End-of-week Report

Still busy with Tales of Berseria, and I also started with Age of Wonders III. The latter has been sitting in my library for forever, and it's surprisingly good. I regret not playing it earlier.
There's always a small problem with posting a review for non-ending games that I don't quit. That's because I always post a review when I either finish or quit, but if I do neither, I should post it at some optimal point between when I've played the most, yet the game hasn't become overly familiar yet.
I'm 20 hours in so far, but I feel like I'd want to play different races, maybe something that isn't the campaign... Explore as many different possibilities as I can.

Anyway, onto the report. The number of games is miraculously still going up. I think this is a sign that I need to just cull a whole bunch without playing them. Maybe if when I reach 300, how about that?

• Games in backlog: 282 (+3)
• of which VR: 18
• of which Visual Novels: 49 (+1)
• of which Early Access: 62 (+1)
• Games reviewed last week: 2
• Games to end-of-month goal: 32 (10.7/day)

Unexplored

Unexplored is a game I added long enough ago that it was when I still wrote about each new game I added to my list. As mentioned, I skipped over it at first glance, but later opted to give it a chance, seeing how various places praised it, mainly for it's unique dungeon generation and content amount. I took my time to play it, quit, then tried again, and quit again. Overall I can't quite say I agree with what I've heard about the game.

Unexplored is an action roguelike. While it might seem like sort of a new idea in its execution at first, I would rather say it's very much a copy of some of the earlier roguelikes I've played, offering nothing new in itself. (Admittedly, I haven't played many old games, but some, still.) Of course, it's moderately impressive how the game quite faithfully manages to translate this experience into a non-tile-, non-turn-based system.
While I've nothing bad to say about the dungeon generation, I really saw nothing special in it. Maybe it's because it actually allows for cyclical routes and has a bunch of interactions between objects in different areas? Sure, the average dungeon generation algorithm I've seen just about anywhere is rubbish, so this one is more impressive in comparison, but it's still nothing special.
As for the content, I'm again not sure what it was being compared to. Compared to the average rubbish roguelike (or action roguelike, often in the form of some sort of shooter), sure I'd say there was a reasonable amount of content. Compared to something like Dungeons of Dredmor or Binding of Isaac? Not a chance. The various weapons got repetitive fairly fast and classes had basically no variety (because they were mostly equipment-based, there is no skill system in this game).
Finally, I find the melee system to be somewhat poor, although this could just be personal preference. Games with good (action) melee combat are pretty hard to come by because of how difficult it is to handle collision, swing speed, "cooldowns", etc.

Ultimately, while Unexplored doesn't seem like a bad game, it's pretty mediocre. Sure it's somewhat unique in being action-based, but otherwise I saw no new concepts being introduced in this game, nor any mechanics being executed particularly well. I can't quite say if you should or shouldn't spend your time trying it, considering most people seem to rather like it, but I rather did not like it.

Catmaze

So, Catmaze is a metroidvania. It looks nice enough from the pictures and the short gameplay videos on the store page, but once you start playing it... It's terrible.

It really feels like someone was just given a basic list of things that they had to implement gameplay- and art-wise, they did that, and then left it at that. To say that there is no polish is an understatement. It just really feels terrible to play this game. All the movement, the enemies, animations, attacks, (action) feedback, it's all so badly made. To give some examples:
I feel like I'm jumping on the moon. When I run towards a ledge to make a jump, I just fall down 9 times out of 10, and I dare say I know how to time my jumps in a "normal" game. Stomping down on a barrel, not only does it feel like I'm falling softer than a feather, the barrel doesn't crash and break, it's more like it awkwardly dissolves. The bouncy yet clunky animations feel like the character is both drunk and doing half-squats all the time. It would be more faithful to the gameplay if they just replaced all sprites with half-filled balloons.

Not a very formal approach this time, but honestly, I don't feel like this game deserves better. One of the worse games that's made me believe I might want to try it, and I don't suggest you do. Stay away.

End-of-week Report

Absolutely not going to reach that goal. I'm barely moving forward. Oh woe, how will I ever finish my queue if even months of free time barely make a dent. I figured a helpful tactic is that I play multiple games at the same time whenever I'm going through any longer games. This way I don't have to choose between burning myself out on playing something for more than a few hours a day every day or "wasting" my time playing stuff not on the list. Considering the amount of hours in a day and how often I'd want to play something, I'd reckon 5 or so games at a time wouldn't be too many.

It's always fun to think of an excuse every week why I got so little done. Y'see, I was learning about image resizing this week, and I thought it'd be an easy thing, but suddenly it was connected to signal processing and that rabbit hole was deeper than I could have imagined. So that ate a few days.

