Gamebox 2.0: December 2023
Another year comes to a close but we’ve got one last group of games we got to check out in December for the final Gamebox 2.0 game reviews of 2023. We took flight in the digital version of Wingspan, revisited classic shooters Kingpin: Reloaded and Turok 3: Shadow of Oblivion Remastered, got stealthy in the Old West with Blood West, and plotted our reign as a demonic overlord in Ruinarch. Check out our reviews of all the games below.
Wingspan: Oceania Expansion (Zach): Wingspan is one of the most popular and critically acclaimed board games in recent years, earning high praise for its strategic gameplay and stunningly gorgeous art style. The digital version, which got its new Oceania expansion this month, is a fantastic adaptation of the game from Monster Couch. In Wingspan, you are trying to lure different species of birds to different habitats and utilize their special abilities to earn more points than your opponent. Some birds allow you to collect more food, which will let you bring in more bird species and some are predators that will attack opponent birds. There are multiple avenues to victory, whether you want to horde food or try to arrange birds a certain way to get bonuses for their wingspan sizes, hence the title of the game. The Oceania expansion adds 95 new birds from Australia and New Zealand. like Emus and Lyrebirds, into the game’s already massive variety of bird species, and all of the birds are drawn in a gorgeous art style with their real-life bird calls. They also all have some sort of animation that adds to the digital nature of the game and makes it more than just a flat translation of the game.
If you’ve never played Wingspan before, there’s an excellent tutorial in the digital version that walks you through the basics of a turn and teh various gameplay elements you need to know. Once you get through the base game tutorial, you can go through tutorials for each of the expansions, European and Oceania, as each one adds new elements and birds that are not in the main, base game. The new Oceania expansion specifically adds a new food source, Nectar, which is wild and can be used to replace other sources of food and there are bonus points associated with how much you collect as well. The Oceania expansion also adds new end-of-round and end-of-game goals that can give you an edge if you manage to complete them or win the round. You can play against AI or challenge other players locally or online, with up to 5 players total. Wingspan is an incredible board game and the digital version is an excellent translation that is worth checking out whether you’ve played the physical version or not. You can get everything, including the new Oceania expansion, now on PC, Switch, Xbox, Android, and iOS.
Blood West (Chris): When wicked spirits and creatures grow too powerful, guardian souls summon a cowboy back from the grave to eliminate the evil in Hyperstrange’s Blood West. This stealthy FPS title blends Lovecraftian horror with the American West, and a dash of rouge-lite elements to soften the terrors. Players take the role of the unnamed cowboy, who has been brought back from the dead to rid the lands of evil. The Cowboy is armed with just what he can scavenge and can get resurrected as many times as needed. He is going to every item and skill available to him to clean up the west a little less wild.
The gameplay of Blood West revolves around completing various quests on a level to face off against a big boss fight. These quests involve finding an item or killing a certain enemy. This involves sneaking and battling your way into an enemy stronghold. Twisted monsters patrol their grounds, looking to chase and slaughter any intruder they spot. The Cowboy was once a battle-tested outlaw, but the evil that controls the lands is not going to be taken out in a simple shoot-out. Blood West pushes the player to be as silent and careful as possible to safely take on enemies. The types of enemies range from simple mindless minions to hulking beasts that pack a big punch. Enemies will chase after the player if they either hear or see them. The enemy A.I isn’t too clever to search in-depth, but will not stop coming after the player once they have a line of sight. It’s not difficult to outrun a lone enemy, but tight spaces and a crowd can lead to a quick death.
The Cowboy is vulnerable to bullets, claws, and ghostly attacks. If he takes enough damage and dies, he respawns back to a safe zone and so do some of his defeated enemies. However, the being killed by the hellish beings leaves a curse on the player. Dying gives a single type of debuff to the player’s stats and abilities. This can affect the total health points, weapon abilities, and experience gained from enemies. The debuffs stacks and after three consecutive deaths a new type of curse gets added. The curses can be removed by performing an additional side quest or using certain rare items that can be found or purchased.
Enemies are deadly in numbers and it’s not recommended to go into every situation guns blazing. A few enemies can be taken out with a charged-up attack from a melee weapon like a knife or axe. Stronger enemies require some tactics to take on and stronger gear. These more powerful enemies either need to be picked off from a distance or need to be blasted with stronger bullets. Ammo is initially limited and comes in three varieties of damage levels. There is a survival element to having just enough bullets to take care of certain enemies and having enough inventory room to pick rare loot. There are lots of items and weaponry that are perfect for certain situations, but it’s completely up to the player to collect and utilize them.
