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I love Inscryption. Not everything works: the connection to the Hex is a bit tacked-on, some of the lore stuff is a bit inaccessible, and I think that the game would have benefited from lower stakes than its mythology ended up tacking onto the game.
Aside from that though, the core game mechanics are just awesome. I'm not a huge card game person but this game made me into a believer. Act I and III are understandably universally acclaimed, but after playing through a few times I found myself appreciating Act II more and more. The sense of atmosphere is great, the characters are really fun, and you really grow to care about the world. Difficulty is set perfectly in my view: it's not easy but you feel yourself getting better at the game and there are a few mechanics sprinkled in the game that are designed to make things easier when they need to be. The community has had thousands of posts of people who have figured out card mechanics to break the game but people are still enthusiastic to talk about it precisely because it's so fun to feel like you've found loopholes to the games' programming. Did I mention the DLC is basically a game in itself that you could easily sync 30-40 hours in?
Daniel Mullins is great, Inscryption is great, and you should get it.
Aside from that though, the core game mechanics are just awesome. I'm not a huge card game person but this game made me into a believer. Act I and III are understandably universally acclaimed, but after playing through a few times I found myself appreciating Act II more and more. The sense of atmosphere is great, the characters are really fun, and you really grow to care about the world. Difficulty is set perfectly in my view: it's not easy but you feel yourself getting better at the game and there are a few mechanics sprinkled in the game that are designed to make things easier when they need to be. The community has had thousands of posts of people who have figured out card mechanics to break the game but people are still enthusiastic to talk about it precisely because it's so fun to feel like you've found loopholes to the games' programming. Did I mention the DLC is basically a game in itself that you could easily sync 30-40 hours in?
Daniel Mullins is great, Inscryption is great, and you should get it.
«Blew my mind»
«Just one more turn»
There's nothing particularly *wrong* with it and it definitely shows some promise as an indie game, but it's just fine (nothing more). The dated pop culture references and eye-rolling self-referential humor didn't particularly engage me, and the puzzles were pretty ordinary. The meta-referential storytelling is the most noticeable thing about this game and definitely what got it the most attention, but it has been done better in many other games and the game is too short to make much of the concept. Overall pretty meh.
The gameplay feels tedious even though the overall gameplay only lasts an hour, the controls are sloppy, the level design is boring. While it's fine to have a game serve as an homage to another game or series, this game takes it way, way too far, doing nothing with the story elements provided by the larger Half-Life Series and including a bunch of immersion breaking in-jokes that make me roll my eyes at the dialogue. It is not a good sign when literally all the dialogue is immediately skippable and the skip option is displayed as prominently as the dialogue tree options. Unlike the flash 2D version of Portal, this game did not reimagine any of the core Half Life game's mechanics to accommodate the 2D restrictions on movement and aiming. I appreciate it basically amounts to a fan tribute but I didn't even bother finishing the final boss fight because I was so bored with the whole thing. Not recommended.
«Disappointment of the year»
«Waste of time»
Like many Daniel Mullins games, Pony Island has a lot going for it. It manages to play to its meta and Format Screw elements quite well, producing a game whose mechanics keep changing quickly enough to keep you engaged. There are plenty of clever secrets that you have to dig deep to find but perfectionists and 100%'s will be rewarded with far more secrets than you might expect at first glance. The gameplay is easy enough so that you never feel lost but challenging enough to keep the player pushing further. Of course, storytelling is a highlight of this game (as it is in all of this creator's output), somehow managing to deliver both an interesting take on damnation and Satan and some amusing meta-commentary on game development (that will make sense after you've played the game). The story is not as strong as Mullins' other games but given its shorter run time and smaller scope this is not surprising.
