Maniac’s Typewriter

[maniactypewriter]

The backlog 7: Guns, Cards and Dance

So many games… so little time… 

Call of Juarez: Gunslinger play time: 3hours. 

One of, if not the only, good games in the “Call of Juarez” series. I am a sucker for westerns. Especially old west weaponry. There is something about old fashioned manual weapons like revolvers, lever action rifles and break action shotguns that make me feel good. Maybe its the tactility, or the possibilities for getting weird with them… but i digress. Gunslinger is about bounty hunter Silas Greaves as he recounts his tales of glory to a bar full of enraptured listeners. Silas’s stories are all about how he interacted with every single important figure in the wild west popular canon in some way or another. These stories take the form of a first person shooter. As you play, you will hear Silas’s narration, and sometimes the narration of some of the other bar patrons who chip in. the game takes full advantage of the fact that its a story being told. Occasionally the action will back up as Silas makes corrections or remembers new tidbits of information. All the while you are engaging in some damn satisfying gunplay. There are only about 5 or 6 weapons in the game, two types of revolvers, double barrel shotgun in both standard and sawn off variety, and a lever action rifle for long range play. Despite the limited weapon pool, each gun feels great to use and master. There is a reason that this game has an arcade game mode. If you are also a sucker for spaghetti westerns, this is a game to check out 

Card City Nights Playtime: 3 hours

I admit bias on this one. I am a fan of ludosity games. I am an active member of several discord servers devoted to their games. I love these games and the community around them. Card city nights is a card game, obviously. You go around the titular card city interacting with characters from other ludosity games, and play card games at them in pursuit of legendary cards. The meat of the game is in the card game. Each player has a 3x3 grid on which they can play cards. Each card has a set of arrows that point to another box in the grid. You have to connect three cards with these arrows to activate the card’s effect. That could be hurting the enemy, healing yourself, or activating one of your cards if it was deactivated. Its a simple game that is made complex by the cards and deck building. I will admit, I am bad at building decks. Which isn't great as i am a big fan of card games. One last thing, I'm pretty sure Yugioh stole the link mechanic from CCN. 

The Consuming Shadow playtime: 40 min

This is an odd duck. It is a 2d Lovecraftian rougelike. You play as an investigator, armed with only a pistol and a vague knowledge of arcane spell casting. You have 60 hours to drive all across the UK to kill eldritch horrors and piece together which of three gods is trying to invade our world. The game combines traditional rougelike elements like randomly generated dungeons, with logic puzzles where you have to piece together how to stop the approaching god, and even which one is even trying to invade in the first place. All the while you have to juggle keeping three resources up. Your health, your sanity, and you ammo. It's a clever little game. Although I feel as though I have only scratched the surface of this game. 

Counter Strike: Source playtime: 5 hours. 

This is counterstrike at its simplest. While CS:GO is probably the best counter strike game, it is also weighed down by the numerous microtransactions and lootboxes it has amassed over the years since its release. Source is CS at its simplest. Two teams in a map, one bomb, a bunch of weapons, go kill each other. It is as simple as that. I was only able to play with bots, due to there not being any populated servers. But that's fine. I'm terrible at CS, so bots can't be disappointed in me when i am the first one to die in  a round. 

Crypt of the NecroDancer: play time (PC only) 4 hours. 

This is the funkiest roguelite on the market. Its a traditional rogue- like game with a twist. There is a beat you have to keep as you bounce through the game. This game has a lot of charm to it, from the funny looking monsters to the superb soundtrack that you will be dance fighting through a dungeon to.  Every enemy has a specific pattern to their movements and attacks. Recognizing these patterns is the key to your survival in this game. I picked up this game on switch a while ago as preparation for the zelda spin off game made by the same devs. It is just as fun on the go as it is on pc. Although it might be a little harder in handheld mode, because you may or may not be able to hear the music.

[maniactypewriter]

Backlog week 6: return of the revenge of the backlog

Summer has returned and so has the backlog. So let's do this baby!

Niche: a Genetics Survival Game play time: 20 min

This game bored me. I'm sure that it gets more interesting as the game goes on, but it does not make a strong first impression. You start as one lonesome cat thing shortly after everyone you know and love is killed. So you set off to repopulate the species. This game aims to simulate real life gene science. That is cool and all, but it doesn't matter if your game play isn't interesting. And for the short time I played, it wasn't gripping me.  The game has potential to be an interesting study on genetics and survival of the fittest, but players won't engage with your unique simulation if it isn't interesting or fun. 

