Spellirium has that feeling of a game from my childhood re-imagined and upgraded to fit into todays times. It’s a point-n-click adventure, but without all that silly ‘make sure you click here and combine the turkey and the jackhammer’ nonsense, it’s also a word puzzle game that actually has a story and purpose. Finally it has a charming atmosphere coupled with amazingly witty dialogue. Sold yet?

If not, let me attempt to persuade you more eloquently. You play as Brother Todd, the youngest member of a secret society known as the Runekeepers. The Runekeepers are some of a small handful of individuals in the world who actually know how to read. Reading has been forbidden by the potentially nefarious Lord Steve (who I’m not entirely convinced isn’t the monkey from Cloudy With a Chance of Meatballs).

When Brother Todd leaves his home to shear some sheep, a tragic event strikes, leaving him saddled with a strange device capable of using words to create, manipulate, or destroy. Brother Todd then sets out into the world proper for the first time, hoping to find out exactly what the device is, and why people are so desperate to prevent him from having it.

The world isn’t like today. A cataclysmic event tore the world asunder, and left most of the technology we use as detritus. Trash is everywhere, and is so abundant that the inhabitants of the world have made just about everything out of it. This recurring theme, dubbed “trashpunk” by creator Ryan Creighton, adds a distinct flavour to the game that hasn’t really been explored anywhere else.

Spellirium is an absolute blast. I haven’t enjoyed the dialogue in a game this much since playing a certain Ron Gilbert adventure in the early 90’s. It’s witty and goofy, while still maintaining an element of maturity that keeps it from getting out of hand. I have honestly not found myself laughing or smiling in a game in the last decade as much as I have with Spellirium.

The word-puzzle elements are very interesting. You have a standard 7×7 grid of letters to make your words from, and you can swap tiles anywhere on the board… they don’t have to be adjacent, although the further away they are the more energy they will use. While creating words like this is straightforward, their application isn’t. Need to shear a sheep? You’ll be wanting to make words like “cut”, “shear”, or “denude”. Dying said wool red might mean only using red letters, and spinning the wool into a garment presents a directional challenge instead.

You also get various companions along the way, such as Lorms, the giant fluffy blue monster who is extremely fearful of small insects. These companions will give you additional abilities to use throughout the puzzles, and add an extra dimension of tactical flow when working through them.

It’s in these ways that the game is kept fresh. Even when Spellirium has you pitted against more generic puzzles, there are specific challenges to aim for, and words to find that can cause an enemy to flee in terror. It’s all a lot of fun, and backed by a story that is actually worth paying attention to, if only for the fourth wall humor the game throws in at regular intervals.

It’s important to note that Spellirium is still heavily in alpha. I don’t mean the kind of Aliens: Colonial Marines ‘pre-alpha’ that is actually better than the finished product, either — Spellirium is definitely unfinished. While there are a few spoken lines of dialogue as placeholders, there is pretty much zero sound in the current product. There are a number of bugs, ranging from simple graphics issues to more complex game logic problems, but in my experience nothing truly gamebreaking ever occurred.

But for an alpha, it shows an awful lot of polish already. The word puzzle element is strongly fleshed out, there is a lot of depth there in addition to things I have already mentioned, and some of the instances can be both fiendishly difficult and incredibly rewarding. The environments and overall look are thematically awesome, and the self abasing humor never gets old.

So, if a trashpunk point-and-click adventure word puzzle sounds like a rollicking good time to you (and it is), you could do a heck of a lot worse than snagging a copy of the Spellirium alpha. The game might be a sizeable way from being finished, but what is there, is absolute gold polished to a mirror sheen. And besides, who wouldn’t want to back a game studio run by someone who tastefully shaved balls onto his face for Movember? That’s pure dedication right there, folks.

You can (and should) pre-order Spellirium from the developer’s official site. $15 gets you into the alpha, and a bunch of other goodies too (including a Steam key).

Welcome to our Massive Monitor Roundup! For our testing purposes, we used the website Lagom.nl, which you can use yourself to try and get great reproduction out of your monitor.

While it does have some limitations, Lagom shows a wide array of tests to discern some of the more basic problems that can plague monitors. If you wish to find out more, head on over to get a better understanding of the testing and calibration.

Let’s begin!

ASUS VG278H

One of two 27” monitors in the roundup, the VG278H has a fairly unassuming exterior that hides a beastly interior. It has a matte finish, standard almost-inch-thick black bezel, and tactile buttons on the bottom right of the monitor. Cable ports on the rear are built deep into the monitor, which actually provide problems when sliding any cables with ferrite rings in (which is the type the monitor comes with). The stand is a weighted round stand with 3D printed boldly on it, and provides the monitor with tilt, swivel, and height adjustment.

Our testing produced a few problems unnoticeable in other monitors. Firstly, getting perfect contrast settings was nigh on impossible, and the monitor lacks an easily findable gamma setting, screwing with White saturation and Black balance. Additionally, colour reproduction seems solidly off, with blues and yellows seeming particularly vibrant. On the flip side, ASUS were the only monitors to not have flicker in the Inversion test, although there was significant ghosting of the navigation rectangle, and test 1 and 2 appeared green when they are supposed to appear grey. Our model also had significant backlight clouding (but not bleeding) on the bottom edge.

Gaming performance is where both the Asus monitors shine, however at times 1920 x 1080 can look decidedly average on such a large screen. The 144Hz frequency means that gaming is significantly smoother than on the standard 60Hz monitors, as long as your graphics card is capable of outputting above 60 frames per second regularly on your quality of choice, and its 2ms grey-to-grey delay offers competitive FPS gamers a definite edge.

Kogan WQHD

As the other 27” contender, the Kogan is the underdog of the bunch. It has a matte finish and a similar bezel and button setup to the ASUS, however the inputs are located on the right of the monitor. Many older PC desks have the case situated on the left, so this may be an important consideration. The stand is a solid square, and offers only tilt ability — however Kogan have mentioned a WQHD S is in the works, which will come with a full complement of swivel and height adjustment.

The testing process is where the Kogan was simply stunning. It offered an impeccable performance through almost all testing. Colours, contrast, gamma were all easy to calibrate and offered perfect reproductions. Black levels and white saturation were all spot on also, and the viewing angles were top notch. The only test the Kogan failed at was a single inversion test, the same one that plagued all but the ASUS monitors (which had other problems outside of flickering). Our model had some very minor backlight clouding (but not bleeding) in the bottom right corner.

Gaming performance is very high with the WQHD, especially with the brilliant reproduction the monitor pulls off. The 2560 x 1440 display ratio is absolutely fantastic both in and out of gaming, and suits the size of the monitor. While Kogan specifies it is a 12ms delay panel, testing showed our model running at a grey to grey of closer to 6-8ms, with no noticeable ghosting during FPS gaming.

ASUS VG248

The first of our 24” screens, the ASUS offers a matte finish and a .75 inch standard black bezel. and tactile buttons on the bottom right of the monitor. Cable ports on the rear are built deep into the monitor, which, again provides problems when sliding any cables with ferrite rings in (which is the type the monitor comes with). The stand is a weighted round stand with 3D printed boldly on it, and provides the screen with tilt, pivot, swivel, and height adjust.

In testing the 24” performed almost exactly as the 27” did, so there’s no real reason not to hit the bigger one if you can afford it. Its one improvement over the 27” is that it apparently offers a 1ms grey to grey response time, which is as low as you’re going to get for a long while.

BenQ RL2450H

The BenQ RL2450H (which we performed a detailed review of here) is the cheaper of BenQ’s two contenders in the roundup. The screen’s bezel is the standard black .75 inch that most 24” monitors have. It has physical buttons on the right of the monitor and features bottom facing input ports with plenty of room for cables of all sizes. This model has a unique looking stand that has just a lick of red around the base, giving the monitor an imposing look — but unfortunately that same stand only provides the RL2450H with tilt and not swivel.

Lagom.nl testing showed great contrast scores, but didn’t do as well in colour reproduction and sharpness, likely due to its TN panel. It performed very well in both black levels and white saturation, but the inversion test gave it a slight stumble, where it failed twice. There was some extremely minor backlight clouding on the very top and bottom of our model.

While the RL2450H seems like an all around average monitor, its gaming features are certainly worthy of taking a second look. It has a 2ms grey-to-grey response performance, and a number of gaming presets that sharpen the image and make any dark areas lighter dynamically for a competitive edge, preventing the need of professional gamers to crank the brightness and contrast to obscene levels. There was no ghosting present at all in the RL2450H, no matter what game I threw at it.

BenQ XL2420T

Visually, the differences between the BenQ XL2420T, and its smaller cousin the RL2450H are staggering. While it features a standard black .75 inch bezel, it is crisply cornered. Where the RL featured tactile buttons, the XL features touch sensitive ones, with the added option of an external controller to navigate through the OSD or switch through presets. Where the RL had a small stand that could only tilt, the XL supports swivel and height adjustment as well with a truly daunting heavyweight stand.

Lagom.nl testing showed some significant differences as well. While the contrast scores were comparable, the colour reproduction and sharpness were the best ever seen on a TN panel, although still not as good as some of the other monitors in the roundup. It performed superbly in black levels and white saturation, and even the inversion test only showed a slight flickering, although it was present on three of the seven images. There was extremely minor backlight clouding on the top edge of the panel.

