I promise this will be our last digital distribution episode.

Okay, no I don’t. I promise it will be our last one for at least a month? …We’ll see how we do on that, I guess.

We’ve spent a lot of time over the past several months extolling the virtues of digital distribution – the frequent sales, the convenience, the portability – and all of those virtues still hold true. It was time, though, to inject a little balance into the equation and start talking about one of the major downsides of digital distribution: you never really own what you buy anymore. Of course, as you’ll hear, maybe you never did to begin with, and it’s just more obvious now. Still, with the recent beta impressions of OnLive hitting the web, it was time to talk about purchasing games vs. purchasing access to games, and the path we feel the future will take. Join us, and see if you agree with our assertions.

Time is also given to Terry Cavanagh’s (if I may say so) brilliant VVVVVV in our indie segment, our retro gaming discussion starts off talking about Tomb Raider and ends up in places I can’t say I’m proud of (really, Warren? You wanted to see this naked?), and we take a look at the UT2004 mod Air Buccaneers, if you’re in an airship kind of mood.

Also, from our list of recently played games, allow me to direct your attention to the D1X-Rebirth mod for Descent, in case you want to lose your lunch in 6 degrees of freedom. Oh, and this. What the Hell, Dwarf Fortress. You blow my mind.

Immortal Machines presents… Here Today, Gone Tomorrow

Hosted and Summarized by Eric [Ravenlock]
Participants are Robert [Trebor], Warren [Mayhem], Jeremy [Lord Don], and perpetual special guest J Arcane
Produced by Clayton [Voodoo]

 

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On this edition of the Immortal Machines Podcast your dedicated cast of Robert [Trebor], Eric [Ravenlock], Adam [Grifter], Jacob [MagGnome], Jeremy [Lord Don], Clayton [Voodoo], and now three time offender J Arcane return to discuss the crazy digital distribution sales than have been going on for the month of December. In Retro land, fond memories that were first though forgotten are recalled when discussing Funcom’s The Longest Journey. Backing into Indie games comes next with a very special review of Gratuitous Space Battles along with Tuper Tario Tros, and an update to Spelunky. And then a final wrap up with what we have been playing. So if you can stop buying games for a damn minute from Steam, GOG, or wherever, right click on the link and download this, that last IM podcast for 2009.

Hosted & Summarized by Robert [Trebor]
Participants are Eric [Ravenlock], Jacob [MagGnome], Jeremy [Lord Don], Adam [Grifter] and J Arcane as himself!
Produced by Clayton [Voodoo]

 

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On this edition of the Immortal Machines Podcast, your more awake than usual cast of Robert [Trebor], Eric [Ravenlock], Jeremy [Lord Don], and Clayton [Voodoo] have the delight and pleasure to talk to ISOTX’s Community Manager, Rhea Monique, about their first commercially released FPS/ RTS game, Iron Grip: Warlords.

The questions we ask – yours included! – are what you would expect from a bunch of PC game playing geeks, but the answers that were returned allowed for a much better understanding of the game’s background, play style, and what future plans are in store for the Iron Grip Universe to keep their fans excited for more. As usual, we have also included our famous / infamous “What We’ve Been Playing” segment, which is actually quite a full plate – and later, Eric gets to respond to a listener’s email concerning the purchase price of PC games on the Steam holiday sale. So get that right mouse button in motion, open that context menu, and download some!

Hosted & Summarized by Robert [Trebor]
Participants are Eric [Ravenlock] and Jeremy [Lord Don]
Produced by Clayton [Voodoo]

 

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Well, it’s that time of year again – time to look back at 2009 and decide who’s been naughty & who’s been nice, and pay respects to those who are no more. We didn’t want to do any actual GOTY awards, since CoG staff and users have already handled that ably, but we did want to talk about the year in games, so that’s what we’ve done. Some genre specifics, pleasant surprises and disappointments are all covered, and then at the end we realize that we forgot to talk about MMO’s. The level of regret on this point is… low.

You’ll also get to hear about some neat indie stuff, both web-based and downloadable, as we run through Emberwind, Continuity and Dreamside Maroon. Our retro segment delves into the dungeons of the Sword of Fargoal, a trip I highly recommend you take. (The direct link to the Windows zipfile, until they get their site back in order, is here.) And I promised Jeremy I would link to Planet MULE, so now I have. Go… do the stuff one does on Planet MULE, after you’re done listening to the show.

