Friday Foxer #186
This week’s handmade co-op puzzle won’t defox itself. If you’re a dab hand at quizzes, lateral thinking, and search engine sleuthing, why not help out.
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The Iwo Jima Paradox (Part 1)
Three things you probably already know about Iwo Jima. 1) It’s a small volcanic island 750 miles south of Tokyo. 2) In early 1945 it was the scene of a fierce and costly five-week battle between US and Japanese forces. 3) While cinematic recreations of said battle are often memorable and exciting, hexy interactive ones tend to be decidedly dull affairs.
A Streetcar Named Desire? Thoughts on Tramcity Hakodate
Four things you possibly didn’t know about Hakodate. 1) It’s a port city on the island/prefecture of Hokkaido. 2) In 1934 it was devastated by a fire that killed 2166 people. 3) In 1976 a MiG-25 Foxbat piloted by Soviet defector Viktor Belenko landed at its main airport. 4) You can beetle through its streets in Tramcity Hakodate, a new £13 Early Access tram sim with old-fashioned graphics, great audio, decent physics, and unusually truthful traffic lights.
Let’s mark/mock some menu screens
Seldom mentioned in reviews, main menu screens are, of course, the most important aspect of any game. I’m sure I’m not the only one who instantly uninstalls a new purchase if I don’t like the main menu artwork, then hunts down the person or persons responsible, and maims them using a thematically-appropriate weapon or tool.
Train and tram sim tidbits
Thanks to a gifted layout artisan called Rinston, owners of railway modelling sim Rolling Line can now drive Lilliputian locos around a stylised recreation of Half-Life 2’s City 17.
Win pike-festooned hex wargame Thirty Years War!
Professional history digitizers Wargame Design Studio have donated two copies of their latest pike and shot-era wargame to the Corner. To win one you’ll need to don your lateral thinking cap and study six images with pikey links.
Where am I?
Using the following clues (the map above is purely decorative) in combination with Street View, work out my location.
Unfussy fun: Old School Rally stirs dust and memories
Hmm. Not many of the 87 jpegs in my Old School Rally screenshots folder convey just how much fun I was having with Frozen Lake Games’ Early Accessible memory stirrer yesterday evening. I blame the fact that I was concentrating too hard on steering and braking to take eye-catching snaps, and, for reasons of practicality and immersion, was awfully reluctant to abandon the first-person views. The absence of replays probably didn’t help too.