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NEKOJONEZ'S GAMING BLOG
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GAMER’S THOUGHTS: MY PALWORLD WISHLIST
Steam store page – Twitter/X – Wikipedia
I know that I’m extremely late when it comes to the Palworld hype. Palworld
released in early January 2024 and currently, since there aren’t a lot of
updates dropping, the hype died out. Yet, the roadmap looks extremely promising.
Since this game is still in early access, I’m always hesitant in writing about
the game. Since, you never know which mechanics or things will change and evolve
during the early access period. Especially since we are currently only at
v0.1.5.1. So, I decided to hold off on my first impression/review article for
now. But, I wanted to talk about this game. So, here are some things I’d love to
see in the full version of Palworld or even in one of the next updates.
First of all, what is a Palworld?
Palworld is a combination of several games, all thrown into one. It’s easy to
describe Palworld with saying which games it combines.
Foremost, at its core, it’s a game you can somewhat compare to Ark Survival
Evolved. When I first started playing, I noticed the similarities right away.
The way how you have a crafting system to build your base, and you have monsters
running around you can tame/catch is totally here as well.
I haven’t played a lot of Ark, so I can’t say if this mechanic is also present
in Ark… But, the fact you can use your monsters to preform tasks in your base
reminded me quite a lot of The Survivalists. A game where you are stranded on an
island, and you can train monkeys to preform actions for you. The big difference
is that now certain monsters can only preform certain tasks, instead of the
monkeys just copying you.
Now, a lot of other articles describe this game as Pokémon with guns. After
playing this game, I think that’s a somewhat unfair comparison. When I think
Pokémon, I think a journey with gyms and an evil team. I think turn based
battles and a big ending tournament as its conclusion. While some Pals share a
very similar design language to some Pokémon, most of the mechanics of what
makes a Pokémon game aren’t in this game. The other big mechanic is the capture
mechanic, but by now this isn’t exclusive to Pokémon games anymore. Especially
since we have games like Coromon.
There are also influences of the latest Zelda games. Especially Tears of the
Kingdom. There are these huge, strong bosses roaming around on the huge open
world map, you can beat at any time. Also, the korok seeds to upgrade your
character are also here in the form of effigies and Pal souls to upgrade your
monsters.
This game really feels like the developers looked at all the games they liked
playing, looked at what worked and threw it all together into one pot and shook
it until it all clicked together. The mechanics of this game really click
extremely well together. If I didn’t know any better, I wouldn’t be surprised if
I said that this was a finished game.
There are some silly bugs here and there and in some spots, this game feels
unfinished. But, overall the game we have currently is amazing and if you would
enjoy a game like this after reading what I wrote here… Give this game a try. I
only told you the most basic things in this game. This game is a survival game
with elements from a lot of other games like those I have already mentioned but
also Minecraft, Dragon Quest Builders and various others.
Let’s talk improvements
While the game is a lot of fun to play at the moment, there are some things I
wish that were improved or updated. While you get a lot of warnings that there
are: save corruption bugs, crashes and bugs… Besides sometimes the lighting
engine giving up for a moment or the AI of the pals or enemies doing some funky
stuff, I haven’t seen too many worrying things.
Take for example this floating rock screenshot here. I have explored roughly
half of the map after 35 hours of play, and this was the only floating rock I
could find. That’s extremely impressive, especially since if you look at the
size of the map… It isn’t small at all. In the future, new islands and area’s
will be added so if they deliver them with this kind of quality, I have no
complaints.
Well, I do have one recommendation. I’d love to see more landmarks in the map.
Currently, almost all the landmarks in the game are based upon the terrain. I’d
love to see more villages or ruins of them. I loved finding these things in the
Zelda games and letting my mind wonder what happened there. It’s a very
difficult balance act, since too many landmarks would make the map feel crowded
and limit the amount of possible base locations.
Basically, I’d love more reasons for me to go exploring these regions and get
unique rewards. Besides completing the Paldex, there isn’t a lot of reason to go
exploring in certain area’s. And when you have set up the right kind of farms
and work stations for your pals in your bases, the chance you run out of
resources is rather small.
Speaking about bases, currently you can only have three bases. Most likely, this
is done to improve the multiplayer performance. Since, the game emulates the
three bases in the background, so you can easily have a base close to big ore
clusters to farm those while you are working in your other base. If you don’t
place a cap on those, it’ll tank the performance of any computer or server. Yet,
I’d give the tools to the player to increase the cap. Personally, I think
Minecraft has one of the best systems with the game rules. You can almost change
anything to your playstyle and even disable or remove caps that are there for
performance reasons. You already have quite a lot of toggles and sliders in
Palworld, but I’d also expand on that.
Currently, the building system is decent, but it needs a lot of polishing up.
The biggest problem I have with the building system are the stairs. It’s a
nightmare sometimes to place stairs to go from one to another floor. Also, why
can’t we place a full wall next to stairs? Most likely because some pals their
hitbox would do some crazy stuff? Also, placing certain items or crafting
stations on elevated floors doesn’t always work the best.
On top of that, besides the visual look of the floors, walls and ceilings,
what’s the point of being able to unlock stone foundations? As a test, I tried
to build a high tower with wood and one with stone. I didn’t find a difference.
I’d love to see more meaning to what I unlock. Granted, stone can’t burn down.
So, if you have any raids with flamethrower or fire enemies, your base isn’t in
danger. But what’s the difference between stone and metal, then?
I honestly think that it’d be a bad idea if PocketPair only created more content
and not make the mechanics have more depth. For example, something I’d love to
see them implementing in the pal task system is a mechanic I love in Cult of the
Lamb. When you welcome a new member in your cult, you can set the main focus of
a member there. I’d love to see that you are able to set the main focus per pal.
For example, when things are damaged in the base after a raid, you select one
pal to go and get the repair kits and repair all damages first before going to
do their usual tasks. Or when you have a pal that can do multiple things, and
you mostly need that pal to pick up items, you could disable their other
abilities. Maybe we need some items for that and those items can be only found
in the wild, and we need to hunt for them. That’s an interesting idea to lure
players out of their bases.
Dreaming like a madman
There are some UI elements I’d love to see change as well. First, I’d love to
have a mini-map. The compass at the top of the screen only shows things in
roughly 300m range, and that’s too short. Especially since in some areas the
warp spots are spread quite far apart. A mini-map where you can pin certain
things like the nearest warp spot would be amazing.
Secondly, in terms of the weapons. I’d love to see their stats before I craft
them. Now it’s a guessing game that if I craft a certain weapon, if it’s going
to be stronger or better than the one I currently have. It’d also be amazing if
the durability is shown outside the inventory as well. There is some space in
the UI element at the bottom right, so why not show it?
Now, in terms of the inventory. Sometimes I have issues with combining stacks of
items. Sometimes I have to do it twice or thrice before they are combined. This
is a rather small things, but outside of those… I don’t have a lot of small
quality of life things that I could recommend. Maybe that if you sleep during
the day in your bed, you can skip to night if you are hunting the nightlife
pals?
Maybe there is one quality of life feature I think would be amazing. Quite
often, when I’m hunting the stronger pals, I have my pal instructions set on
“Focus on the same enemy”. I think it would have an amazing option if you have a
feature where you are able to say to your pal if they are allowed to kill the
wild pal or not. Since, if they are dead, you can’t capture them.
There is one attack that is a double-edged sword. In the Pokémon games, you have
the self-destruct attack. You also have this one in Palworld, yet, some wild
pals with this attack always take it over their other attacks. These bee pals
always swarm me and instead of being able to weaken them, so I can catch them, I
just get blown up. You barely have a chance to do any damage to weaken them to
make capturing possible.
I just remembered one other quality of life feature. You can create saddles,
gloves and other things to do special things with your pals. But, why I am
allowed to create more than one? I mean, I can only use one of them at a time
and they can be interchanged. So, if you make a saddle for a certain bird pal
e.g. Helzephyr, that means you can use it on all Helzephyrs you catch.
But the biggest quality of life feature PocketPair could add is a mini-map
inside caves/dungeons. The times I almost got lost in these caves is insane.
Especially since there are only a handful of rooms in these and it’s easy to get
turned around and confused.
Now, to completely change the subject… I wish there was more music in the game.
The soundtrack in this game is amazing. Sadly, there isn’t enough in the game at
the moment, so there are some silent moments. A little bit more ambient tracks
would go a really long way in this game.
But, I saved one of my biggest things for last. That is inventory management.
This is a total pain in bases. Since pals can put things inside chests, you can
forget organisation. Thankfully, while crafting, the game pulls from all
resources in your base, but if you need a certain item to use at another base,
have fun to go searching through all your chests. What I usually do, if I can,
is start crafting an item with the one I want to move and then cancel it. Since
it drops the resources then and there. Now, how to solve this without breaking
the game and the idea that pals can put things in chests? What if you have a new
skill that pals can have? An organisation skill and depending on the level, they
either put red things with red things or make a weapons chest and come to
complain to you when there aren’t enough chests for their organisation?
If your base is fully set up, the proper of a lack of depth starts to show as
well. When you build your base, why should you return to it besides needing to
craft or repair your weapons? Give us some activities we can do in our base when
we build them. I mean come on, we even have the amusement furniture set. If only
we could play some mini-games with our pals to increase their sanity for
example? Since currently, there is not a lot you can do when a pal is stressed.
Of course, a certain balance needs to be maintained. The more things a pal can
interact with, the more chance you have to create lag or overwhelm the player.
Also, the more depth you create, the more things you have to maintain and maybe
that’s not the type of game that PocketPair wants to create. How I currently see
Palworld is a playground sandbox in the schoolyard. It’s an amazing playground
where you can make your own fun but it’s only part of the schoolyard and only
has a swing, some monkey bars, a climb rack, a small castle and a slide. It’s
all solid built and amazing to spend your time in… But, then you notice the
potential this sandbox has to grow. What if we enlarged that sandbox with
another castle, so the multiplayer can be player vs player as well? Or wait, why
don’t we add an underground to that sandbox?
All I’m saying is that currently Palworld has an amazing foundation. The biggest
issue at the moment is that the game lacks depth. While the current roadmap has
a lot of expansions and more content, I hope PocketPair doesn’t forget to also
make it more than just surface level. For example, imagne that the raid bosses
can be captured and barely have an unique skills. Why should the player do the
raids then? What reward do you get out of it? Not all mechanics can be fun
because they are enjoyable to do. Players will get bored and they will look for
a way to spice things up or to challenge themselves.
Now what that said, I’m going to close off this article. I’m quite excited for
the future of Palworld and I’m going to wait a few more updates before I decide
to write a review on the game. But overall, I’m really liking what I see. The
basis of an amazing title is here already and I think we are going to get an
even better game when this comes out of early access. Let’s wait and see what
happens when the first big updates drop. Especially the raid bosses that got
teased a few weeks ago.
Thank you so much for reading this article and I hope you enjoyed reading it as
much as I enjoyed writing it. What do you think of PalWorld and what should be
added or changed? Let me know in the comment section down below. Also, what do
you think of my idea’s? I’m curious, feel free to leave a comment about that one
to. But, I also hope to welcome you in another article but until then, have a
great rest of your day and take care.
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Posted on April 3, 2024 by NekoJonezPosted in First Impression, Gamer's
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FIRST IMPRESSION: ANOTHER CODE: RECOLLECTION (SWITCH) ~ THE REMEMBERING OF
A REMAKE
Nintendo.co.uk microsite – Wikipedia page
Next year, I’ll be blogging for 15 years. I have taken a look at quite a lot of
games. Now, if you go back to the start of this blog, you might notice that I
only started in May 2013. The three years before that, I wrote a personal life
blog in my native language. I have since deleted that for personal reasons and
started blogging in English in 2013. On my Dutch blog, I wrote an article about
Another Code – Two Memories, but I haven’t written one for my English blog. Yet,
I have mentioned it in 2014 in a top 25 list of my favorite DS games of all
time. I have written an article on the Wii sequel called Another Code: R – A
Journey Into Lost Memories in 2013. While my old articles aren’t up to my
personal standards anymore, I still leave them up to see the growth I have gone
through over the years. Now, these two titles became classics in my eyes. When
Cing went under, I didn’t hold up hope of these games ever seeing a sequel or a
remake. But, we got a big surprise this year. Suddenly, both games were coming
to the Nintendo Switch and not only that, they were remade from the ground up.
Did these two games grow like I did in my writing, or is it something that
should be better left to the past? Well, that’s what I’m going to discover with
you in this article. Feel free to leave a comment in the comment section with
your thoughts and/or opinions on the game and/or the content of the article, but
now, let’s dive right in.
Editorial note: shameless self-promotion: if you want to see me and my buddy
Klamath playing through this title… We started streaming it. So, more opinions
can be found in the streams. Here is a link to the playlist.
The Remembering Of A Remake
In this game, we follow the adventures of Ashley Mizuki Robins. In the first
part of the game, Ashley got a letter from her presumed dead father to come to
Blood Edward island to meet him on the day right before her 14th birthday. On
that journey, she meets a ghost named D, who has lost his memories.
In the second part of the game, we fast-forward two years. Ashley takes a
camping trip to a lake. When she arrives at lake Juliet, she gets flashbacks
from when she was very little. Not only that, she meets a young boy whose father
wanted to build a holiday resort at that lake but was blamed for the pollution
of the lake.
Since this game is a point-and-click game and is quite story depended, I’m not
going to talk more about the story than the two small blurbs above. In terms of
the story, this game tells a very heartfelt story with very nice life lessons.
The writing in this game is extremely well done. The build up towards the ending
of the story is very natural and stays true to the themes of the game. The
biggest theme in this game is memories and history. Overall, this game is quite
relaxing, and the story is never really in a rush to move forward.
New in this version is that there is voice acting. While not the whole game is
voice acted, most of it is and the non voice acted scenes have little grunts and
vocalizations to indicate the emotions of what’s being told. I have to say that
the voice acting in this game is fantastic. I wish the voice actors of this game
had more of an online presence, since I had a hard time finding other works by
these voice actors. The fact that these voice actors didn’t really promote that
they worked on this game on their socials is a shame.
The voice acting in this game brings so much charm to the game. For this
article, I replayed parts of the original DS and Wii game and I kept hearing
those characters talk in the voice of the remakes. They fit the characters like
a glove, which is a hard thing to do since when you have voiceless characters…
Everybody has their voice in their head, and that doesn’t always match up with
the official voice acting.
Now, in terms of differences between the original games and this remake… There
are quite a lot of things. On the Cing wiki, there is a long list of changes.
But I would highly advise you don’t read that before you finished the game.
Since, it contains a lot of spoilers. I can say this without spoiling anything.
The list of changes on the game article page has no real spoilers. If you
haven’t played the originals, you won’t really notice a lot of the changes.
Especially because most of the changes are done to improve the flow of the game
and the story. Other changes have been done because some puzzles used the
special features of the Nintendo DS or the Nintendo Wii in unique ways.
Arc System Works worked together with several members of the original
development team, and I have to say that it really feels like this is the
definitive way to experience these stories. Both stories now flow into each
other, and it feels more like one big story. If you didn’t know better, you
could think it’s just one huge game with those major chapters. They have done an
amazing job of translating the story into a modern area without destroying the
original messages and atmosphere of the story.
Fuzzy memories make imperfections
In terms of visuals, this game goes for a cel shaded look. This makes the remake
of the original DS game look more in line with the Wii title. In the original DS
game, the game was played as a top-down puzzle game, with some moments you could
see a 2D scene that you could explore.
Visually, this game is quite detailed and looks amazing. Yet, I have noticed
some rough models here and there. A book here, a window there. Some of them
really stick out like a sore thumb. Now, I might be very critical on these
things since I review games as a hobby. But let me tell you this as well.
Overall, this game looks amazing. Timeless even. There are only a handful of
objects that could use some touching up.
I have the same opinion on the animations. Overall, the animations are
fantastic. Seeing the first game in 3D was breathtaking. It brought the game to
life in such a different way, and I’m all for it. There were a few stiff
animations, but if you aren’t looking for them, I can guarantee you that you
won’t notice most of them. I especially love the comic book style cutscenes
where the characters speaking go inside their own square next to each other. The
animations in these cutscenes add some charm to this game, it makes the more
relaxing nature of this game shine even brighter.
