Slime Rancher 41/43 Achievements (95%)

2017 Backlog Kill #1

I was extremely excited to play this game again. The original two developers of this game had worked on one of my favorite MMOs of all time - Spiral Knights. They left the SK team as the game was starting to take a turn for the worst and as management from SEGA was too much to bear. I was ecstatic when I heard they were working on a new project - Slime Rancher. Before this game was released early-access on Steam, I played in the pre-alpha invite from the devs back in December 2015 and haven't touched it since - until about a week ago. It is absolutely amazing! Although it is an early access game, everything from the controls to the gameplay to the artwork feel significantly polished. It could come out of early access right now and I would consider it a complete game. The soundtrack gives each biome a unique ambience that doesn't get old, and the slimes are just as adorable in-game as they are in the pictures (not everything is adorable though, the tarrs can be quite frightening). Though comprised of two basic actions - vaccing (sucking up just about anything in the game) and shooting - the gameplay and controls don't get old and you get drawn into the game quickly. I'm one of those people who will install a game, play for 15 minutes, lose interest, and stop (shoutout to the ADHD fam) - this game held my attention for a full 22 hours and I couldn't bother playing anything else within the past week or so - I can attest to its addictiveness.

This game also has the right balance of hard-to-attain achievements v. easy-to-attain achievements. It took me ~20 hours to get 41/43 achievements (out of the last two, one is impossible to attain as of right now because the area hasn't been implemented into the game yet, and the other is just insanely rare to get) and about 40% of those can be achieved through just "completing" a basic run-through of the main aspects of the game, whereas another 30% of those are medium-difficulty with the final 30% being tough (yet manageable) to achieve. The game allows you to play in two modes: adventure and 5-day rush. Adventure allows freedom to explore, and this is what I used to create my main ranch. The goal of 5-day rush mode is to gain as much $$$ as you can - some of the most difficult achievements come from this mode. I failed miserably my first time around in 5-day rush mode but managed to redeem myself the second time around (I didn't realize the price of the plorts were constant in this mode unlike in adventure where they rise and fall like in a stock market).

I do feel like the game could still be improved (despite how far it has come!) There's a mailing system where other virtual AI Slime Ranchers can send you messages but I haven't found that they impact my slime ranching life at all and the detail doesn't really add anything; it would be interesting to see what the devs could do with that - I would love more interaction with the AI Slime Ranching community just like how Stardew Valley has the town community. The thought of a Slime Ranching community, of course, leads to the discussion of multiplayer mode. As of right now, Slime Rancher is only a single player game. I recognize that the devs have publicly stated (on the Steam Discussion Boards) that a multiplayer mode is currently not in the works nor is it being planned for the future as of right now, I do wish there could be some form of multiplayer whether it be local co-op or online. However, I would like to stress that the biggest plus to this game is its team of small but remarkably dedicated devs. To me, the amount and quality of the patches and updates that appear are phenomenal. A lot of early-access games these days are just left...to be in early-access forever. So far, I feel like this isn't the case with Slime Rancher. With each patch, more and more of my minor complaints are fixed - and some of these complaints I hardly recognized myself until I read the patch notes and thought, "huh, yeah, that was annoying - but now it's fixed!"

• New Year, New Me(?)
• Yay(s)
• Nay(s)

HAPPY 2017 BLAEO <3

So it's a little while since I last posted (by little I mean 6 months), mainly because I just started college and that took over my life. BUT since it is a New Year, I thought I'd overcome my laziness for once and give you all an update! (Good news: I learned how to format) I'm hoping my resolve to attempt once more to cut down my backlog doesn't end up to be like some people's workout goals - and to prevent (in)evitable failure, I've decided that I should do an update post every month (hey, I'm being optimistic). Your guide to da tabs: Yay(s) = games completed, Nay(s) = games added to backlog (P.S. Thank you Akantha for the tab layout pastebin, it was a bit tricky at first to figure out ^^)

Completed ^^

• Party Hard
  

  12 hours playtime

  19 of 27 achievements

TL;DR - I have minimal complaints about this game and it was a solid experience, recommended buy Wall-of-text-version (or read my review on Steam that's more detailed) - In my opinion, it's really fun. Stealth game. Go around and stab people at parties. That's it. So if you don't think you'll have fun stabbing pixel art people, avoiding police, and dumping dead people into dumpsters for the entirety of this game, it's probably not for you. For me, this game was repetitively fun. This game is all about replayability and I think it is incredibly replayable if you like the general idea of the game - and with Steam Workshop, well, hooray!

