September-December 2018

It’s been a while since my last post (September) and my gaming time was very reduced over the last couple of months but I just had to post before the end of 2018.

During this period I managed to beat 12 games, including 3 sgwins

• A Hat in Time
  

  13 hours playtime

  11 of 37 achievements

• Braveland
  

  5 hours playtime

  21 of 21 achievements

• Dead Cells
  

  32 hours playtime

  36 of 53 achievements

• The Dweller
  

  5 hours playtime

  11 of 11 achievements

• Glass Masquerade
  

  4 hours playtime

  27 of 30 achievements

• Heroes of Hammerwatch
  

  56 hours playtime

  20 of 47 achievements

• Juanito Arcade Mayhem
  

  6 hours playtime

  44 of 81 achievements

• Little Nightmares
  

  3 hours playtime

  8 of 22 achievements

• Marie's Room
  

  43 minutes playtime

  7 of 7 achievements

• The Metronomicon: Slay The Dance Floor
  

  5 hours playtime

  15 of 32 achievements

• Pocket Kingdom
  

  7 hours playtime

  16 of 16 achievements

• The Tiny Bang Story
  

  4 hours playtime

  no achievements

A Hat in Time - sgwin. A cute 3D platformer in which you play as a Kid, stranded in a alien planet after your spaceship lost all the time capsules that serve as fuel. You are tasked with retrieving the time capsules in order to return home. The game is colorful and has a nice setup but I found it to be a little too childish for my taste. Also, the 3D platforming is way too easy and poses little to no challenge. All in all I’m happy I have played it but I didn’t find it great.

Braveland - A casual turn based strategy game similar to the Heroes of Might & Magic series but too linear, too easy, and very short. There are way better games in the genre.

Dead Cells - A masterpiece. This is a great game in every aspect but it really shines in gameplay. It is a roguelike action platformer with a rewarding progression, varied enemies and loot, and great action (it actively encourages speedrunning). I also love the artstyle and setup. Totally recommended.

The Dweller - A short and casual puzzle game in which you play as a monster controlling a cave and you must kill/scare away a group of explorers dressed as Indiana Jones. The gameplay is simple yet fun, some levels require a little bit of thinking, and it doesn’t get boring.

Glass Masquerade - a nice jigsaw puzzle game that stands out from the rest because of the stained glass artstyle. Recommended.

Heroes of Hammerwatch - An enhanced version of Hammerwatch, a hack & slash adventure with varied enemies, locations, loot and characters to choose from. This new game adds a better progression system, a guild mechanism and a town that you can upgrade to improve your characters. Gameplay is great and, even though the game is built around multiplayer, I managed to beat it solo. Totally recommended.

Juanito Arcade Mayhem - An arcade game similar to Pang in which you must fight an alien invasion that corrupts all our favorite classic video games (Tetris, Donkey Kong, Pac man, Arkanoid, etc…). I had fun with this one. Recommended.

Little Nightmares - sgwin. A wonderful 2D scrolling adventure that takes inspiration from games such as Limbo. You play as a little boy that must escape a terrible place filled with his worst nightmares and sins. The artstyle is amazing, as is the setup and the level design. Gameplay can be a little fidgety at times and you character does not always control as it should but it does not detract from the experience. Totally recommended.

Marie’s Room - a short adventure/narrative experience that is technically competent but that lacks consistency and honesty. I particularly disliked the twist in the end and the way the narrator sometimes knows everything and other times acts as if she doesn’t know stuff she was involved in.

Metronomicon - sgwin. A rhythm role playing game. The world has been invaded by music yielding monsters and it is your job, as cadets from the dance combat school, to defeat them and prevent people from growing crazy. It is a fun game that doesn’t take itself too seriously with some nice music and a non standard gameplay. If you are into rhythm games, this one is worth playing.

Pocket Story - A really nice puzzle game in which you are trapped in a magic island and must complete challenges to find your way out. The game features nice pixel art and chiptune music, well designed puzzles, charming characters, good humor and I found it quite fun. Recommended.

The Tiny Bang Story - A well above average hidden object game with mild puzzle solving and an interesting adventure. Recommended if you like the genre.