What drops this game from an Exceptional is the actual gameplay, which is a bit too padded and frustrating for my taste. Difficulty outside of the programming-based puzzle levels (which were my favorite part of th egame) generally comes less from thinking of a clever way around a problem and more from having to do the same precision action for a long period of time at various levels of difficulty. To be specific about this complaint, there didn't seem to be a point of having the Act III levels be as long as they were, since this just penalized mistakes more without requiring me to actually improve more. If these levels were half as long, I'd still have to avoid the mistakes the level was trying to goad me into making but I would get through to the other side faster. This is a complaint I have about the core platforming levels across the board, which were boring compared both to the exposition-delivering segments and the puzzle mechanics. It wasn't even that I was against tighter platforming but just that requiring me to go through a lot of moments of dodging the same set of obstacles over and over again wasn't actually challenging in an engaging way.
Overall, though, this is still quite strong -- recommended!
What drops this game from an Exceptional is the actual gameplay, which is a bit too padded and frustrating for my taste. Difficulty outside of the programming-based puzzle levels (which were my favorite part of th egame) generally comes less from thinking of a clever way around a problem and more from having to do the same precision action for a long period of time at various levels of difficulty. To be specific about this complaint, there didn't seem to be a point of having the Act III levels be as long as they were, since this just penalized mistakes more without requiring me to actually improve more. If these levels were half as long, I'd still have to avoid the mistakes the level was trying to goad me into making but I would get through to the other side faster. This is a complaint I have about the core platforming levels across the board, which were boring compared both to the exposition-delivering segments and the puzzle mechanics. It wasn't even that I was against tighter platforming but just that requiring me to go through a lot of moments of dodging the same set of obstacles over and over again wasn't actually challenging in an engaging way.
Overall, though, this is still quite strong -- recommended!
«Blew my mind»
«Sit back and relax»
A great example of "simple to learn, hard to master" done right. It doesn't have the dizzying array of moving parts that Dota has, there are fewer elements dependent on RNG, and obviously reaction time plays a smaller role. The Dota tie-ins help existing fans of the franchise get started quickly without being inaccessible to newcomers. Even so, there's still a lot of strategy to learn, with individual hero's abilities interacting with alliances, items, and hero placement in sometimes unexpected ways. The mixture of luck and skill in matches is very well done, and games themselves give players plenty of opportunities to experience highlights even if they don't end up winning all their matches.
The overall experience is not very intense, as intense periods of item and hero selection are alternated with the relaxed experience of watching the Autochess-style battle commence. The whimsical aesthetics actually mesh well with the low-key but still engaging gameplay. There are very few penalties for abandoning (given that matches can continue without players being engaged) and there's no voice/text chat aside from some preset options, so the relaxed approach to gameplay carries over to interactions between players and the overall community as well.
I was particularly impressed with the amount of single-player content available for around $5, although some of the quests were unexpectedly difficult due to balance changes that have happened since that content was first released. There's a lot to do even if you want to remain FTP though. Graphics did not look great on my (admittedly underpowered) laptop, but it doesn't distract from gameplay in any way. You're going to play this for the gameplay itself rather than the aesthetics or (basically non-existent) story, and on that level it succeeds. (Although, on this last note, it is funny that White Spire's lore is at least coherent, unlike Dota 2's impossible to understand backstory).
Overall, highly recommended. Check it out.
The overall experience is not very intense, as intense periods of item and hero selection are alternated with the relaxed experience of watching the Autochess-style battle commence. The whimsical aesthetics actually mesh well with the low-key but still engaging gameplay. There are very few penalties for abandoning (given that matches can continue without players being engaged) and there's no voice/text chat aside from some preset options, so the relaxed approach to gameplay carries over to interactions between players and the overall community as well.
I was particularly impressed with the amount of single-player content available for around $5, although some of the quests were unexpectedly difficult due to balance changes that have happened since that content was first released. There's a lot to do even if you want to remain FTP though. Graphics did not look great on my (admittedly underpowered) laptop, but it doesn't distract from gameplay in any way. You're going to play this for the gameplay itself rather than the aesthetics or (basically non-existent) story, and on that level it succeeds. (Although, on this last note, it is funny that White Spire's lore is at least coherent, unlike Dota 2's impossible to understand backstory).
Overall, highly recommended. Check it out.
