Before working on games likeSkyDrift,Sine Mora, andBlack Knight Sword, Digital Reality was best known for their excellent 4X titles. Arguably the best of their space empire strategy games,Imperium Galactica II, is now available on iPad for$3.99. If you’ve only played the twoMaster of Oriongames (let’s forget a third one exists) orGalactic Civilizations II,Imperium Galactica IIis a bit like those games, but with a larger role for planetary construction and combat. From what I recall, ground combat wasn’tgreat, yet still far more enjoyable than the obligatory boredom of the ground battlesEmpire at Warthrew at you....

It’s a funny thing when you follow an indie game from its initial announcement to its release. I’d say it’s an equally funny thing when you live in ignorance throughout an indie game’s development, only finding out about it when a release trailer is posted. In the case ofKnuckle Sandwich, developed by Andy Brophy, I think there will be a fair amount of both column ‘A’ and column ‘B’ when the game drops in November....

If you’ve spent any time on Destructoid today, you’ve probably noticed mypreviewof Cryptic Studios’ latest offering,Champions Online.It is certainly an ambitious title for any studio, yet in the hands of the development team behindCity of Heroes, I would have to say thatChampions Onlinehas a good chance of pulling off all that it promises. One man in charge of making sure those promises come try is Chief Creative Officer of Cryptic studios....

More of this, please In a surprisingly progressive move, Electronic Arts will offer full refunds on game downloads for Windows or Mac that are purchased on its distribution platform Origin. What’s the catch? There isn’t one, really. You just have to request the refund in the first 24 hours after launching the game, within seven days after the original purchase, or within the first seven days after the title’s release date if you pre-ordered — whichever of these happens first....

More ships, more stages, more Jamestown Jamestownwas a wonderful shoot-em-up back when it first released on PC. With bullets blazing across the surface of a colonial Mars, it paired beautiful sprite art with epic music and cooperative local multiplayer to make something really special. With the release ofJamestown+on PlayStation 4, it’s larger than ever. Jamestown+introduces four new craft to pilot, doubling the number found in the PC release. These ships are not wholly original, with special weapons that resemble those of the base set but function in slightly different ways....

Silly shump returns Something particularly fun and adorable from Hamster this week, as it bolsters its mammoth Arcade Archives range with the addition of Namco’s cutesy ’90s shmupCosmo Gang the Video, now available to download on PS4 and Nintendo Switch. Released to Japanese arcades in 1992, before receiving a home release on Super Famicom shortly thereafter,Cosmo Gang the Videois a spin-off shooter featuring characters that appeared in iconic redemption gameCosmo Gangs, a title which saw the player battling to prevent a squad of crazy-eyed creatures from stealing energy boxes to take back to their home planet....

Kingdoms of Amalurwas hailed by Electronic Arts as a success, partly responsible for the publisher’s strongfirst quarter financial results. Meanwhile, the folks that actually made it are in debt, and the financial future of 38 Studios is uncertain. It’s become known that the studio owes theRhode Island government $75 million, and this last month it missed the last payment. It’s now behind $1.25 million. For those curious, the $75 million was a controversial sum of money given to 38 Studios to get them to relocate from Massachusetts....

Crafting chaos with the game’s creators [Mash Tacticsairs Monday through Friday at 4p.m. Pacific onDtoid.TV. Watch Rick ‘King Foom’ Olson play a variety of games, each day with its own theme. With a heavy focus on community and viewer interaction, you can be as much a part of the show as anything else.] If you’ve been paying any attention toMash Tacticslately, you should know thatRusthas become one of my most recent guilty-pleasure addictions....

‘A powerful antidote to the closed-sourced, black-box consoles of today’ After embarking on a goal of accruing $130,000, the CGW-Zero Open Source Gaming Handheld has successfully completed itsKickstarter fundraisingafter totaling $238,498 from 1,680 backers. This Linux-based retro-gaming handheld has been “built by gamers, for gamers” byGame Consoles Worldwide, with its inception based around running classic PC games, homebrew titles, and emulating your favorite classic consoles. Most of all, though, the GCW-Zero was built to provide freedom to the user, allowing them to do more than just consume content....

The game can apparently tell the lighting condition of your room It’s been around a year since we first heard aboutMetrico, an upcoming PlayStation Vita game that’s hard to pin down outside of its unique theme. In the words of Digital Dreams, this is “all about using input to shape the infographics around you and solve puzzles.” So far, so good. I follow. Then it starts getting right back to “huh?...

Rock you like a hurricane Mortal Kombat 11: Aftermathis now available to purchase. This paid DLC expansion to NetherRealm Studios’ gory fighter includes five-chapter epilogue to the base game’s story, as well as three new characters: Shokan Queen Sheeva, guest star RoboCop, and the God of the very winds themselves: Fujin. Fujin first appeared in theMortal Kombatfranchise as a boss character in the infuriating PlayStation platformerMortal Kombat Mythologies: Sub-Zero.Scant months later, Fujin made his debut proper as a roster member for 1997’sMortal Kombat 4....

Reports claim that some spent thousands as a family vacation As you may have seen, Niantic had their hands full last weekend with their “Pokemon Go Fest” in Chicago, an event that brought thousands of players out to the city. The game buckled under the stress and basically didn’t work for most of the day, an issue Niantic took the blame forandblamed on network carriers. As many have pointed out it’s strange that the company wouldn’t plan for this with wi-fi devices from multiple carriers (they kept repeating that Sprint was an “official partner” so they’re taking care of it), but what’s done is done....

A teaser for the first new episode Episode 1: Nightfall is coming with theOnslaughtdownloadable content forCall of Duty: Ghosts, and here’s a deeper look at what to expect. It takes place in the Alaskan wilderness, where the Nightfall Program has been researching the origins of the alien threat. A small team of soldiers are sent in to retrieve intel, kill off whatever moves, and take on a three-story tall monster....