Hmmm, well it's difficult for me to say since I usually love giving games a chance to thrive, but might be treading on water with this one lol

I don't think I dislike any game but I think the closest for me is Minecraft, I can see how it's a good game but doesn't really fit my style and don't think I'd enjoy it or even get it if it wasn't for very close friends of mine wanting me to play it with them. To me it just feels very average like if I wanted to do things like explore a big world or build houses or fend off against creatures at night then there are much more games I can think of that does way better in those things.

I don't hate it but I do think it is very blown out of proportion and can't really consider myself a fan of the series despite me acknowledging it's a good game even if it doesn't vibe with me.

Take all of the time you need to get to feel better Celicnis. Your physical and mental health take priority after all so I hope you have a swift recovery.

Linear story-driven games are kind of my cozy zone: it's like reading a book or watching a movie, but in an interactive way. If Rebirth is a linear game, it's not a big problem for me, but the game has to keep high the tension and keep pushing me the thrill of being hunted or the thought I'm in danger. 

Talking about Still Wakes the Deep: this is precisely a linear story-driven horror game, but sadly it just disappointed me in what the game should have done to me. The fear, the adrenaline, the horror. None of this exists in this experience because the game is not just linear; it's foregone. 

The oil rig is beautiful, full of details that give the rig a living soul, as are the workers and their stories. But it's just a scheme, a facade that vanishes when trouble occurs, and the horror should appear. You don't empathize with other people because the game doesn't give the player the opportunity to do it, and the level design keeps using a bright yellow tone to indicate where you have to go, killing the sense of bewilderment. 

The voice acting is astonishing, tho: the game is set on the North Sea, and everyone is Scottish with their funny accent. 
The experience in general started very good, only to lose pieces at every progress you made till the very end. 


Still Wakes the Deep: 4h 25m - 65%

I'll leave here some screen made across the game. 









 
PS: English isn't my first language, and despite the fact I can read and listen without any problem, I want to write this blog also to improve my writing, trying not to use IA to write the post (just scribbr to check mistakes). Thanks to everyone for the reading and the patience!

Never would've been able to tell English isn't your first language, you're doing pretty amazing as is

As for Still Wakes The Deep, I'm a bit disappointed haha
I had my eye on it for a bit since it sounded like a cool concept with a cool atmosphere, just hoped it had the story to back it up though it still looks cool from the screenshots you provided so I'll give credit to the devs for how great they made it look

Yeah, it's just up to interpretation though that can change depending on the person. Like a difference between completionist for Pokemon games can be the difference of completing all of the story, side-quests and extra challenges compared to someone else that considers it collecting all of the pokemon which can make the significant gap in the times. They do allow the descriptions at least on what you consider to be the main, main + extras and completionists but realistically I don't think there ever will be a genuine amount of time that's right just based on everyone's skill level or if they have to retry a lot like dying in a souls-like game. Just have to do our best and use the times as a guideline rather than the rule.

Pretty sure it's impossible to unlock all achievements mainly on PC that now no longer have their servers available for online play and online play related achievements so just gives more of a reason to wing it and record the times that feels right to you about what is honest.

I wish I had some good tips but I feel as I've been going I've been getting more meticulous with details so even though I'm better at being faster in some ways I've slowed as I add more to my process. I guess one thing that helps is since I'm always behind my videos for completions I always have the footage for my next game ready by the time I get to working on it. Although I guess a negative of this I'm noticing as I'm working on my Engage video is I have to really search my footage sometimes to find the clip I want since I can't remember exactly when it happened as its been awhile since then. That was the nice part of doing my Jurassic Park video right after, as it was all fresh in my memory. I feel the struggle will be real there when I eventually complete Tears of the Kingdom, which I've had ongoing on and off since release 😅. I'm thinking I might need to start taking notes of when noteworthy little things happen, as it might help me save time searching. I think as we go, we'll get better in our process though and learn little things to speed things up.

But I agree no matter my speed I enjoy making these. I really enjoy that making these videos lets me really reflect on the experience and also preserve my thoughts and memories of the game.

Looks like we're in a similar situation with getting the footage ready for the next game by the time we're done with the other videos from being behind haha.
Personally I try to record on/off multiple times and I found that helps find clips much easier than trying to find it within a stream like cutscenes before stages, the stage, cutscene after, etc. Just much easier to find especially with the video preview within the file explorer, then I look over them (crop sections if needed), then name them in the method that works for me. In longer games like botw or totk, it benefits more to play the game first at some point to get a better idea on if something is about to happen to getting you ready to record at those points. Honestly games that have an autosave I found harder because if they don't have autosave then you can look over the clips to make sure it looks okay before saving at the next checkpoint so turn it off if possible.

These just happen to be what I found to be more useful so hopefully it helps save some time on your end to help make it easier on you. Best of luck

So no new video review posted yet but got some updates!

So first off I got a capture card for my 3DS so I can now capture footage of DS and 3DS games! Definitely excited about that, as since I've started my video reviews I've been hesitant to play those as I couldn't capture the footage. Plus it'll come in handy when I want to do Pokémon Nuzlocke videos in the future! With this I now can capture the footage from any game system I have so there's no limitations now! Already going to put it to use too to get footage of the 3DS Fire Emblems for when I reference them in my Engage video!



As per usual I haven't done as much gaming as I'd like. I've played more Tears of the Kingdom and Path of Radiance but haven't made much progress. I started playing Lethal Company too with some coworkers, which has been fun! Not sure if I'd make an individual video on it, or at least not yet, but I think I'll include it in my ranking video at the end of the year at least if I keep playing it more. I actually did have a random completion though last month! I got the Jurassic Park Classic Games Collection as a gift from my girlfriend, so I ended up playing the NES Jurassic Park and completing it. Seeing it was fresh on the mind I kind of skipped ahead and made the review video for it already! I'm going to wait to post it though since I want to post my reviews in order still. It'll be nice to have a few steady releases though so glad I got ahead there.

