maybe, I don't know. :P

Not Tonight

I only got curious and bought "Not Tonight", because of all the people that screames "propaganda" when it came out. I have to say that I liked the game. Whenit comes to gameplay it's very similar to "Papers, Please!", but I think you have to look at even more details to decide who is allowed in and who has to stay out. Story, characters and moral decisions were a little more interesting in "Papers, Please!" though.

What I really liked about "Not Tonight" were the great pixel graphics and the cool music. There's also a good dose of humour which lightens the rather dark theme. So is it propaganda? I wouldn't say so. In my eyes it's a pretty good (and sometimes harsh) satire about the Brexit and xenophobia in general.

If you liked "Papers, Please!" you should give it a try.

Complete list of finished games in 2018

Postal 2 + Paradise Lost

Funny dialog/memes/etc, but I didn't care too much for the actual gameplay, especially all the traveling around town. The frequent load zones and, toward the end, crashes, were annoying too.

Lost Horizon

A by-the-numbers classic style adventure game with attractive 3d (for character models anyway) graphics and the typical class "adventure game" logic where you pretty much have to combine everything with everything. The game seemed aware of the fact that the players will randomly try things until something worked, to the point where the player character literally explained out loud the solution once you got it. Good thing there weren't too many "everythings" which is why I only needed to look up solutions twice. One of which times was because I forgot to use the "show all hotspots" key (a more modern adventure game function that I've really grown to love.) Didn't really care for the player character's [English] voice actor who spoke every line in the same calm, slightly sarcastic, tone that did its best to put me to sleep.

A couple screenshots for the hell of it:

Battle Worlds Kronos (PS4)

This is a turn-based hex strategy game.

The plot and characters are really bad, best ignored except that you can sometimes get valuable tactical information from them. But they are not the focus of this game. Resource management is minimal and base-building is non-existent, so the game focuses on combat. The combat itself is fairly simple, nothing too complex and there is no “overwatch”. The AI is relatively passive (they don’t move around much on their own, until you get close), but ruthless at punishing your mistakes. The game bills itself as hard, but I didn’t find it so (although I played the game very slowly and methodically without taking any risks). There is also an “easy button” which are free reinforcements you can call in by airdrop every 10 turns, but I did not ever use them except for the penultimate mission which is ridiculously hard.

My greatest challenge was the UI itself, which is rather clunky on the PS4, and although I did get used to it I still made unintentional mistakes fairly often (eg accidentally moving a unit) which caused most of my reloads and caused me to save very frequently.

I think I probably clocked in well over 100 hours to complete the game, including all secondary objectives. However, in retrospect I’m not sure if it was worth it. The game is fun, it just gets repetitive. The game tries to add new elements in most missions to freshen the gameplay, but it’s still essentially the same game and such things can only carry it so far. I think it would have been more enjoyable as a much shorter game. I didn’t play the included “Trains” DLC yet, by the time I finally finished the main campaign I was ready to move on to another game.

Overall I’d still recommend it if you’re a fan of simple turn-based strategic combat, and if you have a lot of time on your hands.

I recently finished the main adventure of Super Mario Odyssey. Super Mario 64 is one of my all-time favorite games, and I pretty much skipped out on the 3D titles between that one and Odyssey. The controls are super tight and allow plenty of creativity in tackling challenges. Each level has some sort of neat gimmick that provides new ways to traverse the level or solve problems. It's a darn fine product, but not without it's gripes. As I neared the end of the game, I started to feel as though it may have peaked at New Donk City. The level themes were starting to revert back to the usual tropes (ice world, forest world, etc.), and it felt like they were artificially extending the game length in a few places. However, those last couple of stages really start to pick up and provide some highly memorable experiences.

Into the Breach
I got it from GOG community giveaway, donated by DampSquib

FTL is one of my favorite games ever so I was very happy to play a second game from Subset Games. I must admit that my expectations were very high and now after one month of playing I may say I’m not disappointed! The game turned out to be even better than I thought. It’s a very unique TBS: randomness is extremely limited so don’t expect any critical hits that change everything nor critical misses that can ruin you victory. In Into the Breach (almost) everything is predictable. Every mission looks like follows:
1) You deploy your mechs on the battlefield
2) AI moves its Veks (insectoid monsters), plan their attacks and prepare to bring new Veks to the battlefield
3) You move your mechs and perform attacks
4) AI execute its previously planned attack
Points 2-4 repeats until the end of the battle. Only the second part involves some randomness - you cannot predict where Veks will move and what will be their intended target. Everything else is 100% predictable. So where is the beauty of the game? You can use the knowledge about Veks’ planned attack to your advantage. For example a Vek is planning to shoot a city which is 3 tiles away from it. If you push it one tile forward it will still shoot a tile which is three tiles away from it! So it will not hit the city but whatever is on that tile. Another Vek for example! Yes, you can carefully manipulate Veks to attack each other!

