In a world where the novos gamo developer is becoming ever more present in the minds of the PC gamer, in no small part to the new emphasis blogs such as ourselves place on the indie scene,  there seems to be a rising divide between the “old” and “new”. While the hoi-polloi steadily build themselves a niche in the market, the gaming oligarchs have been out there doing their thing for decades now. Over these years, the veritable aristocracy of gaming has built up a remarkable set of development houses, often marriages between various gaming studios. Check Your HUD has put together an illuminating (albeit incomplete) diagram illustrating just where all that blue blood flows.

Of course, being an unashamed Valvophile, my first reaction was “What the shit? Where the hell is Valve!” However, when you take a look at it, the sheer scale of such a task of working out just where all these developments studios come from is a massive one. There’s huge amounts of interelationship between the various developers, and it would seem half the battle is finding a big enough monitor to fit it all on.

Above all, the biggest thing I’ve noticed from it, is just how big both EA and Activision/Blizzard are these days: And how they represent the video-game equivalent of the music industry’s labels. EA alone has 35 development studios. The complex workings of the Actizard merge are displayed in all their convoluted glory, and it seems on there that it’s very much a tangled mess of different financial power houses. I would guess myself that the structure will probably balance itself out: all the various subdivisions will likely have a vested interest in working their way up the mishapen ladder, with any luck giving us some excellent games as they try to out-do each other – we can hope.

The diagram’s a work in progress at the moment though at the moment, so any further discussion should probably wait till then, we’ll try to keep tabs on it for you all. One final thought is, they really could have done with a way of defining the publishers from the developers on there.

Dawn of War 2 multiplayer is an exercise in frustration, while at the same time being incredibly compelling and simultaneously tense. It does a lot of small things right, and a few big things wrong, and some things are just a little too confusing. Like many RTS games, the singleplayer would seem to act as a tutorial for the multiplayer, and without that conditioning and slow understanding, the multiplayer is both overwhelming and wonderfully chaotic. Things happen, and you have no idea why or what to do to stop them. That, and you’re far too occupied watching your War Boss crush the exo-skeleton of some piece of tyranid scum.

Perhaps the most frustrating part of Dawn of War 2 is the fact that they’ve kept all the negatives of control points with none of the positives. You can no longer build defensive structures (except for some of the defensive heroes, but they cost so much as to be relatively useless anyway), so holding a strategic points (either Requisition or Power points) means leaving troops there, but Dawn of War 2 has streamlined itself so that you only really have a maximum of 7 or 8 units on the field at once. That’s not a lot of men to hold so many points. So, inevitably, the enemy starts to go for the ones you aren’t defending, and then you rush to stop them. Then they take the one you were just defending, and it all starts to get a little… tiring.

Company of Heroes did so many things right, and it’s obviously had an impact on Dawn of War 2. You have fewer units, and more micro management, but perhaps the best part of Company of Heroes, the need to link your strategic points all the way back to your base, has been done away with entirely, meaning that the enemy can easily just slip past your defensive line and start taking points. It confuses me why they wouldn’t take such a brilliant mechanic from one of their series to the other, when they’ve done so with so many other things.

I’m focusing on the negatives, but that’s only because there’s such potential for a really, really fun game here. The convoluted take and hold strategies serve as a distraction, meaning most fights boil down to a brawl at these points, with the enemy just sending one or two units at most each time. It becomes a game of skirmishes, not battles. And Warhammer is all about battles. The only time you truly get to see the full might of your army is when you destroy the enemy base, but by the time you’ve got there the enemy is usually so weakened it can’t put up much resistance.

Relic have said they wanted to streamline the multiplayer mode, giving quick, 15 minute matches that give instant gratification. Perhaps that’s why there is no need to link points back to your base, and why it encourages sending out constant, small forces at the enemy. I think the problem I have with playing the game is the need for minute micro-management. I’m rather bad at controlling more than one unit at a time, so inevitably I just send different units at enemies, then select the hero unit and focus all my attention on making sure he can kill as much as possible. This makes me lose very often.

That’s ok, though, because losing is almost as fun as winning. I still get to see my troops mash away at the enemy. I still get to see my War Boss crushing Tyranids, it’s just he ends up dying at the end. There is a certain cinematic quality to Dawn of War 2 that makes any outcome fun to watch. The micro-management does work if you don’t get bogged down in the fights, and when you pull off a clever strategy it’s incredibly satisfying. When you hold enough of the points your resource stream means you can churn out units absurdly fast, making the enemy struggle rewardingly. And having just the one base unit is a lovely change. I just wish they’d make it even more simplified; they’ve done away with a considerable amount of the faffing involved in building a base, but kept just a few annoyances that become glaring flaws without the bonuses of it.

Maybe I was just hoping for Company of Heroes set in the Warhammer universe. If that’s what you’re looking for in DoW 2 then you’re going to be disappointed. There is a good deal of tactics required, but at the same time you can enjoy the game even if you’re not at all good at it. Just make sure you’re playing with friends rather than struggling against the freakishly perfect random internet goers.

