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  1. HandsomeDead

    Hohokum

    Hohokum is one of those video games that gets caught up in the debate of 'oh, but is it a video game' and I really hate that debate... well, I don't hate it, I just don't think it matters. Is it a virtual thing you interact and have fun/dramatic/entetrtaining times with? well, sir/madam, that is a video game. So with that sorted, let me tell you a bit about Hohokum. In Hohokum you are a one eyed snake (lol) and you whizz around this strange world full of colourful characters living their wee lives and you have to help them out. The reason you gotta help them out is because other one eyed snakes are trapped and you have to rescue them, and they're stuck in unexpected places. You have to decipher the world and try and figure out where they are hidden. It's hard to explain the game without namechecking others so that's what I'm going to do. So think: Fez Nobi Nobi Boy Animal Crossing. Fez comes to me because becuase it's a game with no hand holding. You're left to go and explore and you have to figure out the problems yourslef. I wouldn't even say the problems are that hard to solve, but when you have a game so full of stuff (cool stuff, mind) it can be hard find them. In fact I found them by stumbling into them, and only in hindsight do I see why. That takes me to Nobi Nobi Boy. To me, that game was just fun to interact with; it was a game that was fun to see what would happen if you did such and such. A few games do that but it's usually based around violence, but this was cute stuff. Hohokum has that too. As well as that I like how the game feels to play, in the way you move. It has a real nice feeling inertia to it, and I also discovered how to move really quickly in it by fluttering the L and R buttons to snake at high speeds through the level. There is so much nuance to the movement, I love it. And the reason it makes me think of Animal Crossing is that it just has that simple satisfaction fo doing simple things for people. Get wee man to a certain place and a cool thingy will happen; get wine to the peole and such and such will happen. It's just full of simple rewards for trivial stuff, but it's fun because of just how the game feels to play. Obviously, it's one of those games that are hard to decribe, but I tried my best here. I think I'd recomend it to anyone who like at least two of the games I'd mentioned.
  2. Before I properly devote myself to Trails in the Sky I want to quickly bash through some of the games I've picked up on Steam in the last year, starting with this. Echo of the Wilds is a kind of artsy exploration game that calls to mind Superbrothers, Lone Survivor etc. There are survival elements like eating, drinking, crafting but I think the game is definitely more Superbrothers than Don't Starve. I could be wrong. There's an endless survival mode as well as a story mode, if I am deciphering the main menu corrrectly...
  3. I think this is a game that maybe a bunch of people have picked up at some point during a Steam sale, maybe. It has even been reduced really low on Wii U so I assume someone may have this game as well. I just want to say if you haven't played it yet but have it then get it played. It's a a cool game. What I've noticed is it promotes itself as a game with no real tutorial and you have to just figure it out. That sounds all well and good but therer are a few to many games out there that claim to do that but are just obtuse and a pain in the arse; Toki Tori 2 isn't that. Maybe it has too much of a simple opening, but it's only after playing it a bit and getting to appreciate the level of complexity do I realise why they started this game slowly. What is awesome about it is that the game is based around interacting with wildlife, and when you start off you don't know the amount of interaction you actually have until you've gone through a load of the game, and then you're like 'oh shit, those butterflies were at the start and I could have got them to do such and such'. I guess it's almost like playing a Metroidvania but having all the power-ups from the start, except you don't know what they do unless you play more, which is super cool. It has the most natural progression without you having to unlock anything. I know it's far from the most exciting game in the world but it is such a perfect Sunday afternoon hang out game. You just potter about and solve some surprisingly satisfying puzzles. I think it's worth a punt, but I don't know for certain if anyone herer would like it. But I'm giving it a hearty thumb up, anyway.
  4. Scram Kitty is a pretty weird game. It's a sort of top down shooter and platformer, but the platforming is still side on because you can only move while attached to like a rail wall thing... and you can only shoot in front of you. It sounds like everything in it is just going to hamper you but there is some satisfaction in unlearning what we usually know about these kinds of games and getting good at Scram Kitty. What your goal is for each level is you have to collect four cats in each level: one you get when you reach the goal, another you get for collecting 100 coins in the level, one appears after killing a tough enemy and the final, and most problematic one, is a cat that moves around the level when you first touch it and acts as a checkpoint race which you have a very limited time to get between checkpoints. I have around 30 cats right now and the more you have the more levels you have access to. From what I can tell you just need 70 to get to the final level, but it seems like there may be over 100 to collect. It's certainly got that 3D Mario game structure in terms of progression. The levels are good, in fact they get super tough, especially where I am now and it's all about using the geometry of the levels to kill bad guys, since you can only shoot forwards getting into position is key. In fact the way some enemies move is really erratic and does get frustrating as it often seems you can't avoid them or shoot them. I'd say that's the worst part of it. So it's an interesting game... not sure I'd call it a great one, or even recommend it, but it's certainly something. It's not boring, that's for sure.
  5. DANGERMAN

