Devil Dice

Bless you. Bless you. Blimey, are you allergic to these dice?

I'm a board gamer. I'm a (currently former) role player. I know my dice. My die? Whatever. I also know Devil Dice, for it is one of the demos on the greatest demo disc in history (Official PlayStation Magazine UK No. 42, in case you're wondering).

However... Video games have surprised me before, and they'll surprise me again. It has been around 19 and half years since that demo disc made it into my hands, and it has taken that long for me to learn that this game started like as a Net Yaroze project - a homebrew, of sorts.

Mind blown. I've kinda ruined the Fun Fact segment of this post now. Should have saved it.

Moving on...

Half-Life

"It's probably not a problem. Probably..."

I came to the PC late in life, and many of the greatest games to be found out there have passed me by, or have been ported over with usually less than ideal results. For many games, if I can't play them, I've got no problems with watching them - and that's still the case today. I've seen Half-Life many times before, in many forms. I know of the kind of game it is, the kind of world it's set in, and the kind of things it did to warrant its place in seemingly all the top ten lists. But I don't really know how it plays.

To my knowledge, this past week was my first time playing the original Half-Life, despite having salvaged a copy from the rubbish a few years ago, and probably having been given a copy by Steam at some point too. I also got the fan-made remake, Black Mesa from somewhere, I think the Humble Monthly Bundle, and so I decided I'd compare the three while I'm at it.

It is the future (or maybe the past by now, I can't remember), and the young, quiet theoretical physicist called Gordon Freeman is about to have a rather unusual day at work...

Grim Fandango

Can I borrow your hole punch?

 

When I look back at the long list of point and click adventure games to have come from the 1001 list so far, I see a fair few titles that I actually want to play again. By 'play again' I mean 'carry on playing', and by 'actually want to' I mean 'have been surprised by and should ignore the fact that I groan when I come across the words point and click because there are now many more games I should'.

That's a long-winded way of saying that even with the ease of having a remastered version on two platforms, I still somewhat hesitated to get around to playing yet another LucasArts point and click adventure game, in the form of Grim Fandango.

I hesitated not because of the cast of characters who are nothing but skeletons and monsters, but because I didn't want to get frustrated by getting stumped on a puzzle, of which there seem to be many in this genre.

Despite the developers constantly saying that there are no fail states, and no ways to lose, I'm never filled with enough confidence to get stuck in and find out, frankly, what I'm missing. Because I've clearly been missing the likes of Grim Fandango.

Radiant Silvergun

There's a ship with a sword.

Source // Hardcore Gaming 101

Hey! Come here! We're going to play a space shooter! I know! Another one!

It is 2520 or so, and the world hasn't just gone to hell but has gone from the Universe. The only survivors are a bunch of space pilots and their robot, and they're not going out without a fight. This is Radiant Silvergun, a shooter that was said to have been released at the wrong time but has also been said to have been released at just the right time, to remind arcade players that the space shooter is alive and well.

Unlike the Earth.

Let's see just what's what.

Grand Prix Legends

"Cars slide, drift, bounce and skid with frightening realism."

When I found out that Gran Turismo isn't the only simulator out there, I wondered just what else could have been competing with the driving juggernaut. Nothing in my childhood came close to Gran Turismo, and my mind is drawing a blank at even naming more modern challengers. The Forza series, I suppose. Project Cars? But those are decades away. What was out in the late 1990s that did racing simulation as detailed as Gran Turismo?

As it turns out, it's a title I'd never know because I was a ten-year-old console peasant at the time. As in I was 10, not my console library. It wasn't even a library, I only had the PlayStation and the Game Boy and I'm off topic here.

For PC gamers, especially for fans of the motor-racing of the late 1960s, there was a simulator not to be missed, and it was simply titled Grand Prix Legends.

Dropping you into the 1967 Formula One season, you get to duke it out around Monaco, Silverstone and the Nürburgring against Jim Clark, Jack Brabham, Graham Hill and even more drivers you've never heard of unless you've an interest in the history of F1. The cars are engines with wheels, the safety standards are worryingly low and the noise of the engines is deafening. This is going to be fun.