Favorite "Indie" Games

[hEad]

Man, loads of suggestions! Legends!

Starchamber has caught my interest. Card mechanics in a game work really well - I often muse about a Dominions CCG, I think it could be a winner.

Baalz, you mention a couple of the Dom characters play, any one in particular? I checked it out but couldn't really find out much info on price and what sort of investment you have to make. All the same, I'm tempted.

I would love to be able to get in to Dwarf Fortress, the premise sounds great and enough people rave about it, but I just glaze over when I stare at the screen. It seems like a series of impenetrable menus and I don't know where to start.

I have Peoples General WW2; it’s a great bit of free work. I quite liked the Panzer General series and thought PG2 and Peoples General were nice tidy games.

Westnoth is another of those generous contributions. The Dev's must put a crap load of elbow grease and love in to this game - sure they a writing the game they always wanted to play, but its fantastic to be invited along for the ride!

I used to regularly pillage the underdogs site even way back before its last site redesign. (Remember in the early days of the net explosion, the classic web site designs, clunky presentation and lots of blue screens and flashing borders?) It was an Amiga game I used to love called the Chaos Engine, that led me to the underdogs originally but finding 4D Boxing, Balance of Power and CIV Net, kept me checking in regularly. Ah nostalgia.

Has any one played Armageddon Empires? I really enjoy this one. Took me a bit to get into it, but once I did it hooked me good for a couple of months. Looking forward to the new one, Solium Infernum.

http://www.crypticcomet.com/games/SI..._Infernum.html

There are a lot of suggestions here. VGA Planets 4 (attack of the pods from outer space… nice!) looks dangerous – looks like every bit the egg game that Dominions is. These games take over your life; how is it possible to have more than one of them in your head at a time? Dominions distracts me enough!

Urban dead looks cool as well – Zombies! why do we love them so much?

Now scrabble with hammers! Wouldn’t mind a couple of hammers on hand when I play a game of scrabble against my wife and her various scrabbly friends. Not a great fan of the game, but with hammers…

[the Vanishag]

Originally Posted by hEad

Has any one played Armageddon Empires? I really enjoy this one. Took me a bit to get into it, but once I did it hooked me good for a couple of months. Looking forward to the new one, Solium Infernum.

Here's one "aye" for Armageddon Empires, as well as for Peacemaker (I just wish it was a bit more micromanagey: one "initiative" per turn feels so limiting) and Iji. These are all great games, even though few of them approach the the scale or scope of Dom 3.

I should totally get VGA planets, but if I did so now, I'd never finish my dissertation.

Here's to indie gaming.

[Baalz]

Originally Posted by hEad

Starchamber has caught my interest. Card mechanics in a game work really well - I often muse about a Dominions CCG, I think it could be a winner.

Baalz, you mention a couple of the Dom characters play, any one in particular? I checked it out but couldn't really find out much info on price and what sort of investment you have to make. All the same, I'm tempted.

Iron Hawk, Quantum Mechani and I had a threeway. In Starchamber you perv. I've seen two or three others from this forum on SC, here's a thread with people talking about it specifically: http://forum.shrapnelgames.com/showt...t=star+chamber

The community there is pretty nice, they'll give you all the "common" cards you want, so you can get a lot of game out of the $10 minimum purchase. I've spent probably $50 buying cards and have played over a hundred hours, so it's been a good investment for me.

Originally Posted by hEad

Has any one played Armageddon Empires? I really enjoy this one. Took me a bit to get into it, but once I did it hooked me good for a couple of months. Looking forward to the new one, Solium Infernum.

AE is a lot of fun, but it really wants a MP aspect. I found it hard to play it against the AI more than a dozen times. All that potential sneaky strategy and nobody to hamstring but a computer...

[hEad]

Originally Posted by Baalz

AE is a lot of fun, but it really wants a MP aspect. I found it hard to play it against the AI more than a dozen times. All that potential sneaky strategy and nobody to hamstring but a computer...

Yep, my only beef with it now. The new one is MP so there is hope. I find the subject matter a tad dark though. I keep recalling that Nietzsche quote - "Battle not with monsters, lest ye become a monster, and if you gaze into the abyss, the abyss gazes also into you."

Odd when I have no quibble sacrificing virgins for a devil or two. Its funny though, it did take me a while to be comfortable playing a blood nation in Dom - sensibilities eh? They turn on and turn off!

[capnq]

Originally Posted by hEad

I find the subject matter a tad dark though. I keep recalling that Nietzsche quote - "Battle not with monsters, lest ye become a monster, and if you gaze into the abyss, the abyss gazes also into you."

The first half of that, while widely quoted, is a rather poor translation.

In the original German:
"Wer mit Ungeheuern kämpft, mag zusehn, dass er nicht dabei zum Ungeheuer wird. Und wenn du lange in einen Abgrund blickst, blickt der Abgrund auch in dich hinein."

A better translation to English:
"He who fights monsters should look to it that he himself does not become a monster. And when you gaze long into an abyss, the abyss gazes also into you." -- Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche

[hEad]

Originally Posted by capnq

The first half of that, while widely quoted, is a rather poor translation.

In the original German:
"Wer mit Ungeheuern kämpft, mag zusehn, dass er nicht dabei zum Ungeheuer wird. Und wenn du lange in einen Abgrund blickst, blickt der Abgrund auch in dich hinein."

A better translation to English:
"He who fights monsters should look to it that he himself does not become a monster. And when you gaze long into an abyss, the abyss gazes also into you." -- Friedrich Wilhelm Nietzsche

I don't really see any differences between the two versions of the quote except that one takes 30 words to say it and the other 23?

[Ishamoridin]

Originally Posted by hEad

I don't really see any differences between the two versions of the quote except that one takes 30 words to say it and the other 23?

The difference, as I see it, is that the first translation precludes battling with monsters on the premise that you will become one, while the second merely warns of the danger that this might happen.

[hEad]

Originally Posted by Ishamoridin

The difference, as I see it, is that the first translation precludes battling with monsters on the premise that you will become one, while the second merely warns of the danger that this might happen.

There is no immutable truth in the word lest from the first definition. Indulging the activities of monsters raises the possibility of becoming one yet, it would be the capacities of the individual not the activity itself, which would finally decide who would become a monster and who wouldn't.

What I perceive both quotes to be clearly saying is that if you don't want to face the possibility of becoming a monster, don't play with them.

Both definitions say this, to me at least, by implication - one just says it with less words.


Welcome to the forum by the way.

I dug out my old Imperialism disk and gave it a whirl for old times sake - 4 hours went by, be great if someone would remake these games.