"Lets get naked and take a swim in the lake!"

Oh man its Adventure time! No not the cartoon with the stretchy dog, I'm talking about an actually adventure game. It's called Fable.

No, not this Fable

 In Fable you play as a dude named Quickthorpe, and you need to go find magic gems. Made back in 1996 and developed by a team called Simbiosis Interactive, Fable follows the old formula of adventure games, IE there's plenty of humor and numerous ways to die.

It's going

 Its hard to talk about adventure games without giving things away, but if you've played a point and click adventure game before you should know what to expect. If you're a fan of adventure games in general, like games with humor, or you're trying to learn weird and unexpected ways of getting out of sticky situations then Fable might be what you're looking for.

"An ice covered lake in an adventure game? I'm sure it'll be completely safe"

You can snag Fable here

Sword fights, spikes, and guillotines

In every kingdom in fiction ever, the right hand man adviser is always an even back stabbing jerk, without fail. So it should come with no surprise that when today's game has one, of course he's the bad guy you're out to stop. That game is Prince of Persia! No, not that time bending ones, the original.

Look at how evil that beard and mustache is

Originally coming out in 1989, and being made by one dude, Jordan Mechner (who with a name like that may very well be a robot) in college , Prince of Persia wasnt a big success at first, not that you would think that given that its still chugging along years later, and even got a relatively decent movie. Only when Prince of Persia was released in Europe and Japan the next year was when it really took off. It was ported over to more than twenty platforms over the years so Mechner clearly knew what he was doing

Disney why

At first Prince of Persia just looks like a platformer, what helped it stand apart at the time of its release was it's rotoscoped animation inspired by the movies The Adventures of Robin Hood" and "Raiders of the Lost Ark", and its sword fighting as most other games at the time used projectiles instead because it was easier. Another key feature in Prince of Persia is the built in time limit, you have one hour to get in, save the princess and beat Jaffar into the floor for being a dick. Are you fast enough? Only one way to find out.

KNEES TO CHEST, PUMP THOSE LEGS

The original Prince of Persia is a favorite of many even years later, so if any of the above draws you in at all, or if you like traps and sword fighting in general, or if you want to play this to remind yourself that when YOU run things to never have an adviser to avoid a "power behind the throne" situation, then this game might be for you!

"Meet me later in that shadowy alley by murder street, bring all you're money. You trust me right?"

You can get Prince of Persia from a lot of places, like here

Rule your domain with an iron fist and high rent

Hey! You ever want to be in total control of a major building? From construction, interior design, to who you let in? Well you can't be Donald Trump, but you CAN play this game! It's called SIM Tower, and it will probably let you live out your sick, frightening, power fantasies.

It all seems so innocent at the start

SIM Tower is just that, another addition to the SIM series, but instead of building a vast city, or controlling and torturing a small number of people, you're in charge of the daily business of a skyscraper. Starting from scratch on ground level, you can build up to eighty levels straight into the sky, and straight down into the ground. You have full control over what goes where, how far up the elevators go, and how much is rent. You could be a benevolent landlord and build your tower in a sensible way, or you could demand and arm and a leg from your tenants, and have no elevators at all to purge the weak, old, and sickly from your domain.

"YOU'LL LIVE IN ROACH INFESTED CELLS AND LIKE IT"

So, if you're working off stress from work and want to mess with people who cant fight back, practicing designing your own REAL LIFE sky scraper (you internet architect, you), or you're thinking about how you're going to design your underground doomsday bunker and are planning on flipping your completed tower upside down and using that, SIM Tower might be what you're looking for.

"I accept rent in food, water, and ammo"

You can get SIM Tower here

A thousand ways to die horribly: the game

Haha! Time for a game that's so schizophrenic in tone I don't even know what to make of it! The game today is Heart of Darkness. No, not the book about colonial racism and the ivory trade in the Congo by Joesph Conrad, I'm talking about the game about a boy, his dog, and his....thing.

The less said about these the better

 Heart of Darkness is a side scrolling, puzzle solving, platforming adventure game, and on the surface it looks like a kids movie, with really good art, but with a deeper look things get weird. See, the kid you play as can die. Normally this would illicit a "DUH" reaction, but the extend this game goes into animating different ways for this kid to die gets a little excessive. Crushed by rocks, burned by fireballs, eaten by the various nightmarish creatures in the game, falling into lava, drowning, being burned by fireballs underwater, and more. All with their own separate cringe inducing animations and bone snapping sound effects. By all rights, if this game had gore these deaths would be shooting blood and viscera all over the damn place.

