PandaPedinte
Member
Voting
- Cosmochoria
- Roguelight
- Absolute Drift
- Kaden's Crypt
- Secrets of Grindea
- Antbassador
- Super III
-
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Indie Games 2014 [October] Now Voting - Post 280!
- Thread starter Toma
- Start date
Anyone who can do the format posting?
The new KRZ side story is pretty cool. Kind of like an IF in the format of a pre-recorded telephone call. Some clever and surreal writing too, though obviously light on the gameplay. Be sure to keep a piece of paper next to you to write down the extensions. Now if only Act 4 would come out so I can begin waiting on Act 5 and for the game to finally conclude. Dying to know what happens.
Steam Halloween sale is up so here are a few independent games I'd recommend. Context for my tastes are I prefer first person shooters, narrative driven games, experimental games, and stealth games.
Night Shift (3.99). Quite short but a surreal and unique puzzle game. Very interesting atmosphere.
Betrayer (4.99). A very atmospheric first person adventure/shooter game with mild stealth elements. A bit hard, but quite creepy.
Insurgency (7.49). Probably one of the better multiplayer modern military shooters out there. If you're a fan of Red Orchestra this would be right up your alley. If you played the mod version and are on the fence definitely get it. It's miles ahead of the mod. Way more polish and content.
Steam Halloween sale is up so here are a few independent games I'd recommend. Context for my tastes are I prefer first person shooters, narrative driven games, experimental games, and stealth games.
Night Shift (3.99). Quite short but a surreal and unique puzzle game. Very interesting atmosphere.
Betrayer (4.99). A very atmospheric first person adventure/shooter game with mild stealth elements. A bit hard, but quite creepy.
Insurgency (7.49). Probably one of the better multiplayer modern military shooters out there. If you're a fan of Red Orchestra this would be right up your alley. If you played the mod version and are on the fence definitely get it. It's miles ahead of the mod. Way more polish and content.
More_Badass
Member
Roguelight
Greebroll
I enjoyed Greebroll. The controls could be tighter, but I really liked the unusual levels and twitchy take on the genre. The moving dynamic environments make for a challenging experience
---
1) The Masterplan
2) Velocibox
3) Absolute Drift
4) Boson X
5) Roguelight
6) Super III
7) Heavy Bullet
8) Greebroll
9) Superdimensional
10) Terrance the Flying Eyeball
Another success from Daniel Linssen, dev of The Sun & Moon and Javel-ein. A roguelike platformer where you're armed with only your trusty bow and limited arrows, your arrows also act as illumination in the enemy-filled darkness. The game just feels tight and concise, no filler, just exploration, careful archery, and evading or killing deadly enemies. The dev hopes to come back to the game and expand it later, and I definitely think there's potential for a bigger more involved experience
Greebroll
Greebroll is a ball roller that stands out thanks to its abstract style, unique and varied levels, and interesting mechanic
I enjoyed Greebroll. The controls could be tighter, but I really liked the unusual levels and twitchy take on the genre. The moving dynamic environments make for a challenging experience
---
1) The Masterplan
2) Velocibox
3) Absolute Drift
4) Boson X
5) Roguelight
6) Super III
7) Heavy Bullet
8) Greebroll
9) Superdimensional
10) Terrance the Flying Eyeball
PandaPedinte
Member
Am I the only one who played Kaden's Crypt?
PandaPedinte
Member
It's not featured on this month but I'm playing Muri, the game is a homage to the old DOS action platformers games, and it really nails the feel and the style it's trying to emulate, be it the colors chosen, the music, the color based enemies etc. As I said in the Steam thread I played only a few of games from that era but Muri does a great job bringing me a nostalgic feel.
The controls are very simple one buttom to shoot and other to jump, there are weapon power ups through the level, secrets hidden and a good level design. From the reviews the game is two hours long, but it's very cheap ($0.39) right now so I reccommend it.
The controls are very simple one buttom to shoot and other to jump, there are weapon power ups through the level, secrets hidden and a good level design. From the reviews the game is two hours long, but it's very cheap ($0.39) right now so I reccommend it.
Dungeon of the Endless got a glowing review from RPS
I'll be back in a couple of hours to finalise my voting list as well!
I'll be back in a couple of hours to finalise my voting list as well!
More_Badass
Member
Only two Voting lists this thread?
