Been downloading a few game demos from Download.com lately.
Spent ages trying to get my hands on a working Civilization III demo. There’s been alot of problems with the demo and in the end it wouldn’t work on my machine as my monitor is Plug and Play (with just the default Microsoft drivers, I can’t work out the make), but in the end I got the Civilization IV which worked.
Civilization, or Civ as it is affectionately known, is a world-famous game of empire building. You start with a small city and build your empire to dominate the globe. It’s supposed to be really good and addictive, and for the most part it is pretty good, but I knew there was a reason I haven’t played my Windows ’95 Civilization I game for awhile: It’s a turn-based strategy.
I knew this before I downloaded it of course, and one of my favourite turn-based games on PC is Risk. But I just found Civ boring. Admittedly I didn’t finish the tutorial so perhaps when I don’t have to follow instructions from an avatar all the time it will be more interesting, but it didn’t run great on my machine anyway and I like real-time action.
I also downloaded a completely free MMORPG called Martial Heroes. It’s actually quite good considering it’s free. I’m not a great fan of RPGs, I like the idea of them, talking to characters and quests etc, but alot of the ones i’ve played have you running about doing nothing for ages. Eve is a MMORPG too but I guess the fact that there’s always something you can be doing (you can look up all the agents on the map and go see them when you want) helps keep it interesting.
Anyway, Martial Heroes is in 3d for a change too. I chose to be an assassin. The character choices are quite limited – warrior, mage, assassin and monk, but I think later on you can customize your character with clothes etc.
The menu system is quite confusing and I think it’s an Asian developed game as funny text characters turn up here and there. One major niggle I have with it so far is that although there’s a minimap (which zooms to a fullsize map) you get given grid references to meet people. For example “Go see such and such at X1567 Y2354″ – Great! I spent ages running about trying to get to the right spot on the map. Once i found the person it was okay though. Here is a screenie of me hunting foxes for the first quest (For the record I hate fox-hunting irl!) and a close up of my character:
I also downloaded the superb Little Fighter 2 again. It’s a free 2D fighting game. Give it a google if you like these retro style games. Sweet graphics and amusing fights. You can throw bottles at the other characters and have massive brawls with lots of characters on screen at once. Now that I’m talking about it I just had to start it up and take a screenie:
I’m going to look up some more games now to keep the old grey matter active=)
Just a word on the news of late -
The article in the paper this morning was about this ‘Happy Slapping’ craze that teenagers are into and the 14 year old girl who got 8 years in jail for filming and taking part in the beating of a man to death recently. This and the previous months stories about the middle-aged couple who raped a 12-week old baby, the guy who thought it would be funny to post a live hamster in an envelope (It survived luckily!) and the youths who skewered a puppy with a mop handle evoke just two words from me, and I make no apology as I don’t think they are over the top or uncalled for: sick fuckers
These kinds of people get no sympathy from me: All paedophiles, murderers, rapists and animal abusers should be punished to the full extent of the law, and then some. Teenage murderers should be named and shamed, as was the case with the girl thankfully, and paedophiles forfeit any chance of having children (ie Vasectomy etc). They should certainly not be allowed to work in schools as in the scandal involving our Education Secretary who signed off on a large number of paedophiles working in schools!
Anyway, now that that’s off my chest, have a pleasant evening folks!