There is a bit of a grind to trade up for better equipment. Quality equipment and helpful items have a higher price tag for trading. However, some decent stuff can be found in tricky enemy locations. Most of the game time is spent clearing out areas to ensure safe passage while earning cash and experience points. Every kill grants some experience points to the Cowboy that can unlock skill points to make the Cowboy a little bit deadlier. Some abilities add passive buffets to the defense like more health or stamina. Other skills make exploring easier with increased loot gathering. Other skills improve attacks and give short bullet time effects while aiming. Not every skill is necessary, but small perks go a long way when fighting through the hordes of enemies.
Blood West has a restrictive scope, but absolutely hits its mark of being an explorative horror FPS. The game only has three acts, each taking place in three distinctive levels. The loop of completing quests and unlocking a boss battle remains the same for all three acts. However, gameplay still feels satisfying and fresh enough to see what new stuff can be gained. Nothing beats looting the riches from a location like a vengeful spirit in the night with silent attacks and expert marksmanship. Boss battles can burn through resources and it’ll take some time to have a decent supply. The graphics are toned down so the horror element is presented as blocky damnations. This game requires more patience and resource management than a boomer shooter. You can’t always run head-first into battle but there are chaotic moments that let you unleash a storm of bullets in all directions (If you are wise about your inventory space beforehand). If you are a fan of looter shooters and love a good western, then travel to the strange lands of Blood West when you have the chance. The full release of Blood West was launched on December 5 for Steam.
Kingpin: Reloaded (Zach and Chris): Another old-school shooter remaster from 3D Realms, Slipgate Ironworks, and Interplay, Kingpin: Reloaded brings the criminal infamous FPS to modern platforms. You play as a criminal left for dead in Skidrow, a desolate and run-down city inhabited by prostitutes, transients, and other criminals. Your character wants revenge on The Kingpin and his lieutenant, Nikki Blanco. But as a low-level thug, you’ll have to grab a lead pipe and set out to bash skulls. Now every tough guy, arms dealer, and safe house will be part of your path to the top of the criminal underworld.
The world of Kingpin is definitely a rough place, both tonally and visually. The original Kingpin came out in 1999 but was affected by the Columbine shooting. Due to the controversial violent gameplay and storyline, the game was sold in limited retail stores and most places refused to carry it in their PC selection. Every other word from almost every character is an F-bomb and the character models are outlandish and blocky. This enhanced version gives the option to slightly updated visuals and UI. You can flip back to the classic visuals at any time during gameplay. Kingpin came out the same year as Quake III: Arena and has that same style of early 3D graphics, so the game is not something you are coming at for mindblowing graphics. However, there are remastered visuals of Reload can cause some glitchy bugs in the cutscenes, leading to faces pulsating and shadows being overdrawn. It’s not a big show-stopper for us but does make the updated retro tone feel more questionable.
There are some interesting ideas in Reloaded that the original game innovated. You can talk to almost every NPC you encounter in the world and you can give a positive or negative response. If you’re positive, you might get some useful info or a sidequest or you could potentially hire them as extra muscle if you have the cash. If you’re negative, you can provoke them into a fight and then kill them and take their cash. Not every NPC is going to be useful, but you can make use of them. Cash is key to buying weapon mods, armor, and other items at “Pawn-o-Matic” pawn stores throughout the world. The game is also more of an open world compared to other boomer shooters that are more level-based. You follow objectives but you can explore and go anywhere you want on your way to completing them. The game also has a fantastic soundtrack from Cypress Hill, which is thankfully still intact from the original game.
The remastered elements don’t seem to be as dramatic as other modern re-releases. It seems like mainly some enhanced lighting and textures were focused on. The ability to play at 4K resolution and on ultrawide resolutions is a nice touch, but it seems like a standard nowadays. There were a lot of fans of the original that were not pleased with this remaster, but we don’t have any preconceived notions about the original. We’re happy to see a return of brutal shooters who took a chance on a violent game premise. Since the initial launch of Reloaded, Slipgate Ironworks has been working on patching and fixing many of the visual issues. However, some of the A.I pathing and logic are hit or miss, but we can caulk that up to the game’s retro designs. We would rank some of the other recent “boomer shooter” remasters and remakes above this one but Kingpin: Reloaded is still an interesting relic that, while ugly as sin and extremely unpleasant at times tonally, has some unique ideas for the time that might make it worth checking out if you’re curious. It’s out now on PC.
