The game feels short and the settings are a bit boring, bland and very different from the first game, but that’s the price you pay shifting from 2D to 3D graphics. There’s few collectables and a lot less challenge but there’s a lot of fixed and annoying camera angles, a slow, tumbling jumping style and a lot of ‘on rails’ sections to overcome. The shooting style of combat is functional and mildly challenging but is a bit lacklustre and looks cheap. The plot’s odd with a dark tone and heavy focus on mysticism but the characters are funny and charming and it still has a silly sense of humour about it. Overall it’s a fun game to play with a good number of levels, a range of gimmicks and good music but it definitely shows its age and the final boss was a real chore. Note: The GOG version also took about an hour to get running effectively on a modern PC and I had to use community mod support – so much for keeping classic games alive. The bonus levels still don’t work properly but at least it’s better than nothing.
What starts off as an effective horror game with creeping dread, jump scares and an eerie atmosphere quickly turns into a jumble of ideas that never manages to repeat the feeling of that first 2 chapters. It makes a few missteps, but what it lacks in consistency and quality it makes up for with inventiveness and volume. The game is very linear and heavily scripted with it frequently taking control away from you via jarring transitions. There’s plenty of interactive sections and puzzles with a basic inventory system but it frequently introduces an idea then forgets to use it again. The physics puzzles and combat are functional but weak and the fetch an item to progress gets ridiculously contrived at times. The later chapters include lots of chase and stealth sequences but due to the speed of the enemies or instant fail criteria, makes it frustrating rather than tense or enjoyable. There’s often too much light in too many locations, rendering the consumable light sources pointless, and items / signposts glow too much which whilst useful for game progression, spoils the setting. The story is good enough but would have been better had it focused on the horror of the psychosis of the character’s dual personality disorder and paranoia during the Cold War and historical periods. As it is, it shows too much too soon, losing a lot of its atmosphere and the constant leaping between the 2 protagonists makes it a bit of a jumble. The graphics are mostly good with only the occasional pop-in except for the character models which look a bit off. Characters vary from scary to comical due to their frequent appearances, visibility and quality of voice acting and the amount of swearing from the main character borders on immature. Couple of minor bugs with control prompts stuck on the screen, items glitch when moved around and having a chapter select to see the different endings would have been nice, especially considering how linear it is.
A weird 2D action survival game where you play as a twee schoolgirl fighting creatures and anime girl bosses in a ruined castle. . It starts off slow and very unforgiving but once you get used to the limited combat, it gets a lot easier, although the difficulty and balance is all over the place due to the overly aggressive status effects. There’s a variety of enemies, weapons, spells and equipment but most of the stuff isn’t useful and the menu makes selecting items awkward. The multi-phase bosses are a good challenge and offer beneficial rewards but get really annoying when you keep dying to them and don’t really stand out as great. The pixelated graphics, cartoon characters and minimal plot serve their purpose and the sprawling map offers some exploration but the lack of music and repetitive settings lack atmosphere. The campaign play length is a good and the achievements and post-campaign content add significant changes to the game which are worth completing as long as you can put up with the clunky combat and other shortcomings.
It feels like a rogue-like but without the difficulty and as such, ends up being very short. The gameplay is solid with a good range of abilities and enemies, although only having one weapon can make it a bit dull at times. The dungeon-exploring is good with ample secrets and although nothing original, Hell looks good with different biomes and challenges. The anthropomorphised animals are a bit weird especially as there’s no context or humour relating to this design choice and the plot and music are minimal. A little too basic at times, but enjoyable and good fun without frustration.
The art style has some charm and the music is good, but everything else about this game is poor. From the awful voice acting, terrible translation and nonsensical riddles to the mundane back and forth and repetitive “gameplay” it’s a complete waste of time. Subtitles are way too small, the music noticeably loops and the minimal amount of interactions make the world-spanning journey a chore rather than an adventure.
An older style point and click adventure game where death is just part of the journey. The plot is quite obscure and heavy on the psychology which can be off-putting, but is part of its overall style and does improve as the game progresses. The dark, depressing and grotesque settings are pretty detailed but due to the limited colour pallet, can look dull and very similar. There are also only a few different characters and scenes but this adds to the atmosphere of being trapped and forced to repeat the same horrors again and again. The game play is simple and apart from one puzzle near the beginning isn’t too difficult. The full voice acting is good enough, but the music was unmemorable and even though it encourages different choices and multiple playthroughs, it still ends up being a very short game.
An interesting nature documentary with great hand-drawn artwork and an educational video style. The delivery is well done and the topic, although made up, is grounded enough with real science to sound realistic. As a visual novel there isn’t much interaction and it’s debatable whether a ‘video game’ is the right kind of format for this, but there’s a good mix of narration, audio and art styles. The story was captivating with emotional moments and a light touch of humour, ending with a promise of more to come.
Whilst the isolated setting and spooky atmosphere were good and built up some tension, the minimal story meant there wasn’t any kind of payoff. The menus were clunky, the ‘teleportation’ movement and unclear objectives annoying and the graphics, whilst functional, were nothing special. It has potential but is far too basic and short to recommend.
A fun setting with great cartoon graphics and funny looking characters, but the game isn’t really playable in today’s setting. The obscure controls and rules of the games are easy enough to learn but the high difficulty and jarring music make for a tough time. With only 6 games to choose from and only 5 buttons to press there’s limited interaction or replay value.
A cute and charming indie platformer let down by clunky jumping and combat mechanics and a poor checkpoint system. The long periods between checkpoints and high damage from enemies leads to repeating large sections of the game which is very annoying and the more you look at it mechanically, the more you see the other poor design choices. The setting and characters are interesting, the music is catchy and the pixel art is functional and colourful, but it is slow going with lots of back and forth due to poor signposting, although this doe get better as it goes along. The bosses are entertaining but do increase the challenge significantly and although it has a lot of really neat ideas, it lacks the finesse of other games in the genre and doesn’t do enough with them.
