We need to talk: Why roleplaying is not just an exercise of creativity and why game developers shouldn’t take stance on drama.

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Elder Scrolls Online is one of the most popular MMORPGs. Personally, I have been with them since beta. Recently my trust in developers was slightly shaken when loremaster Leamon Tuttle took a stance to a player complaining her roleplaying character wasn’t approved in the guild. The player in question shows a photoshopped screenshot, where her idea was laughed at. While the behavior was sub-optimal, the actual timing of the topic is dubious. Original discussion took place in March 2021 and Twitter revelation in October 2021. Note: I’m not going to post a player complaint and the attached picture as it contains player usernames and is not something that should be given time or validity.

Barlow's Dread Machine Early Access (English)

Arcade shooter for whole family

Ladies and Gentlemen come and see Barlows Dread Machine! Grand gaming automaton working on springs, cogs, and electricity. This automaton leads you to the tracks of morbid conspiracy. Our hero is an unnamed federal agent, who uncovers the anarcho-satanists (yep! that's what is said here) plot to kidnap president Roosevelt! Additionally, this game is well suitable for both the parent and child.

Broomstick League Early Access (english)

Not-Quiddich

“Records show that witches and wizards in Europe were using flying broomsticks as early as A.D. 962. A German illuminated manuscript of this period shows three warlocks dismounting from their brooms with looks of exquisite discomfort on their faces.” -Quidditch Through The Ages

The quote should end there as copyrights should be respected. Luckily Broomstick League is doing exactly that by placing the player to the team of three flying wizards. The goal of the team is to catch the ball and flung it through the magical mirror that is guarded by the opposite team. The commonalities between Harry Potter and Broomstick League end there. There are no balls that try to kill the players but more like fun with E-Sports in mind.

The Longing (english)

Waiting can be boring

Mountain King decides to take 400 days nap and leaves his kingdom to his shadow, telling him not to go outside. This starts out a long, idle adventuring game that deals with loneliness and time. The developer is Studio Seuf from Stuttgart, which is known better from Lucky Tower F2P-games. The Longing will be released at 5. Mar. 2020.

Luna - the Shadow Dust (english)

Luna - the Shadow Dust is oldschool point&click adventure competing our attention with more modern games. The story starts with kid finding himself at the root of the strange tower. The light seems to have vanished from the world. During his heroes journey he finds strange companion to aid him to reach the top of the tower.

Rebel Cops (english)

X-Convicts

Flirting with X-Com, the Rebel Cops sets its story to 1994 and small American town. East mafia boss Victor Zulev has taken over Ripton city, and everyone seems to be under his heel. Except you. Group of former cops and pensioners are actively fighting against organized crime. Games developer Weappy Studios has earned its merits by producing 'This is Police'-series of games.

Space Cows (english)

Fart power engage!

Evil Corporation has stolen farmers cow and now the man sets out to Outer Space to bring his belowed cow back, armed with only a toilet plunger.

Tech Support Error Unknown (english)

Big Brothers Helpdesk

Everybody has some experience of dealing with helpdesks and helping phone. Tech Support lets you be the customer adviser of the multinational Quasar-mobile firm. However, as an intern, you receive disturbing rumors that Quasar is gathering illegal information on its customers. As a helpdesk employee, you are required to navigate between what the firm wants and what is right. The games developer Dragon slumber is an indie developer that has published both Arelite Core and Astral Traveller for the PC platform previously.

BATALJ (english review)

Timechess from Space

BATALJ is a tactical level strategy game played against a human opponent. The goal of the game is to gain five winning points from the play area. The game is firstborn from the Swedish startup Fall Damage. Founded by four former DICE employees the focus is on a visually modern turn-based asymmetric strategy, with some wishes of it being viable for e-sports.

Singularity 5 (english review)

Fifth year of Singularity

At the year 2050 we are not living in a robot museum, but a dystopia ruled by Artifical Intelligence called Moore. The rebellion starts from Paris which is crowded with robot spiders of the AI. The player fights his way through the five levels putting robots out of commission. The game is pure wave shooter supported by stunning visuals. The indie-developer Monochrome is putting out their best visuals for the first game release of the studio.

Conarium (english review)

Under the Mountains of Madness

While mainstream movies don’t generally make use H.P. Lovecraft's mythos, the computer games have been illustrating its madness since the 90s. The writer himself regarded his stories as open source material already back at his days, so Conarium has taken its job to write a slight sequel to the 1931 novel At the Mountains of Madness. Main protagonist Frank Gilman from Miskatonic University wakes up from the Upuaut antarctic base without any previous recollection. Head hurts, and gibbous artifact of the unknown sort casts strange lights to the vacant room. Comprehension soon follows, something has gone amiss. What hideous secret lies behind the disappearance of the research crew and what demonic and indescribable things dwell in below?

Zoetrope Interactive has led many previous players to madness with its earlier Darkness Within-games. The PC version of the game was published a year ago and newly published Xbox version provided screenshots for this review.

