QCF: Avernum 2: Crystal Souls

ast summer our good friend from across the pond Stevie reviewed the title from Spiderweb Software entitled Avadon 2: The Corruption. After reading that review I had to appreciate what the developer was attempting to do, in a sense capturing the heyday of PC role playing games in a generation of gaming that has all but abandoned the old ways.

Now I find myself with the similar task of reviewing another sequel, Avernum 2: Crystal Souls. After almost thirty hours of playtime with the title I can echo similar sentiments from Stevie’s review, however what Avernum 2 lacks in presentation and mechanics it certainly makes up for in story and exploration.

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Ser Flash's Cheapskate Holidays

If you're like me, you're poor. You don't have enough cash to spread around as you'd like, and that often means, unfortunately, that games get the cut in favor of food, shelter or other essential commodities. But that doesn't mean you can't have hours of fun in front of your ten-dollar, 13" TV from the Salvation Army (or Goodwill, if you prefer.)

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QCF: The War of the Worlds (XBLA)

I'm not the kind of person that takes to licensed games too often. On the whole, I've not bought any movie games or games based on TV shows, as they have shown to be awful, lackluster cash-in shovelware. Of course, there are very few exceptions; Treasure's Astro Boy: Omega Factor was one of the best games on the Game Boy Advance, TDK Mediactive took Robotech: The MAcross Saga and made a pretty bitchin' side-story  in Robotech: Battlecry and Capcom somehow managed to make Disney's The Little Mermaid both hardcore and awesome. The only problem? Most other developers have sort of forgotten that quality games are actually what people want to spend thier hard earned money on, even if it's not an entirely original IP that they came up with themselves.

As such, I approached the retelling of HG Wells' War of the Worlds With a special brand of apprehension; if TV and movie conversions are generally so bad, just how will a book - from 1898 no less - actually fare?

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