Solve Unamusement: Small BIG GAMEs (NetHack, Transcendence, Anacreon)

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The Dudel Journal

Small BIG GAMEs (NetHack, Transcendence, Anacreon)



This post was originally only going to contain one game until yesterday at about 3:00 AM. At that time I finally played a couple of games that were suggested by a reader, Lur. Both are good in their own rights but out of the two, I am of his opinion. Each of these games are great for some quick and (optionally) time consuming fun. Let us start with the game this post was originally intended, NetHack.

NetHack

A fantasy game old school dungeon crawler just begging to be explored.

This a game that is asking you to have fun at not "being good". This I happy to say is a good thing. I am sure NetHack gets a lot of noise and conflict from "haters" for some of its ways but roguelikes are generally supposed to play as NetHack does. One of my personal favorite parts about NetHack is how I've yet to go very far or even accomplish more then die within the game and yet still have managed to find, learn, discover and do "new things" within each play.

While it is almost impossible to proceed in the game without "cheating", at least from what I have heard, I do feel that would void the point of playing. As I said, NetHack's point of being played is to find these things yourself.

One problem with NetHack will be my problems with all three games so I shall say it here and now. The controls are annoying and/or confusing and the graphics are poor. The latter can be given pass but a small bit of explanation while playing would have benefited each game. Actually, one of the games does do this but its controls are still rather "wonky".

Another problem which two of the games share, NetHack and Anacreon, is lacking in customization of interface. I believe NeckHack's core file can be altered to store and change such settings but, in general, the interface on these two is ugly. They are not difficult, with being somewhat similar to either an emulator program or simple DOS command menu, but still ugly and not fun to deal with.

Anacreon

The only thing I have to say about this is that I hope those who play enjoy chess on a galactic scale. My first impression of this game was "RTS" but there is no "RT" about it. The game allows for a lot of "options for win", provided you can actually win or know what you are doing. Without reading instructions, as I'm an American and that's how we do things, it took about forty minutes to fully figure out the game.

Personally, I am no fan of menu diving and this one is moderately guilty of that. In my honest opinion, there isn't much to this game unless you are in love with chess and the thought of conquering the galaxy with an iron... trade route.

Transcendence

Agreeing with the suggester, this game is rather awesome. Flying a ship of your choice, you are on a fantasy like quest to get a artifact, or something, to please your deity/god and get into this games version of "heaven". You destroy enemy ships, when/if you find them, and loot the remains. Basically its NetHack except a lot prettier while not "sharing the difficulty". It does describe it self as half NetHack so if you like that game you will at least half like this one.

This is a game that would be great if not for the fact that it is, basically, a demo. As the game stands there is not much to do, only one level, and the world is rather empty. Its a lot of fun but more needs to be there before it can really be played.


All of these games are freeware.
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4 Replies:

Lur said...

I'm sorry but from what you said about there being only one level in Transcendence it seems to me you didn't find the gate(inner most planet/asteroid cluster)... there's different systems you can go to, The first one is just a tutorial of sorts.

There are mods for the game but i never got into them, there's some for more playable ships, harder enemys, more weapons, there's even one for more then one gate per system its supposed to turn the gates into a sort of honeycomb pattern.

Dudel said...

I did not count individual galaxies as different "levels". It all seemed rather like the same area only REALLY stretched out.

I'd not call them different levels as each "area" doesn't have enough stuff in them to qualify as a level to begin with.

Lur said...

Oh well that makes sense, but in that case there are other levels. I would say level one ends about when you get to the pirate home system.

=) you'll know when you get there.

Dudel said...

Ah-ha! In that case the levels appear long from my own perspective.

 
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