Posts tagged as pc | Chaotic Tortoise

Stellaris’ wild man-to-monster ride: Descent from democratic federation to fascist empire in 120 minutes

May 24, 2017 by Ding·Comments Off

Stellaris is the great space opera simulator I have wanted at several points in my life, normally after watching a random episode of Star Trek.

A long time ago, in space the final frontier…

The future in Star Trek is great – possibly the only ultimate realisation of a utopian society, yet still with a fleet of ships equipped for battle when those lines of communication aren’t always clear on the first pass.

With Stellaris, my mantra started out as What Would Jean-Luc Picard do? (WWJLPD)

The main thing Stellaris taught me = I am not Jean-Luc Picard.

How Euro Truck Simulator 2 became a mirror into my sleep deprived life

May 22, 2017 by Ding·Comments Off

I’ve not slept for thirty hours and I’m driving a truck from Aberdeen to Rotterdam.

I’m partly past the point I could actually get to sleep anyway, but most of it is that I have a tiny baby on my lap that is getting some much needed rest. I was told they always sleep, but I wasn’t told they always sleep on you.

Wait a minute…I can’t see my hands! AAAAAAAHHHHHhhh

I’m not allowed to go to sleep. If I go to sleep whilst looking after this tiny goblin wrapped in a fluffy blanket, then I don’t want to think about the end of that sentence. Netflix has been the answer so far, but I’ve just finished House of Cards and I’m in that between-shows limbo so I have turned to my old friend video games to bail me out.

That means I’m now driving a virtual truck from virtual Aberdeen to virtual Oslo in Euro Truck Simulator 2.

Who killed the power fantasy? A World of Warcraft story

January 11, 2017 by Ding·Comments Off

I struggled to condense my feelings on the latest World of Warcraft expansion into a short easily readable and pithy blog post so I gave up and decided to write all the words instead.

Prologue: The Sword in the Stone

For a very brief moment I thought I was going to be the King of England. It was very brief, and by that I mean about half a second.

Why yes my shoulders are on fire and I do have a small bird on my head.

I went to Disneyland Paris when I was about 18 with a youth orchestra group. We were playing at one of the little side stages which was a big deal for us, but not really such a big deal for the five people who mistakenly wandered over to the backwater of the park we were playing in.

Being 18 with a youth orchestra group abroad basically means you’re in quasi-parent-guardian mode. If one of the mini-clarinetists falls over and skins a knee, you’re the one that’s responsible for tracking down a plaster and making sure they haven’t broken anything. It’s not like you can just leave them for dead and head over to Space Mountain, you have to work to stop tears and tantrums. What I’m trying to say is by the time I was in Disneyland Paris, I was old enough and in the mindset of an adult enough not to be tricked by any nefarious Disney dark magic.

In one quiet part of the park, there was a sword lodged into a stone, a la the Legend of King Arthur, a la Disney’s The Sword in the Stone. Of course you have to go and try to pull it out. It’s there. That’s what it’s there for. Everyone needs to go and try to pull it out. So that’s what I did, knowing it was a stupid prop that you were probably supposed to pose for a picture with, pretending to struggle to pull it out. Mild laughs all round.

The sword moved…

No Man’s Sky: Space for busy people

August 22, 2016 by Ding·Comments Off

It takes two years to train as an astronaut. They must undergo intensive training in how the space shuttle and International Space Station functions, further sciences, medical procedures and survival training. If they are to crew the ISS, they will also need to learn Russian so they can communicate with the Russian Mission Control centre. You also need to be selected in the first place and applications are numerous whilst places on the training program are few. There are no clear guaranteed routes in, but it’s safe to say you have to be pretty high up in your field to qualify.

It takes 45 minutes to watch an episode of Star Trek. Anyone can watch Star Trek.

Pulse engine space travel effect No Mans Sky

A stunning blend of Star Wars’ jump to hyperspace and the psychedelic colours of 2001: A Space Odyssey

No Man’s Sky is to most of the space game genre what Star Trek is to real world space travel.

Of course, a lot of players dabbling in the space game genre like the idea of massive universes with planets and stars respecting the right scales in terms of travel, but then once you get down to it, there’s a lot of waiting around between moments of wonder and sometimes we don’t have time to wait.

No Man’s Sky cuts out a lot of the waiting. Instead it jumps from moment of wonder to moment of wonder very quickly. You blast off from a planet and leave the atmosphere, you engage the warp drive, you arrive in a new system, you land on a new planet, you name your discovery and you come face-to-face with a giant flying hippo-wasp. The problem with this is that if you present a moment of wonder too many times in quick succession, then it stops becoming a moment of wonder and instead becomes the norm. Ironically, an experience that is literally full of wonder is not wonderful, but merely just ok.

Lara Croft and the Temple of Trust Issues: It’s never really co-op

September 24, 2015 by Ding·Comments Off

Lara Croft and the Temple of Osiris is a game about trusting and bargaining with your friends. It’s probably not meant to be, but let’s face it, when it comes to co-op games, it’s never really co-op.

When you’re carefully tight-rope walking over a bottomless chasm and said rope is being held in place by your companion, you instantly remember all the times you “accidentally” pulled those levers whilst they just happened to be walking over that particular trapdoor. You might find yourself pleading for them not to let go and that you promise you’ll never do something similar to them again.

Temple of Osiris is of course more than an opportunity to be responsible for the accidental demise of all your friends. Aping classic adventure serials, with Lara Croft definitely studying at the Indiana Jones school of “shoot the place up” archaeology, Lara Croft and the Temple of Osiris follows this pattern by allowing you and your friends to cover ancient Egyptian ruins in storms of bullets and magical energy whilst you try and scoop up as many precious gems that aren’t nailed down. It’s your standard classic episode of Time Team.

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Tag: pc