We've come a long way since 1998

The plot of the game is that Andy, our protagonist and hero for this game, is out with his dog Whiskey during a surprise eclipse, and Whiskey gets taken away to another world by some horrifying shadow creature. Andy, showing more initiative that YOU ever did when you were a kid grabs a bunch of his inventions and jumps right in his GOD DAMN SPACESHIP and takes off to rescue his dog. His ship crashes into a cliff and thats where Heart of Darkness, and the high lethality adventure really begins.

That kid is so dead

Heart of Darkness came out on PC in August of 1998, having be released on Playstation a week earlier. It has the same feel as Another World, which was made by Eric Chahi over at Delphine Studios before starting Amazing Studios, the studio that developed Heart of Darkness, and the publisher of the game was Interplay Entertainment.

Best animation. Forever. For all time.

If you like ADVENTURE, gruesome death, damn fine art, crazy monsters and landscapes, late 90s CGI, or kids movies, Heart of Darkness might be for you.

Why would that pink thing evolve in such a way? It must hurt to live

You can get it here or here or a bunch of other places.

Once again, its time to go fast

Haven't done a multiplayer game in a while, that changes right now. You may remember me blabbing about Tribes: Ascend a while back. Some people don't like how Hi-Rez studios runs things. Others say they don't like the new fan base that was brought in from the Free to Play format, which cares too much about going fast and not enough about teamwork.

Look at them, they dont even know the meaning of the word

Is it an actual problem, or just griping? Unless you've played the game yourself, WHO KNOWS? In the face of all of this, the TribesNext project was started. It's a community lead push to revive Tribes 2, the last Tribes game made by Dynamix, the original developers who started the Tribes series, Coming out way back in March, 2001. If you've already played Tribes Ascend then you should know what to expect: flags to capture, going really fast, jets, skiing, exploding frisbees, three different armor types, the works.

Typical Tribes gameplay

If you like fast paced FPS games, team based multiplayer, or just want to be a part of a community revival, then the TribesNext Project might be exactly what you want!

Shazbot

You can snag Tribes 2, the community patch, and a bunch of links to fixes to get the game to work if you need them here

FEAR IS THE MINDKILLER

Time to jump into the way-back machine and play something from the fabled and mist shrouded age of 1998. A golden age where legendary events took place: like Bill Gates getting a pie thrown in his face, Elton John got knighted, Seinfeld ended, and Dune 2000, one of the grand daddies of the real time strategy genre was released. Be sure to walk without rhythm because we got worm sign the likes of which even GOD has never seen.

Oh Westwood, why did you have to die?

Dune 2000 plays like the standard base building RTS, with three sides to choose from. House Atreides and House Harkonnen, which people would be familiar with from the books and movies, and House Ordos, which was made for the game. All three Houses play differently, and have different campaign missions, giving the game more depth and replayability.

Gotta turn all that sand to glass

The name of the game is Spice, The Emperor has issued a challenge that whoever can get their hands on the most gets to control the planet Dune, so the result is a three way beat down with no rules across Dune's surface. You'll not only need to beat out your opponents but also deal with Dune's hazardous environment and the giant sandworms that can swallow vehicles WHOLE.

SKREEEEEEEE

If you like Real Time Strategy games, the Dune universe, or you're training yourself in battle strategy and logistics so you can take over in the power vacuum after the bombs fall, then Dune 2000 is worth a shot.

"My time will come, soon. Soon."

You can get Dune 2000 here and here

Swords, sorcery, and traps

To wash out the terrible aftertaste of that INDIE PLATFORMER, I got something that's basically its exact opposite, so strap yourself in because we're going to weird and violent places. What I got for you today is a game of good verses evil in a in a horrible land filled with traps, witchcraft, ghosts, angry dog monsters that probably have rabies and demons! Welcome to Hexen!

Sound familiar?

Hexen is a game made on a slightly modified version of the DOOM engine, and it plays in the same FPS style as its predecessor. The basics of the plot is that evil is afoot and three heroes are rolling up to beat the shit out of it. The three heroes fall within the typical DnD party formation: A Warrior, a Cleric, and a Wizard. You choose one of the heroes to play as and they all play differently, both in terms of character statistics (Warrior obviously has the most strength, Wizard the most magic, Cleric is the middle of the road well rounded choice), and with what weapons they get over the course of the game.