Nightmare Reaper play time: 2 hours

Aw yeah here we go! This is one of those games that seek to keep the legacy of the old school first person shooters alive. You play as some crazy lady in a mental hospital, who goes into a dream world every night to battle the undead. The game is Rad! The combat is smooth and flows well, there is an interesting variety of weapons, and while I haven't gotten that far in my own play through, varied environments. This game is in early access, so it isn’t finished yet. But that doesn't mean it isn't worth picking up now. The game has enough content in it to be worth the asking price, and they’ll add in the rest of the content once they are finished making the game. So you won't have the game slowly piecemealed to you over the course of years. This game is a must play if you like retro shooters like Doom and Blood. Before I end, I want to mention the upgrade tree. As you progress through the levels, you pick up mountains of gold and treasure, which you spend in your gameboy menu to purchase useful upgrades. And you don't just click a button and get the upgrade, you have to play a short platforming level to get it! I just find that little extra feature so charming. 

No Man’s Sky.  Play time: 10 hours

What can i say about this game that hasn't already been said at length by other critiques more qualified than me? No Man’s Sky is a perfect example of a studio’s redemption arc. Clawing their way from a broken buggy mess all the way up to a decent space survival and exploration game. You play as a spaceman. And your goal, more or less, is to get to the center of the universe. There are other goals that you need to accomplish between you and the final destination, but that's the joy of the game. I got this game after watching Internet Historian’s documentary on the game. However, I got 10 hours in and then got stuck. The next main story mission was in a system I wouldn't be able to travel to in a long time. So I stopped and have not picked up the game since. The game is constantly being updated and patched. So maybe after a big update and a few patches i'll pick it up again. Who knows. Space is huge, and there are billions of possibilities. So I am looking forward to what Hello Games will make next. 

NonGunz Playtime: 50 minutes. 

This… is a weird game. It is entirely wordless, the visuals are starkly monochromatic, except a few shades of red, and the game gives you no tutorial on how its major mechanics work. Even its achievements don't have many words. I will admit, I did look up a guide on steam just to figure out what the hell is going on. The game is slightly deeper than it initially appears. Every bullet you fire increases your score by 1. You could just mash your left bumper to build up a big score, but that is boring, will take a while, and chew through your controllers. The better way to get points is to enter the dungeon. Where you must fight against gross goopy body parts, pick up power up cards, and rescue your fellow skeletons. As you kill the chronenbergs littering this strange hospital/butcher, your score increases. Presumably, once you beat a boss, you have the option to leave the dungeon. You can do this to empower the big gun and skull shrine in the main town and construct loyal warrior minions to collect crap for you, so you can make future runs more successful. The thing is, this takes *Real time* to do. Fortunately you can back out of the game and pass time on the treadmill in your bedroom… which is still in the game. This is a weird one folks i dont know what to tell ya. 

Nuclear Throne: playtime 2hours.

Nuclear throne is one of the old school roguelikes that first popped up when the genre was new and fresh. It has gone on to inspire many other games, such as Enter the Gungeon. I actually prefer Gungeon over Nuclear Throne. Don't get me wrong, NT is still a good game. It's just that it has been surpassed by other games that have the same style as it. You play as a ragtag group of mutants in the post apocalypse, on a quest to sit upon the legendary nuclear throne, and become king of the apocalypse. To do this, you must kill thousands of enemies that stand in your way using an array of weapons. Ranging from standard revolvers, to crossbows, to laser pistols, to screwdrivers. Along the way, your mutant levels up and gains new traits which can make the game a smidge more easy. (not to any noticeable degree though) i dont think ive ever gotten past the third stage of the game. By the time I get there I've lost too much health and spent too much ammo. So I end up dying to some weird looking creature or another. The game is unforgiving. Health is hard to come by and enemies are numerous and fierce. You have to be careful to play this game… i am not careful. 

[maniactypewriter]

the backlog week 5 [new years edition]

New year, new format. Instead of going in alphabetical order, i shall now be letting the whims of fate decide what I play. The magic dice bot on discord I used first pointed me to the T section, but then so many of the games there had some kind of issue that i decided to re roll. That led me to the W section. And thus, these five games. Keep in mind i do not have to play a lot of games, just enough to get a good enough impression of it to give my thoughts. 

Waking Mars play time: 85 min

Waking Mars is a game about astronaut, botanist, and 2 time NBA champ Liang delving deep inside a Martian cave. You are accompanied by your chipper scientist friend and a quirky AI, on your quest to research the heck out of martian life. Said alien life forms are a lot like weird plants. Each room of the cave has a whole bunch of fertile spots where you can Kobe some alien seeds into. The plants will grow, and each plant will have a different effect. From my play time, there was one that healed you, one that shot wet seeds everywhere, and one that was super aggressive and stabby. A big part of the game is research. You have to examine the flora and fauna and experiment on them. You do this mostly by chucking seeds at them and seeing what happens. There is a small problem with the research window if your playing with a controller like i was. You can not easily scroll through the menus with the controller. From the 3 minutes of research ive done, I can safely say that this game came out on IOS first, and was ported to PC later. That would explain why the game prefers mouse and keyboard to gamepad.  Otherwise, the game looks decent. Having a sort of hand drawn art style. The dialogue windows are a bit weird though. Liang’s big head is on the left side, while your companions show up in smaller windows to the upper right. I don't really know why they aren't the same size. Liang doesn't have many expressions aside from “determined” and “determinedly curious” 

