SpaceChem

It’s hard to pinpoint exactly why one keeps returning to this game. It is not exactly unpleasant, merely very taxing on the brain. Indeed, describing Spacechem as ‘fun’ may be pushing the use of the word to the very limit. It is more akin to the satisfaction one gains from solving a particularly complicated maths puzzle, or successfully hoiking out an errant breadcrumb from your keyboard using a modified paper-clip fashioned into a complex grabbing tool.

The blue and red widgets, showing the layout of two simple atoms paths - confused yet?

This game is difficult. It may well be a cliché, but it is fiendishly difficult, in that one might imagine an actual fiend, one of the demons from the nine circles of hell, rubbing his scaly hands together in glee and drooling unspeakable drool at the thought of unleashing this creation upon unsuspecting humanity.

The objective of this so called ‘game’ is to manipulate and control atoms and molecules within a graphical representation of a chemical factory. One is given various tasks along the lines of creating certain types of bonds, or molecules, then delivering them out of the reactor. Atoms are moved around using a ‘widget’, which is essentially a type of railway which can travel in only one direction. The player must place this ‘railway’ in a certain way so as to guide the atoms and molecules around the screen in the correct orientation to ensure the right reactions take place. And fuck me, that sounds boring when I write it, but makes for very engaging puzzle shenanigans.

This is as exciting as the screenshots get I'm afraid

Being a science graduate I was mildly pleased to see the correct types of bonds and molecules that are formed – all in line with what is actually possible in the real world. Expert planning is required to send the atoms around your railway track with the right timing – various tools such as synchronised gates help with this.

The game starts out merely difficult at first, but rapidly rises through the ranks, reaching brain-teasing, confounding, puzzling and nigh-impossible in a very short space of time. You will frequently shut the game down in disgust, swearing under your breath, only to cogitate the answer subconsciously, while asleep, or in the bath, or have it spring into your mind like the theory of gravity to Newton, before leaping back to the monitor and completing the puzzle with a satisfactory smirk. It is a fool’s errand however – the only reward that awaits is an even more difficult puzzle beyond. Such is mans folly in his own knowledge.

This 3rd one is totally off the hook

Eventually one graduates to using multiple reactors at once to create larger and larger molecules. You will soon find yourself staring at the screen with the same sort of empty, confounded expression that a young boy from the countryside might have after being introduced to some artwork of Escher by a creepy old uncle.

In conclusion, this game is one of the most mentally challenging I have ever played, and while not to everyone’s taste, if you consider yourself a human of above-average intelligence, it will provide a worthy challenge. If you consider yourself a human of only average intelligence, then the warm grey slop that drips out of your ears while you try this game is in fact liquified brain.

Spacechem scores – Alarmed Goat

Airborne Assault - Highway To The Reich

This game is a guilty pleasure. It is drinking alone on a Friday night in your flat. It is stuffing your big fat face with profiterole after profiterole until your lips are smeared in chocolate and cream and shame. It is the slightly chubby girl you took back home after the club and who did unspeakable things to you.

You do not boast to your friends about this game. You do not shout its praises from the rooftops. Instead, you close your curtains, lock your door, turn down the lights and bask in its utterly evil joy.

And why the curious silence regarding how good this game is? Because it is a tactical real-time war game simulation. I feel dirty for even typing those words. That’s right. A full-on, hard-core, nerd-boner simulation, with objectives and waypoints and all manner of geekish delights.

SIMULATE ME 'TILL I SQUIRT!

The above screenshot illustrates a typical engagement - a battalion of American Paratroopers (green units) have landed in Holland and are attempting to storm a German hill position. One gains an idea of the size and scale of this game when told that each grid represents 1 square km, and each icon represents a unit of 100 men or more.