• Games in backlog: 279
• of which VR: 18 (-1)
• of which Visual Novels: 48
• of which Early Access: 61
• Games reviewed last week: 1
• Games to end-of-month goal: 29 (2.9/day)

2.9 games per day? Nice joke.

Just Shapes & Beats

Just Shapes & Beats is just that - shapes and beats. You are a specific square. Your goal is to get a specific triangle. Avoid other shapes to the beat of the beats in a bullet hell fashion for a while to reach your beloved tri-angled friend. It's a simple concept, and a simple game.

Not much to say, but I suppose I could make a few disjoint statements about this game.

• It seems to be designed as a party game. It basically lists every single form of possible multiplayer option on Steam, and it has a literal party mode, where you can leave it running as background music, and people can go play to the tune of the currently running track, if they wish to. There is no actual gameplay difference to multiplayer though, at least as far as I understood. Couldn't really test.
• The beats are pretty good.
• I feel the attacks/hazards aren't telegraphed well enough. On one hand, this lengthens the game by making you have to somewhat memorize a level, and both forcing and allowing you to spend more time listening to each of the tracks. On the other hand, it feels kind of shit to get hit by something you couldn't see coming at all. All the time.
• It is kind of just a downgrade from regular bullet hell games, because it lacks attacking back, most forms of score measurement, any sort of upgrades, and possibly more. Your movement isn't really tied to the rhythm either, only the enemies' attacks, so the advantage of the music aspect is mostly, but not entirely, lost as well. A-and, well, further... Regular bullet hell games often have pretty good soundtracks anyways, so...

Overall verdict - not recommended. The music is good, but the gameplay is very basic and uninteresting. Might be a bit more fun with friends, but I'd recommend some other bullet hell game instead of this.

End-of-week Report

Slightly slower week this time. I had a few things that took time, and I also found a game I've actually been playing for a few days now - Tales of Berseria. Almost quit because of the absolutely atrocious KB&M support, but heck, ain't no way I'm going to let a game be playable with a controller, but not without one. It's definitely better than it's predecessor, but at least I decided I'm not going back to play that.

Did I really estimate 29 games in 17 days? That's... going to be tough.

• Games in backlog: 279 (-1)
• of which VR: 19
• of which Visual Novels: 48
• of which Early Access: 61
• Games reviewed last week: 1
• Games to end-of-month goal: 29 (1.71/day)

Space Pirates and Zombies 2

I think it's been about 6 years since I played the original Space Pirates and Zombies. I played it over the span of a few months, starting multiple games, getting bored before I finished any, but then coming back to play some more a while after. It definitely wasn't one of my favorite games at the time, nor now of course, but I still played it a considerable amount.
So I was a little bit sad seeing its sequel, Space Pirates and Zombies 2 in Early Access with bad reviews, but I decided to hold off on playing it until it got out of Early Access. I don't know how long ago that was now, but it doesn't matter. The game has come out, it's reviews have considerably improved, and I had just rolled it from my list to give it a try.

As much as I'd love to just get to the comparison between the two games, I feel a brief description of what the game is is in order. I do know that all those years back I was thrown off by the name of the game, as neither pirates nor zombies were (and still aren't) really up my alley. Luckily, the title mislead me. SPAZ is basically just a half sandbox, half spaceship fighting game. You start off with a pathetic piece of space garbage, and you fly around mining, trading, fighting, and pillaging to keep getting stronger. The game has an open environment (or "world"), a randomly generated map, enemies, stations, and parts, making it reasonably much a space sandbox.

When I entered SPAZ 2, I expected at the very least the same enjoyment I'd get from starting up the original after all this time. So when it had been a couple of hours, and I wasn't really feeling it, I stopped to think why. Clearly my first thought was that this sequel is just worse. However, maybe it was just my mind making the past better than it was. So I took another look at the first game, and tried to see where along the lines they might have messed up to ensure I wasn't just biased.

The first difference anyone would notice, is that SPAZ 2 is in 3D. This might have made a world of difference, if the gameplay were not so sadly still locked onto a 2D plane. I would assume this was intended as a visual improvement, and while I can't say it failed, I can surely say that not only was the effort not worth it, it was overall a negative, since the gameplay suffered due to it. The third person camera made navigation and recognition difficult, and on top of that, I had no idea if my shots were going to reach the target, or if I could/should move further/closer.
The shooting problem was "fixed" by an automatic fire mode that just shot at anything in range, prioritizing your attack target. This fire mode was so efficient I would be severely gimping myself if I decided to switch to manual instead. The downside? That is literally half of the fun of the combat portion of the game, ruined. I had been demoted to just being a pilot.
Further, it would seem like there is just less content overall. Less items, ships, possibilities... More time spent in the less fun map view. Some awkward ship-building system, that, while giving me more options, also made progress feel a bit more hollow. It's just not an improvement over the original, and if you ask me, it really should be.

