I'm not one for "New Year's resolutions", but I am one for overly ambitious projects.
For 2023, Project365 is "One New Game Per Day".
Given that I have 634 unplayed games in my Steam account and {mumble} unredeemed bundle Steam keys, there's a reason my unplayed collection is tagged "Pile of Shame".
I'll pin this to my profile, and give a brief summary here each day (or x, if I miss x days due to work or stuff).
I'll play 15-30 minutes of (at least) one new game I've never played before (or played less than 15 minutes of). I'll give every game at least 15 minutes, even if I hate every minute of it.
I'm also open to suggestions; if you reply to this thread with a game, I'll schedule it, or tell you what I thought of it.
One of the things that's come up is that I have a bunch of games that I've played once, and not touched again.
Originally released in 2003 in Korea, an English edition was released in 2004.
I knew I'd installed it at some stage, and had to dig through my backup drives to work out when. I got an Amazon Prime gaming code for in-game gear, and thought I might finally take a look.
It was definitely an exercise in clock-watching. The MMORPG I've played most recently was Final Fantasy XIV, and comparing the two is like chalk and cheese.
Lineage II is built in Unreal Engine 2.5 and it feels ancient. After a couple of grinding quests, I was glad to log out and uninstall it.
I Am Not A Monster: First Contact is billed as a "retro sci-fi tactical turn-based strategy" game.
By retro sci-fi, they mean early-mid 20th century pulp sci-fi.
If you like that kind of sci-fi, this might be right up your alley. Unfortunately, it's not really my cup of tea, and I couldn't really get past that to lock into the game.
Graphically, it's a weird combination of pulp sci-fi stationary graphics for menus, full-screen pixel-art animated transitions, and high-res gameplay, and it feels kind of jarring switching between them. It just feels a little incoherent.
There was almost something there with the gameplay, but when the game was making me feel like I wished I was playing a completely different tactics strategy game, that pretty much sealed the deal.
October 14, 2023 - Day 286 - NewPlay Review
Total NewPlays: 306
Game: Blade & Soul
Platform: NCSoft Launcher
Release Date: Jan 19, 2016
Installation Date: Mar 17, 2022
Unplayed: 576d (1y6m27d)
Playtime: 15m
Blade & Soul is a third-person martial-arts oriented MMORPG.
Originally released in 2012 in Korea, an English edition was released in 2016.
Because I'd opened the NCSoft launcher a couple of days ago for the Lineage II review, I thought I'd knock this one off as well.
It looks OK, but it's an MMORPG, which means that graphics and gameplay are pretty much just a starting point.
Graphically, it's built in Unreal Engine 4, but it doesn't have that "Fortnite" vibe that so many recent UE4 games seem to have. Gameplay seems OK.
However, to justify whether or not to start a new MMORPG becomes about more than "how does it look & play", but:
does it have a sizeable enough playerbase that you'll be able to play through zones with other people?
is it P2W (ie. "Pay To Win" - or spending more money on the game means you can buy your way into in-game Godhood over lower-levelled players, and gank them mercilessly)
how many other MMORPGs are you also playing?
And:
no
yes
umm, too many.
Ultimately, it doesn't offer me something different that I can't find in one of the other half-dozen MMOs that I've already started playing and lost interest in.
On top of that, I played World of Warcraft for over a decade, and burned out on both WoW and MMPRPGs.
I realised a few weeks ago that what I really missed from my WoW days wasn't the gameplay so much as the shared experience of running end-level content raids with friends, all meeting up on one night, and fighting our way through a dungeon together (specifically, Molten Core, Karazhan, Naxxramas, and Icecrown Citadel all hold dear places in my memory.
Starting a new MMO where I don't know anyone, and the only people I could raid with would be PUGs and randoms? Just not for me.
7 Billion Humans is a top-down puzzle programming game.
Really not sure which order to stick those adjectives, because the fundamental gameplay loop is solving puzzles by using simple programming logic.
In playing it, I thought it felt a lot like World of Goo, (both stylistically and audibly) and it turns out that the reason it feels a lot like World of Goo is that one of the three devs who make up Tomorrow Corporation, is the dev who created World of Goo.