I'm back to work on the Fire Emblem Engage review now, which is definitely a monster of a video and probably will be awhile still. Its does feel nice to have taken a little break to make something quicker though with the Jurassic Park one. I'm hoping it'll be quick to beat the Obra Dinn video too and I want to still beat a few shorter games to have a nice steady flow of completions and videos for awhile before my next big one is completed.

Anyways that's it till next time! Will my Engage review be ready by then? I hope so! I definitely wish I could pump these out faster, but until my life is more stable it'll probably be hard to be consistent. Sometimes I do wonder if I should keep trying to review every completion, as I have lots of other video ideas I want to do, but at the same time I like recording my thoughts on every game and making the videos so I plan to still keep it up as is.

Video Reviews Backlog:
Fire Emblem Engage (Editing)
Return of the Obra Dinn (Script Written)
Jurassic Park NES ✅(Complete, waiting to drop)
Fortnite? (Script started, might restart it from scratch)

Games Currently Ongoing:
Fire Emblem: Path of Radiance
The Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom
Sackboy: A Big Adventure (with my girlfriend)
Lethal Company

First off, congratulations on getting the capture card, lots of good ones on the ds and 3ds to take advantage of on making videos and taking your time to cherish all of the small aspects of the games to me at least makes a more unique and better video because it feels more thought out and personal experience exclusive to you.

Second, uploading once a month sounds pretty good honestly, just been dabbling in the process myself and feels like a lot longer than a month to get the footage, plan what you're saying and then the time-consuming editing haha. Maybe I'm overdoing it and choosing much longer games but feels much longer than you'd expect to make a video. If you got any tips on what helps you save time then I'm all ears but feels like not much of a rush is needed since it looks like on my end at least you're balancing, work, hobbies and video consistency anyway so no pressure with that. Probably much better to enjoy the process and the games anyway so keep up the good work.

How to prevent the feeling of just "beating the game" and just enjoying it can go for a lot of things outside of games and the thing is to never think of it as a task because it then feels more like work rather than a game. It reminds me of the same concept on why people say you shouldn't make a job on something you love because then the feeling of it feeling like work and just personal enjoyment kind of intertwines and you don't enjoy it as much. If you learn to isolate those feelings then it will feel easier to do so to just enjoy it.

I've played video games for pretty much as long as I remember and the easiest way to me personally is to go in with an open-mind but also think critically on it, sounds weird and like more work but mostly all games have a certain aspect you can probably enjoy whether it be the atmosphere or the art design, ost, level design, story direction, gameplay, etc. The point of a game is to be enjoyable so it's not exactly considered a task or something to just cross off, while I do have a checklist myself for my backlog, I do want to cross it off but also with under my standards, similar to how things you want to be proud of are not doing the bare minimum but also with a set amount of quality. If you don't find enough to appreciate from it, I think it's okay to accept that the game isn't right for you though they will have their own audiences.

Just personal preference though, I want you to think to yourself on if you find the game interesting without any external factors like the playtime or youtube reviews or people's opinions, when set with a standard, you will notice those criticisms that much more often and can hinder your experience and save them for after you finished the game yourself so you can at least decide for yourself on what you liked/disliked through your own lens. I have like 1000 total games on my HLTB list, completed maybe like 400 so far, never not completed games and having your own opinion or reason you want to play the game goes pretty far with avoiding burnout along with letting your curiosity take the lead once in a while similar to games like Breath of The Wild. If you're curious about something like what's over a certain mountain or what a specific town has inside, just follow your feelings and fortunately, game developers will probably reward you with that in some way too.

I guess in short, let your curiosity run wild, be open-minded about to appreciate and let your experience with the game be completely yours without being influenced by others while you're experiencing it yourself. If it gets to the point where it feels like there isn't enough to enjoy, then it's definitely okay to accept it's not for you and you can play another game that hopefully will make you feel happier.

Imo an authentic experience would probably be round $350-$400

I have a counter offer under $50:
plus game

I love amigo and ive always wanted to try the dreamcast game. Dreamcasts here are pretty affordable but a collection wouldn't be. Emulation I feel wouldn't be reasonable for ver. 2000 which is a real shame

Whatever works lol
The Wii also had similar accessories but it was more of the unstable precision that made people hesitate anyway, oddly enough I did see some reviews saying the Dreamcast was still more consistent than switch so quite the hefty accessory even back then.

If you do want to play the original just to see, there are a few emulation options since you can still play it with controller. Though it's a bit more complicated I'd also like to thank Dreamcast Live for preserving all Dreamcast DLC and the tools needed to input it.
Unfortunately even if you wanted to, I think Ver. 2000 being Japan exclusive made it significantly harder to find for emulators so wouldn't recommend it since all I found were sites that I'm guessing had potential viruses, just be way more cautious if you want to give it a go.

Very cute game with a good upbeat soundtrack absolutely. Shame to say that Ver. 2000 is the only one closest to the experience. Party Central looks fun but does more popular songs in general rather than latin-based. If you get your hands on it though, definitely a good time.

Glad to see you're enjoying Ghosts Of Tsushima, haven't had the chance to enjoy it yet but most likely will later this year when the Director's Cut comes out.

Also cool to see the Sonic titles up there as I grew up with most of the genesis ones and CD was fun to zoom around on though I don't blame you for not focusing too much on the time travel aspect. Hope you've been enjoying yourself so far so thanks for the post

It's been awhile since I was able to do a little something with this blog especially since life decides to throw some things my way like my Wii Remotes not working but eventually decided it's probably better to do one game at a time rather than a series retrospective otherwise this blog will never get updated haha. So to start off this blog, I want to start off with an iconic innovative series for still being one of a kind: Samba De Amigo.