• The Beginner's Guide
  

  2 hours playtime

  no achievements

100% recommend. This is more of an experience than a game, very reflective. From the creator of the Stanley Parable

• The Wolf Among Us
  

  8 hours playtime

  31 of 35 achievements

I've been playing this game periodically from July - December 2016, and I can say that I enjoyed the story up until...the last episode. It felt rushed, incomplete, and left many holes and questions behind. Sometimes that can be a good thing in a movie or a story, but in The Wolf Among Us, it wasn't. Overall, I'd still recommend this game with a slight hesitation - however, 1 bad episode out of 5 or 6 episodes (forgot the #) doesn't ruin the experience. I have to say though - for a supposed "Choices matter" game, I don't think my choices mattered at all.

Comple- lol, no, just started (but that's better than nothing..right?)

• Epistory - Typing Chronicles
  

  6 hours playtime

  40 of 55 achievements

• Slime Rancher
  

  3 hours playtime

  9 of 43 achievements

• Day of the Tentacle Remastered
  

  34 minutes playtime

  1 of 58 achievements

• Terraria
  

  13 hours playtime

  15 of 88 achievements

Would have been too long if I put it into a pretty format, so all I have to say for myself is..oops..(these are the games acquired after Summer Sale 2016)

• Recettear: An Item Shop's Tale
• Hitman GO
• LIGHTNING RETURNS: FINAL FANTASY XIII
• Pool Nation
• Super Sanctum TD
• Cook, Serve, Delicious!
• Mordheim: City of the Damned
• One Piece Pirate Warriors 3 Fan Gift Pack
• The Flame in the Flood
• Hacknet
• The Escapists + DLC
• Castle Crashers
• Lichdom: Battlemage
• Big Pharma
• Democracy 3 Collector's Edition
• This War of Mine
• Pirate Pop Plus
• Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim Legendary
• HITMAN™: INTRO PACK [Prologue + Episode 1]
• Space Run
• Fahrenheit: Indigo Prophecy Remastered
• Cibele
• Downwell
• Lego Star Wars Saga
• Dishonored GOTY
• Dungeons 2
• The Secret World Retail
• Legend of Grimrock 2
• TIS-100
• Volume
• Evoland
• RPG Maker MV
• Streamline
• DiRT 3 Complete Edition
• The Mean Greens - Plastic Warfare
• ADR1FT
• The Vanishing of Ethan Carter
• Shadow Complex Remastered
• Killing Floor + DLC
• Dragon's Dogma: Dark Arisen
• Kathy Rain
• Styx
• Broforce
• Oxenfree
• Massive Chalice
• Titan Souls
• Lumino City
• Technobabylon
• Chroma Squad
• Spaera
• Westerado: Double Barreled
• Assault Android Cactus
• Action Henk
• Deponia Doomsday
• Slime Rancher
• Epistory - Typing Chronicles
• Train Valley
• Hotline Miami 2
• Devil Daggers
• Agatha Christie: The ABC Murders
• Punch Club
• Amnesia
• Tropico 4
• Castle of Illusion
• DRAGON - A Game About a Dragon
• Disco Dodgeball
• Roguelands
• Spelunky
• Skullgirls + DLC
• Golf With Your Friends
• Lethal League

I’ve been overseas so I haven’t been able to give a proper post-summer sale update (apparently BLAEO is blocked in China!) I can only access this site via VPN on my phone so I’ll have to add the fancy HTML stuff later to this post when I get home ^^ Welp, here we go, first and foremost, the fattening of my backlog via the summer sale:

• Stardew Valley
  

  2 hours playtime

  0 of 40 achievements

• Party Hard
  

  12 hours playtime

  19 of 27 achievements

• Mark of the Ninja
  

  0 minutes playtime

  0 of 38 achievements

• Brütal Legend
  

  0 minutes playtime

  0 of 59 achievements

• Prison Architect
  

  0 minutes playtime

  0 of 18 achievements

• Portal
  

  0 minutes playtime

  0 of 15 achievements

• Portal 2
  

  0 minutes playtime

  0 of 51 achievements

• BioShock
  

  0 minutes playtime

  no achievements

• BioShock 2
  

  0 minutes playtime

  0 of 68 achievements

• Hammerwatch
  

  0 minutes playtime

  0 of 40 achievements

• BIT.TRIP BEAT
  

  45 minutes playtime

  5 of 26 achievements

• ONE PIECE PIRATE WARRIORS 3
  

  0 minutes playtime

  0 of 40 achievements

• Enter the Gungeon
  

  4 hours playtime

  1 of 48 achievements

• Middle-earth: Shadow of Mordor
  

  0 minutes playtime

  0 of 74 achievements

…the end. Typing all of that out made me realize that..haha, that might’ve been overkill with the buying - but I will play them! …one day, hopefully soon.