The controls of this game are excellent. Sometimes the motion control puzzles
are a little bit wonky, but overall they work perfectly. The only thing I really
don’t like is how, by the press of a button, you can see the orientation of
Ashley. Now, what do I dislike about this? Well, it has a sort of build in
walkthrough attached to it. This is something that’s too easily accessible, and
I have pressed the button too many times.
Something I’m mixed about is how the additional lore spots are now somewhat
easier to find. In the original DS game, you could find special cartridges with
additional story lore on them. In this game, the hiding spot is located on your
map. So, if you have missed one, you can quickly see on your map in which room
you need to look. Now, some of them are hidden in very tricky places. During the
stream, I have seen Klamath walk past two of them several times. If you want all
the additional lore, you will have to keep your eyes peeled.
If you have played any point-and-click adventure game, you’ll know what to
expect here. Personally, I compare this game quite a lot to Broken Sword 3, but
without the platforming. You can explore the environment, and you have to solve
various puzzles. Something unique is that you can also take pictures. And let me
tell you, keep every mechanic the game teaches you in mind. The fact you can
take pictures is something that is going to be quite helpful during the solving
of the puzzles.
The only complaint I have is that solving some puzzles have a bit too much menu
work involved. I especially remember one puzzle in the first part of the game
where you have to weigh coins. Instead of them being all five on the table, you
have to take them from your inventory each and every time. And the annoying part
is that the last two you used, move to the last spot in your inventory. There
are a handful of puzzles where some quality of life improvements would be very
welcome.
Relaxing with puzzles
There are some amazing new features in this game as well. One of my favorite
things is that you can access a big board where all the relationships between
the characters are mapped out. Not only that, when you open the profile, you can
read a small note about them. If you click on Ashley’s profile, you will read a
small hint on what to do next. So, if you put this game down for a while, you
can catch yourself up quite quickly.
Also, something I adore is the attention to detail in this game. For example, in
one of the puzzles, Ashley digs into a building blocks box. After she found what
she was looking for, you will notice a small building she built next to the box
with the blocks she took out. There are various other moments like this, and it
adds to the charm and realism of this game quite a lot.
The more relaxing nature of this game not only comes through the visuals and
gameplay, but also through the music. The music in this game is a rather calming
and relaxing soundtrack. The main motive is piano through the whole soundtrack.
Other major instruments are violin and acoustic guitar. The soundtracks fit this
game like a glove. Now, it is tense when it needs to be, but it never steps out
of its lane. It keeps being that relaxing soundtracks that brings this game more
to life, and I have no complaints about it.
The biggest strength of this game is the charm of it all. The writing, the
music, the sound effects, the puzzles… It all flows together so well. While the
game is only roughly 15 hours long, if you know what you are doing, it’s a very
enjoyable time to play through. In this remake, the game also auto saves now but
outside of cutscenes, you can save at any time in 15 different save slots.
Currently, I’m over midway in the second part of the game and I have been
enjoying it quite a lot. While the game has it’s minor shortcomings like some
rough object models and some annoying menu’ing during puzzles… I’m falling in
love with these titles all over again. If you would ask me if the remakes or the
originals are better, I’d have to say both. Both versions still have their charm
but if you want to experience both these titles, I’d really advice to go for the
Switch version. Since, it brings both titles together in a lot better way.
I mostly have minor complaints about these remakes. Like how silly it is that
you can only have ten pictures saved and deleting them is a bit too fincky. But
overall, the issues I have with this game are mostly minor. Maybe a bit more
time in the oven or a polishing patch will bring this game to perfection.
A lot of other reviewers are giving this game lower marks since it’s slower
paced or it’s a remake of a rather obscure duology. I personally disagree with
these lower scores. These two games deserve another chance in the lime light
since they are quite amazing games. I personally don’t mind the slower paced
gameplay, since it’s refreshing to be able to wind down with a slower game. On
top of that, if you look at the care the developers put into remaking this game
and bringing it to modern audiences while not chaging too much to alienate fans
of the original is such a fine line to walk on… And they never fell off that
line in my opinion.
I can totally understand that this game isn’t everybody’s cup of tea. But, the
complaints that this game is linear and doesn’t have a lot of replay value, I
find ridiculous. I mean, does every game need to have a lot of replay value and
let you explore a wide open world? No, it’s okay to play a game where you need
to go from point A to B. It’s okay that the story looses some of it’s charm
because you know how it’s going to end. It’s how that experience impacts you,
that’s what matters.
The reason why I’m so happy to see remakes of these DS and Wii titles is because
we now have remakes of amazing titles like this one and Ghost Trick for example.
Now, because these two games have been remade, I’m holding out hope that Cing’s
other titles like the amazing Hotel Dusk and it’s sequels are being remade as
well. And if they are, I hope the same team is working on them since the love
and care they placed into remaking these two titles is amazing.
I remember Klamath’s reaction when I suggested this game for streaming. He was
worried that it was going to have low numbers and not a lot of interest. But,
after our first stream, he started calling this game a hidden gem. I mean, if
this game can have that kind of an impact on somebody who loves point-and-click
games and the fact that we had a very high number of viewers watching our
streams, it must mean something.
This game has a lot of impact and I hope that others who enjoy puzzle, adventure
and/or point-and-click games give this game a chance. It’s something different
especially since it’s slower paced but if you let it take you by the hand and if
you walk along the journey, you won’t regret the powerful journey you are going
on. It’s a journey that will stick with you and sometimes a memory will pop back
into your head. You’ll remember the fun and relaxing times you had with this
game. While the game isn’t perfect, the positives far outweigh the negatives and
it’s one of those games where going along with the ride is the most important.
Since, the ride of this game is one of the best point-and-click games I have
ever played.
And with that said, I have said everything I wanted to say about this game for
now. I want to thank you so much for reading this article and I hope you enjoyed
reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it. I’m curious to hear what you thought
about this game and/or the content of this article. So, feel free to leave a
comment in the comment section down below. I also hope to welcome you in another
article, but until then have a great rest of your day and take care.
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Posted on March 10, 2024 by NekoJonezPosted in First ImpressionTagged 001, Aiko
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FIRST IMPRESSION: SPIRIT HUNTER VOLUME 3 – DEATH MARK II (SWITCH) ~ GHOST AND
GHOULS IN SCHOOL
Nintendo.co.uk microsite – Wikipedia – Death Mark Wiki
It’s finally here! The 3rd game in the Spirit Hunter series. If you have read my
blog in the past, you might know I have been waiting for this game since the
studio launched the crowdfunding campaign for this game. Back in 2019, this game
got successfully crowdfunded. The game came out in Japan in December 2022. The
English version was going to come out in October of last year. But, it got
pushed to this year, and we saw a release on the February 15th, 2024. While a
lot of other amazing games have come out this month, I have been mostly playing
this game. Does it live up to my expectations, or did it ruin the series for me?
In this article, I want to talk about my honest opinion on the game, while I
invite you to leave a comment in the comment section down below with your
thoughts and/or opinions on the game and/or the content of this article. So,
it’s time to dive right into this new volume in the Spirit Hunter series.
Editorial note: to avoid spoilers, the screenshots will only be of the first
chapter of the game.
Ghost and Ghouls in School
Unlike the previous volume, NG, we don’t play with as a totally new character.
As the name implies, we continue the story of the first volume, Death Mark. If
you are afraid that you need to play Death Mark again to understand the story in
this game, don’t worry.
The game explains who the returning characters are, and the game doesn’t spoil
what happened to them in the previous game at all. Some characters hint at their
chapter in Death Mark, but not outright spoil it. The way how this is handled in
this game is impressive. This way, you can play the games out of order without
getting a lot, if any, spoilers on the previous titles.
While you can jump into this game without playing the previous games, it’s quite
helpful if you have played the previous titles. The references won’t fly over
your head, and it makes the writing that more enjoyable. In this game, you take
on the role of Kazuo Yashiki, the protagonist of the first game. A few months
after Death Mark, he gets called by the headmaster of Konoehara Academy since
there are rumors of a spirit haunting the school. This spirit called “the
Departed” is posting disturbing notices of killing a student at night. The
investigation is started after the first student has disappeared, and the second
notice has been found.
Compared to the two previous games, there is some more voice acting in this
game. While not everything is voice acted, it’s more than the previous two
titles. It’s not fully voice acted like Corpse Party, but the voice acting
mostly happens when a character gets introduced or at very special moments. The
voice acting in this game is quite well done, and I only wish there is more in
the next games. Since, I honestly think that the voice actors really nailed the
personalities of their characters and might make the game even better.
To really avoid spoilers, I’m not going to talk too in depth about the story in
this game. But what I can say is that overall, the story follows the structure
of NG quite a lot. I haven’t finished the game yet, but so far I have been
enjoying the story. Surprisingly, this game is twice as long as Death Mark. If
you know what you are doing, you can beat Death Mark in, give or take 11 hours.
NG can be beaten in, give or take 16 hours. According to howlongtobeat.com, this
game is 25 hours long.
Now, this game doesn’t feel like it’s taking 25 hours to complete to me. While
I’m playing on my Nintendo Switch, where you can’t really see your playtime very
well, I did write my playtime down for a while and honestly, I can totally
believe this game can take you between 20 and 25 hours to beat. The story flows
so well, that you get the impression it’s shorter. I think that mostly has to do
with the lack of padding there is in this game. This game doesn’t waste your
time and gets right into the meat of the game. This game takes you on a journey
and doesn’t let go. It tries to keep you on the edge of your seat to see what’s
going next, and it succeeds in that for the most part. But for a horror game
like this, this breakneck pace is a knife that can cut both ways.
Tamer Ghosts
In some ways, this game is a lot tamer compared to the previous two titles. All
the chapters in this game involve the student body of the academy in someway or
another.
I can’t really put my finger on why, but I found this game less scary than the
two previous titles. This game has its scary moments, but it’s a lot tamer in
its scares.
Maybe the rather fast-paced flow of the game isn’t doing it any favors. There is
not a lot of time for the actual scares to sink in and grab you by surprise.
Thinking about it, padding is quite essential in horror games. Since it gives
you the time to let it all sink in. The strongest moments of horror in this game
are the cutscenes before the final spirit battle at the end of a chapter. The
small cutscene of the spirit entering the room is something I want to see more
of.
Another thing that isn’t doing this game any favors is how lame the actual
jumpscares are in this game. In the original Death Mark, we had some very
creative jumpscares and a lot of them fit the context of the story extremely
well. Now, NG had a few cheap and easy jumpscares. But, it dared to even insert
jumpscares and creepy moments in the pause menu. Now, I can totally understand
people not liking jumpscares and I really like how you have an option to disable
them in the options’ menu in this game. I left them enabled to see where the
creative jumpscares are in this game.
I was extremely disappointed. Every jumpscare in this game is during scene
transitions. And not only that, if you play on a controller, your controller
rumbles several frames before. The tutorial actually tells you that it’s a
feature so you can brave yourself. This is an extremely stupid mechanic and is a
step back from the previous two games. Currently, I’m midway in the game and I
have only seen a maximum of four jumpscares. And I can only remember 1, while I
can remember several from Death Mark and NG. This way I’m less on edge and the
actual scares have less of an impact on me.
It was really promising in the first chapter, where you get introduced to
special events that can actually drain your soul (health) if you make a mistake
in your investigation. The potential to make you think twice before you
investigate something would make a player very nervous. Are you sure this is the
right path forward, or will it lead to loss of your soul? Especially since a
spirit interaction can happen at any moment, and you need your soul power to be
as high as possible for that. I’ll talk about that more later.
Yet, this mechanic is extremely underused. After its introduction, it’s barely
used at all. Apart from some forced moments, I have barely seen any of them. If
we ever get a volume 4 in this series, this is a mechanic they surely need to
develop further. Also, the penalty for these moments is way too weak.
Especially, you have a button to quickly travel back to the save room to fill
your health to the maximum.
Something else that makes this game tamer is the fact that it blocks off some
exploration. There were several times when you were stopped from exploring the
hallways of the academy because you get tunneled to the right location to
investigate next.
I honestly felt that after chapter 2, this game got a lot tamer and the scares
in this game are somewhat underused. It’s a shame since there are a lot of
improvements in this title that will take the series forwards. A perfect example
is when you select a wrong choice, you don’t have to replay the whole
interaction anymore. You start right back at the start of the act with the loss
of some soul.
Also, you don’t have to pick the right character anymore while facing the
spirit. Since, you can actually choose the standby characters during your
suspension acts and spirit fights. Granted, this takes away from the puzzle
elements in this game, but it fixes that you have to go back to the save room to
change character and go back to face the spirit. It saves a lot of hassle with
juggling saves.
More game this time
There is a lot more game in this volume compare to the two previous games.
First, the exploration is extremely different. This time, you don’t go from room
to room or from scene to scene. You can actually walk around with your
character. There are some moments where you explore a room, and it goes back to
the style of the two previous games. And I love it. The controls are extremely
responsive and easy to understand. The only issue I had is that the skip button
sometimes didn’t work after the first press. But it’s something that didn’t
really bother me that much.
Another major improvement and gameplay element in this game is how there are
collectables in this game. Yes, in each chapter there are various teeth of lost
souls you can find. These have two benefits for you to find them. The first is
that when you collect enough of them, you can actually level up and increase
your amount of soul power you have. Let me tell you, this comes in extremely
handy since some fights can be brutal if you haven’t solved the puzzle in your
mind yet.
Another benefit of collecting these teeth is that it unlocks more information of
the characters in this game. It’s a nice addition, but not the main reason you
should collect them, since the additional information is mostly for 100%
completions and don’t really serve a gameplay mechanic beyond that.
Now, what can you do with these teeth? Well, this time the collectable is more
than meeting somebody if you collected all the “D-Man Cards” in NG. Now you can
purchase special items with them. These will help you in combat quite a lot and
are somewhat essential if you don’t want to quickly get in a game over loop. But
I’ll talk about the tense moments and spirit fights later in this article. Just
like the D-Man cards, these teeth are chapter based. So, make sure you explored
everything before you move on to the next chapter if you want to collect all the
teeth.
Now, there are also blackend tooths that can appear. These curse a whole area
and drain your soul power while you are in that area. You can’t leave that area
before you have found and destroyed the blackend tooth. This is an amazing
mechanic I would love to see happen more in the series. I would also love to see
it being more creative, since after you found them, the puzzle is solved. I
would love to see in a sequel that you have to use a certain item or interact
with it in a certain way to destroy it.
The stats system comes more into play this time around. There are several
puzzles where you need to have a certain character with you to solve. And it’s
made even easier, since you can quickly see the stats of the other characters in
the chapter from the pause screen. While it’s sadly underimplemented, it’s a
step in the right direction and I would love to see more.
The tense moments like the Live or Die from the original return as Suspensive
Acts in this game. Instead of your soul power being a countdown clock, you now
how two things to worry about. The first thing is that you have soul power. Each
action costs a certain amount of soul power. Not only that, each action has a
chance to succeed or fail. If it fails, the next time you preform that action,
the success chance increases by quite a lot. Also, a wrong action can give you a
big penalty to your soul power.
While I can totally understand that this new system isn’t going to click with
everybody, I honestly think it’s perfect. The only thing I dislike is that the
options are a bit too limited. If you spend your time collecting the teeth and
buying the items, the amount of choices you can pick from makes the spirit
fights a lot easier. So, it’s a balancing act. How difficult or easy do you want
to make it for yourself?
The biggest issue people have with this new system is that it’s based on RNG. I
can totally understand that from a gameplay point of view, but it actually helps
to make this game even more scary. Since, actions can fail and not everything
can happen perfectly from the first time.
On top of that, this game has several endings. Like the previous titles, it
depends on how good you purify each spirit. This time, you get even more tested
upon how well you understand the spirit you faced. This time you don’t destroy
or purify the spirit during the fight, you actually have to do one more
interaction and depending on that, you get towards a certain ending. Honestly, I
can’t really choose which system I like more. At one hand, now you are tested if
you understand the grude of the spirit, but on the other hand… Now, you don’t
have two ways to finish the spirit fight and you having to figure out if you did
it right. Both systems are quite enjoyable and maybe in a sequel I would love to
see both appear.
