The original “Archaeological Ruin Exploration Action Game” was a very unique approach to exploration-focused platformers, borrowing heavily from The Maze of Galious. Despite having a lot of similarities to the “metroidvania” games, it focused much more heavily on puzzles that could go from covering just the room you are in to the entire game world and required you to pay close attention to the details you see. It had a lot of unique and fun elements to it, but was also often infuriatingly obtuse with puzzle design. La-Mulana 2 feels like La-Mulana did, except if designed as a modern game with fun in mind, without sacrificing any of the excitement and challenge of the original. A lot of simple but very important changes are made to the basics of gameplay and you're told and given enough from the start. It’s so much more fun to explore too. All of the main locations in the game feel unique, with their own distinct looks, distinct focus, fantastic music theme and its own storyline. Game looks fantastic as well, managing to keep that pixelated feel, yet adding in a lot of 3D elements in a natural way. There are some familiar issues, however. Some of the boss fights still feel like you win either because you are cheesing them or because of sheer luck. There are still occasional moments or puzzles that are a bit too hard to understand. And additionally, even in the current state there are still occasional issues. Luckily, the game is still getting updates and a lot of things have been fixed and rebalanced since the release. La-Mulana 2 isn’t just a modern re-imagining of Maze of Galious, or an ode to an old era of games done well. It’s a truly amazing, unforgettable, incredibly smart exploration focused action advent– archaeological ruin exploration action game. It builds on top of all of the experiences and inspirations La-Mulana 1 was built from, and outgrows them, becomes a thing of its own.
Ever since Ico became popular I've seen a lot of games attempt doing something similar - a puzzle and platforming 3D game with no spoken narration, simple but beautiful artstyle, moving music and some central concept/idea to it all. RiME is just another example of this type of game. Made with lots of care, genuinely good looking, with a good story concept behind it and yet all too familiar, not particularly fun and ultimately forgettable. The big issue RiME has lies in the fact that the game never really gets anything to truly hook you with. You run, jump, climb and scream at things to solve problems as you start the game, and that's all you do until the end, with all of these basic mechanics being rather bland. There's never any clever challenge or strategy involved with the platforming bits. Puzzles suffer from a bizarre decision to make action button work only after a short pause after a full stop and scream not working at times if another animation is playing, which isn't helping already mundane puzzle design. There's no good story or even mood hook either. There's an attempt at one, but when the revelation of what this game is all about comes, it feels unexpected because the game never actually delivers on that mood at any point prior to that. Not that the game doesn't try to be interesting and evocative. It does look good, it does sound good (sans that annoying fox), there are a few puzzles that aren't boring and there are moments that are genuinely interesting. It's just that this isn't enough and it's one of those instances where after finishing the game in 5 hours you feel drained as if you spent the entire day and all your energy on it without really getting anything in return. RiME seems to have its heart in the right place and it does feel like it tried to be an interesting moving and beautiful journey. But it's not what it turned out to be.
It's not surprising that people want more games like Clock Tower. While exceptionally clunky, it was a pretty unique blend of adventure, stealth and some survival horror elements that, unlike most horror attempts at the time, was closer to the slasher or Italian giallo thrillers in mood and themes, rather then zombie, monster or gothic themes. So quite a lot of people were excited about Remothered: Tormented Fathers. It is a surprisingly competently made for being a first project. The controls are pretty well thought out, the basic mechanics are quite well designed. The game map is a several store mansion, that's good enough to not get lost in easily, despite not having an in-game map. And the stalkers are genuinely creepy with their voice lines, while the whole escape and hide or use a defense item idea is rather solid. Sadly, most of it fails flat. The stealth aspect is pretty terrible, as the sound mixing in this game is just dreadful and it's usually impossible to understand the source of sounds. In addition, noise/distraction items are mostly useless, stalkers can see you in pitch dark rooms even if you're not moving, while escaping from them via hiding or using defense items is incredibly easy. The story and storytelling in the game are just dreadful. Most of the game dialogue barely makes sense or has character consistency, the cutscenes are directed akin to old FPS demos of late 90s and while some of the themes and ideas behind the story are pretty curious, it doesn’t feel like “first in the trilogy” as much as a bunch of scenes given out of context. Mercifully, the game is pretty short and it's possible to stealth your way without rushing in under 5 hours. Should you spend those hours on it? I'd say no, unless you absolutely need a new Clock Tower fix or plan to design a similar game and wish to learn on mistakes of others. Hopefully, if the series indeed continue, the next game will be better.