Wandersong  play time: 45 minutes

Wandersong is a game about a bard on a quest to save the world. The first thing the game tells you is that you are not a hero. You are a bard. You wield song not sword. The second thing your rainbow haired spirit friend tells you is that you that the world is getting rebooted. Problem is, you live in the world and if the world reboots, you don't have anywhere to live! So off you go on a grand quest to save the world the best way you know how, with SONG! Game play is simple, left stick moves, right stick opens up a color wheel that represents different notes you can sing. A lot like one of last time’s games Aquaria. But instead of using song to move rocks and transform yourself into a war goddess, you use your song to get birds to help you and bust ghosts. The whole game revolves around the song mechanic, and it goes into more than just the notes. The game takes advantage of the fact that you are using a color wheel to select your notes. In one of my favorite puzzles from my little demo, you have to befriend a jump boost bird on the other side of a small ridge. Problem is, you can't jump over the minor bump because you'd use your bird. So you have to maneuver the song directed plant platform under you, and have it move you to the other side where you can use your jump bird to get to higher ground. Thats some nifty puzzle design right there. The game is also made to look like adorable paper cut outs and everything has the right blend of charm to make it a game worth checking out. Definitely going to keep playing this one later. 

Warhammer: Vermintide 2 play time: 2 hours

good ol Warhammer. The warhammer brand is so vast that you can make almost any kind of game out of some piece of warhammer fiction. Case in point, the vermintide series is Left 4 Dead, but replace zombies with rats, and put a bigger focus on melee weapons.  Sure guns exist, but are you really going to use a slow firing fantasy gun when you have a massive sword in your hands you could use instead? Anyway, in vermintide 2, you can play as the same 5 dudes as you could in the last game, each one with their own unique equipment sets and special abilities.each of the 5 characters also has two unlockable alternate forms that change up the play style a bit. Meanwhile, the Scavin race has recruited the chaos faction from Warhammer lore and are wreaking havoc with double efficiency. So now you and three other real live human beings (or in some cases, bots) have to go and wreck some rat faces all over again. Players are tasked with going out and doing missions. Missions result in loot and level ups, more loot means you can take on harder missions. There are also hidden tomes in the big open levels. I never found one but apparently they can make things harder somehow, but result in better loot at the end of the level. Now, the game does have loot boxes. However, as far as i can tell you can not purchase them with real money, only earned in game. As I was writing this, I went to check a fact in the game, and after I looked, I went and did a mission. That's how you can tell a game is enjoyable. 

Way of the passive fist play time 12 min

Not every game is complex enough to deserve a long play time. WotPF is a post apocalyptic style brawler. You play as the wanderer, a man who has mastered the titular way of the passive fist, a unique fighting style that involves dodging and parrying your enemies attacks and then poking them into submission once they tucker themselves out. You also have a robot arm that you can falcon punch with if you build a high enough combo so that's cool. I played this game up to the first boss where I was stumped on how to beat it so I quit. It's an interesting gimmick dressed in fancy pixel art. It's worth looking at if you're into brawlers and want a different experience. 

Western Press play time 12 min

This game is also not very complex, and I am also terrible at it. Another pixel art game, set in the old west. Western press is a dueling game where two players have to hit a series of buttons on their controllers to shoot their dueling partner. And that's about it. There is online, and a single player mode… it's really simple all things considered… the duel abides. Now draw you yellow bellied varmint! 

[maniactypewriter]

The backlog Week 4 [where the hell have you been edition]

I LIVE! In all seriousness, when im at school, I don't have access to my gaming computer and my laptop doesnt have enough space free for a project like this. Anyway, I am back for the next month, so let's get to the first game(s) 

Anomaly warzone earth + Anomaly 2 playtime: 4 hours total

Im bundling these two together as they are very similar in game play. In Warzone Earth, you play as the 14th platoon deployed into the heart of the Anomaly, a giant mysterious dome that crash landed on top of Baghdad and tokyo. As the platoon leader, its your job to make sure the convoy of APCs and walking missile platforms gets through the level safely. The game refers to itself as a tower offense game. Essentially its a tower defense game, but instead of placing down towers, you are the targets that the towers are shooting at. Your vehicle team is constantly moving forward and its your job as commander to choose the right path for the vehicles to drive down and to strategically deploy the four power ups at your disposal. Your tools include a repair which heals your units, a smoke screen which makes enemies less likely to hit your units, and a decoy, which enemies will shoot at instead of your units. Usually the player is spending their time babysitting the convoy and rushing to collect more powers as they are dropped from killed enemies. Each mission has a different objective, but it usually devolves into, get to a place and kill all the towers. 