    The Fall

    Heard a bit of praise for this so I thought I'd pick it up and give it a go. It's a bit unfortunate it's come out after The Swapper, because it shares the same aesthetic, use of light, and creepy desolate space station vibe.The Fall is more of a point and click with gun combat, you use your gun's light to reveal things you can interact with, then select how to interact, combine with an object or whatever. The problem with it is that The Fall can get a bit 'try to click on everything while trying to combine everything with everything' pretty quickly, or it did for me at least, especially annoying when I'd worked out a later puzzle but wasn't allowed to solve it yet, so my progress just stopped. I've also encountered a puzzle where you have to inch your way through, solve one bit and the next bit will drop on the floor, do something with that and now there's suddenly another bit on the floor, but it doesn't really tell you it's happening. The plot is pretty cool, you're the AI of an armoured suit, your human is damaged (non-responsive) and your primary objective is to keep your pilot alive, in any way you can. It's well done so far, and it's got better as it goes along. I suppose it's more like Flashback than anything, seems good so far
  6. DANGERMAN

    Year Walk

    I suspect there's posts about Year Walk on the forum but there doesn't seem to be a thread. I've not quite finished it yet, looking at where I can potentially go there's not a lot left, not that it's impossible that a whole new area will open up, and there's still a box I have no idea what to do with. For those that haven't played it, it's basically a point and click, but one that fairly quickly becomes bleak as fuck. You're not quite just switching between locations, you have to walk along until you get to the path to the next area, which is occasionally used quite well, in quite an ominous way, but when you're stuck, lost, or have to do some leg work to solve a puzzle, it gets tedious. Which is where I'm at with it at the minute and why I'm writing this and not playing it. I've worked out what I need to do to solve a puzzle (in the graveyard for those that have played it) but it involves wandering around finding things that I've forgotten the location of, and I'll probably need to write the solutions down on something. So yeah, time for a coffee and a break before going and doing that. It's good though, I love a good off-key dark fairytale, and that's kind of what this is. It does seem odd that it started out life as a phone game still
  7. Hendo

