BUG'S STUFF

Positive

August 2023

PIKMIN 4!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
So Pikmin 4. It is a video game that exists, apparently. Looking over my notes, I've noticed that most of them are generally negative, which would seem to give the impression that I don't like Pikmin 4, the real video game for the Nintendo Switch, but that couldn't be further from the truth. I would say this (Pikmin 4, actual Video Game that is Real) is among my favourite games, perhaps on a similar level to Pikmin 2, not that I'm generally one to try and arbitrarily rank things. But yeah, super good and awesome and you should by it if you're reading this within about a year of it's release to boost the sales numbers so they don't wait another ten years to make another one.

SO, I put this off for a bit because I wasn't sure how to do it so I'll just go through each bullet point as a bullet point and expand on it.

• SOUND: the environmental sounds are really great, especially stuff like mud and the clink of walking over the clay bridges and stuff. Lots of great ambience. However, I feel like the creature sounds got a bit of a downgrade. It's most noticeable on returning bosses, which can be directly compared to the GameCube games, but most creature sounds seem to go for a more \"realistic\" or \"authentic\" soundscape rather than the more expressive and \"cartoony\" sounds they used previously. I feel they loss a fair bit of their personality because of this, which is a shame. Also the music feels like it's generally going for more ambience rather than \"music\", similar to BOTW and TOTK; it feels mostly like forgettable background noise, where the previous games unquestionably have distinct \"soundtracks\", if that makes sense. That said, when they actually do do music, it's great; I especially liked the tracks used in Olimar's Shipwreck Tale. Speaking of which;
• VARIETY: The game has HEAPS of different \"game modes\" that it regularly switches between to keep things fresh; there's the general overworld exploration with the day timer, the caves which are smaller and more focused (also love that they aren't all just procedurally generated jigsaw puzzles, probably one of the biggest sticking points with Pikmin 2), then there's the challenge mode caves which are just challenge/mission mode levels but sprinkled throughout the story to, as mentioned, add variety. There's the battle mode caves which are a bit less interesting, but it's nice how they act as a tutorial for that (also I understand why they're in split screen despite being against a CPU but it's still really annoying). The night missions are less interesting than I'd hoped, and Olimar's Shipwreck Tale is REALLY good; having a mini remake of Pikmin 1 is just super, DUPER cool and fun. I kind of wish that after unlocking them you could select them from the title screen to just play whenever though; Olimar's thing doesn't use any of your story equipment so that would be easy, and maybe have the challenge levels just give you an \"expected\" loadout like some games do for boss rush modes (e.g. DK64 or OOT3D).
• SWARMING: okay, so a big complain by every single person with a brain that's played Pikmin 3 is the lack of c-stick swarming; the charge changes make in Deluxe were pretty good, but still not a complete substitute. In Pikmin 4, there's this guy that you unlock pretty early that sells you gear that unlocks various abilities and stuff, such as charging. I saw this, thought, \"oh that's a bit disappointing, but makes sense\", and moved on. Eventually I unlocked Shipwreck Tale, played to the second day, and WHAT DO I SEE BUT THE **LINEUP TRUMPET**???? An item that gives you SWARMING??? I was SHOCKED and ELATED and confused. Had I bought this from Russ without realising? Had I just missed it in the shop? I went and checked and no, it was nowhere to be seen. I NEEDED this item, so I looked it up. Turns out it's a quest reward for getting all the musical treasures; I had that quest, and was only missing a couple! So I check the location of the last few, and what do you know, the last one is in literally the final dungeon of the game. So they want you to go through the ENTIRE GAME without a CORE MECHANIC UNLOCKED????? I was shaken once again, horrified. If I was to get the most out of it, I would have to have rushed through the story and ignored all the side caves and treasures and stuff, which of course I didn't because anyone will tell you it's more efficient to 100% each area to avoid having to clear out all the enemies multiple times after they respawn! But it TURNS OUT they don't anyway so that was POINTLESS (which is also generally a bad thing since the areas quite quickly become really barren and lifeless, which just kind of feels bad). So the moral of the story is that you should rush the main quest to the final cave, get the the music box thing from the 4th floor or where ever it is, THEN go back and complete each area. Or just get a mod that unlocks it from the start, like it should be. Also having to hold L to use it wasn't ideal, but I think I mostly got used to it. Would be nice to have an option to swap that around with the camera controls. Speaking of which;
• CONTROLS: the auto-lock-on is horrendous and it's baffling that you can't turn it off. It's sometimes helpful for just quickly dealing with random little enemies but it does far more harm than good; it regularly decides to target random other stuff around you when you're trying to kill and enemy or do some other time sensitive task. The controls from 3 Deluxe were quite good (despite the lack of swarm) and I'd say they should have not fixed what wasn't broken. The changes were likely in service of the new, generally lower camera angle. I was a bit worried when I first heard about it, but it was fine. Holding Y brings up a circle menu with various functions like items and dismissing. This is really shit. Luckily, however, you can map all these functions to the D-pad, so I did and never had to use that menu again; if that wasn't an option I think it would be enough of an issue to significantly take away from the game's quality. It would be nice to remap ALL the buttons, of course, but this is a Nintendo game, so we need to keep our expectations realistic.
• TUTORIAL: is super long and slow; on a first playthrough I can understand but I dread having to go through all that again. Shame you can't skip it!
• BALANCE: Oatchi, especially as the game progresses, gets SUPER overpowered. Combined with the power and ease of accessing items and ice pikmin existing, this game could be trivially easy if you don't restrict yourself. Now, this isn't inherently bad; easy games are accessible games, and nobody is forcing you to spam sprays and lightning, but it's an interesting consideration. On my first run, I went for no deaths and no \"bought\" items (only the prototypes and those dropped from mound and stuff) and I found it to be a pretty reasonable balance, though still easier than the GameCube games. Maybe limiting ice pikmin usage and Oatchi upgrades would balance it out a little better too (though OP Oatchi is very fun to just ram into stuff and run around with). Also glow pikmin for caves are apparently completely broken but I never used any so I can't attest to that.

Wow, that's really long. Pikmin 4 is great.

Positive

July 2023

Could have sworn I'd written this before, but I guess not. Super Squidlit is super awesome and good and stuff. Similar to how the first game is like the first Kirby, this game (like Kirby's Adventure) expands out from the original and adds heaps of cool stuff (including colour!). The FPS segments are interesting, though less so than the regular platforming parts.

Positive

Very fun puzzle platformer with an interesting idea that is explored fully without overstaying its welcome. I played the switch version, and my only complaint is the colour wheel can sometimes be a bit finicky, especially when you need to change quickly. It's a small issue though, and I can't think of a better way to do it. Very good!

Positve

Probably the best platformer I've ever played. Simple controls expanded upon with tons of interesting and intuitive mechanics, each of which feel amazing to use in the masterfully crafted levels. Making each screen a checkpoint allows them to make individual challenges very challenging without being frustrating, allowing the game to be very difficult but forgiving, which, as someone who sucks, is a very good thing. The presentation is amazing, with beautiful pixel art and lighting effects, as well as an amazing soundtrack. I'm extremely jealous that I will never be able to make something on such a level as this.

Neutral

Quite a fun game. The slimes are very cute, especially their sound effects. It's quite fun to build up a little farm with all the different slime types and explore the various locations, but I feel like it's missing something. The world isn't that big, and once you've got all the slimes, there isn't too much to do beyond the lab stuff. While I get it's probably contradictory to their design goals, I felt the automation with the bee robots (which are also adorable) to be rather underwhelming and would have liked to see more. That said, I think that's just from playing too much Factorio. Unless that's the sort of thing you're looking for, it's definitely worth a try!

Positive

A short puzzle game that is absolutely worth playing. The music and sound design are great, the puzzles are interesting and fun, the visuals are pretty. I only remember getting properly stuck once, and that was just because I'm a doofus.

Positive

A short little \"Game Boy\" platformer that is extremely charming and great. It reminded me of the original Kirby. You should definitely play it, and the \"Game Boy Colour\" sequel (when it comes out).