The game features Amigo, a very festive happy monkey and his friends as you follow the rhythm of latin-based music with the instrument of choice being based off of maracas. There will be circles on screen and rhythm balls will head towards them with the beat of the music and you need to shake the maracas when the balls land within the circle.

Originally, the game was an arcade cabinet and was eventually ported over to the Dreamcast which also included the option to play with controllers. The Dreamcast at least only had 14 songs and a version called Samba De Amigo Ver. 2000 would come after that which had improvements such as adding more songs, Amigo's sister Amiga making her debut to the series, and arm waving gameplay mechanics. The Ver. 2000 was exclusive to Japan though, a 2001 version which was international was in the works but never released due to Dreamcast being towards the end of its lifespan especially with the new Playstation 2 coming out and getting a lot of the attention.

Years later there would be Samba De Amigo on the Wii or Samba De Amigo Wii as most people called it though it's basically meant to be an upgrade to the original using Wii Remotes. So technically 4 different versions of the same game, I'd say Samba De Amigo: Party Central is the only one to break that chain many years later.

Despite all of the games, the characters still stay the same so it's better to learn the character's names which were shown in the Dreamcast manual, just remember Amiga is Amigo's sister in addition to the cast. All are very cool characters I love to see in the game though that livens up the atmosphere. That and I also like the cheetahs Chumba and Wamba are based off of the band Chumbawamba, which made the song Tubthumping which was also in the game.



The original arcade machine looks super cool, the picture below is of the Ver. 2000 arcade machine which was oddly significantly easier to find a good picture of. I did find a picture of the original version but it was very low quality. From what I could make out, it looked very similar but had Linda on the machine instead of Amiga. The maracas of the machine felt like an amazing concept done properly though. The maracas have a place to be put down, the cord is long enough to not interrupt gameplay and on the sides of the arcade cabinet you can see IR sensors with the maracas also having IR LEDs within them towards the top of them. These things together along with the game adjusting it based on your height made them more accurate as the sensors help determine where the maracas are for more accurate controls.



The dreamcast version also had maraca controllers to help you get the arcade experience. They were around $75 at the time of release to include 2 maraca controllers, a floor mat and a sensor bar to place in front of your feet and these work the same way to where it's accurate enough to essentially be just as good as the arcade. Considering how it’s a very unique controller that worked surprisingly well, I’ll post a video that goes more in-depth to the maraca controllers if you’re interested in seeing it in action.



That’s a problem with the Wii version, the 2 Wii Remotes you had to use and the sensor didn’t really have a good way to track the controllers vertically so it was a lot more finicky in the controls since the game relied on the sensor at the top end of the Wii Remote, which doesn’t stay as consistent since the purpose was to shake the Wii Remotes. You could’ve also played with Wii Remote and nunchuk but the cord is too short to freely move, it’s trying to be dancing but also making sure you don’t go too crazy which kind of limits the experience.

The experience is a bit better once you learn more about the characters, the game doesn’t really have much of any story to go off of so to make it a bit easier, a book exclusive to Japan called Samba De Amigo: The Greatest Guidebook was released. Still never got an international version but the guidebook is about 223 pages total which included a game guide to the original game, character profiles, original concept art and a backstory called Amigo’s Departure.



In short, Amigo grew up with his mom and dad in the mountains and Amigo’s mom sent Amigo to run an errand in the town. Amigo passed by a shop with maracas in a glass case that captivated Amigo as if they spoke to him. The shopkeeper allowed him to shake the maracas and shaking the maracas was as if Amigo realized his calling to master the samba with those maracas. His mom was hesitant at first but his dad persuaded his wife that Amigo had to go as sometimes a man needs to do what their mind sets out to do and won’t be talked out of it. Amigo leaving that house led them to the journey to master the samba meeting all of his friends along the way. The Wii Booklet told a similar retelling to this but the original concept art and just 223 pages worth for a game you can probably complete fully within 5 hours in astounding.

In my experiences with his game, there’s just so much to love about it while completing the 14 songs. 14 songs is extremely small, though you could get 9 extra songs through the Dream Passport, think of Dream Passport as like the Dreamcast’s online functions to download content since the Dreamcast was kind of the leading pioneer to connecting online for additional content. Most of it feels like it was meant to be part of Ver. 2001 but never panned out unfortunately. A majority of the songs fit perfectly for Amigo adding so much replayability to enjoy the game. With Amigo’s energetic personality, playing festive or upbeat songs gets taken to new heights which are specially shown off during songs like El Ritmo Tropical, Livin’ la Vida Loca, and Al Compas Del Mambo.



It’s just hard to not smile with this game, Amigo goes through all of the emotions depending on how well you do, from clumsily wobbling in the empty streets to being the life of the party with his smile so wide and the atmosphere with the vivid colors. The audience adds so much too as they cheer for you completing difficult parts and clap along with the beat when you’re doing well which helps the game feel more enjoyable to play, immersed in the world as if you’re part of the party and helps you keep the combo since the rhythm balls also follow along with the beat. The Wii version took this aspect out but still has enough to enjoy just watching Amigo dance happily, sometimes it’s fun just watching the NPCs since some like the skeleton guitarists can jump, jump while spinning or even do backflips. Just follow along with the energetic beat, watch Amigo and friends put on a lively performance and end every session with all of your worries washed away in the samba.

While there is so much to talk about games in general, I think I condensed enough of it to at least cover the major things I wanted to mention for the in-game stuff, but there will always be something interesting you tend to see when finding information on games like these.