    They Bleed Pixels

    Got this in the Steam sale. The best I can describe it is like Super Meat Boy merging with a 2D Devil May Cry or Bayonetta. Not as complex as those brawlers but the simple idea is the same in that you can juggle enemies around. Lots of blood and spikes like Meat Boy and the platforming is pretty brutal. The stages aren't short like Meat Boy, only about 7 of them and I'm stuck on the 2nd. One of the cleverer bits is that you can choose where your checkpoints are. You fill up a meter with collectibles and once you stay still for a second or two, the checkpoint is out there. If it's still on sale or comes up again I can recommend it. Here's the trailer which shows it far better than I could. http://youtu.be/7X42GIOfuYo
  8. I was a massive PAD player (Puzze & Dragons). To be honest the game is not well balanced and lower level monsters did not scale so their was really no strategy. Also PAD was harsh due to poorly written algorithms. While I love the RPG/Match Three games I was not happy with that product anymore, so over the weekend I tried three some what new-ish RPG/Match Three games - Tower of Saviors, Pac-Man Monsters and Puzzle Troopers. Pac-Man Monster is new to the app store and is a well made game, but had no strategy you just draw lines thats it. It also not match three as you can tap one red dot and your red monster will attack. Just lame. Puzzle Troopers from Gumi is straight pay to play. It almost religiously badgers you to buy in game currency. Also lame. So I moved on to the last one Tower of Saviors from a Hong Kong based studio. The game is highly polished offering Vanillaware quality artwork and soundtrack. Gameplay is far superior to PAD and better written. While they do offer you gems to buy it really not needed as Mad Head (the developers) are very generous with give you one to two gems a day. I have two solid teams (one with high ranking cards and another mid-ish ranking cards) and I'm more than willing to fork over cash to extend my card slots due to the overall generosity and business practices of Mad Head. Also, a nice touch of detail the backgrounds of the cards move if you move your tablet/phone left to right. <iframe width="640" height="360" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/iebbEzJEuqA" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>
  9. I'm starting this thread because I've been playing this game. Some of you will know that I have bought an arcade stick recently, even though I only had the HD version of Darkstalkers to use a stick on. So since this game was only released about a month ago I decided to get it, just so I had a fighting game that was kinda in vogue. But this meant earning a new fighting game. Now I'm not that familiar with this kinda game so it's weird for me. It's a game where pretty much any move combos into another. I hear the Vs. Capcom games are often like this but I don't know, I' only quasi-familiar with them. I dunno what to say about it. You can pretty much make a combo of anything as long as you start with light attacks and work your way up with standard, crouching and jumping variants. Linking in some special and Blockbuster attacks will also do damage and impress. BUt that's all fighting game bullshit. What I do like is you only have eight characters (well nine now thanks to some free DLC) but they are all very different. And even the bread and butter character, Filia, is pretty damn fun to use so there are no filler characters. I don't really know what else to say about a game like this. I think it's a fighting game fan's fighting game and the stories are really cool but I can't go any deeper than that. Even though this version of the game hasn't been out long there is no-one playing it online so that is annoying. I got it hoping there would be a community. So sorry for the shite impressions but if any PS3 Skullgirls owners are lurking lets hook up. I wanna try my button mashing against people.
  10. This came out of the steam tombola and it comes out on the newer consoles soonish. Normally I wouldn't do a thread for something only I'm going to end up playing, but this deserves it. Did you like Colony Wars and X-Wing Vs Tie Fighter? You'll be wanting a slice of this if you did. SSZ is a space combat game where you're given a set of orders and expected to follow them. You're not a super soldier killing every last thing, you are part of a machine. If you fail to fulfil your orders the whole thing falls apart and can make the rest of the mission harder or even fail it outright. You're going to spend a lot of time dogfighting but there's other orders that mix things up a bit. You're scored on missions, doing well sees you unlocking medals, medals equals unlocks which can be used to pimp out your fighter. Different fighters have different attributes and slots to fill with weaponry. I've not actually unlocked much yet, but I can see that some are clearly better in some regards than the others. Controls are a bit hard to get your head around when you start, but you can pitch, roll and do all sorts of fancy shit that will see you skidding and barrelling through the depths of space. It seems hard at first but before long I was able to do trench runs in my ship on big freighters, taking out defences whilst avoiding crashing into debris that seemingly ends up floating about from all the ships you end up scrapping. Getting hit or smashing into something isn't the end of the world, you have a rechargeable shield that can soak up the damage. If you take a hit that isn't absorbed by shields, you have to deal with the hull damage it inflicts until the mission is over. You can use a limited amount of boost and the games warning system to deploy preventative measures from getting hit even more. It's here the game excels in providing you feedback through visual and audio cues that make sure you're protecting yourself when it matters most. Speaking of cues and feedback, there's a part where you're attacking this big space freighter and it's firing flak cannons into the air around you. The closer you get to it the more interference you get trying to pilot around it, it pixelates your screen like a corrupt MP4 and stimies your ability to pilot as you would normally. Usually I wouldn't like that, but it feels really good here, the ship itself is just an obstruction flying through space otherwise, every time you have to deal with one it feels risky as you swoop in trying to take out a defence to make the next pass safer and easier. Other aids are reticles that you can aim for that react to inertia, speed and angle so that you've some idea of where you should be shooting at far off targets. It's a little feature that goes a long way to making the core concept of the game fun Other stuff I should probably mention. Graphically it looks amazing. Although it's very minimalist it really does look the part. The music is great, it reminds me of the Mass Effect games composition. The voice acting is also above what I was expecting, I like how it's not just Americans, the vocalisation is very varied. It's hard as fuck. I'm playing on easy because of the games reputation and I'm yet to feel truly in control of something because of how fast everything is unfurling. I'm hoping when it eventually drops on the newer consoles it comes with a demo so people can try it out. It might surprise a lot of people. In no way is it a top tier million dollar budget game, but the people responsible have crafted an exceptional game, or at least the SSZ part of it is good, I've no idea if SSI is any different.
  11. I picked Escape Goat 2 up tonight on a whim. The first Escape Goat caught my eye when first voted for it last year in Steam Greenlight, but I never bought it due to it being over priced in my opinion. When I checked out Escape Goat 2 I noticed an improved visual style (A mix of Gothic and Modern Flat) and Double Fine's involvement, so I picked it up and it was well worth the money spent. Turn's out Double Fine is only the publisher and did no work on the game. I find that weird as Magical Time Bean had no issues publishing the fist game by themselves. Why give money to Double Fine? It would be one thing if Double Fine was doing advertising for the game, but I've seen none. Anyways, the gameplay is platform/puzzle most of the puzzle so far were not that tricky to solve. Your goal is to rescue the sheep that are trapped in the tower. You get spirit animals (for a lack of a better word) that you can use to solve puzzles. Right know I have a mouse that can get into spaces that the goat can't. Controlling the goat is tight and on point. The music is soothing and well done. It's to bad the soundtrack is not up for sale on steam or bandcamp. Overall I'm really enjoying my time with Escape Goat 2. Will defo be picking up the first Escape Goat after I finish this now.
  12. DANGERMAN

