Review: Hypnospace Outlaw (PC – Steam) ~ Dreaming Up Nostalgic Investigations

Steam store page – Wikipedia – Official website

So, when I’m writing this, it is 2024. I turned 31 years old back in February. I still love playing video games and surfing the internet since I was a young lad. Besides that, I also have a fascination for anything that has to do with dreams and their meanings. And then a game called Hypnospace Outlaw turns up on my radar. A game that promises to bring back the early years of the internet that I remember. Not only that, we are going to have to moderate the internet with a new technology that allows people to surf the internet while they are dreaming. We have to play as an unnamed enforcer to keep the internet safe and on top of that, we can create our own pages and mod this game easily. But before we start spending time on that, let’s find out if the base game is actually good and if it’s worth to start playing this game or if it’s something we should skip. Also, feel free to leave your thoughts and/or opinions on this article and/or the game in the comment section down below. Besides, dear enforcer and MerchantSoft, this isn’t harassment, this is a fair review/critique of the game. Removing this from HypnoOS isn’t the solution.

Dreaming Up Nostalgic Investigations

In this game, you play as an unnamed enforcer for MerchantSoft. A company that developed a headband that allows users to surf the web in their dreams. Your goal is to clean up the HypnoSpace for everybody. You start in late 1999, where your first case is assigned. When your first case is assigned, you are left to your own devices, and you can explore the internet by yourself. And let me tell you, there is a lot of internet to explore.

The story of this game is fascinating. You get to dive and explore through various pages on the internet about various things. A long time before social media was a thing and everybody had a website for their own creations. The HypnoSpace has several zones, with each their own theme. If you remember AOL, you will know what I’m talking about.

If you want to get the most out of this game, I highly advise you to take your time with this game. Don’t rush it at all. This game is sadly rather short if you only follow the main story of the game. It’s only 6 hours long and shorter if you know what you are doing. I mean, the speedruns are only around 11 minutes. The strength of this game is the depth it has. This game has three main chapters, and there are clear triggers that separate the chapters.

The deeper you dig and the more you read up, the more interesting lore gets revealed. I actually started a second playthrough to try and find the things I missed. And honestly, this game is one that gets ruined by playing it with a guide in any sort or form. Do not play this game with a guide. It’s a lot less rewarding if you play it with a guide in your first or second playthrough. The wonder of getting lost in all of these pages is just so nostalgic.

Now, while I was playing, I was wondering if it would appeal to the younger players out there. I’m somewhat on the fence about that. While it tackles a lot of subjects that are still somewhat relevant, I honestly think that it’ll mostly click with those who grew up with the internet of the ’90 to early ’00. With that said, I think that it still might click with the younger people, but know that the internet was very different back then.

Point-And-Click Detective

This game is a point-and-click adventure game in any sense of the word. You get a case, and you have to explore the internet to see if anyone broke the rules or not.

Each infraction you find, will reward you with HypnoCoin. You can use these coins to buy various things in the Hypnospace. This can go from stickers, wallpapers, themes, applications to so much more. But be careful, it’s quite possible that some of these downloads are infected with malware. And back then, malware was a lot more visual and less aimed at serving you a lot of ads or stealing your information.

The controls of this game are quite easy. You mostly click with your mouse and input things sometimes in the search bar. If you know how to do basic things with a computer, you’ll very quickly find your way around with this game as well. While I sometimes struggled with opening apps, I didn’t have too much trouble with the controls. Thankfully, there are some options to tweak the controls to your liking, like disabling that double-clicking opens apps. But, I’m a Windows user and the double click to open apps is just hardwired in my brain.

Visually, this game really looks like you are playing with the old internet. When I noticed that there was a mod that changed the OS into Windows 95, oh boy, I was sold. There are various themes for the OS in this game, and they go from amazing to silly. There is even a fast food theme. Now, if you read that this game is mostly created by a team of 5 people, it’s even more impressive. Not only that, one of the main designers of Dropsy is part of the team.

The creativity of this game never ceased to amaze me. Let me continue on the trend of the visuals and say that the little details on how the webpages look is just so realistic. The little typo’s here and there, the rabbit holes you can jump down, the crazy visuals on various pages… Even the “help me, I can’t remove this” and “Test 1 2 3″… I made me crack up and remember my early days when I used to write webpages in plain HTML with barely any coding knowledge as a young teen.

While I knew that wiggling the mouse sped up the loading of the webpages, I just never really did. I just enjoyed the webpages loading slowly and having that experience again when I was a teenager before Facebook or any other big social media started to take over. Yes, even before MySpace. While I only experienced the late “pre-social media internet”, I do have amazing memories of it.

On top of that, you have the amazing wallpapers and sticker packs you can buy and play around with. With this, you can really make your desktop your own. But, something that really triggered memories for me were the viruses you can encounter. Back as a young teen, I was a lot less careful in what I downloaded and seeing the visual mess some viruses can create in this game, it triggered some nasty memories.

Memories like how one time, I got a very nasty variant of the SASSER worm and each time I installed something new, my computer would lock up and crash. Yes, even when you tried to re-install Windows, it locked up and crashed the installer. After a lot of digging, I found that it was caused by a program starting with boot and I had to screw out my hard drive, connect it with somebody’s computer and then remove the start-up file from there. I also had a piece of malware that looked like the ButtsDisease virus in this game. Where it started to change all the text on a webpage to another word. Oh man, those were the days.

So, during your investigations you can encounter various things. Things like people breaking the rules, and you have to report those. You mostly need to focus on one of 5 categories. Copyright infringement, harassment, illegal downloads/malware, extra illegal commerce and illegal activity. Each law gets several infractions, and you do have to look for them. At one moment, I really that to take notes. I really have to say, taking notes for this game is really helpful, you even have the notes’ app in HypnoOS.

Sticking in your brain

Now, something I have to commend the developers for in this game is that they also took accessibility into account. Something I have to commend the developers for as well is the amount of content in this game, even when the main story is extremely short. I already talked about the visuals and how much I love them, but the music in this game is something else.

Some of the music tracks are really stuck in my mind and I wouldn’t be surprised that if I ever write another article in my favorite game music series, some of them will pop up in that. Some tracks are real earworms and got stuck in my brain. The music for some of the parody products in this game is so good, that I wish they were real.

The music in this game is a mixture of various styles, and I find some of them more catchy than the others, but it’s really impressive at how many styles there are in this game. If you know that this game has over 4 hours of music in it, that’s an amazing feat.

There is even a whole suite where you can create your own pages, music and mods released by one of the main developers of this game. It works only on Windows and you can read more about it on the itch.io page of Jay Tolen here. There were even various community events where your stuff could appear as an Easter egg in the main game. Yet, these tools are now part of the main game and are in your installation folder.

Speaking about this, modding this game is extremely easy. There is even a build in mod browser, and it’s a piece of cake to install and downloads mods. If you use the in-game mod menu, you don’t have to reboot the game for most mods to take effect. Just go to the main menu, choose the mods button and install the mods you want. Now, there are a lot more mods out there then just what you can find in the in-game mod browser, so check them out here.

The game has an autosave, it doesn’t really show when the game gets saved. There are three save slots, so if you want to replay the game, you can pick another save slot. Now, if there is one mod I highly advise is he expanded endgame cases mod. This mod expands the game quite naturally and is a lot of fun and additional challenge. But don’t read the description when you haven’t finished the game, since it contains quite a lot of spoilers.

This game can be quite tricky. Sometimes the solution isn’t the easiest to find. It’s even possible you don’t find the solution to every puzzle out there. Now, there is a built in hint system for this game. It’s somewhat hidden to avoid immersion breaking, but for a small HypnoCoin fee, you can get a hint to progress. I really love this system, since I rather have you getting a crowbar to get yourself unstuck than you getting a guide where it’s very easy to other things and spoil the whole experience. Since the fun of this genre depends highly on solving the puzzles with what’s given to you. If you want to get a hint, just search hint.

Overall I have been extremely positive about this game, and I have to say that overall this game is extremely well-made. I rarely found any moments where I thought, this isn’t right. But does that mean that this game doesn’t have any negatives? Well, sadly enough there are a few things I didn’t like about my experience and that I want to talk about.

First of all, I wish the default text-to-speech voice wasn’t the default language of your system if you aren’t English. I’m from Belgium and my text-to-speech voice reads English extremely weird. Thankfully, I had the English soundpack installed on my computer so after I went into the BIOS settings, I was able to quickly change it to the English one and it sounds a lot more natural and better.

Secondly, this is an issue in general with point-and-click games but the replay value just isn’t here. Once you explored everything, you have seen everything. There are various mini-games, but those are quickly beaten. While I personally don’t really see this is a negative, since not every game needs high replay value and sometimes playing it once and having the whole experience engulf you is the idea… I want to mention it, if somebody is looking for replayable games.

Third, you can find more infractions than what’s required to close the case. While I can understand that the game doesn’t tell you how many other things there are out there for immersion reasons, as somebody who wanted to experience everything, I was sometimes a bit annoyed that I couldn’t make sure I found everything. If only there was an option you could toggle to see completion percentage or something of that nature. Since, because of this, it’s possible to lock yourself out of achievements or content in this game.

Yes, this game has achievements and some of them are extremely tricky to get. It took me a lot of researching and exploring in HypnoSpace to find all the material. Thankfully, taking notes really helped me to find it all.

And the final thing is that the final chapters of this game feel a bit rushed and undercooked. One of the final cases is a breeze to solve if you have written notes during your playthrough and it feels like there is content cut out of the game. The ending comes a bit out of nowhere and if you didn’t explore everything or didn’t register certain things, the ending won’t make sense to you and it will loose it’s impact. Thankfully, the mod I shared earlier resolves this to a degree.

That’s all the negative I could say about this game, in my honest opinion. When this game clicks with you, it clicks really well and doesn’t let go at all. But, I’ll leave my final thoughts after the summary of this review. So, I think it’s high time for that since I have touch upon everything I wanted to in this review.

Summary

The bad:

-Text-to-speech should use English by default

-It’s possible to miss content or lock yourself out of it.

-The game is rather short.

-Rushed ending.

The good:

+ Amazing nostalgic trip

+ Amazing music

+ Fantastic writing

+ Easy to use mod tools

+ Great puzzles

+ Great controls

+ …

Final thoughts:

Hypnospace Outlaw is an amazing nostalgic point-and-click adventure trip through the late ’90’s internet. This game might not be for everyone, but when it clicks… Oh boy does it really click. Now, this is also a game you shouldn’t rush. The charm of this game is in all the little details and references that are hidden in the pages and the world building of this game.

While the game is rather at the shortside for point-and-click games, I don’t see it as a big problem to be honest. The journey that this game took me on was a lot more worth it to me than having a long game. Since, I think it would have lost it’s charm if this game kept going and going.

While I personally have more memories with the internet time period that came right after it, the developers are already working on the sequel to this game called Dreamsettler. I honestly can’t wait to play that one, since the quality that this game has is just top notch. The music is catchy, the visuals are amazing and it alls comes together in an amazing nostalgic trip that makes you want to play more.

There are some minor blemishes on this game, but you can work with them. Like I said before, when this game clicks, it really does click extremely well. I’d compare my experience with games like There Is No Game or SuperLiminal. Amazing small titles that leave a lasting impact on those who play it. All of these games are passion projects that turned out amazing and get a recommendation from me.

If you enjoy playing unique point-and-click games and/or if you have nostalgia for the old ’90’s internet, I highly recommend that you give this game a try. While this game is on multiple platforms, I highly recommend that you play the PC version since it has mod support that gives you even more toys to play with and expands the game even more.

I had a blast with this game and it’s a breath of fresh air for me. I’m angry at myself that I rushed my playthrough, but now I have installed several mods and I’m so going to replay this game after I have published this article. I also want to earn every achievement in this game, since I really want to see everything. I’m also extremely hyped for the sequel to this game and I can’t wait to start playing that, since that is going to be an even bigger nostalgic trip for me than this game. And with the amazing set of developers behind this game, I think we get another gem in our hands.

And with that said, I think it’s high time to wrap this article up. I want to thank you so much for reading and I hope you enjoyed reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it. I hope to be able to welcome you in another article, but until then, have a great rest of your day and take care.

Score: 100/100

Speedrunning Indiana Jones and the Infernal Machine GBC – Level 5 – Shambala Sanctuary

Level 3+4 speedrun article

While my focus has shifted away a bit from speedrunning, I still sometimes try to beat the records for the Game Boy Color version of Indiana Jones and the Infernal Machine. Now, since we got a new game announced, called Indiana Jones and the Great Circle… I honestly think it’s a great moment to continue that series on my blog, where I explain the starts and fastest ways according to me to beat the game. I want to say as a disclaimer that I’m talking about the current level speedrun records. The_Kovic made an awesome TAS of this game, I mainly want to talk about the current human speedrun. So, let’s dive right into it. Feel free to leave your questions, comments and/or thoughts on this article in the comment section down below.

Current records

One term I’ll explain is something I talked about in the introduction, I talked about “TAS of this game”. TAS stands for Tool Assisted Speedrun. This means that it’s created using tools like save states, slowdown amongst various others. Also, in these runs we can control the input to the frame. Basically, this means that we get a look if the run is perfected.

Now, comparing the route of the TAS through the game and the route of the current record, we basically don’t see a lot of differences. The biggest difference is that the movement is a lot cleaner and a lot of extremely risky jumps and tricks are preformed. From watching the video, the current TAS is, give or take 7 minutes 5 seconds.

Currently, the record for Shambala is 7 minutes 51 seconds, set by myself on December 10th 2023. I know it can go lower since I have already done it. But, due to me messing up my OBS settings, the video is anything but watchable. I decided to not upload the video, but I know it’s possible. Currently, my personal best is 7 minutes 40 seconds. I’ll explain how to save time in this article, since I even think it’s humanly possible to go even below that by a tiny bit.

