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Entries from March 19th, 2010

The RTS Boss Battle

March 19th, 2010 · 17 Comments · Design, RTS

In his mostly glowing review of Dawn of War 2: Chaos Rising, Bill Abner hits on one of my personal annoyances with RTS campaigns – the boss battle. This annoyed me in the original game and it doesn’t serve its purpose any better in the expansion. It just makes no sense to me at all […]

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New Solium Infernum Guides

March 18th, 2010 · Comments Off on New Solium Infernum Guides · Blogs, Cryptic Comet

He’s a little late to the party, but Bill Harris has written up some amazing beginners’ guides for Vic Davis’ latest masterpiece, Solium Infernum. Harris did a great job with his Armageddon Empires guides, and he’s doing well here, too. I’ll admit to having not played SI in a while. I had some MP games […]

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Three Moves Ahead Episode 56: Civ 5, Sid Meier and Farmville

March 16th, 2010 · 17 Comments · GDC, Podcast, Three Moves Ahead

We throw together a show on some of the strategy gaming news and ideas coming out of this year’s GDC. What do we know and not know about Civilization 5? Is Sid Meier coddling players in his psychological approach? And why is Julian on the side of evil in the Facebook wars? We announce the […]

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What does it mean to be “hardcore”?

March 11th, 2010 · 18 Comments · Firaxis, Gamespy, Industry, Preview

When I read the strapline attached to Anthony Gallegos’s preview of Civilization 5, I was stopped a little short. It’s not just for the hardcore anymore. It’s not? When was it? Is Civilization a hardcore game for hardcore people? I tweeted my curiosity and was met with a nice chorus of replies from friends and […]

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Large Scale RTS and their intimacy problems: SupCom 2 report

March 10th, 2010 · 12 Comments · Design, Gas Powered Games, Me, RTS

At this week’s GDC, Gas Powered Games boss Chris Taylor told Greg Tito of The Escapist that Supreme Commander 2 was one of the best games he’d ever worked on. (I’m still working my way through the campaign, but I’ll let you know if I agree with him soon.) He also said that SupCom2 was […]

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Three Moves Ahead Episode 55: Starcraft 2 and Napoleon: Total War

March 9th, 2010 · 10 Comments · Blizzard, Creative Assembly, Podcast, RTS, Three Moves Ahead

Two games this week. First, Tom Chick and Troy Goodfellow report on their experiences in the Starcraft II beta. It’s an old school RTS that eschews fifteen years of evolution in favor of keeping things as they were in 1998. What do we like so far? What do we not like? Meanwhile, Rob Zacny asks […]

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