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    Ghost of a Tale - PC - Day 342 Game 342

    This is a stealth-em-up adventure. It claims to be an RPG, it isn't. It's a very pretty game, but given there's not that much to it, it draws things out a bit. The first hour is mostly just hiding from guards, getting keys and opening doors. Then you get caught and die.

    Not sure I'd want to pay full price for this, but it's not too bad for the £5 I paid. Still, unless you like sneaking about and hiding from rats, even the interesting characters and dialogue (it's not voiced) might not carry it for you.

    I give this one 5 Rolands out of 10.

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      One More Island - PC - Day 343 Game 343

      This is a very basic colony sim/builder game, but Dwarf Fortress it is not.

      You are building a colony on an island, but the progress is particularly linear - Build an apple orchard, build a cidery. Build a wheat farm, build a mill, build a bakery. Build a sheep farm, build a spinning mill. Well, you get the idea.

      You can also build a research station to research new things to build and eventually increase the tier of your colony, so you can do some more linear progression.

      If you're looking for a very straightforward builder game that doesn't take a lot of effort or micro-management, this may be for you - I think I'll be going back to Dwarf Fortress tho.

      I give this one 5 Windy Millers out of 10.

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        Pang Adventures - PC - Day 344 Game 344

        This is an arcade game where you burst bubbles. Sounds easy, but it is not. As you burst a bubble, it turns into two smaller bubbles, which turn into two smaller bubbles, which turn into two smaller bubbles. Only at this point do the bubbles disappear if you hit them again.

        Things get progressively more difficult by squeezing the space with platforms, or other creatures that will impact the travel of the bubbles - but there is the odd power-up to help you and improve your singular spike gun that will only fire one spike at a time unless it reaches the top of the screen or bursts a bubble.

        There are three modes, one is unfortunately locked until you beat World Tour mode (you won't) as it has very difficult boss fights. Along with that is the panic mode, which is Pang in a Pac-Man CE like configuration (and arguably the most enjoyable mode). There's not a lot more to it than that, so it's a quick arcade title you'll dip in and out of now and again.

        It runs well enough but takes no prisoners, so if you like the game Pang, this is actually not a bad implementation of it. I give it 6 Matryoshkas out of 10.

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          A Planet of Mine - PC - Day 345 Game 345

          A strategy game where the gimmick is you're playing a game in space with a rotating planet.

          Can't really recommend this one - there's not much of a tutorial explaining the mechanics of the game and it bugged out when I clicked on a save file, stuck on a screen with a back button that wouldn't go back. Had to Alt-F4 it to quit and didn't think it was worth clicking the play button again.

          The spinning of the planet just makes things super annoying to work out what's going on and it's really difficult to see what buildings are what, most of your time will be spent looking at a spinning globe.

          Stay away from this one. It gets 4 vertigos out of 10.

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            Dreadlands - PC - Day 346 Game 346

            This is a tactical strategy game, set in a Borderlands-like world.

            Basicly it's XCOM, just not quite as good. The tactical battles are decent enough, though not as difficult as those in XCOM which just throws everything at you right from the off. There was no spawn in enemies to catch you off guard, at least in the first hour, and the only thing that took me by surprise was an enemy chucking a grenade that set me on fire. Also, he didn't like my dog and kept targetting him - I bit him and made him bleed.

            The base section isn't quite as good though, no real explanation of how the different sections worked and it was a bit obscure - the workbench section, for example, said it needed to be upgraded before you could upgrade equipment and it didn't really seem to do anything else.

            There was an overworld map you explored to reach your next objective, but that seemed quite linear, so not exactly open-world. While this was something different it didn't really offer anything interesting to find.

            I think the above makes it sound like this game isn't very good, but it's more a case of it's just not as good as XCOM2. That's the problem with any game in this genre; you have to offer something that improves on that game and that's a tricky prospect.

            Dreadlands is competent, just not compelling. It gets 6 Calptraps out of 10.

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              Potion Permit - PC - Day 347 Game 347

              An adventure game with terrible controls, that is supposed to support controllers, albeit partially, but turns out not at all. Then it makes you use an on-screen keyboard to enter a name for your dog (and it's not even QWERTY) and so my dog was named Assbackwards, just as the game seemed to be.

              The game has a lot of strange character and I'm quite sure the town Mayor (Mayor Myer - yes really), is having an affair with the house keep after meeting his wife who was definitely having an affair with the groundskeeper. The Mayor's assistant was steeling money from the Town Hall and the rest of the town seemed to hate me without even having met me before.

              For that crime, I went into people's houses and tried to steal their stuff - I couldn't. All I could do was sit in all the chairs. So I did. I then went to the church and sat in all the pews. Except for one, as Mercy was sitting in it. Then she left and I sat down there - it was warm from bottom heat.