2018 Final Report

2018 was a strange year for me gaming-wise and I found myself losing interest/not having enough time to play videogames as the year progressed. Being a father to a 3 year old girl also plays a major role in all of this.

Anyway, during this year I beat 51 games and enjoyed many of them. The highlights of the year were Hollow Knight, Hellblade: Senua’s Sacrifice, and Dead Cells.

Here’s a graph with my monthly “performance”.

I want to thank you all for the help with my backlog and I really appreciate our community. I will try to be a better backlog assassin next year and hopefully return to my monthly posts.

I wish you all a great 2019

Summer Report (July and August)

As usual, summer time was (mostly) spent not playing videogames. This is especially true now that I have a small daughter and plenty of outdoor activities to do with her.

On my last post I also mentioned my laptop needed repairs and that was done without any hassle andinside the warranty (thanks MSI).

Anyway, over the last couple of months I managed to beat 4 games.

• Axiom Verge
  

  20 hours playtime

  15 of 29 achievements

• Monster Slayers
  

  9 hours playtime

  5 of 22 achievements

• Rogue Legacy
  

  26 hours playtime

  19 of 29 achievements

• Squirm
  

  2 hours playtime

  35 of 43 achievements

Axiom Verge - A retro take on the Metroid formula. Nice story and worldbuilding, great artstyle and music, good level design and progression. The only think that disappointed me were boss fights and a slow start before things got interesting. Recommended.

Monster Slayers - A really nice casual deck-building rogue-like game. You play as one of different classes of monster hunters trying to rid the world of evil and defeat the Harbinger. Recommended.

Rogue Legacy - A rogue-like game with a twist. You play as different descendants of a king trying to destroy the evil that controls the castle. You have different classes with a bunch of traits that can be positive or negative. You must clear out 4 bosses in different areas before the final combat. Controls are a little floaty and level design can be a bit lacking (in part because they are procedurally generated) but the games is really fun. Recommended.

Squirm - A short action platformer with tight controls, good level design, many nice ideas, great humor and lots of charm. Totally recommended.


See you next time and happy backlog assassinations :)

June Final Report

Today I sent my gaming laptop for repair because of a problem with my fan number 1 (cpu). I think it is safe to assume I will not play any more games on Steam until the end of the month so I might as well post my June report. During the month of June I beat 4 games, all of them sgwins.

• Castle Crashers
  

  8 hours playtime

  4 of 12 achievements

• Risen 3 - Titan Lords
  

  36 hours playtime

  31 of 50 achievements

• The Turing Test
  

  7 hours playtime

  15 of 15 achievements

• Unrest
  

  5 hours playtime

  23 of 52 achievements

Castle Crashers - sgwin. A nice side scroller game that is colorful, funny, outrageous at times and with a lot of diversity (locations, enemies, weapons, bosses). You play as a knight trying to rescue 4 princesses that were kidnapped from the castle. The game is made for co-op but unfortunately, I could not find anyone willing to play with me (I don’t like online multiplayer). After letting it sit on my backlog for too long I decided to play it solo and I liked it but I’m sure it is completely different with friends. Recommended.

Risen 3: Titan Lords - sgwin. A Piranha Bytes RPG in which you play as a pirate that is fighting the forces of darkness in a Caribbean setting. If you are familiar with their previous games, you already know that the game gives a lot of customization, open world gameplay, several factions to side with, a difficult start and easy late game, plenty of bugs (some quest breaking), not so good voice acting, lots of quests, and an OK story. A lot of people hate the combat system but I think it works really well after the initial awkwardness. I actually really enjoyed it and I would recommend it for fans of the genre.

The Turing Test - sgwin. A first-person puzzle game in a science fiction setting. You play as Ava , an engineer sent to discover what happened to the ground team that disappeared from Europa, one of Jupiter’s moons. You are accompanied by the station’s AI named TOM that creates a nice atmosphere through a quite interesting narration of events. The game is fairly easy and not too long but I really liked it.

