Games Beaten - September 2023

Surprised this thread ain't up yet. Usual one:

16th September - Murder by Numbers - 30h 19m 57s

Ranking:
1st - Murder by Numbers - Really shouldn't be number one but as the only game I completed it's there by default. I find this game repetitive and bloated with a weak detective story attached

Completed
Blasphemous II (2023)
Trine 5: A Clockwork Conspiracy (2023) //hard combat, medium else

Replayed
Prince of Persia: Two Thrones (2005) //hard
Trine 4: The Nightmare Prince (2019) //hard
Prince of Persia: Forgotten Sands (2010) //medium (weirdly there is no harder modes)
Prince of Persia: Warrior Within (2004) //hard
Darksiders (2010) //apocalyptic (warmastered edition)

would most recommend game outside September called Cocoon. one of bestest vidyas played this year

Toaster Jam (PC | itch.io) ~ 8/10
The Wolf's Bite (PC | itch.io)
No Response (PC | itch.io) ~ 7/10
Baldur's Gate 3 (PC | Steam) ~ 8/10
Dredge (PC | Steam) ~ 9/10
Foretales (PC | Amazon Game App) ~ 7/10
The Dark Pictures: Little Hope (PlayStation 4 | Physical) ~ 6/10
How To Cope With Boredom and Loneliness (PC | Steam) ~ 7/10
Townscaper (PC | Game Pass) ~ 8/10
The Forest Quartet (PC | Epic) ~ 8/10
Donkey Kong 3 (NES | Nintendo Online) ~ 5/10
A Date in the Park (PC | Steam) ~ 4/10

Some great games this month. My favorite were Baldur's Gate 3 and Dredge :)

Broken Sword: The Sleeping Dragon - 11h - WORST
Devotion - 2h15m - REPLAY
Downfall (2016) - 4h30m - REPLAY
Grand Theft Auto: Liberty City Stories - 7h30m - REPLAY
Grand Theft Auto: Vice City Stories - 10h - REPLAY
HROT - 18h20m / 100%
One Finger Death Punch - 6h - REPLAY
The Cat Lady - 5h30m - REPLAY
The Silver Case (2016) - 17h / 100% - BEST
Titanfall 2 - 10h55 / 100%

I got myself a Deck so most of this month I spent replaying some of the older gems on it, the rest is a couple projects I've started months ago and managed to finally wrap up.

Broken Sword: The Sleeping Dragon is the third entry in the BS series and the first to ditch classic point & click gameplay for a more modern control scheme in full 3D environment. Sadly, it's absolutely awful for a myriad of reasons: it's a bitch to set up on PC even when it comes to simple things such as changing the resolution, keeping subtitles on or rebinding controls, all of that gets fucked upon each and every restart for some reason. The 3D visuals are much too outdated even for 2003, the dialogue pacing is all over the place with audio cutting off here and there, there's QTEs with unskippable cutscenes (you can't skip a thing in this game), almost complete lack of puzzles and whenever there is one, it always involves pushing crates, most of the environments are awkwardly quiet and desperately need some sort of ambience or music, freezes & random bugs are also to be expected and, who would have thought, the ending is just as rushed as everything else. Nico's and George's voice actors as well as the few bits of soundtrack are perhaps the only redeeming qualities here. That leaves me with 2 more games in this series, the next allegedly being worse and the last returning to its original roots.

Devotion has become one of my all-time favorite psychological horror walking sims that I wish I could have bought on Steam before it's been taken down over some stupid joke, but I tracked down a copy on the developers store later down the line anyway. I've already expressed my love towards this particular gem and can't recommend it enough.

Downfall (2016) is the third game in Harvester's catalogue and the remake of their first project from 2009. To give you the most basic idea, it's Silent Hill in 2D and borrows mosf of its tropes such as the environment and characters the player encounters representing a fraction of their mental state or the past or visiting places of "macabre nature". It's not as good as The Cat Lady and doesn't really add any QoL features such as being able to sprint or skip dialogue on subsequent playthroughs, but it's still a well-written take on darker subjects.

