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I got a Switch shortly before summer.

So surprising nobody at all, my gaming for the last few months have consisted mostly of Breath of the Wild and Hyrule Warriors. While I have played a bunch of things prior to Switch acquisition... it's mostly been not new games. A few have made their way in there - West of Loathing, Terra Feminarum - and the Switch has of course been the biggest source of new games for me this year.

But I've got other suff to play. Things to clear out of my backlog.

I almost thought I weren't going to do this this year, but decided, alright, this is actually a good time to do it.

You know the drill. Five days, five unplayed (or very little played) games from my backlog. That's where I'll start. We'll see if there'll be another week of it. Weekend stays as cleanup days where I continue playing what I've started and I also have a meeting this Sunday. But I should be able to get some stuff done.

And I'm really only making it a thread here for tradition's sake, despite the forum being quite inactive.

So let's roll.

Games
2018-08-27 - Chuchel (completed 2018-08-27)
2018-08-28 - Caladrius Blaze
2018-08-29 - Year Walk (completed 2018-08-29)
2018-08-30 - Gravity Rush
2018-08-31 - Dead Rising 2

Monday 2018-08-27 - Chuchel




Format: PC
What it is: Latest release from Amanita Design, of Samorost, Botanicula and Machinarium fame. Said to basically be a fusion of game and animated cartoon short. Presumably point and click like their prior things.
Release date: 2018-03-07
Owned since: 2018-06-16
Status: Completely unplayed.
Available: Only digitally. DRM-free on GOG.com, also on Steam.
Verdict: Amanita strikes again. So I finished it. It wasn't long. I knew that. It was also not too advanced, certainly a lot simpler than Samorost 3, Machinarium and Botanicula. It doesn't matter. It was adorable and I loved it. It really was like playing a cartoon, you basically had scenes that you then got to start some secquence in and then some things played itself. I said after Samorost 3 that while I certainly wouldn't mind a Samorost 4 or Botanicula 2 or Machinarium 2, I'd rather see something new cast from the Amanita mold, that still becomes its own thing, because that's what they've done several times before. And that's exactly what they did. Guess I'll play more Breath of the Wild now since I'm not picking another game until tomorrow.

Tuesday 2018-08-28 - Caladrius Blaze




Format: PC, also on X360, PS3, PS4 and arcade.
What it is: A shmup! I don't know too much more about it. I hear it's got anime fanservice which I don't mind as long as the game is actually good too.
Release date: 2017-01-12 (PC version, original version first came out 2013-04-25)
Owned since: 2018-07-19
Status: Utterly unplayed.
Available: PC version digitally, DRM-free on GOG.com, also on Steam. Console versions physically and maybe also digitally.
Verdict: Well. It's not terrible, but this is very much a case of giving the player far too many options, especially for the genre. You have your regular shot, three different "elemental" shots, "special", and bombs, each with their own button, so that's six buttons. Mapping that in a convenient way to my stick was... not great. Ship balance wasn't great either - most ships felt too slow. The game would have benefit greatly from having the regular shmup focused movement thing and faster base movement of the ships. There were two pretty viable ships, one that cound angle its regular shot and one that... was broken as shit and didn't even need to be unlocked, it was just there from the start. Out of eight, so yeah. Other than that... upgrade system, a variety of game modes. A far cry from stuff like Crimzon Clover - but a pretty decent shmup fix anyway. Not that I think I'll pour any more serious hours into it.

Wednesday 2018-08-29 - Year Walk




Format: Wii U (also on PC and phones)
What it is: Originally a mobile game, a puzzle/adventure/something game based in Swedish mythology. Seems like it's quite dark and mysterious.
Release date: 2015-09-17 for Wii U, originally 2013-02-21 for iOS, computer versions inbetween
Owned since: 2017-11-27 (got for gold points on My Nintendo)
Status: Entirely unplayed.
Available: On the Wii U eShop, Steam and whereever you buy iOS games. Not that you would.
Verdict: Well okay that was pretty short, even including getting the bonus ending. And... yeah. Basically a point and click game. Quite dark. A few jumpscares. Glad I played it during the day. Some very excellent use of the Wii U pad, though gyro controls with the Wii U pad suck. It was short enough for it to never become a massive annoyance, but still, eh. All in all, I think I would consider this to be better as a piece of storytelling than it is a game, but using the tools you have through it being a game as part of that storytelling. Huh. That's pretty similar to what I said about Doki Doki Literature Club, come to think of it.

Thursday 2018-08-30 - Gravity Rush




Format: PSVita (yes, I actually own a Vita)
What it is: From what I understand, a 3D game where you can shift gravity to do... things.
Release date: 2012-02-09
Owned since: 2017-02-28
Status: Comprehensively unplayed.
Available: Physically. Probably also digitally. Got a remastered version on PS4.
Verdict: I think I'm done. Let's start with saying I misunderstood a lot about what this game was when I bought it. It's a game that could have been good if not for the incredibly bad controls. The camera is pretty dumb. There's no center camera button, there's no lockon for combat. Jumping is weird. Gravity shifting is... janky, to say the least. A lot of menus (but not all, because what the fuck is consistency) are touchscreen-only. But here's the real kicker: The combat evade motion input is a touchscreen swipe. Usually I can at least understand what kind of logic someone might possibly have used in the decision to make something a touchscreen input - but not for this. Combat evade input is a goddamn screen swipe when you're already using both your hands. Would have made some sense for it to be on the back touchpad - your fingers are there anyway. But no. I got too frustrated to keep playing, since I don't want to use my fingers on the screen and got tired of putting the Vita down on the 3DS stand and use the stylus for things. So when it ran out of battery I decided, fuck it, went to save and I think I'm not going to play any more. Gravity Rush really only accomplished one thing - it's my new benchmark for terrible touchscreen controls. So that's something, at least.

Friday 2018-08-31 - Dead Rising 2




Format: Xbox 360 (also available on PS3, PC, PS4 and XB1)
What it is: Shockingly, it's a sequel to 2006 zombie slaughterfest Dead Rising (which I finally played through from beginning to end last year after a few prior attempts that didn't get far). Same universe, storywise a sequel as well, features a different protagonist who seeks to rescue his daughter, from what I understand (but Frank West from the original is involved somehow and is playable in the expansion/sidequel/something Off the Record, which I also own). Features some things that weren't in the first game, like combining weapons. Does not feature photography like the first (presumably does in previously mentioned OtR, though), since this protagonist isn't a journalist.
Release date: 2010-09-24
Owned since: Technically 2016-08-16, since that's when it became free on Games With Gold
Status: Thoroughly unplayed.
Available: Physically and digitally.
Verdict: So what I ended up playing today wasn't actually Dead Rising 2 proper, but Dead Rising 2: Case Zero, a short prequel game released only digitally about a month before DR2 was released. It was also free when DR2 was on GWG, so I had that, so I played that first. And finished it - it was quite short, did one restart (since it's perpetual NG+, if you start over you keep all experience and money you had previously) when I died, and the save from that can actually be imported to regular DR2, so I'll start at level 5 (the max level in Case Zero). Maybe with some itens from it too, I don't know. It was pretty nice, anyway, and the reason I picked DR2 for Friday was because I figured that was most likely the game I would want to keep playing, so that's for the weekend, and probably a bunch next week as well, since while I might do another week of this, it won't be next week. The only real improvement from DR1 I found was the weapon combinations, even if I didn't do overly much with that, but I'm pretty sure everything will be better in the actual game. So there! I did mean to actually start DR2 after I had had dinner, but a friend asked me to Smash, so I did that instead.

More like a freaking GAY a day 2018.