Unrest - sgwin. A little game that caught my attention a while back. It is an adventure game in which you play as several characters during a period of civil unrest in an ancient Indian setting. You walk around, talk to people and the story unfolds through your actions. It is competently written and fairly interesting but never engaging and the ending is lacking a resolution. It is worth it for the atypical gameplay and featuring an underrepresented culture in videogames but nothing more.


See you next time and happy backlog assassinations :)

May Final Report

During the month of May I only managed to beat 2 games, both of them sgwins.

• Frostpunk
  

  20 hours playtime

  29 of 49 achievements

• Subterrain
  

  42 hours playtime

  45 of 48 achievements

Frostpunk - sgwin. Frostpunk is a great management/city building game set in a retro steampunk world that puts you in control of an arctic colony, after a major cataclysm takes place. You must manage several resources, the workforce, the people’s mood, and prepare for the bad weather and other curve balls the game sends your way while also exploring your surroundings. It is really well made, very streamlined and fun to play. I particularly loved the setting and the moral dilemmas the game proposes. Each of the different scenarios also demands you play the game a little bit different, focusing on different aspects of management and adding flavor to your experience. However, being a scenario driven game, it kind of lacks replay value and I feel it would benefit a lot from additional scenarios and a sandbox mode. Totally recommended.

Subterrain - sgwin. A top down survival shooter game with base management, exploration and crafting/research. You play as Dr. West, a scientist that is imprisoned for an experiment that went wrong and that transformed the entire population of your Mars colony into zombies. You have to escape prison, find a safe haven and explore the entire colony gathering resources, improving your gear, fighting the infection and trying to escape. The game has a nice story and worldbuilding, good gameplay, and a nice progression. It lacks diversity and areas and enemies feel always the same. It is also very grindy and I would have preferred a shorter playthrough. Recommended for fans of top down shooters.


See you next time and happy backlog assassinations :)

April Final Report

During the month of April I managed to beat 7 games, including 1 sgwin.

• Dex
  

  17 hours playtime

  26 of 32 achievements

• Fantasy Quest Solitaire
  

  6 hours playtime

  12 of 16 achievements

• Hare In The Hat
  

  6 hours playtime

  16 of 34 achievements

• Hollow Knight
  

  37 hours playtime

  19 of 57 achievements

• Kingdom: New Lands
  

  19 hours playtime

  17 of 34 achievements

• Tengami
  

  73 minutes playtime

  4 of 4 achievements

• The Way
  

  10 hours playtime

  24 of 29 achievements

Dex - Nice 2d action adventure set on a futuristic cyberpunk dystopia. You play as Dex, a girl that wakes up to find herself being hunted by the authorities under the control of a megacorporation. The game plays both as a side scroller , with awkward movement and easy combat, and an underwhelming twin stick shooter during the hacking phases. On the positive side, it features a nice story, multiple side quests, interesting characters, and great world-building. The game is also fairly linear and sometimes feels more like a point&click than an action game. Even though it has some limitations, I would definitely recommend you give it a try.

Fantasy Quest Solitaire - Casual solitaire game with some hidden object sections and mild puzzling. A time killer and nothing more.

Hare in the Hat - A short puzzle game whose main difficulty is discovering where the puzzles are on the only set available. It is ok, I guess and worth the short play.

Hollow Knight - A masterpiece. One of the best metroidvania ever made and a game that incorporates a lot of great ideas from recent titles. You play as a little beetle that enters an underground kingdom filled with enemies and hazards. Great world-building, diverse enemy types, inventive and numerous bosses (both mandatory and optional), many secrets, and a constant stream of wonder and discovery.I love the way the map opens up, the souls-like environmental storytelling and bosses, the customization of abilities, and I am also very thankful for being able to fast travel. Essential game even for people with only a passing interest in metroidvania games.

Kingdom: New Lands - sgwin. An interesting game. It is a 2d tower defense game with minimal base building and resource management. You play as the ruler of the land and you must build your stronghold and your army to defend against the nightly hordes of greeds that are trying to get all your money and your crown. Once you gather enough resources, you have to repair a boat, take it to the pier and leave for another island. After beating 5 islands you win the game. Recommended.

