#project365ong — Public Fediverse posts

December 31, 2023 - Day 365 - NewPlay Bonus Review
Total NewPlays: **400**

Game: Dave The Diver

Platform: Steam
Release Date: Jun 28, 2023 (PC)
Installation Date: Dec 31, 2023
Unplayed: 0d
Playtime: 43m

Dave The Diver is a 2D sideways-scrolling pixel-art* game that's part management sim, part fishing sim, part restaurant game, and part action-adventure RPG.

When Dave the Diver first showed up on Steam a few months ago, I was still very much of the "pixel-art-no-thank-you" mindset, so it was a pass.

Then I saw some folks raving about how good it is, and then the free Dredge DLC was announced, and I went back and added it to my wishlist.

As they're currently offering a "Dredging & Diving Bundle" on Steam which meant the game was cheaper than the sale price (by a couple of bucks), I decided to add one more game to my pile of shame, and then take it off again, and what a way to finish this project out.

It is REALLY hard to categorise, because it pulls gameplay aspects from multiple different genres, and it's probably best if I lay it out.

Firstly, to address that asterisk against pixel-art, the game uses pixel-art for the gameplay, but uses vector art for the UI, which is a great way to make the game feel up-to-date.

The game opens with Dave relaxing on a beach, drinking a beer, when his phone rings, and he gets a job offer. Queue plane & map intro cut-scene.

A guy named Cobra has offered Dave a job diving in "the Blue Hole", which is a procedurally generated environment that is different on each dive.

After a tutorial sequence, where you learn to catch fish with a harpoon (fishing sim!), you learn that you've been roped into managing a sushi bar as well (management sim!).

Dive twice during the day to complete quests (RPG gameplay!) and catch the fish that you then use at night to set the nightly sushi bar menu.

Oh, and you're also the sushi bar waiter; this takes partial gameplay ideas from cooking sims like "Cook, Serve, Delicious!" in that the various customers will order the things that you've added to the menu, and the cook (thank goodness!) prepares each meal, as you run back and forth serving them, and cleaning up after some detty pigs, as well as another mini-game where you need to pour green tea and fill the cup perfectly.

Some of the RPG gameplay elements like equipment upgrades and weapon upgrades are handled through unlockable "apps" on an in-game "smartphone", and given that there are a number of preloaded apps on the phone with locks on them, looks like there are more mini-games as well.

Somehow, though, the devs managed to pull this off in such a way that it all fits together seamlessly, and is a lot of fun as well.

So, there you have it; for my final game review of 2023, Dave the Diver is:

5: Excellent

#DaveTheDiver #2D #SidewaysScroller #FishingSim #ManagementSim #CookingSim #ActionAdventure #RPG #Gaming #Project365ONG #Project365 #NewPlay

December 9, 2023 - Day 343 - NewPlay Review
Total NewPlays: 362

Game: Midnight Fight Express

Platform: Steam
Release Date: Aug 24, 2022
Installation Date: Dec 9, 2023
Unplayed: 0d
Playtime: 16m

Midnight Fight Express is an isometric brawler.

This is the second game in the December Humble Choice bundle, and is published by Humble Games.

Two isometric games in a row? OK then. The game opens with your amnesiac character, "Babyface", in a police interview room, questioning him as to who he is and why he's been on a crime spree across the city.

There's mention of a talking drone, and then the screen fades to black, taking you back to your apartment where it all began; a large box is delivered, containing said talking drone.

"Droney" (yes, seriously) bursts out of the box, and tells us we need to start killing to prevent the city collapsing to a crime spree during the night. Droney gives the game more than a little of the "My Friend Pedro" feel.

...and away we go.

On the plus side, the game handles the isometric controls well for keyboard play. Unlike Expeditions: Rome, Midnight Fight Express has a fixed view isometric camera.

Unlike most of the fixed isometric view games I've played this year which use ordinal keymapping for WASD (mapping W to "true north"), essentially requiring the use of two keys to move "forward" (or "northeast"), relative to the gamespace, Midnight Fight Express rotates the directions 45 degrees clockwise, resulting in the W key moving "forwards" (or NE).