Visually, this game is really amazing. The game has a very similar style
compared to the two previous games and the art this time around is amazing.
Several times I was looking in awe at my screen at the spirit designs. Apart
from the spirit entering the room, there are no real cutscenes in this game. A
lot is done by big 2D drawings with the text describing what’s happening. To
avoid me talking in circles, I’ll just say that the visual style of this game
didn’t dissapoint. You can even choose between two outfits for the main
character.
I really want to talk more indepth about the visuals and describe them more, but
I’m not going to do that to avoid spoilers in this article. But let me tell you,
this game has amazing design. You’ll get the most out of the visuals and the
scares when you are playing this game not too far from the screen. There are
some details on the spirits you can miss if you are setting too far from the
screen. The first time I encountered the Departed, I didn’t notice some details
since I was playing on my big TV and I set three meters away from that. But, the
second meeting was while I was playing on the train to work. That time those
details caught me off guard and I actually jumped a bit.
In terms of the audiovisual design, this game is pretty good as well. The sound
effects in this game are pretty good. Some of them are re-used from the previous
games but why change a winning formula? But the music is something that’s
extremely well done. I already added the soundtrack to my playlist, I love it
that much. The music is hitting the same atmosphere compared to the two previous
games but it’s also standing loud and proud on it’s own two feet.
Now, there isn’t an autosave in this game just yet. So, don’t forget to save
every so often. This time around we got 99 save slots. While the actual save
file only tell you if you are at the start, middle or end of a chapter… We do
have a lot more save slots now.
Also, we have a gallery in the main menu where you can see the different
artwork, character profiles, play through the sound track and also watch the
spirit introductions. You can even choose which partner is with you without
having to replay that chapter. And there is also an “extra menu” that will
unlock when you have beaten the game… What will that be… I’ll find out soon.
So far, I have been enjoying this game quite a lot. This game changes the
formula of the previous two volumes quite a lot and makes it more like a scary
game than a scary visual novel with some interactive elements. The biggest
complaint I have with this game is that there are a lot of things very
undercooked. Some mechanics are barely used or don’t have a lot of gameplay to
them like the blackend teeth or some just fall flat on their face like the
jumpscares.
But, I’m really loving what I see in terms of evolution through the series. I
really think there is a lot of potential to make more volumes in the series. If
this game was meant to test the waters with the new mechanics, then I have to
say that is was extremely successful. I can’t wait to beat this game and see how
the story will end. Now that there is more gameplay in this game, I even dare to
say that this game might interest people who enjoy playing adventure games as
well. The negative/weaker parts of the game don’t outweigh the positive and good
parts of this game in my honest opinion. There is a lot of potential for growth.
I look at it that way. And what we got is an amazing foundation, especially
since there aren’t really any mechanics or things that don’t work. It’s just
that they lack some depth.
Now, if you are a fan of the previous two titles, Death Mark II knockes it out
of the park and then some. If you have never played any Spirit Hunter game, this
game comes highly recommened if you enjoy horror and/or adventure games. Don’t
let this series be a hidden gem and give it a shot. To me, this game was totally
worth the wait. And honestly, I’m actually crossing my fingers for Spirit Hunter
volume 4. Since if they can do this with the series, oh boy… Can’t wait to see
where they go next.
And with that, I have said everything I wanted to say about this game for now. I
hope you enjoyed reading this article as much as I enjoyed writing it. I hope to
be able to welcome you in another article, but until then… Have a great rest of
your day and take care.
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Posted on February 24, 2024 by NekoJonezPosted in First ImpressionTagged 001, 3,
5, Aksys, arpegi, Ataka, buttonsmashers, death, departed, different, ending,
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Chikami, happenings, hidden, horror, hunter, II, in, inc, jea, Jonez, jonez001,
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spirit, spoiler, spoilers, switch, three, unity, Video Games, volume. Leave a
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FIRST IMPRESSION: TINY TINA’S WONDERLANDS (PC – STEAM) ~ ROLE PLAYING WITH GUNS
Official microsite – Steam page – Wikipedia
Something that is on my bucket list for a while now, is playing a round of
Dungeons and Dragons. Currently, I haven’t made the time to actually do it. But,
when I saw that there was a shooter with a lot of dungeon and dragons elements,
I got quite interested. I mean, I love unique shooters, so I gave it a shot. I
didn’t know that this game was a spin-off of the Borderlands series, another
series that is on my bucket list but… you guessed it, I haven’t played yet. But,
is this game any good? I mean, I placed it on the 9th spot of best game I played
in 2023, so you would think it’s good. But perhaps it’s a “me thing” and if I
look with a critical eye, this game might be full of flaws. There is only one
way to find that out, and that’s taking a good look at it, while I invite you to
leave a comment in the comment section with your thoughts and/or opinions on the
game and/or the content of the article in the comment section down below.
Role playing with guns
In this game, we play as a new character joining a group of D&D players who are
about to wrap up a game. At the start of the game, you can customize your
character. The amount of customization options you get are quite overwhelming.
The amount of control you have in this game to fine tune your character is
possibly a game in itself. Now, it’s a shame you don’t see your character
yourself outside the pause menu or some cutscenes.
The pacing of this game fully depends on if you do any side quests or just want
to explore the world. Overall, the writing of this game is charming. It doesn’t
take itself too seriously, and you really feel that the main characters are a
group of friends who welcome a new player into their world. During the game, the
personalities of the characters really shine through in the world building and
through the voice acting.
We get quite the diverse cast of voice actors lending their voice to this game.
I have to say, they did an amazing job bringing this world to life. The
personality and the emotions of the characters really shine through, giving this
game even more of a Saturday morning cartoon vibe. While the story is
predictable and silly sometimes, it’s written in such a way that you always want
to know what’s going to happen next or how they are going to resolve the current
crisis.
The silly puns of the enemies, the charming world, the over the top writing…
It’s like I said earlier, this game’s story feels like you are watching a
Saturday morning cartoon. There are also various different builds you make, so I
think that the replay value of this game is going to be quite high. It wouldn’t
surprise me that all the different builds play quite different from each other.
Now there is a whole multiplayer section to this game. Personally, I don’t play
a lot of multiplayers. So, I’m not going to talk about it in this article. But,
it sounds interesting. I wonder how they balanced this game, since overall this
game feels a bit easy to me. Maybe I got quite used to keep moving and
prioritizing enemies after playing games like Metal: HellSigner and Doom
Eternal. But, if you balance your weapons and equipment to your playstyle, this
game isn’t too much of a problem on normal difficulty.
On the fly polish
Visually, this game goes for the Borderlands style. This game uses a lot of
shell shading and comic book style to present their world. It has quite
realistic environments, but I do have some complaints.
The first complaint is that after fast traveling or traveling between zones, the
game took quite some time to load in the high resolution textures. If I compare
my computer specs to the recommended specs for this game, I shouldn’t have any
problem. Thankfully, this is something that quickly fixes itself. After max 5
seconds in an area, the whole area loads.
The second complaint I have about the visuals is that in some houses, their
front door is open. Yet, it’s a complete black hole with an invisible wall. You
can’t even enter the houses. I can totally understand that modeling a lot of
houses and balancing the loot and such inside of them is a lot of work, but this
is just bad. It feels unfinished. You would think that there is only one of
these houses like this, but oh no. There are several. Even some side quests have
an NPC exit a house and, behind the front door, it goes completely black. Why?
But my biggest complaint is how quest markers aren’t visible enough on the mini
map. In the screenshot I placed a bit higher, you can see that small blue marker
above my ammo count in the right corner. Guess what, that’s a main quest marker.
Now, you also notice that same marker on the mini map on the top right. But, if
the area isn’t on your mini map, you don’t see it. You don’t get a hint in which
direction you should go. So, we start playing a game where we have to open the
pause menu to look at the map.
Overall, this game looks and runs amazingly fine. Just like the options to
create your character, there are a lot of options you can tweak to your liking.
There is even in a built-in benchmarking feature. I raised every setting to the
highest it can go, and let me tell you, the game looks amazing. The vibrant
colors and the smooth animations of this game are really great. Apart from the
complaints I talked about above this paragraph, I don’t have anything really
that I didn’t like about the visual presentation.
Now, let’s talk about the gameplay. In this game, you go from area to arena to
finish battle arena’s. Honestly, I call it Doom in a Medieval fantasy setting.
That’s one of the core gameplay loops in this game. Now, this loop has one
negative, the risk of the game becoming repetitive. Let me tell you, this game
can be quite repetitive. Outside the battles, there isn’t a lot to do in this
game, and the fact that the enemies respawn in certain area’s for you to grind
isn’t doing the game any favors.
Now, you also have the overworld sections of this game. This is nothing more
than a fancy level select. Now, you do have these wild Pokémon encounters… Well,
I call them Pokémon encounters because they spawn randomly, and you go into a
small arena to battle for weapons amongst other things. The biggest difference
is that you can’t really run from these battles and don’t really have a clear
indication on how many enemies are left in the encounter. Apart from that, you
have some minor environment puzzles where you have to go through a dungeon to
get a key to open a gate, or a cheese chip. Yeah, a cheese chip.
Overwhelming
Now, there is a lot that this game does right. The amusing story, the amount of
depth are just two examples. Visually, this game is also quite good.
Now, something I don’t really like is how many stats there are in this game. It
didn’t take very long before my inventory was filled with various items like
weapons and armor that I didn’t know what to do with. Also, the amount of ammo
creates in the area is just too much. I rarely ran out of ammo. To a point that
I that the ammo that the enemies dropped fill the floor.
You also have a helpful dragon that attacks enemies for you on the battlefield
and saved my skin several times. You have a whole tree to upgrade your
companion. And on top of that, you also have a melee attack you can preform.
But, that melee attack is quite risky, since the animation takes quite some
time… more than enough time for the enemies to gang up on you and do some
serious damage.
The game feels a bit overwhelming sometimes. Especially for loot goblins like
myself, who don’t throw any loot away and think that we can use them to craft or
upgrade them for stronger ones. And this game is also hell for somebody who
wants to open all chests in this game, since your inventory is anything but big
enough to hold all that loot.
You’ll need to make decisions and adapt to the environment. Thankfully, we can
run around the environment with responsive and easy to learn controls. I only
have two complaints about the controls. The first one is that in certain menu’s
like the blacksmith menu, the way to move left/right/up and down isn’t changed
with the controls in the options’ menu. That menu uses WSAD to move, and I use
an AZERTY keyboard here in Belgium… So, I have to set my fingers quite unnatural
to move in that menu.
The other complaint I have about the controls is that you need to hold some keys
to preform an action. In general, this isn’t a bad thing, since now we don’t
have to deal with silly “are you sure” boxes. But, if your inventory is full,
and you are fighting, and you are standing on top of some junk… the pickup key
turns into an equip key. Sadly, the communication to the player that your
inventory is full isn’t strong enough and I equipped weaker weapons and armor so
many times. Just pay attention to that.
This brings me to the music and sound effects for this game. The sound effects
in this game are overall very impactful. You really feel the impact of the guns
you shoot and projectiles hitting you. I don’t have any complaints about that
part, apart from sometimes not having a clear enough sound effect when you pick
up health or when your inventory is full. I mostly had this problem in hectic
battle situations. Thankfully, the visual effects sometimes helped to solve
this.
The music in this game is amazing. I didn’t hesitate to buy the soundtrack of
this game to add to my playlist. It’s very bombastic and orchestral. It’s loud
and proud. Furthermore, it fits the game writing like a glove. I tried to play
this game without music and the impact of some scenes really was lost. The
battles also became a bit boring.
While, I’m currently midway into the main campaign and I haven’t touched any of
the DLC’s yet… I’m quite enjoying myself with this game. This game isn’t
perfect, it has some flaws. But, the positives far outweigh the negatives in my
opinion. I actually had a hard time finishing this article because I kept
playing this game while taking notes to finish this article. While I said that
the gameplay loop might be somewhat repetitive earlier in this article, I still
enjoy it. I also enjoy that you can get a second chance in a battle and revive
yourself. The frequent saving in this game and the fact you can have multiple
characters in this game is another cherry on this cake.
Personally, I recommend this game to everybody who enjoys playing shooter games
and don’t mind having a bit of fantasy in their shooters. It’s an unique RPG
where your main weapon isn’t a sword but it’s a gun. It’s a great game and if
this is what the Borderlands series is about, I’m quite interested to give the
whole series a chance. If I would give this game a score, I would give it a
70/100 for now. But, I haven’t finished the game, so I’ll leave my final score
up for when I write a review of this game or fully finished it.
And with that said, I have said everything I wanted to say about this game for
now. I want to thank you for reading this article. I hope you enjoyed reading it
as much as I enjoyed writing it. I hope to welcome you in another one, but until
then have a great rest of your day and take care.
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Posted on February 4, 2024 by NekoJonezPosted in First ImpressionTagged 001, 2K,
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SPEEDRUNNING INDIANA JONES AND THE INFERNAL MACHINE GBC – LEVEL 5 –
SHAMBALA SANCTUARY
Level 3+4 speedrun article
While my focus has shifted away a bit from speedrunning, I still sometimes try
to beat the records for the Game Boy Color version of Indiana Jones and the
Infernal Machine. Now, since we got a new game announced, called Indiana Jones
and the Great Circle… I honestly think it’s a great moment to continue that
series on my blog, where I explain the starts and fastest ways according to me
to beat the game. I want to say as a disclaimer that I’m talking about the
current level speedrun records. The_Kovic made an awesome TAS of this game, I
mainly want to talk about the current human speedrun. So, let’s dive right into
it. Feel free to leave your questions, comments and/or thoughts on this article
in the comment section down below.
Current records
One term I’ll explain is something I talked about in the introduction, I talked
about “TAS of this game”. TAS stands for Tool Assisted Speedrun. This means that
it’s created using tools like save states, slowdown amongst various others.
Also, in these runs we can control the input to the frame. Basically, this means
that we get a look if the run is perfected.
Now, comparing the route of the TAS through the game and the route of the
current record, we basically don’t see a lot of differences. The biggest
difference is that the movement is a lot cleaner and a lot of extremely risky
jumps and tricks are preformed. From watching the video, the current TAS is,
give or take 7 minutes 5 seconds.
Currently, the record for Shambala is 7 minutes 51 seconds, set by myself on
December 10th 2023. I know it can go lower since I have already done it. But,
due to me messing up my OBS settings, the video is anything but watchable. I
decided to not upload the video, but I know it’s possible. Currently, my
personal best is 7 minutes 40 seconds. I’ll explain how to save time in this
article, since I even think it’s humanly possible to go even below that by a
tiny bit.
On January 22nd, 2022 I also set the current record for all treasures in this
level. The current record is 8 minutes and 57 seconds. Now, this run doesn’t use
all the most optimal jumps and tricks. This is something that can go lower. In
the guide, everything that’s in cursive is additional information for the all
treasures route.
The route
The level starts with a little dialogue box that Indy needs to hurry up because
the Soviets aren’t too far behind. In the PC version, the Soviets only turn up
after you pick up a certain key. In the Game Boy Color version, they are already
there. If you want to run this level, I highly advise you to learn where the 5
guards are in this level.
I had several runs where I lost time due to bad guard movement RNG. The first
guard is when you move up. Just run past this guard to go to the next screen.
Yet, if you are doing all treasures, the first treasure is to the left here. So,
pick that up first. Usually, I pick up that red gem while at the right most edge
of the texture and already turned to the right to run back to run up.
Keep running up towards the building, which is actually Shambala. It doesn’t
really matter where Indy stands to open the door, since the game forces you in
the middle of the entrance when you enter it. When you enter, you’ll notice a
block to the left. Don’t make the same mistake I quite often make. It’s faster
to go to the right block and move that one to the side first. So, move the block
to the side and press the button that gets revealed. Do it for the right and
left side, in that order.
After that, move upwards on the left side of this room towards two doors.
Something I do that’s different to the TAS is I press the third button before I
enter the next room. The TAS presses the button when we exit from the other
room. Personally, I think it doesn’t make a lot of difference timewise, maybe
2-3 seconds. The reason I directly go for the switch is that I don’t want to
forget to press it. The guard is usually now facing away from Indy and walking
towards the other door. The TAS route is riskier, since there is a high chance
that the guard is facing towards you when exiting the other room and can get a
few shots off. And those can be quite dangerous, since the TAS even finishes
this level with one health point left. Anyway, for the next room, you need to
take the left door.