The major thing was something still without a definitive answer from the developers from what I could find and that’s the very many references to the number 38 in the series. 38 appears quite a lot, at the studio stage, there is a 38 on the carpet Amigo stands on, 38 on the backdrop behind the audience of kids, 38 on Bingo and Bongo’s drums, Amigo’s birthday being March 8th (3rd month, 8th day), in the Greatest Guidebook when Amigo leaves the house there is a 38 on the calendar, also in the same story Rio, Chumba and Wamba were on the Billboard’s Latin Charts for 38 consecutive weeks, Amigo in the wallpaper within the game files had a 38 on the side of his car and the licenses plate on the front was Amigo38.


in-game screenshots of 38 shown in each image

While no official answer has been announced as far as I’ve seen, my best theories was they decided to make Amigo’s birthday March 8th and everything was a reference to that or my other one being Sonic Team developing this game was part of the CS3 division in Sega which was later renamed SEGA R&D No. 8 (or called AM-8 but same division). The 3 and 8 from these names would make 38 so might be a reference to the game developers themselves. Maybe we’ll get an official answer one day but pretty much every game has a more interesting story associated with it, though it’s not the Dreamcast version directly, it’s still something I found while researching that I’d like to share involving Samba De Amigo Wii’s marketing.



Now if you’re like me, I thought this commercial was extremely wholesome and cute to see an actual chimpanzee look so happy playing Samba De Amigo Wii. There was another variation where the man’s bored family was greeted by the chimp bringing the game and maracas for the family to enjoy. One group however, most likely disagreed with that notion.

There was another commercial that has been pretty much erased from the face of the Earth (believe me I tried to find it), it was a similar commercial to these ones with the chimpanzee break dancing. PETA basically sent SEGA a message saying they should remove the advertisement because monkey trainers usually train their monkeys with extremely abusive methods like electroshock therapy, beatings, food deprivation and after they become an adult, they’re sent to a roadside zoo or sold to a laboratory for testing since they’ve outlived their usefulness. Just how extreme that sounded made me shake my head in genuine shock but surprisingly enough, SEGA removed the advertisement and promised to never use live chimpanzee actors ever again. PETA celebrated this decision and apparently gave them vegan chocolates in the shape of monkeys as thanks. Their post regarding the matter is still on their website to this day which you can find here: https://www.peta.org/blog/chimp-chimp-hooraysega-pulls-ape-ad/

There’s always interesting stories within pretty much any game you dig into whether being innovative or simply goofy and I’m guaranteed it’ll continue to be that way for as long as the gaming industry exists. Really don’t know if future updates on this blog will be easier or harder than this game but I’ll see what comes of it, hopefully you all found it as interesting as I have so thanks for making it this far. I’ll start seeing what games I can dive into next. Take care in the meantime everyone.

What you wrote was pretty good anyway, I think the best thing a writer can do is put the thoughts and experiences into the writing. The post felt confusing, oppressive, dark, with a sense of the burden of processing information and how it sticks with you even after the journey is over, you want to understand and seek answers but can't.

If that's the way you felt when playing then I think you did it well. Especially since you condensed down the 5 pages to 1 post when there is sooo much we could go into for the experience a game provides haha

Might be vomiting words but looks like a pretty good start to the blogging journey, having more detailed insights like yours is always a good thing to have more of. Certainly enjoyed reading it so great job and hope you did too.

There was a lot of trickery to imply 3d where it didn't actually exist, and 3D Blast is a good example of that.

Sonic The Hedgehog 3 and Sonic & Knuckles were meant to be one game but had to be put into two different cartridges due to memory constraints and for context, both games were like 2mb individually.

Time constraints were the main factor, since the game was to be released in Feb 94, and a lot of the game simply wasn't ready in the latter part of '93 from the original scope. The memory constraints were probably avoidable by using a larger rom size (apparently it was considered) or through better optimisation, since both roms have data that belongs to the other game leading to wastage. The game wasn't ready, regardless of memory capacities.

It's also worth noting that rom size is determined by the size of the chip needed to store the data, not the actual data itself (remaining space is probably written as 0's). Rom dumps contain the "blank" space since that is actually part of the data. Therefore 2MB+2MB rom does not necessarily mean a 4MB game had the original concept been completed, and those were in common use at the time anyway. Knuckles in Sonic 2 actually uses a separate dedicated ROM chip on S+K to contain the patch data for that particular setup but that is probably for technical reasons rather than capacity reasons.

That along with costs also influencing the decisions to divide it into two games and then the restructuring due to splitting it like lowering the difficulty of S&K since it was the start of a new game took some extra time as well. I still think it's extremely cool though to even consider the thought of lock-on technology to try to bypass some of those restrictions.

Certainly a unique way to think outside the box to get their full version out without cutting that many corners for it to work lol

Just now dipping my toes in n64 games, enjoying the fuck out of Banjo Kazooie
However, my thread is actually about something else - because I haven't played games like this before.

I've been becoming fascinated with the way that console architecture affects rendering capabilities, forcing devs to create certain types of games per console, or having some ports be a certain way (ex. n64/PS1 RE2 differences, and even the fact that an n64RE2 exists). Another example could be the PS1/Saturn Tomb Raider differences.

Even snes vs genesis sound boards differences are fascinating to me

Does anybody here have some detailed resources/podcast episodes/video essays that can explain/compare those differences in detail, as well as give more examples in the way those differences manifest themselves? I would love to know more. Unfortunately I'm not the most tech savy person, so do keep that in mind.

Thank you kindly

Actually pretty cool aspect to be interested in, I was actually thinking about doing some on my recent blog on here since I want it to be video essay-esque when I get the time but when you mentioned about the rendering capabilities forcing different types of gameplay, I immediately thought of Sonic 3D Blast.

For starters, Sonic 3D Blast was basically meant to be one of the final games for the Sega Genesis, Sega was more focusing development on the Sega Saturn around 1995 when the Genesis was at the end of its lifespan, they still created Genesis games for like 2 more years but 1995 was more like when their focus to Saturn rather than an output on the Genesis.
I think its extremely important to state just how small the games on the Genesis was able to handle, Sonic The Hedgehog 3 and Sonic & Knuckles were meant to be one game but had to be put into two different cartridges due to memory constraints and for context, both games were like 2mb individually.