On January 22nd, 2022 I also set the current record for all treasures in this level. The current record is 8 minutes and 57 seconds. Now, this run doesn’t use all the most optimal jumps and tricks. This is something that can go lower. In the guide, everything that’s in cursive is additional information for the all treasures route.

The route

The level starts with a little dialogue box that Indy needs to hurry up because the Soviets aren’t too far behind. In the PC version, the Soviets only turn up after you pick up a certain key. In the Game Boy Color version, they are already there. If you want to run this level, I highly advise you to learn where the 5 guards are in this level.

I had several runs where I lost time due to bad guard movement RNG. The first guard is when you move up. Just run past this guard to go to the next screen. Yet, if you are doing all treasures, the first treasure is to the left here. So, pick that up first. Usually, I pick up that red gem while at the right most edge of the texture and already turned to the right to run back to run up.

Keep running up towards the building, which is actually Shambala. It doesn’t really matter where Indy stands to open the door, since the game forces you in the middle of the entrance when you enter it. When you enter, you’ll notice a block to the left. Don’t make the same mistake I quite often make. It’s faster to go to the right block and move that one to the side first. So, move the block to the side and press the button that gets revealed. Do it for the right and left side, in that order.

After that, move upwards on the left side of this room towards two doors. Something I do that’s different to the TAS is I press the third button before I enter the next room. The TAS presses the button when we exit from the other room. Personally, I think it doesn’t make a lot of difference timewise, maybe 2-3 seconds. The reason I directly go for the switch is that I don’t want to forget to press it. The guard is usually now facing away from Indy and walking towards the other door. The TAS route is riskier, since there is a high chance that the guard is facing towards you when exiting the other room and can get a few shots off. And those can be quite dangerous, since the TAS even finishes this level with one health point left. Anyway, for the next room, you need to take the left door.

Now, the next room has three parts to it. It also has three bricks to move, well, depending on the route you are taking. But be careful here. There are two guards roaming around in this room. RNG can really screw you over here depending on how these guards move. Now, if you take the all treasures route, you have three bricks to move. The one for the treasure is at the far left in this room. If you are confident in your jumping, it’s possible to stand on the left most edge of this block and jump up towards the green gem. If you aren’t, move it once right and then jump up towards the green gem.

Now, we take the middle section. This is a little bit to the right when you enter from the left door. You’ll see two gears moving on the wall. Move the block over once to the left. If you stand on the right most edge and face right, you’ll be able to land on the higher platform with the gear. Feel free to move it closer if you don’t feel comfortable with those edge jumps.

After you picked up the gear, move towards the right most section. Now, we do the same block pulling thing here as well. If you can, try to jump up towards the ladder. The less climbing you do, the more time you save. Climbing is really slow in this game. When you reach the top of the ladder, we see the first Ice Monster of this level. Usually, moving to the top row of tiles and jumping over it towards the door avoids damage.

Now, in the following room, we have a hallway and two higher sections. Go towards the section on the right and move the block on the top left of the platform once down and once to the left. Here I lost 4 seconds in my record because of some horrible movement. The following trick might be in my head since the TAS doesn’t do it, but I usually do it. The reason why is that it’s the most consistent way I have to make 100% the cutscene of opening the room on the left triggers without you having to move another block. And that’s not pulling the top block towards the other square but pushing it. Don’t forget that on the top right of this section there is a gold bar treasure, after pushing the block is the perfect moment to go grab it. After you push over that block, go to the bottom right of this section and pull the block towards the bottom square. The reason you need to pull is that it saves time to not have to go around the block after the cutscene. Also, practice the jump of landing in the middle of the hallway or beyond that. You’ll need that later. Now, move to the newly opened section and move towards the other top corner. There you’ll need to pick up a rod. And, if you jump a bit higher, on the next tile a set of coins. After that, leave the building. Be careful to dodge the guards and the ice enemy on your way back. If you feel extremely risky, you can save time by jumping towards the ladder in the ice enemy room to save time, but if you don’t grab the bottom pixels of the ladder it’s game over.

Now outside… we move to the right of the building. Now, the fastest way to arrange the boxes is moving the two stack once to the right and the one stack once towards the left. Doing this jump without loosing time is extremely tricky but would save a lot of time over pulling the blocks into the easiest configuration. It’s a lot of edge jumps here, but I have done it and it’s possible. So, jump up and towards the platform to pick up the blue gem. After that…

… we go left of the building. Here I lose 2-3 seconds of time in my record because of some bad movement and not grabbing the two stack box right away. The easiest and fastest way to progress is pulling the two stack box one towards the top of the screen. After that, jump on the one stack and diagonal to the right to enter the next room. After entering the room, pick up the treasure at the left. Do it now, otherwise the guard RNG will be hell. Now, we need to go in the door next to the climbable wall.

From now on, the easy part of the run is over. Now come a bunch of sections that can potentially make you lose a lot of time or just end your run outright. There is a treasure at the bottom right of this room. Pick it up first. Now, jump over the gap and move towards the broken tile at the top right of the room at the gears. While facing the gears, open your inventory and pick the ratchet. You’ll need to move to the left 4 times in your inventory and press A. This is meant to block the bell from falling back down.

Now comes one of the first sections that can cost you a lot of time. I highly advise you to practice this next section. Just take a look at the stream Klamath and I did. The idea is that you jump back and forth between the two broken tiles. The timing is extremely strict. You’ll hear a sound effect when you hit the tile in time. When you hit the tile and don’t hear the sound effect, the bell is going to fall down and you have to start over. So, try and try this bit until you are good at it. After 7, yes 7, jumps back and forth, the bell reached the correct point. Now, the camera will pull up to show the location of the bell. Whilst it’s moving down, move towards the door at the bottom left of the room. It’s possible to exit the room before the camera reaching the bottom. Since I missed this once during my record, I lost 12 seconds.

After exiting the room, a guard suddenly shows up. The fewer hits this guard does on you, the better. Yet, the space is quite tight and it’s difficult to avoid him. Now, we need to climb up the wall. Jump towards the climbable wall that’s closest towards the door we just entered the room from and climb up. Now, we do something that’s unique to the Game Boy Color. Whilst climbing up, you will have to drop towards another ladder. For the first drop, it’s fine if you move over to the left. For the second drop, climb towards the top and let yourself drop towards the right and hold up. It’s scary to do, but hold up during the fall. Otherwise it’s game over for sure. After you climbed up, go to the left and exit this room at the top left door.

Now comes to the next trick, depending on how well you execute it, you’ll save more time. The idea is that, when you enter the room… you move towards the right edge of the room. Run down and jump down give or take a tile before the edge. Let yourself fall but hold up at the right time. The idea is that we grab the long ladder a bit down there. Failing this trick is a run ender. It’s no short ladder so be careful of dropping off this ladder. Now, after you are off the ladder, move to the bottom left of this room and climb down. Or be even more risky after this ladder snipe and snipe the ladder at the bottom left like the TAS.

Now, in the next room, don’t climb the ladder down. Midway the ladder, drop down towards the gears. You’ll notice that there is a peg sticking out of the wall. Stand in front of that one and open your inventory to go trice to the right to select the gear. Now, stay on the raised platform and move towards the other side of the room. Drop down to take the silver bar and jump up towards the raised platform. Those ice guardians are quite painful and hurt a lot. The more damage you take, the higher the risk you’ll loose your run. Now, jump towards the ladder from a little bit before the last tile to save the most climbing time.

Now, the clock starts moving. Move as quick as you can towards the button and here comes something I’m still unsure about the fastest way to go forward is. I know you can totally skip the cutscene of the camera moving up to show the statue turning like the_Kovic does in the TAS. Yet, in order to do this, you’ll need to preform some tricky jumps perfectly. It does save a lot of time, yet almost five minutes into an any % run and after preforming various edge corner jumps, that annoying bell part… I find the TAS strategy at the moment of writing too risky. I linked to the TAS a bit higher if you want to see how the TAS does it, but I’ll explain how I do it. It costs 10-15 seconds, but it’s a way safer strategy in my honest opinion. Sadly, using the glitch that Indy can move after the button press for a little while isn’t possible, so that costs us an additional second.

So, press the button twice and watch the cutscene of the camera moving up to show the statue moving. While the camera is moving down, we regain control of Indy. Depending on how confident you are with your jumps and your nerves at this point… Press the button between 7 to 9 times. I personally prefer 9 times. It gives you some room for error. The red brick-thing will be either at 9, 10 or 11.

Now, comes the annoying part. We need to go back up. Go towards the raised platform you notice at the middle top of your screen and jump up and enter the door. You’ll notice we exit at the platform at the bottom of the ladder we sniped earlier. Climb up to the top of it. Now, if you want to be extremely risky, you can do what’s known as a corner jump.

It’s an extremely risky jump that can save you a lot of time and is essential when you pressed the button at the bottom 6 or 7 times. The idea is that you jump from where the X is after you climbed up the ladder and hold left up in the air to land where the other x is. Now, missing this jump means a game over. So, you risk it all here. I was around 5 minutes 18 seconds in my record run and as you can see from the screenshot, I walked into the door after the ladder. Now, we need to do a corner jump to the raised platform at the left here. It’s quite the precise jump so that’s why I was only able to do it after my third attempt in my run. Enter the door and jump towards the ladder after exiting the door. Be careful to not miss that ladder, since if you don’t land on that raised platform, it’s an instant game over.

Now, after climbing up that ladder, go towards the button at the top right of this room. As soon as the statue starts spinning, press it. You’ll watch a lengthy cutscene of the statue going on the rails towards the bell. You will see something drop down from the bell and see the door you entered this room from close. This will take +/- 30 seconds.

Let me also tell you, if you don’t have a spinning statue in a few seconds, you best reset your run. Since now the clock needs to reach the red peg and that’s too big of a time waste.

But we are in the final strech of the level. Now, don’t loose focus in these 30 seconds since we are not done quite yet. Run towards the left and jump towards the ladder to save up on some climbing time.

When you reach the top of the ladder, and grab the 9th treasure at the top left of this room, we need to dance around the ice guardian to reach the climbable wall that’s just outside of the shadow part of this section. Now, when you enter the next screen, drop down at the right from the climbable wall.

Now comes the final life or die trick of this run. We need to drop down somewhere along the purple titles. The best way is where I have drawn a red line. Hold up to grab the climbable wall, but not too soon to not grab it at the top. Since climbing is slow in this game and there is still that pesky guard at the bottom. The idea is to grab the climbable wall as low as possible so you can drop down without loosing too much health and not loose too much health to the guard having some free shots at you. You’ll need to face that guard twice, since you need to enter that annoying jumping room to pick up the seed that dropped down. Now, you can save a little bit of time since the hitbox of the seed is bigger then you think. If you stand on the edge of the tile, you can pick it up.

Exit the room and make your way to the building. If you have health enough, drop down from the ledge outside. Once inside the building, move towards the blue flower tile and standing in front of the water… open your inventory and move three times to the right to pick the seed. Now, it’ll turn into a flower. Now, go up towards the right side of the room to enter the right door. After that, go to the right section and climb up the ladder. Here some luck will be involved to avoid the guard. When you climbed up the ladder, dodge the ice guardian again and now you have the run in the bag. If you don’t make stupid movement mistakes… you’ll be able to finish the run in just a few seconds.

Now, move down the hallway we all know to well into the final room. Pick up the final treasure at the bottom right of this room before you do the final “puzzle”. Now, when you stand in front of the fire… stand as close to the middle as possible. I have lost so much time when standing on the edges, it’s insane. In my record run, I lost close to 10 seconds because of this. Now, while facing the fire, open your inventory and move 3x to the right to select the flower. This will open the chest. Move towards the chest and face up and open it. After that, Indy will say that he found Urgon’s Part and the level ends.

Conclusion

Shambala is quite the insane run and after the first four shorter levels, this level is the first of a set of three quite lengthy levels with a lot of tricky jumps and avoiding enemies. Now, currently the world record is 7 minutes and 51 seconds. I have pointed out where I lost time in this article and if you count that all together, you have roughly 30 seconds.

I honestly think that 7 minutes 30 seconds is humanly possible for this level. Maybe even 7 minutes 20. But, that means there is barely any room for error and you need to take a lot of risks and be very lucky with the guards movements.

Usually, when I’m doing attempts for a new full game any % run, I usually know after Shambala if this is going to be a good or bad attempt. Another level is the Volcano, but the reason why I call it my run killer will be explained when I talk about that level.

Currently, when I’m doing speedrun pratice, I’m trying to perfect Shambala. I want a clean recording of my personal best and I want to see how much lower I can take that all treasures record. Now, my first record for the any % of this level was 8 minutes 55 seconds and for all treasures it was 9 minutes 46 seconds. I have saved a minute for each category for this level, and I can go lower. So, keep your eye out on the leaderboards, since as soon as I preform a run that beats my current record run, I’ll post it.

And with that said, I have said everything about this level for now. If you have any questions about this guide, feel free to ask them in the comments. Also, I wish everybody a happy new year, since this is the first article I’m going to publish in 2024. I also want to thank you for reading this article and I hope you enjoyed reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it. I hope to be able to weclome you in the next article and until then have a great rest of your day and take care.

It’s time for the upcoming 10 of 2024

Only a few days left before we enter the new year. I already talked about my 10 favorite games of the past year, but what am I looking forward too in the upcoming year? This list is quite tricky to put together for me. Especially since I don’t always play the latest modern hyped title and to be quite honest, the pool of upcoming titles of 2024 didn’t have a lot of games that interested me. Yet, here are ten games I’m looking forward to play and/or will keep an eye on to add to my collection. Tell me, which games are you looking forward too in the new year? Feel free to leave a comment down below about that, or one if you just want to talk about my choices, that’s a fine comment too.

Editorial note: the release dates are the ones that were known at the time of writing.

#10 – ServiceIT: You can do IT (Q1 – PC)

When I was looking at the upcoming games lists at various websites and saw this one, I raised an eyebrow. As somebody who works in tech, I was interested to see how a tycoon/simulation game about my job is going to work.