Now, the next room has three parts to it. It also has three bricks to move,
well, depending on the route you are taking. But be careful here. There are two
guards roaming around in this room. RNG can really screw you over here depending
on how these guards move. Now, if you take the all treasures route, you have
three bricks to move. The one for the treasure is at the far left in this room.
If you are confident in your jumping, it’s possible to stand on the left most
edge of this block and jump up towards the green gem. If you aren’t, move it
once right and then jump up towards the green gem.
Now, we take the middle section. This is a little bit to the right when you
enter from the left door. You’ll see two gears moving on the wall. Move the
block over once to the left. If you stand on the right most edge and face right,
you’ll be able to land on the higher platform with the gear. Feel free to move
it closer if you don’t feel comfortable with those edge jumps.
After you picked up the gear, move towards the right most section. Now, we do
the same block pulling thing here as well. If you can, try to jump up towards
the ladder. The less climbing you do, the more time you save. Climbing is really
slow in this game. When you reach the top of the ladder, we see the first Ice
Monster of this level. Usually, moving to the top row of tiles and jumping over
it towards the door avoids damage.
Now, in the following room, we have a hallway and two higher sections. Go
towards the section on the right and move the block on the top left of the
platform once down and once to the left. Here I lost 4 seconds in my record
because of some horrible movement. The following trick might be in my head since
the TAS doesn’t do it, but I usually do it. The reason why is that it’s the most
consistent way I have to make 100% the cutscene of opening the room on the left
triggers without you having to move another block. And that’s not pulling the
top block towards the other square but pushing it. Don’t forget that on the top
right of this section there is a gold bar treasure, after pushing the block is
the perfect moment to go grab it. After you push over that block, go to the
bottom right of this section and pull the block towards the bottom square. The
reason you need to pull is that it saves time to not have to go around the block
after the cutscene. Also, practice the jump of landing in the middle of the
hallway or beyond that. You’ll need that later. Now, move to the newly opened
section and move towards the other top corner. There you’ll need to pick up a
rod. And, if you jump a bit higher, on the next tile a set of coins. After that,
leave the building. Be careful to dodge the guards and the ice enemy on your way
back. If you feel extremely risky, you can save time by jumping towards the
ladder in the ice enemy room to save time, but if you don’t grab the bottom
pixels of the ladder it’s game over.
Now outside… we move to the right of the building. Now, the fastest way to
arrange the boxes is moving the two stack once to the right and the one stack
once towards the left. Doing this jump without loosing time is extremely tricky
but would save a lot of time over pulling the blocks into the easiest
configuration. It’s a lot of edge jumps here, but I have done it and it’s
possible. So, jump up and towards the platform to pick up the blue gem. After
that…
… we go left of the building. Here I lose 2-3 seconds of time in my record
because of some bad movement and not grabbing the two stack box right away. The
easiest and fastest way to progress is pulling the two stack box one towards the
top of the screen. After that, jump on the one stack and diagonal to the right
to enter the next room. After entering the room, pick up the treasure at the
left. Do it now, otherwise the guard RNG will be hell. Now, we need to go in the
door next to the climbable wall.
From now on, the easy part of the run is over. Now come a bunch of sections that
can potentially make you lose a lot of time or just end your run outright. There
is a treasure at the bottom right of this room. Pick it up first. Now, jump over
the gap and move towards the broken tile at the top right of the room at the
gears. While facing the gears, open your inventory and pick the ratchet. You’ll
need to move to the left 4 times in your inventory and press A. This is meant to
block the bell from falling back down.
Now comes one of the first sections that can cost you a lot of time. I highly
advise you to practice this next section. Just take a look at the stream Klamath
and I did. The idea is that you jump back and forth between the two broken
tiles. The timing is extremely strict. You’ll hear a sound effect when you hit
the tile in time. When you hit the tile and don’t hear the sound effect, the
bell is going to fall down and you have to start over. So, try and try this bit
until you are good at it. After 7, yes 7, jumps back and forth, the bell reached
the correct point. Now, the camera will pull up to show the location of the
bell. Whilst it’s moving down, move towards the door at the bottom left of the
room. It’s possible to exit the room before the camera reaching the bottom.
Since I missed this once during my record, I lost 12 seconds.
After exiting the room, a guard suddenly shows up. The fewer hits this guard
does on you, the better. Yet, the space is quite tight and it’s difficult to
avoid him. Now, we need to climb up the wall. Jump towards the climbable wall
that’s closest towards the door we just entered the room from and climb up. Now,
we do something that’s unique to the Game Boy Color. Whilst climbing up, you
will have to drop towards another ladder. For the first drop, it’s fine if you
move over to the left. For the second drop, climb towards the top and let
yourself drop towards the right and hold up. It’s scary to do, but hold up
during the fall. Otherwise it’s game over for sure. After you climbed up, go to
the left and exit this room at the top left door.
Now comes to the next trick, depending on how well you execute it, you’ll save
more time. The idea is that, when you enter the room… you move towards the right
edge of the room. Run down and jump down give or take a tile before the edge.
Let yourself fall but hold up at the right time. The idea is that we grab the
long ladder a bit down there. Failing this trick is a run ender. It’s no short
ladder so be careful of dropping off this ladder. Now, after you are off the
ladder, move to the bottom left of this room and climb down. Or be even more
risky after this ladder snipe and snipe the ladder at the bottom left like the
TAS.
Now, in the next room, don’t climb the ladder down. Midway the ladder, drop down
towards the gears. You’ll notice that there is a peg sticking out of the wall.
Stand in front of that one and open your inventory to go trice to the right to
select the gear. Now, stay on the raised platform and move towards the other
side of the room. Drop down to take the silver bar and jump up towards the
raised platform. Those ice guardians are quite painful and hurt a lot. The more
damage you take, the higher the risk you’ll loose your run. Now, jump towards
the ladder from a little bit before the last tile to save the most climbing
time.
Now, the clock starts moving. Move as quick as you can towards the button and
here comes something I’m still unsure about the fastest way to go forward is. I
know you can totally skip the cutscene of the camera moving up to show the
statue turning like the_Kovic does in the TAS. Yet, in order to do this, you’ll
need to preform some tricky jumps perfectly. It does save a lot of time, yet
almost five minutes into an any % run and after preforming various edge corner
jumps, that annoying bell part… I find the TAS strategy at the moment of writing
too risky. I linked to the TAS a bit higher if you want to see how the TAS does
it, but I’ll explain how I do it. It costs 10-15 seconds, but it’s a way safer
strategy in my honest opinion. Sadly, using the glitch that Indy can move after
the button press for a little while isn’t possible, so that costs us an
additional second.
So, press the button twice and watch the cutscene of the camera moving up to
show the statue moving. While the camera is moving down, we regain control of
Indy. Depending on how confident you are with your jumps and your nerves at this
point… Press the button between 7 to 9 times. I personally prefer 9 times. It
gives you some room for error. The red brick-thing will be either at 9, 10 or
11.
Now, comes the annoying part. We need to go back up. Go towards the raised
platform you notice at the middle top of your screen and jump up and enter the
door. You’ll notice we exit at the platform at the bottom of the ladder we
sniped earlier. Climb up to the top of it. Now, if you want to be extremely
risky, you can do what’s known as a corner jump.
It’s an extremely risky jump that can save you a lot of time and is essential
when you pressed the button at the bottom 6 or 7 times. The idea is that you
jump from where the X is after you climbed up the ladder and hold left up in the
air to land where the other x is. Now, missing this jump means a game over. So,
you risk it all here. I was around 5 minutes 18 seconds in my record run and as
you can see from the screenshot, I walked into the door after the ladder. Now,
we need to do a corner jump to the raised platform at the left here. It’s quite
the precise jump so that’s why I was only able to do it after my third attempt
in my run. Enter the door and jump towards the ladder after exiting the door. Be
careful to not miss that ladder, since if you don’t land on that raised
platform, it’s an instant game over.
Now, after climbing up that ladder, go towards the button at the top right of
this room. As soon as the statue starts spinning, press it. You’ll watch a
lengthy cutscene of the statue going on the rails towards the bell. You will see
something drop down from the bell and see the door you entered this room from
close. This will take +/- 30 seconds.
Let me also tell you, if you don’t have a spinning statue in a few seconds, you
best reset your run. Since now the clock needs to reach the red peg and that’s
too big of a time waste.
But we are in the final strech of the level. Now, don’t loose focus in these 30
seconds since we are not done quite yet. Run towards the left and jump towards
the ladder to save up on some climbing time.
When you reach the top of the ladder, and grab the 9th treasure at the top left
of this room, we need to dance around the ice guardian to reach the climbable
wall that’s just outside of the shadow part of this section. Now, when you enter
the next screen, drop down at the right from the climbable wall.
Now comes the final life or die trick of this run. We need to drop down
somewhere along the purple titles. The best way is where I have drawn a red
line. Hold up to grab the climbable wall, but not too soon to not grab it at the
top. Since climbing is slow in this game and there is still that pesky guard at
the bottom. The idea is to grab the climbable wall as low as possible so you can
drop down without loosing too much health and not loose too much health to the
guard having some free shots at you. You’ll need to face that guard twice, since
you need to enter that annoying jumping room to pick up the seed that dropped
down. Now, you can save a little bit of time since the hitbox of the seed is
bigger then you think. If you stand on the edge of the tile, you can pick it up.
Exit the room and make your way to the building. If you have health enough, drop
down from the ledge outside. Once inside the building, move towards the blue
flower tile and standing in front of the water… open your inventory and move
three times to the right to pick the seed. Now, it’ll turn into a flower. Now,
go up towards the right side of the room to enter the right door. After that, go
to the right section and climb up the ladder. Here some luck will be involved to
avoid the guard. When you climbed up the ladder, dodge the ice guardian again
and now you have the run in the bag. If you don’t make stupid movement mistakes…
you’ll be able to finish the run in just a few seconds.
Now, move down the hallway we all know to well into the final room. Pick up the
final treasure at the bottom right of this room before you do the final
“puzzle”. Now, when you stand in front of the fire… stand as close to the middle
as possible. I have lost so much time when standing on the edges, it’s insane.
In my record run, I lost close to 10 seconds because of this. Now, while facing
the fire, open your inventory and move 3x to the right to select the flower.
This will open the chest. Move towards the chest and face up and open it. After
that, Indy will say that he found Urgon’s Part and the level ends.
Conclusion
Shambala is quite the insane run and after the first four shorter levels, this
level is the first of a set of three quite lengthy levels with a lot of tricky
jumps and avoiding enemies. Now, currently the world record is 7 minutes and 51
seconds. I have pointed out where I lost time in this article and if you count
that all together, you have roughly 30 seconds.
I honestly think that 7 minutes 30 seconds is humanly possible for this level.
Maybe even 7 minutes 20. But, that means there is barely any room for error and
you need to take a lot of risks and be very lucky with the guards movements.
Usually, when I’m doing attempts for a new full game any % run, I usually know
after Shambala if this is going to be a good or bad attempt. Another level is
the Volcano, but the reason why I call it my run killer will be explained when I
talk about that level.
Currently, when I’m doing speedrun pratice, I’m trying to perfect Shambala. I
want a clean recording of my personal best and I want to see how much lower I
can take that all treasures record. Now, my first record for the any % of this
level was 8 minutes 55 seconds and for all treasures it was 9 minutes 46
seconds. I have saved a minute for each category for this level, and I can go
lower. So, keep your eye out on the leaderboards, since as soon as I preform a
run that beats my current record run, I’ll post it.
And with that said, I have said everything about this level for now. If you have
any questions about this guide, feel free to ask them in the comments. Also, I
wish everybody a happy new year, since this is the first article I’m going to
publish in 2024. I also want to thank you for reading this article and I hope
you enjoyed reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it. I hope to be able to
weclome you in the next article and until then have a great rest of your day and
take care.
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Posted on January 21, 2024January 21, 2024 by NekoJonezPosted in Articles,
Gaming History, PersonalTagged 001, 5, 64, adventure, all, and, any, arpegi,
arts, bell, boy, buttonsmashers, circle, color, commentary, croft, croftr,
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urgon, walkthrough, well, writing. Leave a comment
IT’S TIME FOR THE UPCOMING 10 OF 2024
Only a few days left before we enter the new year. I already talked about my 10
favorite games of the past year, but what am I looking forward too in the
upcoming year? This list is quite tricky to put together for me. Especially
since I don’t always play the latest modern hyped title and to be quite honest,
the pool of upcoming titles of 2024 didn’t have a lot of games that interested
me. Yet, here are ten games I’m looking forward to play and/or will keep an eye
on to add to my collection. Tell me, which games are you looking forward too in
the new year? Feel free to leave a comment down below about that, or one if you
just want to talk about my choices, that’s a fine comment too.
Editorial note: the release dates are the ones that were known at the time of
writing.
#10 – ServiceIT: You can do IT (Q1 – PC)
When I was looking at the upcoming games lists at various websites and saw this
one, I raised an eyebrow. As somebody who works in tech, I was interested to see
how a tycoon/simulation game about my job is going to work.
While this game isn’t exactly a simulation about my job, since it more than
maintaining a school infrastructure… It gets quite close. I’m mostly interested
in this game to see how well they simulate my work life and how you are going to
make an enjoyable game out of it.
I just hope that they stick to the reality of IT and not go overboard and with
fake IP-addresses, silly terminal commands like “repair” or “fix” and sometimes
really throw you for a loop. Furthermore, I’m also crossing my fingers that this
game isn’t going to be a sort of PC Builder Simulator clone or that it focuses
too much on hardware. Since, IT is so much more than building/repairing
computers. It’s also about maintaining infrastructure, finding the right
documentation, following the latest trends, developing software/websites/tools…
I can go on for hours. But, when I read what I just wrote here, I think I’m
going to set my bar so unrealistically high… But we shall see. I’ll have to play
the game to find out how good it actually is.
#9 – Death Trick: Double Blind (Q1 – PC, Switch)
If there is one way to get me interested in your game, you make a mystery game
with some unique mechanics or a unique way to play it.
Usually in detective games like Ghost Trick or Ace Attorney, you follow every
lead until its end. No stone is going to be left unturned. Yet, in this game
that is thrown out of the window, and you only have a limited amount of time to
investigate and follow up on your clues. But, wait! There is more, since you
play as two characters with their own stakes in the mystery.
Couple that with a gorgeous art style and make it non-linear, and you have
something that gets me quite excited, even with the limited things shown in the
Nintendo Switch announcement trailer. Not only that, this game is being
developed by a very small team that are giving it their all for this game. I
looked at the press materials and I think this is going to be a great game.
Hopefully, it doesn’t fly under the radar and gets the attention it deserves.
#8 – Ubel (Q1 – PC, Nintendo Switch)
When the demo of Ubel released, the developers contacted me. They asked if I
would be interested in writing a review about this game.
This game is extremely similar in terms of setup to the Nonary games. I always
wanted to play another mystery game with that setup.
Now, the reason I haven’t written about the game is because the demo was a bit
too short for to me to write about. I gave some general feedback to the
developers, and I have been lurking on their Discord and following their social
media channels quite close. I was praying that this game wasn’t going to be one
of those games where I take a look at the demo and then just disappears into
development hell or just never gets finished.
Thankfully, we got regular updates and even an alpha version was released to
testers. This game is a passion project and I can’t wait to get my hands on it.
It’ll also release on the Nintendo Switch and I can’t even decide on which
platform I’ll play it.
So, if you are a big fan of the Danganronpa, Zero Escape, World’s End Club,
Death Come True amongst other death game mystery games… This is going to be one
you will have to keep your eyes peeled on.
#7 – Princess Peach: Showtime (March 22nd – Switch)
Like I said in the introduction of this article, I had a very hard time putting
this list together. While I could easily fill this list with a lot of remakes of
games that I want to finish and be done with it, I felt that wouldn’t be a
quality article.
With that said, there are a few games that are going to release in 2024 that are
really getting me excited. One of them is the new Princess Peach game. For those
who don’t know, I’m also a hobbyist actor in a folk theater group in my
hometown. I also love to go to theater to see plays and comedians preform.
