Late End of September Update!

Cat Cafe Manager is a cozy little cafe management game where you rebuild your grandmother's cafe from the ground up. Different types of customers will visit your cafe (such as Witches, Punks, Artists, etc) and each type will give you a specific type of currency as payment. You can use the currency on specific stores to purchase things for your cafe or cats. Each type of person also likes certain types of food.

It's a casual game with minimal story. The fun comes from customizing your cafe. You can choose your employees, which cats to adopt, and what type of furniture to decorate with. There is a large variety of furniture options to make your cafe feel like your own. There are also some fun and creative cat designs.

Overall, its an adorable and fun game. You serve food, decorate your cafe, interact with cats, etc. There isn't really a penalty for doing badly other than taking longer to obtain currency. It's perfect for someone who wants a casual relaxing game. It does get repetitive fairly quickly and goes on a bit too long. I would recommend it on sale.

Steam Deck Compatibility: This game is Verified on the Steam Deck. Overall, it worked very well. There was a bug when adopting and trying to name a cat; it would freeze up sometimes and erase the name, causing me to retype it again. It could be just a game bug.

Inscryption is a deck-building puzzle card game with a strong and unique narrative. You find yourself stuck in a cabin with no idea how you got there, and you're forced to play games with a being called Leshy. The game is full of fun strangeness and adventure, and it kept me hooked throughout.
I'm usually terrible at deck-building and card games, but the game does a really good job at explaining how to play. It also has an interesting story with meta undertones. The graphics are great, and the gameplay provides plenty of variety. If you like unique and strange narratives like Pony Island or the Hex you will probably like this game.

I would have given Inscryption a higher score, but there are some things that hold it back. The beginning of the game is actually my favorite, and I didn't enjoy the rest of the game as much. I still really loved it, but it starts out the strongest in my opinion. Also, after finishing the game, I looked up the lore to clear up some confusion, and I discovered that a chunk of the lore was not presented in this game and had to be discovered elsewhere. I believe part of the story comes from the game "The Hex" (which I didn't remember the story) and maybe some other source. I personally like the full story to be discovered in the game, unless it is said to be a direct sequel. Even if there are just clues to the story, I don't mind as long as all the stepping stones are in the game to lead me to the right conclusion. This is just a personal pet peeve of mine and might not affect anyone else. Either way, I definetely recommend this game off sale or on sale!

Steam Deck Compatibility: Inscryption is "Playable" on the Steam Deck but not yet verified. It did work very well, but it took me some time to get used to using the trackpad for the entire game. Its slower than a mouse, so its playable, but it might be more enjoyable on a PC. Also, there was a moment where you had to type in the game, and I had trouble pulling up the keyboard without pausing the game. A workaround for that is to press the keyboard buttons one at a time slowly, instead of at the same time.

Mythic Ocean is a narrative-driven choice game. You find yourself in the ocean with no memories of who you are. You then meet different gods and discover that you have a choice to change this world and choose who builds the new one. The gameplay is mainly exploration of the ocean and talking to different NPCs. You make choices that change the ending.

I think this is a very creative concept, I really enjoyed it and I would love to see an update or sequel that expands on it! It feels a little to short, and I could see a bigger and better game coming from this. Overall, fun game! Moving through the ocean feels satisfying and fluid, and I liked the different characters. I'd recommend it more on sale just because of the length.

Steam Deck Compatibility: Mythic Ocean is "playable" on steam deck and not yet verified. It works great though! Movement is great and I didn't have any issues at all!

This game is very divided among LIS fans, and I can totally see why. Overall, I did enjoy it, but I was on the fence for a lot of it. I played this game after Life is Strange 1, Before the Storm, and True Colors. I liked those games more, so playing this last probably affected my opinion. I'll write a spoiler review at the bottom to share all my opinions. 

Life is Strange 2 follows two brothers: Sean and Daniel Diaz. After an incident that went horribly wrong involving the police and the death of their father, the two brothers are on the run, and Daniel has discovered he has a new power.

First off, I really liked the main character. You play as Sean Diaz. He's the older brother to Daniel, and he has to lead the two to Mexico to evade the police. He is way over his head, but he still tries his best, and he cares about his little brother. 