Both PSP versions of Grand Theft Auto: Liberty City Stories and Grand Theft Auto: Vice City Stories were emulated on the Deck and it's been an awesome trip down the memory lane revisiting these two, but I seem to be more aware of their flaws now, mostly rooted in the mission design. Luckily, I could save myself some trouble by using save-states to avoid driving back to mission triggers every time or losing my weapons (LCS), but I don wonder how I managed some of these missions back in the day. Despite the absence of the right analog stick, I still think they control just fine and auto-targetting as well as the car handling both get the job done.

HROT is a throwback FPS shooter running on an engine the solo developer has programmed himself in Pascal with a depressing Eastern European setting, Painkiller-esque enemy design and every pixel oozing atmosphere. Fantastic environmental audio with the guns sadly playing the weakest part, I really enjoyed the ammo scarcity to reinforce the idea of using the right tool in the right moment as well as to not underestimate your melee weapon or the ability to kick, the secrets are weill implemented without being too cryptic, the gunplay feels extremely polished and there's tons of cool references to discover. Difficulty feels right and all the needed options (quicksaving, FOV slider, rebinds) are there. It's not reinventing the wheel, but it's an FPS with a character of its own nonetheless and I enjoyed it alot more than Prodeus or Dread Templar.

One Finger Death Punch is a mobile-tier game I've been addicted to in the past and one of the first games I've beaten on the Deck: basically, it's a fighting game that consists of only 2 buttons (left and right mouse click on PC or X and B on the Deck), but that's not to say the game is easy, oooh no. My original plan was to get a perfect score in each level (and there is a fuckton!), but that's been dropped the moment I got to Master (Medium) difficulty where things get ridiculously fast and I decided to settle with simply beating them all. This playthrough has been done on the hardest mode (Grandmaster) and I could just barely get through the last batch of levels, but it still remains a really fun game that you can always come back to in short bursts.

The Cat Lady is the second Harvester game and perhaps their best release yet, a really depressing narrative that I found relatable 11 years ago when I first played it. Much like Downfall (2016), it too is completely in 2D and has a simple UI with most of the environments painted in black & white. Everything from the superb voice acting / music to the unique artstyle and the variety of tasks is close to perfection, the save system is a bit weird and you can't skip anything but none of that will bother you on your first playthrough anyway.

The Silver Case (2016) is a remaster of Suda51's first project released in 1999 on PS1 and it plays like a visual novel for the most part. If you are familiar with Suda51's works (No More Heroes, Killer7), you know what kinda weirdness you get yourself into. But I believe this might just be the weirdest he's done and it's hard to explain what it ultimately is all about. The extremely convoluted plot and its bureaucratic writing aside, I enjoyed it the most precisely for its presentation full of style and, well, weird as well as the charismatic characters, without even hearing their voices! Be asured, this is not a VN for everyone and it takes a special kind of mindset to enjoy. It's just so..... japanese, through and through. I'm not even sure if I can really recommend it since it's not even the type of game you can sit down and "play" for hours. Like I said, strikingly unique.

Tifanfall 2 should probably have earned the BEST spot for its incredibly smooth gameplay mechanics and the larger focus on movement, with graphics still holding up to this day and BT's character development being done exceptionally well for how short the campaign is. But it honestly should have been a tiny bit longer, there are so many fun set-pieces that greatly incorporated all the gameplay's strengths and each one of them ends before you get into the groove of things. Aside from its CoD-campaign-esque-length, there's not much to criticise here: the gun sounds are punchy and the arsenal is fairly varied, wallrunning and double jump abilities are highly responsive, the visuals are crisp, the performance is flawless and the difficulty feels right. It really do be a delightful time for what it offers and I'm sure there's some fun to be had in MP, especially now that it's been revived again, but that's not my cup of tea.

Guacamelee! 2 9/04
Beyond: Two Souls 9/23
Heavy Rain and Beyond: Two Souls Collection 9/23
Half-Life: Source 9/25
Payday 3 9/26
Half-Life: Blue Shift 9/27
Half-Life: Opposing Force 9/28

Ranking:
1st: Half-Life Opposing Force
2nd: Guacamelee! 2
3rd: Half-Life: Blue Shift
4th: Half-Life: Source
5th: Payday 3
6th: Heavy Rain and Beyond: Two Souls Collection
7th: Beyond: Two Souls

Beat two games this month. I had one in mind which I wanted to finish but it didn't quite get around to playing.

