Race the Sun

A fast paced arcade game about postponing the inevitable - your death. You can maneuver through many obstacles for a long time but eventually you’ll crash or be too slow and the sun will set. The game can be played in small sessions which is good for arcade games. At the beginning I was a bit pissed about level changing every 24h but then I realize the game is not about learning levels by heart but being experienced enough to dodge each and every obstacle, no matter if you know what’s coming or not so I must admit it was good choice to introduce randomization. I can reach level 10+ every second game or so and thus I believe I’m done with it for now.


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Pinstripe

It's a puzzle platforming adventure game mix. Interesting art style, I liked that. The puzzles were easy most of the time, but I didn't mind that. I got stuck and had to check a walkthrough two or three times regardless, due to some questionable design decisions (lots of obligatory backtracking without this necessity being completely clear; crucial puzzle element destroyable until you re-enter the screen - also without this being completely clear; previously unaccessible areas accessible later on without notice; also, there are doors in the game that you can only open after finishing the game and starting Adventure Plus mode, which seemed pretty pointless to me, but apparantly they only contain areas with backer (?) names or something like that; still, I had expected them to be part of the game).

The control scheme had me a little undecided on how to best play the game; I started using a gamepad and it felt pretty good, but soon you have to aim and shoot, which seemed manageable with the gamepad at first, but when time pressure or precision were added to some challenges, it became too uncomfortable and I switched to mouse and keyboard for those, which in turn made them almost too easy again. The plot wasn't all that special, rather predictable run-of-the-mill indie horror game story, and the writing felt a bit silly and weird at times. The voice acting was hit or miss. I thought even if there was nothing essentially wrong with it, it didn't always fit the characters that well. All in all a mixed bag of great visual presentation, easy but enjoyable gameplay with some downsides and slight frustrations, and a rather forgettable story. So I guess my verdict is somewhere between "Quite alright" and "Meh". Took me about four hours to complete.

Sherlock Holmes- The Devil's Daughter (Xbox One)

Back in January I played the game previous to this one "Crimes and Punishment'. It was a free GwG game on Xbox and I actually really enjoyed it, way more than I expected. I've been wanting to play this one, but it was a bit pricey for me, but then I bought a "Black Friday" deal $1 for a month of Xbox game pass and then the game was added to the game list for the service this month.

If you've played Crimes and Punishment then you will feel at home here. It's more of the same, which is good if you liked the other game. It consists mainly of 5 separate cases, or more accurately 4 cases and another background case that sort of happens in the background during the entire game and finally concludes in it's own chapter. The game play roughly divides evenly between exploration and clue collection, puzzle solving, timing based action sequences and the actual deduction phase where you finalize each case and make your accusation and decide whether to condemn or not. And yes, you can accuse the wrong person and keep going like nothing happened with no repercussions other than your own guilt at falsely condemning an innocent person. Shit happens!.
The one part of game play I found a bit tedious were the trial and error timing based puzzles. Of special note though, the vast majority of puzzles can be skipped if you would just prefer to press on with the investigation.

I liked the cases, though maybe not as much as the ones in Crimes and Punishment. Also I felt the overall title themed case that finishes up the game is the weakest point. But overall it's still really good and very true, in my opinion, to the source material and the way Holmes would work. The man himself is portrayed quite well, I'm not as convinced with Watson. The visual presentation of period London is great and feels authentic.

So overall I did like it, just not as much as the previous game. I haven't played the earlier ones (all of which are on GoG), so I can't compare to those. I don't know how much this one costs on Steam, but on Consoles I think it's still a bit pricey at regular price, given that it's only about a 12 hour game if you're slow like me. Though I've seen it as low as A$17 on PS4 sales and on Xbox you can always do what I did and play it using game pass if you just want to play it and not own it.

games ive finished in 2017 are as follows:

Darksiders
God of War 3
God of War: Ascension
Prince of Persia (2005)
Need for speed 2012
Need for speed
Mortal Kombat xl
Prince of Persia: The Sands of Time
Battlefield 1
Call of Duty Infinite Warfare
Call of Duty Ghosts
Call of Duty Advanced Warfare
Call of Duty Black ops 3
Assassin's Creed: Syndicate
Assassin's Creed: Brotherhood
Devil May Cry 4: Special Edition
Devil May Cry (DmC)
The Elder Scrolls Daggerfall
Torchlight 2
Infamous 2
Infamous Second Son
Prototype
Amazing Spiderman 2
Bayonetta
Nier:Automata

there are more but i think i'll stop here but you get what i do with most of my time xD

Super Chibi Knight

A very simple but still enjoyable brawler / Zelda / platform action RPG, graphically inspired by and paying homage to Newgrounds games, and especially Castle Crashers, created by one developer and his 8-year-old daughter. Took me 2-3 hours to complete. Apparantly there are two specialization paths, sorcerer or beast master, and the game branches in the second part, leading to two different areas. That wasn't very clear in-game; there were two spots that allowed me to leave the first area and the game warned me that this would mean abandoning all the unfinished quests if I continued, but it didn't actually tell me that it also meant specializing in a particular path and forgetting about the other one. I only beat the game as beast master and would be curious to also see the sorcerer part of the game, but since there is only one single autosave slot per playthrough, I guess that would mean I'd have to start the game from scratch and replay the first part, and I don't feel like doing that now. A pity it doesn't just offer the option to go back to the point where the story branches.

Just got Mortal Kombat X Platinum Trophy. Played it properly (no lazy ass grind strategies) so it took me 95 hours and 30 minutes (+- some). Still missing one skin for Liu Kang, and then I can put the game to rest. Probably last game finished this year? We'll see if Project CARS makes it before New Year Eve :P

List of all my games finished in 2017.

