The PC Beta registration process is now closed, and the testing cycle itself has begun. I’m currently in a randomised queue awaiting my key, and I’m becoming exceedingly impatient. This is the most agitated state I’ve ever been in whilst writing! I shall, however, aspire to calm myself for the duration of this article.

See if I can handle the strain of calm, and find out what the heck I’m talking about, after the jump!

Okay… I’ve made myself a cup of tea and have managed to reach a level of lucidity that prevents me from screaming at small children out of my window. So, why are you reading this? Is it because you’re a conformist? Following every link that you get directed to on a blog? Or is it because you’re interested in what I have to say about Blood Bowl: The Video Game? Hopefully it’s the latter that pulled you in here, otherwise you and I are going to have a problem! (Not really, I’m just being dramatic.)

Blood Bowl obviously hasn’t been released yet, so it’s impossible for me to review it. However, I’ve noticed a distinct lack of mention on multiple websites towards this game and that’s why I’ve decided to write this Almost-a-Preview, to inform the Sarcastic Gamer community about it and fill in a few blanks for people who’ve only heard of it.

Blood Bowl began, as many things did, in 1987. It was a board game (using miniatures), released by Games Workshop that mimicked American Football (you’ll have to excuse the “American” prefix, I’m British), except it involved a whole bunch of fantasy races from Orcs, to Dwarves, to even Rat-people.

The addition of multiple races didn’t really give it the right to be called “Blood” Bowl, though. That title came from the sheer brutality of the game. Players could be dismembered or even killed through a variety of different means. During a game I was playing with a friend recently, a member of the crowd killed one of my higher level players by throwing a rock at his head! I could go into more detail about the board game, but that’s not really what this community is about. So let’s get onto the upcoming video game adaptation!

To be released in June on PC and September on Xbox 360 (and also being released on PSP and DS), Blood Bowl looks to be a great homage to the board game classic. Bringing all the blood, gore and action to the video gaming world in the form of two major game modes, Turn Based (so as to fully replicate the board game), and Real Time (for anyone that wants to play it more like Madden or NFL ‘09).

The blatant difference between these two modes should be obvious, in a Turn Based game you will have plenty of opportunity to strategise, bringing the average match time to 1-2 hours. The Real Time game, however, will be fast paced and will most likely end anywhere between 10-20 minutes. These two modes can be played throughout all of the game’s match types, from the single player Season to the varying Multiplayer modes.

More on this, and the reason for existence, over the page!

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