As far as programming/puzzle games go, this one is pretty good, but I realised that I run into the same problem I run into with every programming/puzzle game:
I'm not a very good programmer. I'm not quite sure why. I feel like I should be good at it. I first started trying to learn to program over 40 years ago. I've written programs in multiple varieties of BASIC, C, COBOL, and TurboPascal, as well as doing years of HTML & PHP work.
But while I can look at someone else's code and kind-of work out what's going on (at least to a middling degree), I don't seem to be able to get past a point with my own attempts at coding where everything just kind of goes blank. It's like there's too many things to keep track of, and that part of my brain shuts off.
Anyway, that's where I got to with 7 Billion Humans. It's:
Arietta of Spirits is a pixel-art based retro action adventure game, about dealing with grief and monsters. You play as 13-year old Arietta, who is staying with her parents at her recently deceased grandmother's holiday cottage.
When I looked up the activation history, I couldn't initially make sense of why this game would be in my library. It wasn't part of a bundle, it looked like I'd bought it. Digging deeper, I found that it was a bonus game that came with the other game I'd ordered from Fanatical that day.
Unfortunately, while I like the idea of games that deal with grief, because sometimes I find them cathartic, Arietta of Spirits is SO retro that I spent much of my time glancing at the clock.
Firstly, the game includes a mechanic that I'm not terribly fond of: character graphic with a text box full of text to tell the backstory. Click, different talking head. Entire conversations like this. At least you can click through them.
Then there's the sound effects. They're /really/ retro, like C64 retro. The death noises of the mobs (see below) was really jarring and set my teeth on edge.
Start off on the adventure to... pick apples. Get stopped by dad, get given a wooden sword, to defend against wasps.
Encounter wasps. Discover that mob hitboxes aren't terribly consistent. Gets worse in the boss fight at the end of the level, when fighting a big wasp, and some little wasps.
I know from reading up after quitting out that I didn't quite reach the core gameplay about dealing with unhappy spirits, it's just... there was just nothing that made me want to keep playing.
For gamers with a deep love of retro gaming, this might be something that would appeal to them, but I'm not part of that group, which is why Arietta of Spirits is, unfortunately, a:
October 17, 2023 - Day 289 - NewPlay Review
Total NewPlays: 309
Game: Between Two Castles of Mad King Ludwig - Digital Edition
Platform: Steam
Release Date: Nov 16, 2019
Installation Date: Mar 28, 2020
Unplayed: 1298d (3y6m19d)
Playtime: 22m
Between Two Castles of Mad King Ludwig - Digital Edition is quite literally a digital edition of the board game.
Based on my experience with the digital edition, I have no desire to experience the tabletop version.
I played through the tutorial with the AI, and lost, then through a level against AI, and lost, and I felt like I was basically trying to work out the rules as I went.
There's little to explain what the icons on the cards mean, and most of them were hard to read anyway.
Between Two Castles of Mad King Ludwig - Digital Edition is an easy:
October 18, 2023 - Day 290 - NewPlay Review
Total NewPlays: 310
Game: The Quarry
Platform: Steam
Release Date: Jun 10, 2022
Installation Date: Oct 18, 2023
Unplayed: 0d
Playtime: 30m
The Quarry is a third-person interactive horror adventure game.
I've made no secret of my dislike of horror games, and I feel much the same about straight horror movies. I'm OK with horror comedy, and there are a handful of horror movies (the original "Last Summer" movies, most of the "Scream" franchise), but as a rule, if a horror movie is on, I'm somewhere else.
When October's Humble Choice Bundle dropped earlier this month, I opened up the email to see the AAA game for this month was a horror game I'd already looked at briefly before, and added to my Steam "ignore" list.
So here we are.
The first surprise was the cast list: there are a number of well-known names in the cast, including horror staples, David Arquette, and Ted Raimi, as well Ehtan Suplee, and Lance Henrikson - which was an even bigger surprise, because for some reason I thought he'd passed away recently. Nope. Still alive and well, and doing the voiceovers for the game tutorials.
The second surprise was that while this time I wasn't going in completely blank, as I knew this was a horror game, I didn't realise it was effectively a playable movie.
Which meant it actually combines two of my least favourite things, horror games AND horror movies.
The graphics are good, with a couple of caveats.
They've used the likeness of the actors, and in the prologue you encounter a couple of recognisable faces.
Unfortunately, it feels a bit Polar Express; the uncanny valley is strong with this one.
