Indie Review: Powder

I'm going to level with you: I don't particularly like RPGs. While I can totally appreciate why a lot of people love them, I've just never got on with sprawling story arcs, random battles, item collection and all of the other aspects one would generally associate with the genre. I'm also totally aware that there are many, many sub-genres within this particular channel of gaming and that to say I don't like RPGs is probably a little bit short sighted on my part. I mean, I really enjoyed Link's Awakening on the Game Boy and Ocarina of Time on the N64, have battled through all of the Mass Effect games and even got pretty far into Virtual Hydlide on the Saturn before the desire to vomit explosively enveloped me...but those aren't really the kinds of game I'm talking about.

I'm talking about learning spells, calculating hit points and wading through loads of text. Frankly, I just find traditional RPGs boring. That's just my (admittedly ignorant) opinion and I totally respect that people reading this may have just spat either cornflakes or a Pot Noodle (or both?) all over their computer or phone screen, but I haven't even attempted to play Skies of Arcadia yet because I just know what I'm going to get in that particular package; and I spent about 8 minutes playing Final Fantasy 7 before I removed it from my PlayStation and stuck Alien Trilogy back in. You can take a horse (me) to water (RPGs), but you can't make it drink (play them). Brackets were used in that last metaphor to clarify what I was trying to convey with my cack-handed grasp of wurds and stuff. Keeping that last sentence at the forefront of your cerebellum, allow me to explain that very recently I was made aware of a home brew roguelike RPG that has been ported to the Dreamcast and can be played using an SD Reader.

Powder started life as a Game Boy Advance project and is the brainchild of programmer Jeff Lait. Writing on the Powder website, Jeff explains that the game was borne out of his desire to play a roguelike RPG on his handheld:

"I created POWDER for one simple reason: I wanted a roguelike on my GBA. The standard RPGs were annoying me with endless battle screens against weak enemies to unfold a drug induced plotline. I wanted a game I could just jump into, and start killing things. Having had more hours than I'd care to log playing Nethack, ADOM, and the Diablos, I knew the exact type of game I wanted. The problem was I didn't see anyone publishing it any time soon."

Since the GBA original, Powder has been ported to various other formats including the Nintendo DS, Windows, Macintosh and Linux. Recently though, Dreamcast.es forum admin Indiket successfully translated the source over to the Dreamcast and the source has - rather helpfully - been turned into an SD Reader-compatible ISO file by DCeric so that morons like me can get involved and begin dungeon crawling.

Atari Jaguar Indie Titles Coming to Dreamcast?

I make no secret of the fact that as well as being something of a Dreamcast fanatic, I also have a soft spot for Atari's much-maligned and under-appreciated Jaguar system. Is it mere coincidence that both of these consoles' failure to penetrate the mass market ultimately lead to their parent companies withdrawing from the hardware manufacturing business (and in Atari's case, any form of business)? I'm starting to wonder if I'm some kind of angel of death - if I am, Sony had better watch out seeing as I recently bought a PS4...

The reason I bring up the Atari Jaguar is that I recently discovered that Orion, the independent developer responsible for several recent Atari Jaguar cartridge and CD-based adventure games is considering porting his wares to the Dreamcast. In a post on both the Dreamcast-Talk and RetroCollect forums, Orion asked whether gamers would be interested in seeing four recent titles make the leap from the Atari to Sega formats:

New SLaVE Trailer Shows Off Gameplay Footage

We've featured Jay Townsend/Goat Store/Isotope's interesting-looking SLaVE previously here at the Junkyard, but until now very few details have been available regarding how the game will actually play. Well, wonder no more - a new gameplay trailer has been released showing lots of glorious in-game footage. The 'Robotron meets Doom' description now doesn't seem so far from the truth having viewed the video. The neon-lit stylised visuals remind me a lot of the early PS1 title Assault Rigs and the frame rate looks super-smooth - I'm a big fan of FPSs and the prospect of a new one for the Dreamcast excites me massively. The projected release date for SLaVE is April 2015 and you can place a pre-order a special edition (complete with poster) for the very reasonable price of $20 by going here.

With AMEBA, Elysian Shadows, Hypertension and SLaVE all on the horizon, the future is looking gloriously bright for Dreamcast fans.

New Indie Title Announced: AMEBA

Who would have thought that in 2014 we'd still be writing about exciting new releases coming for the Dreamcast? Shmup fans have The Ghost Blade coming soon from Hucast Games, adding yet another 2D bullet-hell masterpiece to the growing catalogue; and RPG enthusiasts have the fantastic-looking Kickstarter-funded adventure Elysian Shadows to look forward to. Not only those two, but Goat Store’s psychedelic first person shooter SLaVE is looming on the horizon too. So that’s the shmup, RPG and FPS genres covered…but what if you’re into something else entirely. Say, visual novels with a distinctly Western spin on things? Well, you’re in luck - there’s another new Dreamcast title coming: AMEBA. 