I feel I haven’t focused enough on the positive here, because there really are many. The Tyranids are satisfyingly grotesque, and the carnifex in particular is a glory to watch. The upgrades system lends the ability to customise your units sufficiently that you feel like it’s not just building up an army and winning through pure numbers. The hero units in particular are particularly satisfying to upgrade, as you can really create a very specific toolset that definitely affects the end product. It’s a shame there are only a few really outstanding upgrades though, as most are merely add damage, add health or add armour. But that’s just nit picking.

There is enough of Dawn of War in here to satisfy fans of the series, and there is enough Company of Heroes to make the multiplayer thoroughly enjoyable, if extremely frustrating at times. The fact that I’m still wanting to play it despite it’s few grating flaws is testament to the compelling nature of it. Or maybe that’s just a testament to my love of big green men who shout ‘Daka daka daka daka’ while shooting a very big, and very unstable, gun.

Oh, and Relic; please do away with unskippable cutscenes/Logos. They are driving me nuts.

Flashbang Studios, the genius/mad minds behind the classic Velociraptor Off road Safari, Jet Pack Brontosaurus and Minotaur China Shop have released the first test footage of their new game, apparently inspired by Flight404′s rather brilliant video for their song ‘Relentless, The REV‘, and it’s looking very interesting. It’s certainly tapping into the ambient feel of Jetpack Brontosaurus and hopefully it’ll fiddle with some of the gameplay-as-music things that the Flight404 video hints at. It’s certainly starting to branch off into it’s own sub-genre that’s producing some rather lovely little games.

Apparently the game has a simple mechanic; kill enemies and steal their powers. That, coupled with the somewhat underwater feel of the video certainly puts one in mind of the cell stage of Spore, arguably the best part of the game. Of course, that and Osmos, which it shares some visual stylings with. The game is apparently going to be released on the 1st of March, and, judging by the games they’ve released in the past, it should be really rather good.

Blush (First Test Footage) from Flashbang Studios on Vimeo.

The first screenshots of the Spore expansion, Galactic Adventures, have arisen from an event last night held by Maxis. Along with that, Kotaku have done a series of impressions on what the expansion is going to contain. I have to say, it’s all going in a very unexpected direction; MMO type quests using the (dreary) creature stage as a basis? I hope it’s a little more deep than that, but at the moment it sounds like the most uninspired part of the expansion. There is, however, the option to utterly build a planet from the ground up, which was some of the strongest parts of the original game. The problem was merely not having the tools at your disposal. Hopefully this will be entirely different, instead giving you full freedom before you begin.

There also seems to be a startling amount of city building that was somewhat lacking from the original, especially the somewhat strange maze shot. Are we going to be able to create Sims-esque traps of death to slowly starve and tire our creatures to death? I do hope so, as it’s the perfect punishment for when they wet themselves. Not that Spore creatures have bladders, but I’m sure there’s an equivalent menial task they can fail at.

No word yet about reducing the annoyance of the space stage, but if they don’t, I’d be very surprised, as it’s the biggest weakness of the game so far. They’ve also announced Creature Keeper, a game which sounds essentially like Nintendogs but with Spore creatures. Presumably for children, but we’re sure there are plenty of soft on the inside, hard on the outside gamers who’d just love to interact a little more with their creations. Am I right?

Galactic Adventures is set to be released in the spring, but hasn’t been given a solid release date yet. Keeps your eyes (or eye) and ears (however many of them you have) open. Apologies for the awful pun.

I’ve got a bit of history with EyeMaze, and the Grow series of games. Not really personal history, but I started playing them years and years ago, while I was still a not too spotty, freakishly tall 13 year old, and flash games were pretty much the only thing the school computers would let us play, or even be able to run. So now that he’s released a new one, Grow Tower, I’m clinging to it like the Spikey Goo Ball. It’s another wonderful little game that revolves around placing a certain set of things in a certain order to achieve the maximum growth, in this case directly upwards. Even if you don’t get it perfectly right, it’s still very visually satisfying. You can play it here.

More roBurky! Yes! This time we apply 4X magnification to his game wot dus involve space – Reset.

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After my post about The Hitler Problem got linked a few times further than I’d anticipated, and those who wrote about it were forced to use ‘The Poisoned Sponge’ as an author, I’ve decided it’s time to switch it around. I’m now writing under Phill Cameron, but I’ll keep The Poisoned Sponge as a moniker to use in Steam and the like. My blog will stay the same, and I hope you won’t all get too confused.

The winners of the IGF Student Showcase have been announced, giving a shortlist of 10 games from which the Best Student Game will be picked. There is a bit of crossover, with Feist making another appearance, as well as a few I didn’t even know were student efforts, like Tag (which I covered here). Those which are currently available I’ll run through in the next few weeks, but till then the names of the games, and the links to their websites, are below.

IGF Student Showcase Winners:

City Rain – Building Sustainability
The Colour of Doom
Dish Washington
Feist
Kid: The World Saver
Tag: The Power of Paint
The Unfinished Swan
Where is My Heart?
Winds of Orbis
Zeit