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Started playing this last night. It hasn't come up as a game to play in the monthly thread yet (though has been suggested) but it's a good time to bring it up as is about to be released on PS3 and Vita. It's a platform puzzle game so I'm playing with a pad as I hate playing games like this with keys. There is a story running through it, it's very Valve/Portal-like and has Danny Wallace doing the narration which is quite funny. I'm sure people dislike him but I like him in this and found him ok in Assassin's Creed (2? Brotherhood?). I'm a few chapters in so won't spoil too much but the generic square or rectangle shapes have lots of character (in the narration at least) and it's a lovely looking game with nice shadow effects and a brilliant soundtrack. It was made largely by one guy on his free time while he worked in a big studio. Well worth picking up and giving it a go. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hpsZaExywRk

This is up for free on PS+ right now, and I played it, so here is some impressions. I think I just want to vent. Man, do I hate this game. And for God's sake did I not want to hate it, I didn't want to be that guy. Table Top Racing is made by X-Wipeout folk, and that game rules so, so much. And after Sony Liverpool was dissolved this was what came out. A total mess. I'm heartbroken. It looks like Micro Machines from the 90s. I'm from the 90s, and I liked those Micro Machines games. They should have me in the palm of hair hands, nodding to a game from the 90s with me, as desperate as I am to hold on to my youth (got ID'd last week, I'm still a teen really). But no, this game is really, really confused. It is a lot like Micro Machines in a way. The tracks take place on table tops and its all small and cute, avoiding bread sticks and stuff. But, one of the 'cars' you can buy at the start to race in is the Breaking Bad meth wagon (it has official licencing) so I dunno what they're going for with tone ( Coming from a Mobile origin I guess who cares?). But screw all that: It's about the gameplay. That's what gamers tell me. Even though it is Micro Machines in presentation and has adult content officially licensed in a game that doesn't warrant it... and has a soundtrack that tries to beat Motorstorm: Pacific Rift despite in wubs despite not building up the atmosphere to make it work. The game itself is just shitty. It's a crude mobile port. Knowing it came from a gyroscode design I do respect it in a way. It's a Mario Kart style game that solely requires knowing the tracks for the best racing line, a lot like Wipeout I guess, but it is just executed in such an unsatisfying way; a way that is so unfun, especially compared to Mario Kart which it clearly tries to be as well; a game where it is more fun the faster you go thanks to the drift mechanic. This game punishes going fast in a silly way, despite presenting itself as Micro machines, at least visually. It's like it requires you to drive carefully, be sensible, hitting those apexes right (in a game where you drive through billiard balls like they're paper, with wubs, driving a meth van, with Mario Kart power ups). It's just all wrong. Play it! Tell me it works! I just can't believe these veterans got this so wrong, or they don't care anymore and just want to make something to tick enough boxes for loads of people to work. But this shit doesn't click, and it won't work on a large audience.. I guess they looked a Rocket League and thought they had the game to be this year's version. I expected better from these guys. Fuck this game. It's the fucking worst. Fuck this game. I've not hated a game this much in ages. Thanks for that, I guess.

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.

So this was one of the earlier successes on Kickstarter before (or around) everyone started doing. It's a 2D platformer in the style of classic NES games and it's made by Yacht Club Games who are a few ex-Wayforward people. They left over a year a go and Wayforward games aren't quite what they were; coincidence? I say probably (definitely). Since NES games are the inspiration for Shovel Knight it does play things basic. You play with two buttons and a D-pad; one jumps and one shovels. But you also press down and shovel while jumping to do a downward attack and you use that to bounce off enemies. That's what you mostly do and this game, and it stays damn fun while doing it. They've clearly explored a lot of possibilities with your basic abilities. Enemies are either really defensive knights who can be hard to hit or simpler enemies just placed in awkward places that make things difficult (or fun) for you. It's design we've seen before but maybe in not quite this way. You can also make life a bit easier for you by using items you get through the game. You use them by pressing up and shovel, like Castlevania, and the properties of these items are like the ones you find in that game. That's what Shovel Knight is. It's NES games you know put into one well made game. Specifically it's Konami and Capcom NES games that are the big inspiration: pre-SotN Castlevania and Megaman are clear inspirations, as is smatterings of Ducktails and Zelda 2. But it plays a nicer game than those NES games. It controls well, and does actually look a lot better than those games. It's more TurboGrafx than NES. It also has some more forgiving design choices, like the checkpoints, which can be destroyed for more money to buy upgrades but then you lose them for good (like, they're still not there when you pass them after you've died). That's a cool risk/reward mechanic but I think you can still get a lot of gold without having to destroy them, from what I can tell now I'm at the end, so I suppose it's a case of how fast you want to upgrade your stuff. And when you die you lose a percentage of your gold but it can be picked up again if you don't die on route to where you last died, 'cos Demon's Souls. But overall it's a really fun game in a genre that the indies have explored a lot at this point, but I'd say it's one of the better examples. It's made by people ball achingly passionate about that era of gaming and they've crafted the ultimate love letter with Shovel Knight. That's really cool, but it does mean the game struggles to find it's own identity. I wish they laid off the references as it didn't need them since the game's mechanics were all reference enough. Bottom line though is two thumbs up. It's got some awesome bosses and nice, thick, treacle-y chiptune music. I should go finish it now... Oh, it's pretty fuckin' hard if that needed to be mentioned.

