Kotaku’s Florian Eckhardt has an extended write-up of his Leipzig sit-down with Ensemble’s Bruce Shelley. Given a chance to see Age of Empires III: The Warchiefs put through its paces by one of the most important strategy game developers ever, Eckhardt devotes much of the article describing how bored he is. Eckhardt doesn’t like RTS […]

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Jim Cobb has a review of Norm Koger’s new naval battle game at Wargamer. Distant Guns, from Storm Eagle Studios, was developed by Koger and Jim Rose. It focuses on fleet engagements in the Russo-Japanese War, a conflict that was probably the last time large scale fleet engagements settled the course of a conflict.
Jim liked […]

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British strategy game developer Slitherine is now working on a ruleset for tabletop wargaming. The Art of War will cover the same ground as the popular De Bellis Antiquitatis, a simple miniature game dealing with armies from the birth of civilization to the birth of gunpowder.
The early description of Art of War says that it […]

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Extreme Tech’s Loyd Case (one of the “final words” on hardware, as far as I’m concerned) has written one of those “list” articles that are entirely geared to provoke discussion. And here I am, discussing it. Bravo.
Case’s topic is Gaming Myths, and the top ten list runs the gamut from contemporary business anaysis (Is the […]

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From Paradox’s PR announcement of Bad Day L.A.’s launch via Gamersgate:
“The game combines comedy, chaos management gameplay, a unique art style created by Kozyndan, an over-the-top ironic story and a cast of characters that find themselves in goofy, often surreal missions.”
Comedy, irony and surrealism - all in one handy package.

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It turns out that the bane of first year English majors has had a chance to look at some video games. Civilization caught his eye.
Erst, ye do governe the civilisacioun of the Golden Age, and gathir acornes and the croppes that the erthe ytself doth yive forth withouten labour. Lowys sayeth that this part of […]

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If my readers can tolerate yet another post about Battle for Middle Earth II (since I’ve been pegged a fanboy and all…), Andrew Park has written a good preview of the upcoming expansion for Gamespot.
My knowledge of Tolkien lore is fairly thin. I couldn’t get past the opening chapters in Silmarillon and, beyond the sacred […]

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Welcome to the first monthly guest blog. On the fourth Monday of every month, Flash of Steel will host an opinion not necessarily held by me.
My first guest is Frosty, an auld acquaintance from the forums of Home of the Underdogs, the first gaming forum that I took to pretty seriously. Since then, both of […]

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Paradox’s fans get exercised over the silliest things. But I bet this is the first time that mass bannings have been threatened for discussion of an empire that died over five hundred years ago.

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Despite the confusion over the release date in the final paragraph, Jeff Haynes’ preview of the highly anticipated Supreme Commander should further whet the appetites of Total Annihilation fans.
The highlight of the preview is the confirmation that you can zoom out to a global level, see every ongoing battle and give orders from this God-view. […]

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