Positive

This is a 2D-Zelda-like and is very good at it. The visuals are amazing, and the puzzles and items are good. The only part I remembered having an issue with are these two \"Simon-says\", memorise-the-sequence-and-repeat-it sections, which I always despise. Thankfully one was optional, but please, PLEASE never put that shit in any game ever, they are not fun. Everything else was great though, so still definitely worth playing! On a side note, I noticed the dungeons were generally used more linear, sequence-of-puzzle style layouts, rather than the more circular-y layouts from most Zeldas; not a good or bad thing, just interesting.

Positve

First of all, it's a Pikmin game, so it's obviously amazing and you would play it right now. I'd say there's enough of an improvement from the Wii U version that you should play this one instead (though the old one is much cheaper, if you're really desperate and strapped for cash. Again, it's Pikmin, so it's good). There are lots of control options in this one, which is always a pleasant surprise when Nintendo does it. Personally, I prefer a normal controller without gyro, but you should definitely try the different ways out. The changes to the charge mechanic (allowing you to charge your selected type in the direction you're facing or at the thing you're locked onto) make it better than the original, but it still doesn't feel like it replaces the old swarm. The new side story stuff is nice, even if they are just glorified mission maps. The difficulty options are interesting, though even on Ultra-Spicy, I never had trouble doing everything I needed in reasonable time, and it's still by far the easiest entry in the series. If you never played it on Wii U, definitely get this one, and if you did, get it if you really liked it and want more. Play the demo either way, just in case.

Positve

It's one of my favourite games of all time, and it holds up incredibly well. It's an amazing sequel, refining the mechanics of the first game (which feel pretty clunky going back after the future games) and expanding the content to near perfection. I'm struggling to articulate just how awesome this game is. The bosses are cool and interesting, the music is amazing, the treasures are cool and fun to collect. On that note, many of the treasures are product placement, like the Duracell battery you get on the first day, but I think this is actually kind of cool and gives a nice “grounding” in the post-apocalyptic setting (though it seemed like an odd choice; who is their target audience?). My only complaints are that some of the caves are a bit funky (why is there a perfectly preserved living room under this swamp?) and some mechanics are still a little scuffed, like Pikmin drinking nectar, or how you throw Pikmin with extra momentum when running but only sometimes. Overall, play Pikmin 2 now it's amazing I swear.

Positive

Factorio is one of those games that I'll start playing at noon, look over at the clock an hour later and it's 2 in the morning. Troubleshooting issues in your production lines can be endlessly frustrating, and having an outpost be overrun by alien bugs feels crushing, and yet I continue to persist, laying conveyers and repairing walls, automating the construction of every little crafting component, not because its used for anything important, but simply because I can. My interest in this “automation” genre or whatever you call it originated with modded Minecraft, and I can say that this definitely scratches that itch (and is far less likely to crash and corrupt my save).

Negative

Baldur's Gate is one of those big classic games people talk about that's influenced tons of stuff coming after it. However, I played about 4 hours, put it down and have no real desire to pick it back up. Most of my complaints can be attributed to its age; this is also the first game of this type I've played, so some of it may just be that I don't like the genre. The controls, movement and dialogue all feel very crusty and unappealing. The only reason I'd consider continuing is to see the story through, though it seems to be pretty standard, so I can't see that happening. Overall, pretty meh.

Neutral

So, I really want to like this game, and I kind of do, but I suck so bad at it that I can't really enjoy it properly. My brain just doesn't run fast enough to figure out what to do between the fast beats. I also had this problem with the Cadence of Hyrule demo, which sucks even more because of how much more cool stuff appears to be in it. That said, the visuals are very good and the music is excellent (as you'd imagine from a music-based game). The soundtrack is on Spotify, and I'd absolutely recommend it. The game's definitely worth a try though.

Positive

Donut County is an adorable little game about dropping shit into a hole. It's got some puzzle-y sort of sections, but for the most part it's just that simple. The story and characters are cute too, which is probably the main appeal. The visuals and sound design are very nice. It's hard to describe in a way that doesn't make it sound dumb, but it's really good, trust me. Go play it.

Positive

A fun little Zelda-y puzzle game. It only has three items for you to use, but it explores each of their mechanics and interactions very well and interestingly. I also appreciate that the map shows areas you've not completed yet (once you find the upgrade for it). The game looks good too, though the music was underwhelming, and felt more like background noise. It's short, so no reason not to give it a try!

Positive

It's really fucking good, dude. After 3D All Stars came out, I decided to finally play through all the 3D Mario-s, and Odyssey is easily the best. The controls feel great, the hat mechanic is super cool and well utilised. One major difference I noticed is the lack of super annoying, shitting bullshit parts that previous titles have sprinkled throughout, like the Chuckster thing in Sunshine. I can only think of two parts that even approached that level of frustration, and both were postgame, completionist areas. A testament to the design is also that many parts that should be super shitty and annoying are somehow not, most notably the sheep herding (in the overworld areas) and the face puzzle things. So yeah, the hype is justified, Odyssey is awesome.

Positive

An excellent little platformer with a pretty Game Boy art style. It's good. I find the palette swapping to be interesting, and a nice way to make each level feel different while still maintaining the aesthetic.

Neutral

As a kid, one of the first video games I played was Silver, and, while I had no idea what I was doing, I loved it. So, I bought Crystal when it came to the 3DS, and I love it! I'm not sure I can recommend it though, since it was far from perfect even at launch, and a lot of the shittier stuff has been exaggerated by age. The level scaling is terrible, with wild encounters capping at about level 30 outside of Victory Road and Mt. Silver (which you can only reach after beating the Kanto league), which making leveling up extremely grindy as the game goes on. Some of the mechanics are pretty fucked too, like only being able to carry 10 unique items in your main pocket, not being able to see what moves do without a wiki, and many of the day-of-the-week based events being tedious to reach. Also the roaming legendaries; wowsers. While great for its time and a massive step up from Red and Blue, I'd only suggest playing it today if you're either nostalgic or curious. Play HG/SS instead.

Neutral

I'd previously only played the demo for Monster Hunter 3 Ultimate on the 3DS and didn't really like it, so I was a bit sceptical about it. However, I've found myself enjoying it a lot. It's pretty repetitive, and can get quite grindy if you want all the best gear, but it annoys me far less than I expected. The core gameplay is just really fun. Early on, I had a bit of trouble with the controls, as my brain kept trying to think of it like Dark Souls, though it's not similar beyond vague aesthetics (if that makes sense). On the topic of controls, they're really weird and annoying, with far too many combinations doing various moves or controlling different menus and shit, and I wish there were a way to simplify it all; for example, by default, to scroll through items, you have to hold L and press the D-pad until you reach what you want, but that also brings up this action wheel thing controlled by the right stick, disabling camera controls (I've accidentally wasted potions with this thing far too many times). Crafting equipment is okay, though the menu for the smith is a bit obtuse, and it's annoying that you can't see what an item needs until you've “unlocked” it, meaning it's hard to properly plan ahead. So basically, I like the game, but it has lots of little annoying things that don't detract too much. Play it with friends.

017

Worst games in the series, hands down. Clearly very rushed, with bland graphics, non-existent challenge, basically no story (even by Pokémon standards), no postgame beside the DLC (which feels very tacked on), uninteresting gimmick, and of course, dexit. I feel like they had lots of great ideas, but just half-assed them all. I love the soccer-league aesthetic, but the gym challenges themselves feel completely detached from it, with only the leader battles even happening in the stadium. The wild area is a great idea, but they needed to go all-in and replace routes entirely; we just ended up with a big empty field with nothing to do, and bland, linear routes with no reason to ever return to. To me, it seems like Gamefreak really doesn't want to make Pokémon games anymore, but can't not, given how absurdly profitable they are. It's just really disappointing. All that said, I still did enjoy the game quite a bit; it's still Pokémon at the end of the day, and if you like the core gameplay, you'll probably still have fun with it. The music is amazing as always, and I like lots of the new Pokémon and the Gigantamax designs. Don't bother unless you know you already really like Pokémon.