I loaded up a few of them after playing this, and then went back to Midnight Fight Express again to compare the controls.

I think I prefer this approach, given how frustrating I found The Ascent when needing to use two keys at a time to move (or maybe just provide an option to switch that on and off).

As best as I can remember, I've never played an isometric brawler before.

With some games, the narrative is little more than a device to support the gameplay, while others use gameplay to tell a story. While I think Midnight Fight Express is definitely in the former category, when I went back into the game to compare the controls, I ended up playing for another 16 minutes.

I wasn't initially sure felt, but I think Midnight Fight Express might be growing on me, so I'm going to say it's:

3: OK

#MidnightFightExpress #Isometric #Brawler #HumbleChoice #HumbleBundle #Gaming #Project365ONG #Project365 #NewPlay

October 24, 2023 - Day 297 - NewPlay Review
Total NewPlays: 316

Game: A Juggler's Tale

Platform: Steam
Release Date: Sep 30, 2021
Installation Date: Oct 24, 2023
Unplayed: 0d
Playtime: 46m

Game number seven in the October Humble Choice Bundle is "A Juggler's Tale"; a 2.5D sideways scrolling puzzle adventure game.

I have incredibly mixed emotions about this game.

You play as Abby, a young girl, who is both a juggler, and a marionette. Abby is trapped in a circus and forced to perform, and A Juggler's Tale is the story of her escape, narrated by the puppeteer.

The graphics are gorgeous, the sound design is good. The puzzles are not too challenging, although the controls (on controller) can be a little bit fiddly.

The narrator is an older man with an English accent, and is in turns condescending, and patronising in the way he talks to (and about) Abby, frequently belittling her (and technically *my*) failures when attempting to solve puzzles - and I utterly despise him.

I'm not sure whether the intent of the devs was to make me feel like that towards him, but his manner and commentary triggers emotional responses within me that I don't think were intended.

I'm tempted to just Google the game to find out how it ends, and if there's any kind of catharsis, because the idea of spending the entire game with this horrible person, fills me with dread.

A Juggler's Tale is:

4: Good*

#AJugglersTale #SidewaysScroller #Adventure #Puzzle #HumbleChoice #Gaming #Project365ONG #Project365 #NewPlay

*Trigger Warning, mention of abuse.

I suspect that my reaction is partly a trauma response, from the abuse I experienced growing up. So, while I think this game is good, if you have that kind of trauma it may actually be triggering, which is a weird thing to have to say about a game like this.

July 15, 2023 - Day 196 - NewPlay Review
Total NewPlays: 216

Game: Vampyr

Platform: Steam
Release Date: Jun 5, 2018
Library Date: Sep 25, 2022
Unplayed: 293d (9m20d)
Playtime: 27m

Vampyr (or "I don't vant to suck your blood, but I might have to), is an open-world third-person ARPG, set in London during the 1918 Spanish Flu.

Yesterday's "I feel like hot garbage due to lack of sleep" turned out to be "Actually, sick. Again." so a game set during the Spanish flu feels vaguely appropriate.

The setup of the game is interesting, but gameplay turned out to be a little more frustrating than expected. You're a doctor who wakes up in a mass grave to find he's been turned into a vampire.

However, for some reason that I would dig around and find if I was feeling a little less half-dead, any time I turned in game, the experience would make a whip-pan seem positively leisurely in comparison.

More than once while I was trying to escape the men pursuing me, and seeking to kill me... again?... in attempting to turn a corner, I'd find myself having turned so fast I was disoriented, or worse still, running TOWARD my pursuers.

It hasn't really grabbed me at this point; if I'm in the mood for a supernaturally themed ARPG, I'm more likely to load up Ghostwire: Tokyo than Vampyr, or for vampire-on-vampire violence, probably Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodhunt (at least as long as the servers are live).

I'll probably give Vampyr another shot when my hearing isn't going wild, but for now it's:

3: OK

#Vampyr #ThirdPerson #ARPG #MastodonGaming #Gaming #Project365ONG #Project365 #NewPlay