Give me back my taco!

Fans of Beyond Good & Evil who were outraged by Ubisoft’s failure to market this great game can finally rejoice as it’s creator Michel Ancel and the Montpellier studio have gotten their comeuppance. Apparantely while making three gianormous movies simultaneously, Peter Jackson had time to play BG&E. I guess Kiwis only need three hours of sleep a night to function. It became one of his favorite games and when it came time to start production on the King Kong movie tie-in, he hand picked Michel Ancel to direct the game. It’s nice to see good things happen to people who deserve it regardless of how financially successful they might have been in the past. This powerhouse teaming of Ancel and Jackson along with a surefire license is destined to be a big seller which means if Ancel delivers the goods, he can pretty much write his own ticket for his next project (come on BG&E 2!!)

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John Harvey, you are now a oh, um, let’s see…how about a Level III Sex Offender?

The competition for shortest post is fierce this week, but I think AJ may have won it with his Thursday article. It is comprised of no words and only a 1×1px graphic. Congratulations AJ, you bested us all. Although I’m already conceding defeat, I’ll still throw my entry into the ring.

If you’re a fan of movies like Sneakers and Hackers, however flawed they may be, then this overlooked gem is the game for you. Welcome to Uplink: Hacker Elite, where you take on a series of missions for the Uplink Corporation; hacking into servers, forging databases entries, transferring money in and out of bank accounts, and even messing with the stock exchange. As you complete missions, you earn credits that allow you to buy better software and hardware to help you get around the stronger security measures and rival hackers. You will have to route your attempt through a series of servers around the world as you sneak in, do your deed, get out, and cover your tracks before the authorites can complete the trace. It is a nerve-wracking experience to be sure, especially considering that the Save system is poor at best, constantly overwriting and autosaving. If you fuck up and get caught, there is no previous savegame to reload…live with the consequences. The graphics are minimal, but this contributes amazingly to the palpable sensation that you are actually doing this stuff.

I don’t care how knowledgable you consider yourself or how unrealistic this game actually is….I dare you to play this without glancing at the activity light on your router or NIC from time to time, just to be sure. Check it out. Oh, and if you’ll draw your attention to the bottom left of that page, this is the same company that went on to make Darwinia.

Too many secrets

I’ve been playing a lot of shooter and role-playing games recently and I have become a little jaded with these genres. In the mood for something I’d never tried before, I picked up a copy of Silent Hunter 3 from Ubisoft. This simulator puts you behind the wheel of a German U-boat during World War II. The thought of a historical submarine simulator pleased me, although this may be due to one too many viewings of “Das Boot“. However, this has been a bad week for gaming. My new boss has this ridiculous “I’d like to see you more than twice a year” policy and it’s been making gaming difficult.

Instead of gaming, I’ve been putting some historical perspective on submarine warfare by reading “Ten Years and Twenty Days,” the World War II memoirs of Grand Admiral Karl Doenitz. Doenitz was the number three man in third reich Germany and the commander of the submarine arm of the German navy (and also the highest ranking Nazi to survive the war). Doenitz spent time in jail after WWII for war crimes committed by his submariners - crimes which are only marginally outside the boundaries of any war effort - but let’s face it, you don’t get to be Hitler’s hand-picked successor without being involved in some unpleasant shenanigans. It’s been an interesting read so far, most notably for it’s position that the British initiated naval warfare and that Germany was unculpable in that regard. It seems to be a common position for losers to take. I’ll let you know if I learn anything applicable to gaming soon.

I’ve been a bit under the weather the past few days so forgive me if I make this brief. I discovered this fun flash game: Submachine. Yes, I know it’s another "I’m stuck-in-a-room" game, but it’s quick fun. This game just came out a few weeks ago, and the game maker’s server has been hit with incredibly heavy traffic ever since. Check it out!

Remember trees?

Last week and through the weekend I took some much needed vacation time. The forest rangers of Baxter State Park in Maine have done an amazing job with the flora and water effects in their mountain range simulation. I saw trees with poly counts that must be in the millions. Ok I’ll let this joke end right here. So I didn’t get to do much gaming during this time with the exception of a few rounds of Rummy. But I have returned rejuvenated and ready to take on the ever-growing stack of game titles. I’d like to take this opportunity to remind all of our editors and readers to take advantage of the outdoors before winter (and EMB Winter Games 2005) takes hold. Happy gaming!

It’s with a sad heart that I hang up my hat here tonight at Eat My Bomb. Unfortunately, I’ve been a casualty in the war between competing obligations and the battle to fit everything that needs doing in a brief twenty-four hour time period every day. While Eat My Bomb continues to grow and become a top-notch place to read the skinny on video gaming, I’ve been pulled slowly away from gaming and writing about gaming. Things like work, preparing for graduate school, and other personal obligations have kept me from gaming in earnest and posting content here regularly for those who actually give a hoot about bargain-bin gaming. I don’t think it’s fair to the editors or the readers if I stick around like piece of dead weight.

In addition to hanging up my hat as a writer for Eat My Bomb, I’m also retiring from the awesome Eat My Bomb guild on the Eldre’thalas World of Warcraft server. While I’ll no longer be around to quest with the likes of Feodra, Hariseedz, and Brixtone, I’d be very appreciative if my Night Elf druid didn’t die an anonymous death because of my lack of time and energy to keep going. Adenadar is presently a level 46 druid, with maxed-out herbalism and he is less than fifty points away from reaching full mastery of alchemy and first aid. He comes equipped with a helluva clue stick for knocking sense into murlocs, trolls, and the occasional giant. If anyone is interested in taking over this character and continuing in the adventures of the Eat My Bomb guild, post a comment below or send a note to adenadar@aetherial.net.

So, while my contributions to EMB are at an end, I’ll wrap this up by saying that I’m still eagerly awaiting some reviews down the road. In no particular order, I’m interested in seeing the posts about “The Call of Cthulhu”, the EMB guild hitting level 60, and finding out which next generation consoles are THE shit and which ones are just shit.

So, goodbye all, and may you never forget the original Konami Contra code.

Ever since I played Chrono Trigger back in 1995 during the summer after my first year of college I have always proclaimed it to be one of my favorite games of all time. Recently I decided to revisit the game and test my affection for it by playing through a second time. So far the game continues to maintain it’s spot on my top five and has survived the last ten years of technical advances without losing a thing.

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