While this game isn’t exactly a simulation about my job, since it more than maintaining a school infrastructure… It gets quite close. I’m mostly interested in this game to see how well they simulate my work life and how you are going to make an enjoyable game out of it.

I just hope that they stick to the reality of IT and not go overboard and with fake IP-addresses, silly terminal commands like “repair” or “fix” and sometimes really throw you for a loop. Furthermore, I’m also crossing my fingers that this game isn’t going to be a sort of PC Builder Simulator clone or that it focuses too much on hardware. Since, IT is so much more than building/repairing computers. It’s also about maintaining infrastructure, finding the right documentation, following the latest trends, developing software/websites/tools… I can go on for hours. But, when I read what I just wrote here, I think I’m going to set my bar so unrealistically high… But we shall see. I’ll have to play the game to find out how good it actually is.

#9 – Death Trick: Double Blind (Q1 – PC, Switch)

If there is one way to get me interested in your game, you make a mystery game with some unique mechanics or a unique way to play it.

Usually in detective games like Ghost Trick or Ace Attorney, you follow every lead until its end. No stone is going to be left unturned. Yet, in this game that is thrown out of the window, and you only have a limited amount of time to investigate and follow up on your clues. But, wait! There is more, since you play as two characters with their own stakes in the mystery.

Couple that with a gorgeous art style and make it non-linear, and you have something that gets me quite excited, even with the limited things shown in the Nintendo Switch announcement trailer. Not only that, this game is being developed by a very small team that are giving it their all for this game. I looked at the press materials and I think this is going to be a great game. Hopefully, it doesn’t fly under the radar and gets the attention it deserves.

#8 – Ubel (Q1 – PC, Nintendo Switch)

When the demo of Ubel released, the developers contacted me. They asked if I would be interested in writing a review about this game.

This game is extremely similar in terms of setup to the Nonary games. I always wanted to play another mystery game with that setup.

Now, the reason I haven’t written about the game is because the demo was a bit too short for to me to write about. I gave some general feedback to the developers, and I have been lurking on their Discord and following their social media channels quite close. I was praying that this game wasn’t going to be one of those games where I take a look at the demo and then just disappears into development hell or just never gets finished.

Thankfully, we got regular updates and even an alpha version was released to testers. This game is a passion project and I can’t wait to get my hands on it. It’ll also release on the Nintendo Switch and I can’t even decide on which platform I’ll play it.

So, if you are a big fan of the Danganronpa, Zero Escape, World’s End Club, Death Come True amongst other death game mystery games… This is going to be one you will have to keep your eyes peeled on.

#7 – Princess Peach: Showtime (March 22nd – Switch)

Like I said in the introduction of this article, I had a very hard time putting this list together. While I could easily fill this list with a lot of remakes of games that I want to finish and be done with it, I felt that wouldn’t be a quality article.

With that said, there are a few games that are going to release in 2024 that are really getting me excited. One of them is the new Princess Peach game. For those who don’t know, I’m also a hobbyist actor in a folk theater group in my hometown. I also love to go to theater to see plays and comedians preform.

Now, give it to Nintendo to develop a whole game around stage plays (again). The unique charm that this game gives off through the trailers and the promotion material makes me quite excited to dive into the world of theater again in a whole different way. I just hope we don’t get a game with a lot of gimmicks, but we get a game that’s fun to play and gives the player the feeling that they are an actor on stage, entertaining the crowd. It’s not too long now before we can take center stage with Princess Peach and how a big showtime!

#6 – Decapolice (TBD – PlayStation, Switch)

Almost each year, there is a game like this. A noir styled detective game that’s building up a huge mystery. This year, it was Master Detective Archives: Rain Code. Next year, that will be Decapolice.

This time, it’s “breaking from the mold of the Professor Layton series”. And when you hear that, you know right away that this game is going to be from Level5.

While we have to wait for the new Professor Layton game until 2025, we are going to get another mystery game from Level5 in 2024. And that has the possibilities of it being one of my favorite games of the year. Since, as I told earlier in this article, I adore games with unique spins. And this one has a battle system. Is it taking cues of Danganronpa? Looking at the battle system, it reminds me a bit of Master Detective Archives in a way. I just looked at parts of the trailer and skimmed through the teaser website, and I’m sold. To avoid any more spoilers, I’m going to avoid looking through all the materials, since I love when I can go in these games as blind as possible.

#5 – Another Code: Recollection (January 19th, Switch)

Another Code or Trace Memory was one of those series on the Nintendo DS / Wii that I truly loved. It was such a shame when Cing, the developers, went bankrupt back in 2010.

They made some amazing titles outside of them, like Hotel Dusk: Room 215. Seeing that their games aren’t forgotten and remade for the Nintendo Switch brings me a lot of hope.

These stories deserve to be told and experienced. Especially since the sequel on the Nintendo Wii will be released for the first time in America. Now, I won’t have any excuse to replay the Wii game to finally finish it after all those years. I’m ready!

#4 – Spirit Hunter – Death Mark II (February 15th – Switch/PlayStation/PC)

Since its reveal, this game has been on my list of games I want to play. I have even placed it on my list for this year.

Sadly, we got a delay this year. But, I’m not too sad about that one. This means we might get an even better game.

I’m beyond hyped for this game. Even more after Klamath and I streamed this game. They were such fun streams. I can’t wait to play this game, especially since it throws the whole gameplay loop of this game on its head. And because the successful crowdfunding campaign, we are going to get more than we are used too from the developers. So, February is going to be quite packed for me. But I’m ready to hunt those ghosts.

#3 – Shantae Advance: Risky Revolution (Q1-2 2024 – Gameboy Advance/PlayStation/PC/Switch)

No, that’s no typo in the title for this game. This game is really going to come out as well on the Gameboy Advance. Now, let me tell you the story of this game.

Back in 2002, this game started development but after two years of development, WayForward cancelled the game because they couldn’t find a publisher. Now, surprisingly and out of nowhere… In November 2023, Limited Games and WayForward showed in the Nintendo Indies Showcase that the game has been finished.

That’s the story of this game in short. I’ll link to the fandom page here if you want more information how this came to be. I’m so happy to see developers take on lost media like this. On top of that, I’m quite happy to see it also coming to the original platform. Shantae is such a fun platformer game that deserves more recognition. There is so much charm in this game. The world WayForward created with this game is just beyond amazing and as somebody who grew up with the Gameboy Color, I’m so proud to see this cult classic grow into the amazing series it deserves.

#2 – Broken Sword – Parzival’s Stone (TBA – PC/PlayStation/XBOX)

Ever since I played the directors cut of the first Broken Sword on my DS, I fell in love with the series. While the last Broken Sword game is currently 10 years old, I always knew we were going to get a 6th entry in the series.

And not only that, we are going to get a total remake of the first Broken Sword game as well. So, we are going to get spoiled as Broken Sword fans in 2024.

The new adventure is going to take place in Germany and France. I’m so crossing my fingers that one of these games we are finally visiting Belgium as well. Since, there are so many historical towns like Antwerp, Brussels and Bruges here were stories like those in Broken Sword can be told. But, besides that… I’m just hyped to finally see where George and Nico go next on their adventures.

#1 – Fantasy Life i: The Girl Who Steals Time (Summer – Switch)

While we were promised this game in 2023, it got delayed until the summer of 2024. The exact release date is a secret for “strategic reasons”.

Now, why do I place this game at my number 1 spot? Well, because Fantasy Life was a game on the 3DS that took me by surprise, it became one of my favorite 3DS games.

The open freedom you get with this game is just insane. While parts of the game are quite repetitive, the gameplay loop is still extremely enjoyable. I expect a lot of things from this sequel. My biggest wish is that there is a bit more diversity between the paths you can take. On top of that, I want a more in depth story. They proved they can do it by the amazingly well written DLC story.

They just need to build upon the basis of the amazing core they had in Fantasy Life on the 3DS and we will get an amazing title that is for sure going to be the game I’m going to play during my whole summer. And it’s going to be the perfect game to relax and enjoy Fantasy Life all over again with a new story and new mechanics. Summer 2024, here I come!

Closing thoughts

When I look at my list this year, I’m quite afraid for my wallet at the start of the year. I think this is going to be a trend in the future. Where we only know about the new games being released in the first part of the year and during April-May, we get a list of games for the end of the year.

There are a lot of games without a real release date like Control 2, the new Indiana Jones game, Persona 6, the next mainline (non remake) Tomb Raider game and the new Bioshock game that’s in development are some examples. Now, truth to be told is that about some of these games we barely know anything. We don’t even know if they are still in development or not.

In any case, I’m just glad that this hobby of mine is still strong and not going anywhere. The upcoming year will bring some amazing titles and experiences that we can’t predict. I could write a generic message here about what my plans are for 2024, but I don’t want to do that.

I just want to enjoy life and how it comes. I know that I’m going to work on my blog and improve it and write more articles about the games I have played. I can also reveal that there are a lot of interesting streams planned with my friend Klamath. Outside of writing and streaming, there are a lot of things in my personal life I’m looking forward too as well.

Next year will be the 14th year I have been writing. Now, truth to be told… I have totally forgotten that this year was my 10th year writing on this blog. I mean, 10 years is quite a lot of time. I have talked about so many games and enjoyed it so much that I didn’t even notice it go by. I only just realized while writing this ending section. So, I have a few things in mind for 2024 and 2025. But, I’ll keep them a secret. Especially for 2025, since then I can celebrate my 15 years of blogging.

So, thank you everybody for the support and enjoyment that 2023 brought. I hope I was able to entertain, inform you, or maybe both. I’m looking forward to 2024, and I hope we can do it together. Have an amazing end of the year celebration and I hope to welcome you in another article and until then, have a great rest of your day and take care.

The top 10 games of 2023 – NekoJonez edition

It’s that time of the year again, where we get our usual top 10 lists or “game of the year” articles. That’s no difference on my blog as well. I have put together a list of 10 games I started playing this year. The big difference is that in my list, I don’t really care about release date. So, what is the best game I have played this year? I have to tell you that this year was anything but an easy year to put together. I had such a long list of candidates, that I created this list several times until I felt that I had a great list. In any case, enough rambling. Let’s get on with cracking my favorites this year. If you want to share your own list and/or your opinions on the games I have chosen and/or on the list itself… Feel free to leave a comment in the comment section down below.

Editorial note: some of these titles are multiplatform. The one I placed between brackets is the platform I played it on.

#10 – Fatal Frame: Mask of the Lunar Eclipse (2023, PS4)

I love games with unique story mechanics. The idea that you can fight ghosts via on old camera is just a perfect description of things that just interest me. Now, Fatal Frame is one of my most favorite horror game series. While I have to be honest and admit that I have played a part of this game before via a fan translation, I’m not really counting that as playing this game before.

This game finally got translated and officially released in the west. And not only that, it got remastered. Besides it being built on a new engine, it’s extremely faithful to the source material. While I haven’t played through this game to completion yet, I’m so glad I picked this game up, and I’m hyped to see new Fatal Frame/Project Zero content coming to the west. Now, I’m just hoping that we get a totally new Fatal Frame 6 in the future. In the meantime, I’m so going to beat this game, so I can finally say that I completed all the Fatal Frame games.

#9 – Tiny Tina’s Wonderlands (2022, PC)

I think that this year’s theme was unique story games. Since, this pick is another example of unique stories. A while ago, I played Knights of Pen & Paper and got hooked.

Now, when I started to play this game where you actually go through a D&D campaign instead of it being told to you and not only that, have the characters talk in their D&D character AND as themselves, I think it’s a complete package.

The charm of this game, and the silly campaign we are going through, is just amazing. It’s a medieval shooter that’s quite addictive and doesn’t hold your hand like other games would do. While I learned after the fact that this game is a spin-off from the Borderland series, especially Borderlands 3… I’m so happy that I played this and look at it as a stand alone. Now, I still have to finish that campaign… So, if you would excuse me after writing this article, I have a game to play.

#8 – PARANORMASIGHT: The Seven Mysteries of Honjo (2023, Switch)

My review

What if you had a unique power that just put everything on its head. Not only that, what if you can use and control folk tales? Well, that’s what this game is about.

It’s really difficult to talk about the story and gameplay mechanics in this game and not spoil several unique twists that this game pulls. You really have to think outside the box in this game. It’s one of those games where I actually had to take notes to make sure I didn’t get stuck.

A lot of planning and play testing had to be done to make this game work. While it has a few issues, I think it all works together quite well. And not only that, we are actually playing a game that’s created together with a museum, and it’s not a big advertisement that takes you out of the experience. So, I have to say that the developers of this game did an amazing job on this one. And if you want to learn more, feel free to read my review. I think if you enjoy visual novel adventure games… You’ll really like this one.

#7 – Doom Eternal (2020, PC)

My review

For years now, I wanted to build a stronger PC. And this year, I finally did it. I built a totally new computer. On my old gaming desktop, I was unable to play Doom Eternal. While I heard that the game was “more of Doom 2016”, I still wanted to give it a try.

And let me tell you, at first… The new mechanics didn’t click with me at all. But, after a few levels… Something started to click together and started enjoying myself quite a lot. I especially loved the feature you can use a totally different skin during this game, and it changes also during the main campaign as well. The cutscenes and reflections are totally changed.

I totally felt that this game was one whole compared to Doom 2016. I loved that we had a hub part where we could unlock more special powers with things we unlocked during the levels. It’s a big improvement compared to Doom 2016 and I love it. I’m so glad I played through it and I gave it a chance.

#6 – Metal: HellSinger (2022, PC)

My review

I don’t like rhythm games at all. But, what if you combine it with a high action game like Doom Eternal? Well, you get this gem of an action game called Metal: Hellsinger.

While not all metal tracks suit my personal fancy, I just fell in love with the gameplay loop of shooting demons and going through amazingly designed arena’s that reward well timed attacks. And it’s also somewhat forgiving for people like me who aren’t rhythmic at all. It’s one of the biggest surprises to me this year.