    Betrayer

    I thought I'd only heard of Betrayer 2 days ago when it launched on Steam, but when I was getting killed by a conquistador and his entire face was a black shadow except his eyes, I remembered it from some list of indie games (I presume) Radiofloyd posted. It looks great, the default is that it's black & white with splashes of red on important objects, be that items or enemies. It's set in the 1600s, you've sailed over from England to join up with a colony, only every one appears to be dead, or undead. I'm telling you this because the game doesn't, there's information to find but at no point does it spell out who you are and why you're there, you'd have thought there'd be at least something to set the scene. Betrayer is almost more like a detective game, you hunt for clues and that leads you to question people (spirits) who then give you more information. You have to swap between the light world and the dark world, and the first time that happens it's pretty unsettling. Which is the best thing about the game, for a while having no clue what's going on or what's expected of you is really interesting, it makes the game drip with atmosphere. Unfortunately when you're either stick or dying repeatedly, and I guess this is a problem with a lot of horror games, it neuters everything, you get familiar with the world and a bit more comfortable with what's around you. It's also hugely frustrating at points, because the way you locate things is to hit the X key and then centre in on the sound, once you need more than just a general direction it's not hugely helpful, and if it's guiding you through an enemy laden area it actually starts to feel dickish. That's largely because the game gets hard, the conquistadors can and will fuck you up, in the night world the skeletons have laser precision accuracy, and later on there's enemies who are basically invisible in the default colour scheme. Oh, and it has the Dark Souls mechanic of if you die you drop all your loot, if you die again before you recover it, it's gone forever. For a brief bit Betrayer was both fun and really interesting, the point I'm at now there's too many enemies to make exploring viable, so it's not interesting, and I'm so underpowered compared to the enemies, and so at a disadvantage in terms of spotting some of them, that it's not fun either. It also looks way better than this video makes it look, youtube has compressed it loads
  13. DANGERMAN