Neutral

I've heard a lot of good things about Terraria, but having finally played it, I definitely prefer Starbound. I think it's not bad overall, but has lots of little things that feel annoying or unpolished, which remind me that I could be playing Starbound instead. Firstly, the difficulty spike after beating the Wall of Flesh felt very extreme; suddenly, all my cool gear is completely useless, monsters that can all but one-shot me are everywhere, and the corruption is immediately right on my doorstep. This isn't an inherently bad idea, but I was unprepared and it felt quite unfair. Next, the inventory system feels weirdly cumbersome. It might be that the icons are too small, or they all look too indistinct from one another, I'm not really sure. It just feels off, somehow. I do greatly appreciate the quick stack button, though. Lastly is the crafting system, which is probably the worst implementation I've seen. So, crafting is in a small list bellow the inventory, and new recipes become available when you stand next to certain objects in the world (which can be literally anything). However, recipes only appear if you have all the required ingredients, and you can only check recipes by talking to the guide and placing an ingredient for that recipe in this little slot (that I never would have noticed had it not been pointed out to me). It's really dumb and annoying, and usually requires me to have a wiki open on my second screen. All that said, I like the density of content and the concept of the boss system. The achievement telling you what to aim for next in the menu is also a great idea that helped me considerably. I definitely prefer Starbound though, as it does all the stuff I complained about far better, and has a few other advantages like nicer controls/”interaction systems” (placing tiles in the background, for example), and I prefer the more “firm” lore and the general concept of space exploration much more. I should also note that I haven't tried mods yet, which could very well fix everything and make it amazing.

Positive

Carrion is really good. Not too much specific to say. The best part is probably the overall feel of the game. The creature feels cool to control, the visual effects like the screen shakes, lighting and gore globs are amazing, and the sound is super punchy (especially with the shaking on that gatling gun) and good. It's also really short, but in a good way; it would have likely gotten stale had they tried to stretch it out too much.

Positive

As with Carrion, a very short, well-polished little game. Very good atmosphere as well. My only real complaint is that pretty much all the tension is removed once you die to something, as there aren't any consequences. Not that I think having harsh consequences would be the better option; it's one of those things that make video games weird.

Positive

Holy scabolly, this do be a spicy meat-a-balle! Very good visuals and audio, very nice story and characters and stuff, clever use of the medium to enhance said story; everything! For example, the stealing minigame thing was an interesting application of the existing “hand” stuff and effectively conveyed the tension of the scenario. While it was longer than I expected, it felt far too short by the end. I'm interested to know how much your decisions actually impact the events and outcome of the story, but I also don't want to check for other endings and stuff lest I decide to replay it in the near future (which is likely).

Positive

Very simple concept, yet so many cool applications! Not too much to say otherwise. Love the audio and visuals.

Positive

Very cute, and very nice mechanics used well! I only got stuck at one part near the end, where you have to get a lightbulb up to a platform while you're on a moving platform, which was mostly frustrating because of the wait between attempts. Also, the lighting bubbles not also being low-res pixel stuff is mildly disappointing. I really like that you can so back and collect the little token things after completing all the levels, but it would be nice if that were clearer from the beginning, as I restarted the first level to fine the one bean I missed.

Positive

Most of my observations are comparisons to the first game. I prefer the magic system in this one, though I didn't use it much. The FP (\"funny points\") system, while less unique, seems better at facilitating consistent usage (i.e. less constant backtracking to replenish uses). They also did away with the old durability, which is nice since it felt like a non-issue. My main complaint if the level design, with the map being extremely linear, to the point where it feels weird to even call it a Metroidvania. You get small clusters of connectedness within a given area, with single connections to each of the next parts. Having the ability to warp around between bonfires from the beginning, while convenient and nice, feels like it takes away a measure of connection to each area. I feel like I explore somewhere, reach the next bonfire, and never have any reason to go there again. These combined make the game feel more \"empty\", I suppose. Perhaps if you could only warp to specific bonfires? Also, bonfire placement is sometimes really weird. It felt quite generous, but often you'd get bonfires that felt right next to one another, especially the Dragonslayer Armour and Grand Archives bonfires, which are just comically close. Of course, all the other stuff is good; combat and visuals and bosses and all that are superb. ALSO, I found it odd that, as with to Dark Souls, the final boss was pretty underwhelming, considering the whole point is the big fancy hard bosses.

Positive

While I don't have much experience with the stuff this is based upon (closest I've come would be Half-Life) I think this is very good! I like the N64-y art direction and the level design is also great. On that note, I did often find myself questioning whether I was going in the correct direction or through an extra area, though it never hindered my progress. I only got stuck once; after the first bossfight, I couldn't find the little hole in the wall and had to reference a walkthrough. I really like the simplicity of it, which reminded me a lot of Half-Life, as mentioned before. One odd thing was the crossbow, which allowed for a great deal of cheese (such as basically bypassing the horse boss) and making the soup work on bosses. The atmosphere was great, with some really good spooky sections.

Positive

Really really really cool! I've only played Fusion and the NES original before (both of which I also liked), so I'm not sure how it generally compares, but It was really good. Very good looking too, and at a nice difficulty. That said, the controls are really bonkers; they're trying to do far too much with a standard control pad, and so have to set up this really weird and obtuse control scheme to fit everything in, and it can feel very clunky and bad, especially when quick and precise actions are needed. I also got annoyed at times where I needed to do lots of backtracking, especially when you get into an area you can only leave from in a certain direction, forcing you to circle right around the entire map again, though the map being clear and showing stuff like breakable blocks and uncollected pickups helped considerably. I probably should have written this a month ago when I was playing the bulk of it, as I left it for a bit and only just came back to finish off the final boss.

Positive

Very cute little puzzle game! Quite clever and pleasant. Nothing much else to say, it's a pretty simple concept that is used really well, like with the season changing with the size of the sun and stuff.

Neutral

While I generally think it's pretty fun and interesting, I've found it generally devolves into irreperable traffic issues just destroying everything. It's mostly utilities that just can't get to anyone, so they get angry and move or die. Maybe I should try it with some sort of anti-traffic mod?

Positive

This just happens to be a combination of my two favourite aesthetics; overgrown cityscapes and low-res 3D textures. It is so fucking gourgous, I can't even begin to descibe it. Interestingly, the game starts out pretty routine, but as it goes on you actually have to consider your \"economy\" to be able to pass levels, which I would be fine with either way; at worst, I find I need to add more to a scene that I'm already satisfied with. The plant growth physics are amazing and awesome and I just love this game so much.

Positive

A breath of fresh air! Despite being a spinoff, this is probably the best Pokémon game (at least in awhile, if not ever). I love the gameplay loop of just going around and throwing shit, which reminds me a lot of the Minecraft mod Pixelmon. When you think about it, these two projects are quite similar in concept; trying to translate a turn-based linear RPG adventure game into a more open and free-form one, but Pixelmon falls a bit flat in integrating the Pokémon meaningfully into the existing Minecraft gameplay and providing the player with any direction or incentives beyond “catch the cool thing you want”. PLA utilises Pokémon in all of it's systems whoever, including resource collection and transport, as well as having goals beyond simply plot, making it far more compelling. Of course, they had the advantage of being about to design and build the game from scratch, but still. My main issues with PLA are;

• It's very ugly in both execution and art direction, though that's pretty par for the course when it comes to Pokémon
• It got a bit grindy near the end, having to stand around waiting for space-time rifts to catch some of the rarer stuff like fossils, though this can be worked around with trading
• Lack of meaningful multiplayer; literally only trading, though the bag recovery thing is a fun concept
• Most of the menus have some sort of issue, like lack of sorting. For example, It would have been nice to be able to pin Pokedex entries so that you don't have to navigate back to it every time you check another one.

