I've been on an adventure game kick. Finished Blackwell Legacy, Tales from the Borderlands and Thimbleweed Park. I enjoyed them all, but Thimbleweed Park stands out as my favorite among recent adventure games. I loved the plot, characters, dialogue, everything. It's just exceptional.

I'm just wondering which version? Gamecube or Wii? Or the WiiU digital version- which is the Wii version anyway? I mean they're the same except for the Wii version being widescreen and using the Wiimote for aiming- something that I thought worked exceptionally well, almost as accurate as a mouse and yet you can free aim without changing your entire view like with a mouse.

Anyway it's a game that made me realize how good the Gamecube could have been, a console that could run a game that looks that good at a locked 60 fps back when peoples PC's were struggling to run detailed 3D games at solid 30 fps. But it was doomed by Nintendo's own ineptitude and Sony militantly buying every available franchise it could get it's hands on. Not much has changed.

Gamecube.

Yeah, I threw in my lot with the Xbox at the time (sort of an impulsive decision that worked out better for me than that time I bought the Atari Jaguar...) but the GC was a really impressive system in retrospect. All the games I've played have looked and played very nice. Nothing was stopping Sony back then, though...

<span class="bold">Eschalon: Book 3</span>

This is the third and final game in the Eschalon series.

I’m not sure if I got a bit burnt out by playing all three games in sequence, but this one was my least favourite of the three. It felt shorter and more linear than the other games, and the quests were less interesting.

The game mechanics remain essentially unchanged from Book 2, and it’s still a good game (just not as good as the first two). Overall I would still recommend it!

Beat WarioWare, Inc.: Minigame Mania today. Compared to the rest of the game, the last boss stage was insane.

Metal Slug

It's stupid fun shooting bad guys and blowing up environments. Played through swapping the controller on continues with my buddy, and then again on my own. It's a fun way to pass the time.

Bio Menace true classic. First episode is good fun and relax. Second and third episodes are really demanding and I play them only on easy.

Railroad Tycoon 3

I really enjoyed this game, and it was very relaxing and educational. I'll be damned if I can't figure out how the stock market works, that was my only issue, that and the stockbroker who notices your purchasing power is -$1k, so decides to solve this by selling all your stock one at a time, bankrupting you and causing your companies stock value to plummet. It's probably become one of my favourite simulation games.

The Cat Lady.

This little horror adventure game was quite brilliant. Properly dark and quite serious emotionally, delivered some genuine chills down the spine and some WTF moments. The story is way out there but it's great - some (actually most) of the characters you meet throughout the game are delightfully twisted too. Whilst completely different from Fran Bow, if you enjoyed it then you should give this a try. Great value even at the full price of £8 on GOG. Must pick up Downfall next...

Star Wars - K.O.T.O.R

Nothing I guess I can say about this game given that most of us on these forums will all know it well. This was my first time ever playing it though and I really enjoyed it. Decided to go for a Dark side playthrough and enjoyed being gleefully wicked to everyone although I have to admit I struggled with the Mission part at the end of the game - guess I'm really a good guy deep down!

I was really worried about the combat system as I abandoned Dragon Age Origins last year after completely failing to get a grip of the combat system and taking a stupid number of attempts to get past certain areas. I wonder if after having completed KOTOR would I find it easier if I went back to it or is the combat in DAO considered to be more strategic (and therefore more difficult for as I generally suck at strategy games)?

It was also great to be able to experience KOTOR at 3440x1440 resolution thanks to the Flawless Widescreen fix. I thought the game looked really good at this resolution despite its age. The fix isn't perfect and it did crash occasionally which sometimes corrupted the save files however by having a few save files to alternate between I never had to repeat more than 5 minutes at any point in the game following a corrupted file. On to KOTOR 2...

Vampire The Masquerade Bloodlines

Just finished the game after playing it for the first time and I'm gutted. Such a cool game, never experienced anything else like it and probably never will. Played as a female Malkavaian where ever single interaction was fun with the anticapation of the crazy and funny dialogue options. I'll never forget Jeanette or VV either! At least I can console myself that I can replay the game with the plus patch. I'll park it for now though safe in the knowledge that I have it to back too. So long...

Transistor

Both loved and did not much love this game, to the point that I'm not sure whether the pros outweigh the cons or not.

Pros:
Art
Voicework
Combat concept so full of promise

Cons:
Man does that voice acting get a bit old. It's one thing that the main voice in your head is super melodramatic pause for effect guy, but by the time you reach the final boss, I couldn't wait for both of them to shut up or at least get to the point.

Combat ultimately was a mess, perhaps because with nearly infinite power combos possible, it would almost certainly have been impossible to balance.

The combat flaws really come through not in the story line (where the majority of fights are, if anything, stupidly easy) but when you do the bonus challenges. It's there that the high peaks the devs intended just don't quite click. For one thing, tool tips on abilities seem to be disabled, so the only way to see what a skill (or combo thereof) does is by testing it out.

Which sounds great, except that the game loading system isn't really designed for that kind of trial/error/reload loop to figure out what does what. It's functionally a puzzle, but because the game is probably not going to give you enough data to crack it short of that trial and error, it's...I'm not sure what it is. Annoying, mostly.

At one point I broke down and looked at a youtube for a particular challenge and 99% of the comments were "Oh, I had no idea that skill did that! Thanks!"

And that's the game in a nutshell. You can roll through almost every fight just mashing buttons of cool combos, with the occasional reload when you run into something you haven't seen before, and occasionally juggling your skills to accommodate all the new abilities you've opened up, but mostly just playing the last 60% of the game with basically the same setup.