I played this game not too long after I had beaten Doom Eternal and I was in the mood for a new shooter. I found this in my Steam library and without knowing it was a rhythm game, I booted it up and started playing it. Even when I found out that it was a rhythm game, I kept playing. The game got me hooked. The story was simple, the game mechanics as well. But, the loop is just so perfect and the music fits this game like a glove. Also, the DLC that released after I had written my article adds just so much more on top of the already amazing base game. I highly recommend this game to everybody who is interested in an unique rhythm game where no being rhythmic isn’t a gate keeping mechanic. Interested, feel free to read my review on the game.

#5 – Alan Wake 2 (2023, PC)

One of the main reasons why I loved the original Alan Wake so much is because the story was something I always wanted to play through. What if the story of a writer comes to life and starts attacking the writer. That, without even the writer knowing what’s going to happen in the story.

On top of that, the unique mechanics with the flashlight usage is just the cherry on the cake. This game plays with the themes of light and darkness as if it were nothing. Now, after a lot of years and content in other games… We finally have the next main chapter in the Alan Wake series. We tried streaming this game but we had a lot of technical issues we are trying to figure out. But, I also played this game outside us (Klamath, the_Kovic and I) streaming. And let me tell you, am I glad I built this new computer. It’s highly worth the price of admission. This game is taking the mind bending story telling of the original to a whole other level. While I’m only at the half way point in this game, I can’t wait to finish it so I can experience all the mind bending story this game has to offer. And after that, I still have to beat the other Remedy games and experience the other side stories of our beloved cursed horror writer Alan Wake.

#4 – Resident Evil 8 (2021, PS4)

My review

There is a reason why I write down at the start of the year which games I have played. Otherwise, they risk of being forgotten or just never considered to be put on this list. Yet, this game impressed me so much that I didn’t have to do that.

I found this game for quite cheap on the PlayStation store and I thought, why not? I was able to buy Resident Evil 7 for 2 bucks physical, why not the sequel for cheap as well? When I started to play it back in January and February, oh boy did it not disappoint.

While I haven’t beaten Resident Evil 7 just yet, I can’t wait to do so. Resident Evil 8 was a game I booted up once in a while during the year just to replay parts of it again. I have completed it twice this year. Now, I have been distracted by other games, so I still have to beat the DLC… But, I think that won’t be a problem. I think the next time I boot up my PS4 and this game, the game will hook into me again, and I’ll just keep playing the DLC until I’m done.

#3 – Cult of The Lamb (2022, Switch)

My review

So, when Cult of the Lamb came out, I placed it on my wishlist since I wanted to play it. But at that time, my budget was a bit too tight and I was unable to buy it.

Not too long before leaving on a family trip this year, I bought this game to play during downtime. And this game, just took me by surprise. This charming gem of a game is one of the best games I played all year. It even made me forget that a lot of big titles like Super Mario Wonder, Alan Wake II, Baldur’s Gate 3… all got released this year and were waiting on me to play them.

This game flows so amazingly well and apart from some glitches is near perfection. I have to admit that in several drafts of this article, this game took the number 1 spot. It’s so totally worth the price and it’s going to get a major free content update early next year. That content update got announced a few days after I had written my article about it, talk about coincidence. I can’t wait to see what the new update will bring and maybe I’ll restart my game and create a totally fresh cult and take different decisions compared to my current playthrough. But, I’ll need to be careful… Since it’s totally possible that I’ll be unable to put down this game and ignore all the other games I still want to play. Urgh, the dilemma’s of good games.

#2 – Fire Emblem Warriors – Three Hopes (2022, Switch)

My review

Did you ever play a 40-hour game with somewhat repetitive gameplay and after beating it, told yourself… Yes, I want to play this game again twice just to see the different routes? Last time I did that, I was playing Persona 5 for hours upon hours. This year, I have been playing Fire Emblem Warriors – Three Houses.

I started playing this game early-middle last month and it’s almost the only game I have been playing. It surprises even me, since I’m not that big of a Fire Emblem fan. Yet, the balance in this Warriors cross over hits that perfect balance for me that I keep playing it and just want to fully complete it.

Now, why am I placing this so high on my list? Well, that’s because it feels right on so many levels. The characters are stereotypes, but they are used extremely well. They tell quite in-depth stories and give amazing messages. The gameplay might be repetitive, but is quite rewarding and addictive to do. It also has unique outcomes depending on way you play it. The fact you can carry over so much in New Game+, so you can see the other parts of the story without having to grind for certain pieces is fun as well. And if you are afraid that it takes the challenge out of the game, well… Don’t worry… The higher difficulties are really going to give you a run for your money.

I honestly think that this is one of the best Warrior games I have ever played and fixed so many problems I had with all the previous games. I even tried to pick up Hyrule Warriors Age of Calamity, and I have to be honest… I’m just too addicted to this game for now. It really does something quite unique and I think it’s slowly making me a Fire Emblem fan, since I really want to replay all the other Fire Emblem games in my collection that are sitting there gathering dust. Oh, and maybe give Destiny Warriors a try as well… that too maybe.

Honorable mentions

Master Detective Archives: Rain Code (Switch), Immortals Fenix Rysing (PS4), Venetica (PC), Ark: Survival Evolved (PC), Fire Emblem Engage (Switch), Stray (PS4), Cultic (PC), Escape Simulator (PC), HROT (PC), Dark Cloud (PS2), House Flipper 2 (PC), Control (PC)

#1 – The Legend of Zelda – Tears of the Kingdom (2023, Switch)

My review

Is this a surprise? That my game of the year is the new Zelda title? Maybe. But, this game just grew on me and I had a really difficult time putting this one down.

When I was creating this list, I looked at what the games brought to the table to impress me and make it stand out. Make it different compared to other games and make the experience stand out during the year. While the games on this list had some elements, this game kept having surprises left and right, I couldn’t justify not placing it on number one.

I didn’t think Nintendo would be able to re-invent their open world formula after Breath of the Wild. The fear of the sequel just being a rehash of Breath of the Wild was huge. But not only did they add two new world layers, they completely changed Link’s powers and opened up so much more of this game. As a test, I played some Breath of the Wild this year as well… And I have to admit, that they have outdone themselves. Tears of the Kingdom is my game of the year 2023 for just adding so much more depth and content that it just blew me away and made me quite exited for the future of one of my favorite game series out there. What’s going to be next?

Conclusion

Writing this ending section is always one of the most difficult sections I have to do all year. What do I write in here? A retrospective of my year? That’s possible, but I don’t want to go in too much detail to avoid throwing something private on the internet. Besides that, the main reason why people come to read these articles is because they want to read about the games I have played and recommend playing. I don’t want to look forward to next year, since that’s what my top 10 games I’m looking forward too is for. Of course, that’s the article I’m going to write next, so yeah.

What surprised me most this year is that I wrote fewer articles this year compared to last year, I had more readers compared to 2022. I also felt prouder of all the articles I have written. I feel my quality is finally going up, and I’m finding my way to write and review the games I have played.

If you have read articles from me before, you might know that I work as an IT admin in two art schools here in Belgium. This year, I had several interactions of students and coworkers who bought a game because they read about it on my blog and came to thank me for the recommendation. And I also had other coworkers who complemented me on my writing and said that they enjoyed reading my articles whilst not being into games.

And honestly, that’s what it’s all about for me. I have also said it in the streams with my buddy Klamath. I’m so happy that I have this creative outlet and I can entertain, inform and help others. Not only that, but I have been doing this for over 13 years now, and I can’t wait to see what the future brings.

Each year, I start putting this list together during my summer break. I always think, what games are going to be put on this list? And each year, several games just surprise me. I can’t wait to see what 2024 has in store for me, since 2023 was such an enjoyable adventure. But for now, thank you 2023 for being such an amazing year. It has been the year of rediscovery for me. Like I said earlier, I’m just felt prouder of the things I have been putting out, and I hope you are enjoying things as well. Thank you for the support this year and I hope to see you in the future. So, for now, have a great rest of your day and take care.

First Impression: Cult of the Lamb (Switch) ~ Praise The Lamb, Thy Lamb.

Official microsite – Official website – Nintendo.com microsite – Wikipedia page

I enjoy playing unique games quite a lot. When I came across Cult of the Lamb on the Nintendo Switch eShop, I was interested. I marked the game on my wishlist, so I could find it back when I was hunting for new games. A few weeks ago, I went on a family trip and I wanted a fresh new game to play. Cult of the Lamb was on sale together with all its DLC, and I thought: “Let’s buy this and see what happens.” Now, when I started playing this game… I had some expectations, but I got something completely different. Did this game turn into a game I really like and drew me in, or did this game turn into something I regretted buying? In this article, I want to talk about my opinions on the game, while I invite you to leave a comment in the comment section down below with your thoughts and/or opinions on the game and/or the content of this article. So, let’s dive right into this game and let’s create our very own cult.

Cute horror

When I started playing this game, my younger 8-year-old niece who sat next to me was saying: “Aren’t you getting too old to play this children game?”. Oh boy, don’t let the cute characters of this game fool you. I’ll talk more about the visuals later, but the story is anything but child-friendly.

You play as an unnamed lamb being sacrificed to avoid a prophecy of getting fulfilled. Yet, during your execution, you get sent to “The One Who Waits”. He wants you to make a cult in his honor without giving you any say in the matter. You get reborn with new powers so you can take revenge on the old Gods that executed you. Now tell me, this sounds like this game isn’t too child-friendly anymore, no?

There is not a lot of voice acting in this game besides your usual grunts and babble. A lot happens in text dialogue and the writing is excellent. Since the Gods that executed you are from the “Old Faith”, the writing of some characters is also sometimes in that old English style, and I love it.

If I’m really honest, the story overall isn’t the strongest point of this game. While it’s decent, it’s a bit predictable and an amazing way to set the atmosphere of the game. But, I feel that it stays too safe at certain moments. I noticed moments of expanding the lore and fleshing everything out, but sometimes these moments fly underneath the radar. Especially since some story bits happen during a hectic run and your mind is set on something very different.

If you want to enjoy the story of this game, I’d recommend that you take note of what the characters during your runs are saying instead of mashing through it. I made that mistake a few too many times, and I feel like I’m missing some lore here and there. Sadly enough, there is no “lore book” or history page you can look up things.

Now, thankfully, this game is still quite strong if you don’t pay too much attention to the story. There are various lore video’s out there if you want to relive the story. To me, the story in this game is more something to help set the tone of the games’ world and give it that unnerving layer underneath its cute and charming vibe that the game is giving off.

Stark contrast

This game consists out of two main gameplay mechanics. You have your base building, and you have the rouge lite dungeon crawling “conquests”. Both are quite important, since both mechanics lien on each other in very interesting ways.

If you have played a game like Rogue Legacy or We Who Are About To Die, you know that in those games you explore a randomly generated dungeon or fight random fights. In between the fights, you are in your base camp, where you can buy upgrades to improve your next chances in your next run. Well, in this game, that base camp is expanded into a town simulator. You have to care for your flock by cooking them food, providing them shelter, curing them when they are sick, going on various mini-quests for them… If you are a good caretaker, your flock generates devotion, which you can use to upgrade your base and your abilities in your run. When you are a bad caretaker, they will die and/or even steal from you and leave the cult.

It’s quite important to know that your cult doesn’t sleep or get inactive when you are conquesting. As soon as you go out for one of the four dungeons, your cult goes through their daily routine and things can go quite wrong.

Now, in theory, you can never go conquesting and only focus on the base building alone. Then, you still have an amazing game to play, but let me tell you, you do lose out on quite a lot of the game. Also, some things become quite impossible to do, and you are sort of forced into going into the dungeon. Now, the punishment for death or escaping the dungeon isn’t that hard, depending on your difficulty settings.

Speaking about those, if you put this game on easy… This game is a cakewalk. You can change the difficulty setting quite easily, but the dungeon becomes a bit boring if you play it on easy. The normal setting is quite balanced and provided me with a lot of challenge. There is no punishment for playing on easy or switching, so if you want to lower or higher the difficulty setting, go ahead.

While the base building has a rather creepy-cute ascetic like a children horror movie, the light gore elements come more into play during the conquesting sections. Overall, the game is rather tame with its gore, but if you start reading into the story and the visuals a bit more, things can become quite creepy indeed. Also, depending on the choices you make when you upgrade your cult. Depending on those decisions, you can make the game more “creepy” or more “charming”.

Now, let’s talk a bit more in depth about the conquests you can go on. At first, you can only access the Dark Woods dungeon. The more followers you have in your flock, the more dungeons you can unlock. Each dungeon has its own theme and unique resources you can find in there. Sadly, it’s not always clear which resources are found where, so mental notes can be quite handy. At one hand, the buildings you can create in your base sometimes give very good hints. Since, they are separated into categories and their materials are sometimes the best hint.

During each conquest, you go through small maps where you go from room to room fighting enemies. At the start of the conquest, you get a random weapon and a random second attack. We get a whole range of weapons like knives, swords, axes and hammers. They are also in various categories like vamperic or toxic. This first roll decides quite a lot. The weapon I hated the most is the hammer, since it’s quite slow, and it only damages when the hammer has landed. Not something you need in a fast-paced combat system.

Overall, the enemies telegraph their attacks quite well. Only when they go off-screen and flew in suddenly, I felt that the game cheated me. Thankfully, this happens so infrequently, I’m not even seeing it as a problem. The combat in this game is quite fast-paced. Standing still and not using your dodge roll are two death sentences in this game. The difficulty curve in this game is amazing for the combat. They slowly introduce the new mechanics, and you have time to get used to them. While the game can be unforgiving with barely dropping any healing items, you need to get lucky. But, learning the combat system is essential.

You can also find tarot cards, here you have another random roll. Most of these cards give you a nice buff or change up a game mechanic. Like, there is a tarot card that changes the reward chest of beating a room from gold coins to fish, which gives you more food to feed your flock. These draws are always random and can safe or break a run.