September 26th - Baba is You - 46 h 30 m - (Main+) 7/10 - Beat most of the levels in the map, ??? and depths areas. Got 194 seeds, 11 flowers and 1 orb.

September 30th - Storyteller - 5 h 18 m - (Main+) 4/10 - Beat all levels fully and got 28/31 stamps and 3/5 achievements.

Super short TLDR of my reviews for each game:

Baba is you: Fun but too brain-numbing at times.

Storyteller: Too short for the price.

Managed to beat 13 games and add 3 to my 100% collection.

05/09 - Volcanoids (7h, COOP)
07/09 - A Little To The Left (3h)
11/09 - Steelrising (18h)
13/09 - Nanotale - Typing Chronicles (6.5h)
14/09 - Rollerdrome (15h, 100% Achievements)
17/09 - Trek to Yomi (4h)
19/09 - Resident Evil 7 (11h)
21/09 - Shadow Gambit: The Cursed Crew (40h)
22/09 - Keep Talking and Nobody Explodes (5.5h, COOP)
25/09 - Spelunky (7.5h)
25/09 - Crysis 2 Remastered (14.5h, 100% Achievements)
28/09 - We Were Here Expeditions: The FriendShip (1.5h, COOP)
30/09 - Crysis 3 Remastered (16h, 100% Achievements)

Best:
RE7, Rollerdrome, Shadow Gambit

Worst:
Trek to Yomi

9/04 Fatum Betula
9/04 Five Nights at Freddy's
9/05 Five Nights at Freddy's 2
9/14 The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom
9/17 Unravel
9/21 Five Nights at Freddy's 3
9/24 Five Nights at Freddy's 4
9/24 Armored Core VI: Fires of Rubicon

Didn't get around to playing as many games as I would have wanted this month due to school being hard, but I did get a few things done. The games I have marked as spoiler are supposed to be for a special project I'm working on for Halloween for my blog, that I don't really want to spoil the surprise for. My favorite game this month was probably Armored Core VI: Fires of Rubicon. I've never played a mech game before, and this one was so much fun. I had a good enough time to where I went back and did 3 extra playthroughs to see the secret ending and get the platinum trophy. Shoutout to Tear of the Kingdom also which I heavily enjoyed, but I slightly preferred Armored Core to it. The worst game that I played this month was probably Fatum Betula. I was overall a bit disappointed in the execution of this game after playing the pretty solid demo a few months ago. The game is a bit too slow and cryptic for my liking.

9/25 - Sly 2: Band of Thieves (PS2)
9/30 - Syphon Filter (PSX)

I got sucked into reading for most of September so it took me most of the month to finish Sly 2. Anyway, if I had to rank them Sly 2 > Syphon Filter.

September was quite the productive month!!

- A Short Hike [PC]
- Lover Pretend [Switch]
- Kingdom: New Lands [PC]
- Subsurface Circular [PC]
- Café Enchanté [Switch]

Hopefully October will come with many completions too!

Only two games for me: Dordogne and that was finished right at the start of the month after having started it in August, and Beacon Pines. I loved Dordogne. Enjoyed playing Beacon Pines but had issues with the ending.

Well, I ended up finishing three expansions this month for the same game. So that's something?

Quake II: Ground Zero (PC, 09/04, 6/10)
Quake II 64 (PC, 09/06, 8/10)
Quake II: Call of the Machine (PC, 09/11, 7/10)

I finished all the Quake II content this month for the new remaster/re-release of the game. To start off with, I didn't think Ground Zero was as bad as so many people were saying. All the problems people had seemed very minimal to me, especially when it came to the new enemies like the turrets. I played on Easy as usual so I don't know if that just made things better but it wasn't terrible. It's not great either, mostly because the new weapons aren't that fun to use and the pacing is significantly worse than in The Reckoning. Like most Quake II content, they copy and paste WAY too many Gunner Enemies. This will be the only time I say that throughout this post, because I don't want to sound like a broken record, but it's ridiculous that The Reckoning was the only expansion to realize that this was a problem with the game design. Backtracking was more do-able with the new Compass feature added to the game, so it wasn't awful. The opening cutscene was a lot of cheesy banter from the Marines which I found amusing. Anyways, this is still the worst expansion despite not being a trainwreck like so many people have said.

