<span class="bold">Mekorama</span> (Android)

And yet another game I discovered thanks to GooglePlay's suggestions. Upon playing its first level I thought: "this looks as if the robot from Odd Bot Out had travelled to the Monument Valley world!". As it turns out the first part of my analogy was not that far-fetched, since Odd Bot Out was indeed developed by the same guy: Martin Magni. This time around, instead of slapping a price tag to it Magni opted for a pay-what-you-want approach, so you can play it for free if you so desire (in that case you won't have access to the hint system and the game will sometimes pester you about donating something for your fun).

In essence it's a puzzle game, in which you need to get the egg-headed robot protagonist to push a red button to complete the level. The perspective is isometric (unlike in Monument Valley, here the Euclidean geometry is never violated) and you can rotate the camera at 90º intervals. To reach your goal you'll need to act on movable blocks, avoid deadly electric bots, be helped by other non-lethal autonomous robots, and more. The main character walks in a rather clumsy way, and sometimes it can fall off the level structure if you're not careful. Most of the time that means you'll have to start over... except in one of the later levels.

Almost no two levels are (or feel) the same, and I'm amazed at the variety of puzzles that can be put together with a bunch of building blocks. If, after beating its 50 stock levels, you still want more, you can either get new ones by scanning the QR codes you can find on different places, or better still, make your own ones with the built-in level editor. Almost infinite (re)playability value!

My list of finished games in 2016

Gone Home (PS4)

After the marathon of getting to the Platinum Trophy in Bloodborne, I really needed a nice simple walking simulator to wind down- those last few Chalice bosses almost did me in.
Well it just so happenes that one of this months PSN Plus games (which I subscribed to for a time to play Bloodbornes online component) is Gone Home.

I fully expected to dislike the game and come here poking fun at it. Unfortunately for that plan I actually enjoyed it. For what it is. It's just like a 2.5 hour interactive short story, and just like in written forms, the best short stories keep it simple.

What elevated Gone Home way above just average to awesome for me was one of the best soundtracks ever! Expecting a love story to be full of soppy ballads? No, it's all Garage Chick band Punk Rock (like Heavens to Betsy)- which really surprised me in a good way. Favorite soundtrack since Sunset Overdrive, which also uses Garage Punk style sounds.

I'm no ones financial advisor, only the individual can decide what 2.5 hours of interactive story telling with great songs is worth to them. But since I didn't really directly hand over any cash, I'm content. It was worth exploring the house just for the songs.

You just pushed the game to the top of my backlog. :)

Guacamelee

Everything is tight about this, the visual design, the sound design and even the mechanics of shrinking down to a chicken and pecking enemies in the boney gonads. It's all good brightly colored fun.

But for the love of all that is good, DO NOT play this game with a keyboard. It turns the later stages into a truly miserable experience.

I just finished back to back all the little story/atmosphere-focused games that have been accumulating in my backlog:
Tengami, A Bird Story, Never Alone + Foxtales.

It was a week full of disappointment unfortunately.

F.E.A.R.: Perseus Mandate

If you've played the base game and the first expansion (and you if you haven't then you should) you know what to expect. The mechanics are the same, there are a few new enemies, and a few new weapons. But of course this is not a bad thing.

Bullet time still makes the game too easy - I played on the hardest (Extreme) difficulty, and only needed to retry a few of the fights, and I'm no expert FPSer. Of course you can always make things harder for yourself by not Quicksaving and perhaps limiting your arsenal - try less shooting and more melee combat for example.

After you beat the game, 3 bonus missions unlocked, and these are a unique challenge because they don't have any saves at all - quick or autosaves. The fist mission (Hospital) is not very hard, and once you know what to expect in the third (Sprint), the only difficulty comes from the final enemy. It's the 2nd mission (Arena) that brings the real challenge, since unlike the rest you cannot inch your way forward, peaking around corners, secure in the knowledge that there are no enemies behind you. With this one, even after dropping the difficulty to Moderate I barely eked out a win.

Given that you don't play the same character as in the first game, I have no idea how your bullet time powers are explained.