Sounds great, right? The catch is… the game is very difficult (on hard it’s absolutely brutal). You are outnumbered and have to protect many important buildings and units. So even if you master the tactical approach you will still have problems to survive and finish the game. Sometimes the situation seems hopeless but then you get enlightened - you see a perfect tactic, a very complicated one which requires cooperation between all three mechs but it’s so perfect that it will kill every Vek on the map. Yeah, it sometimes happens. But more often you have to decide what are you willing to sacrifice… Maybe you should allow them to destroy your mech (it will be repaired in-between missions but a pilot who dies remains dead), maybe you can allow them to attack a building which will have dire consequences in a long run (each damage decreases your power and whenever the power drops to zero it’s game over. And you cannot replenish your power often) or maybe you can fail some secondary objectives (they gives you reputation points which you can use to upgrade your mechs). The choice is yours and damn, these are difficult choices because as I said - there is almost no randomness - so it’s not that something bad just happened unexpectedly. You knew it was about to happen and you let it be. It was your choice!

I don’t want to write more, because the game is so fantastic you should discover everything yourself (so far I didn’t spoil anything). As it can be expected from creators of FTL there are several squads that you can unlock, each with its own strengths and limitations so you can expect a lot fun. I had 50 hours filled with pure fun! If you like TBS you should get this game! Even though it’s not as brilliant and epic as FTL it’s a magnificent game and it deserves to be praised!

Full list

Brothers In Arms Earned In Blood, Sept 12 (PS2)-This was like a thinking man's shooter: finding cover, supressing enemies, and flanking them rather than charging in guns blazing. I'm not ashamed to admit I was terrible at this game. I found the missions to be quite long but fighting for each checkpoint felt pretty good. Historical notes at the end of each mission were also enjoyable. I did notice that all the online Let's Plays were quite different than the game I played. The Youtubers got extra squad members and more cover in several levels and in a least one instance a Panzerfaust that I didn't have. Also, in general in the videos it seemed like the central theme of the game (Find, Fix, Flank, Finish) wasn't necessary as they played more like traditional shooters rather than a squad shooter frequently ignoring cover and completing objectives without much help from the squad.

Full List

Mushroom 11

It's a puzzle game where you control... well, a shapeless lump of mushroom tissue apparently. The only thing you can do is erasing parts of your mycelium so that it regrows somewhere else (you can't control where). You can even cut yourself into several pieces. As weird as it sounds it works pretty well - if you erase yourself correctly the whole lump starts to move, roll and propagate into a desired direction. It takes some time to understand how moving around works but then it's pretty alright.

Rather sooner than later you will face some environmental obstacles that are not that easy to pass. Then you will have to solve some puzzles which include buttons pressing, rotating bigger objects, bridging gaps ect. I don't think I was ever confused about what should I do - most puzzles are easy to figure out but some of these solutions are hard to execute given how weird controls over your mushroom you have. A few puzzles (rockets for example) can be frustrating.

Each chapter ends with a boss fight and I must admit they are quite nice. Maybe nothing special but definitely something fresh when compared to the rest of a given level.

All in all it's a decent game. I've played it on Android and it was good this way - I could play it a bit here and there while traveling.


Full list

Letter Quest - Grimm's Journey Remastered

I had finished the story mode on Normal during one of the last years already (possibly even twice, as it seems I started over with the Remastered version), but apparently I wasn't done with it yet, as I think I never listed it here. Now I've completed that mode to 100%, collecting all the stars that I was still missing, and I played a match in Endless mode. I had also started Hard mode at some point, and maybe I will come back to that or the Endless mode from time to time as a distraction, but I consider this game finished for now. It's fun if you're a word game geek, a good alternative to Bookworm Adventures, and possibly even better. Not really an outstanding game that everyone has to play, but quite enjoyable and very competent in its genre. Good for some casual but not brainless entertainment.

OK, it's time to stop slacking and add everything I finished since my last entry.
It will be mostly a list with short impressions as there is quite a lot of it.

Dark Colony - Old run-of-the-mill RTS with tiny resilient bases. Had it for ages but got stuck early in the past. It was not much fun and the unit AI and controls are not good. I spent some 10 hours with it and wished it to be over most of it.