If anything I wrote sounds like fun, go try SPAZ instead of it's sequel. While I can't say the original was super exciting, captivating and all that, especially now due to its age, the sequel is just a downgrade, and not worth your time.

End-of-week Report

Feels good to be back to playing other games. I've got a big backlog to wither down, and I'm no doubt going to hit another gap of not playing sometime, but hopefully not before summer ends.

So good to see numbers going down. In fact, how about I try to get that big total down to 250 by the end of the month, and down to 200 before school resumes? More than a game per day? Well, better to aim a little high than a little low, but technically the goals seem achievable.

• Games in backlog: 280 (-2)
• of which VR: 19
• of which Visual Novels: 48 (+1)
• of which Early Access: 61
• Games reviewed last week: 4

Attack of the Earthlings

The unfavorable (spoilers, sorry) reviews continue with yet another game as a victim - Attack of the Earthlings.

Attack of the Earthlings is a turn-based strategy game that is, in a single phrase, a reversed XCOM. As the name implies, Earthlings (or humans, as we know them) have come to invade your planet, and you, as the matriarch of the Swarmers, whose planet was invaded, take it upon yourself to destroy the invasion from within the drill with which they came. Kill weak soldiers and civilians, eat them, birth new Swarmers, evolve them, kill stronger soldiers, and repeat the process until the level is clear. Then you, for whatever reason, have to leave your amassed army to climb up to the next floor alone and start over. But at least you get some sweet upgrades between that.

My main problem with the game is its relative lack of content. I have like 4 different units, employ the same strategies over and over, the upgrade paths are completely linear and only have a grand total of 3 upgrades, all the levels are pre-made, and there's just seven of them... It was interesting while they were still introducing new game mechanics, but as soon as that stopped, it got tedious and repetitive.

It's a bit of a twist on XCOM (as much as I know about it - I haven't played it very much. XCOM, that is) since there's a good amount of stealth involved. The Earthlings have a lot more units, which are generally stronger, so, ironically, you, as the dumb brute you are, have to outsmart them. Obviously it's because it's just difficult to make an AI that's better than you, so the player will always be the one playing at a disadvantage against an AI, but it's just not quite fitting with the story right now. Oh, additionally, the game has a bunch of humor. Looks like they invested heavily in it, and while it wasn't exactly of the quality that would actually have me laughing out loud, I must admit it was funny enough to be enjoyable.

But really, the entire thing feels like a few steps back from XCOM that probably inspired it. I would assume the team and budget sizes aren't comparable either of course, but sadly the games out there will and have to be compared to each other no matter how much money and people may be behind one or another. While Attack of the Earthlings does play slightly differently, I don't see the differences as something that would make a worthwhile substitute for the quality that is not present. So, while I didn't exactly dislike it, I wouldn't recommend it, as I see nothing particularly new or interesting here.

Tangledeep

I played a fair helping of Tangledeep today, and I feel like I've had my fill. I don't have much to say about this game, so I'll make it short.

Tangledeep is a dungeon crawler which perhaps deviates from the "usual" dungeon crawler by the following:
1. There are classes, but basically no class restrictions - you can wield any weapons, wear any armor, and, without too much effort, rank any skills. You can then mix and match to your liking.
2. You can collect and breed the monsters as pets, then take them with you.
3. There is no passive HP, Stamina, nor Energy (MP) regeneration. Instead the game focuses very heavily on consumables which are dropped in large quantities and can be combined via a cooking system.
Additionally, throw in a bunch of randomness in terms of what monsters you get (although this is not too uncommon in dungeon crawlers), and what you end up is a tangle of stuff alright.

What it feels like is that there has been a heavy focus on quantity over quality, akin to many JRPGs I've played. At first, there's a rather overwhelming amount of stuff to do and making sense of it all takes time, but eventually you kind of learn that some stuff just isn't useful and you end up using only a small portion of the possibilities. It really feels like the focus was on just adding more things without stepping back to look at what's already in the game, if it plays well together, and if it's any fun. In my opinion, it just isn't, and this whole array of "content" is worthless, as I don't want to experience it.

So, as already mentioned, Tangledeep is a mess of things thrown together that doesn't really synergize, and you're left with a whole lot of hollow gameplay. Would not recommend.

Frostpunk

I spent a few hours of the past three days playing Frostpunk. It's a city management game, but with the thematic twist that everything is suddenly freezing over, and people are very distressed by this, so more emphasis is on keeping people alive and away from despair instead of earning money and just building bigger. It's from the same people who made This War of Mine. If you're familiar with that, it might give some insight into the theme of this game. Otherwise, Frostpunk is just a city management game - collect resources, unlock new buildings, try to match your rate of progress with the progressively worsening climate conditions and morale of your people.