Mages Intiation - Reign of Elements (english review)

The Retro-Sorcerer's Apprentice

D'Arc is sixteen years old mages apprentice. He has trained extensively in the elemental arts for the past decade of his young life, under the discerning eyes of the Mage Masters of Iginor. Confined to the existence of academics and magical mastery in their towering hall, the inquisitive initiate often wonders what it would be like to set foot outside in the world he has been secluded from.
As with all young Mage initiates in training, D'Arc's moment of reckoning arrives as Mage Masters put him to the test. D'Arc is tasked with completing three quests and save the kingdom as a bonus.
The game has been under development for whopping ten years and it Quest for Glory/Heroes Quest and Kings Quest-series of adventure games.  Himalaya Studios has been known before as Anonymous Game Developers Interactive (AGDI) and they have published several remakes of the old Sierra titles.

Minion Masters - Forced to Duel (english review)

Real time card game

What is Minion Masters? The definition is quite of a mouthful: “Fast paced real time strategy game which flirts with it’s game design to Hearthstone and League of Legends.” Two years ago the game was published to Early Access, with moderate time table and active development it saw the transformation to free to play in december 2018. Deceased youtube-legend Jim Sterling (TotalBiscuit) also gave thumbs up for the games alpha version.

Miscreated 1.0 beta (english)

Apocalypse, again.

A few years back one could go through the Steam and find loads of survival-crafting games. Back then many people noted Miscreated, though I never got time actually to test it. Price tag being one reason. Miscreated is a surviving crafting game with a hardcore twist. The scavenging is made more interest with dynamic weather and other players competing on same resources. While the game was released 2014 to Steam Early Access the progress on development has been slow sided, and December 2018 version 1.0 tries to find a new lift for the game.

War Thunder (english)

Free to play at land, air and sea

'Massive Multiplayer' is a term that is almost a perpetual motion machine by its own right. The idea to throw a huge number of people to the fights against each other guarantees every game is different. Human opponents make errors that no computer opponent wouldn't. MMOs are also the hotbed of discussion between kids and parents, latter not always understanding why 'five minutes more' would be good. War Thunder is a strong competitor with the World of Tanks, World of Airplanes and World of Warships-series of games. The content is , and development is active, for example, submarine game Silent Thunder is currently on closed testing. Thanks to the review code of the Helicopter addon, I'm focusing on this review on the flying machines more than naval or army assets.

NAIRI - Tower of Shirin (english review)

Nairi, furries and the secret of the tower

Nairi is a daughter of the council member who has to flee the town. Her teacher shows up quite suddenly telling that the guards captured her parents. After being smuggled out of the city, Nairi gets seized by desert bandits. NAIRI - Tower of Shirin is an adventure game which has anthropomorphic animals as well humans. Nairi works her way towards her family while exploring the dark secret of the Tower. In progress, she gets mixed up with the cult trying to cover up the secrets.

Bytecamp (english translation)

Bytecamp (Bittileiri) is a Finnish youth work innovation that has been able to gather teens to the LAN party several times in the year since 1994. In Finland, the professional youth work has been traditionally been provided by the Lutheran church which the municipalities are picking up after 2005 youth work legislation was passed. Bytecamp is the long-standing activity of the Federation of Evangelical Lutheran Parishes in Tampere. During the semester vacation, the camp gathered 36 teens of age 12-16 and some eight volunteering adults.

Lydia (Eng)

Monster in the family

Alko is the national alcoholic retailing monopoly in Finland. The actual propaganda from the dangers of the substances is also part of their charter. Using games as tools for propaganda is an older thing than most think, the long lost game ‘Promille’ was just found from the forest (not kidding) and some adults might still remember the game called Hup-peli (1987). Lydia is a fresh addition and it’s controversialism generated some debate while back. The game received its place in hall-of-fame in the Finnish Gaming museum. The game deals the family and its substance abuse which generates unimaginable fears to the small girl Lydia. Partly surrealistic depictions convey an important message to the player and show that games can deal with serious issues.

Do Not Feed The Monkeys (Beta) (English)

Little-Big Brother

Dear New member of the Primate Observation Club.

1) The Club is organization dedicated to the study of primates in their natural habitat. You can observe specimens in their cages with your MonkeyVision 2.1 application.

2) To maintain your club privileges you will be obligated to purchase cages every 5 days.

3) If you haven’t met your target, you will be expelled immediately

4) Do not discuss the Club or it’s activities to anyone. Never uninstall the application.

5) And above all, do not forget that interaction with the primates is strictly forbidden. DO NOT FEED THE MONKEYS

*In the event of any infringement of these rules you grant the Club absolute right to apply relevant disciplinary measures to me.

Humans Fall Flat (English)

Equally frustrating

 

Crash test dummy makes his way through the puzzle world. The name hints that humans are good at falling and this is rubbed to players face by making the controls challenging, much like in the 'Totally Accurate' games. The innovation of the game is that there's no one sure way to reach the goal but many depending on how clever the player gets.