iGame Radio

Virtual Programming has released Monster Kingdom, the final expansion pack to the unusual RTS game Majesty 2. Bringing to a close the adventures of the crown of Ardania, Monster Kingdom introduces monsters to the ranks of allies helping the king.

The King believes himself to be sole ruler, but the priests and nobles disagree. The priests have stolen his crown, and are using it to summon the Spirit of the Kings and proclaim it the righteous ruler. The King must find unusual allies to take back the crown and his throne.

The expansion pack includes 10 new missions, the monster race available in multiplayer mode, and the new monster kingdom including new buildings, heroes, and citizens. Monster Kingdom requires Majesty 2 to play, and is available from the Virtual Programming site for $14.95 | £9.95 | €14.95.

After a week of downtime we’re back to bring you the news and reviews of Mac and iOS gaming you love.
First up, Virtual Programming announced last week the release of Darkest of Days. Travel through time fighting battles from different periods in history. Sounds very strategic. But wait…it’s a first person-shooter!

Darkest of Days starts with one Alexander Morris, plucked as it were from the very Battle of Little Bighorn by agents of Kronotek and told that he is the key to saving history. Kronotek is a time-traveling company fighting the Opposition, which is fiddling with history’s innards. Morris (i.e. you) must participate in some key historical battles, such as the Civil War’s Battle of Antietam, the Battle of Tannenberg during World War I, a World War II POW camp, and even Pompei on the day in 79 AD that Mount Vesuvius erupted.

You must protect certain important individuals in these historical battles from death due to the shadowy Opposition, of whom you learn more about during play. The game strives to create historically accurate battles in which you will be fighting with period weapons using tactics of the time. But when the Opposition comes, you’ll need to get access to some futuristic weaponry to defend yourself and your charges.

System Requirements include:

• Mac OS X version 10.6.5, or higher
• 2.16GHz Intel processor
• 1GB RAM
• 128MB video card (GeForce 8600, Radeon X1600 or newer)
• 5GB Hard Disk space

You can purchase Darkest of Days now at the Virtual Programming site for £29.95, €39.95, US$39.95.

Virtual Programming has released two expansions for Majesty 2. Kingmaker and Battles of Ardania take the epic fantasy game to the next chapter with new missions, features, monsters, a level creation toolset, and multiplayer options.

Kingmaker introduces a new eight-mission campaign along with a mission creator toolset, a map editor, and a feature for randomizing monster dens and treasure. Multiplayer features four player PVP and coop over a LAN or online. Battles of Ardania also includes a new eight-mission campaign, new monsters and weapon sets, and four new multiplayer maps.

System requirements include:

• Mac OSX 10.6.3 or better
• Intel CPU 2.16 GHz or faster
• 1 GB RAM
• Nvidia GeForce 8600, ATI Radeon X1600 or better
• 128 MB VRAM
• 1.5 GB harddrive space
• Majesty 2 is required

Kingmaker and Battles of Ardania are available from the Virtual Programming site for US $14.95, £9.95, €14.95.

 

What’s inside this episode:

• Host Omaha Sternberg and co-host Corey Tamas of MacGamer talk about the week’s news in Mac and iOS gaming. InstantAction is closing its doors, and looking for a buyer for Torque. What does that mean for developers using the Torque engine, and gamers alike? Omaha and Corey discuss the issue in detail.
• iPad iOS 4.2 is *still* not out…oops, time for Corey to rant. What, you mean December is the end of Fall???
• A bunch of great games have been released or announced this week! Feral Interactive announced Borderlands: Game of the Year Edition. Majesty 2 by Virtual Programming was released (but no Kingmaker as originally announced). The GTA Trilogy was released for the Mac by Transgaming. And id Software released their Rage game for the iPhone.
• EA’s purchase of Chillingo has had some interesting fallout, including comments by developer Secret Exit about publisher branding of a game leaving out the developer. What does this mean about game choices? Should developers choose publishers based on what gamers like about them?
• Omaha talks about the iGame Radio poll, and Omaha and Corey talk about games they’ve played.

Music Notes:

• Digital Droo produced our theme music here at iGame Radio.
• Matt Jarvis for featuring music from Osmos.
• Bobby “Glorian” Slavov and Victor Stoyanov for featuring music from Eschalon: Book 1.

Virtual Programming has released Majesty 2: The Fantasy Kingdom Sim for the Mac. Announced in August, Majesty 2 includes the map editor as well as the Kingmaker expansion.

Majesty 2 takes you back to Ardania, a kingdom still in disarray after a demon wreaked havoc 500 years previous. Your minions have a will of their own, and you have to try to control them with monetary incentives. Smart hero management is key. There are 16 missions within 4 chapters, as well as some side missions and multiplayer maps for Internet and LAN play. You can choose from 10 different classes to oversee the protection of your lands and kick monster butt, and unlike the original Majesty, these classes can be upgraded.

System requirements:

• Mac OS X: 10.6.3 or higher
• Intel CPU, 2.16 GHz or faster
• 1 GB RAM
• GeForce 8600, Radeon X1600 or newer 128 MB
• 1.5 GB Hard Disk space
• Internet connection for product registration

You can purchase Majesty 2 at the VP digital download site, deliver2mac.com, for £29.95 | €39.95 | $39.95(US). A retail boxed version will also be available.

 

What’s inside this episode:

• Omaha reviews Chronicles of Riddick: Assault on Dark Athena by Virtual Programming. Strong on story, voice-acting, and use of shadow and stealth, weak on AI and scripting, you get two games for the price of one.
  

