Warp Zoned Presents
Most Recent: Features
An Interview With PizWiz, the Developer Behind Warp’s Hand-Drawn World
Although there have been many games over the years that use a hand-drawn style, none have managed to encapsulate the sheer sense of creative doodleness of Warp. The game’s developer, PizWiz, is currently seeking $7,000 on Kickstarter, and you can read a bit more about it in our latest edition of Kickstart This!
We chatted with the New Orleans-based developer and artist to find out more about the project, what he has in store for the future, and how to “become cow.” (more…)
Posted in Features, Interviews, PC, Top Story
Tagged Warp (2020)
Kickstart This! Warp
Every now and then you find a project on Kickstarter that is just so batshit insane and creative that you want to rob your child’s trust fund to guarantee that this beautiful, bizarre baby of a game gets made. And if we were ever going to write about a game like that on Warp Zoned, I’m thrilled that it’s called Warp. (more…)
Warp Zoned’s 2018 Golden Pixel Awards: Our Favorite Games From Last Year
2018 was an absolutely astounding year for video games, and while we might not have gotten the chance to play everything we wanted, the Warp Zoned staff was definitely able to add a big batch of new games to our “Favorites” pile.
This year’s selection of standout titles offered something for everybody… Insomniac’s Spider-Man let us soar above Manhattan as the webslinger like never before… The mountainous milieu of Matt Thorson’s Celeste challenged our thumbs and our hearts… Capcom’s Mega Man 11 brought the Blue Bomber back for the first time in almost a decade… And those three games were just the tip of the iceberg.
The Golden Pixel Awards aren’t the “Best Games” from 2018, but these are the titles we plan to return to again and again in 2019 (and beyond). We hope you enjoy them as much as we did. (more…)
Posted in Features, Mobile, PC, PS4, Switch, Xbox One
Tagged Alphabear 2, Celeste, Dead Cells, Just Shapes and Beats, Katamari Damacy, Mega Man 11, Ni No Kuni II: Revenant Kingdom, Octopath Traveler, Persona 3: Dancing in Moonlight, Persona 5: Dancing in Starlight, Spider-Man, Starlink: Battle For Atlas, Tetris Effect
Kickstart This! Freja and the False Prophecy
One genre that is recently enjoying a resurgence, in large part thanks to the Nintendo Switch, is the “MetroidVania” style of 2D action platformers. While the console is fully capable of rendering 3D games like Super Mario Odyssey and Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, its portable screen is absolutely perfect for platformers. And indie developers are taking the confines of the genre and shattering them with stunning visuals and epic storytelling, especially with the likes of Dead Cells and the more recent Gris.
And hopefully, with your help, we can add Freja and the False Prophecy to that list if it reaches its first Stretch Goal. (more…)
Posted in Features, PC
Tagged Freja and the False Prophecy
The Games of December 2018
The New Releases shelf is usually a barren wasteland in December as game publishers want their hot new titles out before Black Friday. But that is definitely not the case this year, and players looking for new games to play during the next four weeks will have a healthy selection to choose from. Especially if you’re the sort of person who loves retro revivals or the slightly goofier side of gaming.
Thankfully, we here at Warp Zoned love those types of games, and you can find out exactly what we’re looking forward to this month after the break. (more…)
The Video Game Canon: Half-Life
Dig deeper into the Video Game Canon with a look at how Half-Life’s opening tram ride changed first person shooters (and may even have created an entirely new genre). Here’s a teaser…
“Good morning and welcome to the Black Mesa Transit System. This automated train is provided for the security and convenience of the Black Mesa Research Facility personnel.”
It’s just another day at work for Gordon Freeman. The well-groomed scientist is running late for an important meeting and he’s forced to board the tram alone as he travels to the secure wing of the Black Mesa Research Facility.
It’s a rather lowkey introduction to one of the most ambitious games ever created, but easing the player into the game’s world was a big part of what made Valve’s Half-Life so ambitious. You’re free to move about the train car as you’re ferried from the facility’s living quarters to the research levels belowground, but for those five minutes, you’re also at the mercy of the developers and how they want you to interact with their game.
Visit VideoGameCanon.com to continue reading this article and to explore the complete Top 1000.
Kickstart This! Gigabuster
After several months, Kickstart This! returns refreshed and rejuvenated. Those following this column likely saw that I recently had a rather sour experience with the Pelda Pro, a battery expansion and dock for the Nintendo Switch. It is still sitting in its box and will probably stay there for all eternity.
However, one bad experience in over five years of crowdfunding various projects is a great statistic, and one that I think only serves to illustrate how well this model of funding has been embraced both by creators and consumers. I very nearly bought an automated cat toilet last week, but I narrowly missed all the early bird tiers.
Anyway, I digress. I’ve been eagerly awaiting a video game project I could rally behind after months in the wilderness of non-crowdfunding. I started writing about Omno, a pretty puzzle game from Jonas Manke that has smashed its funding target, but I prefer to shine a light on games that need your funding.
Games like Gigabuster (though Omno is definitely worth checking out). (more…)
The Games of November 2018
I’m sure that many gamers have decided to check out for the season now that Red Dead Redemption 2 is available on store shelves. But like always, November is just jam-packed with new titles, and some of them are impossible to ignore.
We here at Warp Zoned have a lengthy shopping list for this month, and that includes the long-awaited return of a few well-loved franchises (Spyro Reignited Trilogy and Darksiders III), as well the first multiplayer experience in the Fallout series (Fallout 76), a psychedelic VR-powered take on Tetris (Tetris Effect) from Sony.
Find out exactly why we’re looking forward to these games after the break. (more…)
Posted in Features, PC, PS4, Switch, Top Story, Xbox One
Tagged Darksiders III, Fallout 76, Grim Fandango, Pokemon: Let's Go Pikachu/Let's Go Eevee, Spyro the Dragon, Tetris Effect