From Kickstarter (2013) to Early Access (2014) to official release (2015), Sunless Sea came to be in a manner similar to many indie games in recent years. But even in Early Access it got brilliant reviews and was one of RPS's best games of 2014. Eurogamer gave it 10/10. Those endorsements were enough to pique my interest and I've finally gotten around to putting a couple of hours into it. My early impressions are that it's brilliant. Like I said in the Westerado thread, I love games that are a bit original and this is another game that feels unique. Essentially it is a kind of exploration and survival game. The above screenshots are pretty typical. From the safety of the port of Fallen London (read: some kind of dark fantasy post apocalyptic world) you have to explore the sea, visiting ports to talk to the locals, collect stories, trade all manner of things, pick up quests and generally - discover. The problem is, the extent to which you can explore is limited by your fuel and supplies (food), which are not come by cheaply. Not to mention that it's a dark, dangerous world. In many ways, it's similar to FTL: Faster than Light - but if you read the RPS article you'll see that this is much more of a wordy game, more of an rpg, much more of a developed world than FTL. However, like FTL, death is pretty hard to avoid. When you die in the game you can bequeath certain traits and possessions to your successor, but not everything that you own. So far I've died once, when I wandered too far north and was mauled by some kind of monstrous iceberg that was doing way more damage than I realised and killed me in a couple of hits. I chose to pass on my sea chart to my next character, so the ports I have discovered are still shown on the map. There are actually two ways to play the game - permadeath, and a kind of soft death option (where you can manually save like a normal game), but permadeath is the default setting and the devs say that it is the way the game is intended to be played, so I've gone with that. Last but not least, the game looks and sounds stunning. Close to home the sea is brightly lit but the more you explore the sea is shrouded in complete darkness, so you will welcome the glow of an island you can dock at. And I love the colourful illuminations and designs of the various islands and flora and fauna. As you would expect, the soundtrack is minimal but fitting, and just generally excellent. You can listen at bandcamp.

Apologies if there's already a thread for this, please merge if there is! I think a few of you have played it. I just played an hour and a half of it there, it's brilliant. It's like playing through a novel. I have no idea how long it is, or if the ending is satisfying, but it's a very interesting game to play. Well you don't really play it so much as watch it. You have access to a database of police interviews (brilliantly acted). You find new videos by searching for information or words that came up in the videos you've watched. All of this is completely up to you. The game has a very minimal interface. The sparse music is nice and the occasional flicker of a face on the screen is quite spooky! I've been taking notes with a pen and paper and have covered two envelopers front and back with words to search for, and almost another a4 sheet! So far the story that has developed has been very interesting, and I've unlocked 5/13 of the game's achievements. Great stuff.

Wow, this game is fantastic. The opening is brilliant. Essentially it is like Red Dead Redemption meets Earthbound or Zelda. I won't spoil the purpose of the story but you find it out soon enough in the game. Essentially you explore a Zelda-like overworld in a wild west setting. I've played it for an hour and picked up a fair few sidequests. And the game is seriously beautiful too, and the music is great. Yes, I see a lot of potential in this one...