Show Notes:

• Host Omaha Sternberg and co-host Corey Tamas of MacGamer talk about the week’s news in Mac gaming. You never know where you’ll hear about a game announcement, but there’s no stranger place that hearing about the Mac development of Mirror’s Edge…in a legal brief.
• Tim Langdell (that’s DOCTOR Tim Langdell to you!) is a hurtin’ puppy after the court has deemed him a troll.
• Omaha and Corey talk about games released this week and soon to be released.

Music Notes:

• Digital Droo produced our theme music here at iGame Radio.
• Digital Droo featured music from Active Lancer; pick up the Active Lancer soundtrack
• John Gatti for featuring music from El Ballo; pick up the El Ballo soundtrack

It was announced in May, the system requirements were released in early August, but now we have it in our hot little hands! Supreme Commander 2 has been released!

Dangling us by a string for four months, Virtual Programming finally releases their Mac port of the highly acclaimed strategy title. Supreme Commander 2 involves the threat of war between the United Earth Federation, the Aeon Illuminate, and the Cybran Nation after an assassination of the newly elected president causes their tenuous Colonial Defense Coalition to break down. The game was originally developed for the Xbox 360 and Windows by Gas Powered Games and launched in March of this year.

The game features 18 solo campaign missions focusing equally on all three factions. Integral to combat will be R&D, and VP promises lots of work on developing experimental war machines that can alter the balance of power in combat or the game. The game also includes a redesigned user interface with new Strategic Zoom view feature, serving up real-time feedback for on the spot decision-making.

There are several game modes, including skirmish and online multiplayer, which is available for up to eight opponents. Supreme Commander 2′s maps range from the chilly wasteland of Arctic Refuge to idyllic Setons Clutch and its vast expanses of water. Each requires a unique strategic approach, depending on the faction under your control, so you’ll be redesigning your strategy each time.

System Requirements:

• Mac OS 10.6.3 or higher
• Intel CPU, 2.2 GHz or faster
• 1 GB RAM
• GeForce 8600, Radeon 2400HD or newer, 256 MB
• 5 GB Hard Disk space
• Internet connection
• Steam for Mac (for LAN play)

You can purchase Supreme Commander 2 from the VP site for $39.95 | £29.95 | €39.95.

Virtual Programming is also giving away a few copies of the game, too! All you have to do is email the answer to the following question into VP and you’ll be entered to win!

Which company developed Supreme Commander 2?

C) Intel

Last week I got a hint from Virtual Programming about their next game. “Here’s a hint: Think of a Kinks song,” they said. I jumped onto trusty (well, for some definition thereof) Wikipedia and found a list of Kink’s songs, and lo and behold there was Victoria. I knew then what the game was.

That’s right! Virtual Programming has just announced Victoria 2 for the Mac! The sequel of Victoria by Paradox Interactive where players take control of and manage a 19th century nation-state including its political, diplomatic, economic, military, and technological aspects has reached the Mac with only a 1 month turnaround. Impressive!
Read more

UPDATE: Just got confirmation from VP that the multiplayer will be Mac/PC. Also, they are porting over the map editor as well!

Remember Majesty: The Fantasy Kingdom Sim published for the Mac by MacPlay oh so many years ago? Paradox Interactive finally acquired the rights to make a sequel and released Majesty 2 for Windows in 2009.

Well, guess what’s comin’ for the Mac? Virtual Programming just announced Majesty 2 for the Mac over the weekend. Our long wait is over!

In Majesty 2, your minions have a will of their own, and you have to try to control them with bribes monetary incentives. There are 16 missions within 4 chapters, as well as some side missions and multiplayer maps for Internet and LAN play. You can choose from 10 different classes to oversee the protection of your lands and kick monster butt, and unlike the original game, these classes can be upgraded.

System requirements:

• Mac OS X: 10.6.3 or higher
• Intel CPU, 2.16 GHz or faster
• 1 GB RAM
• GeForce 8600, Radeon X1600 or newer 128 MB
• 1.5 GB Hard Disk space
• Internet connection for product registration

Even cooler is that the expansion, Majesty 2: Kingmaker, will be released as well. The system requirements for the expansion are the same, but include the requirement of Majesty 2 to play.

Pricing has already been set at £29.95 | €39.95 | $39.95(US). You can get more info about Majesty 2 at the official website for the game, but as soon as VP releases the URL for the Mac version site, I’ll release that one as well. No word yet on release date.

UPDATE: Just got word back from Brad Cook of Virtual Programming to clear up some misconceptions about the game and Steam. Cook says, “Actually, it won’t be on Steam for Mac. Players will receive a Steam code so they can play over a LAN against others. That code will also give them access to the PC version. But they will initially buy the game from us, through Deliver2Mac or other service.”

Virtual Programming has released system requirements and pricing for Supreme Commander 2 pending the launch of the game.

Amongst the system requirements one finds that the game will be available on Steam for Mac available for LAN play through Steam…see update above. When first announced, Virtual Programming had specifically stated that they had no plans to release the game for Steam, so this is a big turnaround. It’s unknown whether the game will only be available on Steam, or will be available also on the VP Deliver2Mac service.

Supreme Commander 2, sequel to the highly-acclaimed strategy title released three years ago, involves the threat of war between the United Earth Federation, the Aeon Illuminate, and the Cybran Nation after an assassination of the newly elected president causes their tenuous Colonial Defense Coalition to break down. The game was originally developed for the Xbox 360 and Windows by Gas Powered Games and launched in March.

System Requirements include:

• Mac OS 10.6.3 or higher
• 2.2GHz Intel CPU
• 1GB RAM
• 256MB video RAM (GeForce 8600, Radeon 2400HD or newer)
• 5GB Hard Disk space
• Internet connection
• Steam for Mac (for LAN play; yes, that gives you the PC version for free
  too)

Supreme Command 2 will be available through Deliver2Mac and later at boxed retail, and for LAN play only on Steam with a code. The game will price at £29.94 | €39.95 | $39.95US.