I was hoping to have some time tonight to play a few more games, anyway, I definitely have a voting list in any case, so its 4 at least (including OnPoint)
Desura dump:
Baezult - Free (PC)
Cubot - $2,99 (PC, Mac, Linux)
Hero Keeper - $3,99 (PC)
Lost in Paradise - $2,99 (on sale for 50% off at $1,50 for 3-4 more days) (PC, Mac, Linux)
Pixel Heroes - Free (PC, Mac, Linux)
Pregnancy - $2,99 (PC)
Nexionode - $6,99 (PC, Mac, iOS, Android)
Traumerin - $4,99 (PC)
UnReal World - Free (PC, Mac, Linux)
Baezult - Free (PC)
http://www.desura.com/games/baezult
Baezult is a puzzle platformer set in a lost temple that was discovered behind a waterfall. You play as a brave explorer looking to find riches beyond his wildest dreams. But be careful, the people of the temple have protected their wealth very well.
Cubot - $2,99 (PC, Mac, Linux)
http://www.desura.com/games/cubot
At first sight, Cubot is a 3D puzzle-game with a minimalist gameplay, just move color cubes towards tiles of the same color. It's really easy, but an important point in the gameplay is if you have multiple cubes, they move simultaneously! It will be a torture for your mind to complete all levels.
Hero Keeper - $3,99 (PC)
http://www.desura.com/games/hero-keeper
A real time strategy game that will have you constructing a kingdom to attract heroes who will explore, fight, shop and quest in your realm. Heroes will buy and find equipment, potions, charms, magic books and much more that they can use to become more powerful and gain new abilities! Throughout the campaign you will be faced with fighting hordes of monsters and even other Kingdoms with their own heroes.
Lost in Paradise - $2,99 (on sale for 50% off at $1,50 for 3-4 more days) (PC, Mac, Linux)
http://www.desura.com/games/lost-in-paradise
Immerse yourself in a lost paradise, with a deep mystery hiding beyond it's pristine shores. As a crew member of a suddenly and mysteriously capsized ship journeying through the notorious Bermuda Triangle, you find yourself being the sole survivor on a seemingly deserted island. Deserted but not always uninhabited. Solve the mystery of the lost paradise and claim your destiny. Get back to nature, learn and hone your REAL world survival skills, solve puzzles and live the adventure.
Pixel Heroes - Free (PC, Mac, Linux)
http://www.desura.com/games/pixel-heroes2
A dungeon crawler/hero sim/rpg in which you have to lead a team of heroes through several dungeons. Tons of random-generated loot and awesome legendary items are waiting for you! Pixel Heroes features a turn-based combat system, classical RPG mechanics and a genuine overland travel system. The game is currently in a playable beta state, there is a lot of content missing but most features are implemented.
Pregnancy - $2,99 (PC)
http://www.desura.com/games/pregnancy
An interactive short story where the player tries to influence the decisions of a 14 year old girl about the future of her pregnancy. Lilla gets pregnant after being raped by a criminal and she is confused about what to do with the child she carries in her womb. The player acts as the voice of conscience influencing and guiding the young girl's decisions.
Nexionode - $6,99 (PC, Mac, iOS, Android)
http://www.desura.com/games/nexionode
Nexionode is a sci-fi logic game with dark ambience and devious puzzles, in which you need to connect multiple nodes and take care that every node has the proper amount of inputs.
Traumerin - $4,99 (PC)
http://www.desura.com/games/traumerin
Run and battle through 20 levels with 4 unique worlds, plenty of enemies and a mother that need's to be saved in Traumerin a platforming, RPG experience hearkening back to the days when the gameboy roamed the earth, an ode to the games of yesteryear with a few twists. Finding yourself in a strange and distant land, your only companion being your faithful stuffed bear.
UnReal World - Free (PC, Mac, Linux)
http://www.desura.com/games/the-unreal-world
UnReal World is a combination of roleplaying game and a survival simulation. In a world inspired by iron-age Finland you can track animals, set traps, hunt with bows and spears, tan hides, go fishing, pick berries, cook food, sleep in a temporary shelter or build a log cottage, trade with the villagers, craft items, etc. It has a randomly generated map, skill development and a detailed wounds and combat system.
I dont anyone has posted about it yet, but it certainly looks neat. Could you throw up a format post?
Gimme a minute and I'll do one for both MN and the KRZ episode. I'll edit them into this post.
Here And There Along The Echo - Free (PC, Mac, Linux)
http://kentuckyroutezero.com/here-and-there-along-the-echo/
Another short free episode, this time to tide you over Episode 4 of the surrealist adventure Kentucky Route Zero from Cardboard Computer. CALL NOW (270) 301-5797
Majestic Nights - $19.99/$4.99 for Episode 1 (PC, Mac)
http://store.steampowered.com/app/284140/
An episodic '80s thriller, 'Majestic Nights' is a narrative-driven adventure game riddled with wild conspiracies, government plots, agents, guns, aliens and disco lights.
More_Badass
Member
Don't push it. We can wait another day or two
Yeah there's no rush man. I need to update my votes too and post some upcoming stuff for the Tomabot - didn't get a chance last night.
