Finished Thomas Was Alone. Nice platformer with squares and rectangles. Not very difficult and to be played in short sessions.

Full list here2.

Sniper Elite V2

When I first approached this game, I thought it was going to be about creeping in the shadows of Berlin while avoiding detection and strike like a predator only when necessity demanded it (or orders imposed it). I was wrong.

Set in the very last days of WWII, you take the role of an American sniper assigned with the task of exterminating the German team of scientists behind the V2 rockets and avoid their launch on allied grounds.
Strange as it may sound, you are alone throughout the entire course of the game and you will move around the city like you perfectly knew where to go, and you will never take contact with any ally or hear from the command center via radio.
On contrary, the Russian troops you will meet will always be hostile, and you will act against them as if the US were fighting against URSS rather than the Nazis in the first place, just because.
The plot is lackluster, but at least I must say that the scenarios are evocative; the developers really put some effort into making the ruins of Berlin look as squalid, filthy, grim and devastated as they could, and you can breath its heavy atmosphere.

For what concerns the gameplay side, I see an insane amount of wasted potential that could have been much better used if applied to another kind of game. Aside from the ballistics based on distance and wind (present only on the hardest difficulty setting -which still remains easy, imo), Sniper Elite V2 is a quite unrealistic third person shooter where a lone sniper takes out entire battalions of soldiers without any problem, basically turning into a standard military shooter with emphasis on long ranged rifles.
There are several objects you can use, like mines, tripwires, dynamite and rocks to distract your opponents, but none of them is ever really needed, as they will only serve to make the already easy challenge even easier: enemies will always follow the sound of the rock but you'll have to kill them anyway as a mission requirement sooner or later, so don't sneak too far away before executing them with your silenced pistol; the game makes you think that mines should be used for vile deeds like trapping a corpse to make his companions explode when they check, but in truth they will always ignore the mine and walk straight into it if it is on their path, even when in plain sight and reflecting sunlight; the tripwire has a use only in the unlikely situation when someone manages to enter the lower floor of building you are in, but you have probably sniped everyone already without them noticing while -cheaply- exploiting the noise of heavy artillery. Doing this one time is a nice additon, making it a main mechanic and repeating it at least once each level is not.
Despite looking good, the levels are extremely linear and small, plenty of invisible walls that will hinder your hike just when you thought you have found the perfect spot or an alternate route to avoid patrols; also, the sheer stupidity of the AI does not help, making targets sitting ducks that progressively move from cover to cover in hope of reducing their distance between you and them.
Thanks to this game, I have finally found out what the term “popamole” means: the entire game consists in fact in hitting the vital points of your enemies as soon as they “pop” out of their cover, while avoiding to be shot while you do the same... something easy when you can foresee your enemies moves, and not so much when the game decides that it is spawn time, making a lethal enemy sniper appear from a spot you checked and found empty just a few seconds before.

In every level there are a few hidden wine bottles to shoot and gold ingots to find, but as every collectible I have simply ignored them.

I have been very disappointed by Sniper Elite V2, as the good premises have been in my opinion completely wasted to go the Call of Duty way, while the game could have been a new window on the genre.

Stasis

I've been looking forward to this game since I first heard about it via Adventuregamers.com years ago. And I suppose that my expectations were met, for the most part; I'd say it's definitely an above-average horror adventure game. There's some very good parts, but also a lot of issues. For what it's worth, I'll say it's better than Sanitarium.

The writing is the real stand-out - primarily, the item descriptions (the occasional grammatical error notwithstanding). An example: "The darkness congeals into fearsome shapes in the gap between the bed and the wall".

There's also a lot of great atmosphere that is heavily inspired by System Shock / Dead Space / Alien. And Stasis definitely manages to be more disturbing and unsettling than all of those combined.

I know that the game was mostly made by one guy, and it's a great effort, but there's a lot of problems. There's some awkward animations, glitches / game-breaking bugs (note: several issues have since been addressed in a patch), and some mediocre characterization / stilted voice acting (and text-to-speech dialogue). I would have also liked to have some hotspot highlighting; I spent a good chunk of my time waving my cursor all over the screen.