The other thing, is that one of the characters is played by Skyler Gisondo (you may know him from The Righteous Gemstones, or Santa Clarita Diet).
He doesn't seem to blink; it becomes really unnerving, because the intro doesn't appear to be setting him up as a bad guy, it's just REALLY disconcerting.
The navigation controls are a little frustrating, with the camera swinging around wildly, occasionally leaving me wondering which direction key I needed to use. In the TellTale games of this style, the QTE key is clearly defined. Here it's a black keyboard key icon, with a small white triangle that appears at the last second to indicate which direction to go. More than once I hit the wrong key at the right time.
On the other hand, the environmental design and sound design are very well done, leading to exactly the kind of extremely heightened dread and anxiety that is the exact reason I don't play horror games.
If you enjoy that overwhelming tension that doesn't seem to have any catharsis, this might be the game for you. Me?
Metal: Hellsinger is a rhythm-based FPS. The rhythm in question is heavy metal. Very heavy metal.
This is the second of the October Humble Choice Bundle games, and the second game that I'd looked at before and decided "Ah... no."
It's nothing to do with being an FPS, or a fundie* aversion to the setting, or being a rhythm game.
It was the soundtrack, which seemed to me more like death metal than heavy metal, but I'm old.
In any case, you're more likely to find me listening to Sara Bareilles than Slayer. Dire Straits rather than Dio. Counting Crows, not Cannibal Corpse.
You get the idea.
The idea of a game with a soundtrack featuring the lead singers from bands like System of a Down, Dark Tranquillity, Trivium, and Lamb of God is not my idea of a good time.
I found Nine Inch Nails in Quake was a lot to deal with.
So... I was wrong. Killing mobs in hell, slashing or firing on the beat of screaming thrashing metal is an intense but incredibly fun time.
It's not a game I'm going to play to unwind, by any means, and I can't understand a single word they're singing (which is probably for the best), but Metal: Hellsinger is:
October 21, 2023 - Day 293 - NewPlay Review
Total NewPlays: 313
Game: Rebel Inc: Escalation
Platform: Steam
Release Date: Oct 14, 2021
Installation Date: Oct 21, 2023
Unplayed: 0d
Playtime: 29m
Rebel Inc: Escalation is a top-down political/military strategy sim.
It's the fourth game in the October Humble Choice Bundle, and is by the same developers as Plague Inc: Evolved.
Plague Inc is a game about pandemics, released in 2016, and it's game that, while it wasn't "fun" in the traditional sense, it's even less so now.
Rebel Inc: Escalation brings that same sensibility to taking control of a war-torn country to "stabilise" it, and needing to "deal with a deadly insurgency".
The game doesn't really hold your hand, but it's fairly easy to work out. You have a budget that's provided by... the UN, and you need to spend the money on local initiatives to improve support, and remove support from the insurgents. You also need to create government and military strategies to build towards a win-state, which appears to be finding a way to remove the insurgents while maintaining your own popularity.
While I "won" the first level, it vas vaguely disquieting to play a game about war and "insurgents", and would probably feel a bit on-the-nose at the best of times, but even more so at the moment.
October 22, 2023 - Day 294 - NewPlay Review
Total NewPlays: 314
Game: Spirit of the Island
Platform: Steam
Release Date: Aug 18, 2022
Installation Date: Oct 22, 2023
Unplayed: 0d
Playtime: 72m
Spirit of the Island is a third-person farming sim and is the fifth game in the October Humble Choice Bundle
It's a cutesy game that feels like a mash-up of Minecraft, Stardew Valley, and Animal Crossing: New Horizons, with a hint of Disney Dreamlight Valley.
It scratched the go-here-do-this-make-stuff itch, but not real well.
Unfortunately, it has a lot of rough user interfaces edges that still need to sanded off. Inventory management is a multi-click nightmare, and in a game like this, inventory management is everything.
The game also uses a fixed camera position, and tells you this up-front, but it doesn't make it any less annoying.
I want to enjoy Spirit of the Island, but if I want a chilled out experience like that, I'm probably going to look at something else like the games above first.