Positive

Not a great deal to say, it's very good. Great visuals and sound, and interesting level design. For some reason it really hated my controller so I had to use keyboard and mouse, but the controls were fine once I got use to them. Also fewer spookems than I was expecting; it was more of a slight backdrop contrasting the colourful presentation rather than a horror game or anything, which was unexpected but maybe better? Hard to say.

Positive

It's built on the same base as the first game so there wasn't much new, but the level design was better, and felt different. It might have just been that I was more used to it by the time I played this one, but the levels seemed more designed about speedrunning, more about gliding through them to the end in cool and fancy ways. Beside the shift, they felt generally more interesting, which might have been a result of this or just general improvements in the developers skills; it's hard to say. There also seemed to be even less spooky stuff; maybe I just misinterpreted the intent of the original as spooky, but there was basically nothing beside one big face that pops up on one of the water levels. Overall an improvement upon the original.

Negative

This makes Sword and Shield look good. While theoretically better, the numerous asinine design choices (no scaling on badges leading to a “correct” order despite being able to do them in any order, so the latter half of the game becomes trivial, for example) and the inexcusable bugs and glitches make THIS the worst game in the series! Maybe if they patch the bugs (which I doubt they will; so far the only meaningful fix was a duplication exploit) it'll be at least better than Sword and Shield. Having said that, I still enjoyed it and I like lots of the new Pokémon, I guess? The music is pretty good, as usual.

Positive

I really like the Minish-cappy art style, and the emphasis on exploration was awesome; it rarely felt like I was moving in the intended direction but was still finding cool and interesting things. The lack of traditional “dungeons” as one would expect of a Zelda-like worked well, I think. My main complaints are twofold; death felt entirely consequential, as you'd usually just get kicked to the start of the screen you were currently on, so there wasn't any incentive to not just run past enemies, and making revive potions felt pointless. Also, and more substantially, the hitboxes for most stuff felt VERY janky. Though in their defence, I played most of the game with the lower hit invincibility on, which likely exacerbated the issue, and I expect it's more a result of the engine they used.

Positive

Really fun, if somewhat repetitive, multiplayer game! The digging mechanics are fun, the music is good, all that good stuff. While the game does feature a seasonal \"battle pass\" thing, it seems fairly tame? I can't say that it's meaningfully impacted my enjoyment. Still a bit unsavoury.

Positive

A good game! Regular updates have added a fair amount of upgrades and stuff, where I would have said there weren't very many before. Though I often felt towards the end of a run that unless I was specifically avoiding certain upgrades I tended to have lots of the same stuff. Certain builds also just feel straight up better than others, though I don't know how you could avoid that without making everything the same or something. The art style is great, but projectiles can sometimes get lost in the noise, which is exacerbated by the small colour palette.

Positive

Amazing visuals all around! The gradual build up of SCP stuff is cool, but the payoff was disappointing. The chair being a spooky ghost wasn't mentioned in any of the notes (that I found) and it was apparently quite easy to extinguish.

Positive

May 2023

A very interesting and fun concept! I don't like explaining basic game information in these generally, but given that I'm now publishing them and this is an obscure romhack, I will; this is a roguelite Pokemon game where you go through a Slay-the-Spire-esque map and go into encounters (routes, rest stops, trainer battles, etc.) and fight a gym leader at the end of each segment, then eventually the elite four and champion with your little Nuzlocke team. It's quite hard, and I've have yet to reach the end, but quite fun. Each section has a level cap that you reach almost immediately so as to remove the need to grind, and healing (outside of healing rest stops) costs exponentially more each time you do before each \"boss\". The metaprogression is also interesting; as well as money for progress and achievements (of which there seem to be many) you eventually unlock the safari zone where you can catch anything you've caught previously, including a high shiny chance if you found a shiny in a run. You can only take one Pokemon into a run, which resets when you end a run (to the state it was in when you started, so you can still apply TMs and stuff in the hub). It also has lots of options which I didn't fiddle with too much, but you seem to be able to customise it a lot.

Positive

April 2023

This is an interesting one; despite being a shitpost mod, it's actually really high-effort in terms of both execution and content. It's redistribution of Pikmin abilities feels nicely balanced. For example, Moyai 🅱️ikmin (replacement of purples) are heavy for the purposes of weight puzzles, and \"bonk\" when thrown, dealing extra damage and a momentary stun. This makes them still very useful in general and in niche situations (weight stuff), but not so powerful as to trivialise almost all combat like their vanilla counterparts. The \"trolling\" mechanic is also very interesting, more so than the vanilla flower system; the three stages of flower growth, which grant slightly better walk/carry speed and damage at each stage in vanilla are replaced with three new states. Normal leaf 🅱️ikmin, which are fast enough to keep up with you, the new \"bud\" stage of \"Sonic\" 🅱️ikmin, which as far as I know only improves carry speed, but by a ton, and \"trolled\" 🅱️ikmin, which are acquired the ways you would normally get flowers, are completely useless, being agonisingly slow and weak, and are given a really weird floaty throw arch. This incentivises plucking 🅱️ikmin quickly to avoid troll growth and turns nectar into an obstacle, and withering blowhogs (or whatever the equivalent was called in this) into a helpful utility. Overall, a very interesting take and worth a try, if you can stomach the Youtube poop.

Positive

May 2023

Weirdly fun. At first the requirements for adequate level completion where a bit obtuse beyond the basic “clean the blood”, and I'm not sure I would have figured it out without reading a guide (like stacking the boxes in the appropriate loading zone and using the laser welder thing on bullet holes). Also the lighting (even with a lamp) can be absolutely abysmal (which I get is a part of the aesthetic but it is still annoying). Also the physics can be a quite buggy, in that sort of early teenies Skyrim-y sort of way, though it matters more here since most of the game is manipulating physics objects. ALSO, interestingly, this is the first time I've gotten motion sickness from a game; turning on the big UI circle thing helps, so maybe it's caused by the lack of other UI elements?

Positive

July 2023

First and foremost, the visuals. The Fucking visuals dude. I don't know what it is about these limited palette pixel art games but I just can't get enough of it. The art style alone makes me want to keep coming back to this, it's so FUCKING GOOD!!!!! Anyway, the game is pretty fun too, I guess. the turnover of upgrades and power balance feels nice, though I feel like, after only a few hours, the rate at which I'm still unlocking things makes it feel like I'm about to max everything out (beside the class-specific upgrades). Also an interesting note; one of the episodes of Masahiro Sakurai's little game design show talked about emphasising \"big moments\", such as the player dying. Here we see why that's important, because this game just cuts abruptly to a game over screen, usually leaving me wondering how I died. On a related note, I noticed that 20 Minutes Till Dawn added a bigger death pause shortly after that videos release, and it does indeed feel nicer.

Negative

What a bizarre product. Unlike previous \"remakes\", which are considered among the best games in the series, BDSP are more like glorified ports, with virtually no meaningful changes taken from Platinum and only a few meaningful differences to the originals, beside graphics (which are strangely just \"3D-ified\" versions of the original sprites). On a positive note; the changes to the underground are good, with the dens containing the only interesting geometry in the game, the massive speed issues were fixed (though you could argue that was carried over from Platinum), and the Pokémon league was actually really fun to fight with the increase in difficulty. The HM system is reasonable too. However, the cons far outweigh all of that. The National Dex is limited once again, though it excludes stuff like Sylveon and (I believe) regional forms, which is one of those things that feels like it is only like because of some misplaced dedication to preserving the originals (I'm surprised they even included Fairy typing). The team-wide EXP-share isn't toggle-able, and affection (which would only \"need\" to be included to evolve Sylveon) is TIED TO FRIENDSHIP (this is dumb). Also, technical issues. The game features many soft-locks and duplication glitches, though I've been lucky enough to avoid them. The collision on lots of the geometry is just fucked; sometimes as a product of zealous adherence to the original tile-based layouts, and elsewhere (the underground dens) just actually fucked. The D-pad controls are also broken; they've obviously coded it using a flat if statement, as certain directions have clear priority over others, making it pretty much unusable for anything beside minor corrections around the aforementioned fucked collision. Also berry watering is broken, with random berries getting watered, but sometimes not, as they only appear watered, so you have to manually water each if you want proper yields, which is exacerbated by the removal of the original walking-sideways system. My theory is that Legends Arceus was originally intended to be the gen four remakes, but they got a bit carried away with it, but still wanted something, so they just pawned it off to ILCA, and maybe enforced strict creative limitations? It'd be interesting to know if the \"faithfulness\" was their idea or not. Now, having said all of that, I did still enjoy the game; at the end of the day, it's still Pokémon. I understand Platinum is better than BDSP in basically every way, so play that instead. On a tangential note, I just realised that they stopped using the \"version\" sub-heading thing in gen 6.