I tried to reach the throne again. Multiple times. To no avail. Death seems to be inextricably linked to my poor Fish.

I beat the heart in Binding of Isaac! \o/ the scene before the credits where Isaac opens the large chest was weird for me - personally I didn’t understand why they switched art styles all of a sudden. Next goal(s): the Challenges.

Finished Episodes 2, 3, 4 of Wolf Among Us. I think the story is truly great in this Telltale Game - though my biggest pet peeve with it is how little I feel my choices have on the impact of the story; well, I’m pretty sure they have none. Nevertheless, excited to finish the final episode soon!

Unexpectedly, I’ve already beaten a game I bought over the sale - Party Hard. It’s a really addicting game and you can read my review here: http://steamcommunity.com/id/uptional/recommended/356570/

Thanks for reading and enjoy Backlog hunting!

I’ve mainly been focusing on Nuclear Throne and trying to get to the throne (to no avail, unfortunately). I did unlock a new character: Chicken. I really wasn’t meaning to, but I wasn’t playing that great that day anyways and figured, hey, I’m right before the level that I can unlock it at and the upgrade to trigger it is right there - might as well haha. Here’s a video of it (I know I run into bullets like an idiot at the beginning):

Anywho, I’ll mainly be focusing on Nuclear Throne from my “In Progress” games until I make it to the throne (and sit on it, god, that would be so satisfying). But, if I reach 40 hours and still no throne, welp, gotta move on to some other things and come back to it at a later time. May record some more gameplay but ¯_(ツ)_/¯

I’M NEW! Hey there, hey you, hey world, hey.
So after organizing my 200 something games via the drag and drop categorizing thingy (damn, that thing is really neat) I decided to make a list of the games I was going to progress on in the coming days/weeks. Without further ado, here are the contestants:

• Nuclear Throne
• The Binding of Isaac: Rebirth
• Steamworld Dig
• The Wolf Among Us
  Though I guess one can never say they “completed” Nuclear Throne or Isaac, which brings up one of the things I wanted to mention about the categories. I’m not sure what categories Isaac and Nuclear Throne would actually be in - endless? Beaten mom? Congrats you’ve beaten the boss!..lol jk no, you haven’t seen half of the actual game yet. Reached the throne room? Cool!..now go discover more secret areas! Anywho, I doubt I’ll ever be able to 100% either of those.

The Daily Rundown
The Binding of Isaac: Rebirth
Well I’ve previously beaten mom, but have yet to beat mom a second time and reach the womb and today…I’m proud to say that I DID IT!


I was fairly surprised because the run started out pretty bad and by the second floor I was only on 3 soul hearts after making a weird deal with the devil (I mainly started out the run intending to unlock Azaela via making 3 deals with the devil, which did happen) - naturally, I thought I was screwed. But eventually to my surprise, I defeated Mom, for only the second time ever, and entered the womb. The surprise continues as I pretty much rip through the 1st womb boss but die on the floor after that after making some reckless decisions. All in all, it was a good run - excited to see some new stuff Isaac is going to offer on the next few runs, hopefully I’ll reach the womb more often now.

Nuclear Throne
I’ve never conquered the throne nor have I ever reached 7-3. I’m proud to say that…I reached 7-2 and failed miserably with a lot..A LOT..of frustration. I WAS RIGHT BEFORE THE THRONE. How could I -

/cry. I will make it one day.

Miscellaneous
Of course I can’t end this first post of mine without this - The 1st day I join BLAEO is the 1st day the Steam Summer Sale happens…yay? Due to the summer sale, I’m probably going to end up increasing my backlog rather than decreasing it in the next week or so. So far, I’ve bought Stardew Valley.

• Stardew Valley
  

  2 minutes playtime

  0 of 40 achievements

After tweaking with it for a little bit, I got it to work on my Mac (I own a PC, it’s just a crap PC until I pull myself together enough to upgrade it - and I’m traveling soon, so I’m probably relying on my laptop nowadays a lot more).
And sadly, Stardew Valley will (probably) not be my only purchase.