It s pretty obvious that the excellent Exapunks is a game about hacking. Specifically, it s a game about programming viruses and sending them into networked systems to monkey around with data, set in a great alternative 90s Wired cyberworld of PC cases flashed with black and red decals and zines set in Apple Garamond.

For its makers, though, Exapunks is a game about limitations. Its format is the result of hard decisions about how much space you get to write your code in, how much freedom you get to solve its puzzles, and how it s presented on your screen. And even now, creative director Zach Barth isn t totally sure he and his team got it right. (more…)

An entirely objective ranking of the 50 best PC strategy games ever made, now freshened up to include everything from 2017 and 2018. From intricate, global-scale wargames to the tight thrills of guerrilla squads, the broad expanse of the genre contains something for everyone, and we’ve gathered the best of the best.

The vast majority are available to buy digitally, a few are free to download and play forever. They’re all brilliant.

(more…)

Civilization VI: Rise and Fall wants to solve a problem. That problem is perpetual growth, and it plagues many 4X games. Whether your aim is world conquest or cultural hegemony, victory in Civilization and many of its cohorts depends on domination. However peacefully you try to play, you’re often straight-jacketed into a utilitarian-psychotic view where all resources and people are just raw material to be assimilated, Borg-like, until the whole map is monochrome.

But as the early excitement of exploration and expansion ebbs to late game stagnation, the fun runs out. Historically, stagnating empires tend to fragment and collapse. But in Civilization VI, like many games, you’re the star of the show and there’s nowhere to go but up.

(more…)

Hello. This is Spawn Point, a new not-quite-regular feature in which we take a genre, series or other facet of gaming culture, and try to convince you to give it a shot. It might be those hero shooters you ve always wanted to get into, or that terrifying space game played by thousands of jerks. We ll briefly explain the thing, followed by some ways for you to breach it.

First up, it s… the real-time strategy. (more…)

If you fancy a break from watching the crawl towards nuclear annihilation live on TV, you can now jack into virtual reality and watch it sped-up in Defcon VR [official site]. Introversion Software today launched the free VR doodad, which lets goggheads enter a virtual war room to spectate matches in the nuclear war RTS Defcon. Our Adam will tell you Defcon is one of the best strategy games, and I… don’t disagree but don’t have the stomach to play again. Watching wars with your chums in cyberspace seems deliciously wicked and fitting for something so awful. … [visit site to read more]

A proposal: puzzles games focused on assembling or programming – or both – should be called Zachlikes. Following the atom-assembling SpecChem, production line ’em up Infinifactory, and the computer-programming TIS-100, Zach Barth and his Zachtronics have announced a new Zachlike. SHENZHEN I/O [official site] will combine assembling and programming to build circuits from components and then write code for them. It’s due to hit Steam Early Access in October and, for now, you can check it out in this wee announcement trailer:

… [visit site to read more]

SpaceChem and Infinifactory creator Zach Barth has released his latest thing-making puzzle game, which sits somewhere between fiddling with chemistry and building automated factories. TIS-100 [official site] is an assembly programming puzzler, having you literally learn and write code to fix up corrupted code in the mysterious eponymous ’80s computer. Yes, you do need to learn and write the TIS-100’s assembly code. Computers are puzzles!

After a seven-week stretch in Steam Early Access, TIS-100 properly launched yesterday.

… [visit site to read more]

After having folks design molecules in SpaceChem and automated plants in Infinifactory, Zachtronics are back with another puzzle game of complex systems. What comes after atoms and factories, the whole dang universe? The multiverse? Nah, you write assembly code.

Today Zachtronics both announced and (sort of) released TIS-100 [official site], a game about rewriting corrupted code to fix a fictional ’80s computer. It’s on on Steam Early Access now for 4.49. My prediction: their next game after this will be to literally program SpaceChem.

… [visit site to read more]

The world’s most accurate ranking of the 25 best puzzle games ever to reach a computer. Plucking the peak of PC puzzling, we break down what makes them so special, and put them in the correct order. Read on for more time travel, rearranged tiles, hidden objects and hexed cells than you could ever want.

… [visit site to read more]

Zachtronics has linked the SpaceChem molecule to the Infiniminer molecule to create and announce their new game: Infinifactory. It’s “Like SpaceChem… In 3D!” says the site, which sounds like a very good thing when you consider that SpaceChem broke the brains and captured the hearts of just about everyone at RPS who played it.

There’s only a little information about this new game, but it’s about designing and running factories and optimising them via histograms just as before, but now you’ll be doing it in “exotic alien locales” with a “next-generation block engine”. Alright. It’s due in Early Access later this year.

… [visit site to read more]