This isn't the best screenshot I could have gotten; the colors are wonky, the lighting is bad, meh. But first kiss!! Yay!!

Oh and then this happened:

Your honor, let the record show that these gays have only been on one!! date!!! A date which, btw, wasn't even finished yet when Vanesha popped the question to move in together. This was only roughly 10 in-game minutes after their first kiss.

Riley said yes obviously, but still

Game of the Year List 2023

Honorable Mentions: Touhou: Artificial Dream in Arcadia: I love the oddball mashup of shmup and dungeon crawler mechanics, but I ended up losing interest before the end of the game. In Stars and Time: Still playing this game. I like it so far, but I didn't want to rush it through to get it on this list. It'll go on next year's list if I like it enough. Stuffo the Puzzle Bot: Really great soundtrack. Still on regular rotation.

10. Super Snail (IOS and Android)

This is a difficult inclusion. Super Snail is an Evil game. It's the most monetized game I've ever played. Every screen you can visit can trigger a special offer for a pile of goodies you don't need that you can buy with real money. It's a mobile gacha game, through and through, designed to eat up time and attention and offer back a distant illusion of progress that you could surely expedite, if you were just willing to kick in ten bucks for one of its dozens of customized season passes…. So, why is this game on this list?

Developer QCPlay was already on my radar from previous release Gumball and Dungeons, a similarly high effort mobile game (amusingly originally intended as a Dragon Quest game, until they failed to secure the license and were forced to sand all the iconic teardrops off their slimes and call them gumballs instead). Despite their willingness to indulge in all the awful trends of mobile game markets, these are real, proper game designers, who have buried a real, actual game under all of Super Snail's idle timers and base management bullshit.

Super Snail is constantly shifting, adding new layers of complexity and shaking up existing mechanics. It's the only gacha game I'm aware of in which your gacha machine can be stolen from you temporarily if you use it too much, forcing you to wait on spending tickets until the thief decides its rates are too shit to bother with and returns it to you. There's a dating sim mechanic in which various characters met in your travels (male, female, or both) will find out about your secret base and decide to mooch off you, which is some of the funniest writing in the game.

On that note, the writing is weirdly good for a game that's approximately 80% random pop culture references. The eight demon lords you've been tasked with defeating by the mysterious god "Earth's Will" all have detailed and consistent backstories. There are a few honest-to-god effective twists in the plot, and a lingering question about how shady the god you've signed your life to actually is.

A predatory mobile game shouldn't deserve one minute of my attention, let alone one of the coveted slots on my illustrious top ten list, but Super Snail spits in the face of all that, and god. I can't stop thinking about it, about how many interesting game design lessons are nestled within its strange and evil exterior. So, by compromise, it's grudgingly earned my #10. Just, for god's sake, if any of this backhanded review piques your interest, set a budget for yourself and don't exceed it for any reason.

9. BOSSGAME: The Final Boss is Your Heart (Steam)

BOSSGAME is an action rpg about two dirtbag lesbians, Sophie and Anna, trying to earn rent money by taking random mercenary work in the big city. The story is low pressure fun, with a little melodrama mixed in to spice things up. The plot is needs-suiting, even maybe good, but the reason this game is on the list is the gameplay.

BOSSGAME is really, really fun to play. It uses a combat system reminiscent of the Mario and Luigi rpgs in which both party members are controlled simultaneously. Enemies telegraph attacks that need to be blocked using the left or right side of the gamepad based on character, draining stamina. Attacking also drains stamina, so a careful balance of offense and defense needs to be maintained to survive. Most interestingly, there's no turns: enemies repeat attack patterns usually without waiting for a counterattack, so combat becomes a brain-bending routine of multitasking, with one character needing to block attacks while the other sneaks in some damage. A combo system encourages keeping up constant pressure, with the reward being increased progress toward a super attack that can briefly stun bosses and allow some easy hits before returning to defensive play. The end result is fast paced, engaging, and totally unique combat that was fun to learn for each of the dozens of boss fights in the game.

I'm glad this game ended up being good enough to recommend here, not just because I, too, am lesbian, but because I love designers that are willing to take a chance on unique control schemes. Part of the fun of playing BOSSGAME was getting to learn how to play without being able to rely on any of the muscle memory I've accrued over years of playing other action games. I only wish it weren't so short. Of all the games on this list, this is the one I would most want to see expanded into a full 40-60 hour RPG epic.

8. Slay the Princess (Steam)

A Myers-Briggs test for fetishes. Keep that in mind whenever anybody who tries to talk to you about their favorite "route". Great writing though

7. EDF 5 (Steam)

My official Multiplayer Game Experience of the Year. The EDF (EDF! EDF! EDF!) series is an alien invasion resistance simulator that exists somewhere between Dynasty Warriors and Monster Hunter in gameplay. I've known about the series for a long time, and I had assumed it was the kind of loud dumb fun that makes for punchy clips but wears out its welcome quickly. To be clear, it definitely is loud, and dumb, and fun, but it also has significantly more mechanical depth and complexity than I expected, which kept it fresh and engaging for as long as I played it.

Mechanics like building destruction and corpse hitboxes looks like they're just they're there for spectacle at first, but as levels progress and more and more aggressive enemy types are introduced, these seemingly incidental details take on more and more importance as you need to manage cover and enemy sight lines more effectively. This is the game's most potent tool, I think: everything that makes it great as a ridiculous carnage sandbox has been meticulously designed to also work in the higher difficulty levels to deliver a genuinely tense and highly mobile shooter.

6. Slayers X: Terminal Aftermath: Vengeance of the Slayers (Steam)

A boomer shooter in the same canon as Hypnospace Outlaw, partially developed by troubled teen ZANE_ROCKS_14 and polished up for release 22 years later. For an elaborate shitpost, it's very well made, but what most interests me about it is its contradictory nature. Outwardly, it's completely juvenile and silly about everything it does, filled with poop jokes and mouthy rats and evil stepdads. Underneath that, there's the deep melancholy of a 36 year old desperately trying to relive the last time in his life that he felt cool.

all the levels in the game faithfully recreate scenes of Zane's Idaho childhood, from ritzy suburban neighborhoods to car parks to the local fair, but they're all just a little bit too eerily empty for the settings they're trying to evoke. The protagonist's sincere love for his mother completely clashes with the badass attitude he brings to every other scene. Zane put his all into voice acting the protagonist's lines, while every other character sounds like they're reciting lines into their phone in a bathroom. The end result is a masterpiece in immersive game design, meticulously arranged to feel like it came from a very specific time and place in a fictional alternate universe. It's so effective that even the parts that don't work can be argued as a deliberate part of the overall period piece, like the confusingly short penultimate level or unnecessarily annoying final boss.

5. Cobalt Core (Steam)

A card battler built around spaceship combat. It should be immediately apparent to anybody who's played a lot of Slay-The-Spire-likes that Cobalt Core is on the easier side, but that's a deliberate choice here, in an effort to create an engaging narrative experience rather than a perfectly tuned progression treadmill. While Inscryption (another narrative card battler) managed its story by bringing the player away from the cards for cutscenes or escape room sequences, Cobalt Core delivers everything within its roguelike framework, even going as far as coming up with a time loop justification for why the player is repeating runs to progress the story.

In that regard it compares more closely to Hades than other card battlers, and I also think that's a good comparison because I really like the characters and character interactions in Cobalt Core. Each round starts with the selection of three of the (after finishing a short period of unlocks) 7 crewmates available to play with, and every combination of characters has interesting discussions and interactions between them. Characters also have lines to acknowledge specific artifacts, cards, or game states (like big damage or status effects) that offers a level of reactivity to make each run that much more unique. Also like Hades, there's a concrete ending sequence. Backstory for each crewmate is delivered piecemeal throughout the game, and while there aren't any earthshattering twists or revelations, the ending does a good job of tying everything together for a proper sendoff.

Shoutout to Riggs. Best possum in the galaxy.

!Great Soundtrack Alert!

4. Going Down (2014 Doom wad) (Doomworld File Depot)

This year, I played MyHouse.wad. More and more people were talking about it, and I wanted to give it a try myself before someone randomly spoiled it for me. I didn't end up caring for it much! It did some interesting things, and it was definitely well made, but I'm not that interested in the creepypasta style it was going for.

It did pique my interest in the rich ecosystem of Doom modding that's been quietly trucking along for 30 years before myhouse ever released, though. A friend recommended Going Down, which I found to be terrific, and then I spent the rest of the year playing random wads (level packs) whenever I didn't have anything else to do. Doom has become invaluable to me as a podcast game, especially as I've only just been able to extract myself from Tactical Nexus's cunning grasp this year.

So, without further ado: The Official Doom Wads of the Year Minilist:

10 Struggle: Antaresian Legacy - Most of the levels in this wad focus on low-pressure exploration, but my favorites were the wide-open chaotic battles. I especially like the capstone levels of the first two chapters (maps 11 and 20), which both feature massive arenas with hundreds of enemies active at once. 9 Ancient Aliens - A collab megawad with great aesthetic and theming. Level quality is inconsistent, which makes sense given how many authors were involved, but the best levels in the wad are excellent. 8 Dust Devil - A short campaign of two interconnected levels with a bunch of interesting custom content. The use of grenade launchers and shielded enemies was especially cool, and not something I expected the doom engine to be able to do. 7 Lullaby - A stylish single-map wad in a decidedly undoomlike blue dreamland. There's only five or so major setpiece encounters, but they're all very memorable. 6 Doom 2 - I love how experimental the design in Doom 2 is, especially given that the entire genre of fps was brand new at this point in history. there's abstract levels, puzzle levels, diagetic cityscapes, and more. It's easy to see its influence in every fps to ever follow in its wake. 5 Overboard - A newer wad by the same author of Going Down with a great gimmick- the first five levels are followed by a set of hard mode remixes that use the same maps with more aggressive enemy arrangements. I particularly liked the last map of hard mode, which is identical to its normal mode variant except that it spawns all 500 enemies in the moment the level starts instead of deploying in piecemeal waves as it does in the original. 4 The Thing You Can't Defeat - An experimental remix of the first chapter of Doom 1. Very interesting premise and punchline. If you liked MyHouse.wad, I'd highly recommend checking it out. 3 Tarnsman's Projectile Hell - This is the first touhou game I've played, technically. Deviously difficult design with an emphasis on long distance hitscan enemies that would be extremely annoying in the hands of a level designer any less obviously talented than Tarnsman. 2 Unloved - An ambitious continuous campaign that takes place in a Silent Hill-esque house with several portals to distorted nightmare realms. I like that small amounts of progress are made in each level at a time with frequent revisits to the main hub, and I love the dark atmosphere. Very creepy. Also insanely difficult. 1 Going Down - My favorite by a long shot. The amount of variety in level and encounter design is incredible on its own, but I particularly like the care that went into giving each level a unique identity that still makes sense in the context of the wad's premise (taking an elevator floor by floor down into the depths of hell). Every level is meticulously designed to use the entire space, usually multiple times as later encounters in each level usually reuse the same arenas with additional twists on the layout and enemy deployments.