Double post? I don't even care
Updated (and better) voting and impressions!
Absolute Drift
I'm super bad at this game. Oversteering, understeering, crashing - you name it, I'm doing it. I recognise how well it's made; I like the aesthetic, the physics are really well done and its fun to play. I just suck.
Antbassador
Kind of scratches that Surgeon Simulator itch - without the hair pulling frustration. It's short, has some nice charm to it and squashing ant princesses by mistake (or not) is always fun.
Bonfire
Not such a fan of this - it calls itself "strategy" but it feels as though it's just attritional. There's basically no animation at all as well which is a shame, because it looks kind of nice. I'll echo Toma's thoughts here - seems like it would be a better fit for mobile.
Greebroll
Weird. It doesn't look very nice and the UI is all sorts of horrible. I think if the game was cleaner to look at it might go some way to changing my mind on it. As it is its a simple game about maintaining your balance on rotating and shifting objects. Baddy was much more positive on it than I was though.
Secrets of Grindea
Surprise of the month so far. Beautifully animated, charming visuals and a light hearted story that's clearly drawing inspirations from the Chrono Triggers and Secret of Manas of the world. It's a joy to play and I think the animation is the main draw. It's fluid, fun and I'm definitely buying it when it comes out proper.
The Lion's Song
Charming but super, super short. Not melodramatic which is nice, it has great atmosphere and a nice story.
Roguelight
Yeah - this guy knows how to make games. Looks great and plays even better. It's not my favourite of his games, but when he starts making games for money I might as well set up a subscription service.
The Masterplan
Big fan of this, even if I suck. It's tense, looks and sounds great and has a really well executed heist feel to it. The feeling of satisfaction when you pull off the perfect run is great, and the feeling of shit hitting the fan is even better.
Outland
I played this when it came out on PS3 - so I can't speak too much of the PC version, but the game itself is great. Fluid animations and a great twist on the metroid genre with an ikaruga, bullet hell style twist. Well worth the asking price.
Voting
Secrets of Grindea
The Masterplan
Roguelight
Outland
Absolute Drift
The Lion's Song
Some really good stuff this month. Will try and gather a post together about upcoming games before the new thread goes live too.
Updated (and better) voting and impressions!
Absolute Drift
I'm super bad at this game. Oversteering, understeering, crashing - you name it, I'm doing it. I recognise how well it's made; I like the aesthetic, the physics are really well done and its fun to play. I just suck.
Antbassador
Kind of scratches that Surgeon Simulator itch - without the hair pulling frustration. It's short, has some nice charm to it and squashing ant princesses by mistake (or not) is always fun.
Bonfire
Not such a fan of this - it calls itself "strategy" but it feels as though it's just attritional. There's basically no animation at all as well which is a shame, because it looks kind of nice. I'll echo Toma's thoughts here - seems like it would be a better fit for mobile.
Greebroll
Weird. It doesn't look very nice and the UI is all sorts of horrible. I think if the game was cleaner to look at it might go some way to changing my mind on it. As it is its a simple game about maintaining your balance on rotating and shifting objects. Baddy was much more positive on it than I was though.
Secrets of Grindea
Surprise of the month so far. Beautifully animated, charming visuals and a light hearted story that's clearly drawing inspirations from the Chrono Triggers and Secret of Manas of the world. It's a joy to play and I think the animation is the main draw. It's fluid, fun and I'm definitely buying it when it comes out proper.
The Lion's Song
Charming but super, super short. Not melodramatic which is nice, it has great atmosphere and a nice story.
Roguelight
Yeah - this guy knows how to make games. Looks great and plays even better. It's not my favourite of his games, but when he starts making games for money I might as well set up a subscription service.
The Masterplan
Big fan of this, even if I suck. It's tense, looks and sounds great and has a really well executed heist feel to it. The feeling of satisfaction when you pull off the perfect run is great, and the feeling of shit hitting the fan is even better.
Outland
I played this when it came out on PS3 - so I can't speak too much of the PC version, but the game itself is great. Fluid animations and a great twist on the metroid genre with an ikaruga, bullet hell style twist. Well worth the asking price.
Voting
Secrets of Grindea
The Masterplan
Roguelight
Outland
Absolute Drift
The Lion's Song
Some really good stuff this month. Will try and gather a post together about upcoming games before the new thread goes live too.
Desura Dump #2:
Final Dusk - $4,99 (PC)
Metrocide - $7,99 (PC, Mac)
Pall - $2,99 (PC)
Red Goblin: Cursed Forest - $4,99 (50% off during Alpha for $2,50) (PC)
Spooky's House of Jump Scares - Free (PC)
Mythos: The Beginning - PRICE (PLAT)
Final Dusk - $4,99 (PC)
http://www.desura.com/games/final-dusk
Final Dusk is a unique combination of puzzle and action game. Each level consists of two distinct phases. First you need to manipulate the environment using multiple powers to create a safe path for Vampire Princess Mina. In the second phase you need to actively protect Mina on her way to her goal.
