Year 2023 | Issue #1-2
January-February Report
______________________________________A Tale of Manga, Nostalgia, and Closing.
Hey beautiful people, how’s life going?
Trying to restart and reboot a little, here. Had a month off, in January, and that helped me do some random stuff, included reading and playing some games, all things that I hadn’t been able to do consistently for most of the last year.
And I went pretty hardcore, I would say, since I read from beginning to end both Fullmetal Alchemist and Death Note. XD
Plus, I finally gave a shot to the first Dune book, after seeing the movie that I really enjoyed a lot. Probably also because it was the first movie I saw in theaters, after the reopening.
Gaming wise, here I collected some of the games that I played during the last months, not only the ones of January and February… I can see that I spent some time in the comfort zone of the Artifex Mundi HOGs, with the Grim Legends trilogy. Some of the games here had been installed on my PC for months to years, but I couldn’t finish them before, so I’m happy to have dealt with that. I enjoyed a lot being a shark in Maneater, but after some hours it became pretty repetitive. I loved the story in Heaven’s Vault and its narrative, but I found it too clunky to be deeply enjoyed as it would have deserved. As clunky as Nanotale was, without a good story tho. In the end, one of the highlights of this story was Sonic Frontiers, a little heavy and not perfectly optimized in some parts, with some polishing missing, but anyway a great, enjoyable game, with lots on nostalgia mixed with a lot of possibilities for speedrunning and visually satisfying moments. The other one was the lovely Yoku’s Island express, a pinball adventure game: it always amazes me when someone has the idea to mix up two different genres like this, and the resulting game end up being so nice.
That’s all for this report, have a nice time!
(The proper reviews for the games will appear with time.)
* as shown by GOG Galaxy 2.0
Here.
Played on GOG.
Here.
Played on Steam.
Nanotale -Typing Chronicles
.
Played on Amazon.
Here.
Played on Steam.
Before I Forget
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Played on Amazon.
Here.
Played on Steam.
Grim Legends 2: Song of the Dark Swan
Here.
Played on Steam.
Here.
Played on Steam.
Sam & Max 105: Reality 2.0
Here.
Played on Steam.
Sam & Max 106: Bright Side of the Moon
Here.
Played on Steam.
Here.
Played on Steam.
Maneater 
.
Played on Epic.
January 2023: Community picks
No.
February 2023: Baby, it's cold outside
No.
January 2023: Pile of Shame
No luck.
February 2023: Random Acts Of Kindness
One game here!
Here.
Played on Steam.
2023, I’m ready.
Congratulations on all of your assassinations! It’s soo easy to just catch up reading in January, it’s a fantastic time to look at your lifestyle and make some changes, however temporary they may be. Was was Sonic and Maneater? I liked Maneater but, the DLC was a bit too much for me, and I’m planning on Picking up Sonic Frontiers, eventually.
Thanks! I hope I will be able to keep up with this all.
Maneater was cool, but after a while too repetitive and too much grinding. I didn’t play the DLC however, and I don’t think I’ll buy it, I had enough fun as a shark.
Sonic was pretty heavy on my PC in the moments with many moving objects in the game, like the rings. So I had a lot of freezes during speedrunning moments that broke a lot the atmosphere. And there were some clearly unpolished parts and bits.
But.
All in all it was a really enjoyable game. Some fighting, some platforming, some speedrunning, nostalgia settings taken from all the older chapters, and some kind of story. I got really close to being a completionist here, without being bored nearly at all.
So, as the casual gamer that I am, I would recommend it. Maybe a more pro gamer would find some of the issues more annoying than I did.
I have also played Heaven’s Vault, during January and February actually, and I am pretty much torn apart on it. My first playthrough took me over 30hours as I have explored the whole Nebula and I have to say that I felt quite exhausted in the end. The second playthrough wasn’t exactly pleasant because of it and I quite rushed it. But I think that after some time, like a few years, I will try another run to see other little differences in the story. ^^
I can feel the sensation, I also was fascinated by the story and the discovered locations, but totally got tired with the game. I think the strange graphics and the clunkiness of the sailing were the main issues for me. And also, some limitations to the freedom you could have (not being able to get back to some planets, or also not having the possibility to go back to exploration just before - or just after - the ending) felt heavy to me.
However, rarely before I was so interested by what was unraveled during the evolution of a game story, as I was with Heaven’s Vault.
I was wondering how come I haven’t seen your layout here in ages. Glad to have you back.
What are your thoughts on Dune so far?
Glad to see familiar names around, too… And I hope I will be able to stay around :)
I was emotionally caught by the movie, and the feeling was great also reading the book, that felt so powerful and epic… Till 90% of the book, I would say.
Then, I felt this strange thing, like the author just wanted to conclude it, and it actually ended up in a rush, without any depth.
All in all a great journey, but with a meh ending. What do you think about it?
It’s a great read. First book essentially works just fine as a standalone and that ending sets up future workings of the new empire. I never realized how much I liked in-universe writings presented as historical quotations to open up chapters with until I read Dune.
They indeed create immersion, and they fit greatly with the semi-religious, biblical style of the opera :D
I will read also the remaining books, but not too much in a hurry, I think.