3. Pizza Tower (Steam)

A fluid platformer heavily inspired by the Wario Land games. Its most notable design choice is the lack of fail state when exploring levels. There's no health bar, and falling into pits only resets the room, so there's no significant pressure until the timed escape sequence at the end of each level. That's not to say the game lacks challenge, though. Far from it- the challenge comes not from reaching the end of each room, but in doing so as efficiently as possible. Pizza Tower's principle antagonist is the 5 second combo timer in the top right, forcing a constant stream of action. Every level has just enough stuff in each room to allow a single combo to be carried from start to level finish, which confers the coveted P Rank medal on level completion.

Full P Rank completion is what I spent three months obsessively chasing at the start of this year. Movement in Pizza Tower is so fluid, and so satisfying to learn how to fully utilize, that I couldn't resist going for it. I got so far into it that after finishing the game, I went back in immediately for an optional challenge that requires full P rank completion of the game in less than 4 hours, which required being able to clear each level with perfect consistency.

!Great Soundtrack Alert! https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NWoTeTZL-C8

2. Beton Brutal (Steam)

The trailer for Beton Brutal immediately spoke to me. I've been a fan of persistent-state platforming games for ages, and it's a sorely underserved genre (mostly lurking in MMOs and player-made levels for games like Mario Maker). I like the emphasis on meditative upward progress, and I especially like the increasing pressure that builds as each subsequent jump risks losing more progress than the previous. Beton Brutal's developer was able to deliver this perfectly while also maintaining a consistent and interesting visual style (a stark contrast to the dreadful nft tie-in climbing game Only Up, which also released this year).

For weeks, I opened Beton Brutal after work and played for thirty minutes to an hour, usually seeing some small amount of new progress before inevitably taking a long fall and rage quitting for the day. I don't think I can call this the hardest game I've ever played, given that there's an entire community of people that can complete the entire climb in less than ten minutes, but I do think I'm uniquely poorly suited for games like this, given the extreme precision required. Still, that made it all the more satisfying to finally complete the game after almost exactly 20 hours of effort.

Three months later the DLC "Beton Bath", with another 500 meter tower with new obstacles, mechanics, and visual aesthetic (themed after public pool equipment, which honestly looks great decorating the tower), released. This dlc had mixed reviews, but it cemented this game as a whole as a favorite for me. The new tower has a very different design approach, with more focus on interpreting strange geometry, seeking out aggressive shortcuts, and taking giant leaps of faith. The last 100 meters particularly impressed me, with numerous falls onto trampolines 80 meters below to stride the entire tower in one jump and reach new ladders, before climbing just a few meters higher and repeating the process back to the opposite side.

trying to settle on which screenshot to include with the entry was agonizing, so I'm going to post a bunch more here. I love how this game looks.

Don't worry about the vertigo meter in the bottom left. It's probably nothing to worry about.

Void Stranger (Steam)

Void Stranger is a tile-based puzzle game featuring a magic wand that can pick tiles up and place them elsewhere. Help the noble handmaiden Gray delve into the 256th floor of the mysterious Void to fulfill her heart's desire, learning more about her past by peeking into her memories as she rests at checkpoints along the way.

…But that's not sufficient to describe it, really. The best way I can come up with to describe what Void Stranger actually is, is as a seemingly normal block-pushing puzzle game that's had an entire additional Myst-like adventure game layered over it. The puzzle game is real, and it can be engaged with honestly from start to finish, but the true fun of the game (and several of its many, many possible endings) comes from interpreting obscure clues in the lore and interface to dive deeper.

The more that's learned, the easier it is to navigate the underlying puzzle game. Almost every object in the game has hidden mechanics related to it, opening up easier routes through initially difficult puzzles or allowing the use of shortcuts to skip floors entirely. Once these tricks are mastered, only thirty or so of the game's 256 floors even need to be visited to complete a run, and most of them can be cleared in seconds.

That's a good thing, too, because there's a lot of travel to specific floors needed to find all the secrets in the game. This is a game that thrives on friction in its play experience, which means it's definitely not going to be a game for everybody. If clues regarding certain shortcuts or secrets are missed, it can add a lot of unnecessary work to completing the game. But I personally love that kind of obscurity in games, and I really appreciate that the developer System Erasure (who made the similarly excellent ZeroRanger) was willing to take a chance on a niche-of-a-niche genre that could really speak to its core demographic: me specifically.

I'm not going to talk much about the plot, because most of it is deeply tangled with the Void Stranger's deepest secrets. That said, I appreciate that every route through the game, even the ones that don't engage with all the secret hunting, have been given fully fledged stories. Even the bad ending has a fucking awesome finale, to the extent that I would recommend seeking it out before engaging with the rest of the game's content (if you get offered a fruit, go ahead and eat it!)

Void Stranger is good enough to make it onto my top ten list of games of all time. I've put it at #6, just behind Iji and just ahead of Full Bore. Everything about it is fucking awesome. Check it out!

!Great Soundtrack Alert!

Jack's End of Year Video Game Round-up.

There were many things I couldn't do this year, being in lockdown and all, which in turn meant I played a hell of a lot more video games than I normally do. Here's a quick rundown of what I thought of them.

Hitman 2

IO have sort of perfected the Hitman formula now, so future entries in the series simply have to ask the question of what new directions you can take that formula. In that regard Hitman 2 is a resounding success, setting sneaking and assassination in scenarios around the world from race tracks to holiday resorts, and thus making it the best entry yet. It's possible one day the Hitman conceit will wear thin, but today is not that day.

Thronebreaker

Most people will go into Thronebreaker just wanting a stand-alone version of the Gwent we played during Witcher 3. Thronebreaker is not that. Indeed, even beyond the changes to the mechanics brought in by the online version, Thronebreaker is more of a puzzle game which uses the mechanics of Gwent to concoct unique scenarios. Still, the story is pretty good and it is fun overall, even if it didn't end up scratching the itch left by Gwent.

Black Mesa (Xen)

I returned to Black Mesa after Xen was finally added, eager to see what the team had come up with. My feelings are complicated. The Xen portions of the game are really well designed, great to play and visually beautiful. However the levels hew so far from the Half-Life originals that it kind of stops feeling like Half-Life. I would have like to have seen a more faithful recreation to be honest.

Neon Struct

If you've been wanting a spiritual sequel to Thief that actually used the mechanics of Thief, here you go. Though low budget, and therefore having somewhat uninspiring visuals based on reused assets, it's still a really impressive game from what the team had to work with, and it's short enough that it doesn't outstay it's welcome.

Acid Spy

I'm generally usually okay at stealth games but this one was well beyond my skill level. Got through the tutorial but just got frustrated and quit on the first mission.

Salting the Earth

A wonderfully put together visual novel about the legacy of war and the nature of national identities. Also you date buff orc women. One of the best VNs I've played, but it does have some pretty bleak potential endings that clash somewhat with the rest of the story's tone.

Hedon

Speaking of buff orc women, Hedon is a vivid, perfectly designed retro-shooter that really uses the most of it's engine to bring it's world to life, with shades of Thief and Strife thrown in there. Wears its hornieness on it's sleeve, but if you can roll with that you'll have nothing but a good time.

The Painscreek Killings

I really really loved this immersive narrative game, where you explore an abandoned town to piece together a series of suspicious deaths. My only gripes are the town looks very British despite being set in the US, and the final confrontation adding a chase scene felt a little over dramatic.

Deus Ex Mankind Divided

There are many problems with Mankind Divided. Trying to find another story to do with Adam Jensen. Making the game more of an open world by taking away the usual Deus Ex globe-trotting. The clumsy use of racial metaphor being applied to cyborgs. All in all the game just didn't really come together, which is a shame, because the DLC showed such promise, and hinted at the real Deus Ex game we could have had.

Warhammer Armageddon DLC

I managed to complete the Salamanders DLC and got stuck near the end of the Blood Angels one. All in all it's simply 'more' of what the base game offered, and I'm not sure it really needed it.

Unavowed

Easily one of the most interesting games I played this year. So good It inspired me to write a cheesy fanfic. Sure the mechanics of applying squad mechanics to a point and click are interesting, but it's the world, the art and the characters themselves that really make this game. Highly recommended.

Devil Daggers

The ultimate distillation of classic shooter mechanics. One platform, one weapon, endless enemies. I didn't get all that far into it and I think most people won't, but I'm not going to complain for the price. Overdue a revisit.

Dream Daddy

A fun and fluffy dating game that actually does a good job of putting you into the mindset of a recently bereaved bisexual dad. Come for the hunks, stay for the really affecting story of a strained relationship between father and daughter.

Greedfall

Greedfall falls short of the mark in most aspects, but I have to give it credit for being one of the few games to give us a Bioware companion-centric adventure during this drought of Bioware games. It lacks the zing of something like Dragon Age, and handles the subject of colonialism really problematically, but if you can get past those issues, it's a fun ride, and a world I'd like to revisit.

Endless Legend

I've been wanting a game to scratch the Alpha Centauri itch for decades now and Endless Legend finally did it. There is a risk of being overwhelmed by the sheer number of unique factions to play, and I know I still haven't really scratched the surface even after 4 full campaigns. Is that a criticism? I suppose it depends if you think you can have too much of a good thing.