But worst of all, the game commits one of the biggest game design sins - checkpoints before unskippable cutscenes!

Despite all of the negatives, there's some really interesting/creepy/clever things going on in the game.

Oh, did not know about that one. Definitely completely different! Try the NES one if you ever get the chance. Pure awesomeness.

I finally, finally beat The Binding of Isaac (full game mode) for the first time!
I've been having a session or two daily-ish for the last three weeks or so.
It took me 14 hours and 53 deaths (at least 27 of those were 9-lives cat deaths).
I think I had 7 hearts, chocolate milk charge-shot tears, 2 range power-ups, 2 damage power-ups and one tears power-up during my successful run.

Crimsonland + Crimsonland Classic

Initially, I thought about posting each of the games separately, but they were similar enough that I decided to combine them into one entry. Some of the differences are the somewhat enhanced visuals, more modes (though the typing mode is missing from the 2014 version), more enemies, more weapons and the ability for 4 players to play together (as opposed to the original's 2). Other differences are noted below.

Crimsonland. Named as such, because the amount of blood spilt from the monsters you will be facing will make the ground red. In its purest form, Crimsonland is a top-down arena shooter which pits you against a lot of monsters to fight across 50/60 increasingly difficult stages (the 2014 version has 10 more stages). In almost all stages, you start with your weak handgun and killing monsters will grant you access to more powerful weaponry (as well as power-ups) that can help you clear the stage easier, or even turn the tide. The more stages you complete, the more weapons and perks are added to the game's RNG, so while you begin with some typical weapons like an assault rifle or a shotgun, you later get access to things like the ion cannon, plasma rifle, rocket minigun, etc. While not all weapons are great, those who are, have a nice weight to them and blasting enemies into little bloody chunks is always satisfying, even if the game isn't exactly a looker. The power-ups also offer a nice variety, ranging from healing and invulnerability to something like freezing all the enemies and even a small nuke in there. As for the perks, whenever you are killing monsters, you gain XP and when you gain enough of it, you level up and you are able to select a perk. The perks are numerous and randomly generated, so they might or might not offer some significant help. They can help you gain more XP, grant you some regeneration, allow you to move faster and even allow you to activate power-ups from afar.

Unfortunately, while weapons and power-ups do sport a nice variety, the same can't be said for the stages and the monsters. The stages are all flat and do not possess any interactive features at all like different elevation, structures to take cover and somesuch. It's like each stage you play was first bombarded to oblivion prior to your arrival. Actually, scratch that, there should have been craters in that case! As for the monsters, they are all a variation of one of the common enemies of the game, whether it is an alien, giant spider, beetle or zombie. Different size, colour palette-swap; that''s what you should expect for the most part.

Another thing I didn't like is the 2014 version's increased reliance on luck. In some stages, failing to get a good weapon and/or a good power-up can spell your doom, as enemies can continuously respawn through generators and failing to kill them quickly will eventually result in you getting surrounded and massacred. Also, the 2014 version's Quest mode doesn't support levels and perks, unless unlocked by a password. Even then, it's not obvious when you are about to level up as there isn't a visible XP bar (at least, I couldn't see one).

However, I must say that I appreciate that GOG includes both versions of the game, as I can play the Classic one by myself and the 2014 with my friends. Though, if you are going to play it using controllers, I recommend you find one with nice and responsive analog sticks, as the PS2 ones aren't up to snatch. Other than that, I enjoyed the game, both in single and multi-player.

Full list.

That effectively sums up Crimsonland.

I was sourly disappointed, thought this would be a good "blow off steam for 15 minutes" game but the game actually creates more stress than it reduces. If it was more skill based, I wouldn't complain and chalk up failures to lack of reflexes but this was just way too random, having to restart certain levels just because you get the wrong weapon etc and the survival modes are just as random depending on drops, and after 10 minutes max you're most likely dead.
The classic version is somewhat more balanced but still too random for my taste.