Now, give it to Nintendo to develop a whole game around stage plays (again). The
unique charm that this game gives off through the trailers and the promotion
material makes me quite excited to dive into the world of theater again in a
whole different way. I just hope we don’t get a game with a lot of gimmicks, but
we get a game that’s fun to play and gives the player the feeling that they are
an actor on stage, entertaining the crowd. It’s not too long now before we can
take center stage with Princess Peach and how a big showtime!
#6 – Decapolice (TBD – PlayStation, Switch)
Almost each year, there is a game like this. A noir styled detective game that’s
building up a huge mystery. This year, it was Master Detective Archives: Rain
Code. Next year, that will be Decapolice.
This time, it’s “breaking from the mold of the Professor Layton series”. And
when you hear that, you know right away that this game is going to be from
Level5.
While we have to wait for the new Professor Layton game until 2025, we are going
to get another mystery game from Level5 in 2024. And that has the possibilities
of it being one of my favorite games of the year. Since, as I told earlier in
this article, I adore games with unique spins. And this one has a battle system.
Is it taking cues of Danganronpa? Looking at the battle system, it reminds me a
bit of Master Detective Archives in a way. I just looked at parts of the trailer
and skimmed through the teaser website, and I’m sold. To avoid any more
spoilers, I’m going to avoid looking through all the materials, since I love
when I can go in these games as blind as possible.
#5 – Another Code: Recollection (January 19th, Switch)
Another Code or Trace Memory was one of those series on the Nintendo DS / Wii
that I truly loved. It was such a shame when Cing, the developers, went bankrupt
back in 2010.
They made some amazing titles outside of them, like Hotel Dusk: Room 215. Seeing
that their games aren’t forgotten and remade for the Nintendo Switch brings me a
lot of hope.
These stories deserve to be told and experienced. Especially since the sequel on
the Nintendo Wii will be released for the first time in America. Now, I won’t
have any excuse to replay the Wii game to finally finish it after all those
years. I’m ready!
#4 – Spirit Hunter – Death Mark II (February 15th – Switch/PlayStation/PC)
Since its reveal, this game has been on my list of games I want to play. I have
even placed it on my list for this year.
Sadly, we got a delay this year. But, I’m not too sad about that one. This means
we might get an even better game.
I’m beyond hyped for this game. Even more after Klamath and I streamed this
game. They were such fun streams. I can’t wait to play this game, especially
since it throws the whole gameplay loop of this game on its head. And because
the successful crowdfunding campaign, we are going to get more than we are used
too from the developers. So, February is going to be quite packed for me. But
I’m ready to hunt those ghosts.
#3 – Shantae Advance: Risky Revolution (Q1-2 2024 – Gameboy
Advance/PlayStation/PC/Switch)
No, that’s no typo in the title for this game. This game is really going to come
out as well on the Gameboy Advance. Now, let me tell you the story of this game.
Back in 2002, this game started development but after two years of development,
WayForward cancelled the game because they couldn’t find a publisher. Now,
surprisingly and out of nowhere… In November 2023, Limited Games and WayForward
showed in the Nintendo Indies Showcase that the game has been finished.
That’s the story of this game in short. I’ll link to the fandom page here if you
want more information how this came to be. I’m so happy to see developers take
on lost media like this. On top of that, I’m quite happy to see it also coming
to the original platform. Shantae is such a fun platformer game that deserves
more recognition. There is so much charm in this game. The world WayForward
created with this game is just beyond amazing and as somebody who grew up with
the Gameboy Color, I’m so proud to see this cult classic grow into the amazing
series it deserves.
#2 – Broken Sword – Parzival’s Stone (TBA – PC/PlayStation/XBOX)
Ever since I played the directors cut of the first Broken Sword on my DS, I fell
in love with the series. While the last Broken Sword game is currently 10 years
old, I always knew we were going to get a 6th entry in the series.
And not only that, we are going to get a total remake of the first Broken Sword
game as well. So, we are going to get spoiled as Broken Sword fans in 2024.
The new adventure is going to take place in Germany and France. I’m so crossing
my fingers that one of these games we are finally visiting Belgium as well.
Since, there are so many historical towns like Antwerp, Brussels and Bruges here
were stories like those in Broken Sword can be told. But, besides that… I’m just
hyped to finally see where George and Nico go next on their adventures.
#1 – Fantasy Life i: The Girl Who Steals Time (Summer – Switch)
While we were promised this game in 2023, it got delayed until the summer of
2024. The exact release date is a secret for “strategic reasons”.
Now, why do I place this game at my number 1 spot? Well, because Fantasy Life
was a game on the 3DS that took me by surprise, it became one of my favorite 3DS
games.
The open freedom you get with this game is just insane. While parts of the game
are quite repetitive, the gameplay loop is still extremely enjoyable. I expect a
lot of things from this sequel. My biggest wish is that there is a bit more
diversity between the paths you can take. On top of that, I want a more in depth
story. They proved they can do it by the amazingly well written DLC story.
They just need to build upon the basis of the amazing core they had in Fantasy
Life on the 3DS and we will get an amazing title that is for sure going to be
the game I’m going to play during my whole summer. And it’s going to be the
perfect game to relax and enjoy Fantasy Life all over again with a new story and
new mechanics. Summer 2024, here I come!
Closing thoughts
When I look at my list this year, I’m quite afraid for my wallet at the start of
the year. I think this is going to be a trend in the future. Where we only know
about the new games being released in the first part of the year and during
April-May, we get a list of games for the end of the year.
There are a lot of games without a real release date like Control 2, the new
Indiana Jones game, Persona 6, the next mainline (non remake) Tomb Raider game
and the new Bioshock game that’s in development are some examples. Now, truth to
be told is that about some of these games we barely know anything. We don’t even
know if they are still in development or not.
In any case, I’m just glad that this hobby of mine is still strong and not going
anywhere. The upcoming year will bring some amazing titles and experiences that
we can’t predict. I could write a generic message here about what my plans are
for 2024, but I don’t want to do that.
I just want to enjoy life and how it comes. I know that I’m going to work on my
blog and improve it and write more articles about the games I have played. I can
also reveal that there are a lot of interesting streams planned with my friend
Klamath. Outside of writing and streaming, there are a lot of things in my
personal life I’m looking forward too as well.
Next year will be the 14th year I have been writing. Now, truth to be told… I
have totally forgotten that this year was my 10th year writing on this blog. I
mean, 10 years is quite a lot of time. I have talked about so many games and
enjoyed it so much that I didn’t even notice it go by. I only just realized
while writing this ending section. So, I have a few things in mind for 2024 and
2025. But, I’ll keep them a secret. Especially for 2025, since then I can
celebrate my 15 years of blogging.
So, thank you everybody for the support and enjoyment that 2023 brought. I hope
I was able to entertain, inform you, or maybe both. I’m looking forward to 2024,
and I hope we can do it together. Have an amazing end of the year celebration
and I hope to welcome you in another article and until then, have a great rest
of your day and take care.
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Posted on December 29, 2023 by NekoJonezPosted in First Impression, Personal,
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THE TOP 10 GAMES OF 2023 – NEKOJONEZ EDITION
It’s that time of the year again, where we get our usual top 10 lists or “game
of the year” articles. That’s no difference on my blog as well. I have put
together a list of 10 games I started playing this year. The big difference is
that in my list, I don’t really care about release date. So, what is the best
game I have played this year? I have to tell you that this year was anything but
an easy year to put together. I had such a long list of candidates, that I
created this list several times until I felt that I had a great list. In any
case, enough rambling. Let’s get on with cracking my favorites this year. If you
want to share your own list and/or your opinions on the games I have chosen
and/or on the list itself… Feel free to leave a comment in the comment section
down below.
Editorial note: some of these titles are multiplatform. The one I placed between
brackets is the platform I played it on.
#10 – Fatal Frame: Mask of the Lunar Eclipse (2023, PS4)
I love games with unique story mechanics. The idea that you can fight ghosts via
on old camera is just a perfect description of things that just interest me.
Now, Fatal Frame is one of my most favorite horror game series. While I have to
be honest and admit that I have played a part of this game before via a fan
translation, I’m not really counting that as playing this game before.
This game finally got translated and officially released in the west. And not
only that, it got remastered. Besides it being built on a new engine, it’s
extremely faithful to the source material. While I haven’t played through this
game to completion yet, I’m so glad I picked this game up, and I’m hyped to see
new Fatal Frame/Project Zero content coming to the west. Now, I’m just hoping
that we get a totally new Fatal Frame 6 in the future. In the meantime, I’m so
going to beat this game, so I can finally say that I completed all the Fatal
Frame games.
#9 – Tiny Tina’s Wonderlands (2022, PC)
I think that this year’s theme was unique story games. Since, this pick is
another example of unique stories. A while ago, I played Knights of Pen & Paper
and got hooked.
Now, when I started to play this game where you actually go through a D&D
campaign instead of it being told to you and not only that, have the characters
talk in their D&D character AND as themselves, I think it’s a complete package.
The charm of this game, and the silly campaign we are going through, is just
amazing. It’s a medieval shooter that’s quite addictive and doesn’t hold your
hand like other games would do. While I learned after the fact that this game is
a spin-off from the Borderland series, especially Borderlands 3… I’m so happy
that I played this and look at it as a stand alone. Now, I still have to finish
that campaign… So, if you would excuse me after writing this article, I have a
game to play.
#8 – PARANORMASIGHT: The Seven Mysteries of Honjo (2023, Switch)
My review
What if you had a unique power that just put everything on its head. Not only
that, what if you can use and control folk tales? Well, that’s what this game is
about.
It’s really difficult to talk about the story and gameplay mechanics in this
game and not spoil several unique twists that this game pulls. You really have
to think outside the box in this game. It’s one of those games where I actually
had to take notes to make sure I didn’t get stuck.
A lot of planning and play testing had to be done to make this game work. While
it has a few issues, I think it all works together quite well. And not only
that, we are actually playing a game that’s created together with a museum, and
it’s not a big advertisement that takes you out of the experience. So, I have to
say that the developers of this game did an amazing job on this one. And if you
want to learn more, feel free to read my review. I think if you enjoy visual
novel adventure games… You’ll really like this one.
#7 – Doom Eternal (2020, PC)
My review
For years now, I wanted to build a stronger PC. And this year, I finally did it.
I built a totally new computer. On my old gaming desktop, I was unable to play
Doom Eternal. While I heard that the game was “more of Doom 2016”, I still
wanted to give it a try.
And let me tell you, at first… The new mechanics didn’t click with me at all.
But, after a few levels… Something started to click together and started
enjoying myself quite a lot. I especially loved the feature you can use a
totally different skin during this game, and it changes also during the main
campaign as well. The cutscenes and reflections are totally changed.
I totally felt that this game was one whole compared to Doom 2016. I loved that
we had a hub part where we could unlock more special powers with things we
unlocked during the levels. It’s a big improvement compared to Doom 2016 and I
love it. I’m so glad I played through it and I gave it a chance.
#6 – Metal: HellSinger (2022, PC)
My review
I don’t like rhythm games at all. But, what if you combine it with a high action
game like Doom Eternal? Well, you get this gem of an action game called Metal:
Hellsinger.
While not all metal tracks suit my personal fancy, I just fell in love with the
gameplay loop of shooting demons and going through amazingly designed arena’s
that reward well timed attacks. And it’s also somewhat forgiving for people like
me who aren’t rhythmic at all. It’s one of the biggest surprises to me this
year.
I played this game not too long after I had beaten Doom Eternal and I was in the
mood for a new shooter. I found this in my Steam library and without knowing it
was a rhythm game, I booted it up and started playing it. Even when I found out
that it was a rhythm game, I kept playing. The game got me hooked. The story was
simple, the game mechanics as well. But, the loop is just so perfect and the
music fits this game like a glove. Also, the DLC that released after I had
written my article adds just so much more on top of the already amazing base
game. I highly recommend this game to everybody who is interested in an unique
rhythm game where no being rhythmic isn’t a gate keeping mechanic. Interested,
feel free to read my review on the game.
#5 – Alan Wake 2 (2023, PC)
One of the main reasons why I loved the original Alan Wake so much is because
the story was something I always wanted to play through. What if the story of a
writer comes to life and starts attacking the writer. That, without even the
writer knowing what’s going to happen in the story.
On top of that, the unique mechanics with the flashlight usage is just the
cherry on the cake. This game plays with the themes of light and darkness as if
it were nothing. Now, after a lot of years and content in other games… We
finally have the next main chapter in the Alan Wake series. We tried streaming
this game but we had a lot of technical issues we are trying to figure out. But,
I also played this game outside us (Klamath, the_Kovic and I) streaming. And let
me tell you, am I glad I built this new computer. It’s highly worth the price of
admission. This game is taking the mind bending story telling of the original to
a whole other level. While I’m only at the half way point in this game, I can’t
wait to finish it so I can experience all the mind bending story this game has
to offer. And after that, I still have to beat the other Remedy games and
experience the other side stories of our beloved cursed horror writer Alan Wake.
#4 – Resident Evil 8 (2021, PS4)
My review
There is a reason why I write down at the start of the year which games I have
played. Otherwise, they risk of being forgotten or just never considered to be
put on this list. Yet, this game impressed me so much that I didn’t have to do
that.
I found this game for quite cheap on the PlayStation store and I thought, why
not? I was able to buy Resident Evil 7 for 2 bucks physical, why not the sequel
for cheap as well? When I started to play it back in January and February, oh
boy did it not disappoint.
While I haven’t beaten Resident Evil 7 just yet, I can’t wait to do so. Resident
Evil 8 was a game I booted up once in a while during the year just to replay
parts of it again. I have completed it twice this year. Now, I have been
distracted by other games, so I still have to beat the DLC… But, I think that
won’t be a problem. I think the next time I boot up my PS4 and this game, the
game will hook into me again, and I’ll just keep playing the DLC until I’m done.
#3 – Cult of The Lamb (2022, Switch)
My review
So, when Cult of the Lamb came out, I placed it on my wishlist since I wanted to
play it. But at that time, my budget was a bit too tight and I was unable to buy
it.
Not too long before leaving on a family trip this year, I bought this game to
play during downtime. And this game, just took me by surprise. This charming gem
of a game is one of the best games I played all year. It even made me forget
that a lot of big titles like Super Mario Wonder, Alan Wake II, Baldur’s Gate 3…
all got released this year and were waiting on me to play them.
This game flows so amazingly well and apart from some glitches is near
perfection. I have to admit that in several drafts of this article, this game
took the number 1 spot. It’s so totally worth the price and it’s going to get a
major free content update early next year. That content update got announced a
few days after I had written my article about it, talk about coincidence. I
can’t wait to see what the new update will bring and maybe I’ll restart my game
and create a totally fresh cult and take different decisions compared to my
current playthrough. But, I’ll need to be careful… Since it’s totally possible
that I’ll be unable to put down this game and ignore all the other games I still
want to play. Urgh, the dilemma’s of good games.
#2 – Fire Emblem Warriors – Three Hopes (2022, Switch)
My review
Did you ever play a 40-hour game with somewhat repetitive gameplay and after
beating it, told yourself… Yes, I want to play this game again twice just to see
the different routes? Last time I did that, I was playing Persona 5 for hours
upon hours. This year, I have been playing Fire Emblem Warriors – Three Houses.
I started playing this game early-middle last month and it’s almost the only
game I have been playing. It surprises even me, since I’m not that big of a Fire
Emblem fan. Yet, the balance in this Warriors cross over hits that perfect
balance for me that I keep playing it and just want to fully complete it.
Now, why am I placing this so high on my list? Well, that’s because it feels
right on so many levels. The characters are stereotypes, but they are used
extremely well. They tell quite in-depth stories and give amazing messages. The
gameplay might be repetitive, but is quite rewarding and addictive to do. It
also has unique outcomes depending on way you play it. The fact you can carry
over so much in New Game+, so you can see the other parts of the story without
having to grind for certain pieces is fun as well. And if you are afraid that it
takes the challenge out of the game, well… Don’t worry… The higher difficulties
are really going to give you a run for your money.
I honestly think that this is one of the best Warrior games I have ever played
and fixed so many problems I had with all the previous games. I even tried to
pick up Hyrule Warriors Age of Calamity, and I have to be honest… I’m just too
addicted to this game for now. It really does something quite unique and I think
it’s slowly making me a Fire Emblem fan, since I really want to replay all the
other Fire Emblem games in my collection that are sitting there gathering dust.
