fighting cheating with cheating. The last part of the book was represented ok by the movie, but that part is really just the necessary cap to the book. This movie is barely a version of the book at all.

The movie introduces Ender's brother and sister but makes little use of them. It uses the story of the bug entering Ender's private video game world, but doesn't explain how and doesn't explain how the bug - a queen no less - could be walking distance from Earth's great military base or communicate with Ender. It completely dispenses with all of Ender's and Bean's brilliance and all of the politics.

If you haven't read the book, the movie will be a bit confusing but will probably be ok. If you have read the book, you're curious to see it and it will probably be a bit of a letdown.

Bottom line: I wouldn't call it necessary viewing, but it wasn't bad. Better if you like watching video game walkthroughs.

Jobs: Ashton Kutcher plays Steve Jobs, from his latter days in college to his firing from Apple in the mid-1980s. There are some very short scenes of his return to Apple in the mid 1990s and an opening scene of him announcing the iPod.

The movie's interest to computer geeks and non-geeks is on par with that of The Social Network, which was a better movie. This one wasn't bad. However, the movie spends a whole lot of time on Jobs' negative traits and personal fights and too little time on the brilliance and fun he had and brought to others (and barely any time at all on Bill Gates, who was a seminal part of the Apple story). The actual interesting aspects of the inventions are not discussed. This movie was obviously someone's vendetta.

The early parts of the movie are more entertaining and colorful; the latter parts are mostly boardroom scenes that lead to their well-known conclusions. All of the supporting characters are good, especially Woz (Josh Gad). Ashton does fine, though he seems to be just slightly shy of doing a parody of Jobs' mannerisms at certain points.

Bottom line: Possibly worth seeing on a small screen, but not necessary viewing (there are other biopics about computers and Apple that are better (Pirates of Silicon Valley was a nice TV movie), and you should probably just read the book).

Thor: The Dark World: The movie Thor didn't excite me too much, though it was sometimes humorous and Loki is pretty charismatic. This entry is a bit better: still sometimes humorous, Loki is still charismatic, and the action sequences are well-paced and not all over-the-top, which lets the characters (at least the main ones) drive the action. But the movie is still depressing.

The plot is 12th generation recycled boredom: There was a big battle and a big artifact of power was hidden away, but a human stumbles onto it, and some bad guys chase the human to get it, and some lone good guys try to prevent it (in defiance of other good guys who want to do nothing), and the bad guys catch up to the human and take possession of the artifact, and just when they are about to use it ... they do and the entire universe is destroyed (yeah right). Sound like any other Marvel movies?

With the exception of quick scenes in which Sif (Jaimie Alexander), Thor's buddy, and Frigga (Rene Russo), Thor's mother, fight, the women in this movie are helpless victims. Natalie Portman is wasted, spending her on-screen time fainting.

This movie has very little to do with its Norse mythology source; I know little about comics, but I suspect that it has little to do with its comic source, either. It's just a Marvel action movie, with little to distinguish it from every other Marvel action movie; and frankly, they're getting tiring.

The gods, and Asgard in general, are far more foolish and vulnerable than they should be. The mythology made them vulnerable, but not to simple attacks by space ships or basic deception that any mortal earthling would see coming a mile away. Asgard's line of defense is taken straight from the Gungans in The Phantom Menace: a field generator and some inaccurate laser guns.

Things made of rock fall to pieces all over the place, but if a main character is in a building, it doesn't fall on his head, even if all the support columns are knocked out. And no one cares about the thousand of innocents killed in all of the other buildings.

Lastly, and I can't go into it because it's a spoiler alert, but the major plot point around Loki's character is Badly Plotted. He steals all his scenes, and has good lines, but the movie introduces a plot turn for him and then undermines it with a bad resolution.

Bottom line: If you're into Marvel movies, this one holds up like the others - and it's better than Iron Man 3 - so I can't stop you.