KKND Extreme - Another RTS. It was mostly decent experience but pathfinding is abhorrent. Not much reasons to play it nowadays. Took me around 20 hours. The FMV actins is sure something.

Warcraft 2: Tides of Darkness + Beyond the Dark Portal - My beloved nostalgic game. But I have to be honest and admit it aged a bit. The original campaign is more like series of challenges/puzzles with AI not rebuilding anything. BtDP quite remedies it but sometimes is a bit too brutal and had to be cheesed and few times it bugged out. Still love the music and graphics and mostly enjoyed my time with it. About 27 hours for the base game and expansion.

Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light - Good co-op experience. Sometimes a bit janky and buggy but fun. Would like it more if it was more focused o co-operation than on player player A doing this, then player B that and then player A finishing it. Took us some 13 hours to complete the game and DLC maps that are kind of shit.

Shogo: Mobile Armor Division - Anime FPS with silly story and amusing dialogues. The mech combat was passable but I am not fan of out-of-mech combat and there was a lot it. Much more than it should have compared to in-mech one. Fairly short. Took me only some 7 hours (8 max) to beat and that includes getting both endings.

Batman: Arkham Asylum - Still great game. On technical side it was surpassed by Arkham City but it manages to stay relevant thanks to its atmosphere and the tightness of the story. I spent on it cca. 22 hours to get 100%, including all challenges.

Gain Ground - I bet it was once great game and if it could get remake it could be awesome. It is still original concept and I mostly had fun but is sure aged a lot. Took me some 3,5 hours to beat using the external save feature that was not part of the original.

Duke Nukem 1 - Not bad. Sure, it is quite old and dated but I just didn't feel frustrated while playing it. It wasn't too unfair as these old platformers tend to be and it proceeded well. I beat it in some 7 hours without finding any secret room.

Shadow Dancer: The Secret of Shinobi - Without the external save feature I would have thrown this game out of the window long ago as it tend to screw you over and the 1-hit death is harsh. With it though, it was quite acceptable. It took me some 3,5 hours to beat and I wouldn't wnat to continue much longer.

Prehistorik - I remember playing it on school computers and think how cute it was. Well, the game is shit. It is short and thus is designed to screw you over to make it longer by forcing one to start over and over again. I took me only circa 3,5 hours to beat and still it felt like eternity.

MDK - Payed in the past but never finished I think. It looks quite shitty now and many things could just be better or more fleshed out but overall good fun. Fairly short with some 7 hours of slow gameplay at most.

Prehistorik II - More of the same but this time with save feature (one has to find code for the level, often extremly well hidden). It makes the game more bearable but it still is quite shit. Still designed to make you die and to be frustrated. The way it scrolls makes me want to scream. It was longer with 7 hours even with the same but more than half of it I was stuck on 1 part. Don't want to play ever again.

Bio Menace - Duke's little brother. I haven't enjoyed it as much as Duke but I have to admit, it is improvement over Duke 1. There are some dickish things like randomly shooting indestructible turrets. I hate those. I spent some 11 hours on it and it was a bit too much but it was quite acceptable adventure.

Duke Nukem II - Of these old platformers, I played in this bunch, this one was the most fun. Nice levels to explore, a lot of explosions, ability to save at the start of levels (was in Bio Menace too), still quite OK visuals and cheesy. Things like enemies shooting outside of the screen was quite irritating, though. It took me some 7 hours to complete and I like my time with it.

Blackthrone - Blizzard's Prince of Persia-like platformer but with long hairs and shotguns. It playes quite well but I just wasn't fan of the gun combat. I wasn't good at it and I don't think it's too well done, making often wait too much. The game certainly has style but the gameplay was not that enjoyable and the 12 hours I spent with it felt too long.

That should be it. Hope I didn't forget anything. At least it forced me to be brief.
My yet again complete list.

Entangle

Bought it for a dollar in the last Humble sale and it was well worth the money. Very nice puzzle game, not really hard, but well designed and fun to play. It's a shame that there isn't a level editor. I'm sure people would come up with a lot of great (and more challenging) new levels.

Complete list of finished games in 2018

It always reminded me more of Flashback.

I would say they're all part of the same sub-genre of rotoscoped games with really picky jumping and climbing challenges :)

Plus cover mechanics and shooting. Flashback was pretty awesome though (played the Amiga version). I liked Blackthorne too, but it was a bit repetitive and lacked and an intriguing story.