Tengami - A short puzzle game that plays as a fold-up book. You play as a Japanese character that must traverse several scenarios to get flowers from a tree. You have to alter the world in order for your character to advance and sometimes you must solve some easy environmental puzzles. Recommended.

The Way - A great adventure, in several ways similar to Dex, that focuses mostly on puzzling. You play as a man that has lost his wife. You dig her up at the cemetery, take her home and place her under cryogenic preservation and start a great adventure trying to bring her back to life. The game has a great setup, a good story, wonderful world-building, and puzzles that are cryptic at first but fairly easy to put into place once you figure them out. The only negative is that movement is very stiff and some sections in the game consist of demanding platforming sections. Totally Recommended.


See you next time and happy backlog assassinations :)

March Final Report

During the month of March I beat 5 sgwins. I didn't manage to get as much gaming time as during the previous months since I went with my family to visit my parents and decided to spend a larger part of my free time reading books. No regrets on both counts :)

• Nex Machina
  

  6 hours playtime

  13 of 39 achievements

• Owlboy
  

  13 hours playtime

  4 of 12 achievements

Nex Machina - sgwin. A great arcade twin-stick shooter. Nonstop action, nice soundtrack, good graphics, great enemy variety, inventive bosses, and a very challenging and rewarding gameplay. The only negative for me is that you have to play it in one sitting as there is no save system (understandable since it is an arcade game but, being the father of a 2 year old, I prefer to be able to stop whenever I want without losing all my progress). This is mitigated by the fact that the game is fairly short if you don’t die too much. Beat it on easy and am playing it on Medium. Totally recommended.

Owlboy - sgwin. A charming platformer with a good story, nice characters, and great art and soundtrack. You play as a mute owlboy that is trying to save his homeland from being attacked by pirates and then goes on to save the entire world. The game is quite competent and I found it above average in almost every aspect. The biggest problem with the game is that your main character can fly and therefore the platforming does not feel good. It compensates with some ingenious level design but I found the gameplay somewhat lacking because of that. Still, I would recommend you give it a try.

Reported earlier

• Grow Home
  

  3 hours playtime

  7 of 26 achievements

• Hellblade: Senua's Sacrifice
  

  13 hours playtime

  14 of 14 achievements

• Mr Shifty
  

  8 hours playtime

  10 of 14 achievements

See you next time and happy backlog assassinations :)

March Mid Report

During the first 2 weeks of March I beat 3 sgwins and all of them are really good games.

• Grow Home
  

  3 hours playtime

  7 of 26 achievements

• Hellblade: Senua's Sacrifice
  

  13 hours playtime

  14 of 14 achievements

• Mr Shifty
  

  8 hours playtime

  10 of 14 achievements

Grow Home - sgwin. A really interesting non violent videogame. You play as BUD, a robot that is deployed on a planet and is tasked with making a star plant grow past the stratosphere, where it blooms. You have to climb the tree, latch onto branches and guide them to several floating islands that feed the tree. It is a fairly simple game with some exploration for good measure. The robot’s movement is a little awkward but really works well with the theme and the setting. The experience of climbing to high altitudes and traversing the branches is very rewarding. It is a fun short game that I will probably play some more and show it to my daughter when she grows up. Recommended.

Hellblade: Senua’s Sacrifice - sgwin. One of the strongest experiences I’ve had in a long time playing videogames. This game is beautifully crafted. Graphically it is gorgeous (even playing it on low), the world building is phenomenal, the sound fidelity is even better, and the story is well researched and engaging. Gameplay works really well but I can understand it is not for everyone, especially not for people that like fast experiences or that are easily upset.

Hellblade is basically a walking simulator, with some environmental puzzles and some sections of hack & slash fighting. You play as a woman warrior entering the land of the dead to recover the soul of her beloved. Everything in the game is made to elicit an emotional response. Psychosis, schizophrenia, OCD, phobias, they all play a major role here. Combat, for instance, uses a closed camera angle, a disquieting color palette and doesn’t give you many cues, although it is very robust… this works well but feels strange. Even things I assume were not on purpose (difficulty to interact with doors and objects, obtuse movement at times) further enhance the experience.

