The online blog of Simon Halliday
'I selected all, I charged, I failed' is just one of the many maxims I've had to learn playing real time strategy games since my first foray in to them in the early nineties. We've progressed a bit in the last twenty years from the old C&C style of 'how many mammoth tanks can I build … Continue reading Rome II
J.R.R. Tolkien never liked the idea of his books making the transition to the world of screen. You would hope then, that Peter Jackson's trilogy would have dissuaded him from this line of thinking. It breathed life in to an already well-loved set of books and fascinatingly detailed world through the entirely different medium of … Continue reading Middle Earth: Shadow of Mordor
Impressive The announcer's voice rings out like he's perpetually introducing a Michael Bay film. It would have probably given me a whiff of nostalgia too if it hadn't been used and reused so much over the years in various guises (people who make those annoying mods for Counter Strike being a prime example). Back in … Continue reading Quake Live
With the slew of modern games mostly revolving around beating ten tonnes of shite out of something, someone or even each other, it’s refreshing to know that we do have a few alternatives. The kind of games for those off-days where we feel like slipping in to a hypnotic coma and waking up to a … Continue reading Meditative Gaming
It's been a long time coming, but finally there is a sequel to Jagged Alliance 2. And I say sequel, when really I mean re-imagining. Jagged Alliance - Back in Action takes you back to the island of Arulco where the evil Queen Deidranna has imposed her tyrannical dictatorship on the local populace and it's … Continue reading Jagged Alliance – Back in Action
A few weeks back a friend of mine discovered that I dabble in EVE Online. I’m reluctant to use the word ‘play’ in this regard and would much rather use ‘dabble’. It seems these days that anyone using the word ‘play’ in regards to an MMO such as EVE or World of Warcraft is instantly stereotyped … Continue reading An Ode to EVE
I remember as a child reading a set of Ladybird Well-Loved Tales books that all came with an accompanying audio cassette. There were plenty in the series including The Three Little Pigs, Little Red Riding Hood and Jack and the Beanstalk, to name a few. There is quite a dark side to children’s fairy tales … Continue reading Amnesia: The Dark Descent
It's worth pointing out that this article was originally written in 2007 for an essay as part of my Computer Game Design degree at Teesside University, and so obviously it's a little dated now. Nonetheless, it's interesting to see where virtual economies have actually come since then. In 2006, a self-proclaimed investment banker walked away … Continue reading The Future of Virtual Economies and MMORPGs
An Invert Look 