The whole game feels like this picture

Hexen doesnt mess around, the levels are big enough to get lost in (you will be glad you have a map), most of the time there's over a hundred monsters per level, crushing wall traps, fireball and poison dart traps, death pits, dark rooms where a bunch of mace wielding lunatics just hang around waiting for you to walk in. And lets not forget that at the start for every level past the first one the main bad guy sticks his face through a magic mirror or something to talk smack to you, to give your likely impending murder a personal touch.

Gotta get up close and personal

Hexen originally came out on MS-DOS way back on the day before Halloween in 1995, developed by Raven Software and published by id Software. The same Raven Software that did work on Call of Duty Black Ops. God only knows how they fell so far. Whats notable is that John Romero was the head producer for Hexen, yet at no point are you told to suck it down, or that you are about to be made someones bitch. So that's good.

All that means though is that you get no warning

 If you like DOOM, or other similar games, or games with a dark fantasy theme, then Hexen is worth checking out. However, as an addition, you might want to snag ZDOOM as well to get it run, it works best with games made with the DOOM engine.

You better be

You can get Hexen here, and ZDOOM here

It's like the Terminator, but in SPACE

In the future, unemployment will be even higher than it is today because everything will be done by robots. Repairmen? Robots. Truck drivers? Robots. Teachers? Probably robots already. Those guys who look over tax forms? You KNOW those guys are robots. Even the position of car salesman has fallen to the cold might of the machine.

Look at this job stealing son of a bitch

 It seems that the only jobs positions left that are still filled by people and not robots are either: sketchy corporate stooge, or awesome space fighter pilot. You can already see where this is going. In their haste to downsize what few human employees they had left, the Post Terran Minerals Corporation replaced the staff on their off world mines and laboratories with robots. Robots that have gone rogue and taken the few humans left out there as hostages. In response they hire a mercenary to take an advanced fighter ship out there and go kick robot ass, with copious sketchy corporate stuff going on on the side as well, because it's just expected at this point.

"if we power our robots with orphans hearts we can say we're 'green' on the environment issue" "Genius"

The gameplay revolves around going through these mines and labs full of killer robots to find and destroy the main reactor, which after a short countdown blows up the whole complex, so its better that you find the exit before you start the countdown to a nuclear explosion. Also, in typical dystopian corporate fashion, saving the hostages is a optional secondary objective. The working world of the future, everybody!

Can't you smell the despair?

What made Descent stand out when it was released back in 1994 was the six degrees of movement you had. There is no gravity in the game, so you can fly in anyway and anywhere in the level you like, even upside down. If you ever get confused about orientation just remember: the enemy's gate is down.

If any of this sounds appealing to you, then you should snag Descent and give it a shot. You can get it at a bunch of places, such as here or here

Its dark, you are likely to be eaten by a Grue

I’ve got a full series for you today. One that shouldn’t really need an introduction, and like Nethack, might actually be older than you. A trilogy filled with puzzles, monsters, traps, treasure, and some jokes along the way. That series is the Zork trilogy.

It could be like this, if you have IMAGINATION~

Released in 1980, 1981, and 1982, the Zork games are puzzle filled text adventures, and the main focus of each game is to find certain items to reach the end of that installment, like in the first Zork game, where you need to find the Twenty Treasures of Zork and stick them in a trophy case, only then will the way to the game’s end will be open to you.

Oh damn, its a GRUE! (holy shit this joke is so over done)

The Zork games are some of the best original text adventures, and they spawned a bunch of knock off clones when the source code got leaked. If you like text adventures, or puzzles, or maybe you’re curious about Zork from hearing about it before, then you should just dive right in to the games.

Doors open what are you waiting for?

You can get Zork one through three here or here

In the future all hallways go in 90 degree angles

You better buckle up because its time for you to send a bunch of armored super soldiers off to die in some horrible twisted metal labyrinth. I’m talking about SPACE HULK. What is Space Hulk you ask? Well I’LL SHOW YOU (and by that I mean I’ll post a video someone else uploaded).

Some of you may already know of Warhammer 40K and Space Marines through 40K video games or through the table top games, and you may think “but would the crazy over the top weapons and armor make the game easy?” OH NO. Released back in 1993, Space Hulk is about squads of Space Marines going on missions in the titular space hulk, a giant mass of spaceships jammed together filled to brim with horrific aliens. The Genestealers (the horrible things that kinda look like the Xenomorph from the “Alien” movies) don’t care about things like explosions, bullets, and fire and you will most certainly be sending some of your men off to their gruesome deaths.