Space Hulk Deathwing Enhanced Edition

A valiant effort was put in to make a faithful FPS of the Space Hulk experience, but ultimately it falls far too short. The visuals look great and the game-feel of stomping around as a Space Marine really works, but the game lacks charm and character. Up against Vermintide, there's no comparison.

Sunless Sea

This is a game that feels like a bottomless abyss of secrets and mysteries tied up in a very brutal one-life-only system. I really enjoyed my time with Sunless Seas, with the music calling me like a wailing siren every now and again, yet in many ways I did find it a bit too unforgiving, and it could have benefited from having a bit more of a progression between lives than the almost solid reset it leaves you with.

Age of Empires / 2 / 3 Definitive Editions

The first Age of Empires has an important place in history, but is borderline unplayable by today's standards. Almost every aspect was improved in 2 and going back now feels like trading a car for a horse and cart. It's clear that the game was intending your slow crawl out of the stone age through hunting and gathering to be part of the game in its own right, but today it's just tedious, and the rest of the game is just so slow.

There isn't much to say about Age of Empire 2 that I haven't already said, but I will point out that multiplayer AOE2 has kept me sane over the course of the lockdown, and I'm glad the Definitive Edition enhanced that experience.

Age of Empire 3 tried too hard to reinvent the wheel. Instead of taking 2 and building on it, it instead contorted it around a colonisation theme, and it didn't really work. On top of that, the mechanics really felt they were built more for single-player story missions. The maps are too small, and the expansion factions clash with the rules badly. Still, there is fun to be had, and I'll be checking out the campaigns next year.

Hand of Fate 2

This game takes the original Hand of Fate and adds way, way too much into it. While I appreciate the addition of companions, a longer story mode, and optional side missions, the game is far too experimental with it's formula, and leaves me struggling with complex missions around being lost in a desert or evading barbarian hordes, when all I wanted was a straight forward dungeon crawl. I tapped out two thirds of the way through the campaign.

Wild Guns Reloaded

I love the style and aesthetic, but I just don't have the reflexes (or the gamepad) for these fast paced arcade games.

Vermintide 2 Drakenfels

Fatshark gave us an entire Vermintide campaign for free this year, at the cost of having to be subjected to obnoxious cosmetic micro-tranactions. Hard to say it was worth the price, but Fatshark really do continue to improve, bringing new scope and ideas to every new mission. As good as it gets.

Pendula Swing

A fun little game that apes the visuals of a Baldur's Gate style RPG but the mechanics of a point and click adventure game set in a fantasy version of the roaring twenties. A strong introduction to it's setting but definitely needs building on if we're to see a continuation. A lot of the world-building feels too simple and half-baked at times, and the gameplay feels like too much is going on too fast. Still, a charming story though.

The Shiva / The Blackwell Series

At first I had no idea that Unavowed was connected to a host of other Wadget Eye adventure games, so naturally I had to check them out. I'd known about The Shiva and the Blackwell games for years, but never actually thought about picking them up. Playing them all back to back was a great experience, and almost felt like a prototype to the episodic storytelling many games do today.

Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light/Temple of Osiris

Guardian of Light is a fun, inventive co-op game for killing some time with a friend. The puzzles are often unique and interesting and get you thinking, and the story, while nothing fantastic, is fun enough to keep you interested and have a laugh about with your co-op partner in a B-Movie kind of way. Temple of Osiris adds way too much to the formula, with more characters, mechanics and more open exploration and it absolutely loses the charm of the first game, and even then it's buggy as hell. Skip the second one.

Command and Conquer Remastered

Big chunks of my childhood are taken up with memories of playing Command and Conquer and Red Alert, so it's difficult to really gauge my thoughts on the remaster. On the one hand the art direction looks great and preserves the feel of the original, and the quality of life improvements to the gameplay help make it more playable. The nostalgia hit is also palpable. That being said, the mechanics have not aged all that well, with much of the game being far, far too hard. Probably the best way to experience the genesis of the RTS genre but just know what you're getting in for.

Superhot Mind Control Delete

I wrote a lot at length about how unsure I was about Mind Control Delete at the time, and that's because it does feel a little unsure about itself. Is it a continuation of the first game? A fun bonus mode? A mediation on the nature of addiction? A critique of video game content? A joke on the player? I don't know, but I do know one thing, and that is that Superhot is still as addictive as hell.

Opus Magnum

Zachtronic's steampunk alchemy game requires far too much maths brain than I am capable of , and so I had to rely on guides a lot of the time, but that being said, it's still amazingly put together and vividly presented. Really feels like a game that could be used in schools.

Necromunda Underhive Wars (Story Mode)

I'll be checking out Underhive's Campaign mode in the new year, but for now I just want to talk about the story mode. Much like Mordheim, this is a game that's not going to work for everyone, but I really dug it and like it's unique take on a squad based TBS. However, in many respects the game does feel like a missed opportunity. The storyline is fun enough, and the arsenal robust, but much of the character of the tabletop game, the weird, chaotic, and sometimes comical things that can happen over the course of a battle seems to have been lost in translation, as has the quirky character to a lot of the gangs.  

Outer Wilds

There is little I can say about Outer Wilds that hasn't already been said by others, particularly that one should go into the game as blind as possible. A beautiful piece of interactive art, words would fail me in describing it anyway.

Life is Strange 2

Fantastically written, amazingly animated, wonderfully acted, and grim and depressing as all hell. I really love Life is Strange 2, but it it a tough game to bare witness to, especially in 2020. It treats it's subject matter with great maturity, but is so dark it's hard to motivate yourself to continue each gruelling episode. Also, I really think it would have fared better if it had not named itself Life is Strange 2, as not following Max and Chloe turned a lot of people away from a game I think they'd have otherwise enjoyed if they'd named it Wolf Brothers or something.

Half Life 2 / Episodes / Portal / 2/ Mel

After playing Black Mesa earlier this year I decided to revisit the entire Half Life 2 and Portal series. What I concluded is that Half Life 2 is not really all that good. A well told story wrapped around weak combat and average encounter design. This much improves across the episodes of course, but in the end I rather feel Half Life 2 is pretty overrated.

Portal, on the other hand, still feels fresh, though I was surprised I'd forgotten just how much was added in Portal 2, to the point Portal feels more like a game demo. That being said, I think the slowly growing mystery and menace of Portal has aged a lot better than the gagfest the series became with 2. Mel, a stand-alone mod that feels like could be a Portal 3 in it's own right, returns to a more serious tone, and feels all the stronger because of it.

Control

Control has gone from a game I didn't really care about all that much to one of my favourites of the year, if not the decade. Sure there are criticisms I could make, but the world has so much depth, the characters so much potential, and the gameplay such perfectly designed chaos, that it wouldn't really matter. A great time was had.

Icewind Dale 2

Finishing Icewind Dale 2 was the final banishing of the old ghosts of Infinity Engine games I never finished as a kid. Sure there was the nostalgia, but Icewind Dale 2 also feels prefect for the Baldurs Gate era's swan song. Beautiful environments, a well written story and great interface and design, only pulled down due to some overly long busywork at various points and the plot being dragged on a little too long. Still, sad to know I have no further Infinity Engine games left to conquer.

Elsinore

The first half of Elsinore is an absolutely great time-loop mystery, which seems to be an interesting interrogation of Shakespearian tropes and asks the question of how much of a Shakespearian tragedy remains the more you change it. The second half, however, quickly devolves into a cosmic horror story that feels a poor fit for the genre and far too grim for the art style, and that's even before it basically devolves into trying to do the same thing Undertale did but worse. A well put together game whose ending did not sit well with me.

Gwent: The Witcher Card Game

Since Thronebreaker didn't sate my appetite I started playing competitive Gwent. It is a wholly different game than the one that appears in The Wither 3, but is certainly fascinating in it's own right. After 200 hours I am officially addicted, somebody please send help.

And that's that. Not doing a top 5 games of the year because I played too many this year and I've spent too much time thinking about them already. Here's hoping I play less in 2021 and can get back to a more normal life.

Whenever a game operates as a celebration of a series, and an amalgamation of the concepts included within that series, I inevitably find out my favorite part of the series based on what I’m most excited about seeing coming back.  To that end: god, I would kill for the Dusk trilogy on Switch.

So yeah, that’s the big take-away from Nelke.

Nelke, as a game, isn’t fantastic.  It’s kinda like EOX, I think.  They’re both based entirely in bringing together all the parts of the series to that point, and basically operating as a nostalgia trip through all the entries.  But because of that, the game itself isn’t doing much to stand out or endear itself to me.  I pushed really hard for a one-playthrough 100% clear, not entirely because of my usual ambition for perfection, but so I wouldn’t have to play the game again.

Atelier games have always been about micromanagement, but Nelke takes it to a whole other level.  Mostly because there’s...nothing else to do.  You have two phases: weekday and weekend.  On weekends, you get to talk to your allies, form bonds and all that, research new items, and investigate areas.  Investigation is how you get more materials, so it’s the most critical part of the game, in a sense.  Without the new materials, you can’t really progress.  But you also need to balance the friendship of the alchemists, because research is critically important, and most of the difficulty with the research is not having the friendship ratings necessary to complete it.  On a first playthrough, what this often means is showing a lot of favoritism toward the alchemsts needed for late-game research.  So if your favorites aren’t among that group?  Yeah, good luck working with both.  The worst by far is Klein.  He needs max friendship to complete the final item research, but the fucker can’t fight, and is an alchemist.  Alchemists increase friendship slower than general population, and worse, not being able to fight means those incidents where you can gain a lot of friendship by taking them along to fight monsters getting close to town?  Yeah, he can’t do that.  So instead, you have to dedicate one of your conversations each weekend to getting another asinine quest from him.  It’s obnoxious.  For each weekend, you get 12 points of time.  Conversations take up 2, and investigations go until you reach the end, or run out of time.  The awkward thing about investigating is that...you kinda just learn to run and stop at exactly the right point to gather.  If you get really good at it, you can do two conversations and still collect everything.  If you buy the increase to speed on a map, three conversations.  Which is nice, but it’s also just kind of weird to structure it like that.