    The Cat Lady

    If there's another thread for this I'll find it in the morning, but I know it was supposed to be played in the indie thread. I know this is the sort of thing that everyone says, but generally I'm pretty hardy, I've watched some fairly harrowing stuff, but The Cat Lady is so oppressive that I took a break from it for an hour or so. The game opens with your character, Susan, committing suicide, and that's the happiest thing that happens to her from what I've played. Everything is off-key, distorted in some way and her world is shitty. It's an adventure game, not quite point and click because it doesn't use a mouse but it's 2d and has an inventory. This is where I have problems with the game, there's a puzzle where you have to run the hot water, but it takes ages, there's a few too many examples where the puzzles are a chore. Susan is well acted as are a few other people, but some of them are awful. Typically one of the worst ones was a character I got stuck on. It's a strange game though, and it does depression pretty well. It is relentlessly grim, but because of that it's unique, definitely something you should play if you want something different
  14. Door Kickers was not a game that I liked when I first bought the early access game last year during one of the many Steam sales. On paper I should have loved it at first boot up, but I didn't. A few weeks ago I was chatting on Steam with Mr. Reflex. The subject was his steam tub-o-shame and that he did not like one of the games he drew from it. Frozen Synapse if my memory serves me right. I chimed in with the fact that I had a game like that called Door Kickers and I despised the game. Tonight after taking a break from a session of Halfbirck's Colossatron: Massive World Threat on my tablet I decide to boot up a game on my Linux machine. I saw Door Kickers and thought to myself “what the hell” and re-installed it onto my computer. The game is still in early access and some features are missing. Also missing is the campaign mode. As to what campaign mode is I could not tell you. The game has a playable mode called single player missions, so maybe Campaign is a co-op or vs mode? But a co-op or vs mode would seem out of place in this type of game so who knows really. There is also a random level generator mode and a level editor mode. So once the game was installed I booted it up and selected single player mission mode. The missions are all done in a fog of war, so you don't know where the targets are hiding. I planned out what I thought was the best route to clear the mission. After the smoke settled one of my two squad mates was dead. I'm sure his digital family will miss him. I will send them flowers or a ham with a condolence card. In the end I only got one star from the mission. I sat there staring at my stats for the mission. I mumbled to myself “stars …. like fucken Angry Birds?” I then clicked retry. This time one of my squad members was shot, but it was not fatal. He will be assigned to a nice desk job were he can eat all the doughnuts he wants. This time my stats have improved I got two stars. Then it happened like a caffeine withdraw I needed three stars. I backed out to the menu and click the how to play section. Now I will admit I did not know how to play Door Kickers properly. I thought it was like every other tactics game I've played and I should just “get it”. After all I have been playing these type of games for well over twenty years. After reading the how to play section it dawned on me that I hated this game because I did not know how to play it properly. The game has some deep tactics and I sunk five hours into the game before even knowing I could modify my loadout – primary and secondary weapons, body armor and utility pouch(x2). I could even select who to take on a mission. In fact the men I sent off to die have names like Bing Zhao. So I will admit here in this thread I misjudged this game and I will correct that error by saying Door Kickers is an excellent game. In fact I'm really enjoying myself now that I'm playing it properly. I went back to the first mission. Planned out my attack and executed it. This time no one died but the targets (I think they were debt collectors/telemarketers, so really they deserved it) and I clear the mission in under the time limit set. Also I got my three stars. I fucken hate stars, but I do like this game now. <iframe width="640" height="360" src="//www.youtube.com/embed/bM_Ev7Ks8_o" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>
  15. This is the new one from Vlambeer, the Super Crate Box and Ridiculous Fishing folks. You're lucky I'm here telling you about it because I have been pounding this game the last 24 hours. It's an arcade shooter in the style of Asteroids but there is so much more going on. The enemies are cunts, there are bullets everywhere and you have loads of types of plane that can massively change how you play. The playing field is leveled by you having regen health when you're not firing, but it's really easy to get caught out when trying to get one guy on your tail; it's one of those risk/reward mechanics done really well which I think Vlambeer have a really good hold on, what with this and Ridiculous Fishing. And then there is the plane building thing. Planes atre made up of three bits and there are about six of each which can be combo'd together in any way: there are laser guns, homing rockets, high impact armour, a body that automatically drops bombs, an engine that lets you go under water with taking damage and stuff like that. I feel like some combos are just plain useless (lol) but there are missions attached to (like kill so many fighters, or sink a ship while maintaining max combo) so it's worth seeing what you can do with the dumb combos even if you're not ever likely to get your high score. And it's probably more about doing these missions than getting the best score, it's the thing that keeps you coming back more (though I have a pretty sweet score ) But that's just all guff. It just feels real nice to play. The speed, the responsiveness, just how it's all balanced in how much punishment you can take, all the acrobatics you can do that aren't hard to pull off; it's just a real nice feeling game and polished to a shine. Get it, it's ace.
  16. DANGERMAN