Isn't there any other zap boom bang game that can fill this niche more appropriately? I have Alien Shooter 1 and 2 Reloaded but it was missing the oomph mojo I was looking for, hard to explain...so not sure if I'd like Zombie Shooter/Alien Shooter 2 Conscription and so on. Maybe Shadowgrounds? Something like Crimsonland would be cool but with more strategy (especially regarding terrain) and less reliance on luck. Preferably not too twitchy or antiquated in terms of controls (not in the mood for Crusader No Remorse/Regret style controls). I'm also not really interested in Hatred because I'd prefer dangerous enemy monsters/soldiers/anyone over unarmed victims plus it wouldn't run on my system anyway. Just checked out Running with Rifles which seemed like fun but the graphics are too sterile for my taste. Cannon Fodder is a bit too old, Bastion too colorful and fantasylike and Transistor won't run on my laptop (2.2 GHz Dual Core, 4GB RAM, Intel HD Graphics)

I would have recommended Renegade Ops, but I doubt that your laptop can run it. Some more isometric/top-down shooters would be (played it and liked it) and the [url=http://store.steampowered.com/sub/7678/]Alien Breed Trilogy (haven't played any of them, so no idea).

Thanks a lot for those 3 recommendations, I didn't know about any of these games and they all fit very precisely in the category I'm looking for.

Renegade Ops: Probably can't run this on my system, sadly there is no demo. Reminds me of Nuclear Strike and the Strike series in general, those were a ton of fun.

Alien Breed: Just played the demo, runs smoothly even with Intel HD. I like the graphics and action but the perspective is annoying and confusing due to having to rotate in increments all the time. It's very awkward so that's a deal breaker. And the demo ends just before the first boss :(

Splatter: Blood Red Edition: Very nice and fairly long demo including a boss fight and a rampage using a vehicle mounted MG, very nice. The boss was standard forever-to-take-down bullet sponge fare but the atmosphere is pretty good. It's a very simplistic game but that's just what I'm looking for. I like the story mode a lot more than quest mode in Crimsonland. Survival mode on the other hand is just as unfair as in Crimsonland, at least from what I could test out in the Splatter demo. The only useful weapons in survival mode are that charge up laser beam thing and the flame thrower, everything else seems entirely useless. Didn't realize I'm supposed to use flares until I tried the story mode, it's really cool to tactically throw flares and the zombies shy away from the light like little angsty fruitcake teenagers. Performance is surprisingly acceptable with integrated graphics which are not officially supported. Frame rates weren't super great but it was playable.

Decided to wishlist Splatter as it's just what I was looking for in this category, might pick this one up when it's on sale. Thanks again for the precise recommendations!

I'm not joking when I say X-Com: Enforcer. That game might not be what you'd expect from an X-Com, but it does 'zap, boom, bang' exceptionally well.

The last of my list of early- and mid- eighties games I’ve been replaying recently. Overall, a lot of duds but a few gems too! I certainly had fun in both cases :). I can comment further on any of the games if anybody wants to know more information.

Seven Cities of Gold
Space Taxi
Spy Hunter
Spy School
Street Sports Basketball
Super Cycle
Sword of Fargoal
Tapper
Wavy Navy

Heretic Kingdoms: The Inquisition (WinXP)

Just like other east European games, this Slovakian one has its own charm and technical problems.
Let's get to the negative points first:
Lots of bugs from which most aren't gamebreaking though:
I missed sounds for the impact of melee weapons.
The redcliff mines glitched out pretty bad at one point but after restarting the system it never happened again.
The game hung up on two or three occasions when you switch between the planes in the wrong moment when a script is becoming active.
Hit detection is pretty random when using the first circle earth spell for example.
Unusual skill system that would desperately need some explanation. The moment I really understood how it's working, the game went from hard to extremely easy for me.
There are a lot of items to master but not many areas with respawning enemies, so you'll miss out on some stuff in a playthrough in any case, especcially if you do not understand how to level up certain skills from the start. The effect of the "dexterity" attribute wasn't obvious for me so I didn't level it up until the last part of the game and it seems to be crucial for proper fighting.
Too short for your decisions to really have an impact on the actual game.
In order to see enough of the area to play properly, you have to zoom out every time you change areas but since you can do this with the mouse wheel, it isn't so bad.
The last bass fights are a bit boring.

