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[choppy]

yeah, sorry about the video. action was acting up. (heh) before hand it was recording hardware noise so it got a little better with some tweaking.

[Sappho]

Sheb volunteers for masochism! I'll randomly select your game:

There were 2 items in your list. Here they are in random order:

Naninights
Shattered Haven

Naninights it is! Still need a victim for Shattered Haven...

When it comes to audio when recording games, I have a few tips from my own experiences trying to balance it, for anyone who is interested.

Spoiler: Sappho's Happy Fun Time Audio Recording Tips (click to show/hide)

1. Always test the audio before you start recording. Start up the game and start recording with game audio playing and say a few test phrases, then go watch the clip to make sure you can hear your voice over the game. Most of the time, the game audio will drown out your voice. Remember, it is more important to hear you talking than to hear the game audio. Microphones usually record fairly quietly so you'll need to drop the game's audio almost to zero a lot of the time. (When I record for Minecraft, I put the sound at 5% and I still end up having to reduce the volume later in editing.)
2. Practice speaking clearly. If you're used to talking quietly or mumbling, you won't be intelligible on the video. You can also adjust the microphone recording settings in your system settings ("Sound" in the Windows control panel assuming you're on Windows). By default, they tend to crank up the microphone boost, which makes it noisy and crackly when you speak loudly. Turn that down - clarity is more important than volume.
3. Record sound in a separate program from video and sync them later in a video editing program (I use Adobe Premiere, but there are free ones as well). This lets you balance the sound perfectly for ideal results. I record video in Open Broadcaster Software and audio in Audacity.

[BFEL]

0/10 you wasted a completely good opportunity to use "swordgasm."

Spoiler (click to show/hide)

Well by the end Swordfriend DOES end up penetrating you

[TheDarkStar]

I can take Monkeyhead's other game.

[Sappho]

I can take Monkeyhead's other game.

Sent!

[TheDarkStar]

Mr Makeshifter

From the store page: "To play the game 'straight' you would reach each successive exit until you surmount a final challenge. Action-driven puzzle elements encourage exploration and backtracking, and could lead you to alternative routes, or simply spice up the game world based on your choices." "Tools and Crafting," "Food," "Player-Driven Endings." (For some reason, the game page does not mention that this is a 2D platformer.)

Yeah, right.

The first warning was the single review on the Steam Store page. Although it's positive, it has nearly the same wording as some parts of the game description, suggesting that a developer wrote it.

The second warning was the recommendation that I use an Xbox.

Then the game started. The initial cutscene (ew cutscenes, but at least it can be skipped, right?) had some... interesting grammar in a few places, but most of it was fine. Unfortunately, the cutscene did not make sense. Someone gets a giant egg from a cave and carries it off, and then some plant-looking thing that flies attacks them later. Then the ground opens up and drops them into a chasm? I don't get how this works.

Then the tutorial starts. It's supposed to be "extensive". It does show how to do things like move and jump and use things, which is good. Unfortunately, it doesn't explain "how to use doors", which is why still can't get past the first level.

Next up is the crafting system. Although described by the game as "innovative", I can't tell how it's different than any other crafting system - you pick up items and then you combine them. However, some things don't make much sense - rock + spring + pole = some kind of pogo stick thing that can move really fast?

The UI makes everything worse. Each inventory space has its own key, but that's just for selecting. It requires another key press to use an item. To craft items, they have to be selected again and then the crafting key has to be held down. To pick up an item, you can't just select an empty slot - you have to be crouching. Each one of these things tends to double the time spent doing any particular action (and this is after I rebound everything because the default settings are terrible).

After playing for a while, the tutorial does not make sense either. I have seen no button challenges in the real game and one really important piece of advice - how to go through doors and finish the first level - was not in the tutorial. Also, what are these "clue" things I keep finding? The pictures they show are not helpful.

The graphics are distracting in a bad way. People look just a little bit strange, especially the protagonist's sprite. In the level itself, it can be hard to figure out what things are - for example, there's a thing that looks kinda like a doorway but I'm not really sure because I can't interact with it. In general, the artwork is basic and I have trouble figuring out what most things are. The levels are obviously designed to be based around blocks (the edges of the level don't even have the grass visual effect on them) and, despite them being random each time, they always feel the same.

The combat system is basic. You press the button, you attack on both sides of yourself. Except that most things do damage to you anyway, and there isn't a good way around this. Thrown items tend to go upwards instead of right or left, so they don't really help.

Movement is normal - WASD + space + shift along with grabbing onto ledges. I remapped it, but I changed the key for sprinting to something else and the game wouldn't let me change it back - for some reason, it didn't accept either shift key as the key binding even though one of them was the default.