The game also tackles some heavy topics, like racism and religion. It also features some very lovable side characters. I think the game does a great job at introducing characters throughout your journey and having them stand out in a positive way. They also do a great job at making the terrible, hateful characters stand out in a horrible way. 

I loved the atmosphere. I wish there was more soundtrack since these games like to use indie sounds, and it would have worked so well with the different locations and the open nature throughout the game. The tension is also great. I felt a lot of anxiety while on the journey. The atmosphere switches between both beautiful and nerve-wracking.

There are a good amount of choices in the game that actually do effect the game. I didn't realize a lot of choices existed until I got to the end of the chapter and compared my choices to others. Most choices were not very polarizing, but maybe it depends on what playstyle you're going for. 

A big thing I didn't like was the pacing. I felt bored playing a lot of the game. The other LIS games felt more interactive. You can't play as Daniel, so you don't get to play with the powers or solve puzzles. The gameplay feels very basic, other than finding collectibles. I usually don't mind minimal gameplay, but it is coupled with poor pacing. Some chapters are a lot of fun, and others  draaag. Some chapters are very long, and others are very short. 

Another problem i had was with Daniel himself. I'll add more in my spoiler review, but the game makes him a little too unlikable for too long, to the point where it's hard to fix his character later on. I spent most of the game feeling sympathetic towards Sean and hoping that Daniel improved as a character. I also have some thoughts on the ending, but I'll include that at the bottom. 

Overall, I've enjoyed every Life is Strange game and I'd recommend this one on sale. . 

Steam Deck Compatibility Life is Strange 2 is verified on Steam Deck and works great! I had zero issues. 

Spoiler review:
I'm not sure how I feel about the ending. I'm open to hearing other people's opinions on it. I hated it at first because it felt like my good choices led to bad endings. I know LIS 1 had a sad ending, but that was more of a mystery game in which you solved the mystery only to realize the tragedy of it all. It was meant to happen the whole time.

This was an adventure where you had one goal in mind, which was to get to Mexico and stick together. It seems like every ending has you failing that mission. I taught Daniel to be kind and not to hurt others, but because of that, Sean had to separate from him, most likely never seeing him again and always watching his back. If he teaches Daniel not to care about others, then Sean either ends up dead or with a brother who uses his powers for bad things. Either that, or Sean ends up in jail for 15 years as a cop killer. I figured that was one of the worst ending since his childhood is wasted; he could get physical or psychological damage from that, and it ends up on his permanent record. I didn't want to spend this entire journey getting to Mexico just to get arrested at the last second, like a Monty Python skit.

Also, they didn't tell us until the last chapter that Daniel would not face any repercussions from any of it (except house arrest), so instead of going on the run with Daniel, he would have been way safer staying behind at the beginning. He risked his life and lived outside for nothing.

I guess I wanted some kind of good ending since it felt like a long journey where so many sacrifices were made, just to end with a depressing conclusion. I am glad that my choices in the game did impact the ending and that there were so many different endings which is really nice.

Other than the ending, my only other problem was how they wrote Daniels character. I really wanted to like him more. He's young, and he's been through trauma, so it's understandable that he lashes out. The problem is just that they made him way too unlikable for far too long. The more I had Sean root for him, trust him, and support him, the worse he acted. He would do all the wrong things, go against my judgment, and take everyone's side but mine. I did get the high morality ending, but it was like Daniel was fighting Sean the entire way until the last chapter. I feel like my choices should have had more impact on helping him cope while also not being his punching bag. Sean also deserves happiness. Most of the conflict was caused by Daniel purposely not listening, which kept causing real consequences.

On a positive note, I really liked the side characters. Chapter 3 was my favorite. All the characters in that chapter felt like real people, and it was nice to see Sean and Daniel adapt to these different situations. Also, it was really exciting to see Chris again from the Captain Spirit game. I enjoyed that game a lot and I really wanted to see a full game with Chri-.. er..  I mean Captain Spirit!

Also David made a return from Life is Strange 1. It made me tear up hearing about Chloe. Overall enjoyed myself, would like to see a remake fix some problems though!