Real Game Online

Title: Consortium: The Tower
Developer: Interdimensional Games Inc
Platforms: PC, PS4, Xbox One
Releasing late 2017
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The ultimate single player first-person immersive sim. Explore, talk, fight or sneak through The Churchill Tower in 2042

The immersive sim. It's a small subgenre of games, an eclectic mix of themes and gameplay all bound by a goal of letting you role-play as a character in believable reactive worlds that mold to your choices and actions. Deus Ex, STALKER, Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines, a few others, but perhaps most recently, Consortium. An ambitious sci-fi game set in the confines of a single plane, yet feeling like an expansive experience thanks to the depth of its narrative, relationships, and gameplay freedom.

Now developer IDGI is back with Consortium: The Tower, an even more ambitious sequel that takes what worked in the first game and evolving those elements on an impressive scale and scope.
Consortium: The Tower takes place in a near-future London, in the massive Churchill Tower, now controlled by a mysterious terrorist faction. You play as Bishop Six, an agent of the titular organization, on a mission to observe, report, and handle the situation. How you accomplish those goals are up to you. The tower is home to a whole array of different groups -  terrorists, police, civilians, Consortium and other more enigmatic individuals - each with their plans and agendas. You can sky-dive to flank enemies from above and unleash devastating firepower, cloak and sneak through unseen, explore the tower for better routes and hack into terminals for useful data and hidden secrets.

But Consortium wouldn't be an immersive sim if it doesn't offer choices beyond the shooting and sneaking. The spoken word here is as powerful as any weapon or piece of technology; in fact, it'll be possible to be complete a playthrough without firing a shot. Find yourself in a tense standoff with an enemy squad and you can press the talk button (that lets you engage in conversation anytime, anywhere), throw down your gun to defuse the tension, and convince the group that you're not a threat or even to fight alongside you.

Going further than that, disobey your orders, go against the Consortium's wishes, and you're be disavowed by the agency. In another game, that would be a game over, but here, The Tower continues along, except now you're a rogue agent. That status may make you very valuable to other factions and individuals in the game.
While the game is already ambitious, the developers have even bigger plans if budget allows. Their vision for The Tower is one of a nearly fully-explorable environment, with areas ranging from malls and apartments to museums and industrial areas, essentially what you'd imagine an actual skyscraper of this magnitude would contain.

Consortium: The Tower is expected to release late next year and is currently seeking funds on Kickstarter. You can learn about the game here.

Title: The Last Shore
Developer: Pulpo Games
Platforms: PC, Mac
Releasing mid 2016
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A girl must sail across the ocean, visiting islands and collecting powerful artifacts, to confront the gods and save her family

Inspired by games like Zelda, Shadow of the Colossus, and Proteus, The Last Shore is an adventure across an ocean fraught with monsters and mysteries. Wielding blade and bow, you guide a young woman on a seafaring journey to defeat the gods.

The Last Shore drops you in a vast randomized sea, filled with islands, towns, dungeons, and other locations. From vine-choked temples to towering mountains, each island is unique, offering dungeons, monsters, puzzles to solve, or items to gather. The sea is just as varied, featuring both calm waters and massive underwater monsters to avoid during your travels. Sailing across the ocean is a mechanic to be explored and mastered.
To face the gods and other beasts, you'll be able to equip powerful weapons, from the bow of Artemis to a sword of light found deep within Ares' volcano. Combat looks to be fast and focused on deft evasion and precisely timed attacks.

Text is sparse in The Last Shore's tale of adventure and adversity. Instead, its narrative is told through the environment, animations and music, and the game's vibrant pixel art.
The Last Shore is slated for a mid-2016 release and is currently seeking funds on Kickstarter. You can learn more about the game here.

Title: Song of Horror
Developer: Protocol Games
Platforms: PC, Mac, Linux, PS4, Xbox One
Releasing 2017
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Story-driven third person survival horror

Developer Protocol Games first revealed Song of Horror earlier this year. Unfortunately, their first attempt on Kickstarter failed, but now the game is back, Greenlit on Steam and slated for consoles, and looking even more terrifying.