The game does have one feature - you can only see things in the character's field of vision - but this field is large enough that it's not really noticeable. It doesn't affect the game (despite what the Store page says).

Finally, the story is lacking. The game says it's character-driven, but I've seen no plot since the opening cutscene and some disjointed things in the first level. It might change in other levels, but (as I've said before) I can't see how to get to them.

Overall, I would not recommend this game unless you like unfinished-looking platformers with extremely annoying UIs.

Gameplay: 2/10, could not finish first level; existing gameplay was repetitive.
UI: 1/10, bad design choices were made
Replayability: 1/10, annoying to play.

Overall: 4/30, or 1.333/10 - "Don't get this game unless it's free."

[Sheb]

Oh gosh. It HAD to be an horror point and click? Well, I'll see if I can convince my SO to hug me while I play this. 

[GentlemanRaptor]

Discovery! A Seek & Find Adventure

A Review With Images

Okay, before I get the review proper started, I'm going to give you a brief impression of the game's art.

Ahem.

OH GOD MY EYES. MY EYES HAVE MELTED OUT OF THEIR SOCKETS AND ARE DRIBBLING DOWN MY FACE. OH SWEET JESUS I THINK SOME GOT IN MY MOUTH.

Thank you. And now, back to our regularly scheduled review.

Discovery! is a hidden object game, or HOG, centered around a game show where contestants visit various places around the globe and...look for things, I guess. Riveting program, really. At the game start, you are presented with a screen that prompts you to enter your name. I attempted to type my username, ran out of characters, and then typed Butt because I am a mature adult and definitely not secretly two children standing on each others' shoulders and wearing a trenchcoat.



There are a variety of different options for your avatar. Some of them are even locked! Do I care enough about them to play the game enough to unlock them? Not at all! I will be going with the dignified old woman avatar, because the juxtaposition of that and the name Butt definitely doesn't make me snicker. At all. Stop looking at me like that.



Ah, finally we have reached the menu screen! What wonders await beyond? (Spoiler alert: none. No wonders.) Here the game demonstrates the latest in fashionable art and design: When you mouse over the Play button, our friend Butt does a quick line of cocaine and puts on her most winning smile



and when you mouse over the Change Avatar or Exit buttons, she starts to drop a deuce behind the podium



like so. Since I don't want to clean that up (and the whole coke thing might be easier to explain anyway) let's hit that Play button!

And welcome to hell the self-proclaimed number one game show on the planet with your host, JeeeRRRRY LaNDeRs!



What, you thought I was kidding? That's how his name is spelled in game! That just annoys the hell out of me - fonts with inconsistent capitalization. Yes, all the text in the game is spelled like this. Yes, the kerning is godawful. Yes, it makes me want to find the creator of the font and beat his head in with a typewriter. But enough about my font-Nazi tendencies, let's get to the meat of the game! ...after we meet the contestants. Up against the lovable cocaine-fiend Butt are two wonderfully endearing side characters.

• Jane Wright, a third grade teacher with three degrees and three kids. Probably could use a little cash on the side.
• Mark Cleaver, a real estate broker who is trying to pay off his mortgage with the money from the show.

This is the only attempt at story in the whole game, apparently. Now, it is a hidden object game, not a Bioware RPG, but at this point I dislike the game enough that I'm looking for any excuse to knock points off. What, you thought this would be objective? Well I don't really like hidden object games, and I really don't like hidden object games that cause my eyeballs to burst from their sockets like something from Event Horizon, so there's that. Oh, you want to see the horror of which I speak? Put on some goggles to keep your eyes in their sockets, and take a look at this.



Okay, so I exaggerated. Sue me. But I'm like 80% sure that France doesn't look like a bad Photoshop job in real life! And here's the kicker - I'm pretty sure that not one of these things is an original asset, unless the team hired someone to take a ridiculous amount of pictures of inanimate objects. And it isn't like they didn't have an artist - so did they just not care? It's not like photorealistic HOGs are impossible. My personal theory is that the artist that did the characters was devoured by Beelzebub, Lord of the Flies, who then forced the developers to create all the environments in Photoshop lest he devour them too. And he's also in the code of the game somehow. It made more sense earlier.

Oh, the gameplay? You actually expected me to PLAY this?

...well I played it. For you. And it sucked.

It plays much like any other game in the genre: click on the background to find items. That's it. The main mechanic is pixel-hunting. And it can be done well - but it isn't here. The combination of the haphazardly put-together background and poor quality of the actual images makes for a frustrating experience. The list on the right updates as you find items, until you find all the items that Beelzebub JeeeRRRRY has decreed that you must find. And the hint button? Not a hint at all. Clicking the hint button just reveals the location of one of the items on the list. Oh, one more thing - when you successfully find an item, your competitors start pulling faces.