Now, after a certain amount of rooms, you go to the exit of the map. Then you come across a diagram towards the boss room. You have to decide which path to take. Now, you need to decide this carefully. Since, you can go back, and you only follow the lines drawn on the diagram. So, if you are going for a new follower run, take that path. But, do keep your resources into consideration. If you see food, stone or wood in that other path, and you really need that, do consider that path too.

There are also relics, in most cases these relics are sort of “screen nukes” basically. They either apply an effect to all enemies in the room or on screen, give you a really strong temporary buff, or just kill all enemies. Sometimes these relics are a one time use, and sometimes you need them to recharge by either having your flock pray for you or defeat more enemies.

Now, the amount of control you have over your character is perfect. The controls are extremely responsive and makes me feel in control while I’m going through my conquest. Even when I take a short break from the game, it’s not hard to figure out the controls again, since the first room is always a safe room. Or I could try them out in these special rooms where a character talks a bit about the lore, or where I can draw a new tarot card or in very rare cases even heal.

At the end of each conquest tree, you will encounter a boss room. That’s your destination. Defeating that boss guarantees you a safe return without loosing any resources you gained from that run. These boss battles are quite a lot of fun to play. They are always different depending on your weapon, your secondary attack, your tarot cards… Defeating three bosses in the dungeon will cause the old God of that area to challenge you. When you defeat all four of these old Gods, you will be able to go to the final boss. But, even if you have defeated the old God of an area, you can still go and run their dungeon. And if you then destroy a devotion statue, there is a big chance a red portal will spawn to refight them, giving you an option for a quick escape if you have a terrible map.

Praising how close we were

Now, in the previous section I have talked quite in depth about the conquest mechanic in this game. Let’s now focus our attention to the village building and the other mechanics of this game.

Like I talked about earlier, visually this game looks quite charming. Even in the dungeons, this game looks quite charming if you don’t think too much about what’s actually going on. The game looks cartoony and quite colorful and lures you in with it’s adorable charm to sometimes slap you with a villager request of being scarficed themselves.

Building out your village is quite a lot of fun. You really have to decide to use your resources well, since some buildings can be quite important and even optimize the game for you. For most tasks, there is no way to automate them apart from a very select few.

For example, if you build a morgue, your flock will bring dead villagers to it instead of letting them rot in your base camp. But burrying your death villagers is still a task you need to do and the morgue has only so many slots. Another great example is, you can appoint villagers to tend to the farms. They will plant, water and put fertilizer but actually picking the crops is on you. Update: I turns out I am wrong, I thought I built farm houses level 2, but mine are level 1. The level 2 farm houses do also gathering of crops. Now, the supplying of seeds and fretiziler is still on you.

And the final example I’ll give is, you can build a villager kitchen and they will cook every meal you provide the ingredients for. If you are out of ingredients you have put in, for max of 30 pending meals, you will have to resupply it.

Wood and stone quarries will break after a certain amount of time, so you will have to rebuild them. Also, when you want to upgrade some buildings to their best form, you will have to build their weaker form first. The base building is quite in depth. And on top of that, several important things to keep high. First of all, we need to keep the belief in the cult high. The lower that belief goes, the higher the chance you have of deserters. And the more deserters you have, the slower you can upgrade your abilities for the conquests and let me tell you, you need those upgrades for sure. Besides that, you have hygiene and food to worry about. The lower those meters are, the more chance you have of your villagers getting sick and risking death.

While you are playing this game, I’m going to give you one piece of advice for the base building. Something that’s quite overpowered is the fact you can inspire your villagers every day. This always garantuees devotion and makes sure you level up your villagers and makes sure you unlock the needed items for those upgrades. That way you don’t have the risk using certain rituals to lift the belief up. And why not risking these rituals, well let’s just say that villager requests are timed and they are sometimes shorter than the cooldown time of the ritual.

The day and night cycle of this game is quite important as well. Let your villagers sleep during the nighttime. Also, use the nighttime to your advantage. Critters are running around that might give you that additional piece of food you really need if you catch them. Also, you can go to other places to play mini-games or do additional side quests for more decorations for your base. Besides looking extremely well, these decorations have no real impact to the game.

Something that can have a very minor impact to your game is the form you choose of your followers. Since some types of animals have a pet option that rises their experiece/devotion meter by a really small bit. Experiment with all the different forms since I’m convinced that there are other things that I have missed in there. Their designs are also adorable and charming. Also, you can create some funny looking villagers as well with certain colorschemes.

Now, the music and sound effects in this game are amazing. The soundtrack of this game is calming when it needs to be, but rather intense during fights. Since I started playing this game, I can’t tell you how many times I listened to the soundtrack during work. The soundtrack is created by River Boy and let me tell you again, it’s amazing music in game and outside of it as well.

The sound effects in this game really communicate to the player when for example an attack is happening or a certain action finished. The sound effects feel like they have impact and are really memorable. I have no complaints there at all.

The pacing of this game is something you decide yourself. While this game can be beaten in 14 hours or so, I have been playing this game for way longer than 14 hours. I’m enjoying myself so much with this game, I’m really taking my time with it and going at it slowly. And it’s something that I also love about this game. There is no rush looming over us.

Sadly, while I have been mostly praising the game, I’m said to say that there are some issues as well. Mainly in the base building. These issues mostly come from some nasty bugs that can hinder the experience. Most of these bugs I have experienced where in the base. Thankfully, it’s not always a guarantee these bugs will appear for everyone… and sometimes they fix themselves thankfully.

The first one I expierenced is that sometimes the game has very bad slowdown for just a moment. Especially when we go from night to day. I have a theory why this is, since I didn’t notice this while I’m conquesting. My gut feeling is telling me that when you are in the camp, too many things need to be updated like the crop cycle, waking up the villagers, re-enabling events that you can do only once per day, remove the nighttime critters… And that’s a bit too much for the Switch to handle. I notice that it’s especially bad when I’m at my farms since it needs to redraw all the crops.

The second one I experienced is that the game crashed on me trice. Thankfully, when I moved the game from the SD card to my internal storage, the crashes went away. Now, it’s quite rare for games to crash on me on the Nintendo Switch, but still… Thankfully, the autosave is very generous and you won’t loose too much progress when the game crashes. And if it were to crash in a dungeon run (which I never had happen by the way), those are always around 10 – 15 minutes long in the first place.

Another one I experienced is the infamous morgue glitch. For some reason, it’s possible that when somebody dies in your flock and the villagers bring that body to the morgue, you’ll be unable to pick it out of the morgue. The issue here is that this “ghost body” is permanent and occupying a slot in the morgue. Sadly enough, I have two of these ghost bodies. Meaning, when I get a 3rd, my morgue is filled and I get a permanent hygiene penalty.

In very rare cases, I saw how the game was optimized for Switch. When villagers are off screen, they loose all their animation. Sadly, in very rare cases you can still see it at the edges of your screen and it’s looks quite funny. Another very rare case as well are the glitches where you can’t cut a tree in your base. You somewhat get stuck into the animation. Thankfully, mashing buttons gets you out of that.

But one of the most annoying bugs/things in this game to me is how unrealible the mission length is. You can send a follower on a mission to get new followers or resources. Now here is the thing, they say it will take X amount of days or time for them to get back. Sadly, this is anything but a guarantee. It’s even possible that it takes them two or even three days longer for you to return.

Now, apart from the morgue glitch, all the bugs I experienced you can work around. Thankfully, they don’t appear too often so you don’t feel like this game is unpolished. Since this game has quite a lot of polish and it shows. Since, apart from these bugs, I really have a hard time finding negative things to talk about in this game and if I find them, they are somewhat nitpicky as well.

Things that I found annoying or negative in this game are for example, there is no way to fully harvest all your crops in one go. If there is one, I haven’t found it and it’s not clearly explained to the player. But, it’s a nice and relaxing night time activity so, I don’t mind it too much.

Another example is when somebody dies at day time, it’s always a pain to prepare the body when it’s in a group of grieving followers. The issue here is that they barf on the ground, giving your hygiene a big hit. But, they disperse quite quickly so you can move the body after that.

Sometimes, when a lot of things are near to each other, some hitboxes can be really finicky. You’ll need to stand in the exact spot and face the exact angle for it to register or count. Also, why can you not gather the devotion of shelter when a villager is sleeping in it? You only get the option to talk to that villager.

Like I said, apart from some bugs, the negatives are quite minor in the grand scheme of things in this game. Since this game is filled with strenghts and it shows. Like how easy the UI is to navigate and how many options you get to tweak this game to your liking.

It’s no wonder that I have been playing this game almost exclusively since I bought it late last month. I can recommend this game to everybody who enjoys rougelike games, action/adventure games and to a certain extend even horror game fans. This game really hooked me quite bad and I’m loving the ride. This game is addictive. This game lures you in with it’s cute and charming atmosphere but will sometimes remind you that it might be a wolf in sheep clothing and show it’s true cult colors.

While I can totally understand that some people expected more about this game, is just another thing about this game. It shows the potential this game, this formula has. I’m hoping we are going to see a sequel or even a DLC that adds new mechanics since I’m over half way in beating this game and I’m convinced that after beating this game, I’ll still be hungry for more Cult of the Lamb content. Maybe I’ll even try a run on the hardest difficulty… Since the replay value of this game is out of the roof. Or I might turn into a base building player and use the excellent photography mode… Who knows?

And with that said, I have said everything about this game I want to say for now. I want to thank you so much for reading this article and I hope you enjoyed reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it. I hope to be able to welcome you in another article but until then, have a great rest of your day and take care.

My favorite gaming music #29 ~ Nostalgic Times

More in this series

Sometimes life gets extremely busy. One of the main reasons why I don’t write so many articles lately is because I’m placing my focus on so many other things, and I end up feeling too tired or too creatively drained to write an article. From streaming with my friends to finishing things up in my new apartment. Those are just two things that I have been doing. My day job and personal life are keeping my busy as well, and I have also started spending time with my other hobbies, so I have been playing fewer games lately. But, last week, my old computer that I used to play my Windows98 games on died. I bought a new computer via eBay and in the meantime I have been playing games I used to play when I was a child/young teen. When I heard some of the music of those games, I thought to myself… You know what, maybe it’s a great time to bring back that gaming music series on my blog one time to talk about some of these nostalgic tracks while I’m replaying these old games. So, let’s do right that. In this series, I talk about one track per franchise per article and why it’s in my list of favorite gaming music tracks. I’m trying to do my best to not have repeat tracks in this series. Feel free to write a comment on my choices in the comment section down below, or comment with your own favorite tracks. Now, before I ramble on too much in this introduction, let’s dive right in with the first track.

Nightmare Reaper (PC) – Psyche Surgery

My article about Nightmare Reaper

If there is one game I have been playing since 2020, it is Nightmare Reaper. I just love booting up this game once in a while and playing one or two rounds… Well, I say one or two. But those quickly turn into 10 or more in most cases.

I always know that whilst playing a game, when a game is going to become a classic I’m going to replay in the future. Especially when the flow of the whole game just clicks into place for me, and when I don’t mind restarting the game just to experience it again. And Nightmare Reaper with it’s procedurally generated levels is doing the trick for me. It was also one of the first games I have heard Andrew Hulshult’s work, and let me tell you… It’s always a blast to hear his work in boomer shooter games.

The heavy metal soundtrack in this game fits the chaotic nature of the gameplay where you have to dodge various attacks and do crowd control to the maximum. The soundtrack of this game is that well crafted that even I listen to the soundtrack during work, I sometimes can see the game in my mind and just feel like I’m back home playing it. It’s a blast to listen to too casually and in-game. Highly recommended, and I’m so glad I was able to get the soundtrack on Steam so, I can put it on my phone and even listen to it while I’m in the train from and to work.

Age of Mythology (Titans Expansion) (PC) – Hoping For Real Betterness

My review of the remaster

I just adore games that have a unique twist. Especially when that twist is something that turns on the whole core mechanics of the genre on it’s head. Now, we all know our real time strategy games like Age of Empires or Command & Conquer. Now, some of you might also know the game I want to talk about now, and that is Age of Mythology.

Image, if you will, that while you are playing that RTS match… Everybody has access to 4 godly powers they can use to change the tide of the match. And not only that, depending on if you installed the expansion pack or not, that you can summon huge titans to aid you in battle. This makes playing the game even more unique. Oh, and let’s throw famous mythical stories in the mix as well.

Man, the dilemma back in the day was real. I never knew if I wanted to play through Age of Empires III or Age of Mythology. I was always doubting which one to play and most of the time I had to leave it up to a coin toss and even then picked Age of Mythology sometimes.

The more clam soundtrack while outside of battle is a perfect way to build the tension that is the calm before the storm. The tracks during battles ramp up, of course, but I enjoy them equally much as the more calm and relaxing tracks. Something I adore as well are the cute names that some of these tracks got. Like, the main theme is called: “A Cat Named Mittens”. Just give this soundtrack a listen, you’ll find it equally hard to pick your favorite themes out of this masterclass of an RTS soundtrack.

Pokémon HeartGold & SoulSilver (DS) – National Park

A wild Pokémon retrospective appears

Since last year, I have started to learn myself how to program. I’m doing it step by step, and I’m actually learning a lot. So much, I’m able to create various solutions to lighten the workload of my coworkers in the school I work for.

One thing that also pulled my interest while learning programming is how you can use it to do crazy things. When I saw Pimanrules’ video about how each trainer in the Pokémon games stacks up against the other trainers… I was fascinated by the concept. Recently, the video about the 2nd generation got published. And me being in such a nostalgic mood made me pick up my copy of Pokémon HeartGold to replay through the 2nd generation of Pokémon once more.

There are several tracks that pulled me back to my childhood, but the one that even got me a bit teary-eyed was the theme that plays in the National Park. I have a weak spot in soundtracks when it comes to music with a calm piano track, and the National Park theme hits the nail right on the head.

