Steam broke 125 Greenlit titles today, adding fourteen new games and two new software titles to their sales platform. There are now 127 titles that have been accepted for distribution on Steam through the Greenlight program.
A Hat in Time, Among the Sleep, BROFORCE, Centration, Chasm, Darkwood, Deadly Premonition: The Director’s Cut, Divekick, Operation Black Mesa, Project Awakened, Recruits, Rekoil, Shelter, StarMade, Dexster Audio Editor, and GraphicEditor openCanvas will be released onto Steam when the developers feel ready to make the release. Some will join the Steam Early Access program and others will be released as complete projects.
Steam took efforts to clarify their notoriously convoluted judgement process, but managed to do little more than re-hash previous announcements. This news will probably serve as a disappointment to indie developers who have been demanding clarification since the start of Steam Greenlight.
Indie Royale teamed up with the site Indie Gamer Chick to hand pick nine of her favourite indie games that were released on Xbox Live Indie Game. For one price, buyers will receive Dead Pixels, Chester, Antipole, LaserCat, Smooth Operators: Call Center Chaos, Little Racers STREET, SpyLeaks, Orbitron: Revolution, and a mystery game. The games are a variety of Steam, Desura, and DRM free files. This bundle is only compatible with Windows PCs.
Indie Royale buyers can name their price, as long as it is above the current minimum price. As buyers pay the bare minimum, the minimum price will rise for future buyers. Buyers who pay $10.00 or more for the bundle will cause the price to drop for other buyers.
After a month long wait since the last episode, the third episode of the PayDay 2 live action web series was released today. The third episode draws away from the PayDay crew and focuses on Bain, the mastermind. The FBI are trying to learn more about Bain and his connections to the seedy underworld of Washington DC. The episode crescendos with a fist fight in a seedy strip club and caps off with a small teaser for episode four.
PayDay 2 is developed by Overkill Software as a full retail release, compared to the digital only release of the first title. The game will be released sometime in August, 2013 for PlayStation 3, Xbox 360, and Windows PC.
Indie Gala is celebrating the sun and warm weather in the Northern Hemisphere with the Indie Gala Summertide Sale. They are returning to the three tiered sale, offering a total of fourteen games to buyers.
Those who pay any price will receive Miner Warfare, Doom & Destiny, and Oniken. Those who beat the first tier average price will also receive Space Pirates and Zombies, Exceed – Gun Bullet Children, Exceed 2nd – Vampire Rex, and two unannounced games. Those who beat the second tier average price will also receive Exceed 3rd – Jade Penetrade Black Package, Sacraboar, Trainz Simulator 12, Trainz Simulator 12 – Aerotrain and Coronation Scot DLCs, Painkiller: Recurring Evil, and a mystery Steam title.
Indie Gala Summertide is a mixture of Steam and Desura redeemable keys that run on Windows PCs. A portion of the profit goes to support the AbleGamers charity.
Ubisoft and Pwnee Studios‘ upcoming platformer Cloudberry Kingdom received a hilarious new trailer today. Taking a few veiled swipes at the Super Mario franchise, the narrator introduces Bob and his three friends, also conveniently known as Bob, as they dodge an obscene amount of traps and enemies. Death seems to be a common occurrence in Cloudberry Kingdom, and success is measured in inches as the looming wall of death draws nearer, pressing the players forward.
Cloudberry Kingdom is an infinite platformer that will be released on PlayStation Network on July 30th, PC and Xbox Live Arcade on July 31st, and Wii U on August 1st.
Developer and publisher Wargaming has announced the release of Update 8.7 for grand MMO title World of Tanks in Europe. The update will roll out across North America on July 29 and Korea with Southeast Asia shortly after.
The new patch will include more British self-propelled artillery such as the Sexton, Bishop and the Crusader among others. Prototypes from post-WWII are shifted to the middle tier while the devastating Conqueror Gun Carriage is bumped up to Tier 10 artillery.
The Soviet light tank T-50-2 has been replaced with the Tier 6 MT-25, providing more agility and horse power as key advantages. A brand new winter map, Severogorsk, is included as well as visual upgrades to the Highway and Harbour Maps.
World of Tanks is a team-based MMO dedicated to large-scale tank battles with over 300 armoured vehicles from the United States, Germany, Soviet Union, France, Great Britain and China. We recently interviewed Wargaming CEO Victor Kislyi who gave us some cool insight into the new face of MMOs.
Join Capsule Computers editor Joe Morgan as he recaps all of the video game and anime reviews for the week of July 14 – July 20, 2013. This feature is intended as a way to give you, our readers, a quick recap of every game we’ve reviewed on the site each week. The goal is to let you get the review information you want in five minutes or less.
Early this month Dekko revealed to the Reddit community that they had just submitted their newest projectDekkoScan to the App Store, and were awaiting approval from Apple. Yesterday Dekko announced that DekkoScan is now available on the App Store. DekkoScanallows users to scan real life objects and place them into Minecraft by using the same 3D technology that powers their Tabletop Speed game.
