This WeekEndGame is all about broken promises. OK, not that broken. We’re two weeks late, we ain’t got any Elite: Dangerous and, in what I believe is a first, we ain’t got any Starcraft (hence the carefully chosen title of course) either. But we do have stuff indeed!
Shodan in pre-alpha
System Shock‘s remake’s pre-alpha demo ends on probably the worst cliffhanger in history of video game demos – the amazingly realised view of Saturn’s rings from the haunted Citadel Station and… no Shodan. Instead, it redirects you to the revival project’s Kickstarter page, prompting, I imagine, those in the know to pull out their credit cards without uttering a word.
Will System Shock see itself rise from the ashes in 2017? Will it find success and manage to revive the cult in the days of consumerist triple-A? Will Nightdive pull it off at all? Know what, I don’t really care. When the IP was tumbling down a legal limbo, there was nothing we could do. Screaming, shouting, wielding rakes and torches, throwing money its way… futile. But now we can do something and fuck me dead if I didn’t do it.
Arizon-e-way!
American Truck Simulator is off the line, proper. From a little-too-squashed map of merely two US states, it has recently ventured east to Arizona with, yeah, pretty much all its natural bells and whistles. And that, trucking ladies and trucking gentlemen, is just the beginning.
I have taken a couple of consecutive cargo hauls from where I left off to try and have a little peek. Arizona is beautiful. And has a 121km/h speed limit for trucks! Are you listening, California?
Ships in Space
Last year’s Rebel Galaxy is an odd kid. Managing to evade my sights until the currently on-going Steam sale, it cheekily does something that’d piss any fan of space sims straight-faced. Yet, one can’t call it otherwise as the age-old essence of space sim formula is present, everywhere. Systems, jump gates, traders, explorers, pirates, eventual aliens, you know the drill.
The cheeky part is where it takes away the Z axis from, you know, space, and lets you only use a 2D plane, turning the control very much naval. But where it takes away, it generously compensates. The broadside-to-broadside combat is addictive and fun as all hell and special space treats are lurking all over the space place. I’ve spent the last twenty-or-so hours swooshing about the stars, not minding even a teensy-weensy bit of grind (no, it really is good fun this!) to show you over the coming WeekEndGames.
Starcraft, and possibly some multi player too, is likely to return in the next WeekEndGame, keep it locked. Oh, and yes. The best game this year so far has just got a photo mode. Comments are where they have always been.