Memories came flooding back from me playing Pokémon Gold on my Game Boy Color and abusing the cloning glitch on my 2nd playthrough. Also, memories from my childhood how my mind was blown that we suddenly had a whole second region to re-explore after beating Jotho. And after that, memories of the hype when the remakes got released and how everybody was walking around with a PokéWalker in my school. I even saw a few teachers using the PokéWalker for their kids, it was amazing. Trying to talk about all my memories with Pokémon can be a whole article in itself, but if you read this and think: “I should pick up one of these old Pokémon games…”, do it. Relive your childhood and just let the memories flow back. And just play without using a guide. Let your mind wonder, let it be lost again. Try to find that imagination again, the relaxing nature of the adventure and how life was back then.

The Legend of Zelda – The Minish Cap (GBA) – Palace of Winds

My review on the game

In my review of Breath of the Wild and Tears of the Kingdom, I talked about how I have a soft spot for the 2(,5)D Zelda games. While I totally understand that there will be a small chance we will see a new Zelda game like that in the future, I’m glad that there are so many of them released.

I personally expected that I’d replay the Oracle games in my current nostalgic mood, but I restarted my journey through the Minish Cap again. The first time I played through the Minish Cap was when my local game store still rented out games. For the yearly family trip to the seaside, I rented The Minish Cap and NickToons Volcano Island on the Game Boy Advance. I got hooked so bad on the Minish Cap that I re-rented the NickToons game after I had beaten The Minish Cap. Yes, in the three weeks I had the game, I had beaten it.

Of course, I didn’t play it all the time since as a child on holiday in a child-friendly holiday park, I played a lot outside with my friends. But, on rainy days or on shopping trips, I always had my Game Boy Advance SP with me. And yes, I even snuck it underneath my sheets sometimes to play it during the nighttime. Everybody my age has done that.

One track that stuck with me is the Palace of Winds. It’s an amazing, bombastic track for the final dungeon of the game. Exploring through that dungeon was so much fun. I felt that it was the final challenge before tackling the final boss of the game. I can’t wait to replay it since I have forgotten most of how the dungeon works, and I’m playing through the game again with some vague memories. But, this is the newest game I restarted playing, so it’ll take me some time to reach that dungeon. But, I’ll get there for sure… If I don’t get distracted by other games, that is.

Stella Glow (3DS) – Shop

My review

If there is one game I really want to restart playing, it is Stella Glow. Let me tell you a story. Currently, I have been writing this blog for a little bit over 10 years. Before that, I have been writing a now deleted personal blog for a few years. Now, when I started to write in English, I met another blogger by the name of LpGardian. He ran his own website that is now grown quite a lot.

He had amazing connections with some developers and one time I dropped in a call that I played the Stella Glow demo on my 3DS, and I was quite interested in playing the full game to review it. To my surprise, Atlus actually approached him with a review code for the game, and he gave me the chance to review this game for his website.

Honestly, at first, Stella Glow felt as one of those turn based JRPGs that I wanted to give a chance because the concept and world sounded fascinating. I never thought that it would be that good. The story was better than I imagined and oh boy the soundtrack of this game is just perfect. They are all so catchy and if you look through the previous entries of this series, you’ll find other tracks of this soundtrack as well.

While me and LpGardian went our separate ways since we just grew apart, because we had different life goals… I’m still thankful that he gave me this chance to write a review for this game. Since, it was the final game by Imageepoch, an amazing developer of JRPGs on the Nintendo (3)DS/Wii, PlayStation Portable, PlayStation Vita and PlayStation 3. Their swansong was a hit right in the bullseye and I hope that Atlus creates a remake to the Nintendo Switch or other platforms since this is a hidden gem for turn based JRPG fans. The only grudge I have with this game I that I haven’t beaten the final boss since I’m so underleveled… I have the same problem like with Suikoden Tierkreis, unable to beat the final boss since I focused on the wrong skills and characters… But, I’ll get my revenge.

In any case, just give the soundtrack a listen and know that this soundtrack just hits all the right notes and is a one that I play on repeat during work here and there. Maybe the memories and the chance I got to review this game, which gave my blog a huge boost and being lost in the story might cloud my judgement a little bit but still… reading the comments just proves to me that this is one beast of a soundtrack.

Closing words

Sometimes I feel guilty when I’m in a nostalgic mood and when I’m replaying games I have either already reviewed or reviewed in some sort of way. In the past I used to pressure myself in playing a new game each and every week to be able to write about a new game each and every week. This mindset pushed me close to a burnout and it was anything but healthy for my mental health.

Now, only writing two articles each month and not forcing myself in playing a new game each and every week is just a breath of fresh air. I feel that the quality of my articles just rose by a lot and I enjoy writing again. I also feel way less quilty to replay games I have played since it sometimes helps me in writing.

Being in this nostalgic mood made me realize what gaming means to me. It’s a way to relax and wind down after a long day at work. I get reminded to the simple days that after school and homework, I was able to just put on a game and play for hours. While as a 30-year old, those days are behind me, I still enjoy the hobby quite a lot. And, I’m also quite happy that I made the changes in writing less for my blog and focus on writing better articles. It made me connect with so many amazing people in the blogging and content creation sphere, I just love it.

Thank you everybody for going on this journey with me. Thank you first timers for reading my blog and people who are reading my blog for quite a while now. Thank you for the comments I receive and the interesting discussions about the games I reviewed. Thank you to everybody who helped me or collabed with me to create this blog. While I have been in this nostalgic mood, I also have been scrolling through my older articles to not only see how much I have grown as a writer but also to reminisce.

Don’t read the previous paragraph as a sort of goodbye. Read it as me being thankful and happy on the support. I really meant what I said in this closing paragraph. I’m so glad that I’m able to do this hobby. As a kid I was always creating content, writing my own stories and trying to entertain people. And now I have found my niche and I can’t be happier.

So, that’s everything I wanted to talk about in this article. Thank you for reading this article and I hope you enjoyed reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it. I hope to be able to welcome you in another article, but until then have a great rest of your day and take care!

First impression: The Safe Place (PC – Steam) ~ Playing With Emotions

Steam store page

Remember two games I have talked about in the past before? Little Kite and Repentant? Well, the developer Anate Studio released his newest game last month. The developer was so kind to provide me with a press key to review and talk about this game before release. But, due to life getting extremely busy… I didn’t have the time to actually write something about this game until today. As usual, you’ll get my 100% honest opinion about this game and if this new point-and-click game is worth your time or not. If this world is really a safe place right now, or if we should do something about it. In any case, let’s dive right into it, and feel free to leave a comment in the comment section down below with your thoughts and/or opinions on this game and/or the content of this article. I’m always curious to read those.

Editorial note: this article is written while the game was in v1.1

Playing with emotions

Just like in all previous Anate Studio’s games, this game tackles heavy subjects. In this game, the story is about self-sacrifice and a troubled childhood. In this game, you play as an engineer, Alexander. He lives in the post-Soviet era, which was in the midst of an economic crisis.

One night, he meets a young girl called Christina while waiting for the bus. Things go south from there, and Alexander commits a murder in front of her and covers it up. While the girl promises to keep silent when he helps her, things might and will go even more south from there.

In terms of writing, the story is well tense. There are two majors threats loomed over our main character and they are equally thrilling. Should Alexander deal with the troubles of the economic crisis, or should Alexander make sure that all the traces to the murder are covered up? This struggle also comes back in the writing, making it even more tense for you as the player.

Something I want to mention as well, is that I found it extremely lovely to see the dev diaries on the studio’s YouTube channel. For example, in this video, we see how the first scene is inspired by a real life bridge in Ukraine. You see it all come together in a time-lapse, and you see how much detail and love has been put into this game.

This whole game is also voice acted. I have to say that compared to the previous game, the voice acting has improved quite a lot. The voice acting is a lot less monotone and has a bit more feeling into it. From the three games I have played from this studio, I feel that this is the best voice acting yet. While the voice acting has been improved, it’s still a bit jarring that there is no lip-syncing. So, you will hear the characters talking but not see them talking, you know.

The only critique I have about the voice acting is something I’m unsure is a critique of the voice acting, sound mixing and/or the visuals. It sounds and looks the same when you have thoughts and spoken dialogue. Thankfully, this doesn’t happen very often, so it isn’t a big problem. But, maybe for the next games, have a sort of little distortion on the thoughts and display that text in cursive. Something quite similar has been done by the ports of 999: 9 Hours, 9 Doors, 9 People, and it works extremely well when you are not picking up on context clues.

Before I move on, this time the game is only in English and Ukrainian. I only speak Dutch and English and a bit of French. I know a little bit of German, so I’m only going to stick with the language I understand and I can judge. So, this comes from somebody who doesn’t know any Ukrainian but from what I heard from the voice-over demo on the developer YouTube channel, it sounds pretty good as well.

Drawn by hand

I touched upon this earlier, but visually, this game is extremely detailed. Just look at this screenshot I have placed here. Every environment you visit is highly detailed and looks amazing.

Now, I have chosen this screenshot intentionally. Since, there is a minor issue I want to talk about here. On the desk in the bottom left, there are several items you can pick up. When you click on the desk, the camera zooms in. But, you can still move your character.

This leads to it feeling a bit janky in my opinion. Since, at first I didn’t know how to exit the zoomed in screen and when I learned I could just click on the top to walk away… I felt like you didn’t know what the restrictions were in the zoomed in area. So, if you work with a mechanic like this… Make it evident to the player how they can exit that zoomed in screen and don’t allow the character to move.

In any case, I wanted to talk about the visual presentation of this game. Overall, this game looks amazing. In addition to that, the animations in this game are decent. Some of them don’t really work in my opinion. I mean, the back and forth swaying from some characters feels out of place. It feels a bit unnatural. I can understand that from a gameplay standpoint that it makes the characters stand out more, but it looks a bit silly sometimes. Something I would love to see in future games is that the characters are more expressive, especially in dialogue. Now, they go through the same short animation cycle, and having them more expressive would make the game come more alive.

I hope that you aren’t getting the impression that this game is unpolished or that it’s broken. It isn’t. I’m just quite impressed by the leaps forwards that the developer made compared with the previous two titles, and I just want to see their games become even better. For example, in the previous game you only had a few hints you could use, and you had a set number. In this game, the hint system is miles better. In each area, there are several statues hidden. These statues can unlock an image sequence for you to get a hint. But be careful, since you can unlock an image sequence for a puzzle you already completed. And on top of that, there aren’t enough statues to unlock every hint tree. So, look for them and use them wisely. Since, they are hidden extremely well.

If you know what to do, this game will take you roughly two and a half hours. This game is longer than the two previous titles in this trilogy. Yes, the two games mentioned in the introduction are part of this game. Now, you don’t need to play the two previous games to understand everything in this game. But this game is as long as the two previous ones combined.

Sound support

Earlier in this article, I said that the characters should be more expressive. But, there is another side of the coin. Sometimes, the lack of animation works in the visuals in their favor. Since, the sound design and sound effects make your head fill in a lot of details.

The sound effects really play a support role, sometimes to make the world come more alive. A small piece of advice I’d give is that in the next game you have some sort of subtitles for the sound effects as well for the hard of hearing/deaf people in your next game.

Something that shouldn’t change is the soundtrack. The soundtrack fits this game like a glove. It sounds atmospheric and creepy sometimes. And like I said, it fits the atmosphere amazingly. A rather common complaint from the previous game was sometimes the music and sound effects were louder than the voice acting, this is anything but a problem in this game.

This game controls extremely well. In this game, you almost exclusively use the left mouse button to control the game. This makes the game quite easy to learn. You might think that due to the very detailed art style, it’s not always clear where to click on. But the cursor turns into a nice hand icon when you can interact with something, and you can click the magnifying glass in the left corner to make sure you have investigated every spot.

Now, sadly there are a few complaints I have about this game. The first complaint is that activating the running in this game is quite tricky sometimes. I wasn’t always able to get the running to work, and the main character walks rather slow sometimes.

The two other complaints I have about this game are more UI based. Which is a shame, since they drag the amazingly crafted UI down. For of all, I find it a mistake that there is no save time in the load menu. This game has an auto-save system, but it’s unclear what the latest save is. There is also no way to manually save, either. So, you’ll have to rely on the auto-saving of this game. And that doesn’t happen quite often, only after certain specific events.

The second complaint about the UI I have is something of a pet peeve. Since there are multiple words for something, it’s always handy to have each item named. For example, you have a broom handle or broom stick. These names I’d love to see in the inventory. Since, when you don’t play this game in one sitting, it’s extremely handy to quickly hover over the items to quickly catch up with the items in your inventory.

All in all, this game is a huge improvement compared to the previous titles. The puzzles are quite challenging, and it feels quite rewarding to figure them out. The game has some issues for sure, but comparing the first titles of this developer with this game, it’s impressive how far this developer has come. A better hint system, better voice acting, a longer story and adventure… There is also a demo for this game if you are unsure if you want to pay the 12 euros for it.

The biggest issues I have about this game are rather small in the overall picture. My biggest annoyances in during playing were the running not always working as I hoped and the back and non-expressive characters during dialogue. I mean, the voice acting is so much better, but the animation needs to follow. You can’t have two back and forth sawing characters having a heated discussion.

So yeah, if those are the only two major complaints about an adventure game that’s well written and drags you into a emotionally gut-wrenching story with amazingly handcrafted enviroments… I mean, what’s stopped from me to recommend this game to everybody who enjoys adventure and/or point-and-click games? Nothing! I’m convinced that the next games will have more improvements since this developer works almost alone on these titles and the quality he is able to put out is really worth your time and attention.

And if you’d excuse me now…. I have a game to finish. So, that’s everything I wanted to say about this game for now. I hope you enjoyed reading this article as much as I enjoyed writing it. I hope to be able to welcome you in another article but until then, have a great rest of your day and take care!

