Well, it’s that time of year again – time to look back at 2009 and decide who’s been naughty & who’s been nice, and pay respects to those who are no more. We didn’t want to do any actual GOTY awards, since CoG staff and users have already handled that ably, but we did want to talk about the year in games, so that’s what we’ve done. Some genre specifics, pleasant surprises and disappointments are all covered, and then at the end we realize that we forgot to talk about MMO’s. The level of regret on this point is… low.

You’ll also get to hear about some neat indie stuff, both web-based and downloadable, as we run through Emberwind, Continuity and Dreamside Maroon. Our retro segment delves into the dungeons of the Sword of Fargoal, a trip I highly recommend you take. (The direct link to the Windows zipfile, until they get their site back in order, is here.) And I promised Jeremy I would link to Planet MULE, so now I have. Go… do the stuff one does on Planet MULE, after you’re done listening to the show.

Looking back, it’s actually been a pretty stellar year for PC gaming, and nobody in our group seems to be coming away disappointed. Let me take a moment to wish you and yours a lovely holiday season – we’ll be back just before the New Year to ring it in right.

Hosted & Summarized by Eric [Ravenlock]
Participants are Jacob [MagGnome], Jeremy [Lord Don], Adam [Grifter] and returning special guest J Arcane!
Produced by Clayton [Voodoo]

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We’ve made a big deal before out of how versatile a platform the PC is, how its very nature as an open system means that it can house experiments and experiences that consoles simply never can, so long as they remain shackled by static hardware and strictly governed content requirements.

Mods rest at the very heart of that divide, allowing PC gamers to take the games they buy and tweak them, mold them, sometimes completely reshape them into something new, something uniquely their own. As it happens, several of our crew have a history of tinkering in the mod world, and you’ll get to hear all about it in this episode.

The discussion runs long and there’s a lot of news to cover, so the Retro segment takes a vacation this week, but you do get a discussion of Igneous in our freeware segment, and a look at the very elaborate Sins of the 13th Tribe BSG mod for Sins of a Solar Empire. We also point you to the ongoing CoG Child’s Play drive, which you should already have donated to. If you haven’t, go do the right thing. We’ll wait here.

A few other random links I promised I’d post:

• Read J Arcane’s excellent column, RUN”HISTORY.
• Go play Quake in a web browser!
• Check out this remake of Maniac Mansion!
• A 3rd person UT3 mod with hot air balloons and cities in the sky!
• We like RockPaperShotgun, and so should you.
• Natural Selection 2 is looking pretty hot, and a $20 pre-order will get you into the pre-alpha, if that’s your thing.

…More to come as I remember whatever else I forgot. Get settled in, kids, this one ain’t short.

Hosted & Summarized by Eric [Ravenlock]
Participants are Robert [Trebor], Jacob [MagGnome], Jeremy [Lord Don], and very special guest J Arcane!
Produced by Clayton [Voodoo]

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