Even the final boss:
1) the fight loaded after an infinitely long ramble ramble, the game makes you select a skill setup from scratch (which I couldn't recall what I had, exactly since so many abilities look alike that I threw something together, with 23 of 24 mem slots used.
2) Discover boss does something completely different than anything seen prior - quickly lose a bunch of health
3) reload
4) repeat #1, end up with a slightly different loadout (22 of 24 mem slots used), not intentionally but because shit just kinda looks the same
5) pound boss into sand without really sweating it.

Game ends with a sequence that I won't spoil, but kinda ruined the story imo.

Also, was mildly annoying that a game supposedly with a female protagonist really was just listening to 3-4 guys whine the whole game. The protagonist might as well have been a goat or an animate stick for all she brought to the table.

Considering how happy I am the game is over - not pride at finishing as much as relief at never having to play it again, I guess I'll go with thumbs down, despite the art and concept.

The Book of Unwritten Tales (German) (WinXP / Linux via WINE)

I didn't expect much but it's actually a really nice classic point'n'click adventure with a beautiful mix of pre-rendered backgrounds and high poly 3d models.
The voices (original version) are excellent, the story as well as most details in it are making fun of all kinds of fantasy tropes (as well as a few others), the puzzles are logical enough that even I didn't really need a walkthrough (just used one twice although could probably have figured it out after a little while longer), the length is just about right and performance is great even on my old system.
It was overall quite fun and I'd recommend it to anyone.
The only gripes I have are that you can only walk and not run and that it doesn't have a native Linux port although it's made out of all kinds of open source stuff (Ogre3D, Ogg, LUA, OpenAL, etc...).
I played to chapter 4 on WinXP but after updating my WINE to a current version, it worked flawlessly on Linux too.

8/10

Maize

Boy will I have a hard time to define this game!! You could say it's a mix between an adventure game, an HOG and a "Myst-like" game, in a way. What is sure is:

- that it's short: 3 hours and a half to complete it 100%, no replay value
- that it's beautiful: the Unreal engine is mastered and frankly, it's really nice
- that it's completely WTF and out there, to the point I can't tell you anything about the scenario without spoiling it, except that you "wake up" in a corn field near a farm
- that it's brilliantly funny, in a british humour way. So, mileage may vary, you might hate it if it's not your kind of humour, but I had a blast (except Vladdy. Vladdy is a bit annoying at times. But I forgive him, because I'm not so stupid, after all)
- that you can't really "lose" the game, as is, you won't ever stay blocked for long, so, it's quite friendly.

To sum up, I was really surprised in a good way by that "game" (?), even if I must confess I wouldn't have bought it in the first place. I got it in the last monthly humble bundle, and that's one of the reasons I'll continue with them, because if they can make me discover such little gems, they deserve my money (and the devs too)! So, if you like wacky humour, if you like reading funny atmosphere texts, if you want a game that won't take too much of your time, maybe Maize is for you!

So far in 2017: https://www.gog.com/forum/general/games_finished_in_2017/post15

Edna & Harvey: The Breakout

I would say that one could clearly see that it is one of Deadalic's very early games and that the developer's still had to learn a lot about creating games. Almost everything is mediocre: Graphics, music, animations, controls and even the story, which started ok, but in the end really got weird and didn't make much sense (not to talk about the fact that it ended quite abruptly).

Puzzles were ok most of the times and there were always some hints. Yet sometimes I had to use a walkthrough, not because I didn't know what I should do, but because I couldn't figure out how to do it (or missed a detail).

The one thing were the game really shines are the dialogues between Edna and Harvey, which are quite often hilarious and the German voice acting. I've heard that those things aren't of the same quality when you play in another language, but I haven't tested it myself.

Technically there is a problem with the game: On Windows 7 (probably also in Windows 8 and 10) you can't play in fullscreen mode, because the game requires a very outdated Java version to do so.

Complete list of finished games in 2017

Mad Max (Xbox One)

I love driving games and games with vehicle combat...reminds me of my childhood with Steve Jackson's Car Wars table top game (greatest game of all time). The original Mad Max is one of my all time favorite movies- after all, it was filmed 5 minutes from where I live and I can hear the ghost of the Nightrider whenever I ride my bike down those roads. So I suppose I'm in the demographic that is most likely to enjoy the Mad Max game.

And I did enjoy it, though it's critics are right as well- it does get repetitive after about 10 hours or so. But it's a brilliantly built, desolate open world that perfectly captures the one from the movies. Flying across the barrens battling psychotic bandits is awesome fun. It's just that more than 50% of the world is there for no reason. Unlike say, Mafia 3, where at least everything you do ties to the overall story of taking over the city- in Mad Max taking over the wastelands is an optional side quest. And there lies my point I suppose...whilst the game does get repetitive, most of it is optional. You can just do enough to see you through with enough upgrades to face the end showdown. And what an end...true Mad Max ending, couldn't really have ended any other way and stay true to the source material.

So I do recommend the game if you feel like some open world vehicle combat, but I say play it in sessions broken up with other games or finish the story directly and come back to it as a sandbox from time to to time. Unfortunately I felt a bit compelled to play it all the way through without side games to break it up because I played it as part of the Microsoft Game Pass for which I had a free 14 day trial. I finished the game (pretty much completionist finished) with 3 days to spare!

Performance and visuals were great on Xbox One, and I had no bugs or issues to report.