    Blackguards

    I've done a video for this because it's a nightmare to explain It's a strategy rpg, a German one (which for some reason seems to be important), and it's quite complicated. It's based on dice rolls, for just about everything, so your fire spell might do 7 damage or it might do 11, it might miss completely too. Your heal spell can miss, which is a massive pisser, as can your attempts to repair a wound. If you fall down a hole it's because the dice roll on the skill that avoids falling down holes didn't land in your favour. All of this is done in the backend, it's not something you see, so it can be a bit of a mystery why these things are or aren't happening for a while. My biggest problem with Blackguards, although it's something I'm getting to grips with, is the levelling up system. There's XP at the end of a battle, no idea what it does, I've never been my characters level up, I presume they must but it just isn't shown. Instead you are rewarded AP at the end of a battle. You use this AP to level up everything. Everything on the stats page, everything on the weapon page, everything on the traits page, magic if you have that, and to buy skills. It all comes from the same pool and it's never especially clear what you need at any one time. So if I'm taking too much damage do I need to improve my vitality, buy the dodge skill, improve my dexterity, or improve my weapon ability in the hope I'll block more attacks That's something I've grown to quite like though, I think anyway, that when you level up your ability with a weapon type you choose whether to make yourself better at attacking with it or defending. Oh yeah, and there's no grinding, there's just a limited amount of fights so if you're struggling it's just something you're going to have to deal with watch the video, it explains it better. I need to play more of it (got sent it to review), but when things are going well I quite like it, there's been a couple of fights where I've wanted to just walk away, but I suspect it's just a good, obtuse, difficult game
  17. Steam tells me I've put 9 hours into this, so I think I can put some thoughts down. It's an RPG tower defense hybrid. Collect character classes through the story and put them down as you would towers on the battlefield. They don't move but have different abilities and stats. You have your short range, long range, healer and slow-shit-down classes just like any normal RPG or indeed tower defense. So it's a bit weird that I haven't across something as overtly a hybrid as this before. You level up your characters as you go and although you're only given one of each through the story, you can buy more in the shops. It makes sense to have at least 2 of everything, at some point 3 of everything might be wise. You also buy new weapons and armour from the shops although the stats are ultra simplistic as nothing has a downside - you can clearly see if that new piece of shiny is better, worse or the same as your current build, which is brilliant for ignorant fools like myself. The gameplay itself is really fun but it's not gonna win over anyone that doesn't like tower defense as the core gameplay really is just that, just with levelling up on top of it. The story is very RPG though and is pretty much pants. The writing is pretty shoddy and the cut scenes are just un-animated stills that change occasionally. I think it normally goes for a tenner which is a bit much considering how "homegrown" it is but there is a lot of a game there.
  18. I picked up the early access of Divinity Original Sin on Steam last night. My early thoughts are mixed. The game is way to early on to even be on early access. The character creation is currently set on default, so you can customize your character. They stripped female armor art work out of the game due to an overwhelming outcry from Tumblr's social justice feminist, which has made using the forums to give input on make the core game better completely useless as you have leftwing and rightwing morons trolling each other. Honestly I think people should be focused on other things at this point in development. My short list right now would be. Loading screens that take for fucken ever Janky and broken controls Muddy textures How the game manages resource's to improve overall performance The fact that the only enemy I have seen are giant fucken "Genji" crabs If people put political posturing aside and try to make the core game better then Larian Studios will have a very special game on their hands.
  19. DANGERMAN