Positive

July 2023

I hate horror games, but this is the kind I like; basically all atmosphere, which it does a great job of creating. The fishing mechanics are also just fun. This games main issue is the ending, which I won't elaborate on for obvious reasons.

Positive

September 2023

It's odd that it's now actually, officially called \"Pikmin 1\"; though I've always known it as \"Pikmin 1\" the idea that a game just has \"1\" in the title is odd.

My overall thoughts on this version of the game are the same as before; it's very good, but the weakest entry in the series due to it's clunkiness and stuff. Beside the obvious graphical and control changes made in the Switch port, a few mechanical changes were made with mixed results. Pikmin are generally more responsive, which is a very welcome change, though there are still times when they feel sluggish, like how they need to wait until an object is completely absorbed by the Onion before being commandable again. The changes to bomb rocks are interesting; they're generally much safer to handle now, with it being (maybe?) impossible to accidentally set one of randomly, provided there isn't a \"bomb rock target\" nearby. However, these changes also make them harder to actually use against enemies. I struggled against the final boss quite a bit because I just couldn't get it to swallow the rocks properly; the pikmin kept running around when thrown or just dropping them underneath it and running away. Also they'll return to you without doing anything if a different bomb pikmin has already been assigned to throw a rock at a given enemy, making bulborbs and bulbears quite annoying to fight with them. Unfortunately, pikmin pathing when following you still sucks, making it basically impossible to cross a bridge without a few just walking off the edge and drowning. Also the need to now hold L to swarm is kind of annoying; I somewhat got used to it in Pikmin 4, and I imagine I could in 1 too, but it feels like such an unnecessary change. At the very least, it would be nice to have the option to invert it, since literally the only time I touched the stick was to swarm. All that said, this is probably still technically the best version, unless you can't live without Wii controls.

Positive

July 2023

I would describe Breath of the Wild as \"all journey, no destination\"; which isn't too bad, considering how good the journey is. You run around exploring, finding weapons and monsters and random little things, only to reach a comparatively boring shrine, or a divine beast which is just a bigger, fancier shrine, or a really underwhelming final boss. Tears of the Kingdom is more like 80% journey, 20% destination (give or take). The journey is part is really good, and possibly better, and the shrines feel *somewhat* better, I think (I haven't played BOTW since launch so I may be misremembering); the dungeons are certainly better, most notably having actually interesting and unique aesthetics and settings and maybe leaning into a central gimmick more (again, BOTW might also be like that and I just forgot because they felt so bland). Also, while the basic sequence of proper boss fight and big outside spectacle is reused here, it's executed far better than BOTW. Having a duel with actual, literal Ganondorf is much more interesting than fight a big amorphous tech homunculus, and the dragon thing actually has something to do with the rest of the game (also of note is that Ganondorf turning into a big spooky dragon would probably be more impactful if the main evil guy from the last game didn't spend the entire game as a big spooky dragon). On a more specific note, the stuff it does better:

• The component-gluing-vehicle thing. There is just something about making little cars and driving around that tickles some primal part of my brain in just the right way. Even when it's extremely impractical or I'll only use it for a minute or two, I just can't help it! I do think that they should have shown off the control stick in the tutorial somewhere though, since it would let players know that it exists and to look forward to it.
• The underground, while lacking in variety, feels really interesting. The fact it isn't just a retextured overworld and has it's own unique mechanics and collectables and stuff helps that, and allows for you to mix things up a bit, which is cool. I also just like stuff there you need to play around with lights in dark places.
• Weapon fusing feels like a nicer system than just finding fancy weapons laying around. For one, it allows for more variety and some experimentation (though there aren't too many unique things you can do with it, there seem to be enough, maybe). I also feel that sense of \"I have to save this for the right moment which never comes\" less with this system, since you pretty much always have some good materials you can throw out if you need them. Especially with arrows.

Worse stuff:

• The setting/plot feels really convoluted and disjointed. It might not be so bad if you haven't played BOTW, and it wouldn't matter much if it wasn't positioned as a direct sequel, but I did and it is. Why is virtually all of the Sheikah stuff (both \"mobile\" like the dead guardians and divine beasts and \"stationary\" like the shrines, towers and ESPECIALLY the stasis chamber or whatever where Link was sleeping for 100 years which is just a normal cave now with no trace of anything??) is just gone without explanation? At first I thought it might have been some time-travel-history-changing stuff, but they do reference the divine beasts and Sheikah directly, and there's a little bit left in key areas. I get the non-diegetic reason; having one type of fancy ancient technology that isn't relevant to any of the new stuff would detract from the new fancy ancient technology, and also muddy the world design; they would need to use the existing towers or shrines for something, or clearly deemphasise their importance to the player in favour of the new towers and shrines and stuff. But still, even if they didn't want to do all that, all they would need is some throwaway line from Purah about how the towers all sank back into the ground or something, and the guardians are being salvaged for parts for the new towers. Yet they didn't! (unless I just missed it somewhere, but you'd think this would be an important enough point to make it hard to miss)
• On a related note, the new Zonai stuff is dumb. Did they really need to make a new, different ancient technologically advanced civilization (Fun Fact: this is the third time in a row they've done it; fourth if you want to stretch it and call the twilight people \"technologically advanced\") with suspiciously similar technology to the Sheikah (beside the little vehicle bits)?
• The sage follower guys, while conceptually interesting, are really annoying and badly implemented. Their active powers really should just be in the little menu thing so you don't constantly accidentally try to either explode or blow away the bug you're trying to catch, or ruin the car you just made. Also love when I'm trying to use one but they just run away from you because they think you're just walking in that direction. I'm grateful they at least made them silent so I wouldn't have to endure Yunobo for any longer than necessary.
• No guardians :(

As with BOTW, this is certainly not \"the best game ever made\" (or even the best Zelda) but it's still really good; better gameplay than BOTW but the disjointed narrative stuff brings it down, so maybe on-par overall?

Positive

October 2023

This is the first time I've done a game twice, which is a bit odd. Obviously Pikmin 2 is still the best of the four, and as with Pikmin 1, this is technically the best version. All the original criticisms still apply to this version; nectar drinking is dumb, bombs falling from the ceiling isn't good design, and just encourages you to run around with a single Pikmin to trigger all the traps before actually starting the floor, and the procedurally generated caves are bland, especially now that Pikmin 4's caves exist to compare them to. In regards to the Switch-specific changes, they're a mixed bag (I don't like that expression but I can't think of a better one). The gyro is kind of useless, as I find it mostly just makes the cursor wiggle off target rather than helping to aim. As I speculated in my Pikmin 1 write-up thing I got used to holding L for swarming, but I find myself basically always doing so; the only time I use the stick for the camera is for the pre-existing camera zooming function and by accident; really hoping they patch in an option for this. Also it's sad that you can only swarm (and thus make the funny little noises) when you have Pikmin with you now. The product placement being removed made literally zero difference; as a kid I didn't recognise most of the brands anyway as most of them were either American or European, so they may as well have been made up. I also retract my statement about grounding from the GameCube thing; that's really dumb and I'm not sure what I was thinking.

Also of note is that playing this one directly after 1 really highlights just how fucking stupid the Pikmin are in that game; it's so nice being able to do something as simple as just walk from one end of the map to the other without having to constantly babysit them at every little road bump, though that's more a criticism of 1 than praise of 2.