Metrocide - $7,99 (PC, Mac)
http://store.steampowered.com/app/313130/
Metrocide is a relentless single-player stealth action game in which you play as a contract killer: the notorious T.J. Trench. You will have to negotiate a fierce and brutal city replete with gangs, vigilantes, cops and more, taking out the trash one contract at a time. While cop drones circle overhead, youll be sticking to the alleyways with a variety of weapons and plantable explosives finding new and unique ways to get away with murder most foul.
Pall - $2,99 (PC)
http://www.desura.com/games/pall
Pall is a puzzle/logic game where player has to guide one or more balls through increasingly complex maze. Game features 50 handcrafted levels, which get harder as you progress and introduce new game pieces, such as teleporters, different materials and much more. In addition to this, ball can change shape to steel or bubble, which makes it interact differently with game setpieces, for extra complexity.
Red Goblin: Cursed Forest - $4,99 (50% off during Alpha for $2,50) (PC)
http://www.desura.com/games/red-goblin-cursed-forest
Enter the world where dreams and nightmares are born. Play as Red, a familiar called by "Artuo" a knight with a single wish. To be a wizard. Solve the problems that Artuo caused in the Forest of Dreams by trying to eliminate the source of all nightmares!
Spooky's House of Jump Scares - Free (PC)
http://www.desura.com/games/spookys-house-of-jump-scares
Can you survive 1000 rooms of cute terror? Or will you break once the cuteness starts to fade off and your running for your life from the unspeakable hideous beings that shake and writhe in bowels of this house? They wait for you, they wait and hunger for meeting you. They long to finally meet you and show you how flexible your skin can be after it has soaked in blood. Will you brave this journey, will you set to beat the impossible, the insane, and the incorporeal?
Mythos: The Beginning - PRICE (PLAT)
http://www.desura.com/games/mythos-the-beginning
Set in London in 1934, Mythos allows you to create your own paranormal investigator from scratch and guide them through a frightening exploration of the infamous Harborough Asylum. Three young university students have vanished while attempting to conduct a scientific survey of this dreaded place, and it's up to you to find them! Throughout the night you'll discover that Harborough Asylum's reputation is more than an urban legend, and you'll have to fight for your life against demons, zombies and otherworldly Lovecraftian foes.
OP impressions #3:
Dr. Spacezoo or: How I learned to stop shooting and save the animals
Freeholder
Galactic Parcel Service
Greebroll
Hexcells: Infinite
Kraden's Crypt
p), but the game has tons or ridiculous set pieces going on, it has a unique control scheme, its challenging and just screams FUN all the way. The problem is, that I really, really dont like how cumbersome the controls feel. For shooting arrows, you gotta pull back your mouse, for swords you gotta swing your mouse, for magic you will need to sling the projectile and that is really rewarding to figure out at first, but when I am standing in a room with 7 enemies, who take 5 bow hits each, those controls become incredibly cumbersome. Maybe its just me though. Panda played this right? What was your take on this?
Outland
Parallel Horizons
Refunktion
Roguelight
>----------< Highly Recommended >----------<
Outland
Cosmochoria
Cosmonautica
Boson X
>----------< Recommended >----------<
Absolute Drift
Refunktion
Roguelight
FreeHolder
Dr. Spacezoo or: How I learned to stop shooting and save the animals
>----------< Decent-ish >----------<
Kraden's Crypt
Antbassador
Greebroll
Bonfire
Beyond Gravity
Parallel Horizon
Atom Smasher
>----------< Bleh >----------<
Galactic Parcel Service
Dr. Spacezoo or: How I learned to stop shooting and save the animals
Surprisingly competent top down shooter. Satisfying shooting mechanics and an original theme. I am very annoyed by the camera to the fact that its triggering my motion sickness, and in the current alpha, there doesnt seem to be much progress between the levels, but the levels are fun to play. Recommended.
Freeholder
Very, very interesting Survival Farming game. Unfortunately, the only playable version is an earlier prototype (left picture) which has a multitude of issues with the UI, explanations, graphics and more. But that version already shows a rather deep foundation which is hard to describe, but Harvest Moon probably comes closest. That free prototype shows promise, but is far from actually being enjoyable, but the actual alpha they are working on atm (right picture) is a completely different story and looks much, much, MUCH better. I recommend playing the free version to see whether you might be interested in the version that looks to be a huge improvement. Looking forward to this.