I first heard of Read Only Memories two years ago when it was being kickstarted by a company called GaymerX. Initially I thought it would be some kind of very in your face LGBT game, but then after I watched a couple of videos I thought it looked really cool. Anyway it was released in October. I picked it up in the Steam winter sale and have played a couple of sessions of it. It's great. (I should say, I don't intend to flood the forum with threads for indie games but if I think a game is good enough to recommend, then I'll create a thread for it, unless other people object). A couple of immediate pluses, this game looks great and sounds great (not all indie games do...). It's an adventure game set in Neo San-Francisco in 2064, the gameplay, looks and music are very much in the vein of Policenauts (and I assume Snatcher, although I haven't played it). You do have an inventory and interact with objects in the environment but the bulk of the game has been dialogue. In terms of the LGBT aspect, I've already encountered a fairly diverse range of characters so I can see how that is going to be incorporated into the game, but it doesn't look to be a game "about" that subject. As you can see, it's very colourful. The characters that are speaking, in this case your AI companion Turing, change their expression while they speak. That seems to be his neutral face. Although it was developed in the US, the game does feel very Japanese.

I think some others have been playing this. Any thoughts. I think I quite like it so far but it doesn't feel as sturdy as Ridiculous Fishing or Luftrausers (other Vlambeer games) but I put that down to this being made in Game Maker. It feels like some production values are missing. But that's my only gripe, really. It's some good shooty fun with solid action and loads of Vlambeer screen shake. It's one of those games that has Rogue elements in it except this is a top down dual stick shooter. There are randomly generated levels though the themes are always the same and the same bosses always turn up. You have a bunch of characters to unlock that have different properties. It's a simple enough game. It is hard, though. I've got to the point where I can pretty confidently go through section 3 but I can't get past 4-1. I just get destroyed by the sentient crystals that fire lasers pretty rapidly. I tend to use the purple crystal dude who has more health and can throw up a brief reflective shield. I reckon he is a newb character but this game is pretty hard so I have no shame using him. I've been mostly playing it on the Vita, usually before work for 20 mins as it is pretty pick up and play. It's like Galak-Z in some ways except that is more complicated and does require longer sessions but I think they compliment each other well.

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

Could have sworn there was a thread for this game. Anyway Broken Age is of course the kickstarted traditional adventure game by Double Fine. You play as two characters, Shay and Vella, and you can switch between their story lines freely. The opening of the game hits all the right notes, the artwork is lovely, the dialogue is funny and engaging and overall the game is nicely reminiscent of those old 90s comedy adventures, without feeling overly retro. The tone is more family friendly than Sam and Max or Grim Fandango, probably due to the absence of a sadistically sarcastic narrator... So far only the first half of the game has been released. The game starts off gently with no maddening pixel hunting, inventory spamming or dialogue exhausting required ...although there's plenty of time for all those I'm sure. Vella's opening section is sweet and funny. Shay's is a bit darker and weirder. I've really enjoyed the first hour, and it runs perfectly which is a nice bonus. (Not surprising for a game that was also released on tablets I guess).

Anyone else been playing this? I was a massive fan of the first game, had an absolute ton of fun with it, incredibly addictive, visceral and with a bloody incredible soundtrack. The 2nd game I'm not having quite as much fun with...it seems a bit more stop-start than the first game where you could just get in the groove and be at it for hours, they've also tried to do a lot more story stuff in the 2nd one so there's a load of dialogue this time around, and loads of skippable cutscenes. The music is just as good as the first game, but the level design doesn't feel anywhere near as good to me, the first games levels just felt so tight and well designed around the games controls, but it feels in the HM2 that the levels have been chopped and changed to fit the narrative rather than the other way round, it is still decent though and after the initial hour and a half of frustration and bewilderment I am having a lot of fun with it now. I'm about 5 hours in, so probably not got too much longer to go, definitely feel the difficulty ramping up at the moment.

What's in the cube? A broken server, that's what. It took me ages to finally get in and then trying to buy the stats screen (only costs 100 coins which you'll get in about 10 seconds) is proving impossible. The "game" itself is exactly as Molyneux described and they point out in the about page that it's not a game and is more of an experiment so it's weird to see people so dismissive and angry about it. It hasn't been out long and already the first layer is nearly gone.

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

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.

I love everything about this but I am stuck like a bastard, fairly early on too. I got as far as where they introduce black holes and I can't get any further.

