I read an interesting article about the original playtest version of one of Magic’s most iconic cards from the original Alpha set.
Fun fact: Original playtesters thought this would just make their opponent lose the game.
It’s hard to imagine that this card would eventually become one of the Power Nine and arguably one of the most powerful effects you can take. Yep, this card would eventually become Time Walk, the first extra turn spell in Magic’s history.
I recently wrote a piece about Magic’s recent design problems and how they’ve been affecting the game over the last few years. While I don’t mention it specifically in that article, one of the more problematic cards in the current Standard rotation (aka the most recent few sets released) just so happens to also be an extra turn spell.
While the card isn’t nearly as powerful as its ancestor, it’s clearly not the first time Magic has printed a problematic extra turn spell.
What Makes an Extra Turn so Good?
Like in any turn-based game, players usually have the most fun on their own turn. Their turn is the time when they shine and get to do all the cool flashy stuff. When you introduce extra turn effects to a game, you’re stealing that time to shine away from other players.
Not a lot of turn-based games have extra turn effects. Monopoly allows it to a certain degree when a player rolls doubles too many times in a row. Games like Final Fantasy have spells that will enable player turns to come up more often, but usually not sequentially.
Taking extra turns in Magic not only takes away that fun from another player, but it also grants a more significant advantage to the player taking the extra turn. They get another card to draw, they get another chance to cast spells, and so on.
The Issue With Alrund’s Epiphany
Why is this card so good? It costs a lot of mana, and it exiles itself, so you can’t cast it repeatedly. What’s the big deal, then?
Well, the reason is there aren’t a lot of cards that can deal with it. The current pool of cards in Standard doesn’t provide adequate solutions to deal with Alrund’s Epiphany before it’s too late.
The color pie for Magic determines what each color can and can’t do. This is a fantastic design principle behind Magic’s process, and it’s been a guiding piece for most of the game’s life.
White-based decks can be aggressive and potentially kill an opponent before they can cast more than one, but this isn’t guaranteed.
Blue-based decks can run countermagic to stop big spells like this.
Black-based decks can’t always make the opponent discard the card because the Foretell keyword allows them to cast it from a special zone.
Red-based decks have no way to get around it besides “being faster,” just like White.
Green-based decks have nothing to do except hope they can “be faster,” like Red and White.
Now, this isn’t always the case every time. However, with the current pool of cards available to players, this is the current predicament. Most colors have no way to interact with big, flashy, game-ending spells.
Instead, players were casting several copies of Alrund’s Epiphany in sequential turns, paired with heavy-hitting creatures or even an animated manland. This means that a game that could have been one or two turns away from victory is suddenly gone, as your opponent takes three turns in a row with a 7/7 and some number of bird tokens.
Extra Turn Spells Have Been Constant Problems.
This isn’t the first time Wizards of the Coast has ended up with some problematic extra turn spells, not even within the last few years.
A few years ago, another extra turn spell hit Standard: Nexus of Fate. Not only could this spell be cast at any time, but it would also go back into your deck as it resolved so that you could cast it again. There was also plenty of cards that would allow players to reach that magic number of mana to cast Nexus of Fate quickly, with the biggest offenders being Wilderness Reclamation and Wild Growth.
What could go wrong?
For starters, it got banned in early 2019 for Magic’s Best-of-One format because of the inability to interact with the card. In November of the same year, it would get immediately banned in the newest digital-only format for Magic, also known as Historic.
Not a month would go by before Nexus of fate would get banned again in one of Magic’s other new formats, Pioneer. It was also re-banned when the Historic format added a Best-of-Three mode.
In more recent times, the release of Strixhaven and its “Mystical Archive” would add a bunch of new and reprinted cards to both Standard and Historic. One of those cards that would only be Historic legal is Time Warp, a reprinted extra turn effect.
A deck would soon arise that would allow players to cast Time Warp over and over and over again, with cards that could allow you to cast it for free from your library or graveyard. It became such a problem in Historic that five of the top eight decks in the Strixhaven Championship would be focused around this interaction. Every deck in the top four semifinals would be the same deck as well.
It was soon banned in Historic less than a week after the tournament took place.
Big Flashy Game Enders
Magic is a game where most of the ways to end a game are through permanents (aka things that stick on the board for multiple turns, like creatures and enchantments), or at least it has been for the last 30ish years.
One of the designers of Magic, Sam Stoddard, wrote a piece on how they intentionally add these “finishers” to sets to help with balance issues and give players different options. He even mentions how Planeswalkers have pushed out creature-based finishers in recent years just due to how impactful they are.
He highlights the next set’s new Blue finisher, a powerful creature that’s hard to remove directly and offers a lot of power if it stays on the field. He even suggests several currently playable cards that would be able to deal with said finisher.
But in the last few sets, players haven’t been given any tools to interact with this. Discard effects don’t work; there are no targeted card hate pieces like Surgical Extraction to remove them from an opponent’s deck. The only card that comes to mind is Curse of Silence, which really doesn’t stop the spell from being cast. It just makes it cost more.
The Vast Power Difference Between Extra Turn Cards
I do want to say that I don’t want to rain on anybody’s parade and ban all extra turn effects. On the contrary, I find some of them to be pretty balanced when in the right shell.
However, there’s a pretty significant disparity in how balanced some of these extra turn spells are, with most of them being either unplayable or completely broken. It comes down to how many times you can cast them that becomes the real issue. Taking one extra turn is nowhere near as backbreaking as three additional turns.
Time Warp is a pretty “fair” extra turn card. It has a decent mana value, its sorcery speed, and doesn’t do anything extra. It’s so vanilla they remade it with a horse, and then printed it with a different name. This will be our baseline for any other extra turn spell.
The newest extra turn effect is Alchemist’s Gambit, which comes with a clause that we often see in the cheaper “unplayable” cards. The reason these cards are “unplayable” is that you can’t chain them repeatedly. You lose the game at the end of that next turn. There are five of these kinds of effects, all in Red’s color pie.