Song of Horror is a survival horror game that promises to blend the old-school fixed angle horror of classic Resident Evil and Alone In The Dark with a modern approach. You control the fates of 16 characters, all haunted and stalked by an insidious eldritch Presence, a cast of normal men and women against an ancient cunning evil.
While the characters in Song of Horror are weaponless, they aren't defenseless. You can run, and hide, slow its advance, avoid its shadowy clutches by carefully watching and listening for clues, But if the Presence does kill you, the story isn't over. Similar to games like Heavy Rain and Until Dawn, Song of Horror features a narrative that molds around character deaths.

I was able to try out an early demo of the game, featuring the first chapter set in the Husher Mansion. (Each chapter takes place in a different location.) For a game that still at least two years away, Song of Horror already feels polished and promising. Don't expect many jump scares; the tension and dread here comes from knowing you're not alone; that you're being stalked by a force that can kill you in a moment anywhere anytime; that can't be stopped, only slowed and avoided. The experience is one of measured pacing, cautious careful exploration, and moments of desperate flight as you try to outrun and delay the Presence.
Song of Horror is currently seeking funds on Kickstarter, and is expected to release in mid 2017. You can learn more about the game here; the demo should be releasing publicly soon.

Just a short post for today, but there are a lot of interesting indie releases and projects on the horizon. The gorgeous hand-made adventure game Lumino City is releasing on iPad tonight and frenetic roguelite shooter Galak-Z is finally coming to Steam tomorrow, so you can definitely expect impressions of those soon.

In the meantime, here are some promising Kickstarters to watch, as well as a few games on Greenlight that might interest you:

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On Kickstarter

Doko Roko

Doko Roko is a 2D rogue-like, vertical action game with an emphasis on lightning-fast combat and rich atmosphere 

Collect strange and ancient magicks to do battle with the more hostile denizens of The Tower. Wield massive swords forged from meteorites and cursed earth to slay the many dreaming demons who climb the tower alongside you. A frenetic and responsive combat system that is easy to pick up, but difficult to master.

Wanderer

Wanderer tells the tale of a man called Rook, a greying convict who wakes from cold sleep aboard a massive orbital prison facility to find that it's crash landed on the ruins of an abandoned Earth. 

With the guidance of a hacker named Jin and the aid of a ragtag group of survivors he recruits along the way, Rook must locate and explore the nine cell blocks which have detached from the prison's central tower and scattered across Earth's ghostly wasteland.

Puzzle Depot

In Puzzle Depot, you start out as Todd Torial, Box Pusher 3rd Class, who's just been “volunteered” as a test subject for the facility's CryoFreeze program. When he wakes up, he finds the facility is in chaos. As you navigate your new, more dangerous world, you realize it's not just the facility that's fallen to ruin, but the entire planet.

On Greenlight

Cally's Cave 3

Join Cally and her friends in this action-packed run and gun platformer, conquering insane bosses, exploring to find secrets, and levelling up EVERYTHING. Use your weapons to level them up and evolve them into their ultimate forms! 

Unlock new character abilities like the Triple Jump, Dodge Roll and Water Wings. Use a second playable character, Bera to unleash crazy awesome ninja moves and solve challenging puzzles.

The Mooseman

The Mooseman is an atmospheric 2D adventure game set in the mysterious lands of Perm chud’ tribes. The player's avatar is the Mooseman; a mythological character from perm animal style objects, which we were greatly inspired by.

Intersection

InterSection is a spatially-challenging puzzle game based on manipulating two 2D planes aligned to your player in 3d space. You are linked to two worlds; the dying world of your people, and a young, green world. Use this link to connect these worlds and save your people.

