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Due for release next year, the aggressively titled R.A.W. – Realms of Ancient War looks a little Diabloesque in the four new screenshots below. However, a trailer almost as ancient as the very realms in which it takes place reveals it to have more in common with Baldur’s Gate: Dark Alliance. There are three exciting classes to choose from – warrior, sorcerer and rogue. I bet one of them is stealthy and has a penchant for ranged weaponry. There’s also a storyline about the ruined kingdoms of dwarves, elves and man, but guess what? A new and unknown threat is now rising! Let’s take a look and then guess what this fresh evil might be.

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Following our previous look at indie gem Gunpoint, there is no excuse for not having this game on your radar. Quick, check your radar. It's there, right? That's what we thought.

Here, we've got an eight minute video chronicling a majority of game features. And lots of jumping through windows.

“Level with Me” is a series of conversations about level design between modder Robert Yang and a level designer of a first person game. At the end of each interview, they collaborate on a Portal 2 level shared across all the sessions – and at the very end of the series, you’ll get to download and play this “roundtable level.” This is Part 6 of 7.

Ed Key worked for 8 or 9 years in the game industry, then took a slightly less exciting software engineering job and moved out to the countryside. When he isn’t wandering through sweeping vistas, he’scollaborating with musicianDavid Kanagaon his first official indie game:Proteus,“a game of pure exploration and discovery.”(more…)

A number of people have got in touch to let us know about a new study that has been published, identifying once again that violent videogames may have an effect on the brain of the player. It’s a finding that, in general, is worth taking notice of – last week I wrote about a meta-analysis discussion conducted by Nature that showed a consensus amongst researchers that there is a noticeable change in the brain after prolongued exposure to violent videogames. However, this particular study takes on a slightly different tone when you dig into who was funding it. Which turns out to be a campaign group who have some dubious claims of their own.

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(The headline’s supposed to sound like Paper Mario, but no-one’s going to get that so I’m despondently explaining it here. Oh, the thankless misery of the space-constrained blog punster!)

There was, for a while, a theory that implosion of the high-end MMOs was inevitable but boutique online games would fill the resulant void. The trend towards big MMOs switching to free to play has at least delayed that collapse (and quite possibly extended it indefinitely), and sadly we haven’t really seen as dramatic a rise of smaller, more esoteric and/or indie MMOs as hoped. There are a few for sure – e.g. Wurm, Darkfall, Love, Darkwind – but really the expected explosion of alterna-virtual worlds seems to have centred around Facebook games, digi-playparks for kids and, abstractly, Minecraft multiplayer. So it’s good to see an MMO in the relatively classic sense approached by what appears to be a resolutely indie developer.

The Missing Ink, whose open alpha is expected next month, has an especially charming art style – paper cut-out adventurers tally-hoing through a distorted 3D world – and the added bonus of a personal sandbox sub-world for each player. I don’t entirely grasp how all this works in practice, but it looks both lovely and ambitious.(more…)

Games journalist and professional Francois Truffaut imitator Tom Francis is making the bold leap from critic to creator with Gunpoint, a heist game without procedurally generated cities but with projectile trousers and rewired security systems that cause light switches to activate doors which then clobber people in the face. This new video is the first to show the new visuals in action and it’s also an in-depth guide to how the game will play. Tom’s hoping to release by Christmas and is considering attaching a price tag. In the video he asks whether people would consider parting with cash, to which I respond by drawing your attention to the existence of a mission called Defenestrator.

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Chances are Bethesda Game Studios' next project will be Fallout 4, its much-anticipated follow-up to 2008's smash-hit (and IGN Game of the Year) Fallout 3. Unlike the quasi-medieval fantasy Skyrim, Fallout is set in a post-apocalyptic wasteland. But there are many similarities between the two franchises...

Already updated with plenty of content since its release earlier in 2011, Creative Assembly's excellent strategy game Shogun 2 will get a new standalone expansion in March 2012. According to the Sega Blog, the expansion, called Fall of the Samurai, is set 400 years after Shogun 2 as six new clans negotiate with France, Britain and America for control of advanced naval technology and weapons like the Gatling gun...

Beep, bloop, boppity-beep goes the music. Jump, splat, zap go the Tiny Plumbers. Goombas didn’t burst into a shower of garish red pixels when Mario jumped on their bonces but otherwise, a quick look at this odd little indie platformer could have you thinking it’s little more than a tired spoof. There are even different suits to change into, pipes to travel through and princesses to rescue. However, beyond the obvious references, which are not simply aesthetic, there is plenty to discover. Most importantly, it’s not obvious from the trailer that the levels are procedurally generated. And wait ’til the sky police chase the hovering plumber, their sirens/screams drowning out everything and betokening doom.