Clearly, Jane has developed constipation, while Mark is succumbing to severe depression over the prospect of not being able to pay off his mortgage. Poor, poor man.

There are some minigames involved as well, but I didn't stick around long enough to find out how they play. Can you blame me?

The Verdict

Don't get it unless you really, really like hidden object games. It's not worth your hard-earned $9.99. Instead, consider the much more enjoyable Magicka, which is also going for $9.99 and is miles better than this game. Or, you could save up your money and purchase the $79.99 Mumbo Jumbo (the devs) Collection! Or don't, it's not my money. Now if you'll excuse me, I have some eyeball goop to clean up off the floor.

(Other game review coming soon!^TM)

[BFEL]

Airship Dragoon

You ever hear the phrase "War is 99% boredom followed by 1% excitement"?
Airship Dragoon is a 99% accurate war simulation.

It LOVINGLY renders all the tedium of the logistics needed to wage your battles, and when it comes time to invade your enemies, it makes absolutely certain you don't miss a moment of the action by having all your soldiers walk at a brisk pace towards the enemy (hopefully at least, as you only know the general direction of their camp) and *ENSURING* that every action is preceded by a minimum of 3 onscreen button presses.

You see, the tactical view battles work similarly to the original XCOM, but with all joy slowly and deliberately sucked out of it.
Your units have action points they can spend on a variety of things such as movement, shooting, using items or just mucking around with their luggage (which takes roughly half their turn's worth)

And that's about as far as I got before I couldn't take it anymore and just quit.
I wanted this review to be more snappy and humorous, but I just can't work up the energy after that.

[MonkeyHead]

Yeah, apologies for not being able to download/play/review, but hey, at least this way some other bugger gets the fun

[TheDarkStar]

Shattered Haven

How do I review this? It's kind of a top-down RPG. And it's kind of like the original Legend of Zelda. Plus some puzzle solving for good measure.

In the plot, you play two parents looking for their child in a post-apocalyptic world. How is it post-apocalyptic? There are zombies (called "Grays" and vulnerable to iron, which isn't confusing at all ) and giant crevices, that's how. From 53 minutes of play, it appears that you travel around the overworld and enter portals to do smaller maps. You have to pass every map to progress (probably on to the next area).

The gameplay isn't too bad, although it's a bit repetitive. Generally, the point of each map is to kill all the Grays. I don't actually know why, but that doesn't matter as much. The main issue is the way that zombies are killed - most weapons are melee or are traps that zombies walk into, with several variations that feel the same.

The music is good at times, although I don't really like the overworld soundtrack and some of the level soundtracks are really annoying.

UI: The UI is decent. There are only four usable spots (and they are bound to WASD for some reason - movement keys are the arrow keys) and I had to check a bunch of keys at the beginning like the various interaction keys (some appear to not always work? IDK).

The graphics are... interesting. As a DF player, I don't really mind them (some things kind of resemble the DF texture packs with much higher resolution, actually) but there are times when it doesn't quite get the point across - what trees are "weak" and can be felled with the axe I found? (I figured it out by hitting every tree until I found one that worked.) Also, it can be hard to tell characters apart at times.

Although it was interesting at first, I stopped playing because I got stuck on one of the early levels. I looked through it several times, but I didn't see any way to solve it. There probably is a way (and I would probably find it with more time), but the levels were already starting to feel somewhat monotonous.

Overall, the game is somewhere in the middle. It's not amazing but it's not terrible.

Gameplay: 5/10, but that's because there's something I don't like about the genre that this is. I'm not quite sure why.
UI: 8/10, usable (and there are lots of settings) but it can be clunky at times
Replayability: 2/10, it gets repetitive really fast.

Overall: 5/10, not good and not bad. If you get it free or for sale and you enjoy puzzle games, go ahead! If you really, really like obscure experimental puzzle games, you might even want it for the full $9.99 price. However, if you don't like puzzle games, then this game is probably not for you.

[choppy]

here is a link to my primal fear video with the audio boosted. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zqUjn4F8_ug

thanks for the tips sappho.

[RickRollYou2]

Moto Racer Collection

This one's a collection of four games--Moto Racer, MR 2, MR 3, and the 15th Anniversary of MR.

The Original

The original Moto Racer is much like an arcade game--graphics from the late 1980s and a sick soundtrack. There's not much to say--you're a motorcycle racer, and you race races. You can choose from a practice mode, single race and the CHAMPIONSHIP. I.e., standard choices for a racing game. Revving noises are mandatory. Pretty reminiscent of the kind of machine in arcades you sit on and pretend to ride, but with more intense motorcycle revving. With the announcer coming straight from Double Dragon Neon, I felt like I was a kid from 1980s USA playing an arcade game. I'm not even from the USA. It should be noted that this is the only one in the collection that lags everytime you turn a corner. I have no idea why.