The Great Ace Attorney Goes To Review Trial

A collab review by AdventureRules & NekoJonez
Capcom page – Nintendo.com microsite – Wikipedia entry

Introduction

When the reader clicked open the link, they entered a luxurious courtroom where the jury, the prosecution and the defense were preparing themselves to start the biggest trial in their careers. The headlines didn’t lie. “Is this the great return of the Ace Attorney series?”. When the title dropped on July 27th 2021 on the Nintendo Switch and other platforms, the reviews started to come in. It’s a big departure from the previous entries in the series, and there is a split between the fans. So, two hobbyist reviewers and big fans of the series decided to battle it out in a courtroom and try to be able to answer the question once and for all. Is the game worth your time, dear readers, or is it not? Take a seat in the gallery and enjoy this duel in the courtroom, and feel free to let us know how we did and what you would bring to the table in this battle. 

The judge rose to his podium while he slammed down his gavel. “The court is in session. Is the prosecution ready?” the judge spoke while looking in the direction of the cat-human hybrid sitting behind the prosecution bench. “Yes M’lord” the prosecution answered. Then the judge looked towards the defense and asked: “Are you ready consul of the defense?”. The defense, trying to hide his nerves, firmly pushed up his glasses and said: “Yes, my lord. The defense is ready.” 

The atmosphere in the courtroom was tense. At one hand, you were surprised to see that these two fans stood face to face in this courtroom defending a game. You know that these two writers are good friends, and it’s not the first time they worked together. But now, it looked like they would eat each other raw to win this court battle. But, on the other hand, you were curious what arguments they would bring to the table. You were curious what their thoughts and opinions were about the game you were looking forward to. While you were lost in thought, you missed the judge asking the prosecution to give their opening statement.

“… so, The Great Ace Attorney Chronicles is a combination of two games that left the Japanese shores for the first time this summer.” the prosecutor said, while raising a scroll. “The original versions got released on the Nintendo 3DS way back in the summer of 2015 and the sequel in the summer of 2017. At first, the developers had no intention of bringing this title to our western shores, so fans took it upon themselves to translate the title. But, to everybody’s surprise, this title got an official translation and all the additional content and behind the scenes material got translated into English and as you all know…” the prosecution continued.

You raised an eyebrow, since the way the prosecution was acting looked a lot like how the prosecutor in the trailer of the game was acting. The only thing you were missing was the pouring of wine. Maybe the writer for the prosecutor got a bit lazy and copied the game a bit too much, you thought. You crossed your fingers in the hope that you would see more of his personal style shine through instead of copying the game too much. It would do this trial so much better if it was unique and not copying the established series and formula, you concluded. But, then you got a bit annoyed that you missed the actual opening statement. Thankfully, you read the headlines of the papers, so you know what this trail is going to be about. 

Visual Presentation

“Let’s start with the visual presentation”, the judge said. The attorney and the prosecution quickly agreed that the visual presentation is excellent in this game. “It’s a huge visual upgrade when you look at it from the 3DS games.” the attorney said. The prosecution somewhat agreed and said: “True, the attention to the details is exquisite. Yet, there were some moments when I felt some models looked off. Not polished enough when being brought over from the 3DS. There was even a puzzle that focused on 3D related technology that would have worked so much better on the 3DS. The fact that they didn’t implement something different or a solution for that… But, something that made me roll my eyes is how they reused the models for the jury. The excuse of ‘London is a big city, so you’ll find look-a-likes’ is okay, if it only happens once. It, sadly enough, happened more than once. Too much to count, to be frank.”

The attorney stepped in and said: “Those moments are few and far between. Besides, imagine the poor designers having to create 50 different character models and such to have unique juries. Let them reuse them, as long as there is variation, and it doesn’t get stale… they also justify it in most cases by having them literally be the same character and not just a lookalike. Ryunosuke even comments on it in one of the trials. So while I will allow that some may not like this choice, it was an intentional one on the part of the designers, and they did the work required to make it make sense in the fiction.” 

The attorney paused for a brief second, took a breath, and continued, “… If we are talking about the visual presentation, let’s mention the animations as well. The cutscenes in this game are way better animated than the previous title. The background is less static. The character animations are A+. Multiple times, I found myself literally laughing out loud at some ways these characters behaved. They strongly convey the personality and attitude of the cast.”

A sigh was heard through the courtroom. Of course, the prosecution had an objection. “The cutscenes are less static, I’ll give you that. But, explain to me why there are so few unique locations in this game. We visit the same hospital room in at least 4 to 5 different cases. You have a point that it would cost too many resources to make something unique each and every time, but why do the characters always have to mention… ‘Oh, what a coincidence… that place.’?” The prosecution slammed on his desk and looked straight at the attorney. “Now, let’s talk about the animations. I’m sorry, but I found that some side characters had more memorable animations compared to the main characters. Take Gina for example, her emotions were way more clear when you read her dialogue compared to the ones of Sholmes for example. Honestly, a bit more variation in the animations would be welcome. Especially, you see the same animations during give or take 10 cases this time and not 5. And maybe a few more if you include the bonus content.”

There was a silence in the courtroom. You felt that both parties were making good points. Indeed, the game looked amazing with various memorable locations. The attention to detail and the little nods to the rest of the series can warm any fan’s heart. But, you can also understand the other side of the argument. At first, this game was split into two 3DS games, and having repeat locations and almost the same animations on repeat, well that could get a bit dull and repetitive indeed.

A hammer slammed down, courtesy of the judge. “Okay, I heard both your points, counsels. But a game is more than just visual presentation and animations. Let’s move on to sound, the audio of this game. Let’s talk about that. Counsel of the defense?”

Audio and Controls

You noticed the attorney smiling and when he started talking, you felt the joy and passion of his words. “I loved this soundtrack so much, but of course, Ace Attorney always knocks it out of the park when it comes to music. There were perhaps fewer songs that stood out to me as all-time favorites, but I found that this soundtrack creates a more evocative atmosphere compared to the other games. Having differences in instrumentation and style depending on which country the characters were in made a difference.” the attorney said. 

The prosecutor squeezed the bridge of his nose and said: “Apart from a few tracks, I can’t agree more. There were a few tracks that didn’t hit the mark in my opinion. But, there is something that this game does that doesn’t sit a hundred percent right with me. Almost every character has his/her own theme. But, they like to use their own themes more during scenes instead of something that would fit the scene more. It made some scenes less memorable in my opinion. Then again, it did make the characters more memorable. So, make of the above point what you will.”

It was an interesting question. Should music in a game make a scene or a character more memorable? There was no real right answer for that question, you thought to yourself. And maybe that’s a question you should leave to game designers and producers instead of wondering it for yourself. While you were thinking about that question, you didn’t notice that both parties were talking about the sound effects in the game. You did hear the summary of it, thankfully.

“So, both parties agree that there is nothing wrong with the sound effects. Intriguing.” the judge said. “Let’s move on to the next section. Let’s talk about the various elements of the design.”

“The controls work pretty well. They are extremely responsive and made me feel in control of the whole series of events.” the attorney said. The prosecutor smirked, and you knew that it didn’t take long before a snide remark was going to come the attorney’s way. “Oh yeah? You are totally ignoring some frustrating things. Let’s talk first on when you go through the testimony of the witnesses, you don’t loop after the last statement to the first statement.”

The attorney shook his head and when he looked up to watch the prosecutor right in his eyes and remarked, “But that has an easy explanation. Just imagine being stuck at a certain point, and you skip the dialogue after the cross-examination where you get a hint to progress.” A sigh was heard. “Okay, I get what you are saying. But, think about this one. The original games were released on the 3DS. This version is on the Switch, where we have TWO additional buttons. One of these buttons could have been a sort of switch you could toggle for toggling between a loop or non-loop mode.”

There was no arguing with that. The prosecutor had a valid point there, but he wasn’t done yet talking about the controls. He rose a finger and said with a smile: “Oh, and one other thing. Let’s not forget that fast-forwarding in some scenes don’t even work correctly. The joint reasoning or the dance of deduction is slow when you have to repeat it when you made a few too many mistakes.”

A debate about some small, minor annoyances of the controls continued. You knew that finding the right balance between mechanics, controls and world-building is a difficult one to get perfectly right. There are always going to be things that work and don’t work. If flawless things existed, would they still be fun? From the controls, you heard the debating pair moving on to other things. 

Replayability and Difficulty

“How about you get two games, including the DLC and bonus content, for the price of one? You get 70, if not close to 80 hours of content to enjoy. Isn’t that worth the price of admission by itself?” the attorney said. 

“If only there was a demo for people on the edge to enjoy. That would make that deal even better. Yet, there are two things I want to touch upon. First, the DLC. You can use alternate costumes, but tell me… Why can you only use them in the second part of the game?” the prosecutor said with a slight annoyance in his voice. The attorney wanted to counterargue, but the prosecutor slammed his fist down and continued.

“Oh, and let’s not forget how everything is already unlocked from the start. Apart from a few things, you can start with the bonus material and totally spoil yourself with the spoiler warnings that could have been implemented a LOT better. Granted, all the bonus content is included, but honestly, after finishing the main game… I felt a bit burned out on the game and I haven’t touched the additional content at all.”

The defense attorney’s eyes were wide behind his glasses. The aggressive offense from the prosecution had left him somewhat stunned. He took a calming breath and spoke. “At least the game is somewhat replayable. I imagine it would be fun to revisit this game after you’ve seen the whole story and to recognize the moments of foreshadowing for what they really mean. Also, you can try to go for unlocking all of the achievements – called medals in this game,” he explained. “Oh, and the automated save system is a blessing. You can save essentially anywhere and if you mess up you lose almost no progress.”

“Those two are quite valid points,” the prosecution allowed. “Now, I think we are going to talk about the difficulty of this game now. Well, I have something to say about that. Something that couldn’t be avoided, with combining two games into one as a sort of collection, is that the first few cases in the 2nd half of the game are a bit on the easy side. Since, originally, you couldn’t be 100% certain if a player played the first game before the second. But, the game isn’t too challenging overall. The previous entries in the series were more difficult. That’s not to say that this game is a cakewalk, though. But, overall, this game felt easier compared to the previous games… But that might have to do with the fact I have been playing these games for years now. I actually found the leaps of logic in this game to be tougher than I remember some other games in the series being. In the second game in particular, I had a game over in every case due to moments where I thought the needed evidence was tricky to figure out.” After that long remark, the prosecutor paused.

He thought he had the attorney cornered. But, don’t ever underestimate somebody who is reviewing or talking about games for so long; a comeback can always happen. 

“I’ll allow that following the logic of an Ace Attorney game can be challenging,” the defense began. “But there’s a place for it. For series veterans, the unique brain bending mechanic of pitting two jury members to each other is a welcome addition. Meanwhile, for those who don’t want to deal with the challenge element of the game, there is a story mode where you just watch through the game’s story without any gameplay mechanics slowing you down. So for players who find the challenge to be a barrier, there is a way to experience the story without the puzzles getting in the way.” 

The judge was in awe, he didn’t have to interject nor lead the trail. Both parties were going from one topic to another and putting all their cards on the table. You knew, that’s because both parties have been analyzing games for several years, so they know what to watch out for. They chose to debate in this manner to talk about this game, they wanted to do something unique to review this game, and they were enjoying themselves quite a lot. Suddenly, you heard the hammer of the judge hit, and you looked up to him.

“Before you two ramble on and on about the game, let’s focus on the final two topics of this trial. These are gameplay and the story. Let’s start with the gameplay. Is this game fun to play?” the judge asked.

Gameplay and Story

This time, the attorney started with his argument: “I really liked the analysis sections and pitting the jury against each other. The summation examination mechanic is really solid and adds a lot to the trials. I also liked the Dance of Deduction mechanic for investigations, as it made a section of the game that I usually find to be kind of middling into something more interesting. Being able to examine most pieces of evidence is great and adds a layer of drama to the trials when you suddenly get something new and then a huge new clue comes from checking it out.”

And of course, as expected, the prosecutor wanted to say something as well. “I could start an argument that the game is somewhat repetitive. But, the game is for a certain audience. An audience that enjoyed the mystery novel gameplay. So, they won’t get too bored. And if they get bored, or burned out, they can take a break and come back to the game at a later time. I don’t have any counterarguments in the gameplay department. This game is easy to learn and if you have played previous entries in the series, it’s still enjoyable to play with the new mechanics and tricks it brings to the table.”

So, it’s time for the big one. The story. You didn’t want to miss this. Both parties agreed to keep this debate spoiler free, so you were curious how they were going to handle that. You heard the judge introduce and explain that fact, and both parties looked to each other, readying themselves for the most important topic of this whole debate. 

After a small pause, the attorney started: “I really enjoyed Ryunosuke as a protagonist and the way in which this story is all about building his self-confidence and him finding his path through life. Susato is a wonderful assistant character, and I found myself cheering for her all the time during my playthrough. While Lord van Zieks being racist against the Japanese people really bugs me, it made it fun to get the upper hand against him during the trials, and he has a powerful, evocative design. Also, let’s not forget that this entry has various moments where things don’t always have the rose colored ending we would come to expect.”

The prosecutor agreed, but had to add a few things. “Yet, it sometimes falls in the same trap that all the previous entries started to fall in. I found some sections to be a bit predictable. But, I’m not going to go too in-depth about that since we agreed to keep this debate spoiler  free. One thing I would have loved to see is more voice acting. The voice actors did an amazing job in the cutscenes to make their characters come to life. If only that was used more. Of course, it would be somewhat overkilled if the whole massive script was voice acted, but a bit more would be stunning. It would give more power to certain strong moments in the game.”

The attorney swiftly moved on and said: “It’s a breathtaking entry point for newcomers since it’s a totally new cast of characters. This has been my favorite storyline since Trials and Tribulations. The story is grounded and compelling, with lots of twists and turns throughout. Using two games to tell one big overarching story was a good move.” 