Some objects are easier to scan than others. Simple shapes with matte textures, bright colors, contrast density and high detail, especially at the top of the object, work best with DekkoScan. Too much plain color, transparency and reflective surfaces make it hard for the app to scan and import the object into Minecraft. In the launch release version, empty spaces are not recognized, so once they have been imported into Minecraft, they are filled with cubes. Compatible objects are ideally sized between one and five feet, or, 30cm to 2m. At this point in time, DekkoScan is not accurate enough to scan smaller objects and larger objects take copious amounts of scanning. The object must remain absolutely still during scanning. Objects like large pictures, beer/coke bottles, sleeping pets, tattoos, and, of course, inflatable owls are ideal for scanning and render well, whereas objects like small action figures, empty transparent bottles, plain colored dress shirts, moving objects and cars won’t render as well. The best way to scan an object is by placing it on a low-glare flat surface, preferably with little to no pattern. As the technology sees in black and white and needs a lot of contrast, reflecting objects won’t render correctly. Click here for more information and tips for DekkoScan.
Dekko is aware that there is room for improvement and are already working on their first update. Excellent things can be expected from DekkoScan, and of course, Dekko, who have introduced into the gaming community new technology that is bound to go far.
Supported devices include the iPad 2, 3, 4, mini, iPhone 4S and 5, provided they are running iOS 6.0+.
Dreamscapes: The Sandman Collector’s Edition Developer: Shaman Games Publisher:G5 Entertainment AB Platforms: iOS (iPhone, iPad) – Reviewed on iPhone Release Date: 24th July 2013 Price: Free – Available Here
Overview Once more it’s time to delve into the world of point and click puzzles. A young violinist has fallen into a bizarre and irreversible sleep. It’s up to you to search her mind, solve the mystery and bring her back to the waking world.
“Trust me, I’m a doctor”
Story Laura Young is a talented violinist, playing solo concerts in front of cheering crowds. Life is good. Until, after a mysterious figure appears, Laura falls into a sudden and irreversible sleep.
Now in a coma, Laura’s only hope is Dr Sanders. With the help of his unique dream science, he hopes to send you, the volunteer, into her subconscious in order to discover what is keeping her locked within her sleep. You must wander around a twisted world of fears and memories in order free her from her eternal dream.
Dream catch me when I fall…
Over the course of the game, the truth behind Laura’s slumber, her importance and the figures lurking in the shadows are hinted at, but the problem is that they are only hinted at. The overall premise of Dreamscapes isn’t a bad one, the story itself has some interesting ideas and characters, but it was all too ambiguous. Who are the Keepers? What exactly can Laura’s power do? Why exactly does the Sandman seek her so intently? Other than the general vibe of evil, the Sandman’s motivations aren’t explained. His goal is presented as something to be stopped, but that’s all.
Stick around and hit play after the credits role for some bonus gameplay. This continues on from the end of the story and concludes one question raised during the game. Unfortunately, it also raises a few more questions and fails to answer some of the more pressing details regarding the plot.
Roll up, roll up. Come and see the terrifying Clownface
Gameplay Point and click. Solve and progress. A classic escape the room style puzzler. You are presented with a series of interconnecting rooms, each containing a number of useful, if not obscure, objects. Collect the items, scan the rooms and figure out where and how to use the items you amass. Spread through out the rooms are puzzles to be solved, ranging from tile spinning to 8-bit side scrollers. These puzzles reveal items and passages for you to delve further into Laura’s mind.
As always, if you ever get stuck, there’s a handy dandy hint button to help you along. The button highlights the next area you should visit along with sometimes providing disorganised sketches for you to decipher, in order to learn which objects to use. A skip option also appears during the puzzle sequences, though it takes time to build up.
When a padlock just isn’t enough
Visuals and Audio Dreamscapes actually features a fair few ‘cutscenes’. Characters are fully animated during the more important moments of the game, given the visual some diversity, beyond different looking rooms. Once a level is completed, a transition animation is played, showing the effects you’ve had on the environment as well as introducing the next area.
During the cutscenes, the characters are also voiced, explaining the situation at hand as simply as they can. Though the vocals were a nice touch, they’re not exactly…good. Laura herself sounds like she is in a state of constant surprise, even though she knows more than you do. In an attempt to sound frightening, the Sandman staggers his words and breathes heavily when he talks. Unfortunately, rather than make him scary, this makes him sound like he is sick and struggling to breathe.
The game uses a variety of instruments in its soundtrack, in order to give off that creepy feeling. Piano, cello, violin, even chimes are combined to provide a full soundtrack to inspire a sense of mystery. Ominous chanting is also present amongst the instruments, again creating a scary vibe. The game also provides the classic spooky sound effects, such as the creaking doors and rusty gates that litter the areas.
Come for the rescue mission, stay for the picturesque landcapes
Overall Dreamscapes is an alright game. The storyline itself isn’t bad, but the execution was lacking. The characters were flat and plot details were left ambiguous. That being said, if you’re a fan of the point and click genre, you’ll enjoy the puzzles and pressing forward throughout the environments.
Capsule Computers review guidelines can be found here.
Aarklash: Legacy, the upcoming strategyrpg from Cyanide Studios, has finally launched it’s official website. They’re doing a few things to drum up interest in the game on the website as well.
Each week they will be unveiling a new character introduction. The first character they’re unveiling is Nella, a mage of the guild. Nella is the leader of the Wheelsword band players will get to know so well.
Along with the unveiling of the new site and Nella’s character profile, Cyanide has also released the first of their Developer Walkthrough videos. In the video, they show off the basics of combat, giving folks a good feel for what to expect when they get their hands on it.
You can check out the developer walkthrough video in the player below this video. You can also check out our first impressions of the game. If you want to see their newly unveiled website, you can check it out here.