Galactic Parcel Service
Space Traversal/Mission top down game. Looks rather unappealing, unsatisfying combat and animations and just way too barebones to be competetive in this genre.
Greebroll
Ball rolling game that tasks you with surviving small levels that are increasingly more devious to master. The beginning is easy enough. You start off by just staying on top of a cube, then a rotating cube and then the game shows why its actually an intriguing matter, which tasks you to move up a seemingly surreal structure that turns and requires you to shoot away some platforms to make space to land on while the structure turns. Good game overall, but unfortunately doesnt really make me want to continue playing.
Hexcells: Infinite
Standard Hexcells recommendation blurb with finally the game offering an endless amount of replayability. If you like Minesweeper, get this, its better.
Kraden's Crypt
The game should be really fun to me. Maybe I am just a bit jaded today and I should write game impressions
p), but the game has tons or ridiculous set pieces going on, it has a unique control scheme, its challenging and just screams FUN all the way. The problem is, that I really, really dont like how cumbersome the controls feel. For shooting arrows, you gotta pull back your mouse, for swords you gotta swing your mouse, for magic you will need to sling the projectile and that is really rewarding to figure out at first, but when I am standing in a room with 7 enemies, who take 5 bow hits each, those controls become incredibly cumbersome. Maybe its just me though. Panda played this right? What was your take on this?Outland
I played this on console, and the mashup of Ikaruga style color swapping bullet hell jumping and platforming is a bliss. I can't recommend this game enough. Challenging, underused main gameplay mechanic about color swapping according to obstacles and gorgeous to look at.
Parallel Horizons
Puzzle platformer about falling through the floor and coming out from the ceiling to reach certain regions. Very lovely art style, but the actual level design and challenges arent all that interesting.
Refunktion
3D Stealth Speedrunning Platformer. Very pretty, good controls, good stealth mechanics with enemy line of sight and sound areas around you when making noise. Really simple, but works very well. I really like what they did here, but oh my god, is this hard. I really like the game overall, but they really should have a less punishing mode when you have been found out. It doesnt need to be super easy, but working through a level for 5 minutes, and then dying from one enemy seeing you and you not being able to run away is really... annoying. At least there should be a better possibility to actually run away, since usually it just seems instant dath as I cant even run around a corner. If this had a slightly better balance, it would end up in the Highly recommended section.
Roguelight
Simple action roguelike with an upgrade mechanic after every playthrough based on the coins you found. I am not particularly a fan of those upgrade mechnics, but it definitely works here. The game is charming too, from character designs, to animations or the shooting controls and I really like the idea of arrows as a limited ressource which is used to a) defeat enemies and earn coins and b) light up areas. Very neat risk/reward mechanic there. Not an overly ambitious game by any means, but its definitely lovely in its own right.
>----------< Highly Recommended >----------<
Outland
Cosmochoria
Cosmonautica
Boson X
>----------< Recommended >----------<
Absolute Drift
Refunktion
Roguelight
FreeHolder
Dr. Spacezoo or: How I learned to stop shooting and save the animals
>----------< Decent-ish >----------<
Kraden's Crypt
Antbassador
Greebroll
Bonfire
Beyond Gravity
Parallel Horizon
Atom Smasher
>----------< Bleh >----------<
Galactic Parcel Service
PandaPedinte
Member
I feel opposite about the Kaden's Crypt controls Toma, while you found it cumbersome for me it felt like an interesting take on combat, having a room full of enemies and I having to swing my weapon did make my time with the game more enjoyable, though I can understand your complaints about the combat being repetitive.
I definitely think its interesting too, and I appreciate it a lot... in theory. But actually playing it is just too annoying right now, but as I said, I am fighting a heavy cold atm and maybe I am just not having enough patience with certain games at the moment.
How much did you play and how much does it mix up the basic gameplay?
PandaPedinte
Member
I think I played it for 2 or 3 hours and tried different sets of weapons/shields until I got a giant barrel hammer, maybe I was luck because I wasn't having a hard time killing the enemies with my weapons.
Hm, that could be the difference, maybe the weapons are useful for different enemies, but then again, once you enter a fight room, you cant really switch those around too much so you need to stick with what you had before without knowing which enemies you might run into.
OP impressions #4:
Secrets of Grindea:
Sanctuary RPG:
SUPER III ALPHA:
Superdimensional:
The Lion's Song:
>----------< Highly Recommended >----------<
Outland
Secrets of Grindea
Cosmochoria
Sanctuary RPG
Cosmonautica
Boson X
>----------< Recommended >----------<
Absolute Drift
Refunktion
Roguelight
FreeHolder
Dr. Spacezoo or: How I learned to stop shooting and save the animals
>----------< Decent-ish >----------<
Kraden's Crypt
Antbassador
The Lion's Song
Greebroll
Bonfire
Super III Alpha
Beyond Gravity
Parallel Horizon
Atom Smasher
>----------< Bleh >----------<
Galactic Parcel Service
Done with the voting so far, except for one game: The Spatials. I absolutely cannot not play a promising Dwarf Like-style game, so I'll set some more time aside for this tomorrow, especially considering it costs me 7 bucks. After that, I'll work on putting up the new thread.
