Have You Played? is an endless stream of game retrospectives. One a day, every day of the year, perhaps for all time.
Real-time strategy games seem to be a dying artform, which is a shame given that Eugen System's RUSE provided a perfect roadmap for where they might want to go.
]]>Well, dancing about is all very well, but the only real application we were ever going to be interested in was one involving terrain. Here's a chap from touchscreen clevertypes Evoluce who has set up Microsoft's Silent Robot Eye Of Judgment Kinect thing being to be used in playing a real-time strategy, via VG247. Seems to work. In truth, though, motion control is only really going to fly with me if it can detect my slumped form in an armchair, and enable the ordering millions of tiny men to their deaths with a barely-perceptible nod. Then, and only then, will I install a sinister black camera to watch over me.
Following on from Jim's individual discussion of RUSE, the RPS high-fiving fraternity elected to spend some time getting to grips with Eugen Systems' latest RTS, and discovered they rather liked it. It was time for a verdict. But what would the collective verdict be? And were they wise to the tricks and traps the game laid out for them? And why was John on holiday? Did anyone care? There were so many unanswered questions. Read on to discover...
Jim: RUSE: A real-time strategy that seems to have surprised people. Did it surprise you guys? It surprised me. Kieron: It certainly surprise attack-bonused me. Regularly. But I suspect we'll get to that. Quintin: I had no faith whatsoever in it before I played it. Not entirely sure why. So yes, I was surprised. Alarmed, even.
]]>And henceforth Ruse, because game names with extraneous punctuation in are just silly. Right, Stalker? Right. There can be much in a name, too. In this new real-time strategy from Eugen Systems and Ubisoft everything is based on that one titular conceit: trickery, misdirection, the flow of information. The ruse is the game. Some RTS games make a nod to this stuff with their fog of war, or even stealth tanks or whatnot, but here it's the key to success. It's remarkably refreshing. Also, I flagrantly kicked out my network cable and I didn't care! Why not? Because there's no always-on DRM. But enough pre-blather bombardment. Let's launch the landing craft of criticism directly into what I think about Ruse...
]]>What are you doing this weekend? Well, if you're less busy than me, you can play Ruse, the forthcoming Ubisoft strategy game. It actually quite impressed me at a recent press event, so diving into this Machiavellian game of bluff is something that I'd quite like to spend the weekend doing. Alas! But maybe your life is more pleasurable - yet empty - than mine, in which case I direct you to Steam. Download the client and you can play until Sunday. A chunky 20-minute video where the team talk about the improvements for the free weekend follows if you want a bit of hot developer goss...
]]>RPS didn't got to E3. So E3 came to RPS, with Ubisoft showing their E3 demos in London yesterday. South London being slightly easier to reach than Los Angeles, I went along to have a look at what they have to offer us in the coming twelve months. Well, quite a bit. While ManiaPlanet will await a future date to look properly at it, there were four key PC-relevant games on show: Assassin's Creed Brotherhood, Driver: San Francisco, Ruse and - though it hasn't been announced for the PC, I'll be surprised if it's not - Ghost Recon: Future Soldier. What did I make of them? I tell you below, via the medium of telling.
]]>So it seems that issues were indeed raised by RUSE's length multiplayer beta, as Ubisoft are postponing the RTS-that-wants-to-be-a-boardgame until September. The announcement appears to have been made over on the game's Facebook page, but we expect official confirmation soon.
]]>Ubisoft have released a couple of new R.U.S.E. videos, but only one of them actually gives you a good idea of how the game plays, so that's the one I've posted it below. The video shows how normal strategy systems of building units and sending them off to die can be combined with the RUSE abilities that the game offers. These change major variables on the field of war, like the fog of war and the morale of the units in question. I've spend some time in the beta of this and I've enjoyed the slow pace that makes it feel something like a RTS with the personality of a really good boardgame. I've got fair hopes for its release in the next couple of months.
]]>The rather interesting real-time strategy title from Eugen Systems, R.U.S.E. - which is currently in beta - has just released some more multiplayer footage. No news for the people already playing it, but it's definitely worth a glance for the rest of ye. For some notion of what the game is like to play, have a gander at my Eurogamer preview. I've enjoyed what I've managed to play so far, and I suspect the beta will be very useful for the purposes of balancing this up to a shine.
]]>I've been spending some time in the slow-but-satisfying depths of the R.U.S.E. multiplayer beta. Then I went and wrote about it for that Eurogamer website. Here's a taste:
]]>I'm quite excited about Ubisoft's enormo-RTS Ruse (let's not dignify marketing idiocy with the capital letters or full stops), but last time I nattered about it here all I had to show you was a trailer that seemed more like it was advertising haircuts or watches. So it's way past time I nudged y'all in the direction of some in-game footage. Oh, it's worth watching the HD version of the first vid if your bandwidth can stomach it...
]]>The current, surprising industry-wide obsession with real-time strategising continues. This time it's Ubisoft having a crack at both a new IP and a new take on this oft-static genre, with the fascinating, board game-esque and absolutely gi-frigging-normous Ruse.
I took a first-hand gander at Eugen Systems' (you'll know them from oddball action-RTS Act of War) new baby last week, but sadly the terrifying EmbargoBot has been stood menacingly by my PC since then, wagging an electro-death-finger at me whenever I think about mentioning the game here. Now I can. And I will. Watch me. Yeah. Yeah!
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.png?width=1200&height=630&fit=crop&enable=upscale&auto=webp "שחרורו של Assassin's Creed Shadows נדחה למרץ כאשר מועצת המנהלים של Ubisoft שוקל מכירת חברה")
