violentine

Spelunky is a tough as nails, unforgiving and full of discovery, an unrivaled roguelike platformer that defined its sub-genre. Controls smoothly, looks pretty, wacky sense of humor just like a silly homage to Indiana Jones. It's definitely not one of those games you keep playing for hours on end but it's certainly a one that makes you come back.

Fez is all about beautiful bright colored pixel art and great retro-ish music but unfortunately I can't praise the gameplay. Fez is a 2D puzzle platformer with an unique twist that let's you "change your point of view". This means that the world is in 3D but you can look at it from one side at a time. This allows for great puzzle elements but get's stale quite quickly, after all there's just a little that you can do aside from jumping and there are only few collectables and even those are only for completionists since they offer no new mechanics to the game. For me it feels that all the effort has been in developing this neat trick of 2D/3D but it's not enough to carry the whole game.

Bionic Commando Rearmed is a reboot for NES classic Bionic Commando. There are some added features like new graphics and being able to switch weapons easily during missions but the gameplay is pretty much the same as back then. Problem is that I really like the old pixel art and the new "style" doesn't quite fit the atmosphere. It's still definitely a fun and good game but I recommend playing the old one on Nintendo or setting up an emulator to enjoy the original experience.

This game is only for those that find the era of Commodore 64 appealing. As I'm not the biggest fan of the style nor the gameplay mechanics I'm unable to appreciate this "minigame" of zombie survival. The gameplay consists of minigames where you either walk and shoot or drive with a car in a retro-pixel-world and occationally stop to scavenge for resources though scavenging sounds too good as it's usually the minigame where you shoot zombies and collect the resources by walking over them. The price is very low so I can't warn about that but for me this game represents free-ware gaming.

5 seems a bit rough score for a game that got so many positive reviews already. In all honesty, I don't know how the game managed to get so far with such a mediocre gameplay. I guess the trick is in graphics which are still beautiful and create a fantastic atmosphere suitable for the Stephen King-esque storyline. The story is definitely a homage to King with the writer in distress, weird murderers and dreamlike locations near a very american mountain village. It's like cliche in a cliche. You're armed with a flashlight and a gun and must first use the light to sort of "break down shields" from enemies to be able to shoot them with your weapon. That's all there is to fighting mechanics. Use flashlight, shoot with a pistol. Run to the next area. Bad guys appear from the shadows. Use flashlight, shoot with a pistol. Repeat. Repeat. Repeat. There are also collectibles for those people that bought this game with their last moneys and just HAVE to get everything out of it. The beginning of the game felt a bit like Resident Evil 4 which is a great game. You should play that instead.

Might & Magic Heroes VI does everything wrong that Might & Magic Heroes V had right. As a fan of HoMM 2,3 and 5 this game left me crying. The graphics are great, I admit, but then the problems begin. HoMM VI has only few factions and only one creature choice against 5's two upgrade choices, cityview is bad even though improved after initial release, game demands a lot from your computer and I don't think the minimum specs are correct (I had recommended specs and there was awful lot of stuttering even with minimum graphical quality), HoMM 6 uses Uplay(or Udon't) which is the biggest demon alive, only added in order to control piracy and fails in that too. If you're a old HoMM fan coming back to the series, skip this title and buy 5 or play the good old ones. If you're new to the series, this leaves a foul taste in your mouth. Problem isn't that this game should've been a remake of Homm 3, the problem is that this game just doesn't do justice for the series.

Intrusion 2 has all the cards to be a brilliant old-school sidescrolling shooter but falls short in some areas. In Intrusion you shoot your way through levels in veins of Contra (though much easier), killing somewhat nasty bosses in the progress. Yes, sounds good, but then the shooting isn't most comfortable thing in the world, mouse having weird lagging and the character feeling way to floaty for my taste. My biggest issue was that your "bullets" fly so slowly that you just keep on spamming your guns in enemy's general direction and hope it falls down. This did break my experience and lead to quitting in level 6. To put it short: nice try.

FTL is a roguelike spaceship management game that puts you in control of the ship and it's crew. The game is graphically old-school with pixel art and the interface and controls both work well. Problem is that FTL's appeal didn't last too long. Soon you have seen all possible encounters that the game can throw at you (note: mostly text based) and after learning the ropes it get's boring. I got close to 10 hours gametime before this happening so moneywise FTL is a decent purchase. All and all FTL is a good coffee break roguelike but a bit over hyped in my books.

Tiny & Big is an innovative adventure that suffers a bit from lack of polish (small team). You're armed with a lazer that cuts rocks half (and creates ledges for you to use), hook to pull rocks near you and a rocket weapon that let's you shoot a spiked rocket to any surface and then activate it to push it away. Combining these tools you are tasked to get back your grandpas old magical underwear, cutting through levels filled with huge rocks, statues and stairways. If you like the artstyle of Borderlands you will find Tiny & Bigs' sandy temples rather pretty. I must warn though that the controls and camera feel a bit slippery in certain tight moments and you might end up dying "for the wrong reasons". The game is also very short as I completed it in 2 hours. I didn't try to pick all of the collectibles, secrets etc. though, so if you're a completionist the game will offer you much more. Also, Tiny & Big is good enough to fool around after being completed.

Primordia is a point-and-click adventure game similar to it's predecessors (Monkey Island, Day of the Tentacle etc.) with retro pixel art and some humor here and there. Primordia takes place in scifi world where humans have vanished and left robots to live and build their own future. I wasn't fan of Wadjet eyes earlier games but for some reason I played through Primordia in two days. Puzzles can be reasoned and the plot proceeds quickly enough. The game is pretty "short" as it took only ~9 hours to complete but there's (in Steam version) achievements that might give this game some extra hours if that's your cup of tea. I give Primordia 8 out of 10 because even though it's a good little game it doesn't do anything new or better than other good point-&-clicks. I also didn't like that I was unable to alter the options besides volume sliders and subtitles. Recommended for friends of the genre.