Anomaly 2 is much the same as its predecessor. Set in the far future after an alien invasion, the earth has frozen over and humanity’s numbers are dwindling. Humanity’s only hope is a single convoy on their way through a frozen america to get to New york. As this is the future, humanity's weapons have evolved as well. The standard ACP with a gatling gun on top has evolved into a car with two gatling guns. And it also turns into a walking mech flamethrowers mounted on either arm. Bad ass. The power ups have also changed a little. You have your standard repair bubble, there is a focus power up which will tell all your units to focus fire on one tower you want particularly dead and an emp type power up which will disable enemy towers for a short while. Anomaly 2 also has multiplayer, but I didn't play that as it is most likely dead at time of play. 

Antihero playtime: 70 minutes

Antihero is a competitive digital board game where each player plays as a master thief in a victorian england type setting. As the leader of a thieves guild, you have to go around a burgle the good people of “London” to fund your operations and buy pieces to put around the board. You can hire urchins to occupy specific buildings for special bonuses, hire thugs to block access to areas, and gangs to off your opponent's units and hunt down targets (as well as making a little extra dosh along the way.) this game takes advantage of being a digital board game because everything your opponent does is done mostly in secret. Obscured by the smog of war, you can not see what your opponent is doing, which could spell your doom if you aren't fast enough to look into his territory with your master thief. 

I am not great at this game. I couldn't get past the second level on easy mode that's how bad I am. However, I can see it is a fun game, and I can see how this game’s multiplayer was popular for a time. However, I dare not go there as I fear that I may be utterly stomped by a player who has had several years more practice than I have at this game.

Apotheon playtime: 4 hours

Apotheon is the story of one greek guy not named kratos going to olympus to kick the butts of all the greek gods. The most striking thing anyone playing this game will notice is the artstyle. It is drawn to resemble Greek pottery paintings. You know the kind. The ones that depict Hercules doing his trials or some other greek hero doing something impressive. Anyway, story. The earth has been screwed over by the gods because chronic rapist Zeus decided to revoke humanity’s access to the things that are necessary to life. Hera picks you as her champion then sends you to mt Olympus to gather the gifts of the gods and maybe smack some sense into her cheating husband along the way. The game play is a 2D mix of dark souls and metroidvania games that are so prevalent in the modern day. However, Apotheon came out before the current wave of soulslikes so there is some small growing pains. Combat is kinda clunky and your character can sprint at 30 miles an hour but immediately slows down to a crawl whenever he so much as touches a staircase. Combat as mentioned before is mildly clunky. It uses a physics engine to do all its swings and stabs. Heavy weapons like a club have a wide swing arc and is directed by which way you tilt the left analog stick. The Reliance on physics to get the job done can lead to some interesting results. I saw one raider in the first area get launched into space after being double teamed by me and a friendly malita man. Apotheon is an interesting game with a stunning artstyle and compelling exploration. Which in this modern age of soulslike metroidvanias, is all you really need to stand out. 

Aquaria play time: 1 hour

Speaking of metroidvanias, Aquaria. As the name suggests, the game is an underwater metroidvania mostly concerned with puzzle solving over combat. You play as Naija, a lonely fish lady who can use the power of song to do magic. As a fish lady, you can swim around the oceanic caverns with relative freedom. The game wants to be played with a mouse and keyboard, as my attempt to play it with a controller was thwarted swiftly. As is fitting for a game where the protagonist’s main power is singing, the game has a killer soundtrack. In the little bit ive heard when I was playing, it was some pretty good music. Visuals are decent. The game has a hand painted aesthetic, however some of the animations are kinda stiff and stilted. This game was originally released in 2007 after all. Small indie metroidvanias were not knocking it out of the park yet in terms of animation yet (im sure someone will correct me on that point eventually…) the small amount I played had me swimming around a claustrophobic map going around and solving puzzles that lead me to new areas and new song powers. One of the first i got was the ability to pull around large rocks. The second allowed me to transform into an old fish goddess and shoot energy missiles at hostile fish. While the game is focused on puzzles and exploration, that doesn't mean it is devoid of combat. I feel as this is the weakest part of what i played. I gave up on the game when i died to a puzzle boss who’s apparent solution didn't work. There is probably a lot I didn't see in my short time with the game. There is a whole cooking mechanic that I didn't fully grasp, as well as pets and the ability to decorate the main character’s house with special decorations you found out in the world. I may revisit this game at some later point, but for now its going back into the backlog as I search for more interesting games with less obtuse boss fights. 