    Shelter

    felt sure there'd be a thread for this, Radio Floyd is slipping It's a badger simulator. I know what you're thinking, "why aren't there any badger simulators?", well now there are, this one. You play a mother badger and have to look after your cubs. Initially this is hunting down food, so digging up carrots, ramming trees to make apples fall, but later you're hunting animals, small things like frogs and rodents, before stalking foxes which are more of a meal (and I struggled with). It's very simplistic stuff, so maybe it's more that Badger arcade game you were after. Eventually there ends up being threats in the environment to your cubs. There's eagles that will carry them off, unseen creatures in the dark, and strong currents that can wash them away while you're crossing streams. Shelter isn't very long, and I probably didn't form the connection with the cubs I was supposed to, but I was pissed off when I lost a couple of them, but more because I'd fucked up as a gamer than a mother. Anyway, it's cool, I like it, and it's worth picking up in the Steam sale
  20. HandsomeDead

    Boson X

    I've been playing this a lot the last couple of days so I'm talking about it. It's another endless runner for your phone (or PC, if you want) but this one is actually pretty interesting and a lot of fun. You are a scientist who decided to fire himself down the Hadron Collider and use himself to find the Boson Particle. It's a really cool and dumb premise but it makes for a high speed runner with an abstract style which mostly looks pretty good. I think the only thing I don't like is the running animation which continues the dorky running tradition also used by Temple Run, which I believe was started by that guy in Syphon Filter. But he (or she, you can pick a she in the options) is a scientist so a dorky run is more understandable. But a part from the premise which appealed to me, there is another thing: Boson X must of been paying attention to Super Hexagon because there are some similarities in the design which make it more fun that your average 3D runner. Like Super Hexagon it is random but there is also a pattern to the parts of the run so it's a case of learning and knowing how to react to these random 'phases', for lack of a better word. It's also similar in how it sets out its goals. In Boson X you have to try and run on blue paths that increase a percentage, and also your speed, and getting to 100% makes the level change colour and your speed dramatically increases; then it's just a case of surviving... it's essentially the same as what happens in SH after you cross 60 seconds. When you hit 100% you unlock the next level but there is that leaderboard making you want to keep going on earlier levels. It's a cool game... not as cool as Super Hexagon, but it's a fine effort. It's not quite as tight as that or as inventive with its challenge but not many games of that ilk are. It's free on PC so it's certainly worth a look for a few minutes to see what you think. I also think it's easily worth the £1.50 on iOS/Android. And it has none of that grinding, coin collecting, perk management and microtransaction bollocks of most runners. It's a nice game.
  21. DANGERMAN

