Last Game You Finished and Your Rating

The Turing test 6/10

A great puzzle game in principle, which is very portal in execution, but there's nothing remotely taxing in any of the puzzles. I was hoping for some bastard hard puzzles like in the witness.

Life is Strange 2

I'm not really sure how I feel about this game. I think the story and acting was really strong and there were a lot of good moments. The problem is that setting the game as a road trip kind of highlights the limits of point and click adventure. You get a number of characters who are only in one episode and then gone so you don't really get to build up any real relationship with them. There are choices that you just make that I just find frustrating. Also each episode moves forward months at a time and the main characters situations completely change which can be a bit jarring as they are chatting to people like they've been friends for ages even though you've never seen them before.

Disco Elysium

More people need to play this amazing RPG and hopefully, when it release on consoles next year, they will. The story is entertaining enough but the character creation is the real star of the show. You still earn XP like in traditional RPGs and spend the points to upgrade aspects of your character but the traits you decide to improve really sculpt the protagonist into something unique to each player. And buffing a trait too highly can have adverse effects as well. For example, levelling up the 'Drama' stat will allow you to spot NPC lies more easily but levelling it up too highly and you'll end up navigating conversation trees with your own psyche as it starts encouraging you to lie and bluff because, apparently, no one is telling you the truth.

You navigate the environment like a classic RPG similar to Planescape but the majority of the game is text based, with the outcome of interactions being determined by dice rolls. The writing is absolutely top notch and discovering your character is a joy.

I really liked how you can't just build a character who can succeed at everything and I really want to play it again soon. Seriously, check it out if you haven't heard about it! I'm probably not selling it all that well but it's a GOTY contender.

Disco Elysium - *****

I'm already confident in saying this is one of my favourite games ever. I don't even care if I look up some alternate scenes or replay it in the future and it turns out not to be as robust in its reactivity as it first appears, the experience of this first playthrough was so joyous that I don't think anything can dampen how favourably I view it. It had me belly laughing regularly throughout my 50 hour playthrough but there's so much else to love too; strong writing, memorable characters, the 24 companions in the form of your clashing personalities (probably the most interesting method of character creation I've seen) and the haunting soundtrack. I loved it.

Ending spoiler:

Death Stranding - Any enjoyment I got out of this game was ruined by the 4-6 hour long ending that Kojima forced me to sit and endure.

The Beginner's Guide - Wow! That has saved my evening from the abyss. I didn't know it was possible to feel so many different emotions inside an hour and a half.

To The Moon

Wow, I didn't expect it to hit me like that :cry:

Happy tears.

King of Cards.

Pretty good, although it's probably my least favourite of all of them. I prefer the longer levels, never got into the card game and the final boss is a little bit annoying. But, I would still recommend it.

Persona 5 - 9/10

Just finished. About 85 hours. Perhaps being too hasty to give a rating, given my immediate feeling is that the game should have ended about 6 hours sooner, but overall a sublime JRPG experience that keeps things engaging, challenging and varied throughout. Very well written young adult fiction with some scope to exert your own personality and influence on the storyflow and gameplay.

My Friend Pedro (1X).

Great fun, pretty easy but i guess there are different difficult modes available to step the challenge up. Short, but after 4 hours I felt I had my fill. Also, there is an Xmas themed level in there.

7 bananas out of 10

kazanova_Frankincense wrote:My Friend Pedro (1X).

Great fun, pretty easy but i guess there are different difficult modes available to step the challenge up. Short, but after 4 hours I felt I had my fill. Also, there is an Xmas themed level in there.

7 bananas out of 10

I think the way the game is set up the difficulty comes from playing it as a score attack rather than just playing through the campaign.

However, I also had my fill after 4-5 hours and didn't really feel the desire to go back. It is very satisfying gameplay while it lasts though.

SteamWorld Dig 2 - Loved / 10. Found the ending abrupt, and wish there'd been an NG+. Can't wait for SWD3.

I loved Steam World Dig 2, the main theme is one of the best bits of gaming music I've ever heard. So chilled and suits the feel of the game perfectly.

I finished Totally Accurate Battle Simulator on the Xbox and loved it :wub:

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A simple concept with cartoony visuals that fit perfectly and was great fun while it lasted.
Some of the levels are super easy and some a little tricky at first but it's never overwhelming and it's just a nice relaxing little game

.

Overall a great effort worthy of 9/10 :wub:

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Played Gris, was a little disappointed. It's very pretty and well animated (which reminded me at times of Forgotton Anne) but I found the level design frustrating - it'd be unclear of two directions which was the way to progress and which was the way to find a secret, and too often I'd pick one to find it was the way of progress and I'd be locked out from going back.

Also, the five stages of grief must be the most overplayed theme for "artistic" games ever.

LocoRoco Remastered - 6.5

Charming enough, but more than little fiddly and not at all challenging - the game is built for mental completionists rather than anyone who wants a puzzle/platforming challenge. The game also caused me some mild motion sickness comparable to VR because of the tilting on a TV screen.

What Remains of Edith Finch - 8.5

Masterful game design and direction. Tells an interactive story without being derisive or cliche. Janky framerate throughout on Switch.