Oh, and maybe give Destiny Warriors a try as well… that too maybe.
Honorable mentions
Master Detective Archives: Rain Code (Switch), Immortals Fenix Rysing (PS4),
Venetica (PC), Ark: Survival Evolved (PC), Fire Emblem Engage (Switch), Stray
(PS4), Cultic (PC), Escape Simulator (PC), HROT (PC), Dark Cloud (PS2), House
Flipper 2 (PC), Control (PC)
#1 – The Legend of Zelda – Tears of the Kingdom (2023, Switch)
My review
Is this a surprise? That my game of the year is the new Zelda title? Maybe. But,
this game just grew on me and I had a really difficult time putting this one
down.
When I was creating this list, I looked at what the games brought to the table
to impress me and make it stand out. Make it different compared to other games
and make the experience stand out during the year. While the games on this list
had some elements, this game kept having surprises left and right, I couldn’t
justify not placing it on number one.
I didn’t think Nintendo would be able to re-invent their open world formula
after Breath of the Wild. The fear of the sequel just being a rehash of Breath
of the Wild was huge. But not only did they add two new world layers, they
completely changed Link’s powers and opened up so much more of this game. As a
test, I played some Breath of the Wild this year as well… And I have to admit,
that they have outdone themselves. Tears of the Kingdom is my game of the year
2023 for just adding so much more depth and content that it just blew me away
and made me quite exited for the future of one of my favorite game series out
there. What’s going to be next?
Conclusion
Writing this ending section is always one of the most difficult sections I have
to do all year. What do I write in here? A retrospective of my year? That’s
possible, but I don’t want to go in too much detail to avoid throwing something
private on the internet. Besides that, the main reason why people come to read
these articles is because they want to read about the games I have played and
recommend playing. I don’t want to look forward to next year, since that’s what
my top 10 games I’m looking forward too is for. Of course, that’s the article
I’m going to write next, so yeah.
What surprised me most this year is that I wrote fewer articles this year
compared to last year, I had more readers compared to 2022. I also felt prouder
of all the articles I have written. I feel my quality is finally going up, and
I’m finding my way to write and review the games I have played.
If you have read articles from me before, you might know that I work as an IT
admin in two art schools here in Belgium. This year, I had several interactions
of students and coworkers who bought a game because they read about it on my
blog and came to thank me for the recommendation. And I also had other coworkers
who complemented me on my writing and said that they enjoyed reading my articles
whilst not being into games.
And honestly, that’s what it’s all about for me. I have also said it in the
streams with my buddy Klamath. I’m so happy that I have this creative outlet and
I can entertain, inform and help others. Not only that, but I have been doing
this for over 13 years now, and I can’t wait to see what the future brings.
Each year, I start putting this list together during my summer break. I always
think, what games are going to be put on this list? And each year, several games
just surprise me. I can’t wait to see what 2024 has in store for me, since 2023
was such an enjoyable adventure. But for now, thank you 2023 for being such an
amazing year. It has been the year of rediscovery for me. Like I said earlier,
I’m just felt prouder of the things I have been putting out, and I hope you are
enjoying things as well. Thank you for the support this year and I hope to see
you in the future. So, for now, have a great rest of your day and take care.
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FIRST IMPRESSION: FIRE EMBLEM: THREE HOPES (SWITCH) ~ MASHING BUTTONS FOR WAR
Wikipedia – Nintendo.com microsite
There are only a few Nintendo franchises that are suited for a cross-over with
the Dynasty Warriors series. The best one in my mind is Fire Emblem. So, it was
no surprise to me that when you had the unique concept of Three Houses, a
warriors-style game was going to follow. I wanted to play it since it released,
but I got distracted by other games and the game gathered dust on my wishlist.
Recently, I saw it was on sale on my local store, so I snagged a copy. I put it
in my Switch and I knew it was going to be a game I wanted to write about from
then. What do I think about this game? Is it a good game, or is it a game I have
buyers regret over? Let’s find out in this first impression, while I invite you
to leave a comment in the comment section with your thoughts and/or opinions on
this game and/or the content of this article. So, let’s mash buttons for this
war and let’s dive right into giving this game a good, honest look.
Choosing your starter
In this game, you play as a mercenary Shez hunting down the Ashen Demon. This
Ashen Demon is actually the main character of the mainline game, Three Houses.
The story being told in this game is actually an alternate timeline of the
mainline game.
That’s one of the main reasons why I wanted to play this game. In Three Houses,
there is a lot going on since the main character joined the academy and started
teaching one of the three houses. But, what if that never happened and things go
differently? Well, you get the story in this game. Now, you’d think that this
game is either filled with spoilers for the mainline game or you won’t be able
to follow it if you haven’t played the mainline game.
But, that’s far from the truth. Both games can be enjoyed separately. Things
gets explained and since this is another timeline, things can go rather
differently. Since, in this game, the school life is extremely short-lived.
After your first few battles, you meet the three Lords of the lands, and you
have to make a decision on which house you will join. After that, you basically
choose your story path for the game. For my playthrough, I have chosen another
house from my Three Houses playthrough, and I’m glad I did. I was always curious
about the other characters, and I actually want to replay Three Houses with the
other house now.
The stories in the three houses are quite different from each other. Without
giving too much away, I’ll say this. The stories of all three paths do
intertwine and depending on which house you join, that house will succeed in
their mission. Now, I’m really curious to see how different the stories will be
in the end. But, for that, I’ll have to play through this beefy game. This game
can take around 140 hours to beat 100%, and I’m only half way the first route.
The writing in this game is pretty good in my opinion. It feels like that, an
epic adventure anime series that can really draw you in. The story can take its
twists and turns, but it has extremely powerful heroes and characters that have
their own little quirks and charms to make you love them and cheer for them. You
clearly have your episodic structure in this game, and it fits like a glove.
And on top of that, the voice acting in this game is just the cherry on top. The
same cast returns from the mainline game to this game. While some characters do
sound a bit different with the different direction and the time passed, the
performance is amazing. They all fit the personality of the characters and give
that additional layer of charm. Not everything is voice acted, but most of it
is.
Also, I have to give some additional props to the voice actors since with the
amount of things that can happen in this game and the different paths you can
take, it must have been a beast of a script to do. And to write for that matter.
Yet, I did notice some narrative tricks being used so that dialogue can be
reused. Since, there is this mechanic there is a chance to recruit enemy
generals to your side, and then their dialogue is mostly written is such a way,
it doesn’t really matter in which house they are in.
Depending on which house you choose, you also choose your focus in the game. In
my playthrough I chose for the Blue Lions. They excel at military tactics and
mostly focus on swords and spears.
During the game, you unlock materials and seals to let your fighters go to a
different class, so you can balance out your team. This is something extremely
important, since choosing the right crew to go into battle will make all the
difference in the end. Don’t always choose the class of your crew based upon
numbers, make sure you have a diverse team, and you have all different types of
warriors.
Mashing buttons for war
The biggest difference it will make is in the battles. There is a strength and
weakness mechanic that is extremely well-balanced and can make an easy mission
extremely difficult. But, I’ll talk more about the battles later in the article.
First, I want to focus on the other mechanic in this game, and that is the base.
In between battles, you can run around in your base to talk to other characters
and improve their bonds for not only more lore, but also for benefits during the
battles. Your typical elements like in all the previous warriors games are here.
A smithy, a supplier, a market… But this time, instead of it being a somewhat
boring or overwhelming menu system, it’s a lively camp. It’s a joy to run around
in, but sometimes it felt nothing more than just window dressing. The main issue
is that you have fast travel and nothing else really happens in the camp. You do
have some animations at certain places, but they never move from their location
or interact with others. In Three Houses, you had characters walking around,
making the place feel more lively than it actually was. Now, we have one NPC
maybe walking around and for the rest we have empty paths and market vendors
that shout to buy their wares to you. That being said, it’s extremely nice set
dressing. To such a degree that I now feel that the menu system in Fire Emblem
Warriors feels lazy.
One gameplay mechanic that really got improved is that the upgrading of your
units isn’t a mindless menu system anymore. I always felt that it was really
silly that you needed to upgrade your units through so many steps each and every
time. This has been streamlined quite a lot and I love it. No more grinding
certain missions for that one resource to beef up that one unit you wanted to
play as.
Also, various other mechanics and activities of Three Houses made it into this
game as well. Things like cooking and going on an expedition with you are also
present in this game. They are some fun side activities, but don’t really matter
in the grand scheme of things. Just like finding various notes scattered around
the camp, they are just nice and welcomed set dressing.
Now, explaining every little detail and mechanic of a Destiny Warriors game is
asking for a long article. There is lots to do and balance in this game. I won’t
be surprised that some players will lose hours just to maximize and perfect
every little stat. But, that wouldn’t matter if the other main mechanic in this
game wasn’t fun. How do the battles play?
Well, if you played any warrior game before like Hyrule Warriors… You know what
to expect here. In this hack and slash game, you are dropped in a map with your
allies and you get a main objective. That main objective is your win condition.
In a lot of battles, there is also a loose condition. So, taking that into
account is quite important. Do use the battle map before the battle to your
advantage and swap out your units accordingly. If you strategize before the
battle starts, you will make it yourself easier.
During the battles, you can take control of a maximum of 4 characters on the
battlefield. You can easily switch between them with the up and down arrows of
the D-pad. Knowing when the switch is half the battle. Overall, the AI in this
game is pretty good and provides you with the help you need, and the other units
follow orders perfectly, yet it is faster sometimes to do the fight yourself.
And as soon as you learn the combo’s and master the mechanics of each fighting
style, oh boy can this become an enjoyable button mashing gaming.
Your right side of the controller will get a work-out. Especially the R, X and Y
buttons. The faster you’re mashing them and use R for your special skills, the
fights can become a cakewalk. But, don’t rest easy. You would think that this
game is going to be easy from reading my previous sentence. But, don’t get
yourself fooled. The difficulty differences are quite straightforward, like
explained in this section from gameguides.com. Yet, if you don’t keep your wits
about you and focus on taking out the right strongholds and generals, you will
be overwhelmed pretty fast. When you understand that the non-general soldiers
aren’t that big of a threat, you will make it yourself easier. Also, know when
to defend a unit and when to attack.
Also, you can choose if you play this on Classic or Casual mode. Whilst you can
change your difficulty level if you so desire, you can’t change the gameplay
mode. So, if you don’t want to play with permadeath of your characters anymore,
then you are out of luck. Personally, I’m playing on normal and casual mode. I
get too frustrated when one simple mistake would mean that I loose a character
that might make a later fight nearly impossible and the worry just ruins the fun
for me. It’s a me thing and I’m glad we have the option.
Another part of the difficulty comes in via trying to get the best battle rank
in each mission and chapter. Since, the rewards of these ranks are extremely
worthwhile your time. They also helped during the side missions and unlock even
better weapons and abilities.
There are a lot, and I really mean a lot, of mechanics in this game so that the
players who love to micromanage will be able to eat their heart out. Thankfully,
this game doesn’t force you into learning every single detail of this game and
lets you play how every you want. Making this game’s replay value go through the
roof. Now, another related question is… Is this game best played in short
bursts, or should you play it in longer sessions. Well, that all depends on how
well the gameplay clicks with you. Overall, there are a lot of different things
that can happen during a mission, but after a while we see the same things
happening over and over again.
This game can become repetitive real fast. There are various battle mechanics
and things that can happen during a battle, but the breaks in the camp are quite
welcome. Also, the side missions and the additional bonus things you can do in
between battles are needed to break the repetitive nature of the battles. Don’t
get me wrong, the battles aren’t boring… But, it doesn’t take long before you
have seen the majority of gimmicks that can happen during a battle.
Yet for some reason, I felt that the battles in this game compared to all the
previous warrior style games I have played are the best flowing so far. Giving
order to your units and seeing them dash off and really have an impact on the
battle… It pays off. I feel like they hit the sweetspot here. I can’t really put
my finger on it but the battle gameplay just flows quite nicely. Maybe it also
has to do with the audio and visual presentation during these battles.
The fact you see your allies icon dashing on the mini map towards their goal and
saying a quick line when they executing their task, really helps during the
hectic battles. They warn you when they are in need of aid as well. The controls
to easily switch between your units help a lot with quickly managing everyting.
You rarely feel like you wasted your time with a mechanic.
Visually, this game also helps a lot. The animations really feel impactful and
give you the feeling that you are fighting an epic battle. I can totally excuse
the game not animating all your soldiers in fighting for the sake of
performance, but the little fighting that happens around you to “fake” this
actually happening is doing quite a lot. Rarely did the game slow down for me,
so everything happened with a smooth framerate. Now, I haven’t played the two
player mode in this game… And maybe the framerate there isn’t the best…
Especially in the previous Fire Emblem Warriors game, I played the two player
mode and oh boy, that wasn’t the most optimal mode.
Also, looking at screenshots of the two player mode, I feel like it does a
number on the amazing visual presentation of this game. It cuts the screen
horizontally in half and I’m sorry but it just doesn’t look right. Maybe on a
big screen it looks better but, on the Switch itself… I shudder at the thought.
It’s a shame that the visuals looks so streched and wrong in multiplayer since
they are quite nice.
Almost the sweetspot
This game almost hits the sweetspot on being a “perfect” game, it’s insane. Yet,
there are somethings I find strange how they got through the cracks.
First of all, the visuals are amazing. You really feel like you are running
through a real world that’s going through a big war. The visual style is
medieval fantasy and it really shines through in the whole game. Yet, when
somebody crosses their arms in a cutscene, the hands keep upright. To a point
that it is immersion breaking sometimes. Oh, and the same thing happens in
cutscenes when people want to place their hand in their side. The gap between
their side and their hand is big enough to fit a your whole arm in between.
Also, in cutscenes, everybody is mostly in their idle animation apart from when
they are talking. And this is something that annoyed me a lot in this game. Dare
to keep that shocked pose instead of just going back to idle. It breaks the flow
of the story and it feels stiff and slow.
The UI is extremely clean and easy to understand. It’s a blast to navigate and
gives you all the needed information. Yet, after unlocking a class for a
character you get the question if you want to change it or not… without seeing
which stats are impacted and which ones aren’t.
Using your abilities in battle is quite easy to do. Just press “R” and choose
the right ability. Yet, the very powerful ability using R+A doesn’t always work
as you expect. Sometimes I feel that the very strong final attack just didn’t
trigger and got skipped. Also, the meter changes to being almost full again so I
started wondering if it was glitched or not.
There are also various item pickups in during the battle. But, it’s not always
too clear what item pick up does what. For some reason, I always confuse the
blue and purple pick ups. And it’s so easy to waste a pick up, it’s rather
annoying. Also, when an ally is wonded, you can’t easy heal them or move them to
pick up an item or break a green pot. Little sidenote on pots, these red pots on
the mini map sometimes look quite brown in game. Maybe because of lighting or
maybe it has too much blue and green added to the texture.
These small issues started to grab more of my attention as soon as I decided to
write this article. Like not all sunrays have good anti-aliasing (making
straight lines look less jagged basically). It is distracting once you notice
it. Just like the hand thing I talked about earlier. It’s a shame since the
cutscenes are more lively now since they use 3D character models instead of
character portraits in Fire Emblem Warriors.
Something that doesn’t have any issues is the soundtrack of this game. The
soundtrack really pumps you up during the battle and helps make the game feel
even more impactful during battles and relaxing during camp visits. The
orchestral score is a joy to listen to and I have to admit that I listen to it
here and there while I’m working. It’s a great soundtrack and I’m glad it’s
added to my playlist.
The sound effects are pretty great as well. They stand out quite a lot so it’s
easy to know what is happening and it always gives the needed information to the
player to not make it a guessing game. Thankfully, you also get some visual
information as well so people with hearing problems don’t loose out on the
advantages the sound effects can give you.
The amount of options you have in this game is incredible. You can tweak the
game to your favor, you can also change the whole button lay-out to your wishes
without changing the default button lay-out of your Switch. While I prefer
playing this game with a Pro controller, the game plays smooth with joycons as
well. While the same supports one joy con to play the game, do yourself a favor
and play with either both joycons or a pro controller.