Stair Quest

This game is a parody of the old King's Quest games, or more accurately a parody of one specific feature of them. It's basically just one joke, but it's a funny one! The game can be completed in about one hour (or less I guess) depending on your skill with the arrow keys.

It was created for AdventureJam 2016 and it's free (Windows and Mac): http://gamejolt.com/games/stair-quest/147399

Life is Strange 9/10

Probably not one of the best games technically I've ever played but has become one of my all time favourites. Can't explain why, I just loved every single minute of it.


Dragon Age Inquisition 8/10

A long long game :) At times I did start to get bored of the sometimes repetitive questing but a plot twist or event gave fresh impetus. Would recommend but am unlikely to replay myself. 100 plus hours played.


Psychonauts 9/10

Missed this first time around so didn't play with rose tinted glasses. Thoroughly enjoyed playing this. Is on a lot of alltime lists and it definitely deserves to be there. Not too easy, not stupidly hard, it hits a sweet spot in gaming for me. Highly recommended. 25 to 30 hours played.

I found Trine 1 and 2 to be much more comfortable when played with a keyboard; also, Duke Nukem Manhattan Project. That said, yes, there are not many exceptions to the controller rule.

Games I have finished so far...

Borderlands 2: Game of the Year Edition
Divinity Original Sin: Enchanced Edition
Fallout 4
Huniepop
Incredible Adventures of Van Helsing: Final Cut, The
Kathy Rain
Renowned Explorers: International Society
Shadowrun: Dragonfall
Shadowrun: Returns
Tales from the Borderlands
Torchlight II

arkham city

mostly fishing out my 2 year old save and finishing it up
i stil find it underwhelming


fable 3 on steam 3 years after buying it


resident evil 6

i like it better then 4 but that doesnt say much since i hate resident evil 4

Gabriel Knight Sins of the Fathers 20th Anniversary (GOG)

Got it unlocked in the sale of course. My favorite point and click series ever, but I have to admit it's not my genre much these days. I never liked the first game as much as The Beast Within and the remake doesn't change that. Though I do like the remake better than the original Sins.

Seriously, I replayed the original a few years back and it was sometimes hard to even tell what some items were because it's so pixelated on a large modern monitor. So the newer graphics are appreciated as far as I'm concerned. otherwise it's pretty much the same game.

This will upset plenty, but I also prefer the new voices. Tim Curry may be a fine actor, but in the original he sounded like an Englishman acting the voice of someone from New Orleans- it sounded over done to me. And Mark Hamill has never been a good actor to begin with, I'm sure that will piss off plenty of Star Wars nutters.

So yeah, I think the remake is just fine. But really the whole point and click thing just doesn't appeal to me like it did in the 90's.

Doom (PS4)

Ironically the multiplayer is the worst aspect of this game, it's not balanced (a team that grabs the demon power up has waaaayyyy more chances of winning the game) and it's... uhm... bland, there's no motivation to continue playing it, it's a mindless shooter without any sense of victory or defeat.

The singleplayer on the other hand is more enjoyable, i don't really have nothing negative to say about it but i also don't feel like praising it, it's just a game not meant for me, like the multiplayer, it's a mindless shooter in large arenas, kill everything and move to the next one.

Like i said, not bad but not great, it's just not for me.

The Legend of Zelda - Twilight Princess Picross: Picross. Nuff said.

Metal Gear Solid 3 - Snake Eater: the beginning is awesome, the middle is meh and my god that ending is so epic.

Metal Gear Solid 4 - Guns of the Patriots: This game is the one that got me to buy the legacy collection on ps3. The one I was the most hyped to play... and the one I hated the most. The story was parts ok, parts "aw, f**k you" and parts "yeah!" with a little of "WTF" on the side. But the gameplay... My god I hated it. I get is a more "modern" version and plays ALMOST exactly like MGS3 Subsistance, but I hated it. In fact, that's something I didn't really like about the 3rd one.

Now working on: The Last Door Season 2 and Phoenix Wright Dual Destinies.