What this monitor does, it does well, and that’s gaming. Games are pristine on the 120hz display rate, and the good colour reproduction meant an extremely enjoyable and incredibly smooth gaming experience, no matter the game… although it performs exceptionally well on the competitive battlefield in both FPS and RTS games thanks to its black equalizer technology. This tech allows the monitor to dynamically adjust contrast and brightness in darker areas, preventing the need for games to look washed out when you want a competitive edge.

Dell S2440L

The Dell S440L is the only Glossy screen of the bunch. It’s a 24” monitor that features a standard black .75 inch bezel, with touch sensitive buttons on the side of the monitor, with inputs located bottom facing on the back in an extremely hard to see area. It only has VGA and HDMI outputs, and many HDMI cables with thick plug casing will have difficulty fitting. It has a square based stand that offers a simple tilt function.

Lagom.nl testing reveals the best contrast results we’ve seen in a monitor, though sharpness and gamma seemed slightly off in our model and as a result both black levels and white saturation were problematic at the highest end of the scale. While only perceptible to a minority of gamers, the S2440L was the only model to not have any gradient banding at all. Inversion testing showed four problems, however, with two flickers, a miscolour with one test, and ghosting of one navigation rectangle. No perceivable backlight issues occurred.

In gaming, the glossy screen can be a huge problem, no matter the environment as games have a lot of dark areas, and the reflections are generally distracting and off putting. The superb contrast is definitely noticeable when comparing a game like BioShock Infinite across a number of monitors. Its 6ms grey-to-grey is reasonable, though I did notice some minor ghosting in particularly fast sections of gameplay, perhaps due to its overdrive technology.

Dell U2412M

The U2412M is the other 24” contender from Dell. The screen’s bezel is a standard black .75 inch, which curiously has two problems we noted with our model: the screen doesn’t make contact with the bezel (some of the packing foam was stuck in the grooves) and at various places the bezel actually comes away from the backing, allowing you to see inside the monitor. Outside of this there are physical buttons on the right side and bottom facing inputs that feature plenty of room to plug your cables in. Its stand provides the full complement of four way motion, and can increase the height considerably. A physical feature that Dell provides is four USB ports with this model, which is handy for those with a hard to access tower. We noticed some damage also with what looks to be a physical object stuck between the Anti Glare coating and the panel itself.

Lagom.nl testing showed good contrast and gamma results, with sharpness being slightly off, however black levels and white saturation were a distinct improvement over the other Dell monitor. Inversion testing only had two flicker issues this time, however it showed another problem, which is the strength of the Anti Glare coating. Usually in monitors I don’t notice AG coaring at all, however on this model it is extremely noticeable, especially on large stretches of colour. Significant blacklight clouding occurred on the top right of our model, along with minor amounts in all other corners.

For gaming, the U2412M offers good results. Its 1980 x 1200 (16:10) display does offer a certain additional crispness to the action, and it is quite noticeable in side by side tests with 24” monitors doing only 1080. However movie watching will produce a black band at the top and bottom in fullscreen, which allows that wonderful backlight clouding to shine on through. Its 8ms grey-to-grey was solid, and surprisingly didn’t show any ghosting despite the other member of the Dell family showing some minor ghosting at a lower rate.

The Best of the Best

When I scratched out all the different monitors pros and cons, I was left with a shortlist of only two monitors, the BenQ XL2420T and surprisingly, the Kogan WQHD. I sat down with both monitors for an extended period of time in a whole host of different gaming situations, as well as general use. What I found was that it was mostly up to personal preference, and whether you prefer smoothness or quality.

Ultimately, the BenQ XL2420T is designed solely for the hardest of the hardcore gamers, with a lot of technology that I can see being very useful on an eSports battlefield. It’s smoothness is excellent, and although the ASUS models were a tad smoother, the BenQ provided a higher quality colour reproduction and gamma options. As such, the BenQ XL2420T gets the Best Pro Gaming Monitor Award. This I think is precisely what it is aimed at, and exactly what it does amazingly.

However, the underdog of the roundup is what takes my breath away. It is what is sitting on my desk right now, as I am typing this, and I’ve already made steps to purchase one. For me, even though the Kogan WQHD lacks that ‘ultra fast’ response time, its nigh on perfect colour and contrast reproduction blows me away. After days of rigorous testing I know that not only can this monitor do anything I need it to with excellence, but it has a unique feature… any game I play is displayed exactly as its designers intended it to be. That knowledge is all I need to easily give the Kogan WQHD the Best Gaming Monitor Award.

Some Final Thoughts

When I received these monitors to look at, I had a lot of ideas about which one might be best and what might underperform. In almost every way those thoughts were turned topsy turvy by the end. While Samsung were unable to supply any monitors (due to sending their 2012 models away and waiting shipment on their 2013’s), I wonder how they would have held up under the same light? Seeing this line up showed me what most of the major publishers consider a ‘gaming monitor’, but — looking at the results, one has to ask whether they even know what is important to gamers at all?

The games that instantly blow me away are those that are visually awe-inspiring. Monitor manufacturers these days are doing everything they can to push the envelope, providing huge contrast gamuts or tiny response times (while using vague terms to define both). Each of the monitors that were specifically geared towards gamers had some issue that for me, as a gamer, were not possible to look over when compared to a simple unassuming general purpose monitor with specifications that most would instantly shun.

For me , the WQHD represented a purist approach to monitor manufacturing, and one that I think others could look up to. After all, don’t we want our games to look the way they were intended to look? We ask for the same in our sound equipment, and in our televisions… so it’s about time we started to ask for it in our monitors.

Techland seem to think they can breathe new life into the mutated, infected and somewhat overplayed zombie genre with their new game, Dead Island: Riptide — a spin-off of the original title in which you play the role of a survivor immune to the zombie virus, trying to escape yet another island. While the first game was fresh and lively, the sad truth is that the new game seems like a tired old clown performing the same old tricks in the hope of a new laugh.

The game banks heavily on you having previously played Dead Island, to the point where it’s basically a requirement if you want to follow along with the relatively bland story — and even though I finished the first game, I still had to go back to remind myself who some of the characters were and why I (still) shouldn’t give a toss about them. Many of the games’ basic activities aren’t explained and require a familiarity with the last game for you to even know about, especially things like modifying weaponry and utilising the fast travel system.

There are numerous problems with the game, apart from the fact that there is almost no improvement or innovation over the previous title. Many of the original grievances have been kept in, including a clunky ‘console friendly’ interface, a number of poorly-explained skills (one skill tells you to press both mouse buttons simultaneously, but you actually have to press them in sequence), and sounds that are frequently mismatched, such as the one involved every time you jump on a zombies face. Leaving a cave spouts reams of spontaneous and frequently wrong dialogue, and anytime you come back to the game you have to sit through it displaying every quest you’ve decided to go on.

If the games’ only let-down was that it didn’t focus on fixing previous issues, or didn’t add enough new content to make it worth playing, it could almost be forgivable. However Dead Island: Riptide also decides to drag you on a long, arduous, frustrating mission chain that will have you going around and around in circles, with no real progress and next-to-no fast travel options in sight. It’s certainly lengthy, but that length feels incredibly forced, unnatural, and ultimately boring. The sheer amount of copied-and-pasted areas doesn’t help to this overall feel.

It’s not all old and rusty, however. The game performs just as well as the first, and there are a smattering of new features such as the ability to perform small team quests (usually simple item fetches) that level up your team members and shopkeepers. There are defense quests that have you defending your territory, and are an enjoyable improvement to the game, especially in multiplayer. Multiplayer has had a few tweaks, and I found joining and leaving games both fluid and easy.

The game is (still) a perfectly competent zombie beat/shoot em up, and it’s almost as fun as the first experience was. But that said, a lack of an improved feature set, a frustrating quest line, and dialogue you’ve heard many times before (just how many times can Sam B throw the f-word into a sentence, anyway?) make Dead Island: Riptide seem like a repetitive chore — or worse, an underwhelming DLC masquerading as a fully-fledged game.

Good:

• If you enjoyed Dead Island, you’ll enjoy this
• Because it is exactly the same game

Bad:

• No real improvement or innovation
• Demands familiarity with the previous title
• Not enough new content to justify the price ($70)
• Frustrating, boring and full of padding
• The same issues and complaints, still unfixed from the first game

Dead Island: Riptide is $70 on Steam, or $40 on Green Man Gaming instead. This review copy was supplied by Deep Silver.

The Belkin N50 ‘Nostromo’ Speedpad was a solid piece of innovation and technical engineering. It featured 2 custom rows of gaming keys, a mouse wheel, a directional pad, and a black/silver/orange colour scheme which was striking, if incredibly garish even for the world of 2002. Refine the design and development of the N50 over 10 years and you have Razer’s Orbweaver, a serious piece of tech for gaming enthusiasts that still pays respect to a decade-long lineage. But does it live up to its past, or was it better left as a relic of times gone?

Razer might not have had anything to say in the design of the Nostromo N50, or even its successor the N52, but in 2007 Belkin brought Razer on board to help design a more professional version of the N52 speedpad, the N52te (Tournament Edition). This device — while initially shunned for minor technical differences between its predecessor — had a higher build quality, easier to use buttons, and the iconic ‘black and blue’ colour set still in use by Razer today. It was the N52te that helped solidify Razer as a high-end producer of all things professional gaming, and the repercussions of that dominance are still felt today.