Title: GRIP
Developer: Caged Element
Platforms: PC, PS4
Releasing late 2016
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Inspired by the classic Rollcage games, with a lethal mix of heavy weapons and ferocious speed, GRIP is a new breed of combat racer.

There's nothing quite like a good arcade racer. Burnout 3, Motorstorm, Need for Speed. More recently, the indie revival seen with Distance, Drift Stage, Power Drive, and others. The arcade racer is synonymous with high-speed action, over-the-top tracks, fun handling unmoored from realistic physics, and GRIP promises all that and more.
A spiritual successor to the PS1 Rollcage series, GRIP isn't concerned with realism. It's about combat racing at incredible speeds, taking out rivals with a vast array of weaponry and pick-ups ranging from missile barrages and railguns to manually-directed shields and EMPs. Across unique alien landscapes, your big-wheeled armored car can throttle up walls and ceilings with reckless abandon, evading obstacles, maneuvering around vehicles, and taking physics-defying shortcuts.

Other racers aren't the only targets for your powerful arsenal. The tracks, set in futuristic cities, alien jungles and sprawling deserts, feature destructible environments to crash through and obliterate. The chaotic high-speed action will be spread across a career mode, an arcade mode with numerous modifiers, and time trials. And if blowing up AI racers gets boring, you can blow up your friends in GRIP's local and online multiplayer modes.
GRIP is slated for potential release in late 2016, and is currently seeking funds on Kickstarter. You can learn more about the game on its website and Facebook/Twitter pages.

Title: XO
Developer: Jumpdrive Studios
Platforms: PC, Mac, Linux
Early 2016
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Command a ragtag fleet of starships to escape an unbeatable enemy and save what's left of humanity

Mankind faces a threat unlike any other: a faceless relentless armada that outclasses us in every way. This unstoppable enemy ravages across the galaxy, abducting humans for unknown purposes. As master tactician and commander aboard the lead battleship of a meager fleet, you must rescue your people and defeat this seemingly unbeatable foe.
Inspired by works such as Battlestar Galactica, The Lost Fleet, and FTL, XO offers strategic space fleet combat, driven by desperation and overwhelming odds. Forget negotiations or colonizing or empire-building; your only goal is survival and enduring long enough to gather your forces. Jumping from planet to planet to collect necessary resources like air and fuel, rescuing disabling ships to add to your fleet, and dealing with the stress and tough decisions of being a leader fighting a war of attrition. You will face mutinies and rebelling generals, will need to make sacrifices, and keep your people strong and focused, if you want to save humanity.

XO's combat occurs on a 2D plane, where you set waypoints and select targets in real time. Time is an important factor in battle; using an ETA slider, you can designate units to flank enemy vessels at the same time from multiple angles, or have your forces attack in waves, among myriad other strategies. The game's vector-art aesthetic turns each encounter into a vibrant spectacle of fleet-to-fleet combat: enemy vessels releasing swarms of fighters and massive harvesters clamping onto disabled ships to extract humans, as your fleet retaliates with point defense cannons, particle accelerators, and defensive sandcasters.
One of the most fascinating aspects of XO is the developer's hard sci-fi approach to every aspect of the game, from ship design to combat. Momentum and physics must be taken into account while setting waypoints. Collecting resources requires you to send diveships to gather fuel from gas giants or water and air from habitable worlds. Planets are procedurally-generated based on their location in a solar system, so distance from a sun determines if a planet is frozen over or a barren molten rock. Even the ship design and weapons tie into this realistic approach: your battleship's large radiator fins at its rear are there to shed heat waste generated by powerful laser cannons.
More information on XO's development and gameplay can be found on the developer's blog; XO is currently seeking funding on Kickstarter, and votes on Steam Greenlight.

Hello, readers! Just wanted to give you a heads-up that I'll be away on vacation for the rest of the month so the article output for July is going to be less frequent. But don't worry; I'm bringing my laptop with me, so expect impressions of Feist, as well as news on upcoming games, throughout the month.