It is a beautifully crafted experience with a lot of work and love put into it. However, it is a slow, intense, and stressing experience. Movement is slow, you spend a lot of time outside of combat, there are many environmental puzzles, combat feels strange, and levels are very linear (with slight detours for the only type of collectible in the game). I totally recommend it.

Mr. Shifty - sgwin. This was a blast to play. It is a top-down action game, with some similarities to Hotline Miami, featuring a teleportation power and exclusive melee combat. You play as Mr. Shifty, a special agent infiltrating the skyscraper of a very rich and dangerous man to extract his mega plutonium. Each level consists of a different floor that you must traverse from elevator to elevator, eliminating all threats (sometimes you can also avoid them) by any means necessary, on a mostly destructible environment. The story is fairly standard, you character does not speak and is not particularly original, the setting is OK, and the levels, enemies and hazards are competently done but in what the game really shines is on its gameplay. Teleporting around the levels, punching enemies, and making them shoot each other never gets old. It makes you feel like you were Nightcrawler, a member of the X-Men (the character colors and the smoke as you teleport are almost identical). Would love it if they actually made a Nightcrawler game. Totally recommended.


See you next time and happy backlog assassination :)

February Final Report

Over this month I managed to beat 6 games, 5 of which were sgwins. One of the games was also a long game (50h+)

• HuniePop
  

  12 hours playtime

  8 of 20 achievements

• Pillars of Eternity
  

  56 hours playtime

  20 of 48 achievements

• Steamburg
  

  6 hours playtime

  41 of 51 achievements

HuniePop - sgwin. A match three game coupled with a simple dating sim with nice anime artstyle and sexual content. You play as a guy (or a girl) who doesn’t have any luck with the girls and that has a visit from a sex fairy. She then leads you on the right track to have sex with every girl you meet and also some other non-human special characters. Gameplay is quite nice, although fairly casual (as expected) and the lightspirited “story” makes the clear sexism, racism, dishonesty and materialism tolerable. Recommended.

Pillars of Eternity - sgwin. A modern take on the cRPG games of the past. You play as a character that is “awakened” and that becomes a Watcher, making him able to talk with spirits. You then embark on a grand adventure (50h+) to find out why it happened to you and solving the problems of the region. Similarly to the games it took inspiration from (Baldur’s Gate, most notably of all), it is quite heavy on reading and party management. Writing is, for the most part, competent, combat is really interesting and gives you many options, the UI is nicely streamlined, the character companions are very fleshed out (although their quests were mostly lackluster), you get to manage and upgrade a stronghold, and quests are also nice and many have multiple solutions, including non-violence. However, I did not find the story engaging at all, in spite of all the worldbuilding, and didn’t really appreciate the game’s resolution… introducing a character in the final chapter to explain everything is just lazy writing. Still I would recommend the game for its gameplay.

Steamburg - sgwin. A very simple puzzle game. Earth has been invaded by alien robots that seem taken out of The War of the Worlds and you play as a scientist trying to get back to your wife. Every level consists of you luring robots (by seeing you and using light bombs that attract them) to their deaths with Tesla coils that appear all over the city of Steamburg. Story is simple, graphics are competent but nothing great and the gameplay is also nothing to phone home about. Try it if you are interested in steampunk.

Reported earlier

• Dr. Langeskov, The Tiger, and The Terribly Cursed Emerald: A Whirlwind Heist
  

  26 minutes playtime

  1 of 6 achievements

• Oddworld: New 'n' Tasty
  

  9 hours playtime

  26 of 35 achievements

• Sleeping Dogs: Definitive Edition
  

  16 hours playtime

  19 of 59 achievements

See you next time and happy backlog assassinations :)

Mid February Report

After having a great start of the year in backlog assassination, I’ve decided to try to tackle some longer games this month. During the first two weeks of February I’ve beaten 3 games, 2 of which were sgwins.