October 23, 2023 - Day 295 - NewPlay Review
Total NewPlays: 315
Game: Lords & Villeins
Platform: Steam
Release Date: Nov 11, 2022
Installation Date: Oct 23, 2023
Unplayed: 0d
Playtime: 15m
Lords & Villeins is a top-down pixel-art medieval city-building sim. Number six in the October Humble Choice Bundle.
I generally try to find something good to say about a game, but I genuinely can't find anything to like about this game.
Top-down & pixel-art was a hard sell to begin with, but Stardew Valley is top-down pixel-art and that worked for me.
This just didn't click. It's not so much of a city-building management sim, as a micro-management sim based on city-building.
The systems in the game seem disconnected from one another.
You assign land to a family. A 10 block x 10 block area of land is "10 acres". Each person takes up 1 block, so I guess each person is 10% of an acre in size?
But then you turn that area into a house, and now it's a 10 acre house?
I have to give the villeins everything single thing they need from my "warehouse". There are things in my warehouse. How did they get there? I do not know.
For instance, I had to give them X amount of straw.
Then they need walls on the land I zoned for them, and I can build the walls out of straw or wood. Do the walls come out of my warehouse pile of straw or the straw I just gave to the villeins?
The game does not tell me, and at this point, I do not care. I just want it to be over.
I attempt to build walls. You place the icon and drag out the wall. I dragged it in the wrong place. I can't cancel it. I need to delete it. I can't delete it with a drag. I have to click on and delete every single piece of wall individually.
The systems in this game are opaque and frustrating and when my 15 minutes were up, I gave a sigh of relief.
There is probably an audience for this game, but wherever that may be, I assume they have a tolerance for pain that I lack.
Game number seven in the October Humble Choice Bundle is "A Juggler's Tale"; a 2.5D sideways scrolling puzzle adventure game.
I have incredibly mixed emotions about this game.
You play as Abby, a young girl, who is both a juggler, and a marionette. Abby is trapped in a circus and forced to perform, and A Juggler's Tale is the story of her escape, narrated by the puppeteer.
The graphics are gorgeous, the sound design is good. The puzzles are not too challenging, although the controls (on controller) can be a little bit fiddly.
The narrator is an older man with an English accent, and is in turns condescending, and patronising in the way he talks to (and about) Abby, frequently belittling her (and technically my) failures when attempting to solve puzzles - and I utterly despise him.
I'm not sure whether the intent of the devs was to make me feel like that towards him, but his manner and commentary triggers emotional responses within me that I don't think were intended.
I'm tempted to just Google the game to find out how it ends, and if there's any kind of catharsis, because the idea of spending the entire game with this horrible person, fills me with dread.
I suspect that my reaction is partly a trauma response, from the abuse I experienced growing up. So, while I think this game is good, if you have that kind of trauma it may actually be triggering, which is a weird thing to have to say about a game like this.
October 25, 2023 - Day 297 - NewPlay Review
Total NewPlays: 317
Game: Mr. Prepper
Platform: Steam
Release Date: Mar 19, 2021
Installation Date: Oct 25, 2023
Unplayed: 0d
Playtime: 32m
Mr. Prepper is the final game in the October Humble Choice. It's 2.5D cooker-themed... sorry, "prepper"-themed survival sim.
It basically feels like Fallout Shelter if it were about SovCits. And written by SovCits.
You play as the titular "Mr. Prepper" who literally goes by that name in-game, introducing himself as that to other NPCs.
The US government has been taken over by some kind of fascist organisation that stopped Mr. Prepper from escaping from his home town in the midwest, and is now monitoring him for subversive behaviour.
You need to build a bunker for him, and build a whole lot of stuff for the bunker, all while hiding it from the regular government inspections.
This is another game where if the theme of the game were different I might enjoy it more, but the whole real-world prepper/conspiracy theorist Venn diagram takes the shine off it, and just gives me a case of the icks.
October 26, 2023 - Day 298 - NewPlay Review
Total NewPlays: 318
Game: Dub Dash
Platform: Steam
Release Date: Feb 17, 2016
Installation Date: Oct 21, 2023
Unplayed: 5d
Playtime: 27m
Dub Dash is a dubstep-themed rhythm arcade game.
Using a couple of buttons, you need to time your button-presses just right to dodge the obstacles that pop up in front of you, in time with the dubstep soundtrack.
I have a bit of a thing for rhythm games, but I struggle a bit with games where I need to memorise an exact set of moves and repeat them perfectly. This is a combination of both.