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When he first laid eyes on it, grid-based RPG Legend of Grimrock caused John to claw at the screen in a futile attempt to get his hands on it. I’m not sure if he always plays games by plucking them out of his monitor and laying them out on a coffee table but it may be the case. Along with the announcement of a delay until early next year, developers Almost Human send word that the project has reached beta. There’s a new video as well, which manages to excite me by showing inventory management the likes of which it’s all too easy to desire romantic liaisons with. Then there are the puzzles, the pressure plates, the man casually falling into a pit…I AM CLAWING AT THE SCREEN

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Hooray! A Batman game that won’t use the word ‘bitch’ every five seconds, though God only knows what all the cutsey, wordless Lego-dude chuntering really means. “Oh great Satan, dark lord of my heart, let me worship you, let me consume the souls of the innocent and strangle kittens in your honour” – that’s what Lego Commissioner Gordon’s really saying, I bet.

So, Lego Batman 2: DC Superheroes has maybe been outed, at least if this oddly stark image on Bricktuts.com is to believed. (Uncropped full version of the above pic with more stuff here). If it is accurate, it also means Batman’s bringing all his special friends to the build’n'smash party – which no doubt would mean even more open, joyful silliness than the first game. Lego Superman – i.e. invincible flying man who can destroy any object – must be be a conceptual nightmare, mind.

Interactive fiction – or text adventures to the 80s-raised layman – quietly continues to thrive in its own brainy corner of the internet. But where to start? Well, the annual Interactive Fiction Competition conveniently rounds up the best of the best for lazy people like me. The 2011 results are now in.

Taking the main gong this year is Taco Fiction by Ryan Veeder, which is an agreeably wry and downbeat tale of a feckless gunman attempting to rob a dirty fast food joint.

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Good warning! It's the IGN AU Pubcast - our distinctly Aussie take on the traditional podcast, blending our love of gaming with beer and toilet humour - and a liberal dose of intelligent debate...

Warning: There be spoilers here. All over the shop. Wall-to-wall spoilers, for franchises old and new. Modern Warfare, Gears of War, Uncharted, Halo... There may be some for BioShock as well, in case there's an hermetic order of monks in the remotest corner of the world that hasn't played it yet. Just letting you know...

Mob Rules Games had high hopes for its innovative, user-oriented Kickstarter campaign, where investors would get to choose one of three concepts for the developers to turn into a real game -- Haunts, The Last Second or Guerrilla Gorilla. They believed in this approach so strongly that they allotted just 30 days to raise $20,000. It's more than a month later, and now Mob Rules has just one thing to say about their entire Kickstarter venture:

"Well, that didn't work."

Mob Rules Games didn't reach their goal, but they have a backup plan. The Lewis Charitable Foundation has offered to invest in Mob Rules' first game as part of its Open Game Labs program, but Rick Dakan, Jonathan Wills and Austin McKinley still want users to choose which game they should make. Enter: Free voting.

Anyone can enter to vote for free on one of Mob Rules' three potential games, from now until Nov. 30 at 5 p.m. EST. Whichever game has the most audience support, Mob Rules will make. Entertainment is a wholly subjective experience, so we don't want to tell you which game we think sounds like the most fun, but we'll give you a hint: It isn't the First and it rhymes with "meckond." Happy voting.

We’ve decided that it’s time for the hivemind to turn its unblinking gaze on the world of e-sports, and to do that we’ve recruited our chums over at ESFI World to give us a weekly taste of what’s happening on the various competitive and pro-gaming circuits around the world. Introducing this new column is the story of the recent MLG finals in Providence. E-sports drama, it turns out, can be years in the making…(more…)

Increpare’s brain-jammin’ 3D puzzle game, English Country Tune, has been released. The game plays with a bunch of spatial puzzle ideas to create some ingenious challenges. It’s had me going a bit hypnotoad with concentration trying to get through the puzzles. There’s a demo for PC and Mac on the site. You should play it. You really should.

Sundays. Sundays are for dreaming of another world. Or perhaps Another World, depending on what sort of dreams you have. It is also for skimming across a week of internet links and wondering how all this could happen – why doesn’t everyone just sit down and have a rest? Eh? It makes little sense to me.

• I wanted to link to this post by Jeff Vogel (which I got to from this follow up), but actually it’s worth checking out a lot of the stuff on his blog. Vogel makes turn-based RPGs in a fairly traditional way, and makes a living from that, and as such his insights on what it means to be indie have a depth that other, less experienced indies perhaps do not: “The 10000 Hour Rule is about crushing dreams. It’s about understanding that there are limits to what you can do in the all-too-short period of time we spend on this Earth. It’s about giving people who have achieved mastery the respect they deserve. It’s about, before taking on a new task, honestly evaluating whether we can afford to give what it takes to complete it. And it’s about forgiving yourself for not being able to play the guitar like Hendrix.”

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There is a time for every activity under the sun. Many would survey the current gaming landscape and say that the time for fully-voiced video games is now. But there remains a stubborn few reluctant to recognise it, most notably Nintendo with its The Legend of Zelda series. With each generation o...