Positive

November 2023

Manic Miners is a fan remake of LEGO Rock Raiders, and is pretty good. Now, I've only played the original as a kid (where I was too dumb and scared to get very far) and briefly somewhat recently when I got it running on Windows 10. For the latter, my main issue was that it was super micromanage-y and painfully slow, both of which are still issues with Manic Miners but to a far lesser degree, as the developers put a fair bit of effort into improving the game. For example, you can now adjust the game speed up to 3x which is great, but you have to do it from within the options menu. Your guys will automatically train themselves for tasks as needed rather than needing you to tell them to learn first. Talking about the improvements is a bit hard, since I'm not sure what is and isn't new; for example, there's a lava-spread mechanic which I don't remember at all which might be new. Same with manually controlling lasers, or controlling individual miners for that matter. On another note, the extensive options available are great; you can turn off most mechanics, which would be great for stuff like the oxygen thing that is likely to turn a lot of people off. Also the character creator is a great addition that I didn't know I needed.

Overall, it's certainly the best version of the game, though it's still pretty slow and easy (the first campaign is, at least).

Positive

November 2023

SUPER short, surprisingly so. Only comment on the feel is that the wall jump parts feel super weird for some reason. Also it feels like you should be able to swing on the swingy poles but you can't. Very nice!

Positive

December 2023

Another that I could have sworn I'd already written about, but I guess not. I've never played Advance Wars, but I think I'd like it if it's anything like this. I especially appreciate the variety of difficulty options available for the campaign; options are cool! I only really have three main issues. First is a lack of \"highlight enemy range\" button found in (at least) the 3DS Fire Emblems; you can both press a button to toggle all enemy ranges in purple, as well as highlight specific units in red; here you can see a unit's range when hovering over them, and that's it. Second is a little nitpicky thing that I also got in the habit of from Fire Emblem; when you select a unit to move move it to another to attack it, it will just choose whichever tile is closest rather than the tile you moved your cursor in from, if that makes sense. Instead you have to move them to the tile you want, then select attack (bad). Finally is a general issue with this style of game, which Wargroove goesn't do anything to alleviate. It's extremely easy to get half an hour into a level, everythings going great, when suddenly enemy reinforcements spawn next to your commander and kill them in a single round, forcing you to restart completely. Or even just mispositioning them due to points 1 or 2, making them vulnerable to stuff they shouldn't be. It always feels really shitty and makes me not want to try again.

Neutral

December 2023

It's fine, I guess? The main thing I struggle with in platformers is timed stuff that isn't tied to your actions (for example, the ghost goo from the hotel level in Celeste), which this game is jam-packed with. Worse though is that different elements, even when used together, aren't synconised with each other, nor with the music so for some bits it was just a matter of running blindly into it until you get lucky. Unless you're good at timing stuff, probably.

Neutral

December 2023

Pretty good overall. Not having stuff locked behind classes was a very good call, especially since it wasn't super clear what some of them were in character creation, but respecing is easy. Gameplay wise I have a few complaints:

• The game doesn't autosave nearly enough, so you really need to get into the habit of quicksaving or risk having to redo a few combat encounters (why wouldn't it autosave when you leave combat?)
• It's VERY easy to miss-input in combat; placing the cursor over an enemy can be finicky and pressing right on the D pad (which you'd do to navigate the hotbar) activates \"attack mode\" so it's easy to accidentally waste a bunch of action points just smacking the ground for no reason.
• The default actions associated with some objects are baffling; I couldn't tell you how many times I've tried to open an oil barrel thinking it was a container only to pick it up because that's a thing literally anyone has ever wanted to do I guess? And when I go to drop it it assumes I want to CRAFT with it??
• Not so much a complaint and I get why it's like it is but a part of me really wishes it was on a grid. Maybe I'm just too used to Fire Emblem and stuff
• The quest journal sucks

But yeah, it's pretty good. Also positioning is way more important than I expected it to be which is cool but also means literally everyone you enounter as some kind of teleport power and you're kind of fucked if you don't.

Positive

January 2024

Very nice, actually. My only complaint is that there aren't more scenery prop things, like little houses or something (as far as I know at least). I haven't wanted to include pictures in these until now, but I feel like it would be weird not to in this case, so here are some of the photos I took.

Positive

January 2024

It's Portal! I really liked the new mechanics they added, especially the laser teleport cube thing (and I appreciate that they removed laser damage). The puzzles were all a pretty good balance difficulty wise; I only got stuck enough to look up the solution once and it was super obvious once you see it. My only complaint is that the dialogue volumn is VERY loud and can't be adjusted separately, so I had to play the whole game with very quiet everything except talking. It's been too long since I played either vanilla game or some other mods to properly compare them. I found the opening \"tutorial\" section interesting, since it reintroduces most of the vanilla mechanics in rapid succession, clearly counting on the player to already be familiar with them; that's probably reasonable given that this is a mod, but interesting none the less. Also of note is that they used the \"despawning cubes to unpress buttons and stuff\" thing as an intended part of puzzles, which I only noticed because I saw a video talking about how it's used a lot in workshop levels but never in any vanilla puzzles.

Positive

January 2024

This seems like it would be the opposite of what I like but I like it anyway. Everything feeds into the shitty, oppressive setting and atmophere like the equipment sucking and the various VC filters and the crusty graphics and it all just comes together so nicely. The game's main weakness is the limited content, most notably rooms and stuff for inside the factory thing (and mansion, which I've only seen once and is currently the only other \"theme\"), but I've no doubt that they'll keep updating it for quite awhile, especially given it's popularity.

Neutral

January 2024

Another one I played awhile ago and just forgot to write about. The lack of vertical camera movement feels super weird, but isn't a huge problem. It's usually hard to tell what a switch is doing or how certain stuff is activated, to the point that some areas that probably aren't supposed to be puzzles feel a lot like them. The lack of autosaving at the start of each level is dumb, since there's no reason not to quicksave and load there to keep your items, so they may as well just do that automatically. Still quite fun and interesting technologically.

Positive

January 2024

It's really nice, if a little clunky. Placing stuff down (especially belts) is a bit more cumbersome than Factorio. Also I feel like it doesn't really go anywhere beyond assembling shapes of ever increasing complexity, unless there's some final shape you need to make at the very end; after you start stacking, every shape is pretty much the same process with a few more modules. Also it's weird that it takes so long to unlock copy-pasting.

Neutral

January 2024

Similar to regular Doom, so just insert everything I said about that game here as well. Of note is some of the lighting affects look really cool for an N64 game, but I don't know how much of that is new to the 2019 Steam version. Overall it's maybe better than Doom?

Positive

January 2024

These people just can't miss, huh? It's utterly delightful; very nice translation of the mechanics into 3D (though the climbing can be a big janky), lovely visuals and music and an excellent degree of difficulty. Just super fucking good. Not sure what happened to the other 62 entries though, possibly lost media?

Neutral

January 2024

The checkpoint placement system is interesting. Otherwise pretty okay, I guess.

Positive

February 2024

It's cute! The addition of the infinite flight at the end with the little hidden stuff in each level is really neat. The audio is pretty scuffed though, and the camera goes a little wacky at times. A nice little thingo indeed!

Positive

February 2024

Who the FUCK could possibly have thought it was a good idea to give coins a 30 second despawn timer? There is no situation where it isn't just worse in every way than not having one. But beside that (and the long respawn times) it's pretty good. The level of polish is delightful. Overall I think Luigi's Mansion 1 might be better though, just because the map and level design are more compelling; I'm a bit disappointed this one wasn't more \"metroidvania-y\", but instead each floor (with the exception of the first bit with stairs) is a completely separate area.

Neutral

February 2024

It's fine. I'm not sure it does a very good job of building or maintaining atmosphere, assuming that's the intention. Maybe my experience would be better if I didn't already know the premise? Also the hitting feels a little janky sometimes.