Secrets of Grindea:
Yes please. Biggest surprise this month so far for me. Others liked it already, but just from screenshots the appeal might not be all that apparent. The game looks great, has some good humor, intriguing mechanics, loads of upgrade mechanics, loot, satisfying combat, incredibly sweet pixel art animations and is just a blast to play. I only finished the demo, but this is preordered instantly.
Sanctuary RPG:
Hard to judge from just the beginning, but I bought this and its a damn interesting roguelike with sweet ascii graphics. The combat is turn based and revolves around the player using context sensitive orders to react to any battle situation. I'll definitely play more of this, but it seems to have quite a bit going on with unlockables, combos, ultimate attacks, many different enemy modifiers and combat attributes, levelling up and skills. Really damn interesting, definitely will play more of this. Since the october thread is already ending, be prepared to hear more of this next month.
SUPER III ALPHA:
Puzzle platformer, good controls, interesting level layout, but still in a really early stage. There isnt even any saveable progress yet, and if you screw up a level, there is a high chance you might need to reset the whole game progress, which is a huge, huge minus. Otherwise promising game concept.
Superdimensional:
Platformer, which automatically pushes along and you only have the choice to direct in which dimension the character is moving. This works decently enough since you dont change the dimensions instantly with a button press but you need to direct a cone of light to change certain parts of the screen. Visually interesting, but also a bit.. boring? The game definitely adds some challenge later, but I cant find myself being interested in the rather simple traversal mechanics.
The Lion's Song:
Small adventure story game. Lovely art and interesting idea for the story, but I really wish it would be more interactive with more... gamey elements, like different outcomes at least. Still cute though for one playthrough.
>----------< Highly Recommended >----------<
Outland
Secrets of Grindea
Cosmochoria
Sanctuary RPG
Cosmonautica
Boson X
>----------< Recommended >----------<
Absolute Drift
Refunktion
Roguelight
FreeHolder
Dr. Spacezoo or: How I learned to stop shooting and save the animals
>----------< Decent-ish >----------<
Kraden's Crypt
Antbassador
The Lion's Song
Greebroll
Bonfire
Super III Alpha
Beyond Gravity
Parallel Horizon
Atom Smasher
>----------< Bleh >----------<
Galactic Parcel Service
Done with the voting so far, except for one game: The Spatials. I absolutely cannot not play a promising Dwarf Like-style game, so I'll set some more time aside for this tomorrow, especially considering it costs me 7 bucks. After that, I'll work on putting up the new thread.
Kaden's Crypt wouldn't even load for me :/
Edit
I know it's probably covered but..
The newest Humble Bundle contains:
PWYW
OlliOllie
Insanely Twisted Shadow Planet
Tower of Guns
BTA
Amnesia: A Machine for Pigs
Jazzpunk
Risk of Rain x4
$12
Shadowrun
Also a free copy of Teleglitch!
Also the Weekly Bundle has...
PWYW
Knock-knock
Home
Vertical Drop Heroes
BTA
Betrayer
Five Nights at Freddy's
Our Darker Purpose
$15
Among the Sleep
I'm going in for both bundles I think - I really want Knock Knock, Betrayer and Jazz Punk!
Edit
I know it's probably covered but..
The newest Humble Bundle contains:
PWYW
OlliOllie
Insanely Twisted Shadow Planet
Tower of Guns
BTA
Amnesia: A Machine for Pigs
Jazzpunk
Risk of Rain x4
$12
Shadowrun
Also a free copy of Teleglitch!
Also the Weekly Bundle has...
PWYW
Knock-knock
Home
Vertical Drop Heroes
BTA
Betrayer
Five Nights at Freddy's
Our Darker Purpose
$15
Among the Sleep
I'm going in for both bundles I think - I really want Knock Knock, Betrayer and Jazz Punk!
Ah, sweet. Thanks for the headsup.
Yeah, I usually set 2-3 days aside during a month to power through most games for initial impressions. If I take a whole saturday for it, I usually can test around 1/3rd to 1/2th of the OP games.
OP impression special: The Spatials
The Good: Impressive effort and already way more complete than Spacebase 9 ever will be with plenty of interesting sub systems and rewarding overall campaign progress. It also mixes some ideas from other games (4X comes to mind) and creates its own interpretation of the genre, which is rather refreshing.
