I feel so naughty. Risen is banned here in Australia. It was refused classification back in 2009, for predictably nonsense reasons (it features drug use, which the Australian Classification Board absolutely hates in the context of video games). It has never been re-classified, meaning that it’s still not available here…
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The “Loathing” property occupies a very distinct part of gaming and Internet culture. Kingdom of Loathing is 20 years old now (and still going strong!), and one of the pioneers in Web-based, massively online role-playing gaming. Thanks to hugely entertaining stickman character artwork and ridiculously entertaining nerd humour, it was…
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For years now Zeboyd has been the indie JRPG developer for delivering true love letters to the genre in a way that fans of the genre love. Cthulhu Saves The World and Cosmic Star Heroine are both magnificent, highly entertaining “retro” JRPGs that respect the player’s time and provide a…
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There is a moment, about 20-30 hours into Mount & Blade II: Bannerlord, where you’re about to get into your first truly big battle as a commander (yes, it’s a slow build-up to that point). You’ll still remember what it was like at the start, as you led a rag-tag…
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What was Bilbo Baggins’ great quote from Lord of the Rings (the good one, not the TV series)? “Like butter scraped over too much bread”? Something like that. It’s a great quote and also the best way to describe Temtem. As a Pokémon clone it would almost be serviceable, if…
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If it wasn’t for a compromised localisation, Sword and Fairy 7 – Sword and Fairy: Together Forever in the west – would be right up there with Elden Ring and Xenoblade Chronicles 3 as the best RPG of the year. In a year that has been almost painfully dense with…
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Forget the absolutely dismal Dark Alliance dungeon crawler that was released last year. There was a time where “Dungeons & Dragons” and “Dark Alliance” put together was something worth getting excited about. Baldur’s Gate: Dark Alliance was a series of just two games, but they remain two of the better…
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We should be talking a lot more about The Dragoness: Command Of The Flame, because it taps into something that we don’t see nearly enough of anymore. It’s releasing in September, and from what I’ve been playing of it, it’s excellent. The lack of chatter about it leaves me worried…
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Like with most PC releases, I missed the original launch of Gamedec last year. I just don’t pay enough attention to that space, it seems, because if I did I would have bought this instantly. As such I’m glad it has come to Nintendo Switch, because while the Switch does…
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We’ve seen China grow rapidly as an international game development hub, and one of the most exciting things about that nations’ game development scene is that they seem to be every bit as enamoured with the RPG format as their neighbours in Japan. Codename: Wandering Sword is basically “what if…
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