Positive

February 2024

It's really good! The spritework is especially great; probably the best I've seen in a regular Game Boy game. The difficulty spike at the final boss is pretty brutal though. Interestingly, you can start from any world and checkpoint, so lives seem pretty pointless; they just waste a bit of extra time every fourth death. The only thing is that it resets your score, I guess?

Negative

February 2024

It's a platformer taking after Super Mario Bros 2, but it's incredibly unpolished and buggy, unfortunately. It keeps making a loud audio-clipping sound, the controls feel weird, and the menus and cutscenes are very janky. All it's really got going for it is the really good artwork.

Positive

March 2024

It's pretty cool! Definitely felt like there was a \"correct\" build, as using fire, for example, was just objectively worse than using ice. the visuals and stuff are very pretty too. The screen saver mode is fine until it decides to jerk around violently for a bit, which seems like an odd choice, but I like the concept.

Neutral

April 2024

It's an interesting one. Overall it's quite good; the stealth is usually not too slow that you end up just running though enemies. The weapons also feel weak in a way that often disincentiveses attacking (though the hit detection on bullets can feel really poor sometimes, which may or may not be intentional so as to contribute to that weakness). Replenishing your consumables after enough deaths is also a very nice quality of life touch that I wouldn't have expected in a game from this time, but it definitely helps save on grinding that (at least I) would have needed to do at various points.

There are lots of very \"how would anyone figure this out without a walkthrough\" points though, like how to get the rocket launcher, which you need to kill a boss that isn't clearly indicated as being a boss and attacking them with it doesn't indicate that they're being hurt, unlike most other enemies. Maybe there were more situations where you could call someone and get directions like in the final area, but I didn't know to do that until much later anyway.

Neutral

April 2024

An interesting little match-three game. It's biggest strength is the graphics; it's got that really pretty DS pixel art with a very cute art style. The \"quest\" mode is complete bullshit, and the timer is quite stressful, enough to mean that you need to be in a particular mood to really enjoy it.

Positive

June 2024

The highlight is obviously the graphical stuff; it's very pretty! I find the game feels a lot better in battle modes than racing, which is interesting since in my experience (i.e. literally just Mario Kart) the opposite is usually true. The music, while good, sometimes seems a bit jovial for the setting to me, but nothing that took too much away or anything. Also at the time of writing, I encountered a few bugs, like getting stuck in the sniper zoom camera after dying, but it's only just released and is getting regular patches to iron those out.

Positive

July 2024

Overall a great improvement on the first game. The radar and crawling are excellent additions that feel very at home. I especially like how non-player entities can now have some continuity between screens. Also COMBINED KEY CARDS!!!!!!! Imagine that. The music was also a standout, a good example being the track that plays in the first vent you need to crawl through to enter the facility.

There's fewer bullshit puzzles than the first game, though a few do pop up as you approach the end. Though they do a reasonably good job of hinting at stuff with the random children that are scattered everywhere, for some reason.

Positive

July 2024

What's there is good but I feel like it needs more of something. More stuff to spend money on mostly, like more decorations, maybe other stuff like tank backgrounds or something. Maybe a way to influence the odds on fish packs? I'm at the point where I have essentually infinite money and all that's left to do is roll for all the gold and rainbow fish which I'm not particularly inclined to do.

Negative

July 2024

I didn't realise this was an autorunner, which is unfortunate because I hate autorunners. Looks pretty though.

Positive

July 2024

The main interesting thing I found was how much characterisation they managed to give a bunch of rectangles using narration alone. Otherwise a nice little puzzle platformer.

Positive

July 2024

It sure is something. The metaphors and meanings and stuff are somewhat lost on me, but I appreciate what it's going for, and if nothing else the presentation is superb. I feel like I should add more but I'm not quite sure what.

Positive

August 2024

It was surprising to me just how similar it is to Metal Gear 2. It's usually a thing that when a series moves to a 3D system for the first time it ends up quite different as the added design possibilities lead them to make a bunch of changes taking advantage of those, for better or worse, but Metal Gear Solid is literally just Metal Gear 2 with polygons (and some first person stuff). Which is good; I quite liked Metal Gear 2 and liked this one even more. Fewer weird little bullshit parts is quite nice (though not completely absent), though getting spotted felt a lot more fatal in this one.

The attention to detail is wonderful, in every regard. Especially the graphics though. Holy scabolly, does this game look nice. The stock footage used in some of the cutscenes look a bit out of place though, and it doesn't help that most of them are common enough that I immediately recognised them.

Also, on the subject of similarities, I found it interesting how many sequences and concepts were reused from Metal Gear 2, like the \"four dudes try to kill you in an elevator\" and \"the final section is behind a key that you need to change the temperature of\", and even \"fist fight the pilot after blowing up the big mech\", especially considering plot stuff.

Positive

December 2024

A great little platformer, does everything very well. The only thing might be that (without spoiling it) the situation you're in becomes quite apparent pretty quickly, but the game still treats each instance of it being mentioned as a big reveal, if that makes sense. Some of the \"journal entries\" could be a little less on the nose I think.

Positive

December 2024

Beautiful in every sense. Just such a lovely time, especially the boat and flying (once you get the hang of it). The fishing is very nice, I'm very much in the camp of \"everything needs a fishing minigame\" and this only strengthened my stance. I can't really think of anything intelligible to say, it's all just gushing. It's very deserved though, this is unbelievably good.

Positive

December 2024

This is what we in the business call a \"banger\". It's really good in basically every way, so assume anything not mentioned is good. Speaking of mentioning:

The main elephant in the room is the procedurally generated everything. I understand the motivation behind it; this is definitely the sort of game you'll should replay for the full experience, and that would be lessened if you were already completely familiar with the map and dungeons, but I can't help but feel the missed opportunity of having really good dungeon designs. This is especially apparent given the final dungeon isn't randomised, and it's really good! At the same times, there are some parts that need more randomisation, like the tree-secret-thingies, which only have maybe six fixed layouts. However, overall I think the procedural generation is good, and shouldn't deter someone from at least beating the game through once.

The main other issue I had was more technical. When I first booted the game, it really didn't want to go into full screen, but I managed to get it to somehow I forgot what I did), and the screen tearing is pretty nasty on screen transitions and stuff. I imagine these are more issues with my particular setup though.

While we're on negatives, some other bits:

• Every weapon beside the katana forces you to stand still when swinging it, making them all basically useless. They just feel so bad to use in comparison, though maybe that's just a personal thing.
• It has a little too much meta \"teehee-I'm-a-Zelda-clone-isn't-it-weird-to-run-into-someone's-house-and-smash-their-pots\" type humour for my taste, though similar to the procedural generation, I think it's more that it just makes a bad first impression.

Some good stuff now! Including two entire selectable art styles is extremely cool and impressive. Also having a bunch of extra game modes is always nice, though I haven't played much of them as of writing. As well as that, just a bunch of other little things that are really great, like how using your bow without any arrows swings it instead, and having all the different potions and stuff obscured until you use them. Also Paige.

Positive

February 2025

Very cute little puzzle game! Though I hate \"normal\" mode; having to replay *puzzles* for failing at a later point is weird and annoying, since they aren't generally very hard to execute once you know the solution. Also the slight inconsistency of moment between the two witches feels a bit off sometimes, since rather than having both their movements maps to the button, it seems to be that you control one and the other is just copying you. That sounds like the same thing but it feels different.

Positive

February 2025

It sure is Age of Mythology! Having not played the original in over a decade (and having not even played all that much of it at the time either, relatively speaking), it feels like just a visual overhaul, with the only mechanical differences I noticed being the ability to use god powers multiple times, and the villager thing. The villager thing that lets you auto-assign villagers to resource collection based on a ratio of what you want them to prioritise. It's nice sometimes, as it cuts out a bit of micromanagement, but it's has at least three issues:

• Any map where you have multiple disconnected areas of the map to manage (of which there are several in the campaigns) completely break it, as villagers from either side will be arbitrarily assigned to resources on the opposite side, and just end up stuck in a corner somewhere.
• Villagers love going for resources beside enemy towers and things, so they get shot! Which is bad.
• Whenever you change the ratios, it likes to shuffle every villager to a new task, so all the farmers will become miners and the lumberjacks are now all farmers and so on. This feels very odd.

