The Finite Forest: Tale of Tales Begs To Keep "Art" Alive

The self-described team of artists (rather than games developers or designers) Tale of Tales have long courted the periphery of PC games community. Their string of releases including most famously The Path have all been controversial for one reason or another; usually whether or not they are games at all, and thus deserving of some people's attention or money. (For the record: it doesn't matter and yes they are.)

Now the group, led by husband-and-wife team Auriea Harvey & Michaël Samyn, are asking for donations to keep their first release alive. The Endless Forest requires €165 a month to keep the servers alive. Historically it has been supported by arts charities and communities donations but now that money is running out and the servers are in danger of being shut off for good.

First opened in 2005, The Endless Forest is a peaceful non-combative non-constructive non-verbal social world where players are anthropomorphically-faced deer frolicking around a forest and the ruins, follys and natural features found within. There is no way to speak or communicate in text with other players in this world. Instead, being deer as they are, they use body language (kneel, sit, leap, run around in circles...) and barks. There are no goals, enemies or dangers. Its an extraordinary experience and free to play.

I detailed my personal thoughts on the situation in the comments thread for Rock, Paper, Shotgun's article on this, and I cannot put it better than I did then:

The things is… I would love to. I’d love to be able to throw the whole €165/m at them just to know Endless Forest is still around should I one day want to go back and wander the forest for a couple of hours…

But I can’t. My money is exceedingly tight and I have to be very careful what I put it towards.

What surprises me is that they are [primarily] requesting regular, repeat payments. Yes, they can be cancelled at any time so technically a person could give a single payment but the impression is a significant element. [Also, one-off payments can in fact be made from the Donate page]. Should ToT ask for people to throw, oh, a one off amount of €5 in return for a simple unique visual effect upon their deer I am sure they would make their money for the next 3 months almost immediately. Handled correctly, it could be a great opportunity to build interest in Endless Forest again, their old releases on multiple platforms and their future projects.

Hell, they could ask for pre-orders of 8 (yes, that’s the name of their next big project) and I’d be throwing money at the screen. At least some of that could keep TEF alive.

TEF is free to play and can be downloaded from their website. If you are generous enough to donate, you can do so from this page.

Company Of Heroes On The Line Online

Which is my weird and obtuse way of saying that Relic Entertainment's new re-imagining of classic RTS Company of Heroes has entered open beta. Which as far as free-to-play micropayment-maintained projects means it has just been released.

Company of Heroes Online, as it has so originally been titled, is essentially the hit 2006 World War 2 strategy game sans the pile of expansion packs it has enjoyed over the intervening years with extra tasty MMO features like earnable unit upgrades, hero units and ongoing experience levels. For those of us who fear the roulette of multiplayer matchmaking services, it even involves the entire singleplayer campaign from that original game. For free! Which is nice.

To get to the meat of the game, you first create your commander's allegiance - Allies and Axis, naturally - and appearance in a character designer which comprises of three skin tones (I was disappointed not to be able to create a black Nazi commander but what are the chances), ten variations on strong-jawed poster-boy and an equal number of clean-cut hairstyles. Except for one. Curiously there is the option of giving your character some manner of short mohawk which I just could not turn down.

More importantly, here you are given the option of three doctrines (a different set for each faction) which are superficially the same as those in the original game. Now, instead of the two branches of super-powerful abilities, you work your way up a Diablo- or WoW-esque net powers. And then there's a whole other layer where you earn Supply - ingame currency - and use that to purchase hero units and unit upgrades.

Look, in short it's a free-to-play RTS with persistent stats and a deep level of customisation. Just go DOWNLOAD the bloody thing already. Big orange button on the top-right, 9GB and you will of course require an account.

Survive The Road: A Lesson On The Journey

Time was when I would regularly go to the cinema. Once a fortnight, on a Monday during the 11th hour of the day, right after ... sigh, after signing on for Job Seeker's Allowance. I'd have the screen to myself, every week. Just perfect as far as I'm concerned. And The Road is exactly the kind of film I'd go to see - boring TV advert not-with-standing. But I've not gone to see it. Never read the book. Might do one of them though after playing Survive the Road.

Good To See You, Holmes: 211b Baker Street

Finally a half-decent Sherlock Holmes game has been released. After a parade of simply embarrassing Z-rate point-and-clicks we are gifted with 221B (as in Baker Street, the residence of the great detective). 221B is a web-based flash game tied in with the new movie that appeared in cinemas today.

221B has a great range of mini-games and professional shine (it should do considering how much Warner Bros. must have spent on it) with everything from video chapter introductions and photoshop-ed 'documents' to top-down chase scenes and crime-scene Photosynths through real-English witness questioning.

The game appears to be (not having seen the film) a fully fledged prequel story to the events of the film, with the brilliant duo investigating the growing numbers of deaths of London socialite girls and the strange and mysterious events which are connected with them. It is fairly standard stuff but well told through a multitude of lettes, telegrams, newspapers and specially recorded videos.