The first level is a top-down level where you're a rolling wheel in a trench dodging the obstacles popping out of the side-walls of the trench. Kind of like the Star Wars trench run meets Skrillex.
The thing I found mildly irritating is that most of the required moves are on the beat, and then suddenly one that's off-beat, and not necessarily in a way that makes sense.
I'd feel like I was in the groove, and suddenly I'd smash into an obstacle that was on the third beat. I eventually beat the first level, but this is definitely one of those "I might play it again if the mood strikes me" games.
October 27, 2023 - Day 299 - NewPlay Review
Total NewPlays: 319
Game: Not Tonight
Platform: Steam
Release Date: Aug 17, 2018
Installation Date: Oct 21, 2023
Unplayed: 6d
Playtime: 36m
Not Tonight is a pixel-art work simulator based in a post-Brexit Britain, where a fascist government has taken over, and as a "Euro" with part European heritage and the right papers, you have to fight with an authoritarian bureaucracy in an attempt to remain in a country that wants you out.
To do this you work as a gig-economy bouncer at a pub.
I played for 36 minutes, doing the same job over and over, and if the gameplay loop extends beyond this, I don't feel like playing any longer to
My sole exposure to Vampire: The Masquerade prior to playing Vampire: The Masquerade - Shadows of New York was playing Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodhunt.
Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodhunt is a third-person battle-royale with vampires.
Vampire: The Masquerade - Shadows of New York is... not.
I thought all of the early reading was setting up for the gameplay, but it was taking quite a long time, and then I was faced with a decision, which was - apparently - the wrong decision, because immediately afterwards I was met with a Game Over.
So I started over, discovered that seemingly all of the narrative "choices" in the initial setup lead to exactly the same point of decision, made the opposite decision and... more story.
After a while, because I'd hit the wee hours of this morning, I decided to pull the pin, and looked up the game, and... oh. Right.
It's actually a visual novel, something of a "Choose Your Own Adventure" based on the Vampire: The Masquerade TTRPG, which I also learned of last night.
So, if you're a fan of visual novels, and Choose Your Own Adventure (TM), and the Vampire: The Masquerade TTRPG, this might be right up your alley.
Admittedly, the story did end up being kind of interesting, but this is actually a sequel to an earlier visual novel (Coteries of New York) for which I have an unused key, so might read that first.
October 29, 2023 - Day 301 - NewPlay Review
Total NewPlays: 321
Game: Youropa
Platform: Steam
Release Date: Jun 27, 2018
Installation Date: Oct 21, 2023
Unplayed: 8d
Playtime: 29m
Youropa is a third-person 3D platform puzzle game, in which pieces of a stylized Paris have been ripped from the ground and suspended in mid-air as a series of platforms.
Each platform has one of more puzzles that need to be solved to open the door to transport you to the next platform, and gravity is non-committal about the whole thing.
At times you can walk along a platform that wraps around itself and find yourself walking on what was previously the underside of the platform. At other times you can take a step towards the edge of the platform and find yourself suddenly on the next surface and rotated through 90 degrees, or alternatively, plunging towards Paris below, because gravity, much like the controls for this game, can be finicky.
Unfortunately, while the graphics and lighting are quite pretty, giving the game a certain charm, and the conceit of the game is something out of the ordinary, the wildly inconsistent controls make it equal parts fun and frustrating, and not in a "enjoyable challenge" way, but more in a "Why am I doing this to myself?" way.
Ultimately, I don't think the uniqueness is enough to make me want to come back to Youropa, making it a bit:
Tales of the Neon Sea is a cyberpunk-themed 2D pixel art adventure.
I'm a sucker for cyberpunk-themed games, and this is a game that makes pixel art look gorgeous. It's just a shame that the artwork is the best part of the game.
You play as Rex, a partly cybernetic ex-cop-turned-detective, who awakens in a sewer, only to suddenly find himself being chased by a grim-reaper-esque character wearing a plague doctor mask. Who can teleport.
After slowly escaping (because Rex is injured and moves really slowly), it's eventually revealed that this is a flash-forward.
"Three days earlier...", sees Rex getting out of bed in a gigantic house, and beginning his adventure.
The thing is, Rex moves slowly even when uninjured. The longer I played, the more it became obvious why. This is a game that has been made longer by slowing you down.