«Blew my mind»
«Can’t stop playing»
It's honestly impressive to make a visual novel with multiple people contributing and end up with something this boring. The game mechanics are unbelievably grindy, and there's no intelligence required to either solve the obvious mystery or find a romantic partner. There is almost no characterization in any of the love stories, the art style is ugly, the extras are embarrassingly cheaply done, the writing is bad (especially considering how strong Christine Love's other work is), and they didn't bother to get enough variation in the music to avoid just looping through the same 2-3 tracks over and over.
The most disappointing thing is the game play: usually there would be some twist in the time mechanics or some clever secret that a careful player might find, but the basic time management is embarrassingly shallow. You might expect there to be a distinction between the romance and work performance categories but there is none: work helps fill your love and your work approval ratings just as well. What's most galling is that at one point the game studio charged for this: there are free student Flash game jam submissions that have a significantly higher level of polish than this.
The most disappointing thing is the game play: usually there would be some twist in the time mechanics or some clever secret that a careful player might find, but the basic time management is embarrassingly shallow. You might expect there to be a distinction between the romance and work performance categories but there is none: work helps fill your love and your work approval ratings just as well. What's most galling is that at one point the game studio charged for this: there are free student Flash game jam submissions that have a significantly higher level of polish than this.
«Boooring»
«I could make it better»
I didn't like this game at all. The gameplay is extremely repetitive and the challenge comes from enemies getting faster and more observant as you play longer, meaning that you get better by just learning how to accomplish the given set of goals faster. I'm not clear about what plot/gameplay dynamic/worldbuilding changes are in the game because I got bored and quit before I reached any of those changes. The visual effects of the game are not good looking, and the environment that you explore didn't seem to have any deep thought put into its layout. Quit after maybe 30 minutes, don't regret doing so, not recommended.
«Waste of time»
«Boooring»
Yes, it's basically just an unfinished proof-of-concept for showcasing various video game techniques, but I didn't think the game ended up being a good medium for either discussing different technical decisions or showcasing different lockpicking techniques. The lockpicking games themselves are very buggy (I managed to break two of them), and most of the analysis is not interactive at all and is just a wall of text. The UI and visual appearance of browsing the text wasn't well done either, and it didn't utilize the options for conveying information that interactivity affords.
If you weren't familiar with the lockpicking mechanics in the different games presented, you wouldn't really have a sense of what makes them special with the extremely minimalistic presentation (e.g., audio cues or visual styling are actually important for some of the games featured here and stripping them out doesn't give you an idea of how these mechanics "work"). If you were familiar with them, you'd probably prefer to just play the game again to remember how the mechanic works.
I get I'm not a developer so I'm not the intended audience of this game, but I am way more interested than the average game player in video game design. Since I didn't find it very informative, I can't imagine that someone with more video game design experience (who was particularly interested in adding lockpicking to their game) would either. Overall, very disappointing and a waste of the talent the developer has shown in other games.
If you weren't familiar with the lockpicking mechanics in the different games presented, you wouldn't really have a sense of what makes them special with the extremely minimalistic presentation (e.g., audio cues or visual styling are actually important for some of the games featured here and stripping them out doesn't give you an idea of how these mechanics "work"). If you were familiar with them, you'd probably prefer to just play the game again to remember how the mechanic works.
I get I'm not a developer so I'm not the intended audience of this game, but I am way more interested than the average game player in video game design. Since I didn't find it very informative, I can't imagine that someone with more video game design experience (who was particularly interested in adding lockpicking to their game) would either. Overall, very disappointing and a waste of the talent the developer has shown in other games.
«Buggy as hell»
«Waste of time»
I won't beat around the bush: the only reason this game gets a "Recommended" and not an "Exceptional" rating is its short length. A labor of love of a single developer who did all of the animation, artwork, and storyboarding for the entire game (he had some help with the sound design and the ports), I loved every moment that I spent playing this game but I beat and replayed the game in less than two hours total. Given the price of the game and the amount of potential in both its mechanics and its ambience, I was disappointed enough that it ended so quickly that it hurt my enjoyment of the game.