Since you got games like Super Mario 64 on the Nintendo 64 (a significantly superior console in capabilites), pretty much at the era of introducing 3d graphics, Sega had to get creative on how to match up to something like that so they gave a majority of the project to Traveller's Tales and wanted them to use an isometric 3d view to have a game looking like 3d on the console.

It does look 3d on the surface but the creative part is most of it isn't, even Sonic in this game isn't 3d but rather a pictures of a 3d model from every possible perspective and turned into sprites to help greatly reduce the size of it all. Most of it is 2d and very few things such as the opening sequence was 3d, and arguably took a majority of the space. Leading the entire game (14 levels, 7 bosses, final boss, cutscenes, sound effects, music) pretty much compressed to around 2.5mb.



Since Sega had one of their Sonic games on the Saturn cancelled, Sonic X-treme, they decided to port 3D Blast with enhancements such as higher resolution models, more detail to the backgrounds, tiles having more realistic textures, physics such as bridges tilting when moving across it, water looking much better, weather effects, different special stages and that was closer to 600mb for the Saturn version so I'll leave a few comparison shots between the Genesis and the Saturn to see how different it looks.

I think its about time I give it my shot at creating a gaming blog since I've got a lot of backlog to get through but there's another aspect I like to do outside of simply playing the games, research.

I played a lot of games and I plan on making videos in my spare time based on games similar to retrospectives and there's a lot of various things I'd find that help me appreciate the games whether it be dev interviews, trailers, behind the scenes, mangas, references to other games, and so on.

Chances are there is still an interesting story even behind the development process or the final product outside of the game itself so my journey plans is featuring more of that to help show off more of the devs works, along with my personal perspectives on games including some of the things to learn from the games that we can apply to our own lives to make them better.

For a short bit on myself, I grew up with Sonic the Hedgehog, Wind Waker and Dragon Ball as my most influential things and helped me want to expand much further trying to see a bit from every console or series I can, if it exists, I probably know about it even to a little extent since I try to keep my ear to the ground on those kinds of things more than ever now and try to play or learn about any game series that catches my eye in some way, shape or form.

Though it might take a bit to get the consistency rolling with how life can be, I want to do my best to try to update often and see what I can bring to the table. Hopefully you'll enjoy what this journey will have to offer.

Truly too soon

grew up with Dragon Ball for so long and the motivation to try to work on self-improvement definitely has been affected by that series. The fact that Sand Land is coming out soon and was something he involved himself in as a passion project is just a shame he won't be able to stay to see the final product and how many more lives he'd touch with his timeless artstyle and legendary stories. Wishing his family and co-workers the absolute best for dealing with this tragedy.

As long as you try to manage that burnout when you can I'm sure you'll do a lot in the long run. Certainly got a lot of good series ahead so hopefully your blog helps a lot of the enjoyment and info for when you make it being a game dev. Wishing the best on your journey so good luck

Oki, so after one month, there are good and bad news:
Good news is, I've played and completed more games than I originally thought despite the mid-semester exams (I've even passed the 91% remaining bar, which hasn't happened in a while!)
Bad news is, Valentine's Day and free interesting GOG games have completely destroyed my progress 😭 (which is a good problem to have! I just feel a bit conflicted since even with my best efforts to stick to my resolution, it just seems never-ending, for better or worse 😅).

Anyway, here is the rundown for last month:

Completed Games

A lot of hidden cats games (those are definitely my weakness XD): 100 Hidden Cats, 100 Ninja Cats, Cat Search In The Wild West, 100 Robo Cats, 100 Dino Cats & Cats Hidden in Georgia.

Amongst all of these, I was pleasantly surprised by Cat Search In The Wild West and Cats Hidden in Georgia. The first one uses a lot of color schemes to hide the cats, and the rogue cats appearing after you click on their wanted posters is a nice addition. The second one is more complex than I thought! Still pretty easy, but some cats are very difficult to find compared to others in this franchise. I recommend them both if you like hidden object games, as they are either very cheap or free on the Steam store.

On the other hand, 100 Robo Cats and 100 Dino Cats were big disappointments for me. I'm starting to think about stopping buying cat games from 100 Cozy Games as they just seem copy-pasted from one another. The cats are very cute and everything, but it's not worth it if I can find all 100 cats in 2-3 minutes in a level. Maybe I'm just not the right audience for these, but they just seem like cat games and not hidden cat games. Do not recommend.

Orwell

This is one of the first games I completed on Steam. I only finished one playthrough at the time though, so I gave it another shot in the last weeks and completed my second and third playthrough to collect the remaining achievements. I'm so glad I did it! In this game, you read and analyze a lot of documents (newspapers, blog pages, social media, etc.) and decide which ones to give to inspectors to stop potential terrorists. So your perspective and what you feed to the machine determines the ending and the fate of the characters. Now mix that with a modern setup and a ''Big Brother'' surveillance vibe and you've got Orwell. Loved that game a few years ago and still love it now. Can't wait to play its sequel!

First Bite

I hesitated to put this one in the completed list, as I only completed the main routes and didn't play the DLC yet, but hey, it's both in the completed and the playing category so everything's fine. Anyway, great indie vampire dating sim! As the MC, you're a vampire expert, as in vampire modern nerd. You stumble upon a house that is rumored to be haunted and you decide to take a peek. In reality, you just stumbled into a vampire's nest. Good luck surviving and convincing them to not make you their meal. 😉 Gamewise, the variety of personalities and the synergy between characters is very interesting, and the many death flags add a touch of realism to the scenario. If you like dating sims with an 18+ touch, gender diversity, and vampires, this one is for you.

