Thirteen1: Free Video Games Magazine

Non-Gamer’s Review: SimCity

Few games have the ability to make me jump up and down with glee upon its arrival – but SimCity is one of those games.

Although it was actually released for PC back in March I was holding out for the Mac version, but following EA’s announcement that its release is getting pushed back again to August, I gave in and begged Dan to lend me his laptop and buy it for PC.

As your resident non-gamer, the first thing I ask your Ed when he brings a game home for me is always “Am I actually going to be able to play it?”. It’s no secret that using a ‘twiddler’ (or controller to the rest of the world) doesn’t come naturally to me and has been my biggest stumbling block ever since I was dragged into the gaming world (hmm… dragged is a strong word, maybe ‘compliantly strolled’ might be a little more accurate). It’s like all of my characters are drunk – personally, I think it’s highly irresponsible of them. If you ask me, it may be a generational thing. Hand a controller to a 7 year old and he’ll probably handle it with greater skill than he does a PC. But I’m old (I just turned 27 and am not handling it very well) and grew up on primitive PC games – predominantly the SimCity franchise.

Read More in Issue 63 of T1 Monthly

Review: Remember Me

Remember Me is a new IP from Capcom, which is always a welcome, if somewhat risky move at the end of a console life cycle. By conquering immersive storytelling while simultaneously serving up little of interest in its core gameplay, Remember Me will be remembered fondly for its enamouring world and characters by those who played it through to the end, yet instantly forgotten by those who only have a quick play with it’s flaky mechanics.

Taking place in Neo-Paris, Remember Me throws you into a world where memories are controlled by one corporation, and everyone is waiting to get their next hit of them. Whether that be buying a first kiss memory from a vending machine or a number of other treasured memories long forgotten. You play as Nilin, a memory hunter – one of the best – who uses all her prowess to try and take down the company who made her who she is. She’s also intent on recovering her own lost memories to discover her past, and just generally survive the harsh alternate future Capcom have crafted.

Read More in Issue 63 of T1 Monthly

Why you Should Buy the Knife of Dunwall DLC

The Knife of Dunwall is the second of three downloadable add-ons for Dishonored, a game that reminded critics and gamers how first-person action titles don’t necessarily have to stick a gun in players’ hands to make things enjoyable.

If there are any doubts as to where Dishonored takes its inspiration, The Knife of Dunwall should cast such doubts aside. This is what the Thief games would have been if there had been less shit to steal and more ways to kill people, and The Knife of Dunwall pays tribute to Looking Glass Studios’ first-person sneaker with little flourishes of nostalgia.

Read More in Issue 62 of T1 Monthly

Defiance Review

Defiance is a new type of MMO with its own linked-in TV show, and while it may not topple the giant that is World of Warcraft, it also has no intention of doing so.

Let’s be honest, who needs to worry about kungfu panda’s and magical elves when you have an ass kicking, alien fuelled, massively multiplayer third person shooter on your side?

Defiance opens up in the city of San Francisco, ravaged by war, mutants, hellbugs, and the ever present danger and intrigue of Arkfalls. The setting for Defiance is very urban and gritty, a facet that very much extends to the mission types. In the face of familiarity, San Francisco makes for a surprisingly interesting and rich setting for a game, and that they allow you to battle on recognisable landmarks like the legendary Golden Gate bridge is a very nice touch indeed.

Character creation comes off as a little lacklustre, with extremely limited looks and starting attire for your Ark Hunter. There is the option of playing as either a Human or a Votan Irathient though, which offers more cosmetic changes. You choose a back story at character creation that determines your class, clothing and your starting weapon, and you can always get new weapons and clothing by completing missions.

Read The Full Review in The latest Issue of T1 Monthly

Alien Spidy Review

It seems even the hardcore platform genre must cater to stereotypes.

Brought to us by Kalypso and Enigma Software, Alien Spidy runs with the familiar lost/kidnapped romantic interest as its excuse for a rather endearing character to hop around the undergrowth, swinging from seeds to tree branches and cave walls, and collecting orbs as he goes.

There are sharp moments of gameplay genius wedged in the overtly cute subject matter, which may only serve to make you feel like a toddler having a tantrum when you put – or throw – down your controller in frustration. Alien Spidy does indeed look like a soft and easy title to whittle away the hours of a casual weekend, but rest assured this game has teeth, and it will catch your attention in a death grip the way only hardcore physics-platform games can.

Like many of its ilk, Alien Spidy sets you up with the basic principles of movement and objectives, and then leaves you to get on with a few dozen levels, each one slightly more complicated than the last. This will come as no surprise. There are three themed environments for our heroic arachnid to negotiate, each with an increasing number of hazards that result in a snappy return to your last checkpoint. Nothing that will hoist your eyebrows any higher than standard issue eyebrow level.

Read The Full Review in The latest Issue of T1 Monthly

Gravi Review

It’s not often I find a game both frustratingly hard and fun to play at the same time.

But Gravi, a new 2D puzzle platformer by Hashbang Games, does exactly that, taking a leaf out of Super Meat Boy’s book to deliver an experience that’s as almost fair as it is punishing. Gravi makes you die, a lot, and you’ll be tearing your hair out at its later levels (a lot!) – but boy does it feel good when you make it to the end of a level unscratched.

