I'm having far too much fun in Auto Assault.

The game is, when all's said and done, a bog-standard modern MMOG with all the originality of World of Warcraft or City of Heroes. You pick up your missions from NPCs inexplicably standing around 24/7 (made even more inexplicable by the fact you're in a car). The missions range from kill X thingies to kill X thingies to loot Y items via take this item to NPC Standsthere, with only the addition of Kill X random thingies until they drop a special item times 5 to liven up the oeuvre. The skills are right out of the D&D handbook, with lightning bolts, slow spells and the all too bizarre invisibility (“say, did you hear a car drive past? well, still, I can't see one so I'll ignore it” ) .

What makes it fun - albeit, I suspect, for a short time - is that you're in a car. Not that it's just being in a car that makes it fun, but the car, being a car, moves. This blows holes in the traditional pull-and-fight™ combat model so beloved of the genre. Your opponents move too. So, instead of passive tableaus of static mobs standing waiting for you to peel one of them off the edge of the group and hope to hell none of the rest catch on, you end up diving into the middle of a complete ruck and just trying to hang on until you've managed whatever task you're doing before getting out and back to the repair area before you're blown to shit yourself. Not that it matters too much if you are, there's no death penalty and you just get flown back to the nearest repair station. In short, they've managed to make the combat quite fun, which goes a long way given how much of it you end up doing.

The Edge brings news that the classic “Another World” is to be re-released.

“On April 14th, Chahi will release an enhanced remastered version of Another World, capable of running at high resolutions up to 1280x800 and with newer more richly detailed backgrounds, giving old fans a chance to revisit the world in a new light, and allowing new players to experience both the ecstacy of its serenity and uniquely rhythmic adventuring, and of course the agony of its signature repeat sudden deaths.”

Revisiting Another World - Edge Online

I remember playing this, and the similarly graphical Flashback on the ol' Amiga. Well worth a punt.

(Update: English site)

I picked up my pre-order of Guitar Hero from the Gamestation this morning. I've been playing it most of the day, interspersed with episodes of Buffy to let my arm recover... because its quite a workout on the ol' fingers.

So far, I have to say: really really good.