Quake II 64 was much better. It's almost as good as The Reckoning. It's a much shorter game and it has WAY more personality than the previous expansions. There's more flashiness to it, like having a map screen to show where you are and also in general just having more restrained level design and less enemies, which I found not to be a bad thing especially considering the pacing is just much better in Q2-64. It respects your time and is short and sweet. I found this to be the best thing I played all month.

Call of the Machine was fine I guess. There's tons more enemies to kill than in any of the previous content for Quake II and there are some fun moments sprinkled throughout the game. I like that for the absurd fights with tons of enemies they give you enough powerups to deal with the fights which is pretty nice so I have to applaud them for that. The second half has some more interesting levels on desolate planets and there is a callback to the Shambler boss in the first Quake which was amusing, but overall I felt it was more of the same and pretty unspectacular.

This month is Forza Motorsport month! WOOOO!!!! I'm really excited to start playing the new Forza Motorsport game as I've been waiting for it for several years now. I'm also in the midst of finishing Deadpool on PS3, which is a fast and fun Action Game similar to Devil May Cry in some ways. I'm not a fan of the Deadpool Character but the gameplay is just so good that I can easily ignore the oftentimes bad humor. If I have time, I might even play more Dynasty Warriors 9 considering I played it with my sister and it seems like a very rare example of a "So Bad It's Good" game. Anyways, that's all I can say for now. Cheers everyone!

1. Dinoforce (TG16)
2. Unholy Night: The Darkness Hunter (SNES)
3. Hihou Densetsu Chris no Bouken (TCD)
4. Mizubaku Daibouken (SAT)
5. Mizubaku Daibouken (TG16)

Ths month the games i completed are:

Completed:
Stranded Sails: Explorers of the Cursed Islands - A nice game with relaxing enviroment
Tales of vesperia - A game i really liked i did play more then 100 hours.

Replay:
Metro Exodus

September 28 - Resident Evil 4 (2023) - 14h 37m
The only single player game I finished in September and I'm pretty satisfied with it being the sole game to be completed this month. I purchased it on a sale and I feel like I would have enjoyed for the full price, but waited until now since replaying the original sated me when the remake released. Would recommend as it is same, same, but different in a good way compared to the original RE4.

Only one game completed in September, but was great:

- Sea of Stars - Series X - 19/09 - 32:23 h

I REALLY enjoyed it, since I'm pretty fan of traditional JRPGs such as Dragon Quest. I liked the story, the graphics and the improvements in gameplay. 100% recommended.

Holidays work and other duties meant I was not doing much this month:

05-Sep-2023 - Oxenfree (PC) – 3H49M
26-Sep-2023 - Bonbon (PC) – 25M
26-Sep-2023 - F.E.A.R. 3 (PC) – 9H13M

So a tiny, a small and a medium-sized game (see my size guide below).

Oxenfree won IGF Excellence in Visual Art back in 2016 and I can understand why. The presentation is very interesting with characters interacting with each other as they walk about, giving you a choice of chiming in using speech bubbles or ignoring the conversation. It's a spooky puzzle game, but unfortunately, except for the visuals and presentation, it offers very little.

The same goes for Bonbon - a small itch.io game from the bundle for Ukraine. It feels almost like a developer trying his first experiment in the game engine. Suggestions that it comes to horror replaying our baby nightmares and hints of child abuse are very thin on the ground. Thankfully, it's very short.

F.E.A.R 3 marks my completion of the F.E.A.R series - which I played from the first to the last including all expansions and DLCs this year. For me, this was the best of the series. Many people consider F.E.A.R 1 the best and this one the worst. Playing them in quick succession, I disagree. This is by far the best and a very enjoyable - albeit short, first-person outing. With the generally low-quality games I played this month, this is by far the best.