The Bad: Still in early access, so its still missing plenty of sub systems, which currently break the actual game progress in a way that makes the game very unchallenging.
The combat is a bit wonky, uninspired and boring, which is fortunately not a huge focus atm.
The Outlook: This is looking damn good. It already has enough sub systems to allow for an engaging play session. If they manage to make the combat a bit more interesting (which I dont know whether they might plan that) and add the remaining sub systems (very good chance of that happening), this will easily rank among the better games in the genre.
Basic Gameplay:
The gameplay is basically divided into 2 parts - building and combat. Lets start with building:
The biggest hurdle currently is, that the game doesnt have any actual tutorial. There is a comprehensive ingame manual that explains the game mechanics, but reading through that is hardly a good first impression. In the beginning I was a bit lost and and failed to see the point of the game, since I missed many mechanics. For a basic understanding, you need to know the overall playing structure: Build your base - Finish missions - earn ressources - Build Planetary ressource mines, and repeat.
Another source of confusion is that the needs system of the units isnt fully implemented yet, meaning you have no actual urge to build anything since nothing happens if the units hover at 0 food or 0 sleep. It is clear that they havent implemented these features yet to allow for easy testing of other game features, which they currently want feedback for.
Once I understood that, I started tinkering around with what I can do in the game currently, and was surprised to see how much depth they are going for here. This is a small part of the tech tree and the equipment of one character:
That intrigued me, so I dug a bit into it and tried to figure out how the game is meant to be played and build some basic structures in my home base.
1. Living rooms, beds, decoration.
2. Kitchen, work preparation station
3. storage, storage containers
4. Metal works, work shop... wait. Why can I not build anything in the metal workshop? Hmmm, apparently I need aluminum. Where do I get that?
Then I figured out that the game is not only taking place in my base/my planet, but I can zoom out to the galaxy map and make missions and visit merchants on other planets. Those missions give you a set amount of ressources, and might enable you to mine that planet for a steady income of ressources. This means you either do a mission which gives you aluminum or you do a bounty, which will give you mining permits for that planet, which in turn could give you a steady income of aluminum. The caveat here is that bounties havent been implemented yet, which means that you can currently mine a planet with 2 clicks as they are considered yours to mine from the get go.
Once you have more ressources, you can unlock more options in the tech tree, which in turn allows you to build more objects, which in turn requires more ressources.
It all works surprisingly well, and I love the aspect of making missions on planets to build steady mine buildings, raising my overall income with plenty of building options. I cant judge the balancing on this since there is no real fail state atm without the unit needs.
Onto the combat:
The missing unit needs and the instant mining are a problem for the current gameplay progression, but these are omissions that are already being worked on. However,I have no clue whether the combat might see some improvements and that is so painfully simple that it drags down the overall impression of the game a bit even though you dont spend that much time with it currently. The only thing you do here is left clicking to move your units and keeping your left mouse button pressed to shoot. What you'll do the most is walking after fleeing enemies to kill them, which is rather boring. A simple change, like allowing to control multiple squads would improve this a lot since there really is no strategy to this part atm.
Unlike other Early Access games, this game already has a sizeable amount of content and features, but also unlike other Early Access games, its not really "enjoyable" to play yet, as there really is no progress with some crucial elements missing. As it is, its a cute sandbox, but a very, very, promising one.
Highly recommended with promising future potential, be aware that the game is still missing a lot atm though.
>----------< Highly Recommended >----------<
Outland
Secrets of Grindea
Cosmochoria
Sanctuary RPG
Cosmonautica
The Spatials
Boson X
>----------< Recommended >----------<
Absolute Drift
Refunktion
Roguelight
FreeHolder
Dr. Spacezoo or: How I learned to stop shooting and save the animals
>----------< Decent-ish >----------<
Kraden's Crypt
Antbassador
The Lion's Song
Greebroll
Bonfire
Super III Alpha
Beyond Gravity
Parallel Horizon
Atom Smasher
>----------< Bleh >----------<
Galactic Parcel Service
The Good: Impressive effort and already way more complete than Spacebase 9 ever will be with plenty of interesting sub systems and rewarding overall campaign progress. It also mixes some ideas from other games (4X comes to mind) and creates its own interpretation of the genre, which is rather refreshing.
The Bad: Still in early access, so its still missing plenty of sub systems, which currently break the actual game progress in a way that makes the game very unchallenging.
The combat is a bit wonky, uninspired and boring, which is fortunately not a huge focus atm.
The Outlook: This is looking damn good. It already has enough sub systems to allow for an engaging play session. If they manage to make the combat a bit more interesting (which I dont know whether they might plan that) and add the remaining sub systems (very good chance of that happening), this will easily rank among the better games in the genre.