Ruinarch (Zach): If you’ve ever wanted to be a demonic overlord terrorizing the world, Ruinarch from Klabater and Maccima Games should be right up your alley. Ruinarch is a sandbox simulation game where you can endlessly generate new fantasy worlds with different factions, with your ultimate goal being to wipe out the villagers of that faction. How you get rid of the villagers is up to you and there is a huge array of options at your disposal. There are three types of Overlords to choose from, which with a specific playstyle and power set, from raising the dead and spreading disease to manipulating and deception, to raw power and destruction. You can unleash spells like meteor strikes and undead hordes to attack the villages but you can also get creative and inflict villagers with negative traits. For instance, you can turn one of the villagers into a psychopathic serial killer and let them do the dirty work for you. You also build up your evil lair and each building gives you new options, spells, and minions to unleash.
The retro-style graphics are a throwback to some of the games that inspired Ruinarch, like Dwarf Fortress, and the pulled-back, overhead view gives you a good vantage point for all the chaos you are unleashing. The UI is a little cluttered and there’s lots of info that goes off all around the screen that you might miss because of how much is going on. There also doesn’t seem to be any sort of tutorial, at least that I could find, so it is all about trial and error and just trying things and seeing what they do. There’s no storyline to follow, it’s all about generating a world and then doing whatever you want on your quest for world domination. I played on PS5 and this is a game that is probably best on a PC because playing this style of strategy/simulation game with an analog stick, while tolerable, is not as good as clicking a mouse and using hotkeys. If you enjoyed unleashing disasters in something like SimCity, Ruinarch is an entire game based around that. All of the options available and the randomly generated worlds make it incredibly replayable if you don’t mind figuring things out and experimenting and it’s out now on PC, Xbox, PS4, and PS5.
Turok 3: Shadow of Oblivion Remastered (Zach): Completing their remaster of the classic Turok trilogy, Nightdive Studios released Turok 3: Shadow of Oblivion Remastered for PC and console. Originally released in 2000 for the N64, Turok 3 continued the saga of the Fireseed family, with Turok and Turok 2: Seeds of Evil protagonist Joshua Fireseed sacrificing himself to save his sister Danielle and younger brother Joseph from the evil forces of Oblivion, a cosmic entity bent on consuming all living beings in the universe. You get to choose between playing as Danielle, who can jump higher and wield more powerful weapons, or Joseph, who can sneak and is more stealthy with a sniper rifle and night vision goggles. The game features an outstanding level design with large spaces to explore and, in true Turok fashion, tons of secret areas to find. The weapon selection is also excellent and the pinnacle of the series over the top arsenal with stuff like the Cerebral Bore, which returns from Turok 2, and fires a projectile that attaches to an enemy’s head and then bores into their skull and explodes. There are also gadgets like the grapple shot that are impressive even compared to modern games with the distance you can travel and how fast you get there. The remastered version of the game looks incredibly crisp thanks to Nightdive’s KEX engine, which they have used on their other Turok remasters and other remasters of classic shooters. Turok 3 Remastered runs at 4K at up to 120fps and also features enhanced lighting, enhanced textures, and control schemes that accommodate modern gamepads. The controls on the PS5 felt great and Nightdive did a great job of translating the N64 commands to comfortable equivalents on the PS5.
The original Turok 3 showcased the peak of what the N64 could do before the Gamecube was released a year later and it still holds up as a fantastic game today. The story, though goofy with its mashup of time travel, cosmic evil, zombies, and dinosaurs, is told in a very cinematic manner, or at least as cinematic as the N64 could do, and the music and atmosphere are top-notch. There are some fantastic set pieces and levels, like dodging subway trains in a subway tunnel, and there’s a great pace to acquiring weapons and how the enemies and difficulty ramp up. There’s a great variety of enemies you’ll face off against too, with zombies, bizarre alien warriors, generic soldiers, and, eventually, the series’ trademark dinosaurs. One sticking point for some players may be the price point, as it’s $29.99 just for Turok 3. If you’ve never played the Turok trilogy and are interested in checking it out, it may be a better deal to get the bundle of all three games, which retails for $59.99. If you’re a longtime Turok fan or just getting into the series, this is another excellent remaster from Nightdive and a fantastic version of an already great game. It’s out now on PC, Switch, PS4/5, and Xbox Series S/X.