Armello playtime 2 hours

Armello is yet another digital board game. Set in a fantasy version of zootopia, the king of the land has fallen ill with the Rot. and all the clans of the land have sent their strapingest of adventurers to go and try and claim the throne for themselves. This can be done in one of four ways. Having the most honour points (gained by killing other players, or completing quests), gather four spirit stones and cleansing the king of Rot, having the most Rot yourself, or just straight up murdering the king. In the few matches I have played, the easiest one to achieve is the Honour victory, although that might just be my play style. Like most board games, rounds are taken in turns. Each player has a certain amount of hexes they can move, and landing on spaces will have different effects. Most events that happened as a result of landing on a space are luck based. “Perils” have you rolling dice, quests have you selecting from a circle of icons trying to pick the one that will net you a reward, and a random spinner that could give you anything from rot to gold to teleport you to the other side of the map. Once everyone has had their turn, day turns to night and new monsters spawn on the board. When the sun rises again, the king dies a little from his fantasy aids and gives the person with the most honor points the choice between two Decrees which will most likely be terrible for everyone involved. On top of all this, players have access to a hand of three cards. Which have various effects. Proper use of your cards can lead to victory or defeat depending on who you're playing as. Armello has an online mode, but like the other online modes in this batch of games, I dare not touch for fear of getting crushed. The game also has an online store where you can buy new skins for your dice and new character packs. It's a fun little board game, but im putting it on the shelf for now because i’ve had my fill and have  no friends to play it with. 

[maniactypewriter]

The backlog, week 3 [day late and a dollar short edition]

Sorry this one is so late. I decided to play through the entirety of the last game in this week’s pool. So sorry for the minor delay. I don’t have anything really to mention in this opening paragraph… Bloodstained ritual of the night looks good….

Absolute Drift playtime: 30 min

I was half tempted to just link the tokyo drift or initial D soundtracks. But I knew that would be a cop out. And I am not that much of a hack yet. The basic premise of this game is DEJA VU I SWEAR I'VE BEEN IN THIS PLACE BEFORE.  Ahem sorry. The whole thing of this game is drifting. You have to drift to win. The better you drift the more points you get. I had trouble wrapping my febil mind around how to drift in this game. Im sure if I practiced enough I would get good enough to get good scores. But for my short time with the game I ended up crashing a lot and spinning out a lot more. It is a fun game if you understand how to drift, but i just could not figure it out. Bumping into walls and spiraling out of control was just not fun for me. Play it if you like racing games. 7.8/10 not enough eurobeat /s

Absolver play time: 1 ½ hours.

To put it simply, Absolver is dark souls, but if it was a fighting game. You wander around a big open ish map and get into fights with random mobs, collect loot, level up, and occasionally get the [poop] beaten out of you by randos on the internet. There are a few differences in Absolver though. The aforementioned randos are always there in the world, no summoning or invasions required. Teamwork is also recommended. Some of the mini bosses are much easier if you have someone there to help with the beat downs. And if one of you bite it, you have 60 seconds for your fight friend to revive you. There is a dearth of options for fighting. Downside, is that you have to learn new moves by dodging them. So learning new moves is slow and not an exact thing. The art style is simplistic yet beautiful. A phrase you'll read me saying a lot this week. The soundtrack is low key, in that I don't remember having an opinion on it. This game is a lot deeper than my time with it has shown. If you're looking for a different flavor of Souls, Absolver might be up your alley.

ABZU: play time 40 min

Don't play this game if you are afraid of sharks or the ocean. For all of us non Galeophobes, abzu is an amazingly beautiful game. Most of the discussion about the game is around just how gosh darn pretty this game is. The game is set entirely underwater. I don't quite know what the story is all about, but i know you have to travel from place to place revitalizing shrines and small areas of the sea. And maybe try to close an all consuming black hole? I don't know. What i do know that this game is drop dead gorgeous. The oceanic environments are stunningly colorful and vibrant, with many different kinds of fish swimming about and doing their fishy business. There are even shark statues you can sit on and  just watch fish. The calming soundtrack only enhances the mellow tone that the game is trying to set. Abzu is a chill out game. A game you can put on after a hard day at work and just swim around and enjoy looking at the pretty fish.

Oh,  and uhh… it controls alright too.

AER: Memories of Old. playtime 1 ½ hour.

so … I found a crab rave in this game. I got an achievement for it. I thought that was funny. But that's not important. Half of this game is amazing. In this game you play as a lady who can turn into a bird. You are on a pilgrimage to the three shrines to fight the void or whatever. Like Abzu before it, this game delivers on movement that feels great and satisfying. One of the coolest things to do is to fly really fast and then turn back into a human and glide down to your destination. You fly around a bunch of floating islands, most of which contain some bit of this game’s deep (but sort of boring) lore, and impressive ancient structures… or crabs. However, while the flight is fun, there does come a point where you have to land and enter a temple. In the temples and caves of the world, you can't turn into a bird. If you could that would break a few puzzles. So you're stuck walking around, at a pace that feels fast but is just slow enough to be annoying, solving puzzles and looking a ghosts with your magic lantern. These temple parts bored me. Their only saving grace was the fact that they looked great. This game does the low poly art style nicely. Between the gorgeous visuals and the satisfying flight, this game could use a sequel where there is more flight and more to do in the temples than just walking around.  