The length has then been increased by putting each of the MacGuffins you require to solve each puzzle as far away from you as possible, forcing you to walk slowly from one end of Rex's gigantic house to the other and back. Over, and over. There's no run. Only walk.
You also can't pick up stuff along the way that might be helpful later; things only become available to you when you need them for a puzzle.
While the storyline and setting grabbed me, the constant trudging backwards and forwards in Tales of the Neon Sea made it all a bit:
October 31, 2023 - Day 303 - NewPlay Review
Total NewPlays: 323
Game: TSIOQUE
Platform: Steam
Release Date: Nov 8, 2018
Installation Date: Oct 21, 2023
Unplayed: 10d
Playtime: 17m
TSIOQUE is a 2.5D hand drawn point and click adventure.
You play as young princess Tsioque, who has been left behind in the castle by her mother, the Queen, who has ridden off to fight an existential threat to her kingdom (queendom?)
While the Queen is away, the wizard will play. He's evil, takes over the castle, imprisons the princess, she has to escape, yada yada yada.
There are point-and-click adventures where the puzzles are creative brainteasers, and obvious in hindsight.
There are others where you just randomly click on crap until something happens.
Given the complete lack of tutorial, and the single-pocket inventory, IF you actually have one item, it may not be entirely obvious how to use it.
By "may not be", it's actually "good luck working out the UI!"
A later puzzle presented me with an "invisibility blanket". Often a point-and-click will say "you can't use that now" when you try to use something at the wrong time.
TSIOQUE doesn't. Nothing happens. There's no feedback whatsoever.
Turns out that on the next screen, you need to use it to evade some enemies. How? No idea. I tried to run back to the previous room and use the blanket?
Nope.
Click in the wrong place, the item is returned to the pocket.
Turns out that when you can use it, you kind of drag it towards Tsioque and it's removed from the pocket, and she can use it.
How do you put it away afterwards?
You can't.
Tsioque finds herself standing in the dark. Clicking does nothing. The invisibility blanket is back in the pocket. She's also wearing it, and it cannot be removed.
Take one step forward, she trips, the guards throw the lights on, the wind blows the blanket away and she gets captured.
Over and over.
I gave up in frustration - I'm ten minutes into the game at this point, with a further five minutes of being stuck on this "puzzle", and search for a walkthrough.
Turns out that above the light switch is a spider. I'd seen the spider in previous scenes, but there was nothing you could do with him.
However, NOW he's clickable (not that there's anything to indicate this); his relative size is that of a tap-target on a full-screen mobile ad, and clicking on him will turn the lights off, and all the guards plummet to their death.
Obviously.
Unlike last night with Tales of the Neon Sea's artwork to draw me in, TSIOQUE doesn't even offer that. Do I want to keep playing?:
November 1, 2023 - Day 304 - NewPlay Review
Total NewPlays: 324
Game: Cryptark
Platform: Steam
Release Date: Jun 21, 2017
Installation Date: Oct 21, 2023
Unplayed: 11d
Playtime: 21m
Cryptark is a 2D pixel-art roguelike sci-fi shooter.
You're the away team in a salvage crew, in which you enter procedurally generated ships, destroy armed defences to make your way to the AI brain controlling each ship, within a time limit.
Your attack-suit-mech is heavily armed, and you'll pick up various upgrades along the way.
It's apparently a twin-stick as well, but I played with mouse and keyboard.
I'm pretty wiped out, but even so, it's another of those games that if I was in the right mood I might take another shot at it.
November 4, 2023 - Day 307 - NewPlay Review
Total NewPlays: 327
Game: Little Man Has a Day
Platform: Steam
Release Date: Aug 17, 2023
Installation Date: Aug 21, 2023
Unplayed: 75d (2m14d)
Playtime: 30m
Little Man Has a Day is a 2.5D walking simulator about a little man having a day.
With hand drawn graphics, this game is a deeply complex and cerebral exploration of what it means to be human.
Well, as deeply complex as one can get in 13 minutes. Because that's how long it took me to finish the game. The only reason I have 30 minutes above is that I went back to get the rest of the achievements.
As "Little Man" you wake up and you're having an "eh" day. You explore the map, and meet a handful of characters, and write about it in your journal.