UQM called one of "10 games for your MacBook"
I was reading through a bunch of blogs when I came across an article by Jenn Frank titled “Digital Download Korner: 10 games for your MacBook”:
"Look, I realize that Mac gaming is, on the whole, an oxymoron, like 'jumbo shrimp,' 'diet cake,' and 'libertarian.' And if you want to play on your Apple laptop, why, you're even worse off—seemingly relegated to ports, casuals, freebies, and castoffs. Until recently, even Apple admitted you were better off dual‐booting into XP."
‐ Jenn Frank
Jenn Frank has been involved in video jame journalism since 2005. She has worked at Electronic Gaming Monthly as a reviewer and 1UP.com as a community manager. Jenn considers the Atari 2600, Game Boy Micro and the iPhone viable game consoles.
Here’s what she had to say about The Ur-Quan Masters:
"Fans remember Star Control II: The Ur‐Quan Masters as one of the finest space adventure‐strategy games around (it sounds like a specialized genre, but it’s actually among the broadest and oldest). Initially released in 1992, Ur‐Quan Masters enjoyed a more recent renaissance when its creators loosed the original 3DO code for hobbyist developers to do with as they would. The result: a much more modern game—complete with multiplayer!—that runs brilliantly on almost every system and OS."
‐ Jenn Frank
I’m amazed that she pointed out that it’s “one of the finest space adventure-strategy games around”. I can never come up with a perfect answer that describe the genres that Star Control II covers. I once described it as a “Sci-Fi/Action/Adventure/RPG/Strategy/Space Combat” which is very long, but I’m trying to say that Star Control does such a great job at blending genres in such a way that it’s hard to split it apart into seperate pieces.
Even though it’s not a “top 10” list, I’m glad that The Ur-Quan Masters was listed with other great games I’ve played before such as StarCraft, World of Goo and Cave Story. At the end of the article, Jenn lists some games that “didn’t make the cut” which includes the Mac port of Spore. This reminded me of an article I wrote a long time ago where I write about various people referring to Star Control II when reviewing Spore.
I’m really glad that TFB released the 3DO source code to the community. Without it, Star Control wouldn’t be known for it’s strong “cult” status and I probably would have been stuck playing Star Control II on DOSBox, unaware of spoken dialog and remixed music. The only reason why I know the 3DO even exists is because I found out Star Control II was on it.
Thanks Jenn for adding UQM to your list.
