Manual Labor

Posted by Rampant Coyote on April 30, 2010

The “Golden Age” of CRPGs unfortunately hit around the time I was a poor, starving college student. I had more time than money. Maybe that was why I ended up getting into my games much more than I do now. Nowadays, I’m able to find out what I was missing back in the day, but […]

Filed Under: Design, Retro - Comments: 13 Comments to Read

Linkrealms: Spellcasting Chickens!

Posted by Rampant Coyote on April 29, 2010

I was supposed to get this up last week. Better late than never I guess. Let’s talk about the indie MMO, Linkrealms. And chickens. I got a chance to talk with Herb, Dan, and even a tiny bit with Paul – the Linkrealms team – last week at the Utah Indie Night. Quite honestly, I […]

Filed Under: Game Announcements, Utah Indie Game Night - Comments: Read the First Comment

Interview with Matt Barton

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Wow.  I seem to be invoking Matt Barton’s name a lot this month. But Gnome’s Lair has an interview with Barton, the author of Dungeons and Desktops: The History of Computer Role-Playing Games, which I’ve talked about a couple of times now (perhaps in more detail than I think most people would care to have […]

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My Hopes In the Coming Zombie Apocalypse

Posted by Rampant Coyote on April 28, 2010

If and when the zombie apocalypse happens, I hope it consists of slow zombies (like in Shaun of the Dead), and not the fast zombies like in Left 4 Dead. The reason being is that I’m not as fast as I used to be, and so if zombies are slow and shuffling, it’ll be easier […]

Filed Under: General - Comments: 8 Comments to Read

Eschalon: Book 2 Release Date Announced

Posted by Rampant Coyote on April 27, 2010

The sequel to the very popular “old-school” indie RPG Eschalon: Book 1 will be arriving soon. According to Basilisk Games, the Windows version will be available on Wednesday, May 12th. The Mac and Linux version will follow two weeks later, on the 26th.

Filed Under: Game Announcements - Comments: Comments are off for this article

More Departures from Infinity Ward

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So, is this a case of a parent company killing the goose that laid the golden egg? Five More Out at Modern Warfare Studio Infinity Ward It’s really tough to tell who’s at fault here – I’m sure the courts will be deciding that for a while. I don’t know if West and Zampella were […]

Filed Under: Biz - Comments: 2 Comments to Read

Anti-Videogame Legislation Goes to Supreme Court.

Posted by Rampant Coyote on April 26, 2010

I hope this one gets smacked down hard with the resounding THUD of finality: As Court Reviews California Violent Game Law, ESA Promises To Fight

Filed Under: Politics - Comments: Comments are off for this article

Review: Dungeons & Desktops – The History of Computer Role-Playing Games

Posted by Rampant Coyote on

For my birthday, my wife gave me the book,  “Dungeons & Desktops: The History of Computer Role-Playing Games,” by Matt Barton. Not to be confused with the very amusing freeware game, Desktop Dungeons. The Articles Level Up! I’d previously enjoyed the series on the History of the Computer Role-Playing Game by Barton in Gamasutra. If […]

Filed Under: Books, Mainstream Games, Retro - Comments: 2 Comments to Read

Interview: Steven Peeler of Soldak Entertainment

Posted by Rampant Coyote on April 25, 2010

Steven Peeler of Soldak Entertainment has an interview over at the “videogaming programming” blog, Random Tower of Games. I was especially amused that the interview questions were numbered, starting with number 0. Programmer humor. An excerpt: “The interesting part of games being an inspiration is that a lot of times for me they give me […]

Filed Under: Interviews - Comments: Comments are off for this article

Utah Indie Night – Spring 2010

Posted by Rampant Coyote on April 23, 2010

Holy cow — at this rate, we’re going to have to start renting a convention hall! I think this quarter’s Utah Indie Night was the best-attended ever. Greg Squire is probably going to have a better report on the actual numbers and the full list of games shown, but for the first time ever we […]

Filed Under: Utah Indie Game Night - Comments: 10 Comments to Read

Jeff Vogel on How He Saved the Games Industry Overnight

Posted by Rampant Coyote on April 22, 2010

Long-time indie RPG maker Jeff Vogel makes some dang good points: “If you asked me why I used that same old clunky game engine and why I am still using it, I would give this answer: Because I am really smart and cool and awesome. And if more people emulated me, the game industry would […]

Filed Under: Biz, Production - Comments: 8 Comments to Read

Games as Art? I Thought I Saw That Horse Twitch!

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An actual chat yesterday Me: I am surprised that Ebert jumped back to repeat himself on this subject. I guess he wanted the publicity it gave him last time. Friend: Can’t blame him, really. It’s an interesting discussion point and gets him all kinds of free publicity all at once. Me: I can blame him! […]

Filed Under: Art, Biz, Movies, Politics - Comments: 7 Comments to Read

Game Design: How CRPGs Warped My Brain, Part 4

Posted by Rampant Coyote on April 21, 2010

Okay, it’s time to wrap up this series on the lessons in RPG design that I learned from CRPGs over the years. Four parts is plenty. I’m gonna have to skip a lot more games in this part, but the truth of the matter is that as the era gets later, I’m having trouble identifying […]

Filed Under: Design - Comments: 4 Comments to Read

A Slay Retrospective

Posted by Rampant Coyote on April 20, 2010

Alec Meer on Slay A quote: “Slay is quick and vicious – one wrong move, most especially buying Knight or Baron when you don’t have the infrastructure to support them, and your viral spread across the centre of the land evaporates into small, useless chunks.” I was a late convert to Slay. I didn’t even […]

Filed Under: Strategy Games - Comments: 2 Comments to Read

Do Game Developers Actually Play Games? Shouldn’t They?

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In the forum thread about RPG Codex’s Game Developer Picks for RPG of the Decade [warning: They have been known to occasionally engage in harsh language… 😉 ] some posters rather colorfully called into question the judgment of these game developers (myself included as one of the offending responses) by asking whether we actually play […]

Filed Under: Biz, Game Development - Comments: 7 Comments to Read

Game Design: How CRPGs Warped My Brain, Part 3

Posted by Rampant Coyote on April 19, 2010

So here’s the continuation of the series about several CRPGs over the last three decades and how they did damage to my head and influenced my feelings on games and game design (you can read part 1 here, and part 2 here). So here are a bunch more games, principally from the end of the […]

Filed Under: General - Comments: 10 Comments to Read



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