Weekdays, by comparison, are the true micromanagement hell.  See, you gathered materials over the weekend, right?  Now you have to figure out what to do.  First, you have to build stuff.  You need ateliers for the alchemists to make items out of your materials.  You then need shops to sell those items to generate revenue.  You also need production facilities that can make more of some of the materials; so flower gardens make more plants, groves make more fruits, etc.  You can also dispatch characters to search for materials in areas you’ve already cleared.  Then, once the buildings are done, you set up a shopkeeper, and tell them which one item to sell, and their rating in the category of shop will tell you how much you’re selling.  So they determine the amount sold.  Alchemists are placed in the ateliers, and you then have a set amount of points for each alchemist that determines how much they can synthesize.  Material counts also matter.  Now, all this sounds okay, right?  But here’s the thing: the game will not tell you what you need.  You just have to know.  You can tell roughly based on how many items are shown in stock when you set an alchemist to synthesize, but let’s say you have 20 Wheat, and two alchemists set up.  Let’s say one is making 5 bread, and each bread takes 3 wheat.  Let’s then say you have the other alchemist set to make...I dunno, something else with Wheat, and that item takes 2 wheat per.  You set them to make 5 as well.  Now, clearly, we’re over budget.  They need 25 Wheat total, but you only have 20.  The game will not register the conflict.  It will say all alchemists will be fine and able to complete it, and only once the count is under what a specific alchemist needs will that alchemist and only that alchemist register the problem.  So let’s say instead you did this for a turn and gathered 12 Wheat.  Your count hit 0, but you gained 12 between turns, so you go into the next with 12 Wheat.  The first alchemist, who needs 15, will register a problem.  The second alchemist, who needs 10, will not.  So let’s say you forget who’s doing what and don’t thoroughly check the second alchemist here.  You adjust the first alchemist down to 4 Bread, which can use that 12 Wheat just fine.  The registered problem goes away, and you end your turn, content in your success.  Except then it registers that everything you needed isn’t made, and next turn you’re right back where you started, except now the shops are low on stock because you’ve effectively wasted two turns.

That’s the real nightmare of Nelke.  The only way to accurately check on this, is to check your main menu Supplies.  There, it will have a count of how much will be used, and how much is being gathered.  But it won’t tell you where.  So if you notice a problem, you now have to sift through your alchemists until you find the problem.  So good luck with that, I guess.

Oh, but there’s an alternate way to manage that streamlines it a bit!  You can set up your requested items, and have alchemists take on these requests as a commission type work.  So you throw in, hey, I need 5 bread, and it will tell you which alchemists can take on that work.  It’s a little easier to keep track of...but is horrifically inefficient.  Like with any micromanagement system, every point matters, which means if your alchemists are taking on all your item needs but have points left where they could do more?  You’re wasting time.  Which happens a lot with commissions.  You have to go back and check the values each alchemist is at anyway, and add in a few neutralizers or some low-cost item generally used in a lot of synthesis.  It gets tedious quick.

But hey, I mentioned fairies and should mention that one.  Fairies are great.  If you have a large or deluxe facility, you can add one or two fairies respectively.  For ateliers, fairies increase the number of items produced.  For shops, they increase the number of items sold.  It’s basically free.  Technically, they have wages, but I’ve never once noticed a problem of finances because of wages.  If you’re managing your shit right, the wages are negligible, which raises all kinds of issues with me but that’s not important here.  What is important, is that fairies are great.

So how do you get the large and deluxe versions of facilities?  You need special town items, unlocked via research, and an abundance of space.  So, given that it takes time to research the necessary, you may realize a problem.  Basic ateliers need to be established to actually work at all.  So when those are done, you have a choice.  You can make a new building from scratch, or you can renovate.  The sick part?  They cost exactly the same amount, so there’s almost no reason to ever renovate.  Renovations save absolutely nothing on materials or funding, and knock the atelier/shop being renovated out of commission until they finish, which means shops aren’t stocked and it’s just a huge clusterfuck.  But you also need the space for both shops, and space is generally finite.

Oh god, space.  Okay, so, there are 8 districts in total.  Four of them need you to do extra research on how you could develop the land around that area.  When a district is first opened, you only get so much space to operate in.  When that’s sufficiently filled, you expand and get another patch to work on, at which point you get another expansion.  The expansions can be a huge pain in the ass.  If they open up in a certain way, it can really mess with your layout, which is important because you can absolutely fill up a district the wrong way and be unable to do things optimally.  “Oh, just fill the awkward spaces with the little decorations.”  Yeah, that’s what I mean.  Their effects are so minor as to be useless, and they actually take up too much of whatever the square resource is, meaning you can’t place enough facilities to develop into a full-on town or city-level district.  It’s kind of a disaster.

But all that said...the game’s really not that hard.  Like...at all.  If you keep on top of things, there’s basically nothing that challenges you.  Fights don’t get difficult until the second to last area, and if you buy the stat increases, you’re basically invincible there too.  Cost becomes a problem then, but temporarily.  Funds are rarely, if ever, a problem if you’re upgrading when possible.  The only time a main assignment seems tough is #8, which requires 3 million cole in sales.  But you get 33 turns, and I cleared it in half the time, so...yeah.  Nothing they offer is really that tough, it’s just a lot of time invested to just micromanaging.

And that’s basically why Nelke isn’t all that fun.  It’s great seeing your favorite alchemists together, and the conversations between characters from across games can be fantastic.  But there’s barely any gameplay.  It’s mostly managing items and requests, and with no real exploration (every single area is a straight line you just run through with 2, maybe 3 fights per round) or engaging combat, there’s just not much that your alchemists are actually doing.  I realize having more to do with this level of character involvement would be really difficult, and I doubt there would have been a better way to do a quick thing like this with more effort, but it doesn’t make for the most compelling thing.

So now, I really just want to replay all the core games, and wish desperate for Dusk Trilogy DX on the Switch.

Five Things Sega Could Do To Save a Sonic Unleashed PC Port

Sega has a tendency to release PC ports of their games on Steam out of the blue. Valkyria Chronicles and Bayonetta were big surprises, only announced basically the same day they went up for sale. One PC port some Sonic fans have been requesting (including myself) is 2008’s Sonic Unleashed.

I'd argue that Sonic Unleashed is still, a decade later, the best example of the “boost” gameplay later popularized in Sonic Colors, Sonic Generations, and most recently, Sonic Forces. Sonic’s levels in Unleashed are fast, challenging and frenetic in a way none of those other games ever really matched. The problem is what surrounds Sonic’s levels -- a good 75% of Unleashed’s gameplay is slow, tedious busy work, dominated by levels where you control the plodding “Werehog.” This was a long-running problem Sonic Team was struggling with back then; they seemed to be better at making 2-3 hour experiences in an industry that expected something closer to 8-10 hours. So, they compensated by padding out the clock.

That makes Unleashed the straw that broke the camel’s back. It was the last of their games to contain such a significant amount of padding, with later games embracing their shorter completion times (until Sonic Lost World, anyway). Because of what a slog Sonic Unleashed can be, only the most dedicated really dig in and uncover its bright spots, with most getting scared away by how often and how hard the game slams on the brakes.

Sonic Team’s Takashi Iizuka stated just as recently as last year (2017) that he was open to the idea of a PC port for Sonic Unleashed, so if someone were just so happening to be working on one, I humbly present you with a wishlist of features that I think may help elevate the game to the forgotten classic I believe it to be. Each change will be rated on how hard it would be to implement, and just for the sake of fun, I’ll throw in some left field requests at the bottom that I don’t necessarily think would be possible, but I’d like to see just the same.

1. Reduce Medal Requirements Significantly

Why? One of the biggest things people hate about Sonic Unleashed is the game's medal collection aspect. Stashed in the corners of many levels are sun and moon medals which unfortunately block your progression. As you play through the game, eventually you'll reach a level requiring a certain number of these medals, and if you don’t have enough, you can't progress any further without returning to previous levels and collecting more. More often than not, players don’t know they’re behind on their medal counts until it’s already too late. And as you near the end of the game, medal unlock numbers get to be excessive, wasting hours of playtime on busy work. So, just reduce that requirement. It barely provides any legitimate gameplay and is clearly only there to tack on extra hours to the clock. Nothing of value will be lost, but players will enjoy the game more, and completionists can still hunt out all of the medals for achievements and such. Complexity: Low. With what I know about game development, this would be as simple as changing a few variables in the code -- it’d take ten minutes, tops.

2. Increase EXP Earned for the Werehog

Why? I maintain that a fully powered up Werehog is actually kinda fun. Early-game Werehog sucks; you don't have enough health, and you don't have a lot of combat abilities to fight back with. You must spend HOURS grinding out experience points (EXP) and leveling up your stats before any of that starts to feel tolerable. What's annoying is the Werehog is balanced so that you'll finish the game long before you learn all of the combat abilities, even if you focus on JUST leveling up the one stat that teaches them to you. There are entire DLC levels built explicitly to help grind out tons of EXP quickly, so Sonic Team knew this was a problem. Just throw the player a bone and make defeated enemies drop slightly higher amounts of EXP so you can get to the good stuff faster. Complexity: Low. Along the same lines as changing medal requirements, changing the EXP values in the code could be done in the time it takes to heat up leftovers in the microwave. It would probably take longer to figure out how much to change them.

3. Consolidate all DLC in to one “World Tour” pack

Why? Typically re-releases like this include all of the DLC as a free bonus, but Sega has bucked that trend with games like Sonic Adventure and Sonic Adventure 2. Both games contained optional DLC to add in their bonus Gamecube-exclusive content for an extra $7 or so. Shrewd, I guess, but it probably also helped provide Sega with a financial incentive to make those ports at all. It was also easy to ignore if you didn't like the idea of paying an extra $7, because it was all optional side-content, separate from the main game. So, do the same with Sonic Unleashed: roll the five or so DLC packs in to a singular “World Tour” pack and charge $7-ish for it. I know it's dumb, but business is dumb, and it might give the porting team a little more leeway with their development budget. Complexity: Moderate. I don’t know how Sonic Unleashed supports DLC, but this probably wouldn’t be as easy as packing all the DLC together. It still wouldn’t be that difficult, though.