The setting is September 1944, during the Allied airborne invasion of Holland – a truly remarkable operation involving over 30,000 airborne troops, the largest operation of its type ever attempted. The plan was for three divisions to grab vital bridges deep behind German lines, quickly followed by a massive armoured thrust up through Holland along a single road, over the bridges, and into the industrial heart of Germany. The operation failed, for a variety of reasons, but it makes for a classic and inspiring basis for a game. (For an excellent read, I recommend Cornelius Ryan’s outstanding work, ‘A Bridge Too Far’)

Not for you the pretty graphics and sounds from any game of the last ten or fifteen years, oh no. You get a top-down 2D map-like view. Your soldiers? Square blocks of inanimate colour that move around like migrating jellyfish. That is the key selling point of this wonderful game – the real time movement. The game play is completely different to any hex/turn-based wargame you’ve previously played. You can pause the action of course, but a critical component is forward planning. There is a punishing, realistic orders delay on any command you issue. Sending your paratroop battalion forward into assault positions can take an hour or two (of game time), and there is no way to instantly stop them should a group of panzers appear out of the nearby woods – you scrabble to issue defence orders, but it takes time for the instructions to get through.

Planning a complex set of maneuvers to flank the enemy gives me nerd-boners

The sounds? There's no music, no ambient noises, but who cares? That stuff just gets in the way. You get the crack of rifles, the thunk of AT rounds, the explosion of artillery and the thump of mortars, and that's about it. Even gunfire is portrayed only with simple red and yellow lines. Despite this childish simplicity, it is perversely satisfying to watch the enemy stumble blindly into your ambush, watching the beautiful thick red lines of anti-tank fire smash his precious vehicles, then seeing their status change first to yellow, then to red, as their retreat turns to a chaotic rout.

The in-game menus are almost neo-artistic in their minimilism. They are bare, basic, unanimated, stripped down to simple graphics and plain text. But it doesn't matter. Because this game is so smooth you would rub your naked belly on it.

The brave British boys in red rush a bridge, before dastardly Jerry can blow it up

Planning for the hours and days ahead is crucial – how long will it take your forces to march to the next town? When will reinforcements arrive? Will I get there before nightfall and how far will the enemy have advanced in that time? The tactical and strategic depths of questions that you must pose yourself are outstanding in their realism - you must hold roads for your tanks, and high ground for your artillery, and decent excuses for why you are not going out on a Friday night. Explaining the joys of WWII war-gaming simulation does not always cut the mustard.

In the wide variety of missions (of which you choose to play either the Allies or the Germans) you will command a great deal of troops. The smaller missions will have you in charge of a battalion or two (1000-1500 men) while the larger scenarios will place you in charge of whole divisions (10,000 plus!). The smallest unit represented by the game is generally the ‘company’, 100 to 150 soldiers strong. With this is mind, how on earth would the budding armchair general control so many forces in real time?

An enormous map, featuring a bowel-busting 26,000 allied troops

The answer is with the amazing A.I. and command structure. Without going in to too much detail, you do not have to dally at all in the dirty, lower aspects of your troops unless you wish to. You delegate a lot of the mundane tasks to your A.I. Captains and Majors. You can merely issue orders to HQ sections, who then interpret them in their own way, and carry out the missions assigned to them. For example, you direct a whole battalion consisting of 3 companies, an HQ and 2 mortar platoons to attack a town by issuing a single order to its Headquarters. This HQ unit will then direct and control the entire operation – it will put the troops in formation, assign jobs, locate the best firing positions for the mortars, and even hold some troops in reserve should an emergency occur. However, should you wish to get involved in the nitty gritty, you can directly command each company yourself.

Each unit is subordinate to a higher HQ – so should you wish, you can move every single unit on a map by issuing only a single order to your divisional HQ, who will then conduct the entire task for you.

An attack order is issued for the brave meat-heads of the American 82nd Division

The attack hammers home, sending Germans scattering. That yellow line of gun-fire is about as special as the effects get.

The maps themselves can be huge, up to 100km², and the missions can run from hours to weeks. The scale of some missions is enormous and requires detailed planning. The units themselves, despite appearing as simple coloured blocks, are fully simulated and alive, each with their own characteristics of morale, aggression, commander skill and so forth. Weapons, ammo and men are tracked, right down to the last bullet – a critical factor to know. Should your AT guns run out of ammo or your machine gun section fire its last round, their effectiveness is going to be severely reduced until they get resupplied during the day/night cycle. I have yet to play a more 'hard-core' war simulation game in this respect.