Expropriate, aside from being a mouthful of a card, is “fair.” I put fair in quotes because, well, it’s still usually a game-ending spell. It costs a lot, and regardless of how the votes are done, you’re most likely getting at least one extra turn or several in a multiplayer game.
Part the Waterveil saw some fringe competitive play in its day, and it’s probably the most interesting of the “fair” extra turn spells. Sure, if you pay extra, it can give you a big beater, but otherwise, it can’t be looped over and over because of its exile clause.
If you look at all the extra turn effects ever printed in Magic’s history, you’ll see the list is not very long. And out of that list, only a handful of those cards were ever problematic. Usually, they’re paired with significant downsides that make them pretty difficult to add to a competitive deck.
Closing Statements
It’s no secret that Wizards has had some balance issues in the last few years. And it’s never going to be a perfectly balanced game. There’s no way to catch every edge case in every format, especially with the volume of new cards released every year. However, it’s become clear that extra turns in most games aren’t a fun mechanic. Especially so when it comes to competitive games.
Somewhere under a lost and lonely hill of grim and foreboding aspect lies a labyrinthine crypt. It is filled with terrible traps and not a few strange and ferocious monsters to slay the unwary. It is filled with rich treasures both precious and magical, but in addition to the aforementioned guardians, there is said to be a demi-lich who still wards his final haunt.
These are some of the first words used to describe the setting of The Tomb of Horrors. One of the most iconic adventures to ever grace kitchen tables and strike fear into the hearts of unprepared adventurers.
Dungeons and Dragons is a game that has become one of the core pieces of the gaming world. Whether or not you’ve played the game before, it’s hard not to see its impact on games since its release in 1974. The game remains popular, with game designers bringing the experiences they had to shape the games we play today.
Start The Dungeon Crawling
Dungeons & Dragons is a Tabletop Role-Playing Game for those who don’t know. You, the player, would enter a high fantasy world filled with swords, sorcery, and treasure. Unlike video games, where the goal is laid out before you, you are at the whims of your Dungeon Master. This is another player who drives the world around you.
Through them, you grow your character and delve into dark dungeons, complex political situations, and even dealing with the gods themselves. If you’ve never heard of it before, you ought to check it out.
No, really. Go pick up a starter kit and some friends and play. It’s a blast.
One of the most popular ways to enjoy Dungeons & Dragons is through pre-made adventures. These are published resources for Dungeon Masters to run their players through without heavy lifting. These became popular immediately, with some of the most famous D&D settings today stemming from these “modules” (as they were called back then).
One of the game’s original creators, Gary Gygax, had been running a campaign for his friends. He felt they had become “experts” and wanted to not only give his players a challenge but to make them face what all living beings fear most: death.
Enter: The Tomb of Horrors.
Initially created for the very first Origins convention in 1975, Gary wanted to bring a challenge for players interested in tournament play for Dungeons and Dragons.
Sidenote: Is tournament play a thing? I’ve played for over a decade, and I’ve never heard of a D&D tournament in my life. Reach out to me on Twitter and tell me about your D&D Tournament stories.
Lawrence Schick would describe the Tomb of Horrors as “The dungeon of the demi-lich Acererak was, for Gary, a kind of thought experiment: If an undead sorcerer really wanted to keep his tomb from being plundered by greedy adventurers, how would he do it? The answer, of course, was to defend the crypt with tricks and traps designed not to challenge the intruders but to kill them dead. And furthermore, to do it in ways so horrific that all but the most determined party would give up and leave well enough alone.”
And that’s precisely what happened to players as they adventured deep into the tomb of the undead wizard named Acererak. The module has a mind-boggling 33 encounters in total, starting with players having to search for the tomb itself by poking around the dirt with spears or poles until they can find a tunnel to get inside. And yes, it specifies that they have to use spears or poles. They summon a demon if the players try to be cheeky and become astral or ethereal. So they can’t even phase through the tomb without causing trouble.
Once the players get in, they’re greeted by not one but two false entrances before finally entering the Tomb itself. Once they finally make their way inside, they are greeted by a riddle puzzle before moving forward.
Oh, and did I mention that this dungeon is filled with pit traps? Not just your regular run-of-the-mill pit traps either, ones that once again force players to poke and prod around with poles and spears, lest they fall into the pit. Plus, these pits have poisonous spikes at the bottom that kill you if you fail to evade the poison. Immediately.
The infamous “Face of the Great Green Devil”
Suppose they make it past the subsequent few encounters, including the famous “Face of the Great Green Devil. This is just a face in the wall that destroys you immediately if you jump in.
They’re presented with a room that has a false floor. If the floor opens, anyone inside is dropped into a 100ft pit that cannot be reopened unless someone else triggers the trapdoor. Meaning a party can quickly die right then and there in this room.
Naturally, once they’ve dodged the first ten encounters of the dungeon unscathed, they’re presented with something neat: a Magical Archway.
What does this do, you ask?
Any living matter that steps in gets sent back to the dungeon entrance. But non-living matter? That gets sent far, far away into the depths of the dungeon. It gets sent to the final room where Acererak is waiting.
Yup, if a player makes the mistake of stepping through the portal, they lose all their items.
Misery In The Depths
If you haven’t figured it out by now, this place is pretty miserable. I won’t explain it room by room, but here are some other fun ways players can end up getting a candlelight vigil:
A false crypt that has an illusion of the tomb collapsing. If the players leave the dungeon, the Dungeon Master is instructed to ask them if the dungeon was too hard.
A room named “Huge Pit with 200 Spikes.”
A door that leads to a fake wall that’s actually a secret door. It leads to a room full of sleep gas that has a chance to awaken a Stone Juggernaut that will immediately crush the players to paste.
Another Devil Face that will send players back to the start, naked and without any items.
A different Devil Face that instead teleports them to a room full of the skeletons of people who had tried – and failed – to escape. Even if the players manage to open the hidden door in this area to free whoever is inside, the swords of the dead adventurers will attack the players.
A door with a keyhole that shocks you if you put the wrong keys into it. If you put the wrong item into its slot, it can teleport you like the devil faces, or if you attack the door, it starts to bleed and can flood the room. Oh, and if you light the blood on fire, it turns to fatal poison gas.
