Games

[icycalm]

February has been updated with 17 titles, including the second instalment of Paizo's Quest for the Frozen Flame campaign. This marks the first time a GMRPG title makes its appearance on the Insomnia release schedule (and indeed on ANY release schedule in any videogame site). The banner for this game is slightly taller than normal, because I didn't want to crop it. It'd look crap cropped. I think I'll have to keep doing this unless I want to remake these banners myself from scratch, which would be difficult. I could use Fantasy Grounds' Steam banners, but they are busy as fuck, plus they have the FG logo which implies that FG is required to play the game. But you can also play on Foundry or any number of other VTTs (including TaleSpire), so I don't really want the FG logo on there.



Instead I am using this image made by Paizo and posted on their blog:



This is the official promotional banner for the adventure, and you can see how stylishly they've placed the system/setting, campaign and adventure logos, which are the only ones that should be there.

Problem is, Paizo only started making banners in this style recently, so as I expand the release calendar backwards I'll eventually reach the older titles that didn't have such banners made for them, and then I might be forced to use FG's Steam ones. So for consistency's sake, it might be best to use these for the latest releases too...

Anyway, it's too much to think about right now, and I much prefer the look of the official banners, so I'll go with those now and figure the whole thing out when I absolutely need to.

[icycalm]

Updated some bits and pieces.

1) Added CULT LIVE banner to KOF15
2) Added banners for Darkest Dungeon II and Age of Darkness for October, with CULT LIVE banners for both (more titles for October coming soon)
3) Added WARNO for January (more titles for January coming soon)
4) Reformatted the banner for February's Pathfinder AP release and added November's Starfinder AP release with the new format banner

The new banner format for GMRPG releases is basically their cover, with a width of 292 pixels, just like all the other banners. But since the aspect ratio of these covers is like a book, it means that these banners are way taller. This is what the two I have up currently look like:





This is the most aesthetically- and functionally-efficient solution, because as we go further back in time there is less and less high-res artwork that can be used to make a banner, and past a certain point there's nothing but cover scans. So by using covers, I can go all the way back to the original D&D release in 1974 with no problems.

Of course this means that this genre gets way bigger banners than anything else. But if you know my art theory, you'll know that I believe this is the highest videogame genre, and indeed the highest art genre ever. So maybe the larger banners are warranted. Also consider that, despite being the best genre—or rather because of that—it is the least popular (see my essay on the popularity vs. quality equation [ > ]). So again, it makes sense to highlight it somewhat, and I think these banners will catch people's attention, month after month and year after year. Look for D&D and other brands to show up on the release schedule soon. There's tons of stuff coming out from many companies, and the frontpage is about to get a whole lot more interesting and colorful once I start adding them.

One issue I have is that I'll have to redo the stars and the "NOW PLAYING", "GAME OF THE MONTH" etc. banners to fit this new aspect ratio. It won't be easy, because the aspect ratio isn't exactly standard: different companies use different book sizes, or even the same company might vary them across product lines. So the height can vary a bit. It's a challenge for me, and for a while it will mean that GMRPGs won't have any of these banners next to them, but I'll figure it out eventually.

[icycalm]

January has been updated with 14 titles, plus WARNO that was already up, so 15 in all. In addition there were four more titles released that look like garbage to me so I left them out:

January 28, 2022: Blank Frame https://store.steampowered.com/app/1825620/Blank_Frame
January 27, 2022: Rugby 22 https://store.steampowered.com/app/1475850/Rugby_22
January 21, 2022: Baby Storm https://www.nintendo.com/store/products ... orm-switch
January 20, 2022: Pupperazzi https://store.steampowered.com/app/1028350/Pupperazzi

I am sure there's more garbage, and maybe a couple decent releases too, and I'll be updating more eventually. Let me know if you catch anything.

So now we have January to March up, all three 2022 months so far. I'll be doing April soon, at which point we'll have four months. I intend to stay current the entire year.

[icycalm]

Added December with five games for now. I'll be adding a lot more soon, and then cleaning out all the older months to make space for the current stuff. More action soon.

[icycalm]

December's releases are all up, minus the three major GMRPG releases that I'll be adding soon.

[icycalm]

Added all of August's games, including Pathfinder and D&D. More GMRPG lines and publishers will be added soon. There are quite a few more to add, and all the coolest games are there, so watch this space.

A new feature is a white border around all games that have forum threads. Banners without the border direct to each game's official site.