While Razer eventually gained the rights to the Nostromo entirely and developed their own branded version it was launched to compete with the Logitech G13, a similar style of gamepad that suited larger hand sizes better than that released by Razer. It was important to note that since Razer didn’t significantly change the design of the Nostromo from the N52te, gamers in general believed it to lack solid macro support, a design oversight problematic to the N52te.

Not to be deterred, Razer eventually decided they needed a new gamepad to compete with offerings made by several of its competitors. Enter the Orbweaver, a gamepad produced with Razers newer design principles in mind. While not ambidextrous, it offers several improvements in the areas of customisation and comfort, having an alterable hand, thumb and palm rest. The handrest’s angle can be changed for different grips (or left loose to swivel), and the thumb and palm rests can be extended or retracted for different hand sizes and shapes.

The Orbweaver feature set includes 20 programmable keys, a significant improvement over the 14 originally offered by its predecessor. It also does away with the difficult to use scrollwheel, creating a more unified design that is easier to adapt to. Your thumb has access to a space button, a ‘hyperresponse’ thumb button, and a 8-way thumbpad which while easier and more intuitive to use than previous designs, is very easy to knock during frantic gameplay moments.

By far the easiest to notice improvement has to be the addition of mechanical keys. These feel like the same Cherry Blue switches found in Razer’s mechanical keyboards, which is hardly a surprise. They provide excellent response, and while many prefer Cherry Black’s or Brown’s for a keyboard switch preference, the Cherry Blue’s match the sensitivity of the other buttons and thumpad perfectly.

As far as comfort goes, testing the Orbweaver with a small group of friends showed that no matter the hand type people could adjust the device to a natural comfort level, although small fingered friends had difficulty reaching the top left and right keys. Most preferred to leave the handrest in a loose swivel state, allowing it to dynamically change depending on needs, although its general flexibility leads me to worry about long term wear and tear.

The device is designed for heavy duty use, with rubber used prominently for the various rests and keys. This of course means that blemishes from finger oil happens pretty much instantly, and makes the Orbweaver near impossible to clean. Despite the extremely high build quality, Razer chose to leave out the braided cable used by pretty much all of their high end devices, which seems like a step away from their design principles. Perhaps the inside of the cable is non-standard, but there is no obvious external difference.

Of course, the real test is how it feels in game. The mechanical keys make an almost imperceptible difference until you attempt to switch back to any other gamepad, at which point everything else seems sluggish by comparison. The unlimited macro functionality and 8 different keymaps allow for some great build order combinations in StarCraft II and easy skill swapping in Guild Wars 2. CS:GO purchases were quick and simple, and binding item and ability switching in Skyrim was a breeze. With professional gamers in particular, I can see this becoming a regular choice, especially when the cumulative addup of keystroke delays can mean the difference between a victory or defeat.

Razer have a real winner here, but in the world of console controllers being used on PC with unnerving frequency, is it still relevant? The answer is perhaps an unsurprising yes. With the ability to use a mouse alongside, the enhanced response time, and 22 separate keys (58 if you bind two mouse buttons to alt and shift, but keep dedicated movement keys), it is easy to see how such a device could be a hardcore gaming staple for years to come.

Good:

• Customisable for most hand shapes and sizes
• Mechanical keys with a satisfying click
• Solid improvement over past designs
• Versatile macro management

Bad:

• Price just shy of a full mechanical keyboard
• Cable and Handrest could pose long term problems
• Easy to accidentally hit thumb buttons

The Razer Orbweaver retails for around $120 at many stockists. Product for this review was supplied by Razer.

Although derided by the PC master race for being a console exclusive, the resemblance that DUST 514 has to its elder brother EVE Online is staggering. From the way the game starts, its music, its menu system, even the way you outfit your soldiers — all of it has that traditional EVE feeling. This is on purpose of course, considering that both games are planned to seamlessly partner with each other, a feat never successfully achieved in the history of gaming.

This innovation of DUST 514 is also one of its most defining features. People in DUST can interact with people in EVE, and vice versa. Currently it is limited to people on the ground in DUST calling orbital bombardments (and EVE players obliging), but there is also going to be ways for players on the ground to return fire on those hitting them from orbit, and corporations being able to host both DUST and EVE players for proper coordinated attacks, political intrigue, and more.

Of course, what benefit is there to people in EVE putting their ships potentially in harm’s way to help out a ground force on a planet? While not much is known at the moment, developers at CCP have hinted at a planetary upgrade setup, not dissimilar to the system upgrades currently in place. There is also the potential for planets to send goods up to a small interstellar station, but CCP are waiting to see how the economy balances itself before adding things like manufacturing to the game.

That DUST 514 is a balanced game, while working with EVE Online is considerably impressive. While there are several thousands of distinct ways to outfit any given class, the simple ‘scissors, paper, rock’ of what weapon class should beat others remains a constant. For instance if vehicles are being successfully pinned down and destroyed by a Forge Gun-wielding Heavy, a Sniper or two will make short work of them, allowing the vehicles to travel unmolested. Every weapon class has its own strengths and weaknesses.

This balance extends to every aspect of the game, allowing each individual aspect to shine and stand tall in its own right. The map design is a practically flawless example, with objectives, cover, and important buildings feeling both natural and logically built. Nothing truly seems arbitrary, from the placement of turrets to the setup of hills and surrounding environment.

Unique weaponry is another thing that DUST 514 excels at. While the multi missile launching Swarm Launcher and the ‘charge to destroy’ Forge Gun are the most immediately noticeable, even standard FPS weapons like the Assault Rifle look, feel and handle distinctly different from any other game. It’s not just the weapon types that are distinct though, with individual weapons within that type handling with a lot of variety.

Add to all this the fact that each individual Dropsuit has ways of customising it. From extra shields, more armour, lower signature radius and more… it’s very possible to find a different setup for every person you fight against in the world. It’s not simply that people will have different weapon loadouts, but different skills learnt, different modules fitted and different equipment added.

Finally there is the vehicle selection. While there are your standard Light and Heavy vehicles for both ground and air, the sheer customisability of them is as staggering as ships in EVE or Dropsuits themselves. This creates an interesting setup where the people on the ground might not be able to tell what type of vehicle is coming their way outside of its basic type… is that dropship going to drop troops, scout, or be a mobile weapons platform? All of this works to create tension in a match as well as variety.

In the future we will likely see the addition of both MTAC’s and Fighters to DUST 514. MTAC’s are combat mechs, and will potentially be capable of scaling buildings, engaging vehicles and generally just looking (and being) badass. Fighters seem fairly straightforward, but there is always room for CCP to surprise. Dropsuits and vehicles with cloaking functionality have also been hinted at, but how they will work are still very much unknown.

While it is easy to dismiss DUST 514 at a glance as a generic MMOFPS, it is an incredibly precise, balanced experience that no other MMOFPS has even managed to get close to. As the game gets closer and closer to launch, more refinement and greater variety will be introduced. More and more will also be revealed about EVE interactivity, and how it will change the EVE universe.

Farming Simulator 2013 is a game that hits many of my guilty pleasure buttons. While many people will find the thought of tending a field for hours on end mind-numbingly boring, for me games like this provide a great open ended challenge that is also simple enough to let my mind wander while I play. In providing this, Farming Simulator 2013 succeeds — although unfortunately, it’s about the only place.

It all starts in Career mode, where you can choose from three levels of difficulty, and a single map to start with. Here one of the first of the games many frustrations rears its ugly head, with anything but the hardest difficulty mode providing you with an obscene amount of starting capital, produce and tools… it’s a sandbox mode, with practically everything unlocked from the start and no real reward to progressing.

You also start with an amount of debt in all three modes, but you also begin with a large quantity of resources farmed from somewhere off in fairy land, sitting in silos that you can sell straight away (unless playing on hard). The game in no way lets you know that you have these resources, and you are expected to either be psychic, or stumble across it while fiddling through the PDA menu system.

Of course, in all the tutorials the game makes repeated reference to the PDA system, but never once lets you know what key is required to open it up. This is a game where in spite of having a tutorial system in place, you are probably best just reading the manual first — especially since the tutorial system is basically just showing you how several tools are used, despite there being almost no difference between their usage.

Perhaps the biggest problem the game has, however, is not explaining the differences between tools adequately. There are well over 100 different tools in the game, and while perusing them through the shop (for which there is a super secret button for that allows you access to it from anywhere) you can only hope and pray that the description alludes to some difference between them other than price tag. For instance, practically all ‘drill’ sowers are also cultivators, but that is only explained on a single one of them. One of the sowers also fertilises the field at the same time, but you could only find that out by googling the actual product in the real world.

The problems don’t stop here though. You can hire workers to run your farm equipment for you, but they almost always do so inefficiently, missing entire swaths of field when sowing, or leaving parts of your field uncultivated. The AI can’t empty a harvester either, unless it is a model that can attach a trailer to its rear, so you can’t just leave them alone and hope for the best, as the harvester will sit there while full doing nothing, and the worker will enjoy being paid to relax.