A false treasure room that, if the players loot the money and items, will all disappear once they travel far enough away from the Tomb.
Once they finally traverse the 32 encounters within the Tomb of Horrors, they are in the crypt of the demi-lich himself. And naturally, once they use the keys to unlock the door, there’s a chance anyone at the back of the room gets smushed as the floor shoots upwards to reveal the crypt of Acererak himself.
Or what’s left of him anyway. Since he’s actually a demi-lich, aka a floating skull with jewels for eyes and diamond teeth. He can suck the souls out of players, killing them instantly and always starting with the strongest one. Even hitting the demi-lich is difficult, as you must know certain spells or have specific items even to harm him. And once you crush the skull, any souls trapped inside pose a risk of being gone forever.
And….that’s it. There aren’t any happy endings or heroes coming back to the village as kings. The module ends there, thanking the players for playing.
Overall, it’s a pretty crappy experience, right?
The Impact On D&D
So why does the Tomb of Horrors matter enough to stick around? It wasn’t a random one-off from that convention. It was fully published by TSR (the company that made D&D back then). Since then, it’s received updated versions for every edition of Dungeons & Dragons. It has some people out there who enjoy this hellscape dungeon of a module.
Many players consider this module to be a classic, something iconic and different from other adventures. In a world where most adventures are puzzle-light, combat-heavy scenarios where players get to have meaty action and combat sequences, Tomb of Horrors puts the entire game into a different perspective.
Acererak’s tomb does have a few monsters, but there’s only a handful of them, and they’re all singular enemies, no large groups. Instead, players are forced to use their brains to solve these complex, punishing puzzles that risk instant death if they provide the wrong solution, which is very uncommon for most D&D adventures. It also encourages players to stop and talk about what is going on and better plan their next move because they might not live past the next room.
Puzzles are an essential part of Dungeons and Dragons, as they not only break up the monotony of combat and dialogue but also serve to add atmosphere to the world. If your party is exploring a dark cave searching for a bear, but instead, you come across magical traps, your perception of the rest of the cave is altered. And the Tomb of Horrors is no different.
Sure, you might be told that there’s some great evil inside this tomb, but what adventurer hasn’t heard that before? But when you get there, and you start to see how dangerous this place is, the idea that there might actually be a great big evil that your heroic character can’t defeat begins to set in. Death in D&D is permanent. There are no extra lives or respawn points like in Dark Souls. You can’t learn from these deaths and move on, you have to avoid them, or you will fail.
How Does It Affect the Table?
The genuine threat of death is what I think makes this adventure truly unique. Playing the role of a Dungeon Master is a unique challenge of trying to keep your players motivated and engaged and make them feel challenged by the tasks they need to perform. Player death is always a possibility, but in my experience, it is usually challenging to get there.
Whether you, as a DM, soften up when players are close to dying or a timely roll keeps them alive long enough to rest, a fatality in your party is usually rare but very impactful.
Because the Tomb of Annihilation is designed to kill players – and really KILL them, not just inconvenience them with minor poison and little wounds that add up over time – Players are forced to see the world with a different lens where death is imminent. They need to overcome it to advance or leave.
This plays significantly into the design of Dungeons and Dragons. The game we know now is a much different beast than it was back then, a game of hacking and slashing and combat. Most adventures and groups are focused around combat – because that’s pretty much all the game was. The tools for players to explore the world and interact with it weren’t there yet. Roleplay was light, and there weren’t skills like “athletics” or “acrobatics” or “persuasion.” It was stat checks or nothing.
As D&D has evolved, We’ve seen a shift into a game that Better incorporates the ability to tackle different types of situations. Where previously, Players were forced to have a flat roll to escape a trap or dodge an obstacle, modern editions have broken the game down into Subskills alongside Specific Stats. One character might be more dextrous than another, giving them an advantage.
In the original D&D, you could only choose from one of three classes: Fighting men hit stuff, magic-users could use magic, and clerics could do a little of both. We wouldn’t see a drastic change in diversity until Advanced Dungeons and Dragons’ second edition in 1989, fifteen years later.
Because players were so accustomed to combat-centric games with the occasional puzzle, it made the Tomb of Horrors much more challenging. It forced players to communicate and figure out a real solution to these puzzles because one wrong move could end your character – forever.
How Does It Impact Modern Games?
We’ve seen this sort of game design slowly shift into modern games, mostly with games like Dark Souls. Games where death may not be permanent, but the risk of dying could be devastating. Soulsborne games have mastered the art of learning from your deaths, figuring out how to overcome it, and becoming better at the game overall.
At the beginning of the original Dark Souls, you are immediately faced with a massive Asylum Demon that blocks your path. You’re given nothing- simply a broken sword and vague instructions. Players who attempt to fight the demon usually fail hard.
The Asylum Demon, your first boss in Dark Souls.
But those who explore and learn will eventually realize there’s an unlocked door to the left of the Demon, where you can escape and find a checkpoint. You’ll collect some basic gear and come face-to-face with the Demon again, but you are equipped and ready to face the challenge this time.
I, for one, am terrible at Soulsborne games. I don’t have the patience to learn. I want to hack and slash my way around. I’ve only beaten Dark Souls 3 to date, despite owning all three AND Sekiro. I’m horrible.
However, permanent death isn’t something that’s explored in modern games. Sure, some games may have higher difficulty tiers, including permadeath, but they aren’t baked into the games themselves.
Modern Roguelikes come close, using death as a tool similar to Soulsborne games to help you advance. Unless you’re incredibly skilled at a particular game, you’re seldom going to complete the entire game in a single run. Instead, you’ll progress as far as you can, die, and then use the resources and knowledge you gained from that run to progress even further in the next run.
Other games that use permanent death are still roleplaying games, often inspired by Dungeons and Dragons. Fire Emblem and XCOM are great examples where characters risk dying in combat, which means they’re gone. Forever.
