Quick Review - Antichamber

Game Name:    Antichamber

Developer:    Alexander Bruce
      Engine:              Unreal Engine 3

Platform:     Windows (Steam)

Genre: Puzzle, First person, Platformer

Release Date: January 31, 2013

Disclaimer: As of now, I’m about 95% through the game. I’ve solved nearly all of the puzzles, but there a few still lingering around unsolved. It’s very possible that I will never completely finish this game, but I feel I’ve progressed through enough of it to give an ample quick review.

Short description:  After 4 years of development, Antichamber has arrived! Extremely creative and mind bending exploratory, first person puzzle game set in a seemingly simplistic series of interconnected chambers.

The Good:

• Extremely original, non-euclidean, Escher-like puzzles make for a truly unique gaming experience.
• Graphically appealing. Plain white walls with the occasional splash of color is a surprisingly fitting aesthetic for this type of game. The designer is able to pull your brain in all different directions playing with the color schemes.
• A sufficient challenge! For those that are complaining that games are getting too easy, you'll be happy for a change of pace with this one.
• Philosophical twist. The puzzles are accompanied by small philosophical phrases and cartoon diagrams to loosely guide you along. They oddly taunt you in the midst of a puzzle, but are all the more meaningful once you solve it.

The Bad:

• Little to no direction. Aside from small diagrams you find on the wall, the player is left up to their own devices to figure out what to do and where to go.
• Lack of direction can make some of the puzzles pretty frustrating until you have that “Aha!” moment.
• While sound does play a factor in the game, it's not overly prevalent. I would have liked to see a bit more done with the sound.

All in all, should you play this?

• If you’re looking for an original puzzle game that will twist your brain in very odd directions, I would recommend picking this up. It’s by far the most interesting game I’ve played so far this year, and rivals Portal for one of the most original puzzle games I’ve ever come across.

Here's a glimpse of what this game is like...

Quick Review - Chivalry: Medieval Warfare

Game Name:    Chivalry: Medieval Warfare

Developer:    Torn Banner Studios

Engine:       Unreal Engine 3

Platform:     PC (Windows - Steam)

Genre: First person, Action, Multiplayer

Release Date: October 16, 2012

Short description: First person, primarily melee based, multiplayer (up to 32 vs 32) medieval combat. Wield a wide variety of medieval weapons between four different classes (Archer, Man-At-Arms, Vanguard, Knight) with four different multiplayer modes (FFA, Team Deathmatch, Last Team Standing, Team Objective).

The Good:

• Intense, in your face combat. Multiplayer melee FPS games are few and far between, this scratches that itch in a big way.
• The developers don’t hold back on violence. You can dismember people in a variety of ways. As weird as it sounds to say this, lopping someone's head off with a massive claymore is one of the most satisfying feelings ever.
• Large collection of weapons to unlock for each class. 9 primary, 6-9 secondary, for each class, with little to no overlap.
• Quality team based multiplayer; teams that work together have a significant advantage.
• Huge potential if they decide to open this up to Steam Workshop, or a similarly active modding community.

The Bad:

• The game is buggy. I’ll note just a few that have gotten my goat.
• When you start the game, your key binding are messed up.
• Random key bindings stop working in game, you have to go into your configuration and fix them each time this happens. This can really screw you when your parry key stop working mid-fight.
• The server browser rarely works correctly. The occupancy levels are always inaccurate. Often times nothing will show up at all and you have to restart Steam in order to get it to show up again.
• While all the weapons and maps are nice, I want more content, either in the form of modding, DLC, expansions, anything... give me more!!

All in all, should you play this?

• Despite the bugs, this is an extremely fun game. I would highly recommend this to any fan of competitive multiplayer, particularly of the first person variety. Torn Banner has made a really cool combat system here, and I encourage you to give it a try!

Here's a little sample of some gameplay with myself and a friend of mine playing some Team Objective mode.