I like Gears of War, I also like Dead Space, I even like Army of Two. You know what game I love though? Transformers: Fall of Cybertron (FoC). Now this isn’t because I love the Transformers franchise, this is because it’s a down right brilliant Third Person Shooter (TPS) that seems to do everything it needs to… that little bit better than it’s genre brethren. Here’s what I mean.
“I didn’t care if I was in Heaven or Hell – all I wanted was to kill my assassins. Sometimes you get what you wish for. The Necromancer Mortanius offered me a chance for vengeance. And like a fool, I jumped at his offer without considering the cost. Nothing is free. Not even revenge.” – Kain
One of the most magnificent bastards in video games, Kain the vampire began his undead life in the 1996 PlayStation title Blood Omen: Legacy of Kain (the game receiving the more to-the-point title of Kain the Vampire in Japan), an action-adventure game featuring RPG elements, with two-dimensional graphics and a fixed top-down camera.
At the time of Blood Omen’s development and release, storytelling in console games was still emerging from its infancy, from the days when the plots to so many games featuring any kind of narrative followed the basic “Defeat villain + save princess and / or world = success” formula, and when characterisation carried about as much weight in the game development process as an anorexic midget.
But Blood Omen and protagonist Kain were very different beasts. Story and characterisation were placed at the heart of the game right from the very beginning, with Kain turning out to be a complicated and multilayered character. Ostensibly an undead monster who fed on the living, Kain was indeed violent, arrogant, and ruthless, but there was more to him than that – during the course of the story, Kain was also shown to be intelligent, nostalgic regarding his homeland but contemptuous of his former life, appreciative of beauty, disdainful of political machinations, and afraid of transforming into an utterly twisted and depraved monster.
No one knows what’s going on in today’s episode. We accidentally talk about heaps of stuff though from the many game announcements of PAX East to the resignation of EA’s John Riccitello. Defiance has finally lifted its NDA so we’re free to talk about all our mutant shooting fun. Plus there’s a new crowd funding site making the rounds!
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Show notes after the jump.
Paul Taylor of Mode 7 Games (Frozen Synapse) chats to us about their new project. Frozen Endzone is a simultaneous, turn based future sports game being developed for the PC, Mac and Linux platforms. Personally I’d call it a sexy, thinking game about robots being made for computers.
There’s nothing like teen love. Certainly teen love involving videogame characters is just as unique. Probably even more so. Although I’m not one to judge.
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Next week: Top 5 Controversial games that caused no controversy
Put on your pants as we’ve got company! Developer Liam Hill joins us for a chat about the week’s goings on. From the future of AAA development to the future of Saints Row’s T&A, hoes and foes, Kickstarters that have a really excited and the scariest game we’ve seen all month. Ben also talks about cookies.
Grab the episode here or subscribe to us on iTunes
Show notes after the jump.
Got a couple of bucks? Then you can play these games!
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Next Week: Top 5 Videogame Characters to have a Teen Romance with.
Bioshock Infinite is almost upon us, bringing with it the new playground of Columbia. All this hype over a new Bioshock game got me thinking back to where it all began. I remember the trailers for Bioshock giving me goose bumps and getting all hyped up about the Big Daddies. This naturally led me back to picking up the game again (I sold it a while back) and I’m so, so glad I did. So here are 5 stand out reasons to dig out Bioshock again in preparation for the release of Infinite.
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Eight and a Half Bit 