When it is finally harvesting time though, you are forced to use a clunky menu system to determine just how ‘ripe’ your crops are. You get higher yield the riper the crop is, but the game in no way makes a visual distinction between crops that are just ready and those about to die.

You would think from all this negativity that there was no enjoyment to be had from the game, but honestly — no. Despite the annoying bugs, the inefficient design, the frustrating UI, and the one lone chicken on the farm the game starts me with that will not just shut the hell up, it is exactly the kind of game I expected from the title, and precisely the kind of game my brain enjoys.

The multiplayer is surprisingly exceptional for a game of its nature, allowing up to 10 players on a server to all help out at all sorts of tasks. When multiple players work towards a single goal, the time in the game seems to fly and the overall experience becomes far more enjoyable. It’s also fairly hard to troll other farms, except by maybe leaving hastily written messages into the fields.

Whether it is plowing the fields on a sunny morning, or harvesting canola well into the night and beyond, Farming Simulator 2013‘s core mechanics are surprisingly strong. The versatility, the open world, the decidedly German game design are all a strong part of the games identity — it’s just a pity that identity is hidden beneath a frustrating level of assumed user knowledge and missing critical UI functionality.

Good:

• Multiplayer is great fun
• Huge amount of player choices

Bad

• Buggy
• Horrible UI
• Lacks real progression

The Berserker is a surprising powerhouse of a character. While traditional warrior types are the standard tank characters, Berserker is more of a barbarian, dealing out phenomenally powerful attacks based on rage alone. It’s also one of the fastest damage dealers, capable of blindingly fast speed due to claw synergies.

Critical Mass

Critical Mass (Armory link here) is all about getting a huge crit chance and getting staggering hits with it. This is the build for those who want to carve through endgame like butter… it’s fast, furious, and devastating.

You actually want a nice array of stat points in this build, getting dexterity to about 130 when finished, vitality to 100, and strength to 300. Only put points into vitality when you feel you need them, and instead focus on increasing strength and dex to start.

You’re going to want dual claws for this build, preferably with two sockets each. Socket-wise, you’re after critical damage on your weapons until you reach the 500% cap, then physical damage, a little bit of mana regen, and then just health. Fairly straightforward! End game you want to keep an eye out for damage reduction skulls, to hit the cap of 75%

Skills

Eviscerate and Raze are your primary damage dealing skills. Eviscerate is capable of carving up entire armies of enemies in no time at all, and Raze is stupidly good at destroying harder mobs and bosses. Max both of these as soon as possible. Storm Hatchet will also help with enemies that you’re having difficulty with, but only needs five points to be worth using.

Howl and Battle Rage are both important for debilitating groups of enemies you reach, giving you ample time to decimate them without them actually landing a hit on you.

It also makes them take more damage, which synergises perfectly with your entire build. You’ll want to be maxing these also, but you can take your time levelling them.

Shadow Burst and Savage Rush are utility skills, allowing you to break shields and lower the armor of enemies. You only really need one point in both. Battle Standard should be maxed, and offers a great boon during boss fights or any group of enemies that will likely drop some hits in.

Frost Breath and Ice Shield are both important abilities, though Frost Breath doesn’t really shine with your build until you reach the Tier 3 bonus. Ice Shield should reach level 11 where it hits a 100% reflect chance, and is perfect for enemies just out of reach who are pelting you with missile weapons.

Cold Steel Mastery helps you a lot, giving a huge bonus to Ice and Physical damage — you’ll want to max it. Shred Armor is pretty good while leveling, but later in the game most enemies won’t last long enough for it to truly shine, only put around 7 points into it. Finally, a point in both Blood Hunger and Rampage will seal the build, giving a little bit of life leech and a regular boost to movement and attack speed.

Dervish is an amazing dropped skill with this build, and Concentration can help a lot with mana recovery issues. Critical Strikes is an absolute requirement for this build to work well.

Altered Beast

Altered Beast (Armory link here) is a fun, enjoyable build that is based on using the various shadow skills the Berserker has to great effect. It’s probably the fastest, twitch reflex build the game has, and is great for those who get bored with repetitive ability use without any player skill really required.

You pretty much want a similar stat allocation to the last build. Enough vitality to be a bit tanky, and then an array of strength and dexterity. Don’t put more than 110 points into dexterity.

This is a great build to use a shield with, as it needs a bit of survivability between some of its abilities. Shields might seem fairly weak to begin with, but they quickly get quite powerful towards the end game. You’re after a lot of Mana Regeneration with this build, and stacking a bit of Crit Damage on your weapons certainly won’t hurt.

Skills

Savage Rush is the skill that makes this build. Until the latest patch you were invulnerable while using it, but even now it is fairly difficult for most enemies to hit you. You’ll also want to look at Wolf Shade which is useful for the initial levels (which will feel slow until you unlock more skills), and then later becomes useful for life leech. Max both.

Shadow Burst is your escape skill of choice. It also pops shields, which can be incredibly useful. It does a little bit of damage, but not enough to be a worthy primary attack.

For single targets you’ll be wanting to use Wolf Pack, which is cause for some painfully long boss fights early in the game.

Battle Standard, Ice Shield, and Battle Rage are all important utility skills for this build. You’re going to need these in most battles to deal with ranged targets, regen your mana, and deal extra damage while taking less yourself. Only put 11 points into Ice Shield to reach 100% reflection.

Finally, your passives of Rage Retaliation and Red Wolf are going to help deal additional DPS where it’s required. Red Wolf scales particularly well with your level, and will help utterly destroy large groups of mobs in no time at all.

Blocking, Concentration, and Critical Strikes are your required dropped skills for this build, and all are fairly self explanatory. You’ll also want to throw Silence on your pet to deal with a pesky caster that you’re too busy to take on. Enjoy rending your way through swathes of enemies!

Click here to see all our Torchlight II build guides.

The subject of our third Torchlight II class guide is the Embermage — an absolute powerhouse. While traditionally one of the weaker character classes, its ability to bring out masses of sustained damage over large swathes of enemies is practically unparalleled. Outlander might be able to do an amazing hit every now and then, but you can do almost as good numbers every time you hit.

Afflictor

The Afflictor (Armory link here) is all about causing damage numbers through statuses. The benefit of this build is that once an enemy is hit with a status or two, their combat effectiveness is basically nullified, allowing you to choose the method of his destruction. A great build for those a little cautious, or intending to tackle hardcore.

Statistically we want to throw a lot into focus, since that increases our damage significantly. Depending on difficulty level, and if you’re playing hardcore, you may want to throw some points into both dexterity and vitality, but for most players this won’t be required.

We want wands as our weapon choice, simply due to the fact that we can put more socketables into two wands than into a single staff. There are also unique wands that increase overall skill damage, so keep an eye out for them. In your sockets you want a little bit of mana regen, additional focus, and increased attack speed.

Skills

Prismatic Bolt is the main skill of this build, which when maxed gives a huge output of damage, afflicts status ailments, and also homes onto targets – a great skill choice for damage. It also synergises perfectly with the dropped skill, Elemental Overload – so be on a look out for that.

Elemental Boon and Immolation Aura are active abilities which should be perpetually kept up. Both are important for delivering additional status effects and should be maxed eventually, but not straight away… various other skills are vastly more beneficial to your build.

Frost Phase and Deaths Bounty are your utility skills, providing protection and mana/health regeneration. You only need one point in Frost Phase, and Death’s Bounty should reach Tier II as soon as possible for the casting speed bonus, but then should be kept at that level.

Passives are super important for this build, and all three of the brands should be kept as high as possible throughout your leveling process. This will let you continually be damaging enemies once they are hit by your Prismatic Bolt, and this kind of damage can be kept up pretty much all the time.

Additionally, Elemental Attunement is great for making those statuses stick to their targets, as well as increasing the chance they would be hit for them in the first place. Finally, Prismatic Rift is worth maximising so that way on the odd chance you do take a hit, you’re likely to put the enemy back at range.

As mentioned, Elemental Overload is a very important and frankly amazing dropped skill with this build. If you can find it, it’s worth keeping active as frequently as possible. Concentration is also good for additional mana recovery as well.

Burn Baby, Burn

You want to take the Ember part of Embermage literally? This is the build for you (Armory link here). Capable of burning enemies to a crisp in no time, Burn Baby, Burn is a build all about the flames. With the buff to damage over time skills that the latest patch has caused, this build can truly dish out a terrifying amount of damage, while still being based on survivability. No glass cannon here.

Because dodging isn’t as important as armor and health to this build, you want to get your dexterity to about 50 fairly early in the build process. You also want to get about 100 vitality, and the rest going into focus. This should give you enough defensive power to put up with a bit of punishment, allowing you to stay in place and wreak havoc!

This is one of few builds in the entire game that is benefitted by a two handed weapon, namely the staff! Thanks to the Staff Mastery passive, you can use your staves to lower the elemental resistances of enemies you strike, allowing your fire to burn that much harder, and melt even more faces.

Skills

Magma Spear is an absolutely fantastic skill in the latest patch, and it’s going to be what increases your overall charge. Charge is especially important in this build, due to its mana intensive nature, so Blinding Pillar will also be used during battles in order to hit your max charge in the shortest amount of time. Max both of these early on.

