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The weekend was a little grey, a little dull, although even as an Englishman I can’t blame the weather for not trying harder. Instead, I’ll lay the blame at the door of the internal imbalance that left me huddled on the couch underneath a blanket wishing I could enter the halls of sleep until waking life became slightly less of a chore. What better way to start a new week in which I am a man reinvigorated than with a trailer for Jet Set Radio HD. That’ll put the colour back in my cheeks and onto my monitor. Admittedly, it doesn’t look more highly defined than the Dreamcast version from where I’m sitting, but it’s a treat for the senses nonetheless.

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Sunday mornings are for waking up to hear about a meteor. Poor old space rock, burning up in the atmosphere. All it wanted was a closer look at that big blue-green thing. Oh well. Perhaps I can distract myself from the melancholy of its demise with some writings about videogames. Yes, let’s try that.

• Rowan Kaiser on “How Mass Effect challenged my definition of ‘RPG’“: “The big question surrounding Mass Effect in genre terms is whether it is a role-playing game or not. Unlike most games, especially every other major BioWare release, the answer isn’t obvious – it depends on how you look at genre. That’s a big concept, but it can be examined in a few different ways. I tend to think there are three main ways that people try to define the role-playing genre, which parallel the three questions described at the start of this piece: “Do you play a role in the game?” “Does the game work like other role-playing games?” And, the most complicated one, revealed by the oddity of the film grain, is, “Where does this game fit in the history of role-playing games?”"

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I’m in a bit of a hurry this morning. The bargain bucket is the last bit of work I’m doing before I get on an aeroplane to San Francisco for GDC, and I’ve still got all my packing to do. As such, I’m not going to be operating the gears and levers behind the scenes of SavyGamer.co.uk this week, but my minions Will & Tony will be filling in when they can. Here’s you bucket: (more…)

The folks at Sony Online Entertainment have announced that four titles in its stable of massively-multiplayer online games will be taken out to pasture, but they probably aren't experiences you're staying up nights to savor.

The worlds of Cosmic Rift, Infantry, Star Chamber: The Harbinger Saga, and EverQuest Online Adventures (pictured) will all come to a close on March 29, 2012.

"This is not an easy decision," a post from the team at SOE revealed, as we scoured Google for any information of the aforementioned titles. SOE cites "there comes a time when" development resources must step away from old adventures and focus on new ones as the primary reason for its decision. And ... EverQuest Online Adventures is a PS2 game and it was working this whole time? Color us surprised.

According to Videogamer.com, the multitude of players journeying through the affected titles will receive refunds for any pre-paid time that reaches beyond the shutdown date. Sarcasm aside (we do it because we love you), EverQuest Online Adventures players will net three free months of Gold Membership status in both EverQuest and EverQuest 2 -- free-to-play titles on the PC.

SOE thanked fans for their loyalty, saying: "It's been a blast. And we hope to keep gaming with all of you in our other great games here at SOE."

Eerie and remarkable puzzle platformer The Swapper, last seen at Indiecade last year, has been chosen as the next financed title by the Indie Fund. The fund, put together by a team of indie developers, is designed to make sure developers of great games get the money they need to reach players. Past recipients of the Fund include games like Q.U.B.E. and Dear Esther, both of which recouped their investment very quickly.

So if you weren't already on the lookout for The Swapper, time to get out the telescope. The game is made by two young developers from the University of Helsinki (who told Joystiq that the title's unique graphical look was made using pictures of models built with clay), and though they've said it will likely arrive on "PC and Mac, maybe something else," they haven't announced release plans just yet.

