Posts tagged Steam
Retrospective Overdrive: An Engagement with Lugaru HD
Mar 23rd
I’d like to introduce the Silicon Sasquatch readership to our newest contributor. Dan Phipps, long a friend of Sasquatch editors Doug and Nick, is not just a good buddy but also a diehard gamer and generalized nerd. Equally at home behind a console controller, PC keyboard or 20-sided die, he has an intelligent and irreverent writing style. His look at Lugaru HD fits in with our Retrospective Overdrive. Without further ado, take it away, Dan!
I needed a break from Fallout: New Vegas. I had been playing it for what felt like days and had barely scratched the surface of my persistently increasing list of quests. In times of trouble like these, I’ll usually re-install Deus Ex and try to beat the game (again) with some absurd restriction like only using rocket launchers or swords. But not this time. This time I stumbled upon a treasure trove of games in my Steam account, and I have almost no recollection of how they got there.
One of those titles was Lugaru HD. I couldn’t find any record of buying it during the last Steam Orgy of Wasted Money this past holiday season. Because Steam allows one to acquire games without typing in credit card info or taking a breathalyzer test, it’s not unheard of for me to make bad financial decisions. It is uniquely odd for me to have no memory of the acquisition, though. And there sat Lugaru, a mystery wrapped in an enigma left in my games library.
Sasquatch PSA: Torchlight 50% off! (PC)
Dec 18th
The headline says it all, friends. Steam is running one of its beloved Weekend Deals on Torchlight, a game we at Silicon Sasquatch hold very dear to our hearts — even though we’ve only played the demo (a lot). But now everyone can have the clever action RPG from Runic Games for just $9.99 (normally $19.99) until Monday! It’s a steal, so go grab it right now. Don’t have Steam? Get it. Don’t have a PC? Buy one — or at least put Windows on your Mac. Linux…sorry?
And did I mention that you can have a dog or cat companion cart your loot back to town for you? I’ll let Penny Arcade explain.
Read after the break for more details.
Review: Left 4 Dead DLC (PC)
Apr 24th
Left 4 Dead (L4D) is still the paramount zombie apocalypse videogame — there are no contenders, no second place awards. It’s a frenetic, hair-trigger suicide mission into an infected wasteland that doses players with relentless fun.
Even five months after its release, the original Campaign mode continues to be both exciting and trying, while Versus still turns up the intensity by forcing players to alternate between the roles of survivor and infected.
But despite the release version’s polish, there was always some tiny element missing, something teased but never fully delivered: unadulterated intensity free from the stairstep pacing of the campaign. The strongest moments of L4D lay in its massive NPC crescendos, where a horde of the undead claw, vomit, smash, strangle and pounce to ensure every survivor is indeed, left for dead.
Valve finally realized it could hack all of that terror and confusion into one sanguine slab of gameplay, resulting in the recently added DLC pack.
Review: World of Goo (PC)
Apr 15th
I hope you don’t finish reading this review.
Go ahead and leave! Really, I won’t mind. I’d rather you not waste any more time before you close your web browser and download a copy of World of Goo. But hey, I’m not here to tell you what to do — I’m just a lowly blogger who’s here to state my case, and let you make the decision.
But come on. Let’s be honest — you and I both know you’re gonna get this game, and you’re gonna love it to death, and you’ll think back on it fondly for years to come. Sound good? Great. Not convinced? Read on.
Review: The Path (PC)
Apr 7th
The Path isn’t quite art, but it aspires to be. Belgian-based developer Tale of Tales’ latest title is, like The Graveyard before it, another serious attempt at forcing the gaming populace to think in challenging ways. In that sense it’s more like a thesis paper than a gallery showing. Except in this case you have to pay $10 on Steam to experience the message.
Part adventure, part horror and all patience, The Path asks a lot of its players while giving some of the effort back—if they play long enough to figure that out.