The Room Three & The Room 4: Old Sins

Yeah yeah, I know, puzzle games again. It's kind of a recurring theme of mine (and they are the easiest for me to complete, so why not). Anyway, those two are good sequels to the first two games. Sadly, they are a bit underwhelming compared to their predecessors though (especially the last one). The third game takes place in a mansion where you have to navigate the different rooms to escape. The multiple endings are a nice touch, but achieving them is way less intuitive than the main one (looking at you clock, you really made my brain work hard). The puzzles are nice. I don't have much more to say about this one. The fourth game of the series, though, is a mess. Again, you have to go through rooms to be able to escape a mansion (kind of), but this time, you have to go back and forth between places to use all your items, and boy does this give me nausea. Also, the puzzles are a lot easier than in their other games; the only difficulty is to remember everything going from one room to another. Despite all that, the story of the house's inhabitants is peculiar and it piqued my curiosity enough to finish the game. If you really appreciated the first two games, then go ahead. Otherwise, look away.

The Symbiant & The Symbiant Re:Union

Those ones, I'm mitigated. As much as the first game is an awesome and sweet BL story, the sequel feels rushed and empty from its meaning. Let me explain.
This visual novel follows three individuals: a spaceship captain, his second in command, and a mysterious alien passenger asking for a ride to his home planet with an unknown cargo. During this 3-4 week trip, a love (and horny) story develops between the captain and the alien passenger, but the unknown cargo causes suspicion and threatens the trust between the two. Will they be together at the end of this trip or will the mysterious sarcophagus keep them apart?

The first story has great pacing, interesting developments, twists, and turns. It's well-written, and I was really rooting for the ship to sail!
The sequel, though, is a whole other story. It follows two of the endings in the first game. Sadly, the way the relationship develops feels empty, and this sequel really felt like a Naruto filler: good for more content, but not significant one. The art style is also less satisfying in my opinion. But yeah, if you appreciate BL love stories, just play the first game (and carefully look at the warnings on the page, the NSFW patch isn't for everyone (I should have looked more myself 😓)).

Polimines 2

I don't have a lot to say for this one except that it's the hardest minesweeper variant I've ever completed. There is no guessing needed in any puzzle (despite what you might think or feel) so if you usually breeze through this type of game and are looking for a challenge, Polimines and Polimines 2 are good bets.

Super Mario Bros.

ScarletKitsune's conversation and their love for older gems gave me the push I needed to attack my classic backlog. At first, I thought I 100% completed Super Mario Bros., but then I read online that there are some new things in a second playthrough, so back to the playing list it goes. XD
Anyway, like I said, it's a classic, you can't go wrong. The last level makes me think of a haunted house level where you're always searching for the way out though (not my favorite level). It was interesting to see the origin of such an everlasting franchise (especially with Super Mario Wonders that recently got out and modified a lot of the usual Mario mechanics). Bowser definitely had a glow-up over the years, though. XD

Here it ends for the completed games in the last month or so. Regarding other updates, here is my new playing list as of late:
- Lords of the Fallen (2023) (my most played game as of late. The coop aspects are great! I've purified 2 beacons out of 5, so it's progressing at a good pace. Definitely my favorite souls-like as of now!)
- Needy Streamer Overload (I've almost reached the end of my first playthrough. Now I just need to get back to it 😁)
- Lil' Guardsman (had a great premise, a bit like papers please, but I feel like there is too much of a luck aspect to it and as an unlucky completionist, it bugs me a little. I'll have to continue it if I want to confirm or infirm my suspicions, though).
- Mass Effect Legendary Edition (nothing new for that one)
- Baldur's Gate 3 (nothing new for that one either)
- Shady Part of Me (Didn't find the solution yet. I'm starting to think about using a guide for that one part.)

Continuing to farm for achievements on / 100% complete:
- Globesweeper
- Yeah! You Want "Those Games," Right? So Here You Go! Now, Let's See You Clear Them! (reached 750 000 / 1mil, it's not much but it's honest work)
- Dogs Organized Neatly (almost over with that one)
- Turnip Boy Commits Tax Evasion (can't seem to encounter that d*mn shadow turnip on the Infinity Train 😭)
- The usual dailies, of course (A Little To The Left, Hexcells Infinite & Pokemon Picross (2015))

Previous Backlog: 794 Games + 20 DLCs
Previous Time to Beat All: 1007 Days 19 Hours

Current Backlog: 796 Games + 20 DLCs
Time to Beat All: 1017 Days 5 Hours

certainly a classic to get back to with Mario, need to get back to the classics myself which I certainly intend on doing outside of my busy work.

Super nice to see how well this blog is starting off. Hard to explain but feels like a lot of energy and the formatting looks so clean. You're off to an amazing start so hope you conquer more of that backlog along the journey.

EDIT: THIS BLOG HAS BEEN UPDATED, CHECK FOR THE MOST RECENT UPDATE IN THE THREAD. (5/14/24)

Frankly, it's not as unreasonable as a bunch of other peoples. But it is for me. I used to own over 2000 video games and over the past couple of years. I just kind of had a realization that I truly despise and hate this situation i've built for myself.
Gaming increasingly feels more like a chore, and the magic and enjoyment I used to find in video games becomes more and more like a science as I wonder why I even enjoy them. Sometimes I get so disassociated from my favorite hobby that it feels like I only play them because "pressing x to do 'this' attack and have it hit that guy releases dopamine." It really starts to make the whole act of gaming feel kind of gross.

I've never written one of these blog things, and i'm not really sure how to go about it. So i'm just gonna start with where I started with gaming.

I've been gaming since I was a little kid, I'm pretty sure my first ever console was a ps1. And most of my gaming was like, demo discs we used to get from magazines and stuff. I barely remember the games I played on that thing, but I remember some really good ones, like Tomba and Spyro the Dragon.

From there, over the years I got more consoles. Xbox, Xbox 360, Gamecube, PS2 at one point, Gameboy Color, DS.