Derek Smart is either famous or infamous, depending on who edited Wikipedia last. He’s either been making games for twenty years or making the same game for twenty years, and he’s either a maverick indie genius or mad fool, depending on who you ask. But he has never stopped making games. We caught up with him to talk about his new game, Line of Defense, a remarkably ambitious MMOFPS. It was pitched to us as a challenger to Planetside 2, and we asked him more about that.(more…)

It could be that grid-based dungeon crawler Legend of Grimrock actually takes place entirely in dungeons, what with being at least somewhat related to Dungeon Master, but maybe there will be a tower. Maybe. Whatever the case, the game which has caused me to nostalgically divide my house’s floorspace into equally sized squares finally has a release date. Early April. That’s not actually a date, is it? Not specifically. But it’s better than the previous timeframe, which was simply ‘the future’. No new features now, just bug fixing, completing animations and adding a bit of polish. Then it will be mine and possibly yours as well. A peek at a UI redesign lurks below.

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Tiles are the most exciting thing you can say to a rogue-like likerer: it means that their most-liked of genres has been updated with graphics. DoomRL’s graphical update has been hanging around since 2007, when Spelunky maker Derek Yu promised he’d add them. Now, in 2012, the year of the Mayan apocalypse, he’s finally done it. I’m not saying that this update, which also brings with it some music and mouse options, is the harbinger, the beginning of the end of the age of man, the time we’ve all known was coming yet did nothing to prevent, the year everything changes and the world fights back. No, really, I’m not saying that at all: you’re twisting my words horribly. Stop it! What I am saying is DoomRL has had its biggest update. It’s free, it’s cute in a ‘aw look at him shotgun those flying eye-balls’ kinda way, and there’s a nice video of it below. I’ve no idea where you got that apocalypse stuff from, weirdo.(more…)

Cliff “Positech” Harris has sent word that he will soon be the indie-dev-who-turned-publisher, because he is publishing Redshirt, the debut title from indie dev The Tiniest Shark. In the tradition of Positech’s Kudos games, Redshirt is a life sim set aboard a space station, and it takes a satirical look at the impact social networking might have on familiar sci-fi tropes: “Navigate the professional and interpersonal politics of the ubiquitous “Spacebook” to curry favor among friends and colleagues. As intense intergalactic conflict rages around you, it’s up to you to accrue those all-important “likes” on your status updates! Whether you’re looking for love, opportunities for promotion, or even a chance to play Zero-G golf with the captain, you can schmooze your way through social circles and claw your way up the career ladder. Perhaps you too can finally achieve the dream of an off-station transfer, or even the Redshirt’s opportunity of a lifetime: being sent on an away-mission!”

Redshirt should appear at some point this year.

Zynga is, evidently, aware how crazy and risky it sounds to tie your entire multimillion-dollar business to a single other company (like, say, Facebook). And so it is diversifying, announcing its own Zynga Platform, a Zynga-run portal for the company's social games, like CastleVille, Words with Friends, and ... you know, Zynga stuff.

The platform will feature a live "Social Stream" to see your friends' activity, player profiles (with a "helpfulness" rating), and even a selection of games from other social game companies who are acting as "partners" on the platform.

The Platform will be located at zynga.com, and will launch in beta form "in a few days," according to the announcement from CEO Mark Pincus.

The folks at Sony Online Entertainment have announced that four titles in its stable of massively-multiplayer online games will be taken out to pasture, but they probably aren't experiences you're staying up nights to savor.

The worlds of Cosmic Rift, Infantry, Star Chamber: The Harbinger Saga, and EverQuest Online Adventures (pictured) will all come to a close on March 29, 2012.

"This is not an easy decision," a post from the team at SOE revealed, as we scoured Google for any information of the aforementioned titles. SOE cites "there comes a time when" development resources must step away from old adventures and focus on new ones as the primary reason for its decision. And ... EverQuest Online Adventures is a PS2 game and it was working this whole time? Color us surprised.

According to Videogamer.com, the multitude of players journeying through the affected titles will receive refunds for any pre-paid time that reaches beyond the shutdown date. Sarcasm aside (we do it because we love you), EverQuest Online Adventures players will net three free months of Gold Membership status in both EverQuest and EverQuest 2 -- free-to-play titles on the PC.

