#queuemons

[shalmplay]

FIRST IMPRESSIONS: Dragon Spirits

i believe this one's an RPGmaker creature collector of sorts? always curious to see how ppl use the engine to handle that english translation is definitely on the janky side, but i try to cut some slack for small teams

(bird alert)

chose this fella from among the five "starters"

dragons are "caught" automatically when you meet the given battle conditions (i assume there's a variety)

these directional hints feel wildly unnecessary (there isn't really anywhere else to go), but maybe it's just for the intro stuff? aha there's an NPC you can talk to in order to turn them off. feels like a very RPGmakery workaround--i wonder if there's a better way that can be done?

overall, this is an odd mix of nice looking original(?) assets & RPGmaker stock. nothing against using RPGmaker stock, but i find it's actually a bit more distracting when it's mixed up like this--particularly the SFX (i don't know why that is, but for whatever reason hearing a stock RPGmaker sound effect takes me out of it more than just seeing the familiar RTP graphics 🤔)

[shalmplay]

FIRST IMPRESSIONS: Fearless Fantasy

well this is not what i was expecting lol so tbh i think some of my negativity is going to be a bit unfair

but the splash art for this game is just so, so intriguing i was really looking forward to a traditional JRPG-style game with that type of art (and the name gave the vibe that it was going to be Final Fantasy-ish to some extent)

but then the game starts up & it's just...very mobiley clearly designed for touch/swipe controls (so if there's anything FF-ish about this game, it's....theatrhythmish?) overall tone & voice-acting throwing me off (everything just seems kind of casual/jokey) the animated cutscenes aren't bad per se, but they don't match that wild advertised art style at all also it seems like the pacing of this game is going to be battle screen -> map/menu screen -> battle screen, etc no exploration to speak of which is an unfair expectation on my end, but it would've been so cool with that art style 😭 so on the one hand, i feel i should come back & give this game another shot, now that i know what it even is on the other hand, using the mouse for something that was clearly designed for touch/swipe is going to be a fundamental enjoyment blocker (again, imagine playing theatrhythm with a mouse) oh well at least it's another of those "what is this/where did it come from" games in the steam library, so the stakes were low lol

[shalmplay]

FIRST IMPRESSIONS: Fates of Ort

this game initially caught my eye with its blobby (in a nice way) isometric pixelart

some brief character creation allows you to pick from a set of premade appearances--gotta have a hood!

so there's a weird mechanic in which time is actually stopped when you're not moving, but you can choose to keep it flowing by holding spacebar? seems to be more for battle mechanics than lore (though the NPCs seem aware of it in a tongue 'n cheek way) The opening sequence seems to be presenting you with a moral/class choice? but i'm not sure how much it actually impacts. i seem to have chosen do magic/be bad (i just like to do magic in any given RPG), but i wonder if it will be that straightforward ok, it seems to be more like a "but thou must" choice, since the story at large seems to revolve around you being forced to accept "consumption magic", which typically turns ppl into monsters (unless they wrote two different plots?)

i kept hitting buttons wondering where my inventory was, and it turns out you can only access it at these spire things? interesting, idk how i feel about that yet overall though, this seems pretty charming & i'd like to continue!

[shalmplay]

FIRST IMPRESSIONS: Arcanium

a deckbuilder with the interesting twist of having a party, instead of the usual single main character (making for some tougher choices when picking the single reward card after each battle)

each character occupies swappable "lanes" which can impact where cards can be placed overall i'm kinda diggin it it definitely has "casual/mobile" vibes, but changes up the formula in some fun ways and the animal characters add some flavor

(why's this thicc raccoon so futuristic though lol)

[shalmplay]

FIRST IMPRESSIONS: Elderand

wasn't expecting character creation? minimal options, but kinda neat that it's there

the pixels are quite nice, even if the designs themselves don't stand out too much in their genre

(it took a little while for me to notice that there was such a huge statue in the background of this area--cool reveal!)

on the other hand, the SFX feel a bit out of place--many are too "bright" sounding for a dark fantasy mood (it's got that 'video game coin noise' when you pick up coins)

small thing, but i like that there are cute little save icons based on where you are overall, i'll probably poke at it a few more times, even if nothing in particular is wowing me