Frosty the Clarkman wrote:LocoRoco Remastered - 6.5

Charming enough, but more than little fiddly and not at all challenging - the game is built for mental completionists rather than anyone who wants a puzzle/platforming challenge. The game also caused me some mild motion sickness comparable to VR because of the tilting on a TV screen.

I imagine something is lost in translation from the PSP (or Vita) where LocoRoco feels right at home. If only it could come to Switch

Last edited by deathofcows on Sun Dec 29, 2019 5:51 pm, edited 1 time in total.

Frosty the Clarkman wrote:What Remains of Edith Finch - 8.5

Masterful game design and direction. Tells an interactive story without being derisive or cliche. Janky framerate throughout on Switch.

I too just played this on Switch.

I will never play a walking/narrative-based game again, I don't think. They are simply not for me.

I found it

unaffecting and a little naff. The house premise - Howl's Moving Deathville - was a little contrived for me, in concept and in its manifestation. Each room is an overly perfect snowglobe of a life in a way that did not chime for me with how a real home is more organic, messy, where the outward objects and paraphernalia not so perfectly true and relevant to a person's internal world.

The first story being Molly's ambiguous fantasy monster thing was a little odd, as it scuffed the initial clarity of the core conceit - that each vignette was of their death.

And the vignettes themselves I did not find so moving, in truth. And though mechanically they were interesting and illuminating, sometimes their gameplay was a little rough in a way that undercut their flow or impact (some of Sam's photo-framings took a little longer than I fancied, for example.).

And because the gameplay varies so much throughout, there isn't the accumulation of comfort and familiarity with a motion that engenders the third-space, side-thinking that happens when something feels automatic and natural. And I think that's the space in which emotion and themes can probably be better explored.

In general I often find these games - certainly this one - a little affected. In the oh-so, measured way you look at your own arm as you open a door. Or the borderline pulp-noir self-consciousness of the dialogue tone (though here it was well delivered). And the melancholic music and so on and so on.

I also just find it weird to somehow equate this steady-flow throughout an environment, gaze-ing and pondering things, to the lived experience of moving around in jerky, impulsive ways, with a roaming, flitting gaze and a tactility of all things. I actually find these games have an uncanny valley-type effect of feel, and not visuals. Where they have so tried to convey the apparent lived experience of - say - going through a house that what they come up with just feels even weirder and unnatural. In a way that other games - with their clear difference to real presence or movement or reality or mechanics - don't suffer from.

And so on. I've seen the general impressions online and concede that my reaction isn't the usual, and that clearly I have remained inert to what is a moving experience for others (and for the record I can be moved - Love you Celeste!).

Oh well!

5/10

OrangeXMS wrote:Played Gris, was a little disappointed. It's very pretty and well animated (which reminded me at times of Forgotton Anne) but I found the level design frustrating - it'd be unclear of two directions which was the way to progress and which was the way to find a secret, and too often I'd pick one to find it was the way of progress and I'd be locked out from going back.

Also, the five stages of grief must be the most overplayed theme for "artistic" games ever.

I found it very pretty, and was a big fan of the spare aesthetic, the illustrated animation and its flourishes - like the cube-block-pound or the draping trees. I also thought the game-feel was surprisingly good for a game with sucg a strong emphasis on atmosphere and tone (especially when you start swimming etc.).

But the music and general journey was over-egged, too obviously 'Deep' and 'Emotional', and the themes so abstracted it never really added up to something relatable or affecting for me.

It was also remarkably un-moreish. I liked it and found it mildly diverting, but never felt particularly compelled or excited to carry on. If anything I think it probably felt longer than its length.

Overall, pleasant, I'd say.

3/5

N.b. This and my Edith Finch verdict is making me seem puh-retty heartless...

I mostly agree on Gris, except I didn't particularly like the gamefeel of swimming - or more accurately the transition to and from it, especially when jumping out of the water. The mechanics never clicked with me, it never really felt satisfying in the way breaching should.

deathofcows wrote:I will never play a walking/narrative-based game again, I don't think. They are simply not for me.

Play The Stanley Parable to change your mind!

I've not played Edith Finch, but the impression of it I have is that it falls very much on the "serious, emotional, environmental storytelling" side of the genre. While I've enjoyed games like that it's normally been because they do something else alongside it (Everybody's Gone to the Rapture for its too perfect capturing of an idealised English village, Sagebrush for its lo-fi retro aesthetic - which also deliberately uses the uncanny feeling of the genre to lend an almost horror-like atmosphere to the cult compound).

The "walking sims" I prefer have been less sobering. The Stanley Parable has genuinely funny narration, is very self-aware and deconstructs itself as a videogame with only the illusion of choice. Proteus isn't really narrative-based at all, being procedurally generated, and is more of an obvious game-like art-scape to explore - especially in its dynamic audio reflecting the movement of the player.

Which is to say, I think the genre has more to offer than just the subset of more serious entries. (I think in general games still suffer from thinking that "art is sad" when it doesn't need to be the case)

Last Game You Finished and Your Rating

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