Reviews Rate the game you finished/retired

[Virtual Ruminant]

Retired Frank and Drake (Appnormals Team / Chorus Worldwide Games, 2023)

An unconventional point and click adventure with branching story paths, different endings and puzzle mini-games.

The story is that of two unlikely roommates, one of which suffers from some mysterious sickness that has left him with amnesia for a year and who is physically so weak that he barely makes it through the day - the other is a strange guy who lives a completely nocturnal lifestyle, has a fatal "allergy" to sunlight and a strange diet that consists mostly of animal blood or medical blood products. During the course of a week, both of their lives unravel in strange ways and they find themselves confronted with strange things happening all around the town they live in - and somehow, they themselves seem to be connected with them.

The way the story ends is determined by two factors: The choice of activities for each of the two main characters for each day and the development of the relationship between them.

The game features a plain, yet distinctive background art style and rotoscoped character animations, the sum of which makes it look a bit like a 2000s Richard Linklater film - a great visual style rarely seen in video games. The soundtrack alternates between somber and jazzy moods and is really good as well. The story-telling is deliberately slow and relies a lot on text in found objects, the writing is some of the least videogamey I have seen in a long time, very literary.

I enjoyed my first play-through very much, but, as is so often the case with video games that really want you to play multiple times to get the "full experience" (i.e. every story branch and every ending), it forces too much repetition on the player and what was novel and interesting the first time becomes unskipable tedium on repeat playthroughs.

I managed to complete a second playthrough and then could not find the motivation to play more.



3/5

 

[Virtual Ruminant]

Finished Best Month Ever! (Warsaw Film School Video Game & Film Production Studio / Klabater, 2022)

Me: Copilot, write a script for a choose-an-adventure without a single puzzle, with a story that's just a sequence of stereotypical late 1960s Americana held together by a threadbare plot-device, a bit like Forrest Gump, but edgy, like if Quentin Tarantino wrote it.

Copilot: Ok, here's a story about a road-trip of single white mom and her young mixed-race son, set in 1969, whose black dad skipped out on he-. I am sorry, but I cannot discuss this further, let's move on. However, if you are still interested, I hear some guys from Poland are quite ready to write such a script, if you really think that's a good idea.

This game tracks three scores for the kid character over the course of the game, righteousness, confidence and relationship (to the kid's mother, the other main character of the game). Those scores are influenced by player choices and ultimately determine at which of the nine possible endings the game arrives.

I could only stomach the experience once and found the other endings on YouTube, but even that felt like a waste of time afterwards.

Might be enjoyable if approached with a mindset of expecting something quite trashy and janky, with the occasional nice-looking scene, a more-than-decent soundtrack and a fully voice-acted dialogue and narration. Anybody looking for something authentic or emotionally engaging should avoid.



2.5/5

 

[Ge0force]

Finished Anomaly Collapse


If you like turn-based strategy games, don't sleep on Anomaly Collapse. This charming indie game combines the tile-based tactical gameplay of Into the Breach with the 1D turn-based combat of Darkest Dungeon. There are 8 different characters and hundreds of perks and skills to make each run unique. Definitely one of my favorite games of the year so far!

Score: 8.9/10


Finished Arcade Spirits


Very well-written interactive visual novel about a guy/girl who didn't had much luck in life so far, but finds something to live for when they get a job in a retro arcade hall. You'll meet a bunch of great/crazy/funny/charming people, become close friends with some of them and you can even romance the one you like most. A few decent plot twists keep the story interesting until the end. Very recommended, I even purchased the sequel right after finishing this one.

Score: 8.8/10


Finished Tomb Raider Unfinished Business Remastered


The only expansion for the original Tomb Raider that I never played before, but not a very good one. Especially the Atlantis levels are filled with annoying invisible traps, timed doors and WAY too much combat. I ended up saving (and dying) every 15 seconds, giving me more frustration than fun. Only the last level of the expansion is actually worth playing, but not worth the frustration you'll get in order to reach that level.

Score: 5.2/10


Finished Dead Space (2023)


Excellent remake of one of my favorite games of all time. The game truly looks and sounds amazing, and the combat is still very enjoyable nowadays. I can't recommend it enough!

I regret that it didn't sell enough to justify a Dead Space 2 remake as well. But like probably many other people, I found it hard to pay full price for a visual upgrade of a game I already finished several times. I hope EA will consider a brand new sequel or reboot some day.

Score: 9.2/10


Finished The Saboteur


One of my favorite games of all time, and damn, even today The Saboteur is so much fun to play! The story is excellent, the combination of stealth and 3rd person combat works really well and being able to climb almost every building in Paris is nothing but amazing. The only negative is that enemies seem to be telepathic, they all immediately start shooting at you when you're being discovered. But hey, it's still fun.