I had to create a thread for this. It's a bit of a sleeper hit that was released in August, if you look on youtube you'll see let's plays with millions of views. It's a game built around a simple but effective horror concept and I think the developers really understand what it is about certain horror films that captures people's imaginations/makes the hair on the back of their neck stand up. You play a nightwatchman at some kind of restaurant chain who's job is to observe the movement of four robotic animals who wander around at night - if you let them reach the control room where you are, it's game over. There are no fancy 3D graphics in the game, it's mostly just still photos. You observe the animals by clicking on the cameras in different rooms, but to add a twist, there are blind spots right outside your doors, so you also have to flash the door lights regularly to avoid being caught by surprise. If there is someone right outside the control room, you can lock the door. But using the cameras, door locks and light switches all increases your power usage - and if the power goes out, everything fails, and it's almost certain death. You have to survive from midnight to 6am. There is a bit of a story and background to the game which is developed as each night passes (your predecessor calls you at the beginning of each night). Needless to say, it's nerve-wracking. I think it's a game worth experiencing (especially for €2 in the Halloween sale).

Boot Hill Heroes is a game like Earthbound, set in America in the 19th century. It was kickstarted back in 2012. The snes style graphics are really nice. The version released on Steam is apparently the first part of a three part game. The reason I had even heard of it in the first place was because of this review. It was released to little or no attention earlier this month but I've been enjoying it so far.

Might as well make a thread for this so I can talk about it. It's a first-person point and click horror-adventure game that was released in 2010. Basically you open drawers and light candles (and throw books around). The game is set in an old castle and is very atmospheric, as you would expect. Your character has a sanity meter which will affect your vision if you hang around in the darkness too long, so light plays an important part in the game. I haven't encountered any monsters yet but still I've been closing all the doors when I'm exploring a room, just to be safe... So far the story has been delivered through diaries and letters which I've found scattered around the place. First-person works really well for adventure games. It's a shame this type of thing is a genre that's pretty much confined to the indies. But at least we're seeing more of them.

Anyone else playing this? It's bloody brilliant, i've been playing it for 15-20 minutes a day since i got it, it's very intense. I've just started Level 3, Pillars of Light, which introduces my favourite videogame enemy type...spiders. The game itself is a first person dungeon crawling rpg, with a really good balance between exploration, puzzles and combat. If you like Dark Souls you'll love it.

Made by the team that did World of Goo and the guy who was behind Henry Hatsworth. You can tell the World of Goo thing by the art style and sense of humour, a mile off. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=04GSCt2Wiqo It's a little bizarre. It's a sandbox game with no fail state but there is a running narrative and story. You order objects which you place in your fireplace and then set them on fire. Build combos by combing certain objects together and you'll start unlocking more lists of stuff to buy. All in-game money, no IAP's as far as I'm aware. It's oddly compelling but there isn't much point to it. From Wired:

I got sent a code for this but I'd have bought it myself eventually. It's a retro inspired game, only in a novel twist it's inspired by the Sega side of the fence rather than Nintendo. Thematically it's Sonic 3, the way the scenery smashes apart, the huge sprawling levels, the way everything looks. It's deceptive though as while it really does play like a reimagined 16 bit game, particularly one post Sonic 3, it doesn't play that much like a Sonic game. You dont bounce on people's heads, instead there's uppercuts, low kicks, and special whirlwind jump attacks. It's a hyper action game. Sonic crossed with Knuckles I guess. There's a few problems but I'll do a longer post some other time. It's fucking great though, one of the best 'retro' games I've played, but it is a little rough in parts

I know Mike has been playing this, I've only put 20 minutes in. It would be more as I like the concept of it but I'm constantly stuck, it seems so open that I have no idea where I'm going. I got as far as being asked to clean up a spill in the water (like an oil spill) which I found but have no idea how to clean it. I also found a magic gate that I don't know how to open and a few other paths that there's no way of telling which way I'm meant to go. I might need a guide to get me going as I love the concept and art style (it is Double Fine, after all) but I'm perpetually lost. It's a puzzle action game, kind of like Link to the Past viewpoint but your sword can hack into objects and enemies and you can change their values to make them non-aggressive or let bushes you burn give out tons of hearts. You can pretty much break the game by changing the values in your favour. Like there's a queen sprite in this cave that gives out extra hearts but only once. You use this item in your inventory to change the history of whether she gave you hearts or not and you can just churn out tons of energy for yourself.

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.

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...