Onto the good! As I said above, I loved every aspect of this game. The art direction and sound design are phenomenal, and the core gameplay is very solid. The idea of manipulating these little tiles containing interactive scenes by combining and rearranging them is simple enough to figure out immediately but builds into incredibly intricate puzzles. The puzzles are at the perfect difficulty level where you wrack your brain trying to figure them out but they are incredibly intuitive in retrospect, leading to these incredible a-ha moments where you feel like a genius finally putting the pieces together. I actually thought that the game's approach to storytelling -- focusing heavily on ambience and leaving the core elements of what happened in gameplay slightly ambiguous -- complemented the often ethereal and mysterious answers to different puzzles. While the short length meant that the themes developed over the course of the story are introduced and resolved very quickly (which was a bit jarring), they were still quite interesting and there is one story based a-ha moment that left me thinking after the game was done. Overall, I appreciated the gameplay a lot and would recommend the game, although you'll probably be grumbling about the price tag a bit unless you get it at a steep discount.
Onto the good! As I said above, I loved every aspect of this game. The art direction and sound design are phenomenal, and the core gameplay is very solid. The idea of manipulating these little tiles containing interactive scenes by combining and rearranging them is simple enough to figure out immediately but builds into incredibly intricate puzzles. The puzzles are at the perfect difficulty level where you wrack your brain trying to figure them out but they are incredibly intuitive in retrospect, leading to these incredible a-ha moments where you feel like a genius finally putting the pieces together. I actually thought that the game's approach to storytelling -- focusing heavily on ambience and leaving the core elements of what happened in gameplay slightly ambiguous -- complemented the often ethereal and mysterious answers to different puzzles. While the short length meant that the themes developed over the course of the story are introduced and resolved very quickly (which was a bit jarring), they were still quite interesting and there is one story based a-ha moment that left me thinking after the game was done. Overall, I appreciated the gameplay a lot and would recommend the game, although you'll probably be grumbling about the price tag a bit unless you get it at a steep discount.
«Blew my mind»
«Sit back and relax»
Yes, it's a short walking simulator, which makes the $20 price tag a bit hard to stomach, but once you look past the pricing and the length you are left with a game with first-rate ambience, world-building, plot, and voice acting. I was completely engrossed by the plot during the entirety of this game's runtime, and the world-building and little details that are doled out as you progress through the space station will leave you completely captivated. (I especially loved the magazines, the fictional countries, and the cyberpunk element of having people essentially follow corporations from their education to their grave.) The characters feel like real people with all of their merits and flaws, and you really grow to root for them throughout your playthrough. The delivery of exposition and background through documentation is very well executed (like in Gone Home).
Overall, I wouldn't recommend starting with this game if you haven't played a lot of interactive fiction before, but if you've enjoyed *any* elements of the genre before I'd highly recommend this game.
Overall, I wouldn't recommend starting with this game if you haven't played a lot of interactive fiction before, but if you've enjoyed *any* elements of the genre before I'd highly recommend this game.
«Blew my mind»
«Sit back and relax»
It's a super-short completely linear "message" indie game, so you need to come in with the right expectations. The experience of playing the game is closer to a five-minute YouTube video than a longer-form interactive game.
That said, the medium is a perfect fit for the author's intended message, which hits hard at the end, and the theme of the game seems prophetic given how much worse all of the dynamics that the game explores have gotten in the intervening years. Graphics and gameplay design fit well with the game's intended purpose, so no complaints there.
I'm reviewing this after thinking about it out of the blue while watching the news several years after I last played it. If the fact that it's still on my mind after so many years isn't an endorsement, I don't know what else could be -- highly recommended.
That said, the medium is a perfect fit for the author's intended message, which hits hard at the end, and the theme of the game seems prophetic given how much worse all of the dynamics that the game explores have gotten in the intervening years. Graphics and gameplay design fit well with the game's intended purpose, so no complaints there.
I'm reviewing this after thinking about it out of the blue while watching the news several years after I last played it. If the fact that it's still on my mind after so many years isn't an endorsement, I don't know what else could be -- highly recommended.
«Blew my mind»
«That ending!»