Firestorm is a skill that should be kept for difficult encounters, or when your charge bar is maxed. It creates a vulnerability that, when combined with Staff Mastery, can make your fire skills do significantly more damage.

You want to max Firestorm eventually, but not straight away, and Staff Mastery should be kept high level at all times.

Immolation Aura is a great skill that also absorbs damage. Don’t be afraid to use it frequently to make the most out of that. In order to survive, a single point should also be placed into Frost Phase, which will keep you moving around and hopefully allow you to avoid damage. You want to put spare points into Immolation until it hits Tier II.

Elemental Boon and Elemental Attunement are very important skills for this build, even further increasing the vulnerabilities of your enemies and the amount of time they are kept in that state for. Both are pivotal to the build, and should be maxed, along with Fire Brand for when your enemies are burning.

Charge Mastery is also important, as it allows you to not only reach maximum charge quickly, but sustain it for longer. Whenever you’re in your maximum charge state, you should be spamming skills as hard as possible, since they will cost no mana. By the end of this build, you should be left with a spare point left over, if you want, a point into Ice Brand will give you a little more damage when you use Frost Phase, or to give a slight bonus to Immolation Aura.

The only dropped skill of any importance is Elemental Overload if you can find it, giving you three slots to put whatever you would like inside!

Click here to see all our Torchlight II build guides.

From the most flexible character in Torchlight II — the Engineer — we switch to the least, the Outlander. The Outlander has a problem in that the requirement for its weapons is dexterity, but damage is based off of strength, and as such there is only one viable core build that works in elite difficulties.

Having said this, Outlander can be an incredible blast to play, so we will throw in a super-serious build for those elite players, as well as a fun build that you can essentially make your own for as long as it continues to work.

Destroyer of Worlds

Destroyer of Worlds (Armory link here) is a damage-dealing monstrosity capable of hitting the highest damages in the game. Outlander is very much a glass-cannon class that relies a little more on manual dexterity than others, however this build works at just about any level to completely lay waste to any enemy in your path. Use with caution.

Stat wise we are going for an all-out focus build, while also hitting the dexterity sweet-spot of 109 for maximum dodge. There will be no strength in this build, which might come as a surprise to some Outlanders, but here’s the thing: since you won’t actually be damaging your enemies using weapon damage, great weapons aren’t as important as status afflictions or bonus crit damage. Focus is important because it gives bonuses to your ‘magic damage’ which a lot of your skills are based upon.

You want two weapon sets for this build. Your main weapons might be a surprise, and that is…  dual wands. Wands make use of focus, and also offer fairly attractive bonuses – there are great wands later on which offer a damage boost and two sockets each, allowing those vital +crit damage skulls to work wonders. You also want an offhand weapon (or weapons) capable of using Venemous Hail, an important skill in some late boss fights. You want extra focus in your armor sockets, also.

Skills

Glaive Throw is your main damaging attack. Even though this is the case, the skill becomes exponentially more mana intensive the higher its level gets while the damage it gains is only a minor boost. Cursed Daggers provides additional damage here also, increasing your crit chance which in turn lets Glaive Throw hit those all important crit numbers. Keep Glaive Throw at level 5, but push Curse Daggers all the way.

Flaming Glaives and Venomous Hail are your two boss skills. Flaming Glaives is your primary choice, which also makes your attack skills more powerful. Venomous Hail is important however, for boss fights with obstacles that Flaming Glaives has difficulty getting around.

During these times you have no option but to resort to a different attack, and Venomous Hail is it. Max Flaming Glaives as soon as possible, but take Venomous Hail only to Tier 2.

Your escape skills are Bramble Wall and either Burning Leap or Rune Vault. Experiment with either of the jumping skills to decide which works best for you, and then respec to drop the skill you won’t use. Bramble Wall is very important for times where you can’t deal with the massive horde coming your way and want to split it down the middle. It’s also important in obstacle filled boss fights if you want to force the boss to take a specific path. Only sink one point into your two choices here.

For utility, Blade and Stone Pact provide excellent protection from most of the enemies you will face when your dodge fails. Repulsion Hex is a great skill also, providing ample protection against many enemy types who try to attack you in melee. You’re going to want 10 points in Stone Pact, and max the rest.

Finally — your passives. Master of the Elements is vital to this entire build, which focuses on poison damage quite considerably. Dodge Mastery adds incredible survivability, and Share the Wealth can make your charge powers almost doubly potent. None of these can be overlooked. Critical Strikes and Concentration are both powerful dropped skills for this build.

Mad Genius

Mad Genius is another Focus build that takes advantage of an interesting bug currently within the Torchlight II client. That bug is that weapon damage skills use the weapon damage of your right hand weapon, while skill requirements are based on your left. This creates an interesting character choice in that you can use a wand in your right for incredible weapon damage, while keeping a basic pistol in your left for skill requirements. This build is an adapted work from Empyrean on the Runic Games forum, who discovered this initial bug.

Stats are distributed almost identically to the first build, going heavy on focus, and then trying to hit that dodge sweetspot, however if you are playing hardcore you can throw some vitality in there. You’re going to want any old pistol and a wand, the wand should ideally be poison damage to gain a significant boost due to your skills. Your socketing choices are pretty much entirely up to you, as the biggest benefit is simply from your weapon damage. You can drop the wand/pistol combination when you reach max level for any other elemental weapon of your choosing.

Skills

Chaos Burst is simply an incredible skill with this build, especially with its Tier 3 bonus. That and Glaive Throw will likely be your main skills, although Glaive Throw will not reach the damage heights of your previous build. Keep Glaive Throw at 5 as it does not gain any significant damage increases at higher levels, but instead costs a huge amount more.

The other star ability of this build is Poison Burst, which does a stupidly huge amount of damage to targets, and is perfect for dealing with bosses. You’ll want to max this also. Then it’s simply a matter of personal preference! You’ll want Master of Elements for a straight damage increase, as well as Share the Wealth, but everything else is your choice.

If you want to build Shadowlings at this stage, you can, just be aware that on elite difficulties they currently pretty much die as they spawn. Another word of warning, Shadowshot is simply not as powerful as Chaos Burst, despite its ‘on paper’ damage being higher!  Finally, rapid fire doesn’t work with this build at all, so don’t use it unless you intend on switching to a different weapon setup at very high levels.

Make this build your own, and don’t forget to have fun with it.

Click here to see all our Torchlight II build guides.

Today marks the first instalment of our Torchlight II build guides, beginning with the editor-in-chief’s personal favourite — the Engineer. In this guide we’ll explore two different possible builds, describe the sort of gear you’ll need, where to put your points, and how to play. Let’s kick it off.

The Tanker

The Tanker (Armory link here) is all about taking the most amount of hits possible, while still dishing out a respectable amount of damage. It’s great in a team environment where you want someone up front tackling monsters head on with minimal fear of death, but he is perfectly capable of dealing with the game solo… albeit slowly.

On the stats side of things you want to hit around 100 Dexterity before you encounter the severe diminishing returns it has. Then you want a 2:1 split between Vitality and Strength, as this will enable you to still output some damage and equip better gear, while still having great survivability.

You want a one-hand weapon and a shield for this build. It is important that you try to get a little bit of Strength on your equipment to make sure you can stay up to date with new weapons and armor. In your sockets you can choose from things that increase your armor value, health, health recovery, and even missile reflection. Stun chance or negative armor on hit are both viable weapon choices, especially in a team environment.

Skills

The most important skill for this entire build is Supercharge. While you don’t get it right away, the ability for it to generate charge with relative ease is important, especially with a fast 1 hander. This skill is absolutely required, and should be kept at its maximum level at all times.

Other ‘necessary’ abilities for this build are Healing Bot, Forcefield and Bulwark. All are designed to keep you alive, and Forcefield is particularly good at doing so, capable of taking a tonne of damage from bosses and trash alike. All should be kept fairly high and eventually maxed, starting with Forcefield.

Onslaught, Seismic Slam and Shield Bash are important utility skills that should not be overlooked. Onslaught only needs a single point to be useful, and it is the perfect escape skill, allowing you to jump out of combat with relative ease. Seismic Slam and Shield Bash are also important to debilitate foes that are getting out of hand. Push these both to at least Tier 2.

Charge Reconstitution or Aegis of Fate is hotly debated. Charge Reconstitution gives you heals when you cast Forcefield, and usually you are getting a bit beat up before you use it, so it works wonders there. On the other hand, this is the only build that is perfect for Aegis, and it will help to prevent damage during those times when your forcefield is down. Pick one, and max it.

Sword and Board, Spider Mines and Tremor are all damaging skills that work well with this particular build. Sword and Board is a given, since you will be using a shield at all times. Spider Mines are a great way to increase initial DPS in a fight without having to take up time you could be using to attack. Tremor only needs a single point, as its sole purpose is to chew up a charge to trigger Charge Reconstitution if you need it while Forcefield is on cooldown.

As far as dropped skills go, Blocking and Armor Expertise should be primary concerns. Willpower is also good if in a team environment, otherwise just go with whatever you like.

Bots, Bots and More Bots

Why kill things yourself when what you’ve created can do that for you? The Engineer has a wealth of gadgets and gizmos at his (or her) beck and call. Bots, Bots and More Bots (Armory Link here) is all about getting the most out of these incredible destroyers, and it does so wonderfully. A little weak early on, but an absolute blast to play in the late game.

Statistically speaking your survivability doesn’t matter quite as much in this build. Your minions will be taking fire away from you, causing status problems, and generally wreaking havoc while you sit safe, protected by a forcefield. As such, you want to max Strength with this build, and pretty much nothing else.

You’re after a cannon with this build, which allows you to enjoy Blast Cannon, one of the best DPS skills in the game. Minion Damage, Minion Health, Mana Regeneration are all viable socket options for this build. Weapons should have negative armor on hit, which will further increase the damage your bots do.

Forcefield and Healbot are your lifesavers this time around, so make sure you keep them high, and eventually upgrade them. While survivability isn’t as important as most Engineer classes, you want enough for when you need to get in the thick of things, like when you’re low on mana and need to use Storm Burst to get in there and get some mana back. You only need one point in Storm Burst, by the way.

Blast Cannon and Spider Mines are both amazing choices for DPS skills, and I suggest using both. Which you max first will only be dependent on if you’re getting a lot of Minion Damage socketables or Mana Regeneration. If you’re getting Mana Regeneration, Blast Cannon will be the skill for you.

Gunbot and Sledgebot are next, and both are important. Gunbot is unfortunately pretty poor until he reaches max skill, when he becomes an unstoppable destroyer of all enemies. Sledgebot is a tank, and is amazing at drawing fire away from you. When you max these is purely dependent on your playstyle, since you can’t max Gunbot until lvl 95, it might be worth leaving it alone till 82 or so, and then spend those levels pumping stats into it.

Tremor and Immobilization Copter will be the utility skills, with the later keeping pesky casters unable to do anything because they are being interrupted again and again. Tremor is perfect in just about any situation, and deals a nice amount of damage to boot. Max both.

Heavy Lifting synergises with Blast Cannon fairly effectively. It might be worth taking skillpoints away from Spider Mines to max this if you aren’t going too heavily down the minion damage path. Finally you should put one point in both Onslaught and Coup de Grace — the former will keep you out of trouble and the later will devastate trash through the entire game.

Animal Handling (Pet Mastery) and Concentration are both perfect choices for this build on the dropped skills front. A good heal will also keep your bots up when they would otherwise be destroyed.

Click here to see all our Torchlight II build guides.

Many games have tried and failed recently to capture the perfect balance of strategy and management required for a successful 4X game. Thankfully, Endless Space hits that balance almost perfectly, and throws in gorgeous graphics, amazing UI and incredible versatility to boot.

One… more… turn

What makes Endless Space such an enjoyable experience is simply the amount of attention to detail that the crew at Amplitude Studios have crammed into the title. On one hand you have a clean, crisp, intuitive interface that is able to relay most information at a glance, while on the other a micromanagement system that offers all the depth most players could ever want, while still retaining a way to let the AI do it for you.

Endless Space also has a lot of depth that other 4X titles lack. You can customise your ships, with an intricate yet easy-to-use research tree. You can build your own race, working from a base set of archetypes that play very differently to one another and choosing from a mixture of perks and flaws, and you have a largely varied number of diplomatic options and win conditions.

Each game has a completely fresh feel to it, in part thanks to a ‘blind exploration’ feature. Unlike most space 4X games, you can only see what stars you can travel to and roughly where you are in that specific galaxy. You have no idea if the system you are scouting out will have a way of connecting to any other systems, and when you factor into this the games’ random galaxy generation and racial diversity, you have a level of replayability that is sorely lacking in most games of late.

The combat however is where things truly shine. In addition to an impressive graphical background to each battle, there is a system of three phases that certain weapons perform better when activated during. In each phase you can use an ability… as can your opponent… and certain abilities cancel others out in a delightful rock-paper-scissors mechanic. The system requires you to put yourself in the mind of the opponent: ‘he’s a bit wounded, he’ll likely need to repair soon – if I counter that he’ll be screwed’, or ‘he always tries to turtle in the last round, I’ll sabotage it and win the day’.

Welcome to our Robot Overlords

Defeat in a 4X game is almost never a bad thing to the seasoned player, and when the AI on Normal had finished mopping the grisly entrails of my civilisation from the universe for the third time, I had a grin on my face a mile wide. I was getting schooled by this game. It was mocking me, letting me know I’d gotten rusty and that my skills were weak, and I loved every moment of it.

You see, Endless Space isn’t your typical 4X game, and nor is the AI in it. Most games, you find a tactic that works, you stick with it, and you annihilate… but not so in this game. Expand rapidly, and your enemies will blockade your systems preventing you from gaining benefit from them. Start using powerful lasers and missile defense? Watch while a few turns later you’re shot at by enemies using railguns and shields. The game adapts, and when it does it’s more amazing than vexing.

That’s not to say the game is perfect. Most of its flaws revolve around an expectation that the player will instantly understand concepts that aren’t ever explained, even in the games fairly in-depth tutorial. Trying to figure out why your ships can’t attack the enemy blockading your system, or why you can attack some systems and not others, is a bit of trial and error – and even some of the combat abilities aren’t as clear as they could be.

Other problems are minor, but still exist. The combat uses a series of fixed camera angles to display the action, and it rotates through them in a set pattern each and every time. There is a free camera option, but gives limited control and I couldn’t find a way to go back to the set camera afterwards. The games definition of a ‘Huge’ map is a mere 128 systems large (about the size of some of the smaller maps in other 4X games), and as a result eight player games can feel fairly cramped quite quickly.

Overall though, Endless Space is the sort of game that would take you and your girlfriend out for dinner, before absconding with her and leaving you to foot the bill. It’s vibrant, cheeky, clean, intelligent, and most of all… fun. It has been the most joyous time with a 4X game I’ve had for over 15 years. Highly recommended.

Good:

• Great mechanics, deep replayability
• Impressive mechanical depth and customisation

Bad:

• Expects player to understand concepts without explanation
• Even ‘huge’ maps can feel cramped quickly

Endless Space is available on Steam for $29.99.

Out of all the races Guild Wars 2 offers, none are quite an interesting prospect for play as the Asura. The smallest of the playable races, they offer a combination of fantasy, sci-fi and steampunk feels that provoke a feeling of wonder at every turn. While they may be small, they more than make up for their size with technological prowess, intelligence, and – well, ego.

From the start, choosing an Asura is a bundle of interesting options. Character creation is fairly in-depth, allowing facial changes, radical hairstyles and perhaps the most amount of sliders for ‘ears’ ever seen. Creating some hybrid monstrosity that looks like the love child of Dobby the house-elf and a Gremlin is extremely possible, and you will get to admire that handiwork up close in several of the game’s cut scenes.

There is a sense of history about the Asura that many of the other races don’t quite get to enjoy. It permeates into everything about them – speech, architecture, attitude, creating a race that seems very much alive, and moreso perhaps than the other races we’ve seen so far in ArenaNet’s MMO. But what is it like to play as one?

Perhaps this video we’ve captured will give you an idea.

My first day was pretty hectic. Rogue golems had been turned loose near the city, and so I helped dispatch a number of them while heading off to apprehend the culprit. When cornered, they let loose a giant cubis golem that was quite frankly amazing to behold, and set the stage for some of the larger fights to be had later on.

With that done, I travelled to show my latest invention in front of the council. On the way I helped repair broken golems, completed analysis of energy signatures, thwarted a raid on a science base, participated in golem chess and taught some younger Asura some elemental knowledge. My invention was a success, naturally – although there was a small hiccup that might have almost hurt the counsellor. Still, progress was made!

The Asura story is a rich one, filled with technical parlance at every turn, and absolutely oozing with culture and history. At every point, I was travelling to a science base, helping with experiments or controlling those that had gone awry. Quests and events never really felt out of place or contrived. It all flowed together to create a single unified experience, an experience that felt like it meant something. The main female voice actor was unfortunately the only real let-down, as she wasn’t quite as emotive or engaging to listen to as the male.

While this richness was present in the other races I had played, it wasn’t really until I got a chance to sit down with the Asura that the feeling of being part of something really hit home. The regular NPC chatter in the background, the architecture, the thematic quest and story structure, everything is set in such a way to make you feel you are the race you’re playing. In short, it’s the most immersive experience I’ve ever had in an MMO yet. I loved it.

There are a lot of different ways to make solid money on Diablo III’s Real Money Auction House. You can do simple tricks, like putting an expensive gem in a relatively cheap item to make it sell more than the total combined. You can shove that loot found during gaming up there without a second glance and hope to get a few bucks.

Or with a little thought, and a bit of effort, you can make some serious profit via what is known as arbitrage.

Arbitrage is a very simple concept to grasp. You buy something from one market, to sell in another for a higher price, and take advantage of any disparity that exists between the two. Like buying something from a second hand store to sell off on eBay, or converting AUD to USD in one place, only to convert it back in another that is offering a better rate. The best part of arbitrage in Diablo III, is that the disparity of what is sold for gold and what is sold for real money is quite frankly, huge.

A word of caution: While you can jump in fairly blindly and still make a buck or two, those who know how each of the classes tick will make a lot more profit than those who don’t. Knowing that Life on Hit is amazing on a Monk or Barbarian will have you keeping your eyes peeled for it, as well as an understanding that chance to knockback or fear is bad for them (as it pushes the enemy out of melee range) – which will keep you from buying items that won’t sell. With this in mind, please make sure you research the class you are buying for before attempting this at all.

