Posts By Paula Martin

Death Penalty: Zombie Football Review

There was a time when you could step onto the fictional football field in your favourite sports simulation game without having to worry about the problem of outside interference: the bad weather, the swathes of furiously-shouting fans hurling sharply-worded verbal abuse in your direction, the walking undead advancing slowly but menacingly towards your position for the sole purpose of turning you into a light afternoon snack. Yes, you read that section of the sentence correctly.

Miami Shark Review

Whether you are a fan of Jaws or have the desire to watch a city burn to the ground as a result of a shark, then you might want to consider having a go at Miami Shark, a highly-destructive shark attack game from Mausland.

Pokemon Tower Defense 2

In terms of the gameplay itself, Pokémon Tower Defense 2 feels relatively similar to its predecessor, since battles are still fought in the classic tower-defense style with Pokémon as the towers. You enter into both wild and trainer battles against multiple and single Pokémon equipped with a team of six active Pokémon that can be chosen from a potentially infinite number of Pokémon that you have captured beforehand.

English Learning Games Reviewed

Playing With Language: Best Learning English Games for All Abilities

Learn English: Sentence Master

Sentence master is an extremely clever app designed by educators to really make is players think about the composition, context, and overall structure of thousands of different sentences in the English language.  Developer Masterkey Pro has designed this app with what is arguably the perfect combination of educational approach and “gamification” of the English-learning process.

It’s Alive! – Card Auction Game

An card auction game where players compete as mad scientists trying to bring a monster to life.

Mmm! Braaaiiiinnns!

It is the turn of the nineteenth century, and mad scientists throughout Europe are competing for the infamy of being the first to create life through the power of alchemy. Using only the raw materials provided by some dubious ‘Suppliers to the Anatomical Trade’, harnessed lightning and the services of a motley crew of unattractive servants you race to collect the eight body parts needed to create your monster and bring it to life.

Unfortunately the local peasants are particularly clumsy and tend to die in freak farming accidents so the dubious gentlemen rarely find a whole cadaver in sufficiently good condition. Instead they offer the parts they have managed to salvage. Each turn you may buy the offered part, sell it to an anatomist for a meagre profit, or auction it trying to get a better deal or rip off your opponents. You might be lucky and get a coffin with a weakling clerk’s cadaver in the, which can be used in lieu of any strapping villager’s body part, or your involvement in the macabre trade might invoke the villagers’ wrath”.

Sumeria by Dirk Liekens

Boost the power of the city-states of ancient Sumeria by moving your traders. Gain control of the ascendant states at the right moments to collect the influence you need to win.

Border Reivers Board Game Review

If you’re an historian, the first thing you’ll likely think of when hearing the words “Border Reivers” isn’t a 2-4 player board game centred around some fairly light-hearted economic development and challenging warfare. Instead, you’ll probably be thinking of the groups of men that rode around on horseback in the middle ages, raiding towns around the Anglo-Scottish border and causing notable disruption for both Scottish and Northern-English people who lived nearby.

Border Reivers Books

Medieval history is fascinating with films and documentaries about how people lived back then proving very popular with not just history scholars but also the wider public too. The Border Reivers Gangs are a slice of that history that make riveting reading as they hailed from within a mile of the English/Scottish Borders between the 1300’s and 1600’s and raided the land around the borders constantly within this time period. There are many books on the market that cover the Border Reivers, while here are our top five books on the subject from our number one read through to number five.

About the Border Reivers

Attribution of Above Image of Reivers raid on Gilnockie Tower to G Cattermole [Public domain]

Though Britain in the middle ages can’t exactly be described as having been a particularly pleasant place to live for most peasants, the relative peace that existed on the main bulk of Britain’s land was a stark contrast to the situation on the Anglo-Scottish border. The political struggle between the two countries at the time is probably the most well-documented, but underlying this battle of ideals and ideas was the disturbing of the (still relative) peace around the countries’ borders at the hands of famous clans known as the Border Reivers, operating well outside the law.