This week I finished two games I won on SG: Never Alone and Shank (the links are to my short reviews on Steam). I really enjoyed both, which is more than I can say about two other SG wins I gave a shot - Titan Souls (review) and The Forest of Doom. I did not enjoy these two and likely will not play them in the future.
Still, it was a good week. I enjoyed two games and am slowly closing my SG wins backlog. Soon enough I’ll be able to enter GAs again :-)
I agree about Never Alone gameplay having some rough edges in some cases, but whatever is lacking there it compensates for in other areas - cultural insight being a prime example. I really wish there were more games like it.
Thanks for letting me know about the Titan Souls link. Fixed now.
I have Titan Souls, i should try it out someday.
Does it really not have a story? I figured there was at least Lore, just taking it too account the influence from both, Dark Souls and Shadow of Colossus
No story or lore whatsoever. Just boss fights. At least I couldn’t find anything on the web to suggest otherwise.
What was so bad about The Forest of Doom that had you abandon it after 1.4 hours (I’m assuming the other 3.1 hours are idling). I’ve never played it, though I’m mostly familiar with the gamebook genre.
You’re assuming right, most of the time was idling.
I could see myself (maybe) playing a game with this story and a more dynamic mechanic (first person 3D), but reading pages and pages of a story I don’t find engaging and occasionally “fighting” by rolling a dice is, well, not my idea of fun.
Sounds like you don’t like gamebooks. ;-)
But yeah– a gamebook is only as strong as its story.
Personally, I played Forest of Doom for the November theme and really enjoyed it. Then again, I always liked gamebooks :)
Shank looks fun, how’s the gameplay? I watched a gameplay video the other day and it seemed like a pretty hardcore game O.o
Forest of Doom was my first gamebook. I’m glad I tried it, because now I at least have some experience with games of this type. Probably not my thing, but I may try another gamebook in the future if the story is compelling.
The gameplay of Shank is loads of fun. It’s much more friendly to casual players (like me) compared to something like Mortal Kombat, where I had difficulties even completing the tutorial (of the Komplete Edition).
Damn, I wanted Shank and was very happy when I won it on SG, but after 10 min of gameplay I understand that it is too tough for me. I can’t even reach 1st boss.
Did you use a gamepad? I assume it would be difficult to play without one. Even with a gamepad I can’t say it was easy, but it was very enjoyable.
It definitely took me longer to complete the game than most people, even when factoring out that I left it minimized for a while (to not restart one of the more difficult levels from the beginning while I couldn’t find time to play it). My (very obvious) tip for the first level is to try to use both the knives and the guns all the time, put more emphasis on the former when enemies are really close, and the latter when they haven’t yet reached you. I think it’s worthwhile to try to play this game again. It’s very enjoyable.
Nope, I don’t have gamepad and I’m not gonna buy it so that’s main problem for me ¯_(ツ)_/¯
So I put this game into far away section of my backlog.
Two good games, although Never Alone is a bit rough on gameplay.
Btw, Titan Souls link does not direct anywhere