The game accurately models terrain, line of sight and cover, providing you with tools to judge any situation. But the best innovation in the game? It is the fiendishly clever enemy A.I. It will mercilessly crush you to begin with, it will appear from unexpected directions, flank your carefully planned defences, and laugh as your attack is brutally bombarded by artillery strikes before you even get into assault range.

This game is wonderful, satisfying, deep and challenging. If you can overcome the initial learning curve, you will spend many quiet, precious hours planning your invasion of the Reich.

Final Verdict – Cute & Curious Owl

Spelunky

Spelunky is amazing. Fact. There. Review over. Go home to your wife and tell her you had a good time. Why is it good? You want me to explain? Jesus. Ok then.

Spelunky is a 2D Indiana Jones themed oldschool platformer, created by a guy called Derek Yu, on his own, and released as freeware. This is incredible in itself – the polish that’s gone into this title is heart-warming, and the game is a slick joy to play compared to the vast swathes of dross that a PC gamer normally has to suffer.

Your goal is simple – get through the underground cave system alive, defeat the final boss, and grab as much loot on your way through as you can.

What lurks in the depths below?

Let’s start with the graphics. They project a warmth of a cosier era, a rose-tinted view of the past, where strange bearded men sat in their bedrooms and composed games on floppy disks.

I love the graphics. They are bright, clear, simple and flow amazingly well. The smoothness of your spelunker as he jumps to his death never gets old. The sounds are solid, beeps and boops, with an 8-bit music background, again adding to the retro-ambiance, yet never grating or annoying. They take you back to a simpler time, a happier time, when 8mb was a lot of RAM and people hadn’t heard of circle-strafing.

I am also in love with Spelunky because it is so hard and utterly unforgiving. Gone is the spoon-feeding, nampy pampy gameplay of a generation of cry babies who don’t know the meaning of the words ‘instant death’. You start with four lives, and once they’re gone, it’s game over. There’s no save game feature, no checkpoints (although by saving up enough gold, you can eventually pay for tunnel shortcuts to later levels). You live and die by your wits and your skills. As you progress deeper into the caves, your palms begin to sweat. What was once an easy jump over a spike pit now becomes a yawning chasm threatening to suck your spelunker to his doom. If you die, it’s all over. You know you can’t afford to fail. It’s even worse when you are down to your final life. Every second you spend onscreen could bring imminent death - quite literally, as an unseen clock ticks constantly down, sending an unstoppable ghost to kill you should you dally too long in each level.

A rare shop - no refunds

You can get shot with arrows, devoured by man-eating plants, squashed by boulders and thrown by yetis, among dozens of other ways to die. And you will die. A lot. It took me well over a hundred deaths before I recorded my first victory and finished the final level. And the levels get progressively harder, as deadlier traps and nastier creatures are introduced in the differing zones.

Secrets abound throughout the game, requiring you to experiment and learn. What is this key for? Why do I need the Udjet eye? What does that beeping sound mean and how do I get to the mysterious City of Gold? All these need to be discovered yourself.

The mysterious ice caves. Full of yetis. And, um, ice.

One of the key facets of the game is that the levels are randomly generated, yet always present a perfect challenge and never trap you unless you are careless. You have access to a limited number of bombs and ropes, and may even get your hands on more exotic goodies as you progress. A warm feeling spreads through you when you discover a weapon in a crate, or find a shopkeeper willing to sell climbing gloves or a jetpack. Only being able to carry a single item in your hands makes for some tense moments, as you juggle a damsel in distress, a golden idol and your expensively acquired digging tool, all the way to the exit.

A damsel. Stereotypes abound.