Fire Emblem takes this a step further still, with the chance that essential characters may die in combat and affect the game’s future. Some characters will become unobtainable, or side quests will be locked away. This forces players to think and plan their turns appropriately.
We don’t typically see how games can be flipped around entirely to be seen from a new perspective. Modern games rarely deviate from the norms, with genres mixed up occasionally but seldom experimenting with the formula. While the Tomb of Horrors takes players out of dungeon crawling into a heavy, life-or-death puzzle sequence, we rarely get an opportunity to see other games flip the script.
Could you imagine if next year’s Call of Duty entry took away the split-second reaction style shooter style for a slow, methodical exploration map? Squads have to carefully explore each doorway, hallway, and open area, fearing death is around every corner?
Or what about a visual novel/dating simulator about some book club in a Japanese high school that turns into a grim, psychological horror?
Waifus and Horror
Trigger warning: Self-harm, violence, and suicide. If you aren’t okay with this, skip the following few paragraphs.
Doki Doki Literature Club presents itself as a cutesy slice-of-life visual novel, blending in with the hundreds released every year. You play the protagonist, who begrudgingly joins his school’s literature club to appease his childhood friend after a time and some chances for romance with the other girls in the club.
The game suddenly ends with you discovering your childhood friend has hung herself. Then, the game resets. You’re back at the main menu with your previous game deleted, and you start the game again…
But it’s different. Your childhood friend doesn’t exist. Strange glitches begin to appear, and some text becomes unreadable. And the three other girls in the book club seem…different.
I won’t go any further into the rest of the game, but Doki Doki Literature Club was a massive change in the presentation of a traditional Visual Novel. It added real puzzles and intrigue to an otherwise simple, straightforward genre of “choose your own adventure” style games.
Returning to The Tomb
As Dungeons and Dragons has evolved, the Tomb of Horrors has also evolved. It’s appeared in every edition of the game, with its most recent printing being included in Tales from the Yawning Portal, a compilation book. In its newest iteration, plenty of warnings are given to the Dungeon Master, so they know the experience they will be putting their players through.
Wizards of the Coast would eventually return us to Acererak’s evil games through a new adventure called the Tomb of Annihilation. With this, we were given a more comprehensive look at the world Acererak calls home (known as Chult) and a thoroughly-vetted adventure to ensure it did not become the meat grinder its predecessor was known for.
While the adventure has its issues, it’s been widely praised for being a great module. Heck, it was one of the most playtested modules they’ve ever worked on, according to Wizards themselves. Also, Pendleton Ward, creator of Adventure Time, was one of the collaborators. Weird, right?
Finally Out Of The Dungeon
Whether or not you have had the unfortunate experience of delving into the Legendary Tomb of Horrors, it’s an experience that has shaped the Gaming world. The Demi-Lich’s tomb Still finds its way into the eye of pop culture, inspiring the 2007 game “Icewind Dale and a major part of the book ” Ready Player One.”
I wouldn’t be surprised to hear the module has also inspired countless RPG designers as well, taking it as a lesson in how to expertly craft a dungeon. Or perhaps how to NOT Subject players to the kind of torture you find in the depths of Acererak’s lair.
Have you been brave enough to challenge the Tomb of Horrors? or perhaps you’ve mastered the art of running players through its corridors. Either way, I want to hear about it. Tell us all about it on our Discord!
Welcome indie fans! This is our curated list of recent games that caught our eye on Twitter for #WishlistWednesday. The list is in no particular order of quality or rating.
These indie games are in various stages of development, and we recommend wishlisting, watching, following or otherwise subscribing to each of the developers by clicking the title of each game!
A chaotic online party game that drops players into riotous robbery scenarios where the goal is to collect as many valuables as possible and get back to the escape van before time runs out. Battle your way to first place by using gadgets like anvils, ice, earthquakes and more!
Digital Janitors is an action-packed desktop defense game where hackers have taken your employer’s network hostage, which means the player must go to each computer in the company, excise the virus, and beat the hacker threat.
Discover the joys of entrepreneurship as you manage and grow your own burger truck business in this delicious simulation game. Create the perfect burger for diverse customers, manage your finances, upgrade your business, and cover the city! Play alone or with friends, and unleash the tycoon in you!
Fioresia Online is a fantasy MMORPG set in a vast open world. Play with thousands of other players, conquer castles, explore fantastic locations, discover dungeons, solve puzzles or simply manage your home and farm.
Alien Scumbags is a sci-fi action platformer with a big slice of horror and a stack of pop culture references. You’ll run, hide and kill across several levels, collect items from capsule machines and unlock characters.
Retro city building is back! As mayor, build your city block by block. Manage your citizens (silizens) with the help of deep statistics and analytics and get re-elected!
Moo Lander is a 2D adventure platformer, where you take control over your civilization’s last remaining spaceship to scour varied environments in search for the source of infinite amounts of milk. Tame the Mighty Cows, discover hidden secrets, solve puzzles and fight intelligent enemies!
Mira has been tasked with restoring colour to Chromaland across all 8 art-style based worlds, and squaring off against the villainous Blump. As a house painter, Mira uses her magic brush to steal colour from a host of enemies and use those colours to jump, dash and figure her way through Chromaland.
This 2D top down RPG follows NoName #1892 as he fights his way through vast amounts of monsters, navigates dangerous dungeons, and searches for the most important thing in his life: answers, while blending the excitement of classic adventure games with the fun and impact of story driven RPGs.
Split-screen voxel fun! A Couple of Cubes is a co-op puzzle game set in a world of cubes. Progress through increasingly complex puzzles to escape the government facility that you are held in with the special abilities granted to your characters.
Phaseshift is a sci-fi combat racer with cyberpunk aesthetics. Pilot your agile vehicle through futuristic locales, and assault your opponents with tons of weapon combinations! Fast paced, frantic racing action with intense strategic combat.
Espresso Tycoon – the future of tycoon games is here! The sound of the coffee machine, the unique aroma of coffee grounds… in your own café! Jump into a world full of hardcore management, picky customers, and fierce competition! Build your coffee business from a small place into a whole empire!
