Blizzcon is on and there’s basically two bits of important news.

The first is the new expansion with a new Chinese styled continent. Now this might be a smart move but from here it all falls apart into a dreadful series of cringes.

The continent is called Pandaria. Oh-kaaaay. To fit the new race, the…. Panderan… and a new class the.. uhm Monk. Groan. Yes this is Kung Fu Panda cloned to hell. One waits to see if there is a commercial agreement or a pile of litigation coming.

There’s a 5 level increase to level 90 and new content including a vanity pet battle system and challenge modes. They want to renew Horde vs Alliance but I rather suspect they will shake it up instead. The expansion is titled Mists of Pandaria and 5 year olds will probably love it.

You’ll be forgiven if you think this video is a joke or hoax at first, I certainly did.

The release of desktop dungeons beta has been wonderful. It’s available to those who preorder the full version at a cost of $US10.

Firstly I can reassure the same addictive gaming goodness remains as in the free version. Dungeons are still fast, challenging and fun so most of the glow of my review of the free version of desktop dungeons remains.

There’s graphics changes. A huge improvement really while sticking to the 2D basics. The portraits are particularly well done but we also see a lot of other nice graphical additions such as in the environments and spells. The sounds have also improved and I love the humour.

As before there’s risky options to face if you are to defeat the dungeon boss but if it is botched up there’s always running away. Included now is a tutorial system too.

The real advance though is in the metagame which has been enormously expanded and improved since the free version. Now there’s lots of upgrades and buildings, many of which can offer your stalwart hero assistance in various ways. A sword from the blacksmith for a bit of extra smacking power or maybe a bag of gold from the bank to buy things in the dungeon more easily. Perhaps you could take in a magical trinket you picked up in a previous dungeon.

This is beta but the result is very playable. There have already been some improvements integrated into the game. It will be interesting to see where things go from here.

The adventure update gets more and more intriguing.

This post has spoilers for the upcoming Minecraft’s Adventure update 1.8

Click read more if you still want to see.

Just played the demo of Arcania – A Gothic Tale. I’ve anticipated this forth release of Gothic for a while have quite enjoyed the first three immensely. Arcania is due for release October 12th.

Bit disappointed really. On the good side, the graphics are outstanding for such a game and the views are still good. The fighting has been changed considerably and I think for the better. A lot of the delays have gone too, such as for opening a chest.

What I’m disappointed in is the gameplay depth. It seems to have been grossly simplified. The joy of exploration is gone. Indeed the game is area based much like action-rpgs and ultimately this is how I think Arcania will be received.

One will have to wait and see how the final release goes but I don’t expect much change. Perhaps it is I who need to change. After all this series has gone on for the three games plus the spiritual successor of Risen.