SOE thanked fans for their loyalty, saying: "It's been a blast. And we hope to keep gaming with all of you in our other great games here at SOE."

The Game: Knytt Genre: Ambient Platformer Platform: PC The Scoop: Knytt, from Swedish indie developer Nifflas, is a non-linear 2D platformer with a heavy emphasis on exploration and discovery. After crashing on a mysterious planet, it's up to the tiny ant-like creature Knytt to find all the parts to his spaceship and escape. The parts can be recovered in any order the real joy of Knytt is simply wandering the world and taking in its strange sights...

Heroes & Generals is looking more and more like a game I’d like to play, mostly because it looks like fun but also to form a better understanding of how its campaign will work, overlaid on FPS battles as it is. The game is from Reto-Moto, the new home of the creators of Hitman, and its persistent world offers players a chance to cooperate and approach missions however they see fit. I expect there will be a lot of shooting, some stealth, the odd explosion and some vehicular tomfoolery. What I didn’t expect is that the tomfoolery would incorporate bicycles. There is plenty of information in the four developer diaries below but it’s the bicycles in the fourth that I recommend you pay particular attention to.

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The best thing about Microsoft launching a new version of Windows is watching how they’ll awkwardly advertise it. The Windows 7 party videos might just be the most cringe-worthy thing they’ve ever done, and that’s saying something. So I’m a little disappointed with the launch of the free Windows 8 Consumer Preview. The video on the site is a rather awful, embarrassing attempt to ride the Wub Wub wave by layering dubstep over operating system videos. Incongruous, yes, but I doubt I’ll be linking to it when Windows 9 comes out. It’s just unmemorably awful.(more…)

Some bitpunks actually did their homework this time. Well done, you. Here’s a wee round-up of some of the stuff that has either been left in the comments so far or sent to me inside the carcass of a chicken, wrapped in safety pins. You’re so punk, you lot.(more…)

This isn't the first time a retailer has listed the as yet unconfirmed Call of Duty: Black Ops 2. Last month Amazon France posted a product page for Black Ops 2 but quickly pulled it from the site. Today, a reputable Spanish and Portuguese online shop FNAC has listed the same game with a November release window...

Science Fiction is often referred to as a literature of ideas. Feeling no obligation to depict the commonplace, it gazes much higher, towards the stars, where no subject is deemed too big or too philosophical. It's also one of the most varied of literary genres. It can imagine a better tomorrow an ...

Hello, punks. All right, settle down, settle down. Jeremy, stop setting chequebooks on fire. Tom, leave those men in suits alone – they’re only trying to find their way back to their deathless horde. Honestly, what am I going to do with you lot? Would you ever stop spitting and kicking and absorbing intellectually acclaimed literature as if it was something you hate but secretly really, really like?(more…)

While I’m not sure what sort of game Anteworld will eventually be, I can say I’m already enjoying it. Developers Outerra have released an alpha demo, mostly showing off their engine tech, but with the tiniest particle of game in there. But why is that impressive? Because the demo’s proof of concept recreates Earth.(more…)

I wrote about Mysterious Castle just before Christmas, at which point I was living in a modern apartment. I now live in an old house so logic dictates if I write about it again, by summer I’ll be living in something even more like a castle. Hopefully not a Sinister Oubliette.

The game is a grid-based, tactical spell and sword ‘em up set in a randomly generated isometric world, populated with monsters to slay with turn-based tactics and the occasional village of friendly folk. There’s a demo (Win/Mac) and the full release follows a ‘pay what you want’ model and you can even want to pay nothing. There are reports of Windows 7 64 bit incompatibility at present, so worth checking the demo first.

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Indie Game: The Movie isn’t the only movie about, er, indie games. There’s another in the works, featuring the likes of Jenova Chen, Jason Rohrer, Edmund McMillen, Petri Purho, ThatGameCompany, along with many others, called Us And The Game Industry. And it’s fair to say they have similar themes. The major difference being, Indie Game: The Movie is finished, while Us And The Game Industry is stalled, needing more funding. You can see the trailer below.