Agatha Christie - The ABC Murders play time 5 hours

This is the game that caused this week’s reviews to be late. This game is based off of the book of the same name, penned by the prolific mystery novelist Agatha Christie. You play as inspector Poirot. A detective with a brilliant mind, a silly accent, and a beautiful mustache. It is your duty to investigate a trio of strange murders perpetrated by the elusive ABC. the game play is your standard point and click adventure game affair. You meander about a space, clicking on things, talking to people, and solving puzzles. The latter two are the most dominant of the mechanics. You must thoroughly examine your surroundings, carefully interrogate witnesses and suspects, and rifle through everyone’s personal belongings.  That last part is tricky though, as it seems the new fad in 1930’s England is to have most important objects in your home be obtuse puzzles. The writing is great, as it should be considering this game was originally a book. The graphics are a bit simple, but they get the point across. The game’s story had me hooked and i just wanted to finish it all in one night. Which wasn't hard as it not a long game. However, im sure I missed some things. Special interaction I could have taken to gain more points. (one of the minor actions you can perform is clicking on a mirror to fix Poirot’s Exquisite mustache). The game showers you in achievements for every little bit of story progression, and I don't understand how I earned a fourth of the ones I did. Overall, I enjoyed my time with this game. Now i want a murder on the orient express game. Not bad for the people who made Garfield kart.

[maniactypewriter]

The Backlog, Week 2 [the rushed edition]

Like most college students in my generation, I procrastinate like a mother [oops]er. It is unsurprising that I fell behind this week on this project. I am writing these reviews on the day that I am supposed to upload them. Go me. Anyway, i am changing the parameters of this project. I do not have to play 1-2 hours of a game to review it, just enough that I feel I have a solid understanding of the game. With small Indies, this is simple. However if I ever get to big games I feel like I'm going to have a harder time. But that is a bridge to burn when I get to it. I also reserve the right to skip a game if its a horror game or early access survival game. I did that this week with  7 days to die a game which I had absolutely zero interest in playing. So i didn't. Anyway onto the reviews!

20XX play time: 4 hours

I've had this game for awhile and have played it before I started this project. It was an impulse buy. Even at full price i think. Anyway, this 20XX is a mega man esque roguelite platformer. You play as a pair of mercenary robots reminiscent of Mega Man X and Zero. The blue one, Nina, plays like Mega Man X. she shoots lemons, has a charge shot, can dash, wall jump and kick butt. Her red counterpart, Ace, can do just about everything she can but has a laser sword. These two mercs are hired to throw themselves at boss robots terrorizing the city over and over again. If you’ve played a mega man game, you get the gist of the standard game play. Where it differs is the rougelite aspects. Levels are randomly generated, and presented in a random order. There is no guarantee that you can go fight the boss who’s weakness you just got. Each of the four stage types has a different gimmick and different enemy pools, however there aren't many different kinds of structure in the game, so most of the levels start to feel the same after a few runs. If you like mega man x and want an infinite version of it with two (four if you count the DLC characters), 20XX is something you could check out.

7 Grand Steps, step 1: What Ancients Begat  play time: 15 minutes.

As you can tell by the tiny play time for this game, I did not enjoy this game. Simply put, it's boring. 7 Grand Steps is a strategy puzzle board game where you play as a lineage of ancient man. Progressing from the early stages of civilization all the way through… I don't know the greek era? I couldn't bring myself to get that far. The main game play loop is simple. You have tokens, you stick tokens into slots representing the family members you have to move them about the board, collecting points to try and advance the game before the blank silhouettes representing your opponents get them. The game board is on a big wheel that rotates with each turn, pulling the pawns closer to hungry alligators and leading them closer to the end of the age. The goal is to prosper and have your family be remembered for generations to come. As exciting as all that sounds, it isn't. It's boring. The best thing I can say about the game is that it has a nifty presentation and runs well. But that's it. Don't play this game. Maybe give it a try if you like digital board games with interesting presentations.

911 Operator. Play time: 1 ½ hours

Let me share a story. On my first game, I got a call from a little girl. She was ordering a pizza. I dismissed the call as a prank call and hung up on the girl because the game advised me to ignore prank calls. I lost that first game because i was still getting used to the controls and the like. I started a new game. I got the same call from the little girl. I told her that she had the wrong number… and then the plot thickened. It turned out that she was an abuse victim and she was covertly calling the cops to get help. I thought that was brilliant. I started getting good scores on days from then on. 911 Operator is a strategic management sim where you play as the operator for the 911 center. It's your job to screen calls and dispatch police, paramedics and firemen to deal with problems around the city. It can get hectic as more and more emergencies pop up and you don't have enough vehicles to deal with the issue. And some dilemmas start to crop up naturally. Do you send an ambulance to take care of the injured after a firefight, or send them off to deal with the gaming addiction problem that just popped up. You have to manage this chaos and still pick up calls and ask the right questions to get the most information out of the callers. It is a fantastically stressful game. If you're looking for a challenging, fast paced management sim, 911 Operator is a good pick.