              Before any of this I made sure to sleep in my house that no one had bothered to clean before I arrived for six days, just to keep them waiting. Then I went exploring and walked through sheep and cows that were ethereal before killing a bear and taking its claws as a trophy,

              All in all, a one hundred percent successful trip. 7 I will watch you whilst you sleep and you will not ask me why I'm in your house out of 10.
              Last edited by MartyG; 13-12-2022, 19:49.

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                Stirring Abyss - PC - Game 348 Game 348

                A Lovecraftian adventure with strong RPG elements. Apparently. And tactical battles.

                It's all turn-based and the game is split into sections of using your submarine and exploring the ocean floor.

                It's got a fairly interesting story to it, but the movement around the map is a bit clunky as every character has to be moved separately and it takes ages. The maps are quite large and filled with scary creatures, but they don't put up too much of a fight (although the game defaults to easy difficulty).

                The combat is just a matter of closing in on enemies and being a bit stabby. You can take a couple of bits of kit with you for some other tactical options (like an extra oxygen tank as you slowly run out of air), but as the choices are quite limited, it doesn't add a whole lot to combat choices.

                Overall it was slightly above average, with a nice atmosphere to it but clunky. At least it was trying to do something a bit different with the XCOM-like gameplay, so it gets 6 Call of Cthulhus out of 10.

                Comment


                  Railbound - PC - Day 349 Game 349

                  A puzzle game with train carriages. It starts with one that you need to get to the engine (with a limited number of pieces). It slowly makes things harder, by having fixed tracks you can't bend or change joint direction. Then it introduces more carriages with numbers and these must be attached in the correct numerical order.

                  Then portal-like tunnels, then switches, and then you get stuck and can't solve the puzzle, throw your controller out of the window, and murder the cat.

                  And that's Railbound. 7 Queen of The Seas out of 10.

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                    Oriental Empires - PC - Day 350 Game 350

                    This is a 4X game. It's a boring 4X game. I did execute every single noble in my Empire tho, and my concubine so that I could choose a new and better one. That was the best bit.

                    I'd just play Civ 5 or 6 tho, you'll have more fun, this was very tedious and slow to play.

                    This gets 4 Art of Wars out of 10.

                    Comment


                      Healer's Quest - PC - Day 351 Game 351

                      This is an RPG where you play a healer and heal people. Not by choice tho. Fuddy the Healer wanted to have fireball spells and so spends the game being an ass.

                      The idea is you heal your team as they auto-battle. It sounds a bit crap, but it actually works quite well. The story plays into all the clichés of RPG with a sarcastic slant on the proceedings. If you can get into the style of humour, it's not badly written. It's clearly done very tongue-in-cheek.

                      Overall, I'd say this was a pretty good effort, so this one gets 7 classic dungeons out of 10.

                      Comment


                        Project Hospital - PC - Day 352 Game 352

                        This is a serious version of Theme Hospital. You get to build a hospital, staff it, and then go through examination processes with patients to come up with a diagnosis and prescribe them the relevant treatment.

                        This has all the real medical terms and you will need to go through various examination types to eliminate possible diagnoses until you reach one you can determine as likely. Then stuff them full of Vicodin. So just like real doctorin' then

                        The trouble here is that because it's a more complex sim (it is more sim than tycoon), the UI is a bit all over the place. The building part isn't too bad - there are loads of options for rooms to add in, and should it be a bit much, there are also prefab rooms you can drop in with all the required kit and furniture already included - but the hiring of staff was a bit weird and clunky.

                        There's definitely an interesting game here, it's just missing a bit of polish. And House MD. I think I prefer the serious nature of the game over the "comedy" of Two Point Hospital.

                        This one gets 7 Everybody Lies out of 10.

                        Comment


                          Tinytopia - PC - Day 353 Game 353

                          It's my first city builder with some small puzzle elements.

                          You build stuff like apartment buildings, then provide them with jobs and emergency facilities, the more of which cover your residents, the more tax they will pay.

                          Things a level based with different challenges in each; these mostly revolve around getting residents to move in so you can build the special buildings and win.

                          And that's about it really, City Skylines this game is not, but it is pleasant enough and a game you can chuck on and not need to think too hard.

                          This one gets 6 lego bricks out of 10.

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                            High on Life - PC - Day 354 Game 354

                            A FPS with a talking gun that gets old, very very fast. The environments are interesting, but underneath it feels like a pretty awful FPS tbh. The way markers in particular are annoying to the point I got stuck and didn't know where to go.

                            You can turn off the annoying chatter (and I did), but it doesn't change the fundamentals that this is a very average FPS with an annoying gimmick.

                            5 put a gag on it out of 10.

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                              Eyes on the prize, Martino!

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                                I feel like you deserve an actual cheer squad at this point in the game, hot one’s, possibly Swedish, at the very least Norwegian.

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