Like Cultist Simulator, the game doesn't hold your hand and treats you like a reasonable thinking person. I was lucky enough to play the betas (and even the alpha!) of Cultist Simulator, so the learning curve was a lot gentler for me than most. With Book of Hours, I'm jumping in fresh and it's an enlightening experience. I can only handle the game for an hour or two at a time, but that's always enough to leave me feeling satisfied that I've made progress. I'm perhaps 5% or less through any of it and still learning tons. The game treats you like an occult librarian, giving you the opportunity to rearrange the library how you please, read the books as much as you'd like (limited by your soul's capacity, of course, which can be "upgraded" or expanded), and treat visitors as you'd like. Your ultimate goal is to restore the library of Hush House, but you have the freedom to do that in whatever way you would like. This is something I am happy to return again and again for bite-sized chunks every day. I take breaks because I am getting old and there is a *lot* to learn, but some people seem to be able to sit and concenatrate on it for hours. I think it's an absolutely delight and worth every penny. It's a game about alchemy, magic, and secrets hidden beneath the skin of the world that treats you like an adult.
A really nice game that has as much depth as you'd like to get into. If you just want to be a casual brewer, then it's got mechanics that let you succeed in that. If you really like exploring deeper and becoming a potion master, then you can do that, too! It's not terribly punishing to experiment; you can recover from any of the setbacks. If you're seeking to squeeze every min-max opportunity then you can do that, too. Lots of depth to explore here and it's exactly what I was looking for to scratch that sort of mystical, magical game experience.
I absolutely love the concept and execution. Ever since Cultist Simulator came out, I feel like there's new ground to be broken in occult-themed card and other slow-paced games. Strange Horticulture allows you to proceed at a detective's pace, discovering things about the region's plants and putting you in a place to help or hinder its inhabitants as you please. The game is perfect if you want a chill detective experience. You get clues about the plants from discovered encyclopedia pages, and then apply them to the situations you're presented, both by customers and circumstances as you go exploring. The game is very well programmed, or so it seems. Every challenge I've encountered so far has had a solution that is available to me. Its style is somewhat along the Papers, Please route, but without the time constraint. Take as much time as you'd like. I would like a harder or more challenging mode somehow, but I can't see how it could fit in the game as designed. I've never actually triggered the "dread" mechanic, which is very forgiving. You'd have to get three attempts incorrect to trigger it, which... I think is nice for kids, but offers no challenge so far. Overall, though, a great game, and well worth the full price.
This is one of the best detective stories I've ever been a part of. I urge you not to look up answers; a lot of the community has been good about providing hints instead of outright solutions. It's best if you go into the game blind, but one thing I wish I had known/realized is that you really have to use every detail to your advantage. The first time I realized this, it was pretty neat. To solve the last dozen or so fates, though, I didn't realize that there were even more details that I wasn't paying attention to. The UI is so grainy and colorless, but that's to help focus your attention on what you -can- see. There are tiny little details around every bit that offer you clues to help you solve the puzzle, including things that are missing, or things from earlier scenes. Easily worth $20. I spent about ten to twelve hours on the game over the course of three years, and am very, very happy with it.
Honestly, what a great game at a great price. I played the demo and was absolutely hooked, and if you have any doubts about it then you should, too. That, really, was the selling point for me, and I have absolutely no regrets about my purchase. The horror theme was consistent throughout the game. There were a few lulls where I hit what I thought was a grind, and then there was a pleasant (that is, frightening) interruption from there. Like some great horror games, there's more to everything than what's presented at first, and you'll be rewarded for peeling back the skin of the game. It's not simply a card game, either. There are other elements present, and you should be aware that this really tries to stretch how think and approach things. Most of the things are easy lessons, though, and you just have to elaborate on simple mechanics in complex ways. I did get discouraged a few times, but the game helps push you along to a very satisfying conclusion. I strongly, strongly encourage you not to look up hints, clues, or walkthroughs. It's the most fun I've had in a very long time, and the game design is such that if you find it impossible to progress, just take a break and try something different.
The best Metroidvania that I've played since the original Metroid. No maps, but good keys and abilities to help you keep track of where you are. The difficulty ramps up concurrent with new abilities, providing really satisfying progress. Death is a mere setback, and the roguelike element is very natural and understandable. The map and lack of complex HUD means that sometimes it feels like you're stuck. Don't worry; there's always a way out. The environment is beautifully built, and I had to crawl along the walls sometimes to find something that was obvious in retrospect. Don't be afraid of death; you are the monster.
I got this game ages ago and I'm still playing it. It helps to take a break every once in a while, though I had to go back and re-solve earlier puzzles to get myself back in the mindset. This might be the easiest Zachtronics game to get into (aside from the new Visual Novel), but to me it's very pleasing. They give you the tools and solution to the puzzle: you just have to figure out how to get there. There's something very cool about that, and it looks like it has an active community still going. There are challenge puzzles that are published every once-in-a-bit that you can access in game. For me, this game scratches a crafting game unlike any other. It's very satisfying to see a solution come together and then try to optimize it even further.
There's nothing quite like Weather Factory's game on the market. It tells your story via icons. There are two types: blocks and cards. The blocks are much like engines in that you need to feed them a resource (which is always a card) and they give you something in return. The cards themselves are like snippets out of a book. It's a bit like Choose Your Own Adventure, except that it's much richer in lore and text than you could fit in any normal book. This game is best if you enjoy a long read and delving into the occult. It is roguelike in that you can expect to die quite a bit and learn something each time. Once you get the hang of things, though, it's a rewarding slow burn that permits you to peel back some secrets of the world that Alexis Kennedy created. Most players find dozens of hours worth of entertainment in the game; I hope you do, too.
I know the game got a lot of bad press at release. When I told my friends I was diving into No Man's Sky, they warned me that it was a scam. I'm glad that I ignored the negative reviews and checked it out on sale. It's probably worth full price, to be honest, at least if you go in with the right expectations. The procedural generation bit about planets was certainly oversold. A lot of the planets resemble each other, and it's a shame that the designers didn't make more things just exclusive to certain classes of planets. For instance, there's one particular creature that's been in all three star systems that I've explored that whips out like a planet to beat my poor character in the face. But the views from space are great, the resource harvesting/management is great and interesting, and the way the galaxy is set up is really, really interesting to me. I'm looking forward to exploring deeper in the game, and I want to let you know that the early bad press has been addressed (at least in part!).
I loved the story. The voice acting was excellent, and was enough to draw me in. The mechanics were based on 3rd Ed. D&D, though, which I have never played. I found the whole thing confusing and unnecessarily complicated that distracted from the otherwise epic story.
