Progress Report #1: January 2023
Time for my first monthly progress report! :-)
I only finished one game in January, but it was a big one (for me)... Vampire Survivors!! I had played it for about 10 hours previously during early access, so that means I spent ~76 hours playing the 1.0 release. NOT too shabby for a game that only cost me about $5 total for base+DLC. I was starting to get a little frustrated toward the end, as I had to grind a bit to finish out the achievements, and was also trying to unravel the dev's esoteric riddles for unlocking the secret characters (some of them are pretty ridiculous)—so I think it hit 100% completion at just the right time.
It was a blast playing through the full release and getting to experience all the new content, and I had a few really memorable runs. Like somehow getting over 100k kills on my first run with Menya, a new DLC character. Or getting trapped in a cave in the new Mt. Moonspell and being completely overrun by Oni, but through sheer force of will and some nimble maneuvering, my pal Yatta Cavallo managed to survive to the very end. And of course, I'll never forget my very first win! For a while, I thought I'd never hit that 30-minute mark.
There are tons of "VS-likes" out there now capitalizing on this newly popularized genre, and I've played a handful of them (Boneraiser Minions, Brotato, 20 Minutes Till Dawn, and Spellbook Demonslayers so far). While these are all shaping up to be great games in their own right (and to be fair, all of them are still in early access), playing the full release of VS really impressed upon me how truly polished and creative it turned out to be. Every music track is an absolute banger, a steady pace of unlocks keeps the dopamine flowing, and the dev's wonderful sense of humor is the cherry on top. For me, only Boneraiser Minions comes close right now to the fun I had with VS.
All in all, I had a great time playing Vampire Survivors 1.0, and any additional DLC that comes out will likely be a day-one purchase for me. And I didn't finish finding all the secret characters in the end, so that will give me a little something extra to look forward to whenever new content comes out.
, 10/10, 100% recommend, go buy this game RIGHT NOW if you haven't already!!!! Or else!
After completing Vampire Survivors, I started a few other games and also played a bunch of demos (the demo backlog in my Steam library is a whole other thing lol). I did a mass redemption of unclaimed game keys, so my library grew quite a bit (I made a list of games added to my library in Dec/Jan here) (don't judge me).
I've been playing Return of the Obra Dinn with my dad (a FANTASTIC game), and also started Meteor World Actor, a science-fantasy detective VN. I had tried the demo for its sequel on Steam, so I decided to look into getting the first game. Turns out it's not available on Steam because (long story short) it was rejected due to "adult content." It's only available on a website called Johren. Apparently there are some romance/sex scenes between the protagonist and several of the female characters. From what I read, most people don't feel it adds much to the story. I was interested enough in the setting from the demo that I decided to go ahead and give it a shot. After navigating a veritable obstacle course of payment issues, I finally secured my copy and have been playing it via Steam Deck as a non-Steam game. The translation so far has been excellent, and it's pretty highly praised for its unique jazzy soundtrack. I'm kind of hoping I can skip quickly through the h-scenes as I'm not really interested in that stuff, but I'm a sucker for a good detective story! Although I'll be honest, the protag is shaping up to be quite insufferable and I'm really curious as to how he's going to get anyone to sleep with him.
I also checked out Live A Live on Switch from my local library (I know, right? That's a thing!) and was pretty quickly able to finish the "Near Future" chapter. I really enjoyed it and the story hooked me! It involved giant mech robots, a god, mad scientists, an orphanage, and a gang of street thugs. In a typical fashion of Japanese games, it's completely over-the-top and goofy, but honestly I love that. The combat brings some fun and unique features to standard turn-based battles, and I thought the voice acting was good too. I started my next chapter (Wild West) but have since gotten distracted by other games, so I hope to get back to it soon. Apparently the characters in the distinct chapters all turn out to be linked together somehow, and I'm curious to see how that plays out.
Earlier in the month, I was playing Yonder: The Cloud Catcher Chronicles for a while. But for some reason I suddenly lost interest, even though I was enjoying myself! I don't really know why that happens, haha. I'm content to set it aside for now, and maybe I'll go back to it when the right mood strikes. Although it does shows its age a bit (it was released in 2017), it's truly a lovely and relaxing experience, and you get to explore some surprisingly beautiful landscapes. There's also nearly unlimited inventory space, which, as a hoarder, I very much appreciate.
Finally, I also played a bit of Luck Be A Landlord. It was a pleasant surprise to find it had released from early access, since for some reason I thought the 1.0 version was already out. I got a good 8 hours of fun, but burned out on it pretty quickly and will set it aside for now. I feel it's best played in short bursts every now and then.
That’s all for January! See you next month.
~franplants
-
Return of the Obra Dinn
-
Meteor World Actor
-
Live A Live
-
Yonder: The Cloud Catcher Chronicles
-
Luck be a Landlord
Congrats on completing Vampire Survivors! I generally dislike bullet hell games, but that one is just… good. Also, welcome to another BLAEO newbie :)
Thanks! Yeah, I’m generally terrible at bullet hell, but I don’t really consider VS to be the same. It’s much slower-moving haha
Its a gorgeous top review that you made, is it also in the generator?
Did you and dad enjoy the last Chapters of OD? :)
We do like many of the same games I see :)
Hey! Yeah, I made it in the generator but then fiddled with the formatting to get it looking how I wanted. It’s the Hero format (last option on the generator page).
We haven’t had a chance to play OD in a while, so haven’t quite made it to the final chapters, but I’m looking forward to it! Hopefully soon :-)
thank you :D You do have a great taste in games :)
Is there anywhere on steam where I can see how many new games I’ve added this year? Or would I have to look manually? (And I would never judge all the new game, I just bought 2 bundles..wups..)
Oh and ps.. sorry if this is asking wrongly but may I friend add you? we seem to have a lot of games incommen and I like to have friends I can be inspired by while playing :)
Yes, you can definitely add me! I’m the same, I love to check the activity feed to see what people are playing :-)
I’m not aware of a place that stores stats for how many games you’ve added in a certain period of time. I just looked at Account Details > View licenses and product key activations on Steam and manually added everything from Dec/Jan to a list. It did take a while, but I like making lists so I didn’t mind XD
Great I added you thanks :) and thanks for telling where to find the games, I never knew of that even though I have been a member for 12 years. Goes to check… oh… that many… and I still need to add around 25 Keys… wups :)
No problem! Yeah it’s really useful. At first I was going around to all the different websites I buy from and also checking my Steam library list, then it occurred to me doing it this way would be much easier haha