I’m running a little late today, sorry about that. My brain is still gradually untwisting itself after the mammoth task of chronicalling all the many discounted video games there are, over at SavyGamer.co.uk, during the week. Things are starting to get busy, as everyone across the industry is discounting to help bump up those end of year financials. The bargain bucket has you covered for all the best value PC downloads on this fine weekend, so delve in to see what’s on offer: (more…)

Rab has to look after his nipper today, so no Cardboard Children until next week. In its place, why not watch the latest Shut Up & Sit Down video, which I’ve posted below? Eh?(more…)

It's strange, isn't it? The day after we're supposed to give thanks for all the special things in life, we subject ourselves to unknown abuse all in the name of saving a buck. Let's instead give thanks for indie game projects that you won't ever find under the heel of a particularly ill-tempered Walmart shopper on this or any other Black Friday. Like Dear Esther for example, the promising Half Life 2 mod turned real boy, coming to Steam ... when exactly?

The more calendrically challenged amongst you may not have realized this, but Dear Esther has already missed its proposed summer 2011 release window so you'll be glad to know it hasn't been summarily forgotten. Developer Dan Pinchbeck says the project has been successfully ported to the Portal 2 engine, and discussions with Valve indicate a release "very likely to be either the end of January or the beginning of February next year." Right alongside Episode 3, right guys?

Guys?

Are you a thrifty individual trying to show off your indie cred? How about seventeen indie music albums derived from seventeen indie games? Seriously, it doesn't get much more indie than that. And the thrift, forget about it. You can snag all of them for a donation of $10 or more to the Indie Game Music Bundle.

That's music from Super Meat Boy, Minecraft, VVVVVV, The Binding of Isaac, A.R.E.S, Cobalt and many more for $10 or more. This deal is valid today only, what with it being Black Friday and all, so hop to it.

Google's Paul Kinlan spoke at Develop Liverpool last week, and revealed that Google is aiming to add some more plug-and-play hardware support to its Chrome browser, including gamepad support. The update will also add connections to webcams and microphones, which means that Chrome could, after these updates, directly use those accessories for games and other services.

It should probably be noted that Firefox's API already allows for gamepad support, so Chrome here is just filling out the alternative. Google is also planning to cook in native support for WebRTC, an open source video chat initiative that it has helped run in the past. At this point, developers are basically just lining up APIs to work together, but setting up these built-in solutions could eventually help bring cloud gaming services right into a native Internet browser.

Hmm! Introversion are up to something. They’ve sent us a mysterious image, which you can see below. They tell us it is part of some kind of treasure hunt thing. PCG have the first image. The email from Introversion reads: “The clues are all from Introversion’s next game Prison Architect, and showcase Ryan Sumo’s amazing art. Some of the clues are buried in the Humble Introversion Bundle.”

Intrigue-o-tron!(more…)

KarBOOM is a bitesize freeware treat about some lovely little cars indulging in a spot of sumo wrestling on a high plateau above a bottomless drop. It supports internet and local multiplayer, the latter a ridiculous attempt in trying to fit four desperate hands on one keyboard, each sweating to control the adorable wind up bumper cars as they fight their way through a bevvy of game mutators that work much in the same way as Unreal Tournament handles things.

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It’s been a long time since I played a collectible card game of any sort. I’ve always meant to play Mythos or the Cthulhu CCG because I enjoy being driven mad by unimaginable and blasphemous horrors, but I’ve never quite found the time. I have spent a little while playing Cabals though, which is free and has an occult theme. You can spend actual money to improve your deck but it’s also possible to earn better cards by playing. Fantastically earnest trailer below.

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The Flare Path’s primary recon tool, a Staghound armoured car named ‘Galloping Gertie’, has been off the road most of this week after a high-speed collision with a Charolais bull. As a result I’ve found myself with lots of spare time on my hands. The majority of that time has been frittered away on idle pursuits like scrumping pears and playing Poohstickgrenades, but I’ve also whiled away a few hours in constructive contemplation. The subject of my musing? Mostly, wargame and simulation campaigns, specifically “Why are so many of the bally things so dashed disappointing?”. (more…)

The lovely Cliffski has put up a new developer diary detailing the forthcoming Gratuitous Tank Battles, this time talking about what exactly Gratuitous Tank Battles is. Which appears to be a blend of the sensibilities of previous fleet commander sim Gratuitous Space Battles with the pathfinding of a tower defence game. No, quiet in the back there, settle down. It isn’t your typical tower defence game, see. Let Uncle Cliffski explain.

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Earlier in the year I lost my MP3 player with a bunch of untranscribed interviews on it. The most interesting of these recordings was an interview with Dan Pinchbeck, the games researcher who has turned to making games, starting with a remake of his Half-Life 2 mod, Dear Esther. The remake, which is being done with fabulous new art (above) in the Portal 2 engine, is apparently all but finished, and will appear in January or February next year. Hopefully, around that same time, I’ll be able to redo my interview with Dan and see what he’s learned from the process. Take a look through here for some more fantastic images of Pinchbeck’s spooky narrated explore ‘em up.