 

But it’s also about the choices – the choices! Example. You’ve rescued a trapped damsel (who handily restore lives via a kiss if you get them to the level exit), but you’re faced with a proximity arrow-trap blocking the only exit. You have no bombs left and nothing nearby to trick the trap into activating. You know getting hit will kill you, and you need to get past. The answer? Lob the damsel – she takes the hit from the arrow and you can proceed. If she’s lucky, she may even survive. The budding spelunker faces many such moral grey areas as he proceeds through his adventure.

The game sucks you in. You want to play. Again and again. It reaches that perfect point of being easy to play yet fiendishly difficult to master, confoundingly frustrating in its brutality, but yet possessing a goal of achievement which is worth all the deaths. The primal thrill of reaching a new level zone drives you onwards – although it is often followed by the crushing defeat of being instantly murdered by a previously unencountered foe.

Speaking as a simple human being to another simple human being, I beg you – give this game a try. It would be criminal not to.

Final Score – Amazingly Happy Dog

Napoleon : Total War

I’m not going to give much of an intro here. Everyone knows what the Total War series is all about, and if you don’t, you are a hermit crab. You control a faction in history trying to achieve various objectives and/or total conquest of a region of the world. Napoleon Total War has you getting to this goal by shooting muskets and advancing in line while wearing silly hats.

I’m a big fan of the Total War series. Medieval Total War 2 is among my favourite ever games, and for amount of time played, has got to be in the top 5. I would quite happily be buried with that game, and take it up to heaven with me, and rub it in God’s big beardy face.

I got sick a few weeks ago, and watched a marathon 9 episodes of Sharpe in two days, which is probably unhealthy and against European regulations, but it left with me a hunger for more sexy hot musketry action, and I needed my fix. NTW stepped into the breach.

Spot the moustache

The Good

You really have two games when you buy a Total War title – a cool strategy game and a really fun tactical combat game – you know what I’m talking about, you big lug. The giant map with the cities and regions, and then the battle map, where you crush the enemies forces beneath your imperial boot and laugh at the AI’s foolish attempts to overthrow its human oppressor.

The graphics in both are great. The strategic map is a living, changing thing, especially as the seasons roll on. The game timeframe is about 2 weeks per turn, which makes the movement of armies fairly realistic. Choke-points and zones of control are useful too. The battle maps are even more wonderful. You can zoom right in and the see the moustaches on your little soldiers faces, see the smoke and fire from the muskets, and so on.

Europe - yesterday

POW! KA-BLAMO!

The battles are solid Total War, and really fun, like chewing on a satisfying bone (if one were a dog.) Executing a cunning flanking move, routing your enemies morale with a cavalry charge from a hidden position, or fending off a massively superior force through clever defensive deployment is still fun and satisfying. You control your little army unit by unit as usual, and the action can get almost excitingly overwhelming at times in the larger battles, when you are rushing from one end of the battlefield to the other like a mad raccoon who has eaten a particularly exciting acorn, desperately trying to direct your troops. For a real challenge, try playing without using the pause button.

Even better, real world tactics can be employed, such as Wellington's favourite - reverse slope defence – whereby you line up some of your troops just behind the crest of a hill, shielded from cannon fire. As the enemy gently stroll over the top, they walk right into your pre-prepared gun sights. (yes, I have actually read a book on Napoleonic warfare (lovely book), and no, it was awesome, and yes, girls love hearing about the reloading times of 18^th century muskets)

And that’s where the battle tactics are slightly different from medieval Total War, obviously. You have guns! Each ranged unit has a handy zone marked out for it when selected, showing its musket, rifle or cannon range. Many infantry units can’t fire on the move, so positioning becomes important – if your unit is static, it will open fire first. Hand to hand combat is still important, but fighting head on in a prolonged melee is costly for any unit.

The Campaigns are also great fun – as much as I dislike the cheese-eating surrender monkeys on purely national grounds, playing the French is fun. Early campaigns are short and easy (Italy, Egypt) and walk your through the beginning of Napoleon’s climb to power, and you get a good story progression. Balancing your budget and deciding which buildings to invest in are other Total War staples still kept – with added naval warfare, which is sadly kinda pointless. Very quickly I let all naval battle autoresolve themselves.

