The summer closes with some expansion packs and a delayed release. Can the fall get here a little faster?
The new titles:
August 28 – Medieval II: Total War – Kingdoms (Creative Assembly/Sega)
August 31 – Europa Universalis III: Napoleon’s Ambition (Paradox)
Combat Mission: Shock Force was released in Europe on schedule last month, but the retail release of the game was held back on this side of the Atlantic because the box version was the not ready for prime time 1.0, the version that led to a few hundred people finding this blog after I told people I wasn’t having much fun with it. And I wasn’t alone.
In any case, I’m not really excited about either of the expansion packs, probably because Bioshock is coming out on August 21. Bioshock is one of those games that I haven’t been following very closely but have all of a sudden become curious about because people I trust and respect are excited about it – one of those contagious titles that I’ll buy knowing next to nothing. Apparently I’m supposed to be concerned that there are limits on my ability to kill children or something.
Of course, Matrix and Shrapnel could mix things up by releasing a game that I didn’t expect. Like the former did a couple of weeks ago with Guns of August. I’ll have some thoughts on it once I figure out what the hell I’m doing.
As tempting as it is to make a joke that ‘All American’ has secretly gone gold and is planning to ship, we’d be hit with far too many emails, so I have to report that unfortunately no, there won’t be any surprise strategy titles from Shrapnel in August.
I’m awaiting Bioshock too, if only for its pedigree. Gameplay-wise it looks and sounds rather bizarre and creative; whether that’s a good thing remains to be seen. While I enjoy when games color outside the lines, sometimes it just ends up looking like the cat threw up on the page, ya know?
Oh come on, surely you’ll at least release an update of 101 with the new engine as a teaser, won’t you? Actually, I bet you could get away with releasing the old version and generate comparable buzz. Now, where’d I stash my copy again?
As for Bioshock, I know I’m supposed to be excited about it, but somehow I haven’t yet become enamored with anticipation like I was for System Shock 2. I blame Civ 4 for sucking away all of my gaming energy.
Alan, if we could, we would, but it’s my understanding that Empire Interactive controls all the rights to 101st, which is why you haven’t seen it released as freeware by us.
It’s possible that there have been enough turnovers in the staff at EI that they wouldn’t mind giving up their control, which would be quite nice.