New Character Creator

Vegeto’s Bones shows its Fungus Side. Our new plug-in just might have the vaccine for Spores! We expect a miraculous immune response.

Vegeto's Bones

by Geek Woman of WomenGamers.com

Disney's Pirates of the Caribbean Online doesn't have the sharpest looking graphics or the most interesting missions you'll ever play. What they are going for with this title is as casual interest MMO. With the millions of fans of the movie IP and the millions of DVD's sold it was a pretty sure thing for Disney to poop out this game and expect to make a bundle. Even with its offered free-to-play mode, you can be sure that there is revenue coming in or they wouldn't have made a business model like this one.

by Sean Nicholls

As I noted in Screen Play last year, one of the most frequent criticisms of games is that they can be repetitive.

Yet in some games, rather than a tedious bore, repetition can help get the player into a wonderful trance-like rhythm and can be very relaxing and pleasurable.

By Clive Thompson

Something quite interesting happens in the first few minutes of Ninja Gaiden II: The dead people don't vanish.

About five minutes into the game, I finished my first battle, and it was a grisly spectacle of carnage. I'd killed about seven guys, and their corpses lay scattered about. Then I went around the corner to save my progress at the "sacred statue."

By Screen Digest

Screen Digest analyst Piers Harding-Rolls discusses the ranks of young girl gamers that have prompted growth in the handheld and online gaming markets.

Teens and pre-teens or ‘tweens’ (eight to 12-year-olds) have always had an important role in consuming gaming media, from the very first arcade cabinets and home entertainment systems in the ’70s and ’80s, through to the Nintendo and Sega consoles of the ’90s and more recently the Game Boy and its later iterations.

Posted by Gamakarmica, on Gamespot

The release of Grand Theft Auto IV has brought on all sorts of comments of the status of gaming at this time. "The revolutionary game that will change videogaming forever" is one of them, while others have been calling it "The Godfather" of gaming. So many outlets are ready to pinhole this game as the next coming to bring games to the mainstream as a permanent foothold.

This fellow has compiled a lot of the info you'll need if you'd like to contact the Sci-Fi channel about the pending cancellation of Stargate SG-1. You can write, email or call with his collection of contacts.

The future of Stargate is in question today, as SCI FI Channel has cancelled the long-running Stargate SG-1, Multichannel News reported today and a GateWorld source has confirmed. The news regrettably follows the airing of the show's milestone two-hundredth episode on Friday.

The makers of the documentary offer a free, Creative Commons licensed .torrent download of their film, Done The Impossible which is also being released on DVD. Must see for all the Firefly/Serenity fans.

I had an intense conversation with my best friend about our search for the perfect roleplaying system. He’s very into game mechanics, and I’ve been thinking I’m more of a narrativist. I’m not.

Roleplaying Tips Weekly E-Zine Issue #304 - Take Ten: Balance is now online. This weeks issue discusses the skill 'Balance', and includes Readers Tips such as How To End A Session and Gummi Corpses.

So you want to run a Play-by-Post RPG?
-Part 2- "Keep it Simple, Stupid"

You may want to get really fancy with storylines and add a whole slew of different genres and influences to game-play, but you need to think small. Don’t bite off more than you can chew, and don’t let you eyes become bigger than your belly. It’s alright to have ambitions, that’s what’s keeping this type of play going, whereas Play-by-chat hasn’t had a facelift in some time, and it’s starting lose popularity over types of play that allow more room for thought and ‘thinking ahead’ instead of constant flaming in a chat room (Play-by-chat isn’t all bad though). Start with a really basic concept, easy rules, easy character creation and a quick transition into game-play. The goal is after a person signs up they need to be able to make a character and ideally be playing same-day. If not you could lose potential new members. This is usually where Play-by-post games die, they don’t get started. There are a lot of good ideas for games floating around out there; the problem is there aren’t enough players to go around –even if you’re doubling up.

Roleplaying Tips issue #299 has been posted online.

This issue contains 150 benign encounters for your campaign, including things like emptied chamber pots, pesty children, street performers, angry customers . . .

It's part of my job as senior editor at the Gateway to check all of the links in my categories periodically. One of the main reasons we do this is because so many sites disappear, and I've noticed lately is that the worst offender of disappearing sites is the PBP or forum based game. On an average, they last 6 months, and many owners give up after only two months.

A PBP is very enticing. You've got a great idea for a game and you want to share it - a forum board is readily available, and the price is right - free! So you set up the board; fiddle with the layout, add some forums and a few topics, maybe list your site at the Gateway, and sit back and wait for members, right? Wrong. They aren't coming - at least, not right away.

Kikizo Games had conducted an interview with John Carmack. There is a lot of talk about console platforms like Revolution DS and more. Here's one very interesting excerpt:

Kikizo: What's next for id after the new Wolfenstein?

Carmack: We are working internally on a completely new project, but we haven't made any firm plans yet for the future of the Wolf, Doom and Quake franchises.

Read the whole article here: http://games.kikizo.com/features/id_johncarmack_interview_jan05.asp