One day I’ll write a Desert Island Discs about the games I’d keep with me until the end of days, given a choice of ten. It’ll no doubt be a Desert Island Digital Downloads given the absence of physical media in my life. I live with the ghosts of entertainment.

Rather than compiling the list of games I’d take to the Vault with me though, today I’m aiming to put together a collection, one from each genre, that I’d use to introduce those genres to a PC gaming newcomer, or a lapsed gamer. A friend inspired this particular bundle of joy, someone who grew up with an Amiga but developed other interests and hasn’t touched a game for more than a few minutes at a time, either console or PC, for over fifteen years. A recent illness has left him unable to engage in his usual outdoor hobbies and games have filled the gap.>

… [visit site to read more]

I rearranged all of my furniture yesterday so that I could play a game and it’s not even a game with a stonking great dancemat or waving and waggling control scheme. I’ve been dungeon crawling.

This weekend, the stars aligned and I finally sank around fifteen hours into one of the big games waiting in my backlog. If I’m being honest, I shouldn’t look to the stars – I spent fifteen hours or thereabouts with Legend of Grimrock 2 because of the flurries of sleet that kept me huddled beneath a duvet, grimacing at the outside world.>

… [visit site to read more]

Legend of Grimrock 2 sure was very good, everyone can agree. It took the style and mechanics of the original and expanded them in every direction, and the result is something that is definitely the best… something or other.

John: Ooh, this was a tough game. A lovely, tough game. Not just because it starts you off far too weak and dumps you in the middle of a vast labyrinth of levels with no sensible way to know which bits are going to be too difficult, but also because the puzzles require an extension be built on your brain.

… [visit site to read more]

Dungeon Master and Eye of the Beholder were like mother’s milk to me, and Legend of Grimrock is like a perfectly muddled gin and tonic. Grimrock’s sequel now has a release date, October 15th, and a new trailer to coincide with the announcement. It shows a variety of enemies and areas, including what appears to be a cannon-wielding pirat(e), as can be seen above. There are also spikes and tile-based puzzles, as the dungeon gods demand.

… [visit site to read more]

Last week we wrote about the Humble Jumbo Bundle 2, because it was the best haul of games we’d seen in a Humble Bundle in a little while. Now that bundle has expanded as planned, and the three new games added are all good too. Pay more than the average of $6.62/ 4 and you’ll now receive Legend of Grimrock, PixelJunk Eden and Orcs Must Die! 2.

This on top of a bundle which already included Galactic Civilizations 2, Terraria, Crusader Kings 2 and more.

… [visit site to read more]

Look at that! It’s the first screenshot from Legend of Grimrock 2 and it’s one of the worst pictures of a dungeon I’ve ever seen, right up there with the Mona Lisa and Magritte’s not-a-pipe-nor-a-dungeon. After creating some top notch dank dungeons for their first RPG, Almost Human appear to have slipped up and the dungeons in Grimrock 2 will apparently contain some trees and blue skies, and crenellated turrets peering from on high, just around the next bend in the path. Of course, it’s entirely possible that the picture isn’t a dungeon at all and that the game is undergoing a design overhaul. Let’s consult the development blog.

(more…)

For those of you that haven’t tried out Almost Human’s dungeoneering masterpiece Legend of Grimrock, shame on you, and a pox on both your houses, and oh fie is me, and please try it, it is nice. But for those hungry for more of the wonderful dank atmosphere, creepy monsters and surprisingly sexy stone walls, you can grab this new mod reworking the original maps whilst we await the second installment. (more…)

You know what’s finally real? No, no, not high-speed space travel, a panacea for the collective shattered heart of humanity, or lights that turn themselves off when you’ve gotten way too comfortable in bed. Something better! Odds are, Legend of Grimrock II will basically be all of those things – symbolically, anyway. And it’s an actual, factual Thing now, as per word from the wonderful dungeon master race of snail people over at Almost Human. There is one downside, though: that Grimrock expansion they were working on? Sadly, it won’t be seeing the light of day.

(more…)

Two things:

1) Latter-day Dungeon Masterlike Legend of Grimrock has sold quite well. 600,000 copies or thereabouts, in fact.2) This is well enough that IT LOOKS LIKE THEY’RE MAKING ANOTHER ONE AND IT HAS PLAYABLE RATMEN IN IT (more…)

The holidays are a time of indecision. Who should you visit? What ugly, uncomfortable seasonal sweater should you wear? Which deity(s) should you dedicate your hedonistic blood celebrations to (aside from Horace, of courace)? And, most importantly, what will you buy before/after your relatives shower you with socks or rocks or whatever it is that passes for a universal gift these days? But it doesn’t end there. Oh no. There are, after all, 927.45 trillion videogames to choose between, so you may as well just start sobbing and curl up in a fetal futility ball right now. Unless… no, no. That’s crazy. But maybe… no. It’ll never work. Ah, what the hell: bundles! Both Indie Royale and Humble Bundle have new offerings up, and they’re quite tempting, if I do say so myself.

(more…)