Aaero playtime 30 min

Aaero is an odd duck. It's a rhythm game where all you use are the left and right joysticks on your gamepad and the right trigger. I am one of the Saps that got a steam controller around the time they first came out. And while they have served me well, they do have their weaknesses. Especially in games like this where its kinda important to have two actual joysticks. However i made due and was able to play a rather unique music game. You control a spaceship zooming through vast desert and miles of industrial corridor, shooting baddies and tracing a light rail to the beat of a thumping techno track. I played through 5 of the game’s songs and each one felt different. The fifth one was an actual bossfight against a [oops]ing sandworm. The game is tricky and the songs are fast paced enough that you can have a hard time keeping up with the light rail. It is one of those games that you are supposed to play the songs over and over again to get onto the high score tables that nobody cares about. I am not particularly a fan of techno music, but from what I can tell they have actual licensed songs in their soundtrack. They also have the album covers as their steam trading cards which i thought was cute. If you want an interesting and challenging rhythm game, give Aaero a try.

Abalone playtime: 15 min

Why did there have to be two boring board games this week… Abalone is a digital version of a real game. Each player has a bunch of black or white marbles on a hexagonal board and they have to bump the other player’s marbles off the board. It's a simple as that. I was never good at games like this. So after getting trounced once, i had enough info to write this review. If you like minimalist board games, give it a shot. Just get it on sale or in a bundle.

[maniactypewriter]

The Backlog, week 1

I am one of many steam users who have way to many games in their steam libraries. And I have also not been able to play many of them. This summer I wish to rectify that. Every week from here until the end of summer, I will play 5 or more games from my steam library and write a short review on them. This is the tumblr version of this project, but I will include links to the Steam review versions with every review. We are starting with the numbers and working our way down. Now enough rambling, let us begin.

100% Orange Juice.  Time played: 1 ½ hours.

100% Orange Juice is a board game. That is about the most I can say definitively about this game. It is extremely luck based. So for the majority of the game you’re praying to RNGesus to give you rolls that put you on the spaces that get you stars, and to avoid spaces that make you lose stars. Stars are extremely important to the game, being the metric that determines who wins the game. There are also spaces dotted around the board that teleports you to another random teleport space, and on top of that, sometimes at the start of every chapter the game decides to teleport you to the other side of the board. There is some strategy to the game though. The game has several cards that can be played on your turn that have various effects, including increasing/ decreasing stats, healing, warping players around the board and more. From my short time with the game, I get the impression that there are not many cards in the game. However, I could be completely wrong about that. The game is a bit daunting at first, but once i got the hang of it, I found it pretty fun. The graphics are somewhere between cartoons and anime. The audio is a mix of decent music and annoying Japanese VO for the announcer. There is also a store where you can purchase characters for real money, and an online game mode that seems to be the real focus of the game. I have dabbled in neither system so take that as you will. If you are looking for a light, fluffy, totally random board game experience, I'd give this game a try.

1001 Spikes play time: ½ hour

This game is hard. I am tempted to leave this review there. The fear of writing this review made me halt the writing part of this summer project. But I must keep going, so here we are. 1001 Spikes is a retro style indie platformer, invoking the spirit of pulpy adventure movies ala Indiana Jones. The story, as it is, is that some deadbeat guy inherits a map from his jerk wad treasure hunter father, and decides to follow it to for one final “up yours” to his old man’s ghost. The game play your standard retro platformer affair. You run, jump, throw knives, the usual sort of fair for this type of game. The twist in all this is that it's painfully difficult. Now, i enjoy hard games. I am a proud member of the sun bros after all. However, I find that this game is way too hard. The best game I can compare it to is I Wanna Be The Guy,  and other such obtusely difficult platformers. The nominal “gimmick” of this game is that you have 1001 lives at the start of the game, and the game will take those lives faster than you can blink. My big problem with this game is that it doesn't have a good difficulty curve. Once you get past the tutorial, the game take’s its gloves off and punches you straight in the jaw. If you are in the mood for a difficult platformer that is ever so slightly fairer than I wanna be the Guy, give 1001 Spikes a try

12 is Better Than 6 play time: 1 hour.

