I've been chomping at the bit to play a good multi-character CRPG for some time now, but am typically presented with various barriers, which I'm constantly looking to overcome. I think I've found one way to get through one of the most egregious barriers, and that's minimizing set up time. Whether truly necessary or not, when it comes to a good CRPG, I like to read the manual first so I can plan out my character creation strategy and then hit the ground running. Unfortunately, gathering the motivation to actually break out the manual and read it is difficult at best since there are so many other demands on my time, many of which are considerably more fun than reading rules. Since the Kindle app on my iPad 2 now supports the sending of documents over email directly to the device, I was able to send both the PDF manual and PDF map for Darklands (which Matt Barton covered here and here) from my Evernote account via my Kindle-specific email address. While I own the complete boxed version of Darklands, having both the manual and map on my iPad are considerably more convenient since I can read the former at my leisure, and refer to the latter as needed. In fact, I read about half the manual today during lunch, and will probably get through the rest when doing cardio at the gym tonight after hitting the weights. This way when I do have a little time in the evening, I can simply start the game. And speaking of the game, I got Darklands on gog.com, and it's already installed on my gaming PC, so no need for me to set up my original disks on an old PC and go through the whole tedious process that that would involve. This of course further streamlines my ability to actually get to the game before using up all of my time and/or energy.

An overview and unboxing for Pier Solar and the Great Architects for the Sega Genesis/Mega Drive. This specifically covers the USA Posterity edition of the game. It's an amazing homebrew creation involving hundreds of volunteers and years of effort.

By the way, Super Thunder Drive III is a clever fake, and underneath the cartridge is a certificate of authenticity card. Mine is Copy number 11 of 800 for the Posterity edition! Oh, and the "posterity" bit means my name along with the hundreds of others who pre-ordered this edition are mentioned in the manual...

Newcomer (C-64) collageThanks to our friends at GameSetWatch for the excellent blog post informing us of the pending release of a computer role playing game (CRPG) for the legendary Commodore 64 (C-64), entitled, Newcomer. Apparently 20 years in the making, this appears to be the epitome of "epic", with top notch visuals, enhanced interactions, and everything else you'd expect from a modern day C-64 game. According to GameSetWatch, "The game has elements from both classic adventure titles and tabletop roleplaying games, placing an emphasis on interacting with characters, exploring the world, developing in/game and real life skills, and solving puzzles.

It's a massive title (for the C64), as one would expect after 20 years of development. Newcomer features 180+ characters to interact with (each with their own portraits), 10+ people who can join your party of six, 50+ areas created with 30+ graphic sets, 100+ cutscenes, 180,000+ words of in-game text, thousands of puzzles, and more all packed into 2 MB."

I for one can't wait, and I know one or two our readers surely feel the same...

Full Feature Set from the Protovision Website, where they seem to indicate that this had a prior life, including as "Enhanced Newcomer", with this version being "Ultimate Newcomer" (fingers crossed this gets a fully packaged release!):

Most of us who are heavily involved in games and game design realize the massive benefits to simple, classic turn-based mechanics. I'm not going to say that turn-based is "better" than real-time any more than a screwdriver is better than a hammer; they're just tools which we can use to get the job done. These days, however, many game designers are indeed using a hammer to nail in a screw, and building some pretty shoddy birdhouses. So many games coming out today would greatly benefit from a turn-based gameplay mechanic - often you can see that the designers knew this, but that something held them back from using one. Today I'm writing about what this something is - a deep-seated cultural mistake that we make about games in general.

Rampant Coyote has posted a new review of my book Dungeons & Desktops: The History of Computer Role-Playing Games. It's a very positive and detailed review and really gets at the heart of what I was attempting with the book: Bottom line (again): I loved the book. If you are a serious computer RPG fan who doesn’t believe the genre began with Oblivion or Diablo II, and especially if you are at all involved in making or reviewing RPGs, you should give it a read. I have a response below.

Wow--now this really sounds interesting. Apparently Fable 3 will let co-op players have sex and eventually have children. Details seem scarce, and some are already thinking back to the seeds and trees thing from Molyneux. Even if it doesn't work out, though, I think we can all see the potential of something like this.

This week's show features Tunnels of Doom, an 8-bit classic rpg for the TI-99/4A. Enjoy, and please spread the word.

Realms of Quest III BeastiaryAs you may or may not know, those of us at Armchair Arcade have been following the progress of Realms of Quest III - the amazing Commodore Vic-20 RPG - with great interest for some time now. Well, we're pleased to announce that the full commercial release of the deluxe package is now available. What follows is Ghislain's post about its release, which was originally here, where we were previously discussing it:

[BEGIN]
Realms of Quest III is finally available! You can order it here:

Premium Edition: http://www.binaryzone.org/retrostore/index.php?main_page=product_info&pr...

Budget Edition: http://www.binaryzone.org/retrostore/index.php?currency=GBP&main_page=pr...

(premium means you get a plastic jewel case + 36 page manual, budget is disk-only)

-----------------------------------------------

Today's casual photos (bit higher quality than usual, with my Panasonic digital camera), shown below, are two rare Apple Macintosh RPG's from 1989, Xor's TaskMaker (original version) and Postcraft's Citadel: Adventure of the CRYSTAL KEEP. The classic Macintosh platform is not known for its RPGs, and stand outs on the platform have been few and far between. Some of the others I own are rare and generally highly sought after, including Legends of the Lost Realm, a multi-character role playing game from Avalon Hill (1988; I don't have the sequel, which uses the same box, just with a small sticker on it to distinguish it), and the classic, Quarterstaff: The Tomb of Setmoth (1988, Infocom), which was originally released by Simulated Environment Systems in 1987 as simply Quarterstaff before Infocom's acquisition, and is considered one of the few authentic pen and paper-style RPGs in videogame form. Photos below: