I started this week having a go with a game I haven’t played
for a while: Dungeon Master. Some of you may remember I started playing this
game back in April, and I didn’t get very far with it! This was partly due to
the clunky nature of the game mechanics being a lot more work than fun in many
cases, and also, looking back at the date stamp of the blogs I did last year, I
discovered Eternal Crusade a couple of days later. I was a little better at the
combat last time, and I understand how to work the spells now, but the latter
still isn’t going very well. This could be because I’ve picked four heroes that
don’t have a lot of mana about them; apparently spells are a crucial part of
beating the later game so it might mean another re-start to pick a more balanced
group of heroes!
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| Always more fun with a funny name... |
Later in the week I tried Colonization again, and after a
couple of hours of play I did what I always do whenever I play a 4X game –
realise I’ve messed it up completely and will need to start again. I
anticipated this and kept things fresh by entering my name as a famous person
from the relevant country every time I do. England is the obvious one as I know
some of the names, and I had the entire English Colony of America headed up by Rowan
Atkinson at one point. In my current play-through that I’m almost certainly
going to have to abandon, the Dutch are being led by Ruud van Nistelrooy. It’s
completely useless but it’s fun to think about!
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| A murderer amongst you... but who is it? |
I carried on with Murder in the Alps as and when I had the
time, and ended up beating the third stage which I think wraps up the whole of
the trilogy. Currently there is one other episode available and another four
planned, according to the list of levels you can choose from, and I’m quite
glad that I got to the end of an entire trilogy of levels – getting to the end
of a story-based game on a mobile device is no mean feat – without having spent
any money on it. I wonder if it’s worth doing a review at this point.
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| 10/10 for style, though. |
On Saturday I had a go with another Games Workshop licensed
game: Chainsaw Warrior. I bought this in a Steam sale at some point and I didn’t
pay a lot of money for it, which is for the best because it’s not that good of
a game. It’s based on a board game that’s dungeon-bashing with cards, except
that games have come on a long way since 1987 when it was released and it
shows. The point of dungeon-bashing games is to go in with as good a chance of
winning as possible; apart from selecting your equipment at the start of the
game there’s almost nothing you can do to affect this and most of it relies on
Random Chance. I know that with a Games Workshop game that’s like complaining
that grass is green, but it doesn’t make for a hugely engaging experience.
Thankfully it doesn’t last long!
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| I actually got to run a dragon. A proper dragon, that fights and everything! My players killed it. |
Finally on Sunday I carried on with Rise of the Runelords,
with Dave, Victor, Morgan and some of their friends. I’ve been running this
campaign for over two years now and I’m pleased that a solid core of the group that
originally started it are happy to keep playing! Currently we’re at Fortress of
the Stone Giants, and I’m really enjoying running this dungeon. What I’ve found
with the current edition of the game is that when you have a group of players
who know exactly what they’re doing when it comes to optimising their
characters, it’s very difficult to frighten them with encounters they can
easily beat. Some of the monsters I’ve been putting them up against - Deathwebs,
Redcaps and modified Stone Giants – have been capable of doing them some
serious harm, and I’ve been able to use terrain and traps to a good effect as
well. The result is that it feels less of a grind for my players, and it’s a
lot more fun for me.