Looking back, it’s actually been a pretty stellar year for PC gaming, and nobody in our group seems to be coming away disappointed. Let me take a moment to wish you and yours a lovely holiday season – we’ll be back just before the New Year to ring it in right.

Hosted & Summarized by Eric [Ravenlock]
Participants are Jacob [MagGnome], Jeremy [Lord Don], Adam [Grifter] and returning special guest J Arcane!
Produced by Clayton [Voodoo]

 

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We’ve made a big deal before out of how versatile a platform the PC is, how its very nature as an open system means that it can house experiments and experiences that consoles simply never can, so long as they remain shackled by static hardware and strictly governed content requirements.

Mods rest at the very heart of that divide, allowing PC gamers to take the games they buy and tweak them, mold them, sometimes completely reshape them into something new, something uniquely their own. As it happens, several of our crew have a history of tinkering in the mod world, and you’ll get to hear all about it in this episode.

The discussion runs long and there’s a lot of news to cover, so the Retro segment takes a vacation this week, but you do get a discussion of Igneous in our freeware segment, and a look at the very elaborate Sins of the 13th Tribe BSG mod for Sins of a Solar Empire. We also point you to the ongoing CoG Child’s Play drive, which you should already have donated to. If you haven’t, go do the right thing. We’ll wait here.

A few other random links I promised I’d post:

• Read J Arcane’s excellent column, RUN”HISTORY.
• Go play Quake in a web browser!
• Check out this remake of Maniac Mansion!
• A 3rd person UT3 mod with hot air balloons and cities in the sky!
• We like RockPaperShotgun, and so should you.
• Natural Selection 2 is looking pretty hot, and a $20 pre-order will get you into the pre-alpha, if that’s your thing.

…More to come as I remember whatever else I forgot. Get settled in, kids, this one ain’t short.

Hosted & Summarized by Eric [Ravenlock]
Participants are Robert [Trebor], Jacob [MagGnome], Jeremy [Lord Don], and very special guest J Arcane!
Produced by Clayton [Voodoo]

 

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What’s in a number? What’s in a number? Maybe nothing is in a number? Maybe a number is just a number. For Robert [Trebor], Eric [Ravenlock], Clayton [Voodoo], Bryan [Smoof], Adam [Grifter] and Jeremy [Lord Don] we all toast the 21st edition of the Immortal Machines podcast with our presence, participation, and spirits. On this most auspicious of occasions we go through the podcast paces with our banter ever increasing as we make more and more toasts while the discussion of PC games continues on.

We start out with what games we have been playing which winds up becoming quite an interesting dialog about Modern Warfare 2. Next up is the Retro gaming segment that covers everyone’s favorite third person Norse hack and slash, Rune. The Indie gaming segment discusses the 2D action shooter GunFu Deadlands complete with bullet time! Then we come to the new and shiny Mod Segment where the Dawn of War Firestorm over Kronus mod is covered, WAAAGH!!!!! Finally some of the latest in PC Gaming News is discussed by all and believe me, this you do not want to miss.

Hosted & Summarized by Robert [Trebor]
Participants are Eric [Ravenlock], Bryan [Smoof], Adam [Grifter] and Jeremy [Lord Don]
Produced by Clayton [Voodoo]

 

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Every story has a beginning — sorry, I’m kidding, I’m not actually going through with that. The 20th installment of Immortal Machines seems a momentous occasion, though, so we did want to do something a little bit different and special. Toss on your rose-colored glasses and take a trip with us back in time as we reminisce about days, systems, and games gone by.

Many hands are on deck this week to share a little bit about our roots – the games and machines that got us into PC gaming years (sometimes decades) ago and will keep us there for years to come. Our retro title goes about as far back as it is possible to go, delving into the history and ramifications of Spacewar! Also discussed are the delightful and short Small World, the surprisingly authentic Doom Roguelike, and Abandonia, home to wayward titles from a lost age.

And, of course, the usual smattering of news and commentary (actually, quite a bit of news) to get you through the day. If you happen to subscribe to our iTunes feed and you like the show, head over there and give us a rating, that’d be swell.