Now, this game does have an autosave feature, but I’m also really glad that this
game have several save slots. While you only have 8 slots in this game, that’s
more than enough to experiment in your playthrough. The only minor issue is that
when have saved before the last battle, the game forces you to save before you
enter the war map the last battle. Without mistake. One simple if loop where the
game checks if the player has saved a few minutes manually before and it wasn’t
an autosave would solve this minor issue.
Overall, I fell in love with this game. Compared to the previous warrior style
games we got from Nintendo franchises, this is one of the better ones. It isn’t
overwhelming and you don’t have to micromanage every little stat, but it does
provide you with that option. It’s the same addictive hack and slash gameplay we
are used too in these games but it also manages to flow a bit better.
While the game does have some minor issues here and there, they aren’t too big
of a deal. Like when you teleport in your camp to a facility you can press A to
interact but when you teleport to a unit, you have to walk a few steps towards
them before you can interact.
If we ever get another warrior style game, I think that this game has set
amazing foundations for the next title. The main complaint I see other reviewers
say is that the combat isn’t diverse enough. Personally, I somewhat agree that
some classes play extremely similar but, it’s one thing they should focus on
expanding next. Do more with combat styles like archers having a larger attack
range but being weaker in close combat. Or give mages the chance to buff their
allies.
What we got in this game feel like an extremely solid foundation for the next
games. I’m so glad I played this game since it’s one of the better ones I played
this year. I was afraid that I was burned out of the warrior style gameplay, but
no. This game drew me right back in and reminded me why taking care of the
details is so important in making a good game. I can’t wait to see what else
this game has to offer since I’m going to beat it, that’s for sure. And after
that, I should beat the other Fire Emblem games that are still on my backlog…
shouldn’t I?
I highly recommend this game to everybody who enjoys warrior style games, hack
and slash games, Fire Emblem fans and everybody who enjoyed the Hyrule Warriors
games. This game takes leaps and bounds to improve itself compared to the
previous warriors game in the Fire Emblem series. While it has some small
distracting issues, overall this game delivers an amazing experience where you
can sink a lot of hours into and with a highly replayable game. So, what are you
waiting for soldier? A command to play the game? Well, here it is! Pick up your
controller and join the war with quirky, unique characters that takes itself
just seriously enough. Join the fight in something that feels like you were
young watching your favorite adventure TV-series every Saterday morning whilst
you feel extremely powerful and wonder what’s going to happen next. That’s how I
personally felt while playing this game.
And with that said, I have said everything I wanted to say about this game for
now. I want to thank you so much for reading and I hope you enjoyed reading this
article as much as I enjoyed writing it. I hope to be able to welcome you in
another article but until then, have a great rest of your day and take care.
SHARE IS CARING!
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Posted on December 3, 2023March 1, 2024 by NekoJonezPosted in First
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FIRST IMPRESSION: CULT OF THE LAMB (SWITCH) ~ PRAISE THE LAMB, THY LAMB.
Official microsite – Official website – Nintendo.com microsite – Wikipedia page
I enjoy playing unique games quite a lot. When I came across Cult of the Lamb on
the Nintendo Switch eShop, I was interested. I marked the game on my wishlist,
so I could find it back when I was hunting for new games. A few weeks ago, I
went on a family trip and I wanted a fresh new game to play. Cult of the Lamb
was on sale together with all its DLC, and I thought: “Let’s buy this and see
what happens.” Now, when I started playing this game… I had some expectations,
but I got something completely different. Did this game turn into a game I
really like and drew me in, or did this game turn into something I regretted
buying? In this article, I want to talk about my opinions on the game, while I
invite you to leave a comment in the comment section down below with your
thoughts and/or opinions on the game and/or the content of this article. So,
let’s dive right into this game and let’s create our very own cult.
Cute horror
When I started playing this game, my younger 8-year-old niece who sat next to me
was saying: “Aren’t you getting too old to play this children game?”. Oh boy,
don’t let the cute characters of this game fool you. I’ll talk more about the
visuals later, but the story is anything but child-friendly.
You play as an unnamed lamb being sacrificed to avoid a prophecy of getting
fulfilled. Yet, during your execution, you get sent to “The One Who Waits”. He
wants you to make a cult in his honor without giving you any say in the matter.
You get reborn with new powers so you can take revenge on the old Gods that
executed you. Now tell me, this sounds like this game isn’t too child-friendly
anymore, no?
There is not a lot of voice acting in this game besides your usual grunts and
babble. A lot happens in text dialogue and the writing is excellent. Since the
Gods that executed you are from the “Old Faith”, the writing of some characters
is also sometimes in that old English style, and I love it.
If I’m really honest, the story overall isn’t the strongest point of this game.
While it’s decent, it’s a bit predictable and an amazing way to set the
atmosphere of the game. But, I feel that it stays too safe at certain moments. I
noticed moments of expanding the lore and fleshing everything out, but sometimes
these moments fly underneath the radar. Especially since some story bits happen
during a hectic run and your mind is set on something very different.
If you want to enjoy the story of this game, I’d recommend that you take note of
what the characters during your runs are saying instead of mashing through it. I
made that mistake a few too many times, and I feel like I’m missing some lore
here and there. Sadly enough, there is no “lore book” or history page you can
look up things.
Now, thankfully, this game is still quite strong if you don’t pay too much
attention to the story. There are various lore video’s out there if you want to
relive the story. To me, the story in this game is more something to help set
the tone of the games’ world and give it that unnerving layer underneath its
cute and charming vibe that the game is giving off.
Stark contrast
This game consists out of two main gameplay mechanics. You have your base
building, and you have the rouge lite dungeon crawling “conquests”. Both are
quite important, since both mechanics lien on each other in very interesting
ways.
If you have played a game like Rogue Legacy or We Who Are About To Die, you know
that in those games you explore a randomly generated dungeon or fight random
fights. In between the fights, you are in your base camp, where you can buy
upgrades to improve your next chances in your next run. Well, in this game, that
base camp is expanded into a town simulator. You have to care for your flock by
cooking them food, providing them shelter, curing them when they are sick, going
on various mini-quests for them… If you are a good caretaker, your flock
generates devotion, which you can use to upgrade your base and your abilities in
your run. When you are a bad caretaker, they will die and/or even steal from you
and leave the cult.
It’s quite important to know that your cult doesn’t sleep or get inactive when
you are conquesting. As soon as you go out for one of the four dungeons, your
cult goes through their daily routine and things can go quite wrong.
Now, in theory, you can never go conquesting and only focus on the base building
alone. Then, you still have an amazing game to play, but let me tell you, you do
lose out on quite a lot of the game. Also, some things become quite impossible
to do, and you are sort of forced into going into the dungeon. Now, the
punishment for death or escaping the dungeon isn’t that hard, depending on your
difficulty settings.
Speaking about those, if you put this game on easy… This game is a cakewalk. You
can change the difficulty setting quite easily, but the dungeon becomes a bit
boring if you play it on easy. The normal setting is quite balanced and provided
me with a lot of challenge. There is no punishment for playing on easy or
switching, so if you want to lower or higher the difficulty setting, go ahead.
While the base building has a rather creepy-cute ascetic like a children horror
movie, the light gore elements come more into play during the conquesting
sections. Overall, the game is rather tame with its gore, but if you start
reading into the story and the visuals a bit more, things can become quite
creepy indeed. Also, depending on the choices you make when you upgrade your
cult. Depending on those decisions, you can make the game more “creepy” or more
“charming”.
Now, let’s talk a bit more in depth about the conquests you can go on. At first,
you can only access the Dark Woods dungeon. The more followers you have in your
flock, the more dungeons you can unlock. Each dungeon has its own theme and
unique resources you can find in there. Sadly, it’s not always clear which
resources are found where, so mental notes can be quite handy. At one hand, the
buildings you can create in your base sometimes give very good hints. Since,
they are separated into categories and their materials are sometimes the best
hint.
During each conquest, you go through small maps where you go from room to room
fighting enemies. At the start of the conquest, you get a random weapon and a
random second attack. We get a whole range of weapons like knives, swords, axes
and hammers. They are also in various categories like vamperic or toxic. This
first roll decides quite a lot. The weapon I hated the most is the hammer, since
it’s quite slow, and it only damages when the hammer has landed. Not something
you need in a fast-paced combat system.
Overall, the enemies telegraph their attacks quite well. Only when they go
off-screen and flew in suddenly, I felt that the game cheated me. Thankfully,
this happens so infrequently, I’m not even seeing it as a problem. The combat in
this game is quite fast-paced. Standing still and not using your dodge roll are
two death sentences in this game. The difficulty curve in this game is amazing
for the combat. They slowly introduce the new mechanics, and you have time to
get used to them. While the game can be unforgiving with barely dropping any
healing items, you need to get lucky. But, learning the combat system is
essential.
You can also find tarot cards, here you have another random roll. Most of these
cards give you a nice buff or change up a game mechanic. Like, there is a tarot
card that changes the reward chest of beating a room from gold coins to fish,
which gives you more food to feed your flock. These draws are always random and
can safe or break a run.
Now, after a certain amount of rooms, you go to the exit of the map. Then you
come across a diagram towards the boss room. You have to decide which path to
take. Now, you need to decide this carefully. Since, you can go back, and you
only follow the lines drawn on the diagram. So, if you are going for a new
follower run, take that path. But, do keep your resources into consideration. If
you see food, stone or wood in that other path, and you really need that, do
consider that path too.
There are also relics, in most cases these relics are sort of “screen nukes”
basically. They either apply an effect to all enemies in the room or on screen,
give you a really strong temporary buff, or just kill all enemies. Sometimes
these relics are a one time use, and sometimes you need them to recharge by
either having your flock pray for you or defeat more enemies.
Now, the amount of control you have over your character is perfect. The controls
are extremely responsive and makes me feel in control while I’m going through my
conquest. Even when I take a short break from the game, it’s not hard to figure
out the controls again, since the first room is always a safe room. Or I could
try them out in these special rooms where a character talks a bit about the
lore, or where I can draw a new tarot card or in very rare cases even heal.
At the end of each conquest tree, you will encounter a boss room. That’s your
destination. Defeating that boss guarantees you a safe return without loosing
any resources you gained from that run. These boss battles are quite a lot of
fun to play. They are always different depending on your weapon, your secondary
attack, your tarot cards… Defeating three bosses in the dungeon will cause the
old God of that area to challenge you. When you defeat all four of these old
Gods, you will be able to go to the final boss. But, even if you have defeated
the old God of an area, you can still go and run their dungeon. And if you then
destroy a devotion statue, there is a big chance a red portal will spawn to
refight them, giving you an option for a quick escape if you have a terrible
map.
Praising how close we were
Now, in the previous section I have talked quite in depth about the conquest
mechanic in this game. Let’s now focus our attention to the village building and
the other mechanics of this game.
Like I talked about earlier, visually this game looks quite charming. Even in
the dungeons, this game looks quite charming if you don’t think too much about
what’s actually going on. The game looks cartoony and quite colorful and lures
you in with it’s adorable charm to sometimes slap you with a villager request of
being scarficed themselves.
Building out your village is quite a lot of fun. You really have to decide to
use your resources well, since some buildings can be quite important and even
optimize the game for you. For most tasks, there is no way to automate them
apart from a very select few.
For example, if you build a morgue, your flock will bring dead villagers to it
instead of letting them rot in your base camp. But burrying your death villagers
is still a task you need to do and the morgue has only so many slots. Another
great example is, you can appoint villagers to tend to the farms. They will
plant, water and put fertilizer but actually picking the crops is on you.
Update: I turns out I am wrong, I thought I built farm houses level 2, but mine
are level 1. The level 2 farm houses do also gathering of crops. Now, the
supplying of seeds and fretiziler is still on you.
And the final example I’ll give is, you can build a villager kitchen and they
will cook every meal you provide the ingredients for. If you are out of
ingredients you have put in, for max of 30 pending meals, you will have to
resupply it.
Wood and stone quarries will break after a certain amount of time, so you will
have to rebuild them. Also, when you want to upgrade some buildings to their
best form, you will have to build their weaker form first. The base building is
quite in depth. And on top of that, several important things to keep high. First
of all, we need to keep the belief in the cult high. The lower that belief goes,
the higher the chance you have of deserters. And the more deserters you have,
the slower you can upgrade your abilities for the conquests and let me tell you,
you need those upgrades for sure. Besides that, you have hygiene and food to
worry about. The lower those meters are, the more chance you have of your
villagers getting sick and risking death.
While you are playing this game, I’m going to give you one piece of advice for
the base building. Something that’s quite overpowered is the fact you can
inspire your villagers every day. This always garantuees devotion and makes sure
you level up your villagers and makes sure you unlock the needed items for those
upgrades. That way you don’t have the risk using certain rituals to lift the
belief up. And why not risking these rituals, well let’s just say that villager
requests are timed and they are sometimes shorter than the cooldown time of the
ritual.
The day and night cycle of this game is quite important as well. Let your
villagers sleep during the nighttime. Also, use the nighttime to your advantage.
Critters are running around that might give you that additional piece of food
you really need if you catch them. Also, you can go to other places to play
mini-games or do additional side quests for more decorations for your base.
Besides looking extremely well, these decorations have no real impact to the
game.
Something that can have a very minor impact to your game is the form you choose
of your followers. Since some types of animals have a pet option that rises
their experiece/devotion meter by a really small bit. Experiment with all the
different forms since I’m convinced that there are other things that I have
missed in there. Their designs are also adorable and charming. Also, you can
create some funny looking villagers as well with certain colorschemes.
Now, the music and sound effects in this game are amazing. The soundtrack of
this game is calming when it needs to be, but rather intense during fights.
Since I started playing this game, I can’t tell you how many times I listened to
the soundtrack during work. The soundtrack is created by River Boy and let me
tell you again, it’s amazing music in game and outside of it as well.
The sound effects in this game really communicate to the player when for example
an attack is happening or a certain action finished. The sound effects feel like
they have impact and are really memorable. I have no complaints there at all.
The pacing of this game is something you decide yourself. While this game can be
beaten in 14 hours or so, I have been playing this game for way longer than 14
hours. I’m enjoying myself so much with this game, I’m really taking my time
with it and going at it slowly. And it’s something that I also love about this
game. There is no rush looming over us.
Sadly, while I have been mostly praising the game, I’m said to say that there
are some issues as well. Mainly in the base building. These issues mostly come
from some nasty bugs that can hinder the experience. Most of these bugs I have
experienced where in the base. Thankfully, it’s not always a guarantee these
bugs will appear for everyone… and sometimes they fix themselves thankfully.
The first one I expierenced is that sometimes the game has very bad slowdown for
just a moment. Especially when we go from night to day. I have a theory why this
is, since I didn’t notice this while I’m conquesting. My gut feeling is telling
me that when you are in the camp, too many things need to be updated like the
crop cycle, waking up the villagers, re-enabling events that you can do only
once per day, remove the nighttime critters… And that’s a bit too much for the
Switch to handle. I notice that it’s especially bad when I’m at my farms since
it needs to redraw all the crops.
The second one I experienced is that the game crashed on me trice. Thankfully,
when I moved the game from the SD card to my internal storage, the crashes went
away. Now, it’s quite rare for games to crash on me on the Nintendo Switch, but
still… Thankfully, the autosave is very generous and you won’t loose too much
progress when the game crashes. And if it were to crash in a dungeon run (which
I never had happen by the way), those are always around 10 – 15 minutes long in
the first place.
Another one I experienced is the infamous morgue glitch. For some reason, it’s
possible that when somebody dies in your flock and the villagers bring that body
to the morgue, you’ll be unable to pick it out of the morgue. The issue here is
that this “ghost body” is permanent and occupying a slot in the morgue. Sadly
enough, I have two of these ghost bodies. Meaning, when I get a 3rd, my morgue
is filled and I get a permanent hygiene penalty.
In very rare cases, I saw how the game was optimized for Switch. When villagers
are off screen, they loose all their animation. Sadly, in very rare cases you
can still see it at the edges of your screen and it’s looks quite funny. Another
very rare case as well are the glitches where you can’t cut a tree in your base.
You somewhat get stuck into the animation. Thankfully, mashing buttons gets you
out of that.