I always loved games that were full of color and character. My standout memories in that regard being Eternal Sonata, The Legend of Zelda: Windwaker, The pokemon games and quirky RPGS.
During my youth a lot of people really gravitated towards like, gritty, 'realistic' games of my time, like Gears of War, Call of Duty, and bloody and gorey games like God of War. That just was never for me (except gears of war, the 2nd one was the best in the franchise to this day imo)
I always focused heavily on feelings in games, sound design, art, mechanics, design and messaging. Basically i'm a pretentious gaming snob.
And that focus has lead me down my palette for gaming. I really love seeing what anyone and everyone does with the medium. I try to dabble my fingers into pretty much anything, though that has narrowed down over the years purely as I am pretty insecure about being bad at games. But i'm trying to open my horizons again and feel the world out there again.

Back to the backlog. Basically my journey with gaming is that i'm starting to hate my passion. I truly miss the days of being able to breathe and feel free. To just whimsically put a thousand hours into one game and that being ok. Or replaying a game for the 5th time. I feel this constant demand and obligation this absolutely disgusting slew of games I own. And I've had to start opening myself to some truthes not only about gaming, but about life.
That i'm not meant to experience everything, that so many wonderful games I will have to watch with a heavy heart, sail on by. And that's ok.

I want to find meaning in gaming again, I want to find passion, and love, and creativity for this medium again. It used to propel me to the highest of highs and make my mind abuzz with thought and wonder.
But over the years i've numbed myself and made myself ground down to where I wonder what is the point of this, of anything I do (that sounds so out of base but I have a lot of personal tyings into this at this stage of my life (I am 30.))

So now i'm on my backlog journey. I long to be free of this burden, and I long to accept that notion that i'm not meant to experience everything. But I also want to see what lies beyond all of this. I do not believe I will actually beat all of these games. In-fact I expect many of them, I will let coast down the river away from me.
At this time of writing, I have 446~ games in my backlog. And it disgusts me. It's hard to believe there ever was a time I was so purely focused on quality and absolute true desire to engage in a game where I could look at my library with pride and every one had it's place. Like good friends persisting since childhood.
Now I just feel like gluttony, no taste for quality, only quantity. Which is not exactly fair to say to games, we now live in a time where there is just. Such a brilliant amount of wonderful games and experiences made by just about anyone from all over the globe.

But what is such a meal if you can't taste the difference from Chicken Marbella to Chicken Nuggets with vegetables garnished in a handful of spices.

Anyways. Enough about that, for anyone who care to read these blog posts of my journey. Welcome, and I hope you enjoy whatever updates I put out.

Hopefully you get back to that point where they held much fonder memories, even if you treat life like a game I think you can get there too but as long as you're doing it at your own pace or whimsy.

Nothing wrong with being a pretentious gaming snob haha

Also grew up with Wind Waker and couldn't get into those realistic games, the journey and sometimes the lessons learned from the games make it the experience that'll also make your life better. Hopefully the blog helps you put it into words because there's certainly a lot to enjoy with it all so here's hoping you enjoy the journey too.

Thank you for the well wishes!

Regarding Parascientific Escape and Rhythm Thief & The Emperor's Treasure, it's my boyfriend who found them for me. He's more of a collector than I am and always discovers interesting titles for me to try out. 😁 With the eShop closure almost a year ago, I bought a lot of DS/3DS games that would be otherwise unavailable or way too expensive for me to buy. A good chunk of my backlog comes from this period.

I noticed that a significant portion of your games comes from earlier consoles. What aspects of those mediums interest you? 😊

I hope your backlog won't get the best of you either. If you ever start a blog too, give me a heads up, and I'll follow your adventure too! 😁

Ah that figures haha, the Parascientific Escape and Rhythm Thief were ones I really enjoyed but I'm probably like your boyfriend where I try to be a collector of sorts of games that interest me and the demos of both of those games were enough to convince me to purchase.

As for the older consoles, I think its because I was behind a bit like a console generation or two when I first started so I am a lot more lenient about games in general since I can see the improvements throughout the years, and I think seeing those different variety of games helps me enjoy the effort put into it a lot more as well including researching like their development history and stuff like that.

I do have a bias more towards Sega though since I was a community moderator for them at one point and was really proud of that and wanted me to try that their other past titles I haven't seen before since some of their current games have references to them.

As for the blog, I really considered it but I'm not sure if I want to take the dive since I've been busier and it might be inactive in weird bursts haha

Oh man, I don't know how to do this, but if I never start then how can I hope for actual progress. XD
So welcome everyone to this pandora's box that is gaming to my poor wallet!

Hi! I'm Eleanora1315 (you can call me Ele, Eleanora, etc. I really don't mind 😊).
I'm more of a casual player that tries to squeeze in as much gaming time I can while tackling university courses. Therefore I'll try to keep up regular updates, but it will all really depend on how much time I'll be able to dedicate to video games.

For now, my main objective is to maintain or reduce my backlog. So I have a policy of maximum one game bought per one game completed in 2024. 😁
Let's see how long this will last . . .
Also, I'm working on old games I've started but never finished / long term goals. I'm more of a 100% completionist type of person, so it's really hard for me to mark a game as completely finished without getting all the achievements and the tiny itty bits of contents. 😅

At the moment, I'm playing the main story / part of the following titles:
- The Room Three (currently working on the 3rd chapter)
- Mass Effect Legendary Edition (currently playing the first game, I've cleared all the side missions I could + Noveria. I've just started Feros.)
- Amnesia: Later x Crowd (completely cleared Kent's parts of the fandisk during the holidays and now I'm trying to get through Ikki's)
- Baldur's Gate 3 (mid act 2 I guess? Hard to say since this game has so much content and side quests)
- Fantasy Life (cozy and quasi infinite game 💛)
- Shady Part of Me (I'm stuck on a puzzle in chapter 3. Let's see I can find the solution any time soon!)