What first caught my attention was how beautiful the game looked. I think it really captured the feeling it was going for, as I could feel the cold and hopelessness just from looking at the entire thing. The music also contributed nicely. By the end of my first day of playing, which was about 5 hours, I really liked it, and I was itching to get back and play. Over the next two days my excitement slowly fell, but I remained pretty invested. That is, until I reached the point where I realized they were wrapping things up, the game was going to end, and... that was it. I didn't really feel like starting again, since I had seen pretty much everything, and it would just be more of the same. So, rather abruptly, disappointment hit. But allow me to explain in more detail.

While most city management games have what we'd know as a free-play mode as their main mode, and then maybe some scenarios to show off interesting aspects of their game that might not happen naturally as part of the free-play mode, Frostpunk only has scenarios. And at the time of writing, only a couple, though with more promised to come. But that last bit is irrelevant. There's a problem with scenarios in a game like this. Sure, they may give a very well-tailored experience where all the events have been carefully balanced to keep you on edge, yet not overwhelm you (though it might still be too hard or easy, depending on how well you're doing), but once you're done, you're done. There's no reason to go back, because there are basically no random variables. All the resources, locations, the weather, all the events are pre-scripted. A fair amount of time has been spent on developing these interconnecting mechanics which allow for simulation-like gameplay, and then it's completely hindered by fixing all the things that drive your decisions in place, effectively removing most of the emergent gameplay possibilities. And in this example specifically, if you deviate from that path to play in a different way "this time", you will have a hard time winning.

Overall, for the first playthrough, Frostpunk is a really well made game, and I absolutely loved playing it. The uncertainty of what's to come, if you'll survive, and how, keeps things very interesting. There's constant surprises to knock you off balance just as you feel you're about to regain your metaphorical footing, and the ending is lovely as well. Sadly, the playthrough is short - 12 hours at best, and there is nigh zero replay value after that. You can decide for yourself if the cost is an issue for that much game time, but if it's not, I would in fact recommend playing it. Due to the lack of replayability though, it will not earn a spot in the Hall.

Skelly Selest

It's been a long while since I last randomed a game from my list. Feels nice to be back, I hope my writing is not rusty.

Skelly Selest is an action-rogue-like where you run around, whack enemies with your axe, shoot them with your pistol, and try not to get hit. The usual stuff. There's some dungeons, some items, some enemies... Some, but not a lot. I saw nothing special in the gameplay possibilities this game offered. Same stuff as most of these dungeon-crawly-shooty-slashy games, except both less variety and content than what I feel would be a good standard. So nothing interesting, nothing good here.

The art style was nice in an aesthetic sense, but sadly a hindrance. I found it difficult to look at, difficult to read the writing, and difficult to track enemies and projectiles. Functionality should always come first. And speaking of writing, using "thee" and "thy" at literally every possible opportunity is not pleasant to read either.

Skelly Selest has oddly high ratings (although not too many of them), but I see no reason for this. It has nothing unique, and just a subset of features of some better games of the same genre. I wouldn't recommend playing it - there's nothing to be seen here.

End-of-week Report

Somewhere in the middle of copying over the games from my personal list to the Hall of Games I realized a few things.
For one, it strikes me as barbaric to keep a copy of a single thing in two places, where both of those places have to be manually updated. I considered if automatic updating was a possibility, but no sane solution struck me.
Secondly, formatting this stuff with HTML and CSS in the equivalent of a Notepad text editor is torture. The process of adding a single game, or, heavens forbid, a whole new category, is way too much overhead, not to mention the previous point of having to do this in two places separately.
As such, I've decided to remove the half-finished Hall of Games and All Games pages from this blog and instead remove any personal information from my personal lists which I update anyways and link to those. They're not as pretty, but it also has some other tabs you may or may not care about, such as most of my backlog.
This is definitely not an equivalent alternative, but rather a compromise. However, due to the two points listed above, I decided it's really not worth my time to keep a duplicate which is also a pain to update. Still, this should no doubt be a better alternative to not having any list at all.
I am now just missing short descriptions from all the games on the list, but I guess I can add them at a later point in time, when I feel like writing a bunch. But I've reached this milestone, so I feel comfortable playing something new at long last. It's July, and it's about damn time for that.

In any case, speaking of my backlog:

• Games in backlog: 282 (+2)
• of which VR: 19
• of which Visual Novels: 47
• of which Early Access: 61
• Games reviewed last week: 0

PS. I finished watching Neon Genesis Evangelion some time ago. I must say it was quite different from any other anime I've experienced. That's not to say it was good, but I must give it points for being so bold with a lot of its choices. Overall it was definitely worth watching.