My Game Size Guide:
Tiny (0-2 hours), Small (2-6 hours), Medium (6-14 hours), Large (14-30 hours), Huge (30-62), Epic (62+)

I have completed 15 games this month. Most of them are indie titles, but my favorite completion of the month would be Yakuza 4 Remastered. Other than that, I haven't really progressed with my big titles, which I am planning to do during October.

Another month with no completions for me. September just breezed by so quickly 😅. Hopefully I’ll have at least one for October.

Sep 01 - Jurassic World Evolution - PC
Sep 02 - Shadow of the Tomb Raider - PC
Sep 03 - Chicory: A Colorful Tale - PC
Sep 11 - Vivisector: Beast Within - PC
Sep 24 - Squirrel Stapler - PC
Sep 24 - Orbo's Odyssey - PC
Sep 25 - Zortch - PC
Sep 30 - Death Stranding: Director's Cut - PC

Death Stranding was actually pretty good, the deliveries can get a bit tedious though so I didn't do too many of the optional ones.

I have actually managed to finish a few things in September, unlike last month.

Muv-Luv: Alternative - One of the supposed magnum opuses of the medium (at least as far as I could see, this is how it's often viewed) and I can see why, but to me personally, it was just alright. I'm tempted to say it was good, but that would exclude Extra and Unlimited, the first two parts of this trilogy. Because those were at best mediocre, and I can't just say to skip them, because the story would probably be pretty confusing without them. On its own though, Alternative was a fairly engaging read, if not without its own issues. The big battles, however, were excellent, those were immensely exciting sections, edge-of-the-seat stuff, wish there were more of them. In the end, I'm not sure I can say that the entire trilogy was worth it, and I'm also not sure if I can recommend just skipping parts of it to get to the good bits, but all in all, it was alright.

Mass Effect 3 (Legendary Edition) - I finally finished my replay of the original trilogy that I started at the beginning of the year. They are all excellent games, this one included.

Last month I told myself I'd focus on longer games on September, since my backlog was getting kinda skewed to the longer side and I wanted to maintain some sort of balance between short games and long games. So what did I do? I completed 10 games, 7 of which were very much on the short side... Whoops

Untitled Goose Game - Sep 09
Yakuza 3 Remastered - Sep 12
Pokémon SoulSilver - Sep 12
Gris - Sep 18
Rusty Lake: Roots - Sep 19
Batman: Arkham Knight - Sep 20
Azure Striker GUNVOLT - Sep 24
The Quarry - Sep 25
Drop Alive - Sep 25
Rusty Lake Paradise - Sep 27

Now, to be fair, most of the short games I completed this month were games that I played with my girlfriend, so I DID spend most of my solo gaming time focusing on longer-ish titles that I had been meaning to get to, so it was not that bad. And it was definitely a fun month in terms of gaming! Nothing super amazing, but definitely many enjoyable moments

And now for October, I think I'll be sticking to this plan. Long-ish games while playing by myself, and shorter games when playing with other people. Let's see how much I actually follow through with that, though...

On September ___ I beat [or retired] ___ and gave it a score of ___.

09 – [Helldivers], 70%
04 – The Beginner’s Guide, 85%
04 – Aperture Desk Job, 75%

Best
The Beginner’s Guide is extremely creative, and it's an impressive narrative execution. The themes are intriguing and thought-provoking. Your distance may vary depending on how much of yourself you see in the narrator or in Coda. Definitely worth a couple hours for a unique experience.

Not Best
Nothing bad this month. Aperture Desk Job wasn’t as novel as I hoped it would be, though it’s my fault for playing it with mouse and keyboard. Still some good chuckles. Helldivers was grindy and there’s no story worth mentioning, but it is chaotic and fun to play with a friend.

(Xbox One) Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Shredder's Revenge- 100%

(PS4) Call of Duty: Modern Warfare- 75%

(PS4) WWE 2K Battlegrounds- 20%

(Wii) Where the Wild Things Are- 60%

(PS4) Bayonetta- 90%

(Switch) Dream Daddy: A Dad Dating Simulator- 100%

(Xbox One) Yakuza 0- 100%

Kero Blaster - PC - September 26, 2023
Murder by Numbers - PC - September 18, 2023
Guacamelee! 2 - PC September 08, 2023