Project Zomboid is an isometric survival "simulator" that puts you in control of a character that is destined to die in the process. This turns around the focus in the game and instead of trying to reach a specific "end" you are encouraged to "enjoy the ride". You can cook, loot, shoot and must take care that your character get's enough sleep, even bandage yourself if wounded. You may carry a melee and/or ranged weapon but the bigger the gun, the bigger the sound. Shooting attracts near-by zombies towards you and while it's easy to kill couple of them, a horde overruns you easily. I must say that this game isn't easy (as in casual easy) and requires some learning (as every good game does, mind you). Highly recommended for friends of roguelikes and zombies.

People still talk about Brood War? Forget about it. Starcraft is and has always been about competitive and tense multiplayer. It's definitely a game that I wouldn't buy for it's campaign (even tho I have heard praise about that too). Starcraft 2 Wings of Liberty started improving the gameplay in many areas (no more sending every probe to the mineral line i.e.) and Heart of the Swarm continues from that. I play multiplayer almost every day and the new units in HotS really bring more variety to the mix. The changes to the multiplayer aren't too significant (couple of units for every race) but overall the game is getting constantly more dynamic.

This game isn't hack 'n slash, not an rpg and definitely not a strategy game. It's a game for kids that would like to try out an rpg without heavy dialogue and stats based system. The whole game is pretty much about collecting stuff from trashcans and from the ground, opening chests in a not-so-secret-areas and occasionally fighting in turn-based combat from side-view (made known by final fantasy series). Costume Quest isn't a bad game, it's just too light for a serious and seasoned gamer with it's "grinding"-based gameplay.

This game is advertised as zelda-esque, atmospheric adventure game. As this game indeed resembles Zelda graphically it's a far cry from an adventure like Zelda. The story itself is one of those 'you don't know why you are here and everything's strange' -types and you have to follow a certain path to advance in it. There's not much room for exploring other than finding the gateway to your next 'dungeon'. These dungeons consist mostly of week enemies, very easy puzzles and a final boss. There are also sort of collectible cards that are required for you to open gates to new areas but besides that do nothing else than provide couple lines of "humour". These "jokes" feel quite ackward in context of rest of the game being "serious". The audio of the game is decent but forgettable. I didn't feel that Anodyne was really a game, it resembles more to "To The Moon" as an interactive story that looks like an old JRPG and should be counted as one when considering a purchase. The price tag of 8€ is a bit steep so I recommend waiting for a sale.

Retro City Rampage. It's a retro-looking GTA 1 (even more retro than gta itself). I didn't understand anything in the 5 first minutes of the game. Everything is very small and the constant flow of gaming parodies in the dialog, missions, buildings, cars (everywhere!) can be rather overwhelming. Things move on quickly and you may roam the city free or do the main questline that consists of fetch this and fetch that quests although breaking this grind momentarily by offering new toys to play with. The problem I had was that I didn't immerse to the "story" at all, the countless parodies make dialog and the story confusing and irrelevant. It was fun to throw people their mail and notice it was a parody of Paperboy (the game). What if you never heard of? It's just a mini-game. How about the other problems: driving is boring and different cars (making no sound when driving full speed!?) offer you nothing unique, weapons all feel pretty much the same except for explosives that get yourself killed easily and the often mentioned Meatboy minigame (as are the others) is just a distraction from the main game and only for the completionists. Only thing above average this game can offer you is a fantastic mini-game 'spot the reference'.

Magicka is a humorous adventure game in which you guide a wizard (with up to 3 friends) through a parody fantasy world where everyone speak bad swedish. The twist is that you combine different elements (fire, ice etc.) by yourself and then launch the outcome towards your enemies and/or friends. This leads to a huge arsenal of different spells and together with staffs and weapons make your character feel charmingly random. Problem is that playing this game with a gamepad is not recommended since the joystics are used to combine the spells and makes it slow and clunky in comparison to keyboard. And as the game offers an option to play from one computer you should plug in 4 keyboards for it to be at it's best... Another issue is with the parody side of the game; it makes the game so much better but if you're in search for more serious adventuring then getting constantly killed by your teammates might not be the thing for you.

If you're looking for a graphical roguelike this is not it. 'Hack, Slash, Loot' has only what the title says, tho even that is dumbed down. That's why the title has hitting enemies mentioned twice. You hit enemies, they hit you. One of you dies. Actually there isn't looting since what ever items you find you may choose to swap them with your old gear and that's pretty much it. This is to boost your damage since majority of the items just add to your stats without giving you any new options how to play the game. There are several "quests" that you may choose from with themes varying from descending into a dungeon to dungeon descending. Very bland and boring. The game is so bad that it gives you more characters as you die so that you don't want to touch the old ones ever again. So bad that it's insulting to call it a roguelike.

Mark of the ninja is a 2D stealth/action, slightly puzzle game that let's you decide your own course of action. You may choose to kill every enemy in the game or none of them, use traps and devices to move undetected, to kill swiftly or just to distract enemies. The art style is very similar to Shank 1 2 although not as colorful, but rather a bit grim and gloomy which suits the theme very well. Fantastic game if you're into sneaking, planning and/or killing your way through the game.

Reminds me of Shoot many robots: Arena Kings; by it's bad and unmemorable gameplay. Buy this game if you like jumping and shooting in 2D... actually no, buy something else that has these features, it's probably better. Pros: Colors. Cons: ****'t recall anything unique about it. 2.Reminds Arena Kings. 3.That opening theme song isn't that great, just a generic guitar riff with some distortion. **** expose to cancer.