Currently in alpha, the premise of Gravi is misleadingly simple. You play as a small blue orb named Gravi, who is stuck in some sort of alien testing facility and being chased down by a red orb called Anti-Gravi. That’s about all you get on the story front at this early stage, and I’ve pieced most of that together from the trailers. Your objective is to escape the facility by navigating a series of increasingly challenging mazes. True to hardcore puzzle-platformer form, there are a billion and one things in your way, and you WILL die from their touch…over and over again.

Read The Full Review in The latest Issue of T1 Monthly

AR-K: Chapter 1 Review

Having first been released in 2011 by Gato Salvaje, episodic adventure title AR-K: Chapter 1 has been relaunched over PC, Mac, iOS, and Android with a more heavily translated version than the last. The game is downloadable for free from their site over April too, which is a bonus for thrifty adventure fans like myself.

We’re welcomed to the game with some dubious renders grinding one another in a club devoid of patrons. The main character, a journalism student called Alicia Van Volish, then wakes up in her trashed (yet futuristically clinical) room, looks around and exclaims: “What the f*ck?!”

As openers go, it’s a pretty engaging one, despite its shortness. Our heroine must now uncover who it was that she slept with last night. We’re introduced to Alicia through a short exposition sequence where she explains that she actually wanted to be a police officer, but her budding career was ruined because the police found a mysterious object in her handbag, one that she apparently had no idea about. She then began studying journalism for an outlet for her ‘deductive skills’.

Read More in Today’s Issue of T1 Daily

Bioshock: Infinite Review

When I played the original BioShock for the first time I didn’t know what to expect. Back in 2007 I wasn’t the savvy gamer I am now (debateable, I know), and I hadn’t played any games by Irrational Games, meaning I missed out on System Shock 2.

I only picked up its spiritual successor, BioShock, as a buffer while I waited for Halo 3 and Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare, and despite the time I spent with those two titles, it was BioShock that left a lasting impression on me. Never before had an FPS drawn me in with an engaging narrative, not to mention the superbly crafted world of Rapture, a dystopian city built under the sea. How could I not fall in love with its majesty, or the mystery behind its downfall? The genius science fiction involving splicing and ADAM, the 1960s backdrop, Andrew Ryan’s doomed vision of a society without limits, and of course the trippy hypnotherapy twist – wow! Yes, BioShock really did leave its mark on me. Unfortunately the same could not be said for BioShock 2. While it’s not an overly terrible game, it didn’t cut the mustard like its predecessor. But enough talk of the past, as easy as it is to reminisce of games gone by, it’s BioShock Infinite that everybody’s talking about these days.
There’s a strong family resemblance between BioShock Infinite and its older brother; the theme of “it’s the same, but different” is constant throughout. Andrew Ryan, the charismatic ruler of Rapture from BioShock is replaced by Zachary Hale Comstock, or Father Comstock the Prophet as he’s known by the residents of Columbia.

Read The Full Review in The latest Issue of T1 Monthly

Starcraft 2: Heart of the Swarm Review

When it was first announced that Starcraft 2 was going to be split into 3 parts, well I’m not going to lie – I was more than a little annoyed.

Thankfully, Wings of Liberty proved to be pretty good, and that set my mind at rest. However what I didn’t bank on was having to wait another 3 years before part 2 showed its Zerg Infested face.

Part 2, Heart of the Swarm, has now arrived, and I still have to decided whether this expansion lives up the legacy of its predecessor. There are some bits it has done really well, but there are some that just feel ‘off’, for want of a better term.

Obviously, as with all Starcraft games, this is a story of two halves: Multi-player & Campaign.
Personally I have always been a fan of the campaign, and like Wings of Liberty before it, Heart of Swarm is focused primarily around one character – this time Sarah Kerrigan. The story follows her as she regains control of the Zerg swarm to get revenge on Arcturus Mengsk for basically screwing her over and causing her to become the Queen of Blades in the first place.

Players of the previous segment will already be familiar with the between-mission hubs, which allow you to talk to a series of supporting characters. Thankfully this has made a return and, shockingly contrary to my previous image of the Swarm, there are actually some interesting creatures to converse with.

Read More in Today’s Issue of T1 Daily

Sniper Elite: Nazi Zombie Army Review

When you are asked to review a game with a name like ‘Nazi Zombie Army’, your reply will always be “hell, yes.” A game with a name like that can’t suck; well, at the very least it’s unlikely to be boring. That was my thought process when I took this review on, and I’m happy to say that I was not disappointed.

Nazi Zombie Army (NZA) brings a lot to the gory and somewhat blood-soaked table. A standalone expansion game based on the Sniper Elite series, NZA was developed by Rebellion, the award-winning Oxford-based developer responsible for titles such as Star Wars Battlefront: Renegade Squadron, Sniper Elite, and Sniper Elite V2.

NZA is set at the tail end of WWII. Hitler is having a rough go of things; with the writing on the wall he makes a last-ditch effort at world domination by unleashing an army of undead Nazis. Your job is to complete missions by mowing down wave after wave of ill-tempered racist zombies in a dark version of Berlin.

Sniping the undead is decidedly easier than taking out baddies in previous iterations of the Sniper Elite series. The folks at Rebellion have made it simple to hit your targets, but there are more than enough nefarious enemies to keep your trigger finger twitching. NZA also marks the return of Sniper Elite’s ‘kill cam’ – an opportunity to watch bullets rip through decaying flesh, bone, and organs up close. It’s a cool effect, and extremely satisfying to watch your well-placed shot explode through zombie skulls and chests in slow motion.

Read The Full Review in Issue 60 of T1 Monthly