I'm also farming achievements / alternate endings for those games once in a while:
- Globesweeper
- Slay the Princess
- Yeah! You Want "Those Games", Right? So Here You Go! Now, Let's See You Clear Them! (that 1m dollars' achievement is going to be the end of me . . . 😤)
- Persona 3: Dancing in Moonlight
- Persona 5: Dancing in Starlight
- Dogs Organized Neatly
- Turnip Boy Commits Tax Evasion (my luck is trash and even after a while I can't seem to encounter the shadow turnip on the Infinity Train 😭)
- A Date with Death (I've only completed one ending for now, the DLC's one, and I can't wait to see the others! 🖤)
- Cooking Companions (really loved the ambiance and the characters, but I can't seem to get back to it! Argh, one of my biggest challenges at the moment 😓)

All while trying to keep up with some mobile games + the daily puzzles of those three:
- A Little To The Left (100% completed, I just like the daily puzzles 😊)
- Hexcells Infinite (There are 10 000 puzzles available in the infinite mode, let's just say I'm trying to chip that bit by bit)
- Pokemon Picross (2015) (Since I started that one after the eshop closure, the limited amount of picrites I can farm everyday blocks any significant progression, hence why I'm playing a bit daily)

I didn't put everything up there, since I kind of go back and forth between a couple of titles, but those are my most frequently played ones as of late.

Regarding my monster of a backlog, all of it (with 2-3 exceptions) are all games I'm planning to play. There is no iffy or random bundles there sadly / happily. My time is based on 100% completion at average speed though, and since I have some very long games there like Civ VI and Fire Emblems games, it may seem bigger than it actually is? No, I'm not trying to cope here, don't know what you're talking about.

Some of the sorts of games I love
- Otome Games
- Puzzle Games
- Visual Novels in general
- Hidden Cats Games 😻
- Story-driven Games
- Mario and Zelda Series
- Information Games (don't know how to explain that one. Good exemples would be Home Safety Hotline, Orwell and maybe Papers Please?)
- Rythm Games
- Little Horror Games made with RPG-maker like Ib

Some of the sorts of stuff I play here and there / with others
- Souls Games
- RPGs
- Platformers
- Adventure Games
- Anime Inspired Fighting Games

Some of the sorts of stuff I tend to avoid
- FPS
- Games using Street Fighter's style
- MMOs
- Racing Games (Mario Kart is the exception 😉)
- Farming Simulators
- Space Setups
- Bullet Hells
- Sport Games
- LEGO Games

I'm relatively new here, so don't hesitate if you want to discuss a bit, I'm a bit shy / slow on the answers though, just be warned.
I'm also taking recommendations if you have some, preferably already in my library so I can continue to fight the backlog 😅 (but you can also be very cruel and expose me to new games you think I would enjoy 😈).
I'm mostly a PC and Switch user, but I also have at my disposition most modern consoles except for Xbox devices.

Hoping this won't be a scream into the void and that I'll actually continue to go through this insane backlog. 😅
Thank you for embarking on this journey with me!

Current Backlog: 794 Games + 20 DLCs
Time to Beat All: 1007 Days 19 Hours

Hopefully it all goes well for you Eleanora, clearing the backlog must be tough with how many games you find, don't really see many people find Parascientific Escape or Rhythm Thief & The Emperor's Treasure if they aren't actively looking for new titles haha.

Won't be adding recommendations to make sure you don't go deeper in the backlog's grip but hope it turns out well, my backlog needs to be taken down a notch or two when I get the chance but wishing you all the best and I'll try to keep a look out for your progress.

Ah so you also grew up with doodling Robotnik bosses, they just seemed so easy yet fun to come up with mechanical animals and the sort haha
Hope your backlog battling goes well Crowdog and that the newfound confidence takes you far, can't wait for part 2

Happy New Year everyone!!
For this new year I was thinking about trying new genres, so if you guys can give me any jrpg recommendations. I was thinking about finishing persona 3 before the remake come out but idk.
I used to play in the past but know seems impossible to me if u know a good start let me know ;D

If you don't mind a bit more difficulty in yours then I highly recommend The Legend Of Heroes: Trails Of Cold Steel, one of my all time favorite games I just happened to find in passing.

The Legend Of Heroes series in general is seen pretty favorably but can only vouch for Cold Steel at the moment since the others are in my backlog haha

So, I have accumulated over the years about 100 extraneous games in my Humble Bundle account. In the spirit of the holidays and the new year, please take some of them off my hands and enjoy them! Reply to the thread with what you want and I'll message you a Humble Bundle gift link, where you should be able to go to reveal your Steam key. You must have been a user of this site for at least a few months, and normal Halloween candy rules apply: don't take too many; leave some for others. I'll strike through games from the list as they are claimed. And apologies if it takes me a little while to get back to you. I'm not checking this regularly, but I'll respond to replies in order!

Edit: The list continues to be chipped away. I've deleted everything that's been gifted. Here are the available games as of 3/16/2024:

Alien Spidy
Archangel: Hellfire – Fully Loaded (requires base game, which is free)
Ashampoo Photo Optimizer 7 (via Ashampoo)
A-Tech Cybernetic VR
Beholder
Burnout Paradise: The Ultimate Box (redeemable on Origin instead of Steam [note to self: this is on my other account])
Canabalt x2 (note to self: one is on my other account)
Command & Conquer: Red Alert 3 – Uprising (redeemable on Origin instead of Steam [note to self: this is on my other account])
Corridor Z
Draw Slasher
Drawful 2
Driftland: The Magic Revival
DV: Rings of Saturn
HIVESWAP: Act 1
Lust for Darkness
Magicka
Monaco
NecroWorm
Neverout
OddPlanet
Out of Reach: Treasure Royale
Pathway
Radio Commander
Rustler (Grand Theft Horse)
Shing!
Starfinder: Pact Worlds Campaign Setting (via Paizo)
Stealth 2: A Game of Clones
Super Hexagon
Telefrag VR
WARSAW
We Are Alright

pretty generous to have this many keys for giving so very much appreciated

I'd like Inmost if its still available at the time ty