Basic Gameplay:
The gameplay is basically divided into 2 parts - building and combat. Lets start with building:
The biggest hurdle currently is, that the game doesnt have any actual tutorial. There is a comprehensive ingame manual that explains the game mechanics, but reading through that is hardly a good first impression. In the beginning I was a bit lost and and failed to see the point of the game, since I missed many mechanics. For a basic understanding, you need to know the overall playing structure: Build your base - Finish missions - earn ressources - Build Planetary ressource mines, and repeat.
Another source of confusion is that the needs system of the units isnt fully implemented yet, meaning you have no actual urge to build anything since nothing happens if the units hover at 0 food or 0 sleep. It is clear that they havent implemented these features yet to allow for easy testing of other game features, which they currently want feedback for.
Once I understood that, I started tinkering around with what I can do in the game currently, and was surprised to see how much depth they are going for here. This is a small part of the tech tree and the equipment of one character:
That intrigued me, so I dug a bit into it and tried to figure out how the game is meant to be played and build some basic structures in my home base.
1. Living rooms, beds, decoration.
2. Kitchen, work preparation station
3. storage, storage containers
4. Metal works, work shop... wait. Why can I not build anything in the metal workshop? Hmmm, apparently I need aluminum. Where do I get that?
Then I figured out that the game is not only taking place in my base/my planet, but I can zoom out to the galaxy map and make missions and visit merchants on other planets. Those missions give you a set amount of ressources, and might enable you to mine that planet for a steady income of ressources. This means you either do a mission which gives you aluminum or you do a bounty, which will give you mining permits for that planet, which in turn could give you a steady income of aluminum. The caveat here is that bounties havent been implemented yet, which means that you can currently mine a planet with 2 clicks as they are considered yours to mine from the get go.
Once you have more ressources, you can unlock more options in the tech tree, which in turn allows you to build more objects, which in turn requires more ressources.
It all works surprisingly well, and I love the aspect of making missions on planets to build steady mine buildings, raising my overall income with plenty of building options. I cant judge the balancing on this since there is no real fail state atm without the unit needs.
Onto the combat:
The missing unit needs and the instant mining are a problem for the current gameplay progression, but these are omissions that are already being worked on. However,I have no clue whether the combat might see some improvements and that is so painfully simple that it drags down the overall impression of the game a bit even though you dont spend that much time with it currently. The only thing you do here is left clicking to move your units and keeping your left mouse button pressed to shoot. What you'll do the most is walking after fleeing enemies to kill them, which is rather boring. A simple change, like allowing to control multiple squads would improve this a lot since there really is no strategy to this part atm.
Unlike other Early Access games, this game already has a sizeable amount of content and features, but also unlike other Early Access games, its not really "enjoyable" to play yet, as there really is no progress with some crucial elements missing. As it is, its a cute sandbox, but a very, very, promising one.
Highly recommended with promising future potential, be aware that the game is still missing a lot atm though.
>----------< Highly Recommended >----------<
Outland
Secrets of Grindea
Cosmochoria
Sanctuary RPG
Cosmonautica
The Spatials
Boson X
>----------< Recommended >----------<
Absolute Drift
Refunktion
Roguelight
FreeHolder
Dr. Spacezoo or: How I learned to stop shooting and save the animals
>----------< Decent-ish >----------<
Kraden's Crypt
Antbassador
The Lion's Song
Greebroll
Bonfire
Super III Alpha
Beyond Gravity
Parallel Horizon
Atom Smasher
>----------< Bleh >----------<
Galactic Parcel Service
More_Badass
Member
The most impressive thing about The Spatials is that it's a port of a free-to-play mobile game
I was thinking of that due to the simplistic click/hold combat, but the other parts of the game really dont look like it. Very interesting.
PandaPedinte
Member
Try playing Kraden's on windowed mode
Just gets stuck on the loading screen for me :/ ah well, not to be!
First voting month in which I have so many games in my highly recommended list that wont land in the top list for next month.
Really surprised to see no love for:
Cosmochoria
Sanctuary RPG
Cosmonautica
The Spatials
Boson X
Really surprised to see no love for:
Cosmochoria
Sanctuary RPG
Cosmonautica
The Spatials
Boson X
PandaPedinte
Member
I gave love to Cosmochoria and for some reason I totally forgot to buy Boson X >.>
Games I would vote for if I had played more games from the OP and felt comfortable voting (in alphabetical order):
Absolute Drift
Boson X
Cosmochoria
Heavy Bullets
Hexcells Infinite
Outland
Secrets of Grindea
The Lion's Song
Make of that what you will, Toma.
Why would you feel uncomfortable about it? Its 8 games you liked enough to put them into the voting poll. Sounds perfectly reasonable to me.