4. New NPC marker to denote story-critical characters

Why? A big complaint and misconception I've seen about Sonic Unleashed time and time again is that you HAVE to spend lots of time hunting down and talking to villager NPCs in towns. Though there are a few times the game forces you to talk to townspeople, you can ignore most of them and progress through the game just fine (I certainly did). The issue is that the Unleashed doesn’t really designate between characters you can talk to, characters that give out optional side quests, and critical story characters, so it’s easy to get stuck doing something that’s unnecessary. My answer is to simply do what many other games do: mark which NPCs are important. NPCs already have markers above their heads, so simply add a new type of marker so it’s obvious who you need to talk to for progression and who is giving out optional side quests. Complexity: Moderate. This would require generating new graphics assets to insert in to the game and editing the icon display systems as well as changing map values to support it. Not difficult, but it would still take a bit of effort.

5. Break Werehog levels up into smaller chunks

Why? The other main problem with the Werehog is just how disproportionately large his levels are. Again, I don’t actually think the Werehog is the worst thing in the world, but only when it's experienced in the right context. 20+ minute Werehog stages vs. 3-5 minute Sonic levels creates a significant imbalance, and combined with grinding out EXP, everything about the Werehog feels like too much effort for not enough reward. So, cut the Werehog levels short. In theory this isn’t hard -- just move the Goal Ring found at the end of a stage somewhere closer so the level ends sooner. Of course, this creates a huge list secondary problems with pacing and leaves a lot of unused real estate on the cutting room floor, so this would take some significant work to figure out. But it’d be a necessary evil for making this part of the game a lot more digestible. Complexity: High. Individual elements of this seem simple, but combined, this would take a lot of coordination to do properly. You’d be redesigning almost half the game.

Now, let’s talk about fringe features. Things that would require exorbitant amounts of work, or are just daydreams:

6. Recreate the game in Sonic Forces’ “Hedgehog Engine 2” Why? Regardless of how you feel about the game it powers, Hedgehog Engine 2 does seem to offer some moderate technological and rendering benefits over the original Hedgehog Engine that powers Sonic Unleashed. Those benefits could be carried over to a remake, but that could come at a cost: a remake would have to be careful to make Unleashed feel “right” otherwise the whole project would be in vain. Complexity: Extremely High. You’d have to update everything for the new engine, and change how the engine itself works to support features from Sonic Unleashed that aren’t in Sonic Forces. It’s basically like making an entirely new game.

7. Implement Sonic Colors’ “Marathon” Egg Shuttle Mode Why? The shuttle mode in Sonic Colors is basically the only way I play that game now. It runs through every level in the game, in order, with boss encounters, without having to go back to a map screen or watch cutscenes, turning it into an experience like the classic Genesis Sonic games. All Sonic games could use something like that, including Unleashed. Complexity: High. You’d have to write a lot of new code and make a new map and menu option for this to work.

8. Steam Workshop support Why? Sonic Generations modding support was hacked together from scraps and managed to generate some very impressive results. It’d be nice if we could get the official Hedgehog Engine tools in some form and have a way to publish levels without having to fumble around in the dark. Complexity: Extremely High. The old Hedgehog Engine tools require having a specific versions of the Havok Physics SDK installed, which costs multiple thousands of dollars. A workaround would have to be implemented.

9. Redesign the entire end game Why? Sonic Unleashed is not a game that finishes strong. From the moment you unlock the final level, the villain’s twisted theme park called “Eggmanland,” the game nosedives hard. Eggmanland is an obnoxiously long level, easily taking over an hour to clear (without any time to stop and rest). It also breaks many of the game’s rules, with a number of genuinely mean traps that only exist to mess you up and get you killed. Your reward for finishing Eggmanland is a gauntlet of at least three final bosses, each one more stupidly aggravating than the last. None of it is fun or exciting, just annoying. Every part of it needs to be reworked somehow. Complexity: Extremely High. Eggmanland needs to be shorter, bosses need to be more forgiving, controls in certain parts need to be improved… it’ll be a lot of work.

10. An option to revert every change on this list Why? Even if I think all of these changes are necessary to improving Sonic Unleashed, it's also important to preserve it in its original format. Besides, there will always be a group of people who prefer the old game over the new version, so, every time you implement a change, put in an option to revert to put it back the way it was. Simple. Complexity: Variable. It depends on what gets changed, really.

Some people may look at an article or a list like this and ask: why not just play the modded version of Sonic Generations that adds in the Sonic Unleashed levels? Why do we need to muck around with changing Sonic Unleashed for a PC port nobody supposedly needs? Because while The Unleashed Project (that Generations mod) is pretty cool, it’s not perfect. Generations doesn’t support everything required to translate those levels perfectly, and some of them definitely suffer for it. Not only that, but future updates to The Unleashed Project are indefinitely on hold, meaning the more questionable parts will never be fixed.

The only real solution is to port the full Sonic Unleashed game to PC, and why not smooth over some of its rough edges while they’re at it? Taxman and Stealth’s Sonic CD port in 2011 did this, improving the game’s control, collision detection, and framerate. Nintendo did this when they updated The Legend of Zelda: Wind Waker for the Wii U -- they added items to speed up the slower parts of that game and make the overall experience more enjoyable. Precedent for fixing these kinds of games does exist, it’s just a matter of whether or not anyone at Sega has the initiative to make it happen, vis-à-vis a potential Sonic Unleashed PC port.

One can only hope.

AndaSeat Jungle Series Is a Great Gaming Chair for the Price

AndaSeat Jungle Series Gaming Chair

8.00 / 10

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As long as you're slightly smaller than me, the AndaSeat Jungle Series gaming chair is a perfect option. It's relatively affordable, comfortable, well-built, and tasteful in the looks department.

Specifications

Brand: Andaseat

Material: PVC leather with memory foam cushion

Height Adjustable: Yes, up to 6'5"

Adjustable Arms: 2D adjustable

Recline: 160 degrees

Maximum Load Weight: 265

Pros

Reasonably-priced

Extremely comfortable as long as you're under 265 pounds

Low-key look won't take over your room

Cons

Lumbar pillow is a little thick

Doesn't work well for tall people

Hard armrests

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Gaming chairs are quickly becoming one of the most popular accessories for gamers. You can't turn on a Twitch stream or watch a YouTube video without seeing the host sitting comfortably on one form of gaming chair or another.

A company that's making waves in the gaming chair space is AndaSeat. The firm got attention with its Fnatic Edition chair (check out our full review of that chair) and with its newly-announced high-end AndaSeat T-Pro 2 luxury gaming chair.

Now, the company has a seat targeted explicitly at gamers on a budget (and those who aren't of the larger variety) with its AndaSeat Jungle Edition chair. Rather than breaking the bank at $500 or more like many other chairs, this one comes in with a $299 price tag, which is quite reasonable for what it brings to the table.

With that said, does the AndaSeat Jungle Edition do enough to make it worth buying?

Design

This chair seems to be designed for the gamer who doesn't want huge graphics and busy color schemes. Instead, it comes in only two colorways: solid black and black and red. Both are tasteful, but we ended up going with the lowkey all-black model for our review.

There are a couple of small logos on the chair, but nothing that stands out too much. On the chair's back, right around where your shoulder blades rest, is an "AD" logo. On the lumbar support and headrest are the AndaSeat name, and the back has AndaSeat as well. The rest of the chair is a solid color with stitching accents that make it look good without being too aggressive.

Obviously, if you're looking for a gaming chair to serve as a conversation piece or a busy background for your stream, this might not be the best choice for you. But if you want a chair that'll look good in your office while still offering the racing seat design for which gaming chairs are known, this is an excellent option.

Features

As this is a more affordable chair, some of the higher-end AndaSeat features aren't included. Instead of the 4D armrests, the Jungle series gets 2D armrests. Basically, that means the armrests can only move up and down. The extra movement would be nice, but something had to give to get the chair down to a lower price, and that was it.

The chair is made with PVC leather, commonly referred to as Vinyl or not actual leather. However, the tradeoff for getting fake leather is increased stain-resistance, durability, and scratch-resistance.

So far, the chair has been able to handle everything I've thrown at it, so the PVC leather does seem to be doing its job in that regard. The other nice thing about PVC leather is that it's easy to clean, so you can simply wipe the chair down with a damp cloth to keep it looking good as new.

AndaSeat built this chair to both recline 160 degrees and rock back and forth, so you get the best of both worlds in terms of flexibility and usability.

Moving onto the chair's other features, you'll also get a neck pillow and lumbar pillow for extra support. Both are removable and can be placed in different spots depending on your height. This is yet another way the chair is able to be versatile to meet the needs of all different gamers (well, all different smaller gamers, since the chair doesn't work well for anyone larger than 265 pounds).

The chair also comes with wide wheels that are covered with PU rubber, which promises quieter rolling. For me, it wasn't quiet, but I live in an apartment with uneven and old wood floors (it was built over 100 years ago), so any chair is going to make some noise rolling over it. As long as you have a smooth floor, you should find that the wheels don't make too much noise.

This is not much of a feature, but it's worth mentioning that the chair rotates 360 degrees and does so entirely silently and with minimal effort.

Setup Process

The setup process wasn't too bad, and I was able to get the chair completely assembled by myself in about 30 minutes. The instructions are easy enough to follow, and none of the parts are so heavy that you won't be able to lift them.

The only part that took a little longer than I'd like was attaching the back of the chair to the seat (a problem my colleague Kris Wouk also faced when building the Fnatic Edtion chair in his review). Still, even that only added a couple of extra minutes to the process. It also took a bit of force to get the wheels to attach to the chair's base, but leaning on them and pushing with all of my weight made them click in nice and tight.

All of the tools you need to put the chair together come in the box (and it's a huge box), so even if you're not the type to spend time tinkering, you won't have to worry about running out to buy any extra tools to assemble the Jungle Series gaming chair.