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Whether you're plunking down $30 on the Idle Thumbs Kickstarter, or waiting patiently to pick up Thirty Flights of Loving later on, at least you don't have to wait in the interim before checking out some screens and the above teaser trailer. Your interest is warranted: It's the sequel to Blendo Games' Gravity Bone, an excellent PC game that's still available for free download.

If you've been looking for a way to experience more video game and video game-inspired music, here's a pretty cheap one-way ticket right into the scene. Nubuwo is a site that's been created to cover exactly this kind of music, and over on Kickstarter they've compiled the talent of 12 different musicians across quite a few games into one big bundle for sale.

For $6, you can pick up either a 92-track "Vocal Pack" featuring the likes of Laura Shigihara, Floex, and the great Mega Ran, or a 150-track "Instrumental Pack" with the soundtracks to The Binding of Isaac, Bit Pilot, and ilomilo.

For $9, you get both of those, and for $15 you'll get 25 more tracks from excellent indie games like Spelunky and Antichamber, a couple interview segments with Final Fantasy composers Nobuo Uematsu and Kumi Tanioka, and a few other goodies. Higher donations can get you the tunes on actual CDs, and signed by the composers.

SimCity is returning, if German magazine GameStar is to be believed. In a post on NeoGaf, images of alleged SimCity concept art have been posted, as well as a rough translation of GameStar's article on the title. The article highlights a few details, such as the ability to create winding roads as o...

Analogue: A Hate Story, the latest game from Digital: A Love Story and Don’t Take It Personally, Babe creator Christine Love, came out a few weeks back. I’ve finally been able to sit down an explore this dark, sad detective story set on a ghost ship from the 25th century. Here’s what I discovered.

CHOOSE:

I like the art style/don’t care either way/won’t let my dislike of it stand in the way of finding out more about an interesting videogame.

I will not play a game that has that art style.

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How will your Xbox Live account integrate into Microsoft's upcoming operating system update? Engadget EIC Tim Stevens is here to show you, touring the Windows 8 consumer preview build ahead of today's big launch. The long and the short of it? It's basically Xbox Live as you already know it. The thrill!

The ex-BioWare bods, Stoic, with their offices in a goat shed have released a trailer for the intriguing The Banner Saga. Revealing the traditional animation style, as well as the ye-olde-school grid-based turn-based combat, along with RPG-like dialogue options, it gives you an idea of the tone being aimed at, if not how it will feel to play. We’ve also got some rather lovely screenshots that we’ll even let you look at. If you’re good.

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Serial demaker, Eric Ruth, has a new game out. And it’s not an IP-threatening pixellation of someone else’s game this time. It’s Corril Slayer, a Castlevania/Mega Man-style side-scrolling shooter for only $3. There’s a trailer below, which reveals some truly awesome dialogue.

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Could the Game Of Thrones MMO being about breeding? I ask because of this: “Bigpoint’s design goal is to capture the show’s compelling drama and action and create a visceral gaming experience via an unprecedented level of visual fidelity. The bloodthirsty struggle for power, corruption, and deception will persist. To ensure survival of their dynasty, players must master combat and politics.” Because, you know, that’s not all you need to do to ensure survival of your dynasty, is it? I mean there are certainly other aspects to it, which I personally have been pursuing for years… Anyway. Probably not, eh? No.

The game will be browser-based, so we’re speculating F2P, the website is up here, and that’s the first image up above. Not all that inspiring, but the only way is up, eh? More on this will be coming out of GDC, apparently. So that’s good.

What can I do to convince you to play 1000 Amps? The unenigmatic screenshots of black and white levels made of dull tiles are not going to do it. That you’ve never heard of it, nor its developer, Brandon Brizzi’s The Odd Man Out, means you’ve no previous attachment or interest. And if I describe it to you, I still fear it won’t convince you. I’ll have to think of something.

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