Tomi on 23/5/2022 at 10:07

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I've been playing a bunch of games again. Here are some from the last week:

Dirt Rally 2: I'm really enjoying this again after taking a little break from the game. These days I mostly play the online daily/weekly/monthly rallies. I really wish I was somewhat good at this game though, but I just can't keep up with the best players; they're often like a minute faster than me on a 10km stage. Of course, I can say from my old Dirt Rally 1 experiences that knowing the stages thoroughly beforehand gives you a huge advantage, and I just haven't got familiar enough with the DR2 stages yet. I think it would also be helpful if I knew how to tune my car, but I often just drive with the default tuning. So yeah, I just need to play more and make an effort to learn all these things, and maybe I'll get better one day. Perhaps I should invest in a half decent racing wheel - I currently use the Xbox One controller!

art of rally: I play this when I have like 10-15 minutes to spare, and I just want to drive a stage or two and have fun. Often I don't even feel like playing the game for any longer, because there's still no proper "career mode" or anything that would make things more interesting. It's a great rally game though, and it does look very pretty. And I don't have to tune my car!

[IMGHIDE=Effie:]https://steamuserimages-a.akamaihd.net/ugc/772865835189649981/B2BE0FFFDF68DD830D3C64698CB059BE7FDA8024/?[/IMGHIDE] I felt like playing a random game in my games library, and ended up playing Effie. It's a 3D action platformer, very unoriginal and generic in just about every way. The low poly models in the game are outright ugly, the level design isn't very interesting, and the actual gameplay can be a bit frustrating at times. You'd think that this game is from the early 2000's, but it's actually from 2020.

[IMGHIDE=Colt Canyon:]https://steamuserimages-a.akamaihd.net/ugc/1264897457533243802/C739BB442595E20F01131E7CC6AFA5137AD04313/?[/IMGHIDE] Colt Canyon is a fast-paced 2d action roguelike pixelart thingy set in the Wild West. Sounds like my thing, but I'm not enjoying it as much as I thought I would. The action feels intuitive and especially the stealth kills are satisfying, but it's also very repetitive. the enemies are too stupid, and even though the levels are procedurally generated, every play through still feels like the same. I haven't even got very far in the game, but I don't feel like grinding through the same content anymore, just to unlock some new gun that I'll never use anyway. For me the last straw was finding out that Colt Canyon doesn't have any kind of a save system. I thought that the game would at least automatically save in between the levels, so The world needs more games set in the Wild West for sure, so it's a shame that this one's not very good.

[IMGHIDE=Book of Demons:]https://steamuserimages-a.akamaihd.net/ugc/918038307427729242/DA6C4137E212B476F920228505BA41E6A32C9639/?[/IMGHIDE] Book of Demons is one of the most interesting "Diablo clones" that I've played. It mixes up the standard ARPG gameplay with cardgame elements, and even though the resulting game is much deeper and more tactical, I don't find the combat very satisfying. It might be because I'm playing with gamepad, and it just feels a bit clumsy and awkward. I'm really digging the papercraft-like art style and the music of Book Demons, even though it looks and sounds so much like Diablo. It's intentional though, and some of the dialogue where they poke fun at Diablo is actually quite funny.

henke on 23/5/2022 at 14:31

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Yeah, I briefly tried the non-motion controls and they felt even worse. Right stick is dedicated to swinging your sword around rather than turning the camera. I felt like they could've made it just control the sword while you're locked on to an enemy. Or even better just cut out the directional faff and just turn sword fighting in a single button you mash (sword fighting is the worst part of the gameplay anyway), tho that'd require serious reworking of a ton of stuff so, eh... it's pretty much motion controls or nothing.

Renzatic on 23/5/2022 at 17:53

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I played Skyward Sword exclusively in handheld mode, and thought it worked fairly well. It took a minute to get used to LB to use the right stick to move the camera, but it didn't bother me much once I got used to it.

Overall, I thought the game was just...well, okay. It's a classic N64 style Zelda game to a fault. If you liked OoT and Windwaker, you'll probably have fun with this, so long as you're not expecting it break the mold in any way beyond the motion controls.

Anarchic Fox on 30/5/2022 at 16:20

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This weekend I found out Daniel Remar, a stalwart of the indie gaming scene with two decades of output, has kept on developing under the Ludosity banner.

Princess Remedy in a World of Hurt is a lo-fi action game, whose theme is that you're solving people's woes. These woes range from mundane illness to existential crises, represented by enemies you fight (viruses, bacteria etc.) by flinging medical supplies at them. Every successful battle yields an upgrade (health, damage, number of shots, regen, number of flasks (grenades)). At the end you can marry any of the ~100 characters you've healed, and in the sequel you can apparently date any character, so I guess this game is for the polyamorous folks out there. It's a fun thirty minutes, well worth a look.

Ittle Dew 2: A Zelda-like game with an alcoholic fox sidekick. This games have the classic Zelda structure of overworld plus dungeons with upgrades in each one, but it's much less linear and there is a much heavier emphasis on puzzle-solving. The puzzles are largely block-pushing affairs, but there are moments that require lateral thinking. Combat is easy except for the well-designed bosses, but doesn't feel particularly good. The story is just a vehicle for jokes, but the sense of humor is good, mixing absurdity with dry sarcasm. The second game is an expanded version of the first with a heavier emphasis on overworld exploration, plus a whole bunch of optional bosses, and multiple layers of secrets (I got one bonus ending, but had to watch Youtube for the others).

Your Chronicle: Idle game silliness, but it provides a helpful neurochemical boost.

Reventure: A basic, compact platformer with a handful of items (but also a weight limit), and 100 endings. The goal is to try to find every ending. There's one for every death, one for killing every important character, one for hugging every important character, and a "rescue the princess" plot that can go off the rails in two dozen different ways. Every ending has some impact on the world, usually just aesthetic, but sometimes unlocking a helpful shortcut. You can also find hints for the endings scattered about, and also after finding enough endings you get special items (compass and map) to help find the remaining ones. A good time.

O'Fox Life: A skeleton of a platformer. A student project, I guess. Not worth playing.

mxleader on 1/6/2022 at 03:08

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My current Windows 7 laptop will only allow me to play Thief 1, TG and T2 OG and Fan missions and also really old stuff like Microsoft Train Simulator.... So I've been playing modern games like GTAV, Dirt 4, Dirt Rally 2.0 and Farm Simulator on the Xbox. I finished the offline GTAV series and have been playing the online version for about a year but it can be really annoying at times and the side quests are repetitive. Sometimes old games like SWAT 4 multi-player were more fun and much simpler than GTAV online. Maybe when GTA6 comes out in the year 2050 it will be fun.