“The Vagabond Emperor” is a 2D RPG where you begin as a simple vagabond who decides to become an emperor in the fictional Middle Ages during a spreading curse. It’s up to you to decide what to do and where to go to achieve your goals.
Every Level is like an old school RPG puzzle.Even the enemies are puzzles of how to avoid or destroy them.Control each character separately and use their unique skills to get past obstacles.You must figure out how to gather the party at the exit portal to advance.
Billiards Dungeon is a pool-based, procedurally-generated rogue-lite. Players control the direction and force of the cue-ball character against a range of enemies. Explore and battle through floors of unique dungeons that change with every game, while unlocking more items in subsequent runs.
The world is your garden : chill and cute Ecosystem Sandbox ! Create your biomes, balance the food chain, build unique landscapes. Take the control of any creature and roleplay as a wild beast that must survive. Imagine your own unique stories.
TISIS is an indie horror game currently in development by a single developer. Its atmospheric and existential horror elements are inspired by The King in Yellow, by Robert W. Chambers and its philosophy revolves around the works of Nietzsche and Zapffe.
During World War II, there were expeditions in Antarctica by both the Allied and the Axis forces. Although the reasons behind their existence were that of asserting control in the region, the true intentions were far more sinister. The game takes place in 1952, eight years after the Antarctica Expeditions. You follow the story of a member of the Allied expedition, who, after waking in a lunatic asylum with no recollection of his past, must search for clues to retrieve his identity and face the horrors that were unearthed in Antarctica.
The plot is heavily inspired by the philosophical background of the worldview in ancient Greece, the cost of committing hubris (ὕβρις), the intervention of the gods with ati (ἄτη), their anger and vengeance, nemesis (νέμεσις) and finally the punishment and destruction of the abuser, tisis (τίσις). Additionally, the game is set in the universe created by Robert W. Chambers in The King In Yellow and its atmosphere and story greatly focuses to visually represent philosophical concepts and ideas proposed by Friedrich Nietzsche, Peter Wessel Zapffe, Thomas Ligotti, H.P. Lovecraft and more.
TISIS is developed in Unreal Engine 4 mainly with assets from the Epic Games Marketplace, with no existing budget. I strive to keep that fact from affecting the quality of the project and intensely work to, at least, reach the expectations that I believe should be achieved by a project entirely developed from a single person.
A cozy 2D point & click adventure featuring multiple playable characters and plenty of silliness… Oh, and there’s also some time traveling and relationship stuff going down too… Yeah, and robots – robots too…
Terra Earth is a 2D platformer with a mostly NES-faithful pixel art style. You can visit the six stages in any order, and the order in which you complete stages affects how the story plays out. That’s basically it; it’s not that complicated, so give it a shot if it seems interesting to you.
Heat and Run is a unique 2D shooter MOBA experience. Compete against players worldwide in team battles of heroes with unique skills, equipped with magical relics and the outstanding ability to create blocks. Cursed blazes of Navadran island await you.
FRAGGERWAVE is a Retro First Person Shooter with a Vaporwave / PixelArt Aesthetic. A celebration of shooters that collects my favorite mechanics from the past 2 decades of FPS goodness, into a single highly offensive-based FPS. A niche game, made by an obsessive gamer, for obsessive gamers.
You are the captain of a starship venturing through a massive open universe. Customize your crew and take command at the helm of your very own ship as you explore a galaxy torn apart by internal strife, alien threats, and political intrigue.
Explore a future Venice struggling with the effects of rising water slowly destroying the city as a bored teenager, with your hoverboard and your trusty drone.
God’s Domain is a realistic VR MMORPG that tries to capture the essence of reality with added fantasy elements in a virtual world. The goal is to build something that lets you the player escape to another world where all of your worries from your 9-5 job or your daily life can be replaced with a new life full of adventure, exploration and excitement.
Shatter Sky is an upcoming indie flight sim where you get to fly really fast and blow stuff up.
Shatter Sky is an upcoming arcade style flight sim currently in development due for release later in 2021
Full game pad or mouse and keyboard integration, pick up and play jumping straight into the action
Fast paced no strings attached combat, taking down swarms of aggressive enemy AI across multiple terrains and obstacles using an array of weapons and some fancy flying
Low system requirements, keeping the frame rates as high as possible
Aircraft loadout customisation and optimisation
Unique HUD with some familiar flight sim components
Low poly graphics for a 90s arcade flight sim feel with some modern comforts
Ad Wars is a multi-genre adventure game where you travel all over the Internet to destroy ads, once and for all!
The game is divided into 3 episodes, where each one of them is a completely different adventure with it’s own type of gameplay. You’ll find yourself jumping and shooting the mischievous yet endearing Gengens in Super Freemium Lands, taking on all sorts of monsters RPG-style in Clickbait Kingdom and playing the role of a roguelike detective in Download Highways. Oh, and did we mention that it all starts with Bullet Hell mania?
KEO is a team-based online multiplayer vehicle combat game set in a sci-fi post-apocalyptic world. Build your loadout to suit your playstyle and balance your team to dominate the battlefield using futuristic remote controlled vehicles! #PlayKEO
Rushout is an enthralling and hilarious 3D ragdoll platformer with simple gameplay set in fantastic flying landscapes. And the prize for the best result will spark real excitement in you!? Beware of crazy chickens!?
In Santabell City, political intrigue and shadowy organizations have become commonplace. To counter these growing threats enter Sharla, Indira, Kyra, and Liria of the newly-formed Santabell Arbiter Branch in this intricately deep turn-based JRPG.
Join your monster brethren and sistren in psychedelic warfare across historically-inaccurate battlefields of glorious mayhem. It’s the classic struggle of Wicked vs. Evil in this electrifying conclusion to the infinite war of the monster armies.
Sally forth to the monsterfront, do your absolute worst, and have a great time. An ever-expanding theatre of madness awaits.
Becloudead is a post-apocalyptic sci-fi hack and slash cinematic platformer. Unravel the dark truth behind the zombie apocalypse as you venture deep into the bloody and gruesome narrative of Becloudead.
