Is it materialistic, or does the supernatural exist in-universe?

Amerzone: The Explorer's Legacy (1999) (Linux/Wine)
[thank you, Dejavous, for the game!]

It was short, but it was much better than I expected!
What brought my attention was "visuals designed by Belgian comic artist Benoît Sokal". I really liked unique atmosphere of Syberia series and I hoped the game will share that specific style of the artist. And, indeed:

⌘ the game takes you into wonderful and unique place created with incredible imagination
⌘ it's short (around 4h), but in consequence it's relatively fast-paced (as for adventure game, of course) and also never gets boring
⌘ visuals are obviously aged, but the world still looks impressive
⌘ sound and music are great (use your headphones for better experience)
⌘ you won't be stuck in this game - it's quite simple, there is only a few items and a few locations available at once, you'll also always know what to do next
⌘ it works like a charm under Linux/Wine

I really liked the game and I recommend it to players who are fine with retro and who value atmosphere and exotic journey over modern graphics!

List of all games completed in 2018.

Serious Sam

A couple of weeks ago I saw a video on a particular FPS and decided, "I want to play that game". That game was Duke Nukem, but it wasn't available on GOG, so I settled with what I was told was the next closest thing. Serious Sam see's you play as Sam, who has decided that doom guy is a pussy for wearing space marine armour and so goes about his killing in a T-Shirt and Jeans (Though for some reason the cover art has him wearing a vest and sunglasses). The game see's you travel back in time to ancient Egypt to stop an alien invasion in the present, but of course the story doesn't matter in a FPS. It feels like the developers were creating a tomb raider style game, suddenly decided they wanted a FPS and just decided to keep the locations as they are. You fight many enemies, often at once, you don't know fear until you have to fight 30 bulls charging at you who can kill you in 3 hits. That common part of a game where you end up in an arena having to fight masses of all the enemies you'd previously fought, that usually occurs just before the final bossfight, that bit happens multiple times. This is a difficult, fast paced shooter but was great fun. However the game ends with a 'To be Continued' so I was very disappointed by that, however I would still recommend it.

heh. other than owing money at the end, I don't mind the forms that much. state forms can be harder, esp. depending on the state and if you move mid-year.

Swords and Soldiers HD [Steam GA]

I really wanted to like this game, and had hoped it would be even half as fun as CastleStorm (similar concept)...but it wasn't.

It definitely had its moments, but also moments of significant frustration.

Pros:
Fun idea
Amusing artwork

Cons:
-Terrible story. It barely made sense, and esp. on levels you ended up having to replay, having to sit through it a second or eighth time (no skip that I could find) was annoying.
Most levels are very, very short. Like 2 min short.

-Difficulty spikes are high. Most of the levels you could probably beat with your eyes closed just randomly clicking, but about 7-8 of the 30 are hair pulling. If you don't do those exactly how it was designed, you will lose. This is exacerbated by no in-scenario save (somewhat defensible given the length of most, but annoying on a few longer, multi-stage levels,esp. with the plot issue above). I just want to skip the annoying plot-filled prologue even if it was only 60 seconds and pick up when we've moved on to phase 2, please?

-Balance not very good. In the main story (no DLC) the campaign has you rotate between Vikings, Aztecs, and Chinese with 10 scenarios in each. But many of the scenarios have mixed-faction options open, or partial skills available. The Chinese in particular I found hard because so many of the units are squishier than other factions', and they are also more reliant on using the full spell kit, and their towers don't defend, they just increase your mana to cast spells. Just more micro-managey all around, and making a mistake with this faction can set you way back.

Which would be fine if you could save, or pause, or even slow the game speed, but you will be clicking furiously at certain parts, and then probably restarting because you had the game won until you were just a second slow.

-Sounds, particularly voices, are amusing for 10 seconds and then obnoxious for the remaining 4-5 hours of gameplay.

All in all, really, you should play CastleStorm instead. Better levels, better balance, more fleshed out. This feels like the gameplay wasn't quite finished and/or it was just a mobile port.

It's not a baaaaad game, on the whole, but definitely not a great or even a very good game. It's got a few good moments, buried in a terrible plot and levels that vary from 2 minute cakewalks (a lot of those) to ones I had to restart 10-12 times that made me consider why I was wasting my life.

I absolutely agree with that. When I was a child I was fascinated by demo, which looks incredibly... When remaster was released I tried it and "demo part" was again great fun, but apart from that I was disappointed by many illogical puzzles.

That's a Tim Schaffer game :) Incredible world, story, characters and dialogues but a flawed game design. In this case, puzzles are often illogical or too difficult.

Stalker: Call of Pripyat

Very good game, quite different from the first two titles and focused somewhat more on exploration and quests, less on gunfights...I missed some of the hardcore extended firefights from the previous games, but on the other hand it's still very immersive and just a great gameplay experience. The final area Pripyat seemed a bit under-developed (people who complain the game is too short are exaggerating though imo). Ending was a bit abrupt, with many questions left unresolved, but on the other hand I feel that fits the mysterious nature of the zone.
My rating: 4/5.