Buying out

Before you can buy the items you’re going to sell, you need to know what to buy, and more importantly, what things are worth. The first step is to get a grip on what the gold-to-dollars conversion ratio is, otherwise you’re basically in the dark. Playerauctions[/url] is a safe community site that has been around for years, and provides a quick way of glimpsing what people are buying and selling Diablo III gold at. The dropdown for amount of gold will change its default depending on what the average amount people are buying at, so it’s recommended you at least drop it to 1 million gold to get a grasp on it.

Once you’ve figured the conversion rate, then it’s time to look for items. Where to start depends mostly on your initial income, and it is suggested that you start with familiar items you’ve hopefully already bought and sold on the Gold Auction House. Simply search up some properties that you have looked for frequently while playing your character and compare pricing on both auction houses. Taking screenshots will help compare the findings in both quickly and easily, as when you switch auction houses you have to restart the search from scratch.

If you’re looking to go from the RMAH to the GAH instead of the other way (which you’ll need to do when you want to get some gold to buy more items again), focus on cheap legendaries that have good demand, like Lacuni bracers and Andariels Visage. Both of these will sell quickly, and the price difference between the two Auction Houses should be minor.

Some good items to consider if you’re new to Diablo III entirely:

• Attack Speed Gloves (Crit Chance, DEX, Crit Damage, Resists, etc)
• Tank Barbarian Armour (STR + VIT + All Resistance)
• Magic Find Gear

As time goes on you’ll get a good grasp of what sells, as well as what kind of demand exists for certain items. It takes a lot of work initially, but eventually you’ll find yourself surprised by an item you thought was more or less worthless, but is actually worth quite a lot. It’s these moments where you can potentially corner an entirely untapped market, buying goods for gold that resell on the RMAH for double or even triple their gold rate.

Cashing out

Don’t forget to pay close attention to the fees inherent in trading on the RMAH. Blizzard takes a flat $1 on all equipment sales (and 15% for commodities), with another 15% being taken from you every time you use PayPal, and your Battle.net Balance can’t go higher than $250. This is especially important when you are buying small items, because if you can sell it for $1.25, you’re really only getting 25 cents. That’s not to say that you shouldn’t try starting out at $1-3 items, but be extremely cautious of those fees.

It can be extremely tempting to sell all your items to PayPal, but remember that you are going to have to use some of your profits to fund more item buying. I personally use Battle.net balance for any sale under $10, but you can decide a zone that is right for you. Also, remember that with that 15% PayPal fee, you can actually save money by keeping it all in gold or Battle.net Balance, instead of cashing it out only to have to use some of it to cash back in.

One of the worst parts of the entire RMAH process is the constant wait when someone has purchased your goods. Unlike the GAH, it isn’t instant, and usually requires an hour or more before your funds are available to you, or over 24 hours if you’re getting it via PayPal. This is the biggest speedbump to regular steady profits, so make sure that you think about this while deciding what to buy, as well as how to sell.

If I can leave you with one piece of advice in all of this, it’s this: if you want to start making real money on the RMAH, start now. Currently it is unknown when the gold:dollars conversion house will open within game, but when it does people will become more knowledgeable about the price of their items and common items will quickly become harder to swap between Auction Houses for profit via arbitrage.

Right now though, it’s a goldmine. Good luck.

Spam is one of those everyday occurrences in modern gaming, that most people are pretty much used to by now. No matter the game you’re playing, if it’s a persistent online world there will be someone trying to make a quick buck from you. The problem comes when you have a company who has an extraordinary amount of experience dealing with spammers, and yet do anything about it. And that, is what’s happening in Diablo III.

The Problem

It all started in Diablo II, twelve years ago. Item farmers got the idea to setup chat bots to promote their trades. Then came the gold and item sellers, who had built websites around the idea, and it snowballed from there. Despite the number of people complaining about this to Blizzard, their hands were tied – with only a skeleton staff and no regular money coming in from the game to fund development costs, nothing could be done.

It took them until a patch about two years ago to implement a rudimentary block system into the game, that to this day frequently wipes itself when you leave. Spam bots still run rampant in the game, and third party programs designed to maintain a blocklist would frequently cause Blizzard to ban your account, despite helping you maintain a quiet peaceful online experience.

And now Diablo III is upon us – and on the third day of its launch, the spamming began. It was a trickle at first, one or two bots that would post about once every 30 minutes, but quickly it got to the point where for every three lines of dialogue, chat bots would completely flood the window. Why is this happening? Well for one thing, Blizzard, bizarrely, has allowed guest accounts to chat.

That’s not all they did, however. For some reason, they haven’t even included the URL blocking feature from their other massive online game, World of Warcraft. They also still don’t have a report option for goldsellers, instead relying on the generic ‘Spam’ tag that most people abuse to report others they simply disagree with.

So how does Blizzard fix this? The answer is surprisingly simple.

The Solution

You might think an easy solution would be to simply stop guest accounts from using the chat service. While this would work, the solution would only be temporary at best. If a gold seller can make more money in the time it takes to get banned than the cost of the game itself, they’ll simply purchase keys over and over and over again.

It also would not be incorrect to assume that the Real Money Auction House will curb many of the sales that go on, and make gold selling less profitable… except that there will still be groups of uneducated masses who do not even know the RMAH exists, and will likely continue to provide a regular customer base for gold sellers. This needs to be fixed now, before it gets completely out of hand.

Step 1: Provide a report option specific to gold sellers, or advertisers, or whatever you want to call it. This is important! While a single person being an idiot and spamming random insults in general chat can be annoying, we can block him and know he won’t bother us anymore. We need a specific way to deal with the problem.

Step 2: Initiate a group reporting system. Say four different people who aren’t on each other’s friend lists (and therefore can be assumed to not be working together) report someone for gold selling. This triggers an automatic muting and flagging of the reported person. Leave them muted until a Blizzard rep can look it over. Make sure that their account is muted, and their IP as well if possible.

Since it’s a temporary mute, you’re unlikely to run across issues with other legitimate people using that IP, and if you do, it’s temporary for a reason.

Step 3: This is the big one. See those URL’s people are posting? Setup a server side filter that prevents those messages from being displayed. Don’t mute the people saying them, and don’t inform them that the message hasn’t gone through. Every time a bot makes it to Step 2, find the unique wording in his message, add it to the filter. Make sure anybody hitting that filter more than once in an hour period is immediately flagged.

This would help immensely, and pretty much make it financially impossible for gold selling bots to do business. A spam bot has put spaces in their website to fool the filter? Add it to the filter, and all of a sudden w w w. b u y m y g o l d . c o m will no longer work, and the people running the bot will be none the wiser. As far as the gold sellers will be aware, Diablo III must just not be a profitable market anymore, and they will move onto other games.

The reality is that Blizzard has had 12 years of experience with spammers, five games, and a whole host of expansion packs to figure this out somewhere in the development cycle. It is disappointing that spam problems still continue to plague their latest title, despite the advances in protecting against it that they’ve demonstrated in their other games. For the good of the community and the health of the game, Blizzard needs to address this sooner rather than later.

Diablo III’s Auction House system is fascinating. Not because it’s highly intuitive or incredibly deep – it’s not – but because of the sheer volume of players using it at any one time. It creates a fast paced, volatile marketplace, and one that can be easily used to gain a profit without too much work. Inside this guide you’ll see how to do just that, and come out on top every time.

Always know what you’re buying

The first step when jumping into Diablo III is knowing what sells. What are the important statistics on an item? What are the things that will make an otherwise poor piece of equipment saleable? These things change all the time in Diablo III as builds go into and out of popularity, and this will heavily affect your abilities to turn a profit. So far, things that get great mileage are:

• Main stat + VIT (+ %Life is also good here)
• Gold Find / Magic Find (Ideally both. If high Gold Find, pickup radius is also nice)
• All Resistances + Resist single (especially if with DEX + VIT for a monk, or physical resist for other classes)
• Crit Chance + Crit Damage (Add in Increased Attack Speed and these are golden)
• + chance to block on shields (Mix this with Main stat + VIT or Resistances)

There are plenty of other great statistics, but what I’ve shown above is likely to stay popular throughout the Diablo III lifecycle. There will always be people wanting to increase their damage, decrease the damage opponents do, and find cool stuff. It’s the way the game is, and will continue to be for a very long time.

Keep your ears open

Knowledge is power when working a market, and that’s incredibly true in Diablo III. I mentioned builds earlier, so make sure you stay up to date on these! You might see a build gaining popularity that uses a statistic other builds don’t. When you see this, buying items with those statistics could mean that when that build gets a sudden burst of popularity, those items you stockpiled for 5,000 gold are now worth 50,000 or more.

Learning how each of the classes work is also beneficial in knowing what things could be popular down the line. For instance, players are only just now starting to learn the value of stacking a lot of items with STR/DEX/INT rather than Main Stat + VIT. Those items are still very cheap, but in no time a few popular Diablo players will make videos showing off their gear, and all of a sudden they’ll get expensive. Max Discipline for Demon Hunter is also something people are learning is powerful in Inferno, and the prices for these are rising as well.