firstly, Yeehaw, second, this is a good game. Set in the old west, you play as “The Mexican” an amnesiac murderer who escaped slavery and is on the run through the old west. The Mexican is armed with only a knife, a sombrero, and whatever weapons you can pick up. The big draw of this game is that it has semi realistic gun controls, and by semi realistic, I mean it has clunky gun controls.  In my time with the game I had access to three guns. The shotgun is the simplest to use. A point and shoot double barrel shotgun can get a lot done, the downside is that there are only two shots before you have to reload. The middle most complicated gun is the rifle. To fire this gun, you have to alternate left and right mouse buttons to cycle the chamber, but it does have excellent magazine size and good accuracy. The third weapon and the most complicated so far is the revolver. You have to hold down right mb and then click left to fire, then click again to cycle the chamber. I could not get a handle on the revolver controls, and avoided them like the plague. Since the gun control is clunky, and you die in one hit, its best to use stealth. The game is really a stealth game at heart. It has you sneak around and knife bounty hunters and other folks who want your mustache stuffed and mounted. If you're spotted, or fire a bullet accidentally, the entire map is alerted to your presence, and they all come rushing to kill you. You can still shoot your way out of the problem, but success is unlikely. The game is presented in a beautiful hand drawn ballpoint style. If you're looking for a difficult, hotline miami experience with more stealth and mild racism, 12 is better than 6  is for you. … did I mention that you can collect hats?

140 time played: 2 hours

140 is a minimalist, music based platformer. You play as a… shape… maneuvering through a technicolor level, collecting orbs and avoiding static. The art style is minimalist and so is the core game play. The platforming is solid and tight. The whole game revolves around the soundtrack, sort of. The first orb you get lays down the baseline, and the more orbs you get, the more sound elements get introduced to the song, alongside new game play elements for you to platform around. Each level is capped off with a boss fight against the static. In one, you have a triangle that fires lasers and you have to dodge projectiles while still hitting the boss. Another has you dodging static spikes in a vertically scrolling space. there isn't much more to say about 140 if you want a challenging platformer with good music, play 140.

2064: Read Only Memories  play time: 1.75 hours.

Cyberpunk is an interesting genera. Many Books, fims, and games are set in a cyberpunk setting, but all of the worlds start to end up feeling the same after a while. There are always big corporations keeping the lower class down with drugs and robots. Cyberpunk is almost exclusively a dystopian setting. 2064 is different. It’s world is a modern cyberpunk, taking place in the not so far future where robotic advancements and genetic tampering have made the world a more technologically advanced place. Its setting is a lot like modern day, but with more robots and cat girls. The game itself is a point and click adventure game crossed with a visual novel. You’ll spend half of your time talking to colorful, fully voice acted, characters, and the other half doing simple rub one thing on another thing puzzles. You play as a snarky aspiring journalist, who’s home is broken into by a sapient robot who’s creator has gone missing. You and this robot, named Turing, must now embark on an adventure to find your missing friend and Turing's creator. The game is presented in beautiful, detailed and colorful pixel art. Each screen has a lot of things to look or touch at and the protagonist or Turing will have something to say about each of them. You can also carry spoiled milk. Yay? If you're looking for an interesting cyberpunk story, with beautiful graphics and a sorta unique setting, 2064 Read Only Memories is for you.

[maniactypewriter]

Weaver of Stories

I am a weaver of stories. My pens are my needles, my words are my thread. I create entire worlds with a few thoughts. I sit at my desk hunched over my Maniacs Typewriter. Here is where my creativity takes shape. My stories take inspiration from everything. There are stories in everything

Spiders weave stories into their webs. I find inspiration in the baby cobwebs formed by the baby spiders who left and the dust that has settled in the sticky strands. There is inspiration in the finch sitting in the tree watching over her eggs. There is a story in the large crack in the large stone. Everything has a story, from the mold in the basement to the sad apple hanging from the branch.

Consequently everybody has a story to tell.  The fisherman will rant about the huge bass he saw in the ocean. The window maker designs stained glass using dyes that represent the colors of emeralds, roses, cobalt, and lavender.

I tell stories about heroes fighting great villains sing swords and magic. I sit in my room, scratching the head of my old dog and resisting the allure of friends and the internet. I feed on pizza and snacks covered in salt. I twirl my pen between my fingers and wait for ideas to strike. Then I see a face in the fire or a shape in the ice in my cup. I stare at the baby cobwebs and imagine that the older cobwebs are fussing at them. I see water roll down the fichus and envision a worm, happy to tunnel through the dirt. I take to my electric pen and paper and begin creating my picture made of vowels and consonants. My ideas clear as diamonds.

Once I am finished, I step back from my woven word tapestry. I envision that my work will one day be great entertainment, put into books, movies, and television. People will remember the fun they had when everything seems broken and sad. I know in one vast bubble of the multiverse, Fireworks are being launched in my honor; I will strive to experience the same.

I am a weaver of stories. My pens are my needles. My words are my thread.