Hillsfar (1988)

The oldest brother from Pool of Radiance family sold here with
Forgotten Realms: The Archives - Collection Two. Due to lack of time and focus for full-size crpgs I've taken this one as something shorter, easier and less complicated. Unfortunately it's not so simple due to arena fights and brought me some headache. It's also (with some strong arcade elements, lack of character's development etc.) not exactly crpg, but in this case it's probably not a matter of mixing genres, but rather early stage of crpg evolution (it took some time to establish and clarify some genre's rules and common elements).

Anyways - the game was fun, it brings nice atmosphere of retrogaming and is still worth to try. Finishing Fighter's storyline took me about 6 hours. Quest-lines for Mage, Cleric and Thief are totally different, so if you enjoy the gameplay, there is much more than that.

Oh, and, please, note that the opinion comes from someone, who never played the game before. My adventure with crpgs began with Fallout 1. Everything created before was digged out later.

List of all games completed in 2017

Beaten chantelise but not the survival dungeon yet since i got stuck between the bosses and they got me at floor 35.
Chantelise does play rather differently than recettear dungeons,recettear dungeons were rather randomly generated while here you have them properly set in each area.You have no level ups or xp but the only proper way to play this is to find secret treasure in game where you have to do something to make them appear,the gear is very important to make the game easier,because the game is kinda hard,especially at start.
You can buy health but each time it gets expensiver with every buy the same with gear,otherwise the things you sell like treasure gets cheaper.
So it's just a fighter and a fairy,the fairy can do magic by simply picking up the magical gems with the fighter and then it depends on which gems you used and how far you got in the game to cast magic like maxium i have seen were 4 gems being used,while gear you can use maxium 5 slots what i've seen.
Also there is less different enemies here than in recettear,but in this game you sometimes have to figure out what to do to beat an enemy or boss,especially bosses,which recettear didn't have that as much.
Otherwise it is a decent game.
Final boss of story i only won because i have been changing gears in battle intelegently.

Anomaly Warzone Earth

The first in the series, I believe. I think on the whole I preferred Anomaly 2 slightly better, but this one is still mostly enjoyable.

Of the 15 boards in the campaign, 2 suffer from gimmicks I was not entirely wild about. One in particular, the second act of the mission is much longer than the first, introduces a timed bomb attack against you (and depending on what route you picked, it might be impossible to avoid), and worst of all, there's no check point for much too long.

That said, there's an escort mission that's actually done pretty well, and for the most part the maps are designed well for the strategy aspect of the game. On sale (or as a free gift, in my case) I think it's well worth a play-through if you like the genre at all.

Star Command

I swear, if it wasn’t on Android I would never finish it but oh well, playing on mobile is like that: if I can play 5 minutes here, 15 there I’m not so picky anymore. Sadly, the game is rather dull. Not bad per se but boring and empty. Clearly the game tried to be a younger brother of FTL with different approach (more captain oriented) but still cool enough on its own. Sadly, it failed. It’s full of questionable features, for example you can let your hull be completely destroyed but as long as your captain lives you are fine (just remember to repair it after the battle). The game is fairly linear and the fact that you can pick several missions in various order doesn’t make it non-linear. But most important of all - it’s boring. Every mission is almost identical, battles are not really interesting and while the game can be a bit hard even on normal difficulty it’s not really rewarding to finish yet another mission. I don’t recommend.


Full list

Finished two games lately:
- Space Pilgrim Episode 2: More of the same. A short but quite well done point'n click.
- Transformers Devastation: A good beat them all in the universe of the Transformers. The story is really good but the fights and the animations are very good.

Full list here.

Metal Slug. I think I could say this is one of my all-time favorite games. It's a parody of run-and-gun games that's also a great example of the genre, it's actually pretty fair to play despite being a coin muncher - I seem to get better at it every time I play - and of course it has arguably the best pixel art ever. It just makes smile the whole time I play it. Games like Metal Slug are why I can't help but be a little skeptical whenever I see a lot of new indie games boast of their "gorgeous pixel art!" Many of them are certainly nice-looking but stuff like Metal Slug is on a totally different level. It's like comparing modern limited TV cartoons to the fully animated films of the 1940s.

Quantum Break

Got it on the Humble Monthly bundle. Didn't know it was from the makers of Alan Wake, which I loved. But the filiation was clear, both from the whole atmosphere of the game and the complex storyline and from little details here and there in the game, like little winks to that game.

Quantum Break was, on many points, breathtaking. I mean, that might be the very first time I'm feeling like I'm playing a movie and not a game, but in the good sense. The production value is very high, actors are really good and even if the scenario is pretty complex, it holds well (I guess it wouldn't if you actually took a step back, put everything on paper and think about it, but that's not what a game is for, I think).

I've been fortunate enough to not encounter all the freezes, bugs and desktop crashes that were mentionned in the Steam discussions. Plus, On almost every settings maxed out, it ran smooth as butter on my rig. So, yay me!

The only gripe I might have about the combat, and more precisely the camera, since turning to face your adversaries after a certain move can be awfully slow... But it's a minor gripe, I think...

All in all, I really enjoyed Quantum Break! One of the best games I played this year!

So far in 2017: https://www.gog.com/forum/general/games_finished_in_2017/post15

Aw man, Shadow of Death was insane. As I mentioned in the HOMM section, I had a rough time playing through it on Impossible. Restoration of Erathia, on the other hand, was very fun. "From Day to Night", "Tunnels and Troglodytes", and "United Front" are scenarios I'd love to replay in my spare time. As for replaying Shadow of Death...you'd have to pay me to do that.