Also there's the auto-production-queue stuff, that's quite nice.

Neutral

February 2025

It sure is a Video Game. I don't have all that much to say design-wise, I mostly just feel the need to highlight it's existance. Because it sure is a thing that exists. For the uninitiated, it's a parody of shitty Harry Potter licensed games, and does some stuff with that concept. It's reasonably short so you should try it out. Also I got 1349 beans.

Positive

March 2025

A good little game! I only played the campaign so I can't speak to how balanced multiplayer is, but probably not super well if the singleplayer is an indication. As an example, I struggled a lot on the final level, slowly building up my base only to get inevitably overwhelmed, but then I just rushed their king with archers from basically the beginning and won very quickly. Also the controls can be a bit finicky, with you being unable to select tiles occupied even slightly by a unit, and accidentally moving units is very easy (which is especially bad in a game were you have a unit you very much *don't* want running into the middle of the enemy base). But very good and fun overall I think!

Positive

March 2025

Very cute and fun and hard. It's hard to go back to earlier levels without the dodge after using it, as it feels very natural and good (though it feels like there's a few too many frames of delay at the beginning).

Positive

March 2025

It's super duper good and stuff. As I said in my thing about Pikmin 1, it's a great game that's held back by the clunkiness of controlling the pikmin and stuff. This game, being a remake of 1 in 2's engine, fixes basically every issue I had with 1 and improves upon it even further. I especially like the new system for bomb rocks; throwing a yellow pikmin puts them into an \"armed\" state (with very clear visual indication), and whistling them while in this state makes them drop their rock and run. After a few seconds, they return to normal and can be safely whistled normally. It's a really good system! I only accidentally blew myself up once, and that's because I was trying to rush and didn't properly wait for all of them to disarm. Also Louie's Quest is really cool and fun! It's a good level of difficulty, and it's cool seeing Pikmin 2 mechanics get incorporated into the game to add more variety and stuff. The maps are mostly reskins, with various terrain changes and additions, but at least one was significantly different enough that it took me a bit to recognise it. It's kind of like the map differences between 1 and 2, but to a lesser extent.

Also I'm still not entirely sure if it's supposed to be \"Pikmin²\" or \"Pikmin 1²\", but I like it without the 1 more so that's what you're getting.

Positive

May 2025

To begin with, the original is very good and this is basically the same and thus also very good. Some of the changes are quite interesting, however.

The hazard stripes near pits were at first quite jarring but I got used to them pretty quickly. It feels like quite a weird thing to include, since \"falling in pits\" is a pretty well establish video game thing, and even if someone is unfamiliar, they'll fall in their first pit and go \"oh, pits are bad\". The two new enemies, the sand guy and mech guy, are a bit odd and generally feel quite obviously out of place, at least in the main story. Speaking of which, the Merry Magoland stuff is very strange. There's a bunch of times around the first world they draw attention to it and it always felt really weird, kind of like DLC in Oblivion where it just immediately tries to shove it in your face the moment you finish the tutorial. The game mode itself is fine, just weird that they tried to integrate it into the regular game rather than leaving it separate. Otherwise, the new stuff (that I've seen so far) is quite good, especially the epilogue! They gave Magolor so many little tidbits and personality that I think he's now probably one of my favourite characters.

Positive

June 2025

Better than I remember it being, surprisingly. I think a part of that might be people generally talking shit about it and that colouring my memory, but while certainly not the best in the series it's really good and has a lot of interesting stuff.

I find it interesting to compare the maps of this to ORAS, as they're built in the same engine but are so starkly different. XY's areas are generally quite small, with a fairly direct path through and branching areas around the periphery. ORAS, on the other hand, copies it's layouts almost one to one from the originals and are thus much larger, ''maze-like'' and usually more complex. However, XY puts a great deal of effort into presentation, with nearly every area using an entirely unique tileset and theme, interesting use of the camera and come completely unique parts like Glittering Cave. ORAS's areas are far less diverse, and feel blocky and inorganic.

To continue the comparisons, it would be nice to be able to turn off the roller skates and just walk around normally like in ORAS; it's cool and all, but sometimes annoying. Or even to have the stick walking in the skate-free areas (though most of those seem to be related to mechanics that would break with free movement, like the mirrors).

I'm going to start using bullet points!

• It's very easy, even with the light Nuzlocke rules I used for this playthrough.
• Character customisation! Wahoo! Would be nice to take your hat off though. Also very interesting to consider the two possible motivations from the designers to not include it in ORAS; either it was a gimmick specific to XY (similar to secret bases and contests) to be discarded for the next entry, or they were just so dedicated to being faithful to RS that they couldn't possibly let you wear different hats (like how FRLG just didn't include a day-night cycle, because it wasn't in the original). Both seem odd to me.
• It would be very nice to be able to disable the little pop-ups on the multiplayer screen; they are annoying and just force you to press an extra button when you want to use it.
• It still rustles my jimmies that they never released an update to improve compatibility between XY and ORAS; it was the first time they could meaningfully update the game (which they did at least a few times), so would it really have been the end of the world to just add the ORAS player icons and the new megas and moves? I don't mean make them available to acquire, obviously; they need to sell you the new games somehow, but needlessly segmenting multiplayer like that always annoyed me. SM and USUM was the same, too.
• Lumiose City is really cool! I mentioned the camera before, and this place sure is camera-ific! It's not actually very big or complex, but the low angle makes it feel large and disorienting and like an actual city and stuff. And there's lots of stuff! The style mechanic is a bit obtuse but conceptually cool, which combines with the various stuff to do to make it feel like a more interesting place, and (for lack of a better term (I dislike using it but I really do lack a better one)) feels ''alive''. Or at least makes it more interesting than just a field with a couple of buildings you pass through once and fly back to occasionally because it has the only shop that sells quick balls.

Positive

July 2025

It's cute! I don't think I've seen the DPPt digging system anywhere else, and this uses it quite nicely (assuming it's intentional). I was worried it would ramp up a little too fast with the dream fragment value multiplier, which definitely accelerates progression substantially, but it turned out okay in the end I think. Maybe slightly fast for my taste? Hard to say.

Positive

July 2025

The visual style, as with most sokpop games, is really cool! There is definitely some balance things where certain upgrades are either extremely good or completely useless, and the bosses, while cool, are all way easier than everything else given they can only be beating using very specific (and quite easy) methods. Overall quite cool and fun though.

Negative

August 2025

An interesting game, I think. The visuals and stuff are really cute, though the portraits are a bit odd looking. The game has two major issues (that I encountered, at least). The game plays kind of more like a factory builder than I expected, and you need to balance production of a variety of different resources but you don't have enough direct control of anything to actually do that effectively, I feel. The main issues seem to be a complete lack of any meaningful influence on item logistics, just trusting that your guys will happen to deliver the necessary stuff on time. Also you need to employ so many people at warehouses (or whatever they were called) that just having one for each resource puts considerable strain on your population. Also also, keeping track of production ratios and requirements is very unclear, which is quite annoying then that's the central focus. The other issue is combat stuff. There is one \"rival\" CPU who will regularly make demands of tribute to you, and if you refuse will invade you. The first time this happened, I noticed the large army they sent just sat on the map edge and did nothing (not sure if that's untended) so I ignored them and then my economy collapsed, as you can't receive migrants during an invasion, though it took me quite a while to figure that out. I slowly zergged them with my gradually rebelling soldiers (who are quite difficult to train, and cost a ton of upkeep), and then after a short time got invaded again with an even stronger force. In another game, I took out a nearby graveyard (which occasionally spawns skeletons) quite easily, then tried the same with a spiders nest which proceeded to slowly wipe out my entire city because every time I would kill any they would immediately respawn. Overall, combat is not good, but would be considerably nicer if producing and maintaining troops was somewhat economically feasible.