They dont come in peace

Unlike Alien Swarm which I already covered, this game has you directly ordering and controlling a number of guys instead of just one. In game play, troop placement is critical, as you only have so many men to cover the possible directions where the aliens could attack you from, and like the weird song in the intro video implies, you cant move any guys past each other in the narrow hallways. But seeing is better than reading, have another video.

Multiple mission types, unmapped missions, and strategy game play. If that sounds good to you, or if you’re a fan of 40K stuff, then Space Hulk might be for you. If nothing else, if you’re a fan of the board game you should know what to expect from the game.

"There was a board game?" Yes, surprisingly

You can snag Space Hulk here

Prison Commander

Today, we’re going to step back through the misty curtain of time (or take a delorean) back to the year 1987, the time of Predator and Spaceballs to check out a game that sold forty thousand copies in its first year and was ported to eight different platforms. For its time that was kind of a big deal. That game is DUNGEON MASTER.

"You drew the short straw, so you have to carry the candlestick"

Dungeon Master is a grid based action RPG that takes place in a horrible death pit of a dungeon, full of traps and evil creatures out to kill you. At the start of the game you choose four characters from the twenty four available, all with their own stats and starting equipment, and different ranks in fighter, ninja, priest, and wizard. With your dream team chosen, you have to arrange them in the two by two formation that the game works with, since if your characters get attacked by something, the side they are getting attacked from determines which two characters are getting hurt.

Of course there's only one guy your party REALLY needs

Not only do you need to worry about the usual dungeon crawling terrors such as the undead and spiders, but you also need to keep in mind the last time your characters ate or drank, as each character has a hunger and thirst bar and if you get stuck or waste time, starvation and dehydration can become a real problem, thankfully food can be found in the dungeon, and you can use a water skin that you can refill at fountains.

See this guy? Wasn't prepared

The effort that went into making this game playable is dedicated to say the least, and it was worth it, given that the game is playable on Windows, Mac, Pocket PC, Linux, and MacOSX because of it. Even better, Paul R. Stevens (the guy who did all the work) didn’t just make it so you could play Dungeon Master, he did Chaos Strikes Back as well, the expansion to Dungeon Master. Chaos Strikes Back has 24 new characters to choose from, some of which are hidden! It was possible to import characters to Chaos Strikes Back from Dungeon Master in the original game, though I am not entirely sure if that’s possible with this recoded version of the game. Even so, those games are still considered to this day the best among all of the clones that were made in its wake. So go, form your party, descend into the depths and go punch mummies in the face

C'mon, bring it!

You can get Dungeon Master and Chaos Strikes Back here

THE FUTURE AS PICTURED BY THE NINTIES

The original System Shock  could be said to be overshadowed by its more popular and graphically intense sequel, but doesn’t mean its subpar, quite the opposite, as there obviously never would have been a sequel if the first System Shock wasn’t up to snuff.

Placing you in the shoes of “The Hacker” after you remove the ethical restraints on an artificial intelligence in return for a military neural interface in a shady back room deal so you don’t go to jail for hacking into the database of a major corporation. Obviously this bites you right in the ass, good job there, smart guy. Awakening after six months of recuperating in a healing coma, you’re stuck on Citadel Station with SHODAN and everything has gone to hell, and that’s where the game begins.

The enemies the games throws at you range from robots, to mutants, to cyborgs, and mutant cyborgs. All of the enemies in the game come from those types but there is some significant variation between them, in stats, gameplay, and art assets. System Shock also has a oddly in-depth difficulty system, allowing you to choose how difficult you want the combat, the puzzles, the cyberspace segments, and even the plot, each with its own setting, allowing you to crank the puzzles and cyberspace sections to the highest difficulty while keeping combat easy. Or you could keep everything else at a normal level but put the plot on the hardest setting, which adds a time limit to the game.

Some people might find the games dated graphics to be a turn off, I say that’s a stupid way to think. For its time, back in 1994, System Shock was praised by critics and was considered to be a significant innovation. The game’s pros far outweigh the dated graphics on a nearly twenty year old game, and if you‘re into FPSs, cyberpunk action, or enjoyed Bioshock or Deus Ex and want to see what those games draw inspiration from, this is definitely worth your time.

System Shock can be downloaded from
http://www.systemshock.org/index.php/topic,211.0.html
or
http://www.abandonia.com/en/games/24684/System+Shock.html
or a plethora of other places.