2

This one has arguably worse graphics than it's predecessor, but still has a certain narm charm to it. Kind of looks like they pixelated everything and smudged it together. Like an oil painting, but without the oil and with MOTORCYCLE REVVING NOISES. Soundtrack is still sick, and you'll feel pretty alive when start your engine up. It has a much more polished start screen, if we're going by first impressions. Just like it's predecessor, it has loud revving noises. That made me feel good. However, when I was in last place, a weedy voice also announced that I was in last place. That made me feel not so good. Did I mention revving noises?

3

At this point, the graphics have evolved to the style of Mechwarrior: Mercenaries (that is to say, photo-realistic-ish), except you're in a motorcycle, and you'll mostly be fighting your own bike. This one seems to have a more touchy physics engine, as I slipped, slid and catapulted myself over the heads of the other racers to victory. My biggest complaint is that they replaced the glorious roar that 8 24 engines screaming to life simultaneously produced with a weedy hum. Maybe they're electric bikes? The soundtrack also became slightly jazzier, and I'm not sure what to feel about that. Races begin with you walking swaggering to your bike, which, I gotta say, at least attempts to make the player feel cool.

15th Anniversary
This is just the first one, with updated graphics. Slightly louder revving noises? I can't really tell.

Overall
If you've noticed I talk primarily about graphics, that's because I feel that's all that's changed. Updated graphics, updated soundtrack, more racetracks, but same gameplay. I can't blame them--they've sold me what I asked for. I (well, Sappho) bought a game called "Moto Racer Collection" and that's exactly what I got. Moto racers. And revving noises.

They also seem to have kept the same announcer for the first 3 games, which made me feel like I was coming back to an old friend. Or maybe they just have generic voices.

Now, I've never been a big fan of racing games, so I can't say for sure my review is entirely fair. I suppose if you want an old timey looking game where you race bikes with the AI or in multiplayer (I think it's pretty dead) then you could do MUCH worse. Overall, it's actually a pretty good arcade game, considering its age.

[Sappho]

Just a few days left! Keep 'em coming!

[Sheb]

Naninights

First of all a disclaimer.  I'm a total wuss when it come to horror game. To the point that making me play horror games to see my jump around and hug me back to quiet has been a favorite pastime of several of my girlfriends.

So, did you ever play Five Nights at Freddy? Did you like it, but though "this game is too well made, it makes me feel inadequate? Also, naked smurf with gas masks are way scarier than animatronics dolls? And I just have too much fun in my life?" Well, then Naninights might be for you.

The game is literally a bad, lazy FNAF clone. The blurb on the steam page inform us that we are in a lab, a test subject was let loose after someone forgot close a gate and he's not prowling for you in a lab which consist of a hallway, a child's bedroom and another hallway.

Meet our main villain. Apparently it's some "human engineering" project so top secret they didn't even remove the "blank number" from the subject slip.

Yup, it's a 8-year old with a plastic gasmask

Also, notice how he apparently get very naughty by period ending by 6. As any babysitter will tell you, kids get very naughty at 4:07.

So you play from this room. You've got a mirror, a small light cube and a gate, each blocking Gasmask Smurfy from one of three way into your room. Of course, you have a power bar that gets drained by looking in a mirror or keeping a vent closed because... I dunno. And of course, the killer smurf can be scared by looking at him in a mirror.

How is a light in the office supposed to scare him in the other room? And where are the doors?

Clicking where the heart is open the camera map. No, wait, not camera, apparently you're using psychic power of an A.L.I.F.A.* mask to see around the place, because FNAF did cameras or something.

BTW, here is what the map looks like. Notice how the entire facility consists of four rooms, which all are only connected only to yours. Smurfy Boy can apparently teleport through walls to to jump from one to the next. He also sometimes randomly shows bellow that bookcase in the office for no reasons.

Worst. Babysitting job. Ever.

Now, for the scary part? Well, if you let Masked Pedophile Fantasy gets to your office you have what is probably the most pitiful jump scare ever. Don't mistake me, I AM a wuss, and that sent me jumping two meters away on the bed to land behind a conveniently placed girlfriend that then got to hug me to make it go. But seriously, is this supposed to be scary?

Final note: 1/10 I guess technically it's a game, and at $2.99 on Steam it does provide a better fun/price ration than buying three dollars worth of ground glass and shoving them up your nether region.

*What exactly IS an A.L.I.F.A. mask is never explained. Nothing is ever explained. The game promise to "reveal the truth" when completing it, but after watching videos of masochists finishing it, you only get two screenshots showing masks in display case.