    The Swapper

    I played through this at the weekend and really enjoyed it. It's quite hands off with the story for most of the game, you're kind of filling it in yourself, but once it gets to it it's done really well. It's mainly just a puzzle game though, ever so slightly with a Castlevania/Metroid map. You make your way through the level, there'll be obstructions that require orbs to move, so you'll have to go to a room where there's a puzzle to find some. The mechanics are pretty simple, you get a gun called the swapper that lets you make clones and eventually fire your 'soul' in to them. You can only have so many clones out and they all move when you do. It's really simple but the environment gets more complicated. Rather than just working out angles and platforms, you end up having lights that block the clone ability or the soul swapping ability It's mostly a perfect challenge, but I had to look up 2 of the last 3 puzzles on youtube, they're a bit more fiddly than I'd been used to, dumping clones so you can edge a bit closer to where you need to be. Really good game though, and I haven't done a very good job of explaining it
  22. DANGERMAN

    Gone Home

    I can't find a thread for this, in some ways I'm not surprised because why it seems like the sort of thing a few people would play, it was way overpriced. Gone Home is kind of a discovery game, you don't really do a lot, but the more you search the more you'll find and the fuller the story will feel. It's set during the 90's, you play as the elder sister of 2 just returning on short notice from a year in Europe. Your family have just moved in to a new house, you arrive late at night and explore as your character the house as your character does. I'm not going to go in to the story because anything I say about it will mean something you don't have to discover, but it's pretty interesting. I can't say I agree with all the praise the game got, the 90s nostalgia is pretty funny, and there's a good atmosphere to things, but I'm glad I waited for the game to be on sale
  23. Two Brothers is a retro Zelda-like that was successfully kickstarted in September 2012: http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/ackkstudios/two-brothers-0 Right now you can get it on their own humble store for $9.99 or wait for it to appear on Steam sometime in the coming days. I've played the opening half-hour or so and It's a beautiful game with a lovely gameboy-style soundtrack and art style, with controller support.
  24. The Age of Decadence is an old school isometric 3D rpg that has been in development for a long time (since 2004 I think). They released a combat demo for the game in 2009 and the first proper demo in 2012. Recently an expanded version of the demo has been released, which includes two of the games three major cities and essentially 60% of the content of the game. This is the version that is now also available on Steam Early Access: http://store.steampowered.com/app/230070 The title refers to the period of the decline of the Roman Empire, which is the setting for the game. Combat is turn based and quite similar to the original Fallout in that weapons can have fast/slow/aimed attacks and that all actions and movement cost AP. What's unique is the level of detail in the game and how the character you choose impacts how you play through the game - i.e. the game has combat and non-combat classes, and the non-combat classes will literally find other means to make it through the games quests and scenarios. It's a "scenario" and dialogue heavy game. Encounters in the game play out like this where the game cuts to a conversation screen and depending on your character and your stats you have various options to navigate your way through it: I pre-orded it a long time ago after playing the free demo (which is also on Steam). So far I've played two hours of the Early Access version and I'm really enjoying it. I guess you know if you'll like this kind of thing. It's a very detailed rpg in the spirit of the isometric rpgs of the late 90s and early 00s.
  25. Put a good chunk of time into this today. For a 400mb download you might think it would run on anything but it seems to be one of the most demanding indie games I've played. It was unplayable using a laptop with only integrated graphics. I managed to get my own laptop going which also chugged at the game's default resolution but at lower resolutions it ran fine - except when your character has any weird traits like colour-blindness which slow the game down again. But that's not really a problem as you can mostly avoid those. Performance issues aside, it's a cool game. The graphics and music are fine, nothing much to say. Basically you pick a hero, go into a Castlevania style dungeon, inevitably die, spend the coins you earned on stat and equipment upgrades, then go in again as a new hero. Dungeons are randomised but there is an NPC called the Architect who will "lock" a dungeon's design if you like. It's unforgiving but not in an overly unfair way, so it does have that Dark Souls fun/addiction factor. Initially you'll be dying after a few rooms but once you understand how the game's combat and movement works (and how the enemies behave) you'll start surviving for longer and reaching new areas. Basically it feels like a natural enough evolution of traditional roguelikes.
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