Doom (2016)


pretty great fps, that runs fluent even on my mediocre machine. had no fps drops during any fights only once in a vast open space with loads of effects but no enemies and even then I only noticed because of the fps counter but the game still somehow managed to run smoth and fast. Really fun game to run and gun (and jump and squish demons) had a great time with it, although I had to turn down the difficulty around midway through down to "I'm to young to die" but then even I got through every area on first try ;) I'm sure I'll do the campaign again someday on harder difficulty but right now, I have a backlog to tackle :)
highly recommended. (though multiplayer seems rather empty, if that's your thing... (from the 20secs I tried to find a match before uninstalling ;)

Rick and Morty: Virtual Rick-ality (PSVR)

This is a VR game by the developers of Job Simulator, and it has many similarities with the latter game.

If you just stick to the given tasks it's quite short, but much of the fun in the game comes from general goofing off and playing around with items in the environment, which extends the gameplay considerably (I played the game for around 5 hours or so). I also found the general difficulty of the game to be higher than Job Simulator.

On the negative side, I did have some tracking issues because there is no in-game turn option, so sometimes you're trying to reach for something behind you where your body blocks the camera so you have to side-step to get your body out of the way.

Overall though it's a fun game and quite funny (especially when characters berate the player's stupidity) and I would recommend it, although I'd probably wait for a sale if you're not a Rick & Morty fan.

Floor Plan (PSVR)

This is a VR puzzle game, somewhat similar to a point-and-click game where you collect items and use them with other items or characters in the environment.

The gameplay is very simple and the story is almost non-existent (there are no real voiceovers). It doesn't make very good use of the VR aspect either, it could just as well have been a flat game. It’s also very short (under 1 hour).

Overall it's OK fun though, and given the fact that its base price is quite cheap I’d recommend if you can get it on sale.

Owlboy

I liked it for the most part. Beautiful pixel graphics, a wonderful soundttrack and a descent story with interesting characters. Controlling was a little counterintuitive (mostly because you don't only control your character, but also another one that he's carrying around), but after a while I got used to it. Difficulty was fair and especially the bossfights were very good and well designed.

In the end it was a little too long for my taste and there were too many cut scenes that broke the flow of the game. But all in all I had fun with the game and would recommend it to people who like the genre.

Complete list of finished games in 2018

The Typing of the Dead Overkill

An interesting take on the arcade classic House of the Dead, in which you have to type words to shoot your ennemies.

Interesting game, since you don't have so many typing games on the market. But be careful, it's really "overkill", in that it's gore and more than that overflowing with rude language and crude situation. You like it or you hate it. I did both during my playthrough but ended by liking it.

Not too long, so it doesn't overstays its welcome, plus you can download custom dictionnaries and the original shooting game is included.

So far in 2018: https://www.gog.com/forum/general/games_finished_in_2018/post12

Inaria

Neat and short little Ultima-style RPG with simple but cute graphics and nice soundtrack. I think I got it from Bundle in A Box a few years ago; after ignoring it that long, I just gave it a try and ended up liking it. Was a bit grindy in the beginning, since monsters in dungeons always respawn when you leave and re-enter and I often had to backtrack to town healers when my health was too low, but in the end, when I could heal myself easily, was able to use a ranged weapon, found magical equipment and learned some combat exploits, the game got very easy. But also fun. Story was simple but enjoyable, especially the ending. Minor downsides include only one save slot, some bugs in the endgame that can get you stuck in maps, and that for seeing all the dialogue an NPC has to offer, you have to click on the NPC several times (and each time you have to select the speech bubble icon again before you do it). I didn't track the time it took me to play through it, but my guess is it was something around 4 hours.

Super Mario Galaxy. I actually beat this last year but I decided to go for the "true ending", which means you have to replay it, as in get all 120 stars, with Luigi, who handles a little more slippery than Mario but has a higher jump. So I would spend like a half hour or so playing it every couple of weeks and I finally got it all done the other day. Not surprising but this was a bit overkill and probably wasn't worth the effort - 120 stars is quite a lot even if most of them don't take very long to get.

Anyway, I think it's a really good game and it's my favorite of the 3D Mario games I've played. Definitely an improvement on Sunshine. I've seen some reviews criticize it in comparison to Mario 64 because there's less room for exploration, but I like the tighter level design in this one because even the levels that run on a bit can be finished within 10-15 minutes at the most. (In revisiting N64 games, I've generally found many of them to be a bit too slow for my taste.) Most of the levels are fun but a few can be pretty tedious, probably to be expected with so many to play. As usual for Nintendo, the graphics are very nice, not because they're so technically advanced but because the art direction is brilliant at working around and hiding the Wii's limitations, creating a vibrant, cartoony world.