The Bad

Well, lordy, like a girl with a great body but a face that demands two bags (one bag for her head, and one bag for yours in case hers comes off), the game ain’t perfect. The battle AI can at times be utterly, almost inexcusably inept, like someone has installed a special-needs patch. There are plenty of examples, but one of them really sums it up – the AI takes no consideration for elevation of terrain when firing it’s cannons. The result? It’ll often fire directly into a mound 5 metres ahead of it for the entire battle. Utterly, utterly retarded and inexcusable. You can (and I have) installed simple fan mad mods to improve the AI, but really, do you need a community patch to stop your cannons shooting into the bloody ground, or the army General running about willy-nilly in musket range of my line infantry, for no other obvious reason than to show off? I think or not

The game lacks historical accuracy on almost anything that you care to point out, from the range of the muskets to the types of little coloured hats worn by French horsemen (this is a real argument – the NTW forums are full of slightly scary people who know far too much about this sort of thing. There is nothing so fierce as an angered fan of history).

Silly hats - mandatory

Even the size of the armies involved are way out, and are actually tiny. Take for example, the Battle of Austerlitz, a famous French victory over the Third Coalition. More than 70,000 men were involved from both French and combined Prussian/Russian armies – in the game, a single stack of 20 units can at best muster around 2,400 individuals.
 

Is this even a bad thing though? I don’t think so. This is a game based on some general details after all, not a historical representation. The gameplay that derives from these mistakes is still very enjoyable.

However, you are only allowed single stacks within a battle. Any nearby reinforcing stacks will then begin to add their units in, one by one, as your current units get destroyed or run away. This is very unrealistic, even in a computer game. And you don’t even get to choose which direction the reinforcements come from, or have any idea from which direction they will arrive. Or indeed, if you want them to join the battle at all.

Another problem is that every turn, one has to scour one’s towns and cities to determine what can be upgraded. This process can at times become something of a mindless exercise, with limited strategic options. For example – you have a Gold mine. You can upgrade it to a Better Gold Mine if you have enough money. This Better Gold Mine can then be upgraded to the Best Gold Mine if you have even more money. And so on with many other buildings. There is some strategic choice here e.g. picking which cities you want to produce your troops and focusing your military buildings there, but often these are obvious anyway (e.g. Paris).

Conclusion

Despite these reservations, Napoleon Total War is a really fun game, and is definitely worth your time. I'm not going to go down the artificial route of assigning arbitrary percentages to games, which I feel a little trite. How exactly does one work out a game scores 86% precisely? So instead, I'll be using pictures of animals to represent my emotional state while playing the game.

Napoleon : Total War scores – comfortably smug Polar Bear

Intro

Welcome to ‘How I Mine For Fish’, one of the very first games-review-blog-webpages on the global internet. I took a long hard look at the internet the other day, and saw immediately that not enough people were on it shouting and flailing around giving their opinions on things to random strangers. I thought I’d better join this elite group of intellectual powerhouses, and boost the dwindling numbers.

So, the point of this blog – for me to write my opinions willy-nilly about whatever game takes my fancy, hopefully for readers to read (as is their want) and enjoy, and maybe encourage people to play games they have not played before.

I will be sticking exclusively to PC games, for I enjoy big expensive boxes of noise that frequently need upgrades. I have no time for these upstart consoles, which I believe the young people use, along with the hip-hop and the baseball caps, all things of which I heartily disapprove.

I will try not to wander off into the realms of reviewing movies, books, Pokémon’s, flavours, or types of cat, as I do not want the blog to lose its focus and becoming the internet equivalent of a crazy old man standing at the edge of the road yelling at traffic, something which I have enough trouble trying to contain every day as it is.

The games will be any and all from the history of PC Gaming, taken up and reviewed as and when I play them – some old, some new, some bought, some, um, maybe borrowed. Comments are encouraged, as are rants, flames, mum jokes and so forth. I hope you enjoy my forthcoming word explosion. It will taste delicious and opiniony.