As always, your mileage may vary when it comes to assembly should you choose to buy a chair (we all have different levels of patience when it comes to these sorts of things). I can say that the process was more or less painless in my experience, which started the chair-owning experience on a rather positive note.

Build Quality

It's hard to rate the build quality of something like a chair within the timeframe of a review. After all, most of the build quality shows itself after months and years of use. Still, I can say that chair feels quite solid and well-built.

The armrests feel strong and sturdy. The seat cushions are firm, so they don't feel like they'll give out after a while. The wheels don't seem like they're going to seize up anytime in the near future.

For AndaSeat's part, the chair sounds well-built too. The company says it uses a 22mm diameter enhanced steel frame to support the trials and tribulations gamers put it through. It also features a 55KG/M3 density foam padding that is designed to handle extended periods of use without giving way. In fact, the company promises years of use without losing its shape.

The company also offers a lifetime warranty on the steel framework and a two-year warranty for the other parts of the chair. Obviously, there are limitations (for example, the company won't cover rips in the PVC leather), but it's still nice to see AndaSeat is confident in its product.

Comfort

At the end of the day, the main thing that matters when buying a chair is comfort. The chair can look like a race car seat or the cockpit of a fighter jet, but if it isn't comfortable, none of that matters.

Fortunately, I found the AndaSeat Jungle Series chair to be quite comfortable, although I am a little big for it. I weigh 250 pounds, so I'm pretty close to the limit in terms of how much this chair is designed to hold. I also have large thighs from 20+ years of playing hockey, so the chair definitely felt like it was hugging me a little bit too much at first. As long as you are in the low 200 pounds or less range, the chair (which AndaSeat says is Medium), should fit you quite well.

I had some trepidations regarding the armrest, as I typically like my chairs to come with padded ones, and these are on the harder side. However, that wasn't an issue at all, and I found the slightly contoured shape of the armrests to be rather comfortable once I dialed in the height just right.

As far as the padding goes, it feels great. Of course, firmness is entirely subjective, and what everyone likes will vary greatly, but for me, the Jungle Series chair perfectly walks the line between being firm enough to be supportive and soft enough to be comfortable.

Personally, I don't like the lumbar support pillow that comes with the chair, so I took it off. I found that no matter where I positioned it, it stuck out a bit too far for my liking. It is soft and made of the same foam as the chair, so you might like it, but it wasn't for me.

The neck pillow works much better, though. I had to put it higher than the instructions called for since I'm fairly tall, but once I got it in the right position, leaning back during slow periods of gameplay felt great.

All in all, the chair is quite comfortable. For $300, I really have no complaints about the feel. I spend a good four to six hours sitting in it every single day of the week, and it feels good every time.

Should You Buy The AndaSeat Jungle Series Gaming Chair?

As long as you're slightly smaller than me, the AndaSeat Jungle Series gaming chair is a perfect option. It's relatively affordable, comfortable, well-built, and tasteful in the looks department.

If you're large (bigger than 260 or have larger-than-average thighs) you might want to look elsewhere. Also, if you're looking for something with flashy colors and logos, there are better options out there. But if you want a comfortable chair that won't completely dominate the look of your office, you should definitely grab one of these.

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A service service is said to be a specialist in mobile program progress offering a distinctive experience in Cellular Application Progress on each system including iPad, iPhone, Blackberry, Android, Hands web OS, Windows Mobile, Nokia Ovi, Bada, J2ME, & QT etc. Boosting the discussion via focusing on the information of the created and video reviews in regards to a sport does not need certainly to come at the price of a score that is expressive. The best place to consider most of the mobile phones from Motorola is net. Understanding how http://fitnesswelt-de.com/titan-gel-preis-die-bewertungen-die-wirkung-wo-kaufen-webseite-des-herstellers-oder-eine-apotheke/ that is mobile is felt about by individuals, we imagine there is planning to be many major scoffing in Guitar Hero Live's pricetag, but look at this . Let's go into how you can set the easiest solution as well as a windows mobile spy effortlessly up to get it done. Having 135 Pokémon that was fresh, new types of S /E, Pokéballs, Pokémon Challenges and, the benefits of Battle Frontier, in Pokémon Emerald revolutionized the Pokémon activities. Additionally it is less likely to want to occur than the ascendancy of Jaime though a relaxing shift of capacity to the Imp would-be among the many delectable things we're able to actually see in another Game of Thrones. For frequent RPG followers, the overall game wins by advantage of good balance in marrying mainstream tropes having humor, loveable figures and a history that though not distinctive in a synoptical impression (evil being overthrown by band of cheerful civilians) offers a well-executed and excessively gratifying experience with surprisingly emotive transforms that aren't too tacky. We attempt to pair games up with the individual who knows the genre the manufacturer, along with the kind of recreation sport, in order to offer the many expert viewpoints. Only six could be got by recreation of Thrones earnings someday in summer 2017 for season SEVERAL, that will get several attacks Year EIGHT. Advanced activities are loved by me, but a game that I'd to obtain numerous components created myself less fascinated. Regarding a good example let us check out the functions spec and cost of g five g3000 mobile phone. Just in case you're wondering why the overall game is called Crimsonland, it's because your opponents pour their body around the battleground as you take them out. Granted the road is a small basic searching, employing vector-graphics to generate it focus on a number of gadgets not just the latest smartphones, nonetheless it is relatively comprehensive. Indeed are overpowering games that are dear quicker than games that is cellular is taking-over consoles. Here's where your $1,000+ dollars come in. The Samsung Series7 Chronos provides outstanding CPU and design specs, with a quad-coreANDSEVEN thread Intel Key i7-2675QM Exotic Fill PC with SIX megs level 2 cache and Turbo-Boost to 3.1GHz, SIX gigs of DDR SEVERAL 1333MHz Memory (8 optimum) and an 8x dvdburner (number Blu-ray selection). Android Telephone SEVEN that you'd like to view outlined, iPad, let us understand if you've a suggestion for an application for that iPhone. There is regular - full resolution (typically 1080p in animations games on Android) plus a greatest FPS of sixty. Next there is save electricity,” which declines the frame-rate to a greatest of 30FPS and lessens the solution (prone to 720p). Personally I actually don't think the adjustments are this kind of matter anymore as developers are currently becoming greater at enjoying for their benefits, but yes people who don't sport on mobile phones appear to generally be of the view that the settings is likely to be bs. I.e.- average gamer Perceives Implosion is 10MONEY and appreciates nothing of its material or value, passes rapidly over it and data several trash mech sport that is f2p and dislikes it and is quit continuous to think portable offers very little to offer relative pc or to system. Running budgets that are tiny keep compensated portable games at night. Using online Cellular Keep, you can consider every phone's details and prepare, and take action at your personal speed. John Lindley, senior manufacturer at EA, appreciates the Business's new game comes strongly in the group that Hearthstone has helped legitimize, observing that Hearthstone is each creativity and competitors. By the period the erosion at this range's bottom end takes carry portable may also have now been changed fembots, by neurological gaming or something. Which should perform fine too if you pop in a fresh hard-drive, mount Snow Leopard import Your Time And Effort Device copy as you defined. Yahoois chance is the fact that by depending on Android adopters modify the OS and to create the equipment, the adopter might hand the OS due to their own utilize and not avail themselves of the means of Google. However it generally does not fit-for the operator, already attempted together with the PS3 controller Sport!!! The matter that set-back out sport essentially the most animating and was modeling the Pokemon. Most TELEVISION collection GRAMS five cellular handsets are not low in excellent and helps dual sim (GSM) function. Properly explained, and I assume they currently do, using portable gaming's growth within their home country. He once instructed several children that when there is a game title preordered sufficient previously will be sometimes come away by it. Choosing Android application programmer programmer on constant, weekly and regular schedule is achievable, as with all the greater functions the business enterprise could possibly get ignited with this work style. Regardless of more than 16 years afterwards the flaws, that are quickly identified currently , Pokémon R /W/Y was the sport that is perfect. Bingis private emulator wasn't always the fastest and easiest to utilize (to the stage where Microsoft wound up liberating its own). We observed it was additionally suitable for my Nvidia DEFEND Android Television, therefore it was fitted by me there too and plan to view what happens later. Clearly the aesthetic side of things is the most clear to identify from the player, but more conversation using materials inside the environment of the game, like deterioration, which could play with a part within the gameplay of the game and a role that is next. Nicely, I woke up early, between 5 and SEVERAL:30am. I began enjoying and downloaded the overall game. Camping goers and additional camping experts is going to be contained in the recreation though brands have not been stated nonetheless. Video gaming have come quite a distance, and have spread to cell hand helds which might be a lot more advanced and superior custom home consoles, pc and laptop gaming and with greater and greater digital features and visuals. Android is currently assisting to transfer customers to T-Mobile the knowledge companies of: income of Android equipment were up 137 pct this season from your year that is previous. Are you currently buying way to Traveler Mobile Phone Text it's cando it using cell-phone criminal is hardly difficult to use. In Game of Thrones, the audience is made conscious incredibly first of what is currently going on in Master's Obtaining. That several money is better spent if you've got Computer or a system on preserving up for one of the activities. (by-the-way, the initial Arkham Asylum is just $thirteen this weekend on Steam) and when you do not, next only purchase something else - there are many of steps games on Android which are simply simply better. Take a look at our manual on how best to move your acquaintances between iPhone and Android for an easy approach that has iTunes. Among the minion sorts in the first activities was updated for the film, as well as the game developers offered one-an additional outfit to create a full fledged chatting NPC. You're able to support the Siri Remote in possibly landscape or symbol, with respect to the game—most operator - type games will require landscape, while point-and- activities ought to not be coarse in symbol method. Currently, some 300,thousand people include rated Flappy Bird, several causing long critiques using recommendations, needs, and general ventilation: The only reason why I've not however removed this awful game will be the overwhelming sensation of relief and achievement I'm when I eventually overcome a high report,” produces one. Back-up. It was as if you just said that it is a recreation around shooting at high-school females with a wonder climax gun wherever you go. Windows Mobile is an operating system (OS), developed and produced by Microsoft.