Coming from the mind of former Games Tribune journalist Carlos Oliveros and his Retro Sumus development team, AMEBA is described as a 'detective adventure' that he first had the idea for whilst translating Pier Solar into Spanish several years ago. Carlos actually left Games Tribune (which for those who don't know, is a games/technology magazine sold in Spain and Spanish-speaking countries of South America) when he embarked on his quest to transform AMEBA from the stuff of dreams into reality, as he didn’t want the burden of having to evaluate other developers’ games while working on his own - a very noble and magnanimous move in our opinion. But enough from me - Carlos tells it in his own words…

“How do you investigate a series of murders that may as well have never existed? Or, how can you be sure you haven't lost it, when you're the only cop in your city who thinks several un-connected deaths were not accidental or natural? These are the questions veteran inspector Hugo asks himself on an everyday basis.

I usually loathe visual novels. With the exception of just a few really good ones, they're too ‘Japanese’ for my tastes, culturally speaking. So we're taking the genre in a new direction: no anime-like art, as the teaser poster shows, obviously a more western take on storytelling and characterization, a serious story. Imagine Davind Fincher's Seven meets Frank Miller's Sin City comic books. Well, that's what I'd like, but I'm not expecting to reach that kind of quality!”

Carlos very kindly furnished us with some concept AMEBA art, and to give a feel for how the game will (hopefully) eventually look, here's an image of an inspirational NTSC-J title, Kara No Shoujo:

This isn't AMEBA - it's just to give a feel for the style of game

The visual novel genre is not one a lot of Western gamers will be familiar with, but AMEBA has certainly captured my interest. Like any good story, it promises an intriguing tale and I’m very curious to see how this type of game will make use of the Dreamcast’s processing power - we know they system can produce stunning visuals and sound, so to see it used in a novel way (excuse the pun!) interests me greatly. Retro Sumus have an exciting team of talented industry veterans onboard for AMEBA, and there are some great ideas being put forward, however we have been asked not to reveal too much about the story, setting or characters just yet...even the meaning behind the title of the game. Curiouser and curiouser...

There's no official statement yet on the funding the AMEBA project will need, but Kickstarter is just one of the options being considered at the moment. If it can reach the level of popularity that Falco Girgis’ Elysian Shadows has, we can’t see why won’t be enjoying AMEBA in the not too distant future. Keep an eye on the official website for upcoming announcements and developments on AMEBA.

In the meantime, here's a first look at the AMEBA teaser trailer:

New indie release announced: SLaVE!

Feels like a tradition now for a Dreamcast indie game to be revealed on this anniversary date, doesn't it? At least I hope it hangs around as a tradition anyway. GoatStore Publishing have just revealed via Dreamcast Scene that SLaVE, a doom-like FPS with Robotron 2084 stylings will be released on Dreamcast in April 2015, and is available to pre-order in limited edition and limited limited edition versions. No that's not a typo, they are actually called that. You can get an additional 5% off the price with the voucher code TJOOS as well!

"This is what happens if Robotron 2084 and DOOM got together and had an illegitimate lovechild. SLaVE is the timewarp of 1984's aesthetic and 1994's tech to make a game that is uniquely 2014. It is relentless neon arcade blasting action from a first-person tech utilizing features in the extended DOOM engine 3DGE that gamers could only imagine in 1984, or 1994 for that matter." - Goatstore

The trailer above is from quite a while back, back when it was just known to be a PC game. It's creator Jay Townsend is an animator and game designer I have been following for years and I had been watching the progress of this game over time, so I'm delighted to discover that this is making it's way to the Dreamcast next year!

Xump Your Dreamcast

Xump. How do you pronounce a game called Xump? I'd go for "Zump" personally, but to be honest it really doesn't matter. It doesn't matter because Xump is yet another homebrew game that's totally free to download, burn to CD-R and pop in your Dreamcast to play. Here's the jargon from the rather lovely retro-themed, pixel-art Xump website:

Xump - The Final Run is a simple multi-platform puzzler by Retroguru. Initially released by Psilocybin Development in 2005 the game has been improved in almost every aspect you can imagine. New graphics, new levels, new music, new options, new everything...

Help Holger to clean up deserted space fields. As this is a very dangerous task for a human being a headbot named Xump will be the one who has to suffer.

Your main task is to clean all dissolvable tiles on several single-screen levels by simply stepping on them, one by one. Few fields are secured with mines and need a double tap. Mines can be blown up when passing by or de-mined by Xump when staying on this specific field for a short moment. Certainly the mission sounds easier than it will be.

The Elysian Shadows Kickstarter has launched, bringing a new RPG to the SEGA Dreamcast!

 

The Elysian Shadows Kickstarter has officially launched. Dubbed a “next-gen” 2D RPG, the game is slated to hit a number of platforms including our beloved SEGA Dreamcast. The Dreamcast release starts at the $49 level in the Standard Edition which comes in two flavors, signed and unsigned. The signed edition is limited to 100 copies. The $125 level features a Collector’s Edition of the game with several physical goodies that are only digital in the lower tiers.

As far as stretch goals, should the project hit $400,000, the team plans to create a monster training VMU mini-game, while $500,000 will open to game up to the modding community (Dreamcast included).

Make sure to check out the project, and if it appeals to you, show your support!