Score: 9.0/10


Finished Sable


Charming open-world game with a great setting and story, but sadly also with mediocre gameplay. The open world is rather empty, with only a few points of interest to discover in each area. Therefore you're wasting way too much time driving around on your bike. There's also no combat so you won't encounter any enemies to beat up. Major perk of this game is that you can climb almost everything, but because of the very simple graphics, it's often hard to see how steep a surface is. This makes it hard to predict if your characters will climb or slide down after a jump, which can be very frustrating when you're falling down to the bottom once again. Some of the puzzles are fun though, despite being rather easy. Mediocre, but again, very charming.

Score: 7.6/10)


Retired Alina of the arena


Another roguelike deckbuilding game, but sadly not a very good one. You're fighting in an arena, and at the start of every turn you can move your character one single step. This makes it problematic to avoid being hit by AoE attacks and to avoid begin surrounded when there are many enemies on the playfield. There are a few cards and items that let you move as well, but getting these is a matter of luck. I wasn't able to beat the second boss after many tries, and while I like a good challenge, dying often felt unfair to me so I quit.

 

[spiel]

Completed A Little to the Left

7.5/10

Some of the later levels got too abstract for my liking, and I thought the number of puzzles could have been trimmed down for a tighter experience (I would have given 8/10). But it was indeed very satisfying when a puzzle did click.

 

[didamangi]

Finished Prince of Persia: The Lost Crown 10/10

Played on the Immortal difficulty, it's the best Prince of Persia game for me, replacing The Sands of Time. The Lost Crown > Sands of Time > PoP 2008.

Fluid combat and platforming, satisfyingly hard and cool and fun boss fights with some good puzzles. Also good pacing with the power progression, and surprisingly interesting story with good VA. I'm slightly let down by the graphical quality of the game (subjectively) and some minor weird bugs.

I'm glad it's sold enough (maybe?) to warrant a story DLC, they've given some free updates along the way too, adding boss rushes, and extra hard challenge rooms (combat, platform). Will double dip on Steam for sure.

 

[Mivey]

FInished Judgment the other day

On its surface, this is a pretty straightforward spin-off to the Yakuza games. Instead of Kiryu, a goody-two-shoes former Yakuza, we play a former attorney turned private investigator. We of course return to Kamurocho, and the game tells one long mystery story, that begins with a couple of murders of low-life Yakuzas and end up becoming a nationwide conspiracy of the highest order -- the usual Yakuza stuff. The big difference to Yakuza is how the story is told. Whereas Kiryu just stumbles into everything, without understanding much of anything, just fumbling from one brawl to the next until he's punching the head of some corporation or secret underground organisation, instead we have to figure stuff out slowly as a detective. Lots of collecting clues, tailing people secretly to find out their secrets and so on. It's a slow burn that grew on me and gives the game ultimatley a very different vibe.

Part of that is how Yagami, our detective protagonist, and Kaito, a former Yakuza who acts as his side-kick, have a great bromance going on that allows the narrative to build in a way that classic Yakuza usually doesn't, in those game the plot usually just pisses around just until the vey end when everything happens at once, usually involving a big brawl. Well, ok, Judgment also ends on a big brawl, but it feels more earned here. Yagami feels in control in a way that Kiryu never did. I loved the story, the characters and the story progression in this one.

Combat is the usual fighting game affair, with a few twists to keep things fresh. Enemies can inflict "injuries", reducing parts of the health bar permanently, and requiring special, expensive health items to repair. THis ends up addding some flavour, but overall it's not too important. The game never reduces more than 40% of your health and it is often easy to avoid the telegraphed attacks that cause this in the first place.

One complaint I have is the "gang" mechanic: every once in a while a gang that Yagami pisses of starts to cause trouble all over Kamurocho, requiring you to beat their bosses (or wait for a long time for them to pass). While this is going on, the enounter rate on the map goes up the roof, and you will basically fight people all the time. This gets old very quick, but sadly the game never stops this nonsense, even after you defeat the gang in story. Bad choice.

Other than than that, I don't think I have anything I could complain about. Judgment feels like the perfect spin-off game for this series.

 

[spiel]

Tinykins completed

10/10

This game is just bursting with joy. Traversal is really fun with a surprising depth to it to discover if you play the time trials. Your dash mechanic is sliding on a bar of soap and it (appropriately enough) controls slippery but never in a frustrating way. There's a wonderful amount of variety in the environments that makes exploring every nook and cranny a delight. Even though the fetch quests got samey eventually, the game's short length helps to mask this issue.

It's a shame that the devs never added a collectible tracker. Trying to 100% the game by aimlessly combing through the levels again drains the fun right out. So I'll stop while the game's ended on a high note.