What if Super Hexagon was a walking simulator? Meet Kanso, a hyper relaxing follow the line game. Avoid obstacles while you trace around circular forms and find your moment of Zen.
The adventure about hunter’s trip, nature and an alien meeting! Explore the wild nature, climb and move further through the cold lands. Save the lost friend and yourself! Meet the Unknown and find the mystery!
High school students return to school late after hours, each with their own reasons and an ominous feeling. After midnight…the fears deep inside become a reality.
What could be scarier than a massive dungeon-tower infested with skulls, ogres, and dragons? That those same monsters ride the largest multinational in the world with it. You know; business is business.
Fight your way with fire and sword through more than 25 levels of pure action in a Hack and Slash as epic as it is hilarious: Skip all the sequences and dialogues, who cares? Farm dozens of hours until enemies are nothing more than punching bags, beat 200 hours of a no-budget indie game, and then cry on forums about how short it is.
HOCKEY HEROES is a 3-on-3 arcade hockey role-playing party game. Play alone or with friends as you draft your team from a roster of diverse characters and travel across the country battling through tournaments to win all Original Six Cups and become hockey legends!
Nobody’s Quest is a relaxing adventure game with light sandbox and RPG elements. Explore the realm of Hubbington, collect crafting materials and resources, save the citizens of Hubb Burg so they can help you in return, defeat Evil spawns and face LOATHE!
Follow the antics of disgruntled guilds leaving their homelands to face the harsh unknown in the Untamed Wilds. Row-based combat system forces players to make strategic choices at every moment. Monitor each hero’s Argument meter; if it gets too high they may refuse to help fight!
A retro RPG wherein you assemble a party of 4 Heroes from 12 Classes and embark on a journey to rid the world of Tsufana from the titular tower’s corruption.
Command custom mechs and outmaneuver the Swarm in this post-apocalyptic turn-based tactics game. Leverage the terrain, your Mech’s unique skills and your wits to survive a series of ever-changing strategic battles and give humanity hope.
Discover a post-human earth in Trash, a beautifully crafted open-world action adventure game where strange and wondrous trash-based life thrives. Explore your surroundings with friends, solve puzzles, craft unique attachments and emerge from the heap.
In 2017 Netflix CEO, Reed Hastings, scoffed at the idea of competition with the answer that Netflix biggest competition was sleep. In 2019 Hastings reasserted his view of Netflix inhabiting Olympus by dismissing the idea that they were remotely interested in the games streaming market.
Watch this editorial on YouTube
For the large part Hastings has been right; at the end of 2020 Netflix smashed through the 200 million subscribers barrier and holds the top spot by some distance in global figures, with over 30% more subscribers than Amazon Prime and nearly double the largest Chinese streaming service.
Reed Hastings speaks with Host Chris Anderson at TED2018 – The Age of Amazement, April 10 – 14, 2018, Vancouver, BC, Canada. Photo: Ryan Lash / TED
But there have been rumblings in Mordor in recent weeks; insiders say that Netflix has been shopping around for executives to help it enter the Gaming Streaming market?
Under Pressure
There are two key reasons why Netflix has changed its mind on games streaming.
Firstly, Netflix has an increasing need to change what it is doing and domestically it’s under pressure. In 2020 alone it lost a third of its market share in the US, from 29% down to 20%. It has had to compete with the entry of HBO Max, Disney+ and the continued growth of Hulu.
Image courtesy of Visual Capitalist
Netflix grew by four million subscribers globally in the first quarter of 2021, which represents its smallest first quarter growth of the last four years and they’ve downgraded their new subscribers forecast from 10 million to just one million in the second quarter of this year. This prompted an 8% drop in share price a couple of weeks ago and whilst the stock has rallied, signs for the future remain brittle. In the last four years Netflix’s growth rate has slowed every year, down from 34% growth to 24% and this year is looking considerably worse.
Overall in 2021 it expects to only break even.
Any way you look at the figures and trends, that growth is slowing and competition is squeezing Netflix. It is still top of the tree, but if it wants to remain there it has to do something else.
I want it all
The second reason Netflix will stream games is that the market has simply become to big to dismiss.
Netflix has already dabbled with interactive experiences
The TV-on-demand market is expected to be worth $87B by 2024.
By comparison the global games market is expected to exceed $200B in 2023 and $300B by 2025 by some estimates. Even when we factor in that just over 40% of that games market is mobile games the remaining market is still double the TV on demand sector.
Netflix cannot simply allow its competitors to carve up this larger and expanding market.
Breakthru
Gaming history is littered with new players to the market who arrived with a smash. Most recently Sony and Microsoft barging to the top of the pile with their consoles. Nintendo has fought back with the Switch, but the future lies in streaming though tv. In this sense Epic have bet on the wrong side of the coin in trying to woo people with a new store and Google (as usual) is facing the future with Stadia and Microsoft has XBox Game Pass. Microsoft are betting big on this with a stack of day one releases as their focal selling point for them in the recent E3 presentation.
They made a hit out of turning Minecraft into an interactive series.
The thing the successful companies who barge into the market all had was technical know how and Netflix is king of streaming. This skill and infrastructure puts them in a great position to enter the streaming games market.
Netflix pioneered streaming for mobile phones and today streaming accounts for 80% of all mobile internet traffic and successfully developed a seamless service where you can download, pick up, switch devices and lose not a second of where you were. They accounted for 15% of all global internet traffic in 2020. Think about that for a minute…15% of all global streaming came from this one company.
One Vision
Having seen the difficulties of Epic in getting past the gatekeepers like Apple in their recent court case and Google in setting up Stadia and a reliable streaming service, it seems obvious that Netflix has a well established infrastructure that is reliable and capable of delivering gaming. They have significant tech capability to wade into this growing market and they have already dabbled in this direction. Remember interactive tv programme Bandersnatch and Minecraft story mode? Both were significant hits and proved Netflix capable in this field. They will have learned a great deal from these.