Only fools pay retail

Selling and buying are the bread and butter of an Auction House, but how do you know when to do it, and for how much? The truth is most players just care about getting fast money, and won’t even research the item they’re selling. On the selling side of things, just do a quick search for the good statistics of your item on the Auction House, and see what your competition is selling for. Some quick things to look out for:

• Are there over 5 pages of similar items? If so, undercut the lowest buyout by 10%
• Is there less than a page of similar items? If so, sell for similar prices, unless…
• Are the items close to finishing? Chances are they are overpriced – undercut them.
• Do most of the items have 1d20h remaining or more? Sell high (good demand)
• Are there no results? Lower search parameters, overcharge by 10-50%

Buying is a little trickier, but there are a few tricks you can use to score yourself a bargain. Firstly, stock is refreshed globally every 5 minutes on average (sometimes a little longer due to server load). Setup a timer and click refresh just as that time is up to see if anyone is just selling a good item without researching. This can get you all manner of bargains. I’ve seen items worth more than a million gold selling for 40,000.

Are you under level 60? When you search for items at your level it is searching for the base level of the item and not taking into consideration ‘reduced level requirement’. Increase your searchable level to beyond your own, and add a filter for level requirement which would put items at that level down to yours. With this you can find weapons with over double the DPS, or armors with double the statistics of ones you could normally find, but usually even cheaper!

More is good… all is better

Cornering a market is probably one of the most lucrative methods of making a profit on the Gold Auction House. Holding all the keys means you can set all the prices – but to do that you will need to have a few things no one else will. First, you will need a few days to gain intimate knowledge of the product, and how much people are willing to pay for it and when. Second, you will need to be in absolute control, always able to get a cheap item when it comes around.

But first you have to find that market. You have to consider the kind of things players might experiment with, or a build that a small amount of the population will use, and find the best weapons or armors for that purpose. In no time you’ll have found something that you can hopefully control, and start to buy and sell the items. Remember to put yourself in the players shoes: would they search for 165 dex and above? Unlikely, they’ll usually just search for an even 150. Make sure to keep things like that in mind, and you’ll have great success with your own items.

Vendor items can also be a wonderful source of profit, for the right person. If you check the vendors regularly in late Hell and beyond, you will sometimes find something that is certainly saleable, be it a 12% magic find ring, an amulet that gives great damage, or a pair of pants that have huge VIT and sockets. When you’re comfortable with the rough worth of items, you can attempt to find these – and when you do, buy them. Buy them all. A single 12% MF ring will cost you 6,000 from a vendor and likely sell for close to 20,000. Buy them until you are broke, and you’ve effectively tripled your money. Remember, greed is eternal.

Warlock: Master of the Arcane is one of the most enjoyable experiences I’ve with a turn based 4X game in a long, long while. That’s a hard act to pull off, considering the genre is littered with games like Masters of Orion and Civilization. But where other, lesser games fail in capturing the overall spirit of a 4X experience, this game goes above and beyond to deliver.

Warlock is a streamlined experience. That’s not to say that it isn’t as complex as most games in the genre, but merely that they have ironed out the UI to be friendly, and reduced the amount of micromanagement required (though you still can do it, if you want to wring every ounce of potential out of your units and cities). Mix that with an overall fantasy feel, and you’ve got a game that first timers to the genre can fit into, while still being rewarding to those who’ve played similar games to death.

There is a lot visually in common with Civilization V, as any screenshot will be quick to show. But while the oversaturated colours were off-putting to some in Civs environments, here it mixes seamlessly with the bright and vibrant fantastical landscapes and races. It also shares some common elements with Masters of Magic, such as three distinct factions and using magical beasts and spells to conquer your way to victory. However while these similarities are very noticeable, Warlock has an identity all to its own.

Based in the world of Ardania, the same world present in many of Paradox Interactive titles, Warlock has access to a great amount of lore and history. Unfortunately, the storyline of the game falls a little flat: war engulfs the land, causing enough chaos and destruction for the gods to step in and end it with a free for all against the worlds remaining great mages, the winner of which will become ruler of all Ardania.

This is worthy of note. You see, the game is all about war, and victory through conflict. It’s reflected in everything the game offers, like its diplomacy options, which although lacking in comparison with other 4X games, makes perfect sense with the setting… you’re not going to share spells with someone when you know they’re going to be used against you.

That’s not to say the only way to win is to take out all your enemies, far from it. The game offers four distinct victory conditions, ranging from capturing all the games’ holy grounds to defeating an avatar of a hateful god. However only two of these seem to actually be functional, and by the time you’re powerful enough to do any of them you end up being developed enough to defeat your foes directly instead.

Space is at a premium, which forces players continually into conflict with their neighbours. This is amplified by the fact that the games XL world map, while big, isn’t even close to the size that maps in the genre have been known to reach. This conflict needs to be fuelled by something however, and that something is your economy. Each unit has an upkeep cost, as well as individual buildings, which makes for a lot of juggling required on the resource side of things.

Some interesting elements have been added also, such as portals that lead to smaller worlds to conquer, each with their own resources. These portals continually spew forth challenging monsters that will cause havoc locally, and heading inside will find you face to face with hordes of them to face. The rewards are worth it though, and allow you to settle a land that your enemies will have difficulty touching.

Unfortunately the game is let down by more than a few bugs. Some graphical glitches occur when micromanaging your cities, which can lead you to sometimes misjudge the benefits of deactivating a building. I’ve also had a couple of save files corrupt on me, although this could have been due to the day one patch. You can demand that people give you gold and mana for the privilege of going to war with you, which is also a little bit silly.

There are also some nuisances that crop up as well. You can’t really tell how a tile type (swamp, lava, etc) affects your unit until you’re on the tile, as there is no way to get that information ahead of time. Also the lower difficulties become a cakewalk once you realise that quickly forcing your race to the top of its tech tree and producing a small squad of its best units will absolutely dominate the world.

One of the reasons 4X games are so interesting is due to the passion of those that play them. Each game has such a personal experience, fueled by so many choices, that any flaws in the game tend to become extremely pronounced. Unfortunately this is the case with Warlock, but there has never been a game of its type that hasn’t had problems such as these as launch.

Ultimately, Warlock: Master of the Arcane presents a fun 4X experience that is generally challenging and rewarding (especially at higher difficulties). Its AI is well done, and much improved since the demo was released last month. Each game presents a new world with new possibilities, enemies, and victories to be had. Do not get this game if you value your sleep.

Warlock: Master of the Arcane is available now on Steam for $19.99.

Good:

• Vibrant fantasy setting
• Great strategic depth
• Loads of replayability and customisation
• True 4X fun

Bad:

• Techical glitches
• Exploitable diplomacy
• Lacks multiplayer
• Win scenarios are poorly defined

Crafting in MMO’s can be fairly hit and miss, with some systems being far too simple, or relying too heavily on random number generation. Others still are so complex that only those with a solid interest in reading hundreds of internet guides and sinking hours of their life into it might enjoy them. Guild Wars 2, however, creates a crafting system that is dynamic, being as simple or as difficult as the player chooses, and it’s as deep and detailed as any I’ve ever seen.

It starts out very similar to other MMO’s you might have played. There are 8 total disciplines (such as Weaponsmithing or Leatherworking), and you can choose only two. You increase your capabilities by creating items from loot or resources you will find throughout the world, and as you increase in skill level you unlock more and more recipes requiring higher level loot. So far, so normal.

Although you start out with a couple of basic recipes, and gain some more every few levels, the vast majority of them are left for you to discover yourself. Some are improvements on your base recipes, but others are entirely new items. Discovery itself isn’t too difficult: stick an ingredient in a grid, like a sword haft, and the items it could combine with from your inventory are highlighted, as well as a comment on how many items could be made from it.

It’s that discovery that makes the game interesting, and it’s very possible that a player who discovers a recipe could feasibly be the only one in the game to make it, at least for the first few months. This is compounded by the sheer amount of recipes. Each crafting discipline has 400 levels, and each seems to have at least double the amount of levels as recipes, which is at least double again the amount of recipes World of Warcraft has, without a single expansion pack.

But the real surprise is that even with that incredible volume of items, each different variation of a weapon, armor, ring or otherwise is going to be of benefit to someone. From our time in the beta tests so far, crafters generate better items than most found in the wild or at a merchant – and add to that the capability for any character, regardless of disciplines, to gather the required materials or resources and you have the start of a strong crafting system.

There is a lot of little things to love about it as well. Junk items can be broken down into their individual components with a chance of providing rarer ones, so all loot is inherently worth something. Although you’re restricted to two crafting disciplines, you can remove one at any point to pick up a different one. Picking a discipline you levelled in the past is expensive however, and gets more so as the levels go up. Bulk crafting is easy, with the game speeding up each successive craft so you’re not waiting around an hour for a bunch of ingots to smelt.

Ultimately, Guild Wars 2 has made an effort to improve on every aspect of the “traditional MMO”, and that is seen even down in the roots of its crafting system. While many players will simply rely on a wiki to provide them with recipes, the allure of accidentally stumbling onto something that no one else has yet discovered is tantalising. The amount of effort and thought that has gone into the system is simply mind-boggling, and is one of the biggest reasons – among many – that I’m looking forward to the games release. Fingers crossed that ArenaNet change their mind on those Oceanic servers.