Leverage the power of Influencer Marketing for popularizing your mobile app

The evolution of mobile technology is shaping the world in a new way. It is also changing the outlook of businesses towards marketing and modifying the process of buying and selling online.

While many businesses have already got an app for their brand, others are already on the spree. The smarter business owners are opting for DIY technology and venturing into mCommerce by creating apps with free app maker tools like AppMySite.

Besides promoting the brand & products, it has become important to promote one’s app as well. This development is also affecting the ways in which the world of marketing functioned. People are now resorting to newer tools of marketing and advertisement for driving sales.

Amidst many other marketing techniques like SMS & Email marketing, Affiliate Marketing, Media Advertisements, and more, Influencer Marketing has cast its own charm among people across the globe.

In this article, we will discover the most fascinating aspects of the importance of influencer marketing for popularizing mobile apps. Read further to discover how influencers are adding more value to the app marketing sector. Learn the key takeaways and implement them for absolute success.

Know the ten commandments of success

Influencer Marketing is wowing the world with its unique, glamorous and creative appeal. We have rummaged through the most popular facets of it to curate this absolute list of key takeaways.

Go through the ten tips & tricks and leverage your marketing strategy:

1. Know your business goals

Before you proceed to invest your time, effort and money in influencer marketing, you must determine your business goals. Having a deep understanding of your purpose and targets, will help you make the best use of the resources at your disposal.

You should analyze the goals and then proceed accordingly. Knowing what you wish to achieve will redirect your efforts in the right direction and channelize it fruitfully. With respect to app promotion, it can be done to achieve a variety of targets. 

You can go for influencer marketing to fulfil any of the following needs:

i) To populate your business app and products

ii) To inform people about a new campaign or product

iii) To advertise new offers, updates, features, or more

iv) To attract new customers attracted to influencers

v) To retain existing users or re-engage lost users

 2. Measure the pros & cons

As you measure the various aspects of your campaign, you must also enlighten yourself with the pros and cons of the technique. It will help you perform anticipately and deal with the shortcomings, if any, on time.

Thought it widely varies from campaign to campaign, the general concerning factors are as follows:

Pros-

Fetches active and engaging users

Boosts installations & conversions

Low cost per installation rates

Gets stronger brand recognition

Builds social proof & authenticity

Cons-

Cracking agreements can be tricky

Lack of standard pricing practices

Unpredictable results & output

Depends upon third-party

Impact can be short-term 

 3. Identify your target audience

Once you have discovered your purpose, you will need to identify your target users next. The target audience determines the influencer you will seek out and vice versa. Hence keep both the factors in sync. Just like your products, different influencers appeal to people of different age, gender, class, location, and more. Consider these factors and measure your target audience cautiously.

Who are the people you want to reach out to? Where are they likely to be present? Who will like your products (or the app) endorsed by your influencer? Finding answer for these questions will give you a clearer insight and a deeper understanding of your potential customers. 

4. Choose the right platform

Choosing the right platform is as crucial as selecting the best influencer and sampling the target audience. Although Instagram is considered to be the best platform for Celebrity or Influencer Marketing, there is no absolute formula for it. Nothing is written in stone when it comes to principles of marketing. 

Find your calling and fathom your resources to choose your platform accordingly. You can stick to one channel or branch out. Harness the social media platforms to the fullest as it is more likely to work in this arena. Create videos and influential stories and showcase it on YouTube, Instagram, Facebook, etc. You can also drop teasers on your website, twitter or other places and create excitement about the company-influencer partnership.

5. Find relatable influencers

The marketing space is unpredictable so you cannot really tell what will click. However, you must take calculated decisions if you want the maximum output. Selecting an ideal influencer can be quite tricky.

However, the best approach is to find someone who connects with your product idea and is really willing to promote it. For instance, you can look for someone working for the environment to promote your organic products store. The idea is that their image should align, resonate and affirm with yours. 

 There are mainly two types of influencers you can choose from:

Micro influencers: They are the average people who enjoy limited popularity and thus, are cost-effective. They can be extremely beneficial if you wish to target a specific audience that looks up to them. However, the fame can be short-living.

  Macro influencers: They are people who enjoy vast popularity and stardom. If you have a good budget and strong outreach strategy, you can hook them. They can create more buzz & drive more engagement and are also good for building brand reputation.

 6. Plan your outreach strategy

Reaching out to the influencers and convincing them can be mind-numbing. You must have a strong outreach strategy in order to get the influencers of your choice and to produce the desired output. Today, there are agencies who provide wholesome solutions for Celebrity/Influencer marketing.

If you feel that your communication skills are good and your brand has a strong appeal, you can also contact them directly. Tell them about your campaign in detail and make them believe in it. It will help you build brand authenticity. Get to common grounds when it comes to budget, time, location and other factors and clear everything before drafting the final contract.  

 7. Conceptualize your campaigns

Make the influencers a part of your planning and ideate a strong campaign that earns the trust and attention of your customers. You must also have a set formula of marketing your campaign and calculating the feedback. This will help you determine the budget and scope of the campaign. You can also learn from your industry competitors.

It has become easier to quantify these campaigns as the market has set standards for Influencer marketing. You can set the budget based on various models like Cost Per Click (CPC), Cost Per Mile (CPM), Cost Per Installation (CPI), or more. 

The three types of influencer agreements are:

Shoutouts: Here they just mention about your product in brief or slip in the app name smartly. It comes at a lower budget. 

Gameplay: The costs can be higher here as the influencer will tell about your products in detail. It can drive more engagement. 

Visibility: It works best when you wish to target a larger audience. The focus is on brand awareness and building social proof. 

 8. Implement your program

Once you have measured all the pros & cons and carved out your strategy, you can proceed to the implementation of your campaign. You can penetrate the already competitive platforms or seek new channels that assure success. Find your marketplace and let your creativity and energy flow as you proceed to put the program in action.

Be high on energy and efforts but do not over do. The best approach is to sell without selling. Go around narrating stories and slip in your app in between. Do not hesitate in giving creative liberty to your influencers and let them play the game. But, keep a keen eye on the entire program and supervise everything.

 9. Promote on various platforms

There is no harm in branching out as long as it is not annoying your audience. Experiment with various channels and cross-promote the campaign on various platforms. Post stories on social media channels like Instagram & Facebook and invite people to interact. Focus on the details like campaign video, content, slogan, and more. 

Go around creating a buzz about your campaign and harness the possibilities to the fullest. You can also send push notifications to your existing customers about the developments. You can then opt for the referral rewards technique and ask them to share the campaign in their circle, and incentivize them in return.

10. Analyze the feedback

It is important to calculate the outcome and result of every activity to evaluate the performance. Even after a successful 360-degree campaign, there can be a lot of things that could fall short. Every campaign has its peak and weak points and it is important that you identify yours. A brief SWOT analysis or a general study can make the picture clear.

Do not just limit this study to counting the number of impressions and installations. Instead. having a deep understanding of your strengths and weaknesses will help you identify the opportunities and threats. It will also help you discover what worked and what did not. This will facilitate the process of setting new business & marketing goals and achieving them.  

 Build the necessary infrastructure 

If you are intrigued by the benefits of elevating your app popularity with influencer marketing, it’s time to get the infrastructure. You will need an amazing app with tempting layout and viable features. 

Let us make it simpler for you! All you need to do is to register on AppMySite mobile app builder for WooCommerce. You can proceed to build your app and customize the layout as you simultaneously preview it. Go ahead and publish it on your preferred platform. That’s it! You will easily get an app that will charm your users.

Catalyze your success further by implementing the right marketing and publicity techniques. Contact an influencer and promote your app to make it ‘the new talk of the town’. Also, keep following our trending articles for more such informative and entertaining content and stay updated.

New Write-up Exposes The Low Down on video game As well as Why You Must Do something about it Today

Purchasing a residence is something that needs a lot of time, effort as well as is streamlined when a strategy remains in area to assist take care of the procedure. Bean bags are preferred for video games such as cornhole or corn toss wherein the bags are thrown at an increased system with a hole on the far end. Consequently, any type of recreational activity is good as an anxiety breaking strategy. There are various kinds of gambling enterprise games that have actually obtained in appeal for many years. Get your practical Children of the Nile and also enjoy this one-of-a-kind city building experience. Most people think that purchasing a printer is confusing and also hard. We do not ask children to reveal more individual information compared to is necessary for them to participate in a specific task, as well as we take actions to stop youngsters from uploading call information. The scholarship version of the video game included a great deal of new content, which developed an already stuffed game and also is a need to purchase for both brand-new players as well as returning Bully followers. In Game Dev Tale, you take on the function of humble computer game advancement group and also their journey to becoming a leader (or failing) in the gaming market.

What You Do not know Regarding video game Might Be Costing To Greater than You Believe.

One of the hardest components is the seeming strike on your identity when you not load a provided duty, a duty you might have played for years, also years. Considered the initial of its kind in Tampa Bay, the playing field is made up of ancient chambers, snaking passages and deep jungle whereby the gamers come to blows. Players will certainly get to see just how this plays out when the game launches on October 17th. If reginadefitness.info you have actually ever before wished to participate in desert safari Abu Dhabi is the place for you in addition to offering you an opportunity to enjoy camel rides, archery, desert walk, falconry and other tasks.

The Nuiances Of video game

You wish to frequently hold the reins and take on every obstacle to ensure that your personal thumbprint makes every little thing excellent. The Movies is most definitely my top pick although I'm somewhat biased as I have always taken pleasure in mogul video games. Variety: Artificial Life, Real Evolution is a complimentary indie video game like Spore that aims to capture the very best aspects of spore as well as build on them. In Attract Online poker, each and every gamer is dealt five credit card, as well as a round of betting ensues. By functioning just with reliable companies, you make certain not just that your cash is protected, but also that you have a wide variety of video games to choose fro ... (find out more). These are video games that you will actually take pleasure in, as well as not just sub-rate, kiddie video games, yet ready all ages and also all preferences.