They have also been developing games/TV tie-ins lately in Castlevania and The Witcher. This gives them an extra dimension of clout for possible exclusives in future. In all, Netflix has been acquiring interest and experience in the interactive games arena.
Don’t stop me now
Lastly and perhaps most potently…you are the reason they will win.
Sure, Amazon has purchased Twitch and is trying to tie in gaming that way and Google had to build Stadia with the problems that have gone with it, but more people have Netflix than anything else and it is simply going to be too easy to add on the games element.
My wife stores her pictures in Google photos; not because it is the best service but because it is the most convenient and integrated service. She has Google Drive and it’s linked to her phone, so it’s easy for her to store those pics she takes on her mobile and keep her memory clear. I have Amazon Music, again, not because it is the best music service, but because it is the easiest to have with what I already have. I have a Prime account and have Alexa in the house…so naturally when thinking of which music streaming service to choose…why complicate things by going elsewhere?
Hammer to fall
So when Netflix starts offering a games streaming service… you’re in. You can claim you won’t be, but why have two applications or interfaces when you can have it all in one place? You won’t…you’re in.
Consider also that the growth of cloud gaming in the future is going to come from the young, most of whom at 11 or 12, whenever they start gaming will need parents to pay for the service when they start. If parents have Netflix more than any other service They will pay for the add on. They will have some element of oversight with a company they know, trust and that regularly tops customer polls. That will be game over.
In the same way that sports teams give free tickets to schools and why Google gives free Drives to students…locking in future loyalty, so too with the gamers of the future being locked into Netflix. It’ll be too much of a nuisance for most to bother changing.
If you can make the choice easy for the customer and you can provide a reliable service then you will likely win. Netflix can do both and they cannot afford not to be part of the future of how we play games.
To quote from The Matrix…that “ding” sound, flashing you through the colour band of the Netflix logo when you press play on an ‘Original’ show. ’That is the sound of inevitability’.
You can also watch this editorial on our YouTube channel. Watch now: Netflix game streaming
With the announcement of a new TSR and some questionable words of the new owner Ernie Gygax, son of the late and great Gary Gygax (the father of Dungeons and Dragons, and the original TSR), alienating the entire LGBTQ community in one fell swoop.
But what, or who, even are TSR?
Let me take you back to a faraway time, called 1973.
The formation of TSR
Gary Gygax and Don Kaye come together to form a publishing company to publish a role-playing game called Dungeons and Dragons. This company would be known as Tactical Studies Rules, aka TSR, and would go on to publish several games over the years.
Business was booming, and in 1975 they would create a separate company called TSR Hobbies Inc. to market more games, including the famous Dungeons & Dragons Basic Kit as well as Advanced Dungeons & Dragons, and even Gen Con, one of the largest tabletop and board game conventions in the world.
Now I do want to mention that by 1983 there were now five TSR’s under one umbrella, and I can’t seem to figure out where one ends and another begins, so let’s assume they are all one massive TSR conglomorate.
Gygax leaves to Hollywood to market Dungeons and Dragons as a license and ends up doing pretty well, publishing new D&D settings like Dragonlance and Oriental Adventures (yikes).
When Gygax returned to home base upon the rumors that someone was trying to sell the company, causing some legal troubles and the majority of the company being sold to Lorraine Williams.
Over the course of the next decade or so, TSR would go on to be incredibly successful and release some of the most impactful RPGs and fantasy settings to ever hit kitchen tables.
But, as most things do, financial troubles hit again and TSR was eventually sold to Wizards of the Coast in 1997, who was then bought by Hasbro.
Fast forward to 2011, a dude named Jayson Elliot discovered that the TSR trademark had expired, and snatched it up. He wanted to launch it as a new company, with some assistance from Gygax’s sons Luke and Ernie, as well as other original contributors from the past.
Fast forward again to 2016 and TSR is in trouble with Gary Gygax’s widow Gail, who had a trademark dispute with TSR and Gary’s two sons. The company is still in operation, though they don’t publish much these days.
Now, we timeskip again to the present day: A press release comes out from TSR.games that TSR is Back – With the original logo, and even the original shop that TSR was run out of back in the day, all run by Ernie Gygax as Executive VP.
Why does this matter? Well, it really didn’t matter all that much until Ernie sat down with the Youtube channel Live from the Bunker to talk about it all.
In this interview, Ernie would go to explain the history of TSR, the reason they formed the new company (hint: because they could), and their first project, Giantlands.
And then he said the bad stuff.
Now, I want to pause to mention that some of this stuff is probably not the worst things you’ve ever heard, but there is a very real issue with the “old guard” of the RPG world being pretty unwilling to move on with the times and be accepting of the LGBTQ community, as well as some pretty dicey racism stances. They can think of rich fantasy worlds, but two dudes kissing apparently is too much for them.
This is not, has not, and will never be what the true RPG community is like. It is a warm, wonderful, and accepting of all people in the world, regardless of your race, identity, religion, or sexual preference.
And there’s no excuse for this kind of behavior.
So, when asked about Wizards of the Coast, who are the current owners of the Dungeons & Dragons brand?
Ernie replies “They just took as all corporate raiders do the treasures and then tried to make them their own. American Indians did the same thing they would, um, wipe out another tribe many times take the women and children and murder off everything else and leave to make your tribe that much better, room to grow.”
what?
And when asked why a new TSR needed to exist, he said:
“TSR has been gone. There’s a ton of artists and game designers and people that play….. and recently they were dissed for being old-fashioned, possibly anti modern trends, and enforcing, or even having the concepts of gender identity (laughs).”
TSR Controversy
Funnily enough, shortly after all of this went out into the internet, TSR’s twitter account quickly responded to the defense of “we don’t follow Ernie’s words” and “everyone is invited to our tables”, but Twitter quickly lashed back with some fun stories about Gary and other former TSR collaborators being bigots on the internet. And TSR doing some weird tweets.
Fun times.
And here I sit, an avid lover of Tabletop RPGs, staring at this bizarre mess of a situation, being glad that Wizards of the Coast is at least trying to make an attempt to be more welcoming, and distancing themselves from the original generation of tabletop gamers. Although, they really aren’t doing that great either, but that’s a story for another time.