Hosted & Summarized by Eric [Ravenlock]
Participants are Robert [Trebor], Jacob [MagGnome], Mike [Bandango], and Bryan [Smoof]
Produced by Clayton [Voodoo]

 

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We’ve been anticipating this for awhile – we asked for your questions, we gave out copies of the game – so I’m going to keep the preliminaries short. We spoke to Runic about Torchlight. They answered your questions. There were a lot of them (people on the call, and questions being answered). We had a lot of fun. We hope you’ll listen and enjoy.

On the Immortal Machines side:
Eric [Ravenlock] – Host
Clayton [Voodoo] – Producer
Jacob [MagGnome] – Cool Guy

On the Runic side:
Max Schaefer – CEO
Travis Baldree – President / Project Lead
Jason Beck – Art Director
Adam Perin – Tech Artist
John Dunbar – Zombie Pyrotechnician
Wonder Russell – Minister of Public Relations
Falcor – Dog

Thanks to everyone who submitted questions, we did our best to hit as many as we could.

 

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With all the positive PC game experiences, there are also sadly, some very bad ones as well. In fact those experiences are so horrible that it leaves an indelible mark on one’s game psyche. Some have had fortunately only one or two, but most out there have had three or more. In this, the 19th edition of the Immortal Machines podcast, Clayton [Voodoo], Eric [Ravenlock], Robert [Trebor], Jacob [MagGnome], and Mike[Bandango] lament over what three PC games gave us so much grief, pain, and a quick return to the store for something else to play.

Before this trip down this “via del la Rosa”, we talk about the games we have been playing since the last podcast which has a nicer ending. The Retro Gaming segment covers the classic action third person RPG from 1996, which is none other that Blizzard North’s Diablo. The Indie Game segment discusses Lucidity and The Three Musketeers, no not the candy bar. We finally wrap up with a coverage of PC Gaming News where items such as Call of Duty Modern Warfare 2’s lack of dedicated servers, Left 4 Dead 2 Achievement list is released to the public, the “to be released” PC game Torchlight by Runic, and more.

Hosted & Summarized by Robert [Trebor]
Participants are Eric [Ravenlock], Jacob [MagGnome] and Mike [Bandango]
Produced by Clayton [Voodoo]

 

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Geez, you step away from podcasting for an extra half a week, and the world goes crazy in your absence. This is perhaps an overstatement, but there actually was quite a bit of news to break on the PC front while we tried to get our schedules together, so that takes up the bulk of this installment of the podcast.

Among the topics discussed are a potential sequel to Planetside, yet a few more PC delays (and let me change my stance here a bit from what I took in the show proper and say “bring ‘em on, I’ve got plenty to play already”), the clever subversion of nVidia’s attempts to lock PhysX integration out for people who also have an ATI card installed, and a wealth of goodies about digital distribution, including some talk from Brad Wardell about Stardock’s DD numbers, and perhaps the most insane downloadable sale yet (now over, sorry) from Direct2Drive. Probably some other stuff I’m forgetting, too. Unfortunately the little dust-up between Randy Pitchford and indie devs over Steam’s treatment of “the little guy” happened just after we recorded, but let me suggest that given the evidence, we probably would have ended up siding with Steam on this one. If I’m wrong about that I’m sure my cohorts will reprimand me.

Quake II is our retro title this week, and the consensus seems to be that iD builds great engines so that other people can build great games. The freeware / indie segment touches on a few things, The Shivah, RunMan and ASCII Portal being the stars, but I was also asked where I get these wonderful toys, so at the risk of making myself obsolete let me humbly suggest that you add Bytejacker, RockPaperShotgun, TIGSource, and IndieGames to your browsing habits if this sort of thing interests you.

Oh, hey, we mention it in the episode, but if you happen to subscribe to our iTunes feed and you like the show, toss us a rating over there, hmm? It’d be appreciated. We may have some exciting news coming soon, too, so keep your eyes peeled.

Hosted & Summarized by Eric [Ravenlock]
Participants are Robert [Trebor], Bryan [Smoof] and Warren [Mayhem]
Produced by Clayton [Voodoo]

 

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