Honest Report Reveals The Unanswered Questions on game

If you do a great deal of printing in your home, or have kids that do, you believe spent quite a bit of your budget on printer ink. This is why millions selected this site as their source for on-line video games. Coming from the best names in the pc gaming market, the entire game plot, and gameplay will certainly impress you in every feasible means. A single of the reasons for these flash action games to end up being amusing is the fact that the developers of such action video games create truly applaud deserving computer animation and a solid story line that makes these video games addictive and so preferable. It is among those games that could be taken pleasure in whatever degree you play at. • The Art of the Gamer of Chess is to extensively understand the network as well as study of influences and also pressures on the chessboard, then to elaborate a method that will certainly lead him/her to the loss of the opponent. With an intention of saving expenses, the companies have actually planned to go paperless by selecting a file scanning option for their offices. Click on this link to uncover just how you could begin a cost-free trial at the net's leading and most preferred XBOX 360 game downloads site - pleased gaming! Later you will obtain a 2nd plan called the "Lords" package which is offered when you reach Town Hall level 4. The Lords plan will have an added city teleporter. On January Second, fitness centers all over the world are going to be crowded 24/7 with people that made a New Year's resolution to obtain a six-pack. Players can see our site anywhere around the universe, simply by clicking the play currently button as well as start playing the 13card game. How do the gamers maintain the outlaw's identification/ criminal offenses secret from a powerful potential enemy - particularly if any of them have a Big Mouth or Lyin' Eyes.? A great deal of players locate that in instance they hold the striker amidst the thumb and ring finger (as received picture), and let go the demonstrator as they are making the stroke, it includes great solidity as well as augmented precision to their shot. Right here, you will certainly locate sound advice to help you discover very easy ways to increase your catch quantity. Physical violence is intertwined with several points, the state of ones mental capability and actions leading up to a tragic event is another article for an additional day. In addition, treatment has to be taken to have a secure environment for the kids to play their video games in, as well as they ought to be managed in any way times. Jon says that they should make cause to eliminate against the Military of the Dead. Other games such as Techmo Bowl created the first prominent sports games.

Mobile gaming startup Mech Mocha raises Collection A spherical

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Mobile gaming startup Mech Mocha raises Collection A spherical

Bangalore-based totally Mobile gaming startup Mech Mocha Sports Studios Pvt. Ltd has raised $5 million (Rs 32 crore) in its Series A spherical led via task capital companies Accel Partners and China’s Shunwei Capital, a business enterprise declaration said.

VCCircle broke the story earlier this month, wherein it pegged the round at $three.eight million, bringing up filings with the Registrar of Organizations. Accel had invested around $1.7 million even as Shunwei installed $1.five million, the filings showed. Milestone Trusteeship Offerings Pvt. Ltd, a debenture trustee that caters to Blume Ventures, and Australia-primarily based S Deo Corp Pty Ltd also took part in the spherical, the record said.

“The Indian Cell gaming region is growing at a quick tempo and holds wonderful opportunity. We are hoping to share our experience in China and use it to create new possibilities for Mech Mocha in India,” said Tuck Lee Koh, founding associate, and CEO, Shunwei Capital. The fresh funding comes almost a yr after the enterprise raised $1 million from Blume and e-trade firm Flipkart.

Mech Mocha will set up the finances to expand and launch new Mobile-gaming titles throughout casual and mid-center gaming categories, centered at the Indian target market, the startup said in the statement.

Mech Mocha become released via Arpita Kapoor and Mohit Rangaraju in 2014. Its first Recreation, Puppet Punch, clocked a lakh downloads in the first four days of release in January 2015. The employer develops and publishes freemium games, with Chhota Bheem-Himalayan Sport being its first providing for the Indian market. It claims that over 4 million Indians have performed the sport to date.

“We’re exploring partnerships with global gaming Companies to release their blockbuster gaming titles in India. We will announce a partnership soon,” Kapoor advised VCCircle.

The agency can even launch a new Sport in more than one months. Besides investing in localization, Mech Mocha plans to utilize a part of the budget raised on an included technology platform with capabilities in behavioral analytics, multiplayer, LiveOps, and monetization.

Shunwei Capital, which invests in Mobile Internet, Net of things and tech Organizations, has been keen on investing in Indian startups in partnership with domestic assignment capital companies. It had closed its third fund in July 2015 with a capital commitment of $1 billion, a document by means of Chinamoneynetwork.Com stated previously. In February this 12 months, it had invested $three million in Mumbai-primarily based Trebil, a market for pre-owned motors. The gaming startup area has visible a few funding activity over the past few months.

Earlier this year, Udupi-based totally gaming startup 99Games On-line Pvt. Ltd. Raised an undisclosed amount of funding from Jap funding company Dream Incubator. Present investors Ascent Capital and Kalaari Capital also participated in the round.

In November final yr, Cell gaming startup PlaySimple games secured $four million (nearly Rs 27 crore then) in a sequence A spherical led by SAIF Partners and IDG Ventures India. in the same month, Mumbai-primarily based Mobile video games developer Nazara Technologies stated it may opt for a public list in 2018. Across the equal time, social media massive Fb Inc. launched a function referred to as Facebook Instantaneous video games, to be able to permit users to play video games with messenger contacts.

In September 2016, Cell video games publisher Flixy games Pvt. Ltd raised $425,000 (Rs 2.eight crore) in seed funding from Rebright Companions, a Japan-based totally venture capital company.

The Destiny of Cell Gaming – Interview With David Kainer

The Future of Cellular gaming is being fashioned via interesting new Technology that allows multiplayer gaming. This article is an interview that shows a discussion between a Mobile enterprise blog and the Managing Director of Viva La Mobile. It highlights each the modern-day country of the Cellular gaming market and appears to the Future trend of multiplayer Mobile gaming.

Interviewer: Hi David, thanks for taking the time to talk to us. We have been having plenty of fun with Top notch Puzzle Bobble Multiplayer and can not watch for Viva to drop some other hit! But before we move on, are you able to please tell the readers a touch bit approximately Viva Los Angeles Cell and what you men do over there?

So a touch historical past first. Viva La Cellular is a Cell video games developer and publisher based in Sydney which I co-founded in 2003. We have a first-rate deal of enjoying designing and creating Cell games of all kinds, But our specialty is multiplayer. We pioneered actual time multiplayer on mobiles via using the functions to be had on 3G networks and handsets. Early on in our records, we determined no longer to target the ‘low striking fruit’ cease of the market and try and provide some thing different to Cellular gamers. I’ve always wanted to maintain Viva L. A. Cell’s position as an innovator in preference to a follower. This could be risky within the Cell games industry However it is sincerely greater amusing for product improvement.

Interviewer: I have a love/hate relationship with the iPhone. I like it because it’s unbelievably cool, glaringly, I hate it because it’s no longer to be had in Australia and the shortage of 3G makes me marvel what Apple have been smoking. What is it approximately the iPhone that makes playing video games so a laugh? Is there an incredible difference between regular Cellular games and iPhone games? How do you believe you studied the iPhone will impact the Australian Cellular video games marketplace whilst it finally arrives?

David: To be sincere I’ve not without a doubt made lots effort to inspect games on the iPhone, probably because I do not have one! My view, even though, is that the iPhone is little extra than a lovely excessive end handset with games to fit. This is much like Nokia’s new N-Gage enabled handsets. The games might be wonderful But at the end of the day, it’s far a small part of the general market. So whilst the iPhone arrives it’s going to virtually seize a share of the market and probably raise the image of Cellular smartphone games within the eyes of consumers which is a superb thing. In the long run, we plan to target it as just every other cellphone among the loads we already try to attain. As for the dearth of 3G, I am nonetheless shaking my head in surprise, though I hear it’s coming very quickly.

Interviewer: There may be no disputing that Viva La Mobile are the authority on Multiplayer Cell games. Will multiplayer Mobile games be the Destiny? Will each single Cell Recreation have the multiplayer capability?

David: Multiplayer on Cell has good sized increase capability and that I suppose because the 3G marketplace matures you may discover advanced multiplayer video games being played in extra and greater numbers because of the faster connectivity and the tendency of 3G users to definitely ‘use’ the features of their telephones. However I do not consider that every Mobile Sport will have the multiplayer capability – now not every Game wishes it. I assume it’s miles important that a multiplayer Game is specially designed for a couple of gamers within the first vicinity, as opposed to clearly tacking on a multiplayer mode to a Recreation that is glaringly designed as an unmarried player.

There will continually be exquisite unmarried participant games that honestly aren’t conducive to playing towards opponents. However, if you have a brilliant Game that lets you at once defeat your friends or other players from around the world it takes the competitive and social factors of gaming up a level. Mobile phones are an excellent medium for multiplayer video games because they may be designed for connectivity and international interplay. At Viva Los Angeles Mobile We’ve got continually maintained that it’s far more amusing to play with a person else than to play with your self.

Interviewer: I am a sucker for massive-branded Cell games like Iron Guy; However I am frequently upset by way of the terrible gameplay and rushed degree design. It seems quite a few these games, especially movie tie-ins, are rushed to manufacturing with the idea that clients pay for some thing with a logo connected. Viva L. A. Cell has been on both aspects of this argument, with branded games like Notable Puzzle Bobble and non-branded video games like Badlands. How critical is a logo in relation to creating a Sport that sells? Are branded video games the Future? Will there be any room for the little guy?

David: You’re spot on about the film tie-ins. We constantly see huge branded titles with second charge Recreation play being rushed to the service decks with the belief that customers will pay for some thing with a brand connected. And the unhappy factor is they regularly do. This has triggered a few actual problems as purchasers are not idiots and the terrible value for cash being furnished by way of a number of those big brands is keeping the boom of the industry stagnant. I think the main sales channels (service decks) are quite responsible right here too as they’ll push something with a large emblem on the top of the deck on the cost of unbranded titles that may have extremely good Sport-play innovation inside. Innovation isn’t always being rewarded and the little man is finding the going tough. The net effect is that greater progressive Groups are turning far from the carrier decks and this is probably in which the longer term Destiny of the enterprise lies.