In short, you are always welcome to play any tabletop RPG you like. You are welcomed, you are loved, and you are wanted. Regardless of your race, religion, sexual preference, pronouns, you are welcome.
E3 has been digital this year because of the pandemic and before it became E503 with a crashing website on Saturday, ChasingXP were there with media access. Dodging the predictable dripping mouths watching Battlefield and Elden Ring reveals we have kept our eyes on the Indie scene with a plethora of games being revealed through the Day of the Devs, the fantastic tongue-in-cheek Devolver show and the Guerrilla Collective’s presentation. In all, the games presented topped a hundred.
Sifting through all of this, I’m bringing you my top 5 indie games featured at E3, most of which are due out in the next six months.
Watch this review on YouTube
First up…
Moo Lander – The Sixth Hammer
A beautiful, looking but mad game based around cows and the pursuit of milk to save your planet. I know…but trust me this is ace. Working like a platformer, it looks very much like GRIS, but unlike that Moo Lander opts for some wondrous humour and then starts throwing in RPG upgrade trees, speech choices and shooter elements.
None of this is overwhelming and all of it delivers a mightily impressive game from the Bulgarian development team who are richly deserving of their showcase spot at E3 this year. I’m led to believe that all the talk of Herd Immunity this pandemic is actually a reference to God Mode in Moo Lander and if that doesn’t help you walk on the sand then you lactose.
Moo Lander is vastly better than my jokes and is out in Spring 2022, but a playable demo is available over on Steam and I strongly urge you Moove over there and check it out.
Second on my list…
Sable – Shedworks
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UIWWEmacD2A
From Shedworks, a two man development team founded in a shed in North London. You play Sable, a young nomad girl. Guiding her from a third person perspective. This 3D puzzle/platformer has been on my radar and wish-listed by me for some time. Showcased as part of the Guerrilla Collective, it is a gorgeous looking game that makes you feel like the Mandalorian on your own land-speeder. Explore the remnants of ancient civilisations, glide, hover, leap your way to the treasures and answers and forge your path through a rite of passage in this strange, beautiful world. Sable promises to be a wonderous adventure when it is released later this year.
Third on my list of highlights is…
Severed Steel – Greylock Studios
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oqIJ2EOp5Xk
A supercool looking FPS, heavy on bullet time, stunts and neon, making it feel like the violent child of Superhot and Far Cry: Blood Dragon. The development team of Greylock studio describe the game as stylised gun violence and bloodshed. It oozes pace and action against a glossy cyberpunk, Matrix-like backdrop. It does not yet have an official release date, but given it was included in this years’ Guerrilla Collective during E3 you can expect to somersault onto your monitor and double tap you in the eyeballs sometime in the next year.
Fourth up is…
GRIME – Cloverlite
A Metroidvania, Souls-like platformer from Clover Bite, due to be released from the ever reliable Akupara Games. You are the product of some form of vacuum collapse in a side-scrolling adventure where you explore your surroundings, meet interesting creatures and destroy them, absorbing their powers to grow with each victory. Surreal, beautiful and with options to vary your playstyle through skill-tree choices – Grime drops later this year and promises to be an action/RPG combat fest. So eyes peeled for this dark fantasy.
Last up on my list is the wonderful…
Last Stop – Variable State
Set in London this is a third person adventure where you play as three different characters all set on a super-natural collision course. Developed by Variable State, who won a BAFTA for the FBI adventure – Virginia in 2016. An unexpected body swap, a game of amateur detective that goes wrong and an ex-spy trying to save her family from the threats of a blackmailer. Last Stop promises to be a rich story of adventure and intrigue. Find out what connects these characters in July, when you can board this ride of discovery.
Be sure to check out Jeff Nabor’s top five from E3, they are completely different to mine, but just as awesome looking.
We use cookies on our website to give you the most relevant experience by remembering your preferences and repeat visits. By clicking “Accept”, you consent to the use of ALL the cookies.
This website uses cookies to improve your experience while you navigate through the website. Out of these, the cookies that are categorized as necessary are stored on your browser as they are essential for the working of basic functionalities of the website. We also use third-party cookies that help us analyze and understand how you use this website. These cookies will be stored in your browser only with your consent. You also have the option to opt-out of these cookies. But opting out of some of these cookies may affect your browsing experience.
Necessary cookies are absolutely essential for the website to function properly. These cookies ensure basic functionalities and security features of the website, anonymously.
Cookie
Duration
Description
cookielawinfo-checkbox-analytics
11 months
This cookie is set by GDPR Cookie Consent plugin. The cookie is used to store the user consent for the cookies in the category "Analytics".
cookielawinfo-checkbox-functional
11 months
The cookie is set by GDPR cookie consent to record the user consent for the cookies in the category "Functional".
cookielawinfo-checkbox-necessary
11 months
This cookie is set by GDPR Cookie Consent plugin. The cookies is used to store the user consent for the cookies in the category "Necessary".
cookielawinfo-checkbox-others
11 months
This cookie is set by GDPR Cookie Consent plugin. The cookie is used to store the user consent for the cookies in the category "Other.
cookielawinfo-checkbox-performance
11 months
This cookie is set by GDPR Cookie Consent plugin. The cookie is used to store the user consent for the cookies in the category "Performance".
viewed_cookie_policy
11 months
The cookie is set by the GDPR Cookie Consent plugin and is used to store whether or not user has consented to the use of cookies. It does not store any personal data.
Functional cookies help to perform certain functionalities like sharing the content of the website on social media platforms, collect feedbacks, and other third-party features.
Performance cookies are used to understand and analyze the key performance indexes of the website which helps in delivering a better user experience for the visitors.
Analytical cookies are used to understand how visitors interact with the website. These cookies help provide information on metrics the number of visitors, bounce rate, traffic source, etc.
Advertisement cookies are used to provide visitors with relevant ads and marketing campaigns. These cookies track visitors across websites and collect information to provide customized ads.
