Amber

If you havn't read the first five books in the Roger Zelazny Amber series, I really recommend it. The books set up a universe that was made for roleplayers. Cosmic powers, forces of order and chaos, a complex and interesting history with powerful characters and infinite worlds in shadow (read the books).

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Asheron's Call

Asheron's call was at one time the only answer to Everquest's domination of the 3D persistant world. I bought it and played the free month as my interest in Everquest had gradually waned. This game has a very cool architecture for the outside world. No zones as you move across the island of Derreth, just a dynamically loading bubble that loads content iteratively based on where the players are actually spending their time. I ran my little archer from one end of the island to the other, moving seamlessly through a diverse range of landscapes and creatures (who were spawned before I arrived and released after I had left). Apparently this game also had the capability to modify terrain geometry while the game was live, a feature that was used during the many gm run events in the world. The frequency of gm events is part of the commitment Turbine have to an ongoing storyline that will actually affect the world that the players interact with. The one failing for the game was the quality of the player and monster models, the art was simply not up to scratch when you compared it to the stunning models in a game like Everquest. Still an awesome premise and a storyline that kept the faithful coming back made Asheron's Call an immersive experience.

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Everquest

At last the graphical mud has arrived. The MMORPG (massively multiplayer online rolepaying game) is taking over the world. I was totally addicted to this game for almost a year. A bit scary, but a hell of a lot of fun to play. All the people I worked with at the time played this game obsessively. We talked EQ, we dreamt EQ and we made friends in EQ. The first of many to come I think.

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Chronopia

"There is no way I will ever actually play one of these goddamn games, I am just painting the models" That is what I said when I started painting some table top gaming minatures with a friend at work. You can probably guess that I did eventually play one of those games and that game was Chronopia. Sitting round on a Sunday afternoon drinking beer (hrm ... reading this over I have noticed many of my gaming experiences involve beer) and playing a table top wargame is a lot of fun. Chronopia had a great, if somewhat depressing, background and an elegant, consistant combat system. Unfortunately later supplements to this game broke the balance that was there in the initial release. Since Target games has gone bust I guess I wont be playing this game again, but I have fond memories of it nevertheless.

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Crush Deluxe

My friends tell me that the table top fantasy football game Bloodbowl was some of the best gaming they had ever experienced. The fantasy football niche in the gaming comunity had high hopes for the computer version of this popular table top game. Unfortunely, their hopes were dashed when the disapointing computer version eventually came out. Stone Jackal Studios took the fantasy football concept and created something much better, Crush Deluxe. A simple premise, three teams search for a ball in 8 ball bins. Once the ball is found they struggle to carry it to the designated goal area. Players clash, are brutally injured and killed. Over time they gain experience and can learn new skills. Illegial equipment provides special abilities, but risk your player being sent off. A group of friends and I gather on Tuesday nights to play this simple yet compelling game. We may be the only people left in the world who still play, but we love it. Apparently someone who worked on Unreal loved it too, with the Slith monster and the kurgan skin (both races from the game) popping up in the first version of Unreal. I enjoy this game so much I reverse engineered the data format so we could get more stats than the basic ones that the game provides. The stats program I wrote can be downloaded here.

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