“World of Tanks had a much slower pace, thanks to the very nature of its cast of squat, earthbound war-boxes. It was much more about tactics than twitch gaming, giving players time to think and to plan, to flank and to hide. World of Warplanes’ sky is big and blue and wide open, its aircraft naked, fragile and, in some cases, very fast.”

I missed this going live too, as I think I had my nose in something else. Here’s my early impressions of World of Warplanes, a game all about, well…

“A quick glance across any battlefield in War of the Roses inevitably identifies at least one or two combatants leaning down to slaughter their foes. It’s the kind of naked violence that would make a tabloid editor perk up like a meerkat and if you’re the victim of it, you have to suffer it all from your first-person perspective.”

I think this went up while I was busy travelling, and I didn’t spot it at the time. I’m hoping I might get onto the beta for this. Fingers crossed.

“Though the scope of the game will broaden considerably, Creative Assembly doesn’t want to add to players’ workloads. They hope to make a grander, more glorious experience than the first Rome, but not one that sucks players into the quicksand of micromanagement.”

Last week I went to Horsham and I watched Romans stab and break things. Here is my report.

“Dungeons never go out of fashion – not amongst gamers, anyway.  For some reason, the urge to delve deeper burns inside all of us, whether as a party of adventurers or a cadre of miners.”

This went up a few days ago, but I actually forgot to link to it…

“Alongside beefier Floaters, meaner Sectoids and deadlier Chrysalids, it looks like entirely new aliens will also feature, and the “now familiar” plot has also been revised and will be peppered with all sorts of (probably unpleasant) new surprises. In the meantime, though, the rest of Enemy Unknown remains classified, and bad things will come to those who wait.”

“My experience is less akin to a game and more like an orgy of destruction, spiralling further and further out of my control until everything becomes a bloody mist of damage numbers and body parts. I feel like Caligula with a carving knife. I hope that’s not my own voice I sometimes hear cackling.”

I’m quite the previewer lately.

“The most striking aspect of this multiplayer combat game is also one of its most common sights: that of injured or incapacitated warriors being finished off in a merciless and gruesome fashion.”

“I hold out hopes for it, because it’s bravely testing waters that have long been choppy, perhaps even cursed. Attempts to create either a definitive or spiritual sequel to Master of Magic have failed several times.”

“This is not Command & Conquer as we know it. In fact, it’s not even war as many of us know it.”

“Battles like this are raging across every continent, all day and every day. Generals come and go as they please, territories change hands by the hour.”

Yes, that’s right, a massively-multiplayer online real-time strategy game. GOODNESS.