The prosecutor cracked his whip loudly, causing the defense attorney to reflexively flinch. The entire courtroom was paying attention to him. “But, there are a few things that could have been handled better in terms of writing. First, if you don’t understand English too well, especially British English… A lot will go over your head with the dialect writing and no option to turn it off. But, props for writing the script in that way, though. Now, if only there were more Japanese jokes and such snuck in when a case played in Japan. Speaking of which, there is no investigation section in Japan. Which brings me to my next point. The structure of the game feels weird in places. The tutorial feels too long in the first game because of both the first and second chapters being tutorials (one for trials and one for investigations). The first game essentially only has two proper cases in it, and the trials are never broken up by investigation sections, so the investigations feel super long.”

He left a small pause to try and read the room. It looked like he wanted to say something, but he was unsure if he should mention it or not. You could read in his eyes that he has seen this dilemma before. Should he talk about something that might spoil the whole game before or should he leave it out since they agreed not to talk about spoilers in their debate? 

So, you sat there looking at both parties argue. Each party had great points to bring to the table. You could totally understand where both parties were coming from. But, now it’s up to you, dear reader, to draw your own conclusion. Yes, the writers of this collab are taking that ‘easy’ way out. Now that you heard the negatives and the positives of the game, what do you think? Let us know in the comments down below, and maybe we shall ask you to be our next witness in this trail to answer the question in this trail once and for all. 

Editorial note: the portrayals of the prosecution and defense represent the combined views of both NekoJonez and Adventure Rules, who each contributed pros and cons to the review. 

Additional note from me, NekoJonez: Thank you so much Ian from Adventure Rules for working with me on this! Your art, advice, proof reading and advice made this collab come out the amazing way it did. Really check out his blog and his Twitter if you want to see more of his work. It’s amazing and worth checking out! Thanks buddy for this collab and thank you for all the support man!

Review: AI: The Somnium Files – The Nirvana Initative (Switch) ~ Let’s Dive Again

Official English website – Wikipedia page

One of my most favorite genres is an adventure visual novel. A game with a deep story with memorable characters and unique gameplay that draws you into the world of the game. Examples are Corpse Party where a cursed school plays tricks on your mind or Ace Attorney where you play as an attorney that takes on the strangest cases. I could list examples here for quite a while, like Time Hollow, where you get a pen that can mess with the past in certain circumstances. My favorite series in this genre are the Nonary games. I sometimes quote various moments to this day. I was beyond excited that after the trilogy ended, a new series by the same writer started in 2019. AI: The Somnium Files. Now, after I finished that game, I couldn’t wait to see what Kotaro Uchikoshi and his team were going to turn out next. And that is a sequel to AI: The Somnium Files, which picks up 6 years after the original game. But is it any good, or is this a sequel that we should avoid? Well, that’s what I want to talk about in this review. This review is spoiler free, so if you haven’t played the game… You shouldn’t worry about that. But in any case, let’s dive right into the game while I welcome you to leave a comment in the comment section with your thoughts and/or opinions on this game and/or the content of this article.

Editoral note: this game also released on all other major platforms. I chose to play this game on Switch since I played the original on Switch as well.

Have you played?

In the original game, you took on the role of Date. An investigator at ABIS with a special AI companion implanted in his eye. Now, in this game, that isn’t really the case anymore since the focus is more on daughter Mizuki. In this game, you also play as Ryuki who is another investigator at ABIS. Both these agents are involved in a cold case which they are trying to solve for their own reasons. After the case going cold, suddenly 6 years later a new clue is found that totally reopens the cold case. So, why did the case turn into a cold case and why suddenly after 6 years are there new clues found?

In terms of explaining the story, that’s all I’m willing to say to avoid spoilers. I know I might be cutting it a bit short or being extremely vague, but this is a sort of game where you should go in as blind as possible. The story in visual novel adventure games like this one are best experienced as blind as possible. At least, that’s the way how I enjoy it the best. And sidenote, to avoid spoilers I’m going to explain some things in this article with rather generic terms instead of the in game terms.

Something that really surprised me in the opening few minutes of the game is that there is something implemented that is something I think should become a standard in other visual novel games. A sort of check to avoid spoilers of the original game. Since this game is a sequel, there is a potential that people start with this game before the original. And if you won’t get yourself spoiled on the previous game, certain pieces of dialogue are changed if you are unable to answer the questions about the ending of the previous game. Then, it skips over the dialogue that spoils parts of the previous game. Apart from a few lines, it doesn’t change too much, so you won’t be missing out if you answer the question or not.

In terms of writing, this game really delivers. The new characters don’t feel out of place at all. I honestly sometimes felt that the new characters were background characters in the original game… The voice acting in this game is one of the strongest points of this game. They make the characters come to live and pull me in the game’s world so hard. There are some weaker moments in this story, but overall, these are far and few between. In general, this pacing and story of this game is good.

Something that’s really great in this game is that there is a sort of glossary. When you forgot who a certain character is or what a certain word means, you can easily look it up in your file. There is some amazing value in there as well. So, I highly recommend reading through it.

Explore the dreams

Just like in the previous game, in this game you have to explore people’s dreams to find answers and clues for your investigation. If you played the previous game, it’s very familiar. In these explorations, you have 6 minutes to unlock the mental locks of a person to find the big clue that’ll let you progress into the game. Each interaction costs a certain amount of time, so you have to be careful and really think your actions through.

You do have 3 “retry coins” you can spend to travel back to a previous checkpoint. So, if you mess up, and you want to restart a certain section with a bit more time, you can travel back. If you don’t have enough retry coins or game-over, you’ll have to restart from you’re the start of the exploration. Also, in these explorations, it’s possible that the story splits into two paths. Now, I highly recommend that you explore all paths to the end before going to another path.

There are some additional mechanics during these explorations that can influence the time used, but that mechanic is somewhat underused in this game compared to the original. I played this game on the highest difficulty setting and to be honest, while the puzzles are interesting and a blast to figure out… I found them a bit too easy. Furthermore, I have to admit that I had to write some puzzles down on a piece of paper, but rarely did I get stuck or didn’t know right away how to solve a puzzle. The original game was more challenging.

With that said, it doesn’t mean that with easier puzzles that this game is less fun. Maybe I got lucky in figuring them out, or the experience of solving these puzzles from the previous game helped me out here.

Something I really like is when you full beat one of these dives, you unlock that dive without any time limitations. So, I can find out what the dialogue is in the wrong options and enjoy more of the enjoyable writing of this game.

This game controls extremely well. I don’t have any complaints on how this game controls. There is one minor complaint I have. There is one mini-game in the pause menu, which you can’t select by going through the menu. For the longest time, I thought I was able to only play this in handheld mode, but you just have to press the minus button on the controller to enter it. But I’ll talk more in depth about the mini-games and such later in the article.

So, these explorations in people’s minds isn’t the only mechanic in this game. There are also reconstructions you have to do. This is where you have to search for clues in a crime scene to answer a question. These moments are a lot less punishing since they don’t have a time limit.

These moments are a nice distraction to the game. Since, they help to sell that there is actual investigation work going. Yet, some of the hardest puzzles are in these sections. But, if you get stuck, the biggest hint I can give is to write the puzzle down. In these sections, there were one or two puzzles that would work a lot better if you were able to look at the clues, so that’s why I highly recommend you to write them down.

Another gameplay section of this game are the moments with quick time events. These moments are easily the weakest link of this game. I found these moments a bit boring since they are basically an interactive cutscene. You know when they are coming and these moments would have been so much more fun if they weren’t quick time events since they slow the scene down when they happen and these scenes are supposed to be fast paced actually. I’m sorry, but the implementation of the quick time event scenes in this game isn’t the best in this game. All these moments blend in with each other a bit too well.

Now, you can change the difficulty of the quick time events and the exploration moments. So, if you want to focus more on the story instead of the gameplay, that’s totally possible. Lowering the difficulty makes the game easier since it has less penalties for you. The game doesn’t lock any content away from you by lowering the difficulty.

The final gameplay section you have in this game is the investigation section. Where you go from place to place, so you can talk to the various characters to gather more information. During these moments, you can look around and investigate the environment for additional world & character building, jokes and dialogues.

These moments are just the right length. I never really felt that the conversation went on for a bit too long. Also, you can save during at any time during these moments, so when you have to leave the game and want to come back, you can comeback to a save point. This game also saves automatically. But speaking about saving and loading, this game has only one save slot. So, don’t forget about that.

Costumes and such

The music and sound design in this game is quite enjoyable. The music fits this game as a glove. I have already added it to my playlist, so I can listen to it while I’m working.

In terms of sound effects, the high quality is there as well. I don’t have any complaints about them. Most of the sound effects are just like the previous game, and they worked extremely well there.

Visually, this game looks excellent. There are some very minor rough spots, especially in low lighting, but they didn’t bother me too much. Overall, the visuals fit the atmosphere of the game extremely well. The new locations created for this game fit extremely well in the world. The animations in this game are great as well. I did notice some minor animation flaws here and there, especially with the mouths not always closing after some dialogue. But on the other hand, they help put the expression of the character come to life.

Now, let me talk about the performance of this game. Overall, I noticed barely any performance problems during my playthrough. There was some minor slowdown here and there and I felt like some cutscenes ran at a bit lower framerate compared to the rest of the game but overall, nothing really major in that regard. The game did crash on me. Three times even. Thankfully on moments where I didn’t loose to much progress but it did happen.

This game took me around 35 hours to complete and also to see some of the additional content. So, I think that the price is totally worth it.

One of the last things I want to talk about are the mini-games and the DLC. There is DLC for this game in the forms of alternative customes for the AI assistants in this game. Overall, the additional content is quite cheap but it’s 100% costmetic. If you are a fan of silly alternative customs, they are the right fit for you.

Now, during the game you can unlock eyeballs. With these eyeballs you can purchase the unlocked costmetic items via the bonus menu in the main menu. You can also unlock concept art and other materials. Some of these items even have some easter eggs in them!

What you can buy with these eyeballs depend on your progress in the game. Now, something I really like is how you are unable to unlock everything when you have seen the true ending of this game. You’ll have to go back into the game to go in alternative routes and maybe try the wrong options to have a new evalution. There are in total 40 evaluations to unlock and completing the true ending, I still had 16/40 left to find.

The only dissapointing thing is that there are barely any hints in the game to find these remaining endings. I think it would be a nice feature if you are able to see on which day you can unlock that evalution after you have seen the true ending. This doesn’t take away the challenge of searching for the ending since each day has a lot of content to go through.

There are two “mini-games” in this game. One is a sort of advice room where the AI assistant of the character you are playing as plays a sort of shrink for you as the player. I rarely used this mode apart from it also being the dressing room of the costumes you bought. The combinations you can make with dressing up your AI ball are numerous. I just wish that there was a button to “sync” costumes between them.

Anyways, there is one other mini-game I have to talk about. This is a sort of Tamagochi where depending on how you answer the questions, your tamagochi AI-ball evovles into different AI-balls. Each 20 minutes you get a question. You have four different possible replies. Depending on your replies, a certain stat increases and you can get another creature. Since, it all depends on the stats you increase. You can also unlock a guide when you reach a certain type which can help you unlock all the others. It’s an enjoyable destraction to the game but apart from it being a nice source of eyeballs to purchase costumes, I found that there is nothing really to it. While I can totally see some people enjoying this, I’m not one of those.

Overall, in this article I have mostly praised this game. But, there are a few things that don’t work at all and can be improved in a patch or a sequel. The first big thing is the small font of the option menu. If you play this game in docked mode and sit a meter of two (which is +/- 6 feet), the option screen becomes close to unreadable. Thankfully, there is a zoom feature on the Switch and the top right infobox gives some hints… But still, that menu is too small. If they wanted to keep the same visual design, just make more pages with a bigger font.

A nitpick I have is that when something is added to the file, and it’s in the manual… The green dot is so close to the binder of the manual that you can barely see it. I think changing the color of the manual in the file would have been a great move.

Another nitpick I have is when you go to the bonus section from the main menu, you only see Aiba there. I have never seen the other AI-ball there. I found this a missed oppertunity. It would be kind of fun to have a random chance to see either Aiba or Tama there.

The final thing I dislike about this game is that there is no real run button in this game. You do have a skip button, that’s pretty close to the “auto” button, but you can’t run in explorations. I would even not mind it with having a run button and it costing twice as much time to move around… Since, the walking speed is a bit slow when you are playing again to find the other endings.

So, with that said, I have said everything I wanted to say about this game. So, I think it’s high time to wrap up this article in a nice conclusion so people who are looking at this article to know if this game is any good or not and don’t want to read everything have something to quickly read.

Conclusion

The good:

+ Enjoyable story where you can avoid spoilers of the original.

+ Amazing soundtrack.

+ Creative puzzles.

+ Great controls.

+ …

The bad:

-Some slowdowns/crashes can happen on the Switch version.

-Too small options menu.

-Missed chances with quick time events.

-Some minor issues in terms of polish like one of the mini-games being reachable with a button instead of it being highlighted when scrolling through.

Final thoughts:

To answer the question I posed in my introduction, I think that this game is a worthy sequel to the original game. The game is quite a lot of fun to play and I had a blast playing it. The game has it’s weaker moments but those overall are no big issue compared to the overall package. This sequel can also be a great entry point into the series and there are a lot of winks to veteran fans.

There are some issues for sure and the story has some weaker moments but I might repeat myself but the positive and fun moments far outweigh the negative moments. I enjoyed this game so much when it finally released here in Europe that I even pulled an all nighter during my summer break while playing this game. It’s so much fun.

Thanks to it releasing in my summer break, I have already beaten the game and now I’m looking for the things I missed but so far, it’s one of the best games I have played all year.

Personally, I highly recommend this game to everybody who enjoys adventure and/or visual novel games. This sci-fi thriller story is a blast to play through. This game comes also recommended if you enjoy playing mystery solving games. The original game now has a demo as well on the Switch eShop and if you enjoy that, this game or the original are going to be such an amazing time!

With that said, I really have said everything I wanted to say about this game. I want to thank you for reading this article and I hope you enjoyed reading it as much as I enjoyed writing it. I hope to welcome you in another article but until then, have a great rest of your day and take care.

Score: 90/100