Now to the good stuff:
The story of an atheist inquisition is a nice idea and since a god actually did exist in this world at one point but is dead gives the story some unique directions.
It's not a hack'n'slash ARPG like I thought at first but rather something like a far less sophisticated Inquisitor with interesting mechanics.
The main character has a personality but isn't good or evil but rather something bitchy in between with a dark childhood and you decide in which direction she is heading.
It isn't as annoyingly colourful as today's RPGs and the mix of 2D backgrounds and 3D characters/monsters is working better than I expected. It does blend together quite well.
I like the ending although it could have been longer and would need a proper outro.

Conclusion: If you like somewhat dusty looking but special western RPGs that are different from all the others, you should definitely give this one a go but I'd recommend to ask people that already finished it about the skill system to save you some late surprises.
I'm looking forward to the second part of the series that was gifted to me and that inspired me to finally play this title.

List:
http://www.gog.com/forum/general/games_finished_in_2015/post68

Arma 2

I think I'm going to call this one at 98% completed. I havn't played every wargame but I'm thinking it would be extremely tough to out do this one. I would rate this extremely highly, the devs have years and years of experience making military simulations, it feels like the sequel to Operation Flashpoint. I read somewhere the engine is used for real military simulations.

One of the great things about it is the way it forces you to use realistic tactics to survive, if your standing out in the open without cover you will most likely be shot and killed, just like in real life.

The graphics are superb, everything has a real solid feeling to it. The gameplay is also very solid, incredibly open and unlinear, I love unlinear gameplay where things work realistically instead of being scriped. Materials that react properly to damage and gunfire, not much clipping through objects. Good animations, models and sound effects. It seems a lot like Swat 4, not as precise but with much larger environments, vehicles and aircraft.

It's not without flaws but they are totally overwhelmed by great stuff they're almost a non factor. Sometimes triggers won't go off you've completed things, forcing you to redo missions (Latest versions somewhat fix this), very little instructions about some mechanics, sometimes unspecific objectives, pretty weak voice acting and lip syncing and somewhat tank-ish controls. Ten to twenty years ago type hard, which I love, with loading and save scumming you can get through easy enough. It crashed a couple of times in only two of the bigger missions, it was usually extremely solid.

Overall one of the best games I've played, with some of the most awesome moments I've had in gaming, there was a lot of moments I was astonished by what just happened or taking out ten guys in some heroic final stand. There's too many great stories to be able to tell, the "what game are you playing" thread is filled with my war stories.

The last senario mission seems purposefully badly balanced to not be able to complete it, but I completed all the training missions, the senarios, Red Harvest campaign, EW campaign and the Operation Arrowhead expansion. (Great expansion too set in the middle east.) And some of the toughest moments I've had in gaming.

I'd give this 9.5 out of 10, and that's the conservative score. If you ever wanted to play Black Hawk Down or Zero Dark Thirty, this is totally it.

It does look like it could be fun, I never played it as it got only lukewarm reviews by the press back in the day and there was no shortage of quality shooters at the time. To fulfill my needs in the brainless shooter category, I already had Serious Sam which is all one needs in that category anyway, I doubt XCOM Enforcer can compete with that level of brainlessness. I might check out a demo if I'm in the mood though so thanks for the reminder!
At the moment, I'm more interested in games with a 2D isometric/top down perspective rather than over the shoulder TPP in full 3D, and it would be great if there are at least some tactical elements because the lack thereof was one of my main gripes with Crimsonland.



How long is the game, approximately?

I have the GOG version but 've been putting off this one for a long time even though it occupies the next to play spot in my action RPG backlog. Perhaps I'm concerned about not having time to finish it.
I recently turned down a ninja gift of Inquisitor because that one supposedly takes a very long time to finish (up to 100 hours) and I simply can't manage something like that at the moment. If Heretic Kingdoms is much shorter, I might give it a shot in the near future, it's been rotting on my shelf long enough. Anyway, thanks for the review.