• Dr. Langeskov, The Tiger, and The Terribly Cursed Emerald: A Whirlwind Heist
  

  26 minutes playtime

  1 of 6 achievements

• Oddworld: New 'n' Tasty
  

  9 hours playtime

  26 of 35 achievements

• Sleeping Dogs: Definitive Edition
  

  16 hours playtime

  19 of 59 achievements

Dr. Langeskov, The Tiger, and The Terribly Cursed Emerald: A Whirlwind Heist - A free to play short experience developed by one of the creators of The Stanley Parable. It is a walking simulation in which a narrator instructs you in what to do on the set of a game and comments on your actions. It was OK and funny at times.

Oddworld: New ‘n’ Tasty - sgwin. I loved the original Abe’s Odyssey when it came out and I loved this new remake. It is a puzzle platformer in which you control a strange, funny and lovable character trying to escape from becoming processed food and saving his friends in the process. It is quite challenging, smart and fun game. Totally recommended.

Sleeping Dogs: Definitive Edition - sgwin. An open world game set in Hong Kong in which you play as an undercover cop infiltrating the triads. It has a nice story, good world building and fun gameplay. The highlights of the game are the martial arts fighting with exploitable environment for immediate knockouts and the high speed carjacking mechanism. These features complement the usual tropes in this type of games: racing, hacking, singing karaoke, etc. Recommended.


See you next time and happy backlog assassinations :)

January Final Report

January was a great start for what I hope will be a successful year fighting against my backlog. During this month I beat 11 games, 4 of which were sgwins.

• Ori and the Blind Forest: Definitive Edition
  

  10 hours playtime

  33 of 57 achievements

• Mind Spheres
  

  2 hours playtime

  11 of 11 achievements

• KAMUI
  

  42 minutes playtime

  11 of 17 achievements

• 140
  

  3 hours playtime

  4 of 8 achievements

• Jotun: Valhalla Edition
  

  8 hours playtime

  9 of 36 achievements

Ori and the Blind Forest: Definitive Edition - What a great game. Wonderful artstyle, beautiful story, great characters, very good gameplay, and a great experience overall. You play as Ori, a light being that is witnessing the death of the valley he lives in. He sets out to explore, discover what has happened and try to fix it. It is a metroidvania game with somewhat floaty character controls but that compensates by not being too demanding on precision, combos or tight landings and by the fact that you can save almost everywhere. Totally recommended.

Mind Spheres - A simple puzzle game in which you have to guide a ball to a designated goal by adjusting some platforms and obstacles. It is a fairly short game that can be 100% without too much trouble. The game is fairly easy and forgettable.

KAMUI - A nice shoot-em up game from the late 90s. It is, as you expect from the genre, a frenetic bullet hell with a lot going on at the same time on the screen. It is very competent in what it does and I enjoyed the fact that you have to use a secondary weapon to hit enemies on the ground or at a lower level than you are. As with every game of this type, it can be beaten in less than 1h and the lasting appeal is to break your highscore. Recommended for fans of the genre.

140 - This game was a wonderful surprise. Half platformer, half rhythm game with a minimalistic artstyle, stroboscopic animations, and loud electronic music. It is really well done and I enjoyed it very much. Totally recommended.

Jotun: Valhalla Edition - ABC challenge (finally back on track). You play as a female Viking warrior that dies and has prove her worth to the gods in order to enter Valhalla. It is boss rush game with a great artstyle and a nice setting. Before you beat each boss you have to explore a couple of areas and solve some fairly easy puzzles. Each level has some twist to it but the games feels slow and the world empty (it is the afterworld so I can’t really blame it for it). I enjoyed my time with it but, to be honest, I found it quite average, apart from the artstyle.

Reported earlier

• The Shrouded Isle
  

  8 hours playtime

  9 of 16 achievements

• Valley
  

  5 hours playtime

  22 of 30 achievements

• The Mammoth: A Cave Painting
  

  6 minutes playtime

  1 of 1 achievements

• The Plan
  

  6 minutes playtime

  1 of 1 achievements

• Scanner Sombre
  

  84 minutes playtime

  no achievements

• Phantasmagoria
  

  6 hours playtime

  no achievements

ABC Challenge Progress: 16/27

See you next week and happy backlog assassination :)