But one of the most annoying bugs/things in this game to me is how unrealible
the mission length is. You can send a follower on a mission to get new followers
or resources. Now here is the thing, they say it will take X amount of days or
time for them to get back. Sadly, this is anything but a guarantee. It’s even
possible that it takes them two or even three days longer for you to return.
Now, apart from the morgue glitch, all the bugs I experienced you can work
around. Thankfully, they don’t appear too often so you don’t feel like this game
is unpolished. Since this game has quite a lot of polish and it shows. Since,
apart from these bugs, I really have a hard time finding negative things to talk
about in this game and if I find them, they are somewhat nitpicky as well.
Things that I found annoying or negative in this game are for example, there is
no way to fully harvest all your crops in one go. If there is one, I haven’t
found it and it’s not clearly explained to the player. But, it’s a nice and
relaxing night time activity so, I don’t mind it too much.
Another example is when somebody dies at day time, it’s always a pain to prepare
the body when it’s in a group of grieving followers. The issue here is that they
barf on the ground, giving your hygiene a big hit. But, they disperse quite
quickly so you can move the body after that.
Sometimes, when a lot of things are near to each other, some hitboxes can be
really finicky. You’ll need to stand in the exact spot and face the exact angle
for it to register or count. Also, why can you not gather the devotion of
shelter when a villager is sleeping in it? You only get the option to talk to
that villager.
Like I said, apart from some bugs, the negatives are quite minor in the grand
scheme of things in this game. Since this game is filled with strenghts and it
shows. Like how easy the UI is to navigate and how many options you get to tweak
this game to your liking.
It’s no wonder that I have been playing this game almost exclusively since I
bought it late last month. I can recommend this game to everybody who enjoys
rougelike games, action/adventure games and to a certain extend even horror game
fans. This game really hooked me quite bad and I’m loving the ride. This game is
addictive. This game lures you in with it’s cute and charming atmosphere but
will sometimes remind you that it might be a wolf in sheep clothing and show
it’s true cult colors.
While I can totally understand that some people expected more about this game,
is just another thing about this game. It shows the potential this game, this
formula has. I’m hoping we are going to see a sequel or even a DLC that adds new
mechanics since I’m over half way in beating this game and I’m convinced that
after beating this game, I’ll still be hungry for more Cult of the Lamb content.
Maybe I’ll even try a run on the hardest difficulty… Since the replay value of
this game is out of the roof. Or I might turn into a base building player and
use the excellent photography mode… Who knows?
And with that said, I have said everything about this game I want to say for
now. I want to thank you so much for reading this article and I hope you enjoyed
reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it. I hope to be able to welcome you in
another article but until then, have a great rest of your day and take care.
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Posted on November 19, 2023November 19, 2023 by NekoJonezPosted in First
ImpressionTagged 001, action, action-adventure game, adventure, arpegi,
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FIRST IMPRESSION: METAL: HELLSINGER (PC – STEAM) ~ RHYTHMIC DOOM
Steam – Official website
While I love music, I’m not that fond of rhythm games. Because, I can’t keep a
rhythm for some reason. Especially in games, since my playing style is quite
reflex based, and I act on instinct instead of on the beat of music. Anyway, I
was scrolling through the games I got via my Humble Bundle subscription and I
saw Metal: Hellsinger. I was like: “Oh, a new indie shooter game, let’s give it
a try.”. I only noticed that it was a rhythm game after I installed it and
booted it up. So, I was afraid that this game wasn’t going to be something for
me. Yet, this game surprised me… And in this article I want to talk about it,
while I invite you to give your thoughts and/or opinions on the content of this
article and/or the game in the comment section down below.
Going to hell singing
In the world of this game, hell is a place where memories are lost. Demons don’t
know who they were and why they are down there. Also, because souls are tortured
in hell, something is taken away from you. For the main character in this game,
the Unknown, that’s her voice. She is out to get it back and travels through
hell to defeat the demons standing in her way to get her voice back.
The story in this game mostly takes a backseat for the actual gameplay loop of
this game. I’ll talk more about the gameplay later. First, let me talk about the
voice acting. The voice acting in this game is pretty good. Since the main
character is mute, one of our weapons is our guide and tells what’s going on.
The skull named Paz is voiced by no one less than Troy Baker. His performance
here is excellent, and it’s a joy to listen to. The other voiced character is
the main antagonist of the game, the Red Judge. She is voiced by Jennifer Hale.
I have to tell you, the voice acting in this game is well done.
In terms of the story, I’m not going to critique it too much. Because the game
is rather short, and I don’t want to spoil anything. Not that this story is
going to move you to the edge of your seat, but still. Howlongtobeat puts this
game at a runtime of 4 1/2 hours, and I have to say that’s a very low estimate.
If you are good at rhythm games, I can totally see this game taking you give or
take 5 hours, but if you aren’t the best in rhythm games, I think that 7 to 8
hours is more reasonable.
Now, something I really like in this game is that the cutscenes are mainly
lightly animated comic book panels. This makes the art in the cutscenes of this
game highly detailed and give it an amazing atmosphere. A few cutscenes are
in-game and they look fine. Let me just say that if I had to be real nitpicky
that some textures in action moments were a bit rough and stood out from the
amazing looking visuals in this game. Thankfully, it’s something that will be
noticed if you review games for a hobby or a job, but I’m certain it will be
less noticeable if you are just enjoying this game.
The story is mostly told at the start and at the end of each level. The pacing
of this game is quite fast because of certain gameplay mechanics. But, more on
that later. If it’s too fast for you, you have a codex where you can look up
more lore or more information on the enemies and events in the game. These
unlock automatically, and you don’t have to go looking for them… Looking at you,
Doom…
Rhythmic Doom
If I had to describe this game in a few sentences, I have to say this. Take the
hectic shooting combat of Doom, combine it with the combo system of Devil May
Cry, and mix it with the rhythm gameplay from Crypt of the Necromancer.
In this game, you go from arena to arena and fight a boss at the end. The arenas
themselves are combat puzzles where you have to know how each enemy operates in
order for you to prioritize the right enemies. Each arena is gets between 2 and
5 rounds of enemies spawned in. In total, you have 7 main enemy types for you to
deal with. They get introduced one by one, and you get more than enough time to
learn the behaviors of these enemies.
You also have special elite versions of some enemies, and let me tell you… They
are the ones you will hate. They are not only stronger than their normal
counterpart but also hit harder. I still hate the first elite enemy you
encounter. The shield cambions can go and die in a fire. You need to get close
to them and strafe around them to get through their shield, but they have a very
nasty wide fireball attack that makes getting close to them quite difficult.
Just like in Doom, you can stagger an enemy. When you stagger an enemy, you can
glory kill them. Instead of blinking blue, they blink orange in this game. If
you press E at the right time, you will fly towards the enemy and glory kill it.
If you don’t press E at the right time, the enemy will get up and continue
attacking you. Glory killing is important since you can regain some health from
it. This is especially handy when you used up all the healing crystals in the
arena.
Now, you might have noticed at the top of the screenshots, you have a
multiplier. This multiplier is exactly what you assume, it’s a damage
multiplier. Like in Devil May Cry, if you keep fighting, that meter will go up.
The higher it goes, the better. It’ll slowly go down, so you have to make a mad
dash towards the next arena to fight again to keep it high. There are also
sometimes power-ups in the arena’s that either double your current fury OR up it
to the maximum right away, which is 16x.
Sadly, just killing enemies doesn’t increase the counter. If you look closely at
the crosshair in the screenshots, you might start to understand how the rhythm
mechanic in this game works. It’s sort of like DDR/Guitar Hero, where arrows
come from one side, and you have to hit the right button when they are inside
the arrows of the crosshair. The better your rhythm, the more damage you do and
the more your fury meter increases.
But, that’s not the only advantage of keeping a rhythm. When you press “R” at
the perfect time during the reload animation, you’ll be able to instantly reload
your weapon. Now, unlike Doom, you don’t have limited ammo. So, no need to keep
in mind which ammo you still have and which one not. You can only take two guns
into a level, so choose wisely. Each weapon has their own special mechanics and
usefulness and maybe if you die over and over again, you might want to try with
another weapon.
Another important gameplay mechanic is the yellow bar you see in the
screenshots. This yellow bar is a charge bar. The better you hold the rhythm,
the more you charge that bar with that weapon. When it reaches max, you will be
able to unleash the special ability of that weapon. For example, for your blade,
it’s going ninja on your enemies with extremely fast sword swings. Another
example are the dual pistols, where you spawn a temporary clone of yourself,
they not only helps you fight but also increases your fury meter.
Now, interesting to know is that you can revive yourself 3 times on the easiest
difficulty when trading in some score. This is an amazing feature in my opinion.
This allows players with a bad sense of rhythm to play this game without getting
too frustrated, but it’s also a punishment. Now, these points are nothing more
than bragging rights for the global leaderboard, but it works quite effectively.
I don’t know how different it is on the other difficulty modes, since I’m
playing on the easy difficulty. There are four of them, with the 4th one being
locked at first.
Metal rhythmic
I think that it’ll surprise nobody that for this game, we get a metal
soundtrack. On the Wikipedia page for this game, you get an amazing list of all
the tracks in this game.
Now, while I do enjoy metal music, I’m not that big a fan when the vocals are
just screaming the lyrics into the mic. I just enjoy my music when I understand
the lyrics right away without listing closely, and English not being my first
language also plays a huge role in that. Thankfully, in this game, it isn’t that
bad. There are a few tracks where it happens and most of them are
understandable, like in Amaranthe tracks, for example.
The amount of different artists that helped to make this soundtrack by Two
Feathers come true is just incredible. Some of these are real earworms, like the
main theme and “Stygia ft. Alissa White-Gluz from Arch Enemy”. I think I’ll have
to look up some of these bands later, since I really liked their work for this
game. Each level has its own theme and the soundtrack fits this game as a glove.
There are also two DLC’s for this game. One adds 9 additional songs and the
other one adds two songs and some cosmetics.
Let me be honest, I feel that the second DLC with “essential songs” isn’t the
best. There are some none metal songs in there and clash hard with the vibe. The
other DLC that adds two additional songs and cosmetics is a lot better and a
steal for the price. I’m really curious to see what they are going to do next,
since when you look at the DLC list in the main menu, there is a third option
saying “coming soon”.
The music and gameplay work together quite nicely to bring you a highly
addictive arena shooter with a lot of rhythm game elements. Apart from that, the
sound design of this game is also quite amazing. The guns and weapons feel
amazing to use, and you really hear the impact they have. Now, sometimes the
feedback of getting hit isn’t clear enough, but playing a bit with the options
fixed that for me.
Speaking about the options, the amount of flexibility this game has is just
insane. You can adjust quite a lot to your liking, and you can even totally
disable the whole rhythm mechanic from the game. Now, I advise against doing
that since the game is quite well-balanced on the easiest difficulty setting,
and you can just recalibrate so the audio and video latency is to your
playstyle.
Visually, this game looks amazing. While the colors used in the levels can be
quite monotone, everything still stands out and everything is quite easy to read
during hectic fights. Also, details like the marionete enemies having strings
aren’t lost during the hectic gameplay. You can quickly see when you are low on
ammo on a gun or when an enemy is hiding or walking behind a wall. You also
quickly see exit when you finished the arena.
Each level also has it’s own unique visual presentation. From a snowy arena to
an big church… Each level looks different and looks amazing. A lot of memorable
set pieces. I loved the mine level where you always came back to a similar room
and had a lot of different fights. Also, the visuals change whenever you are in
a higher fury counter. A lot more fireworks are displayed with some more
animations.
In terms of animations, these just add to the atmosphere. Attacks are quite well
telegraphed and with the quite responsive controls, I rarely felt that taken
damage wasn’t my fault. Also, the green glow healing crystals give off, makes
them easy to read as well. Something I also love is that you can see the top of
the Unknown’s wings when you double jump. There are a lot of details present in
this game without the UI and the screen becoming cluttered with information. Oh,
and in terms of the animations as well, the animation of the main character in
the main menu, oh boy. The way she throws you the peace sign and flies off when
you click on the exit button or when she looks at the skull when you look at the
codex, just wow. The charm while staying true to the setting is amazing.
Something you need to be careful of is that there are no mid-level saves in this
game. One time I had the bad luck that just before a bossfight, Windows Update
decided to reboot my PC. When my computer rebooted and I restarted the game, I
had to restart the level. Thankfully, the levels are rather short so it isn’t
that bad. The game saves automatically when you beat a level so we don’t have to
worry about that one.
Something else to keep in mind is that healing crystals can be destroyed with
one simple shot. And yes, they despawn quite rapidly. So, stay aware while
fighting since these healing crystals are really needed in this game.
I have been mostly praising this game, but are there any negatives I can say
about this game? What is this game doing wrong? It’s not the extremely stable
frame rate, since I haven’t seen any slowdowns while playing this game. Most of
my complaints about this game are rather small in the grand scheme of things.
The first minor complaint I have is that actually preforming a glory kill is
quite unforgiving. If you are even a little bit off, you get denied. Thankfully,
you get that information quickly with a visual and sound cue. But, still the
amount of times I was off by just a few milliseconds and got denied, is
frustrating.
The second minor complaint I have is about the default controls. Your blade is
the first weapon you have and let me tell you, with the font useed, you barely
see the difference between É and E. So, it took me some time to realize I had to
press 1 on my number row instead of E… Just show the number keys too on that
small icon.
Apart from going for a higher score or finding the hidden coat of armor for more
additional bonus goodies, there isn’t a high replay value. Also, the UI before
you enter the level gives you the impression that you need the sigils … while
you don’t need them at all.
Sigils are bonus challenges that can unlock additional perks but unlike
Nightmare Reaper these are anything but essential to finish the game. I only
finished my first Sigil after I had beaten one of the final three levels. Yet,
they are a fun challenge to challenge your skills with the game with an unique
twist. They are also timed as well.
The third minor complain I have is how semi-aggressive the DLC is promoted.
“Unlock by buying the DLC”. But on the other hand, I totally understand that the
company needs to make money and promote that the DLC exists.
My final minor complaint is that as soon as you have found your two weapons, you
are set. Apart from when they are introduced, there is no reason to use them
anymore. It’s a shame since all them have unique and nice gameplay styles. Do
yourself a favor and change up your weapons sometimes.
Honestly, I’m having a hard time finding negavites with this game. Most of the
negatives I can say about this game are rather minor and don’t detract from the
amazing gameplay loop. While I can totally understand that this game can feel
repetitive to some, I feel that the gameplay loop and unique arenas are
addictive enough to stand up on their own two feet.
I’m surprised that a rhythm game is this much fun and provides challenge for
every playstyle. Even when you can’t keep rhythm like myself, you can still
enjoy this game. You can also disable the rhythm mechanics completely. You’ll be
able to experience the whole game but not be able to submit your score to the
leaderboards. But, like I said earlier, you’ll miss out on one of the
fundemental mechanics that make this game so much fun to play.
I highly recommend this game to everybody who enjoys action/shooter games.
Especially if you enjoyed games like Blood, Nightmare Reaper, Quake or Doom. Do
be warned that this game is on the short side, but is in my opinion totally
worth full price. The amount of polish and care that has been put into this game
is fantastic. At first I was afraid that this game was going to frustrate me
like all other rhythm games do, but this game is polished to a fine diamond that
really makes me want to stay in rhythm since it feels so rewarding to finally
beat my score.
And with that said, I have said everything I wanted to say about this game for
now. I want to thank you so much for reading this article and I hope you enjoyed
reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it. I hope to be able to welcome you in
another one but until then, have a great rest of your day and take care.
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Posted on October 22, 2023 by NekoJonezPosted in First Impression,
PersonalTagged 001, actors, arpegi, backer, bonus, buttonsmashers, cosmetic,
crafted, DLC, doom, first, free, funcom, game, gameplay, hale, halloween,
happenings, hell, hellsinger, impression, information, jennifer, Jonez,
jonezjea, judge, laterlevels, lore, mage, Metal, more, narrorator, NekoJonez,
Nightmare, normal, opinion, outsiders, pc, pixels, playstation, quake, Reaper,
red, review, rhythm, scary, shooter, special, spoiler, The, troy, unknown,
voice, well, Xbox. 2 Comments
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