The 2019 what we are playing thread

Hollow knight
Dead cells
ETG

Completed Unforeseen Incidents. The story itself was perhaps not the most original, and the ending a bit lacklustre, but at least the art was brilliant (especially liked the Port Nicola locations; very bright and vibrant) and the humour was good too.

I still think the puzzles had you running around a bit too much. I mean, some of these locations were miles apart, and I lost count how often I had to go back and forth between them on the same evening. (Or maybe it was evening again by the time I arrived.)

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@TaarakVakil long time no see!
Nice to have you here, welcome back.

PS: I never write in this thread because I very seldom play videogames, latelyā€¦ but Iā€™m always lurking. I trust the good taste of this community

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I donĀ“t like Video Games, but I donĀ“t really like Lana Del Rey in general.

:drum:

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:kiss: :kiss: :kiss:

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Yeah, never really got the fuss. Always found it bit boring. :man_shrugging:

Thanksā˜ŗ

I finished Technobabylon. Probably the last of my holiday season playthroughs.

It was enjoyable. The story and gameplay are slightly clichƩ without much of anything to say, more of a mood, but generally well executed. Sometimes gameplay suffered for story reasons and vice versa. I consulted a walkthrough two or three times, one time because I overlooked a couple of pixels in bad retro.

The ā€œbig revealā€ was telegraphed well in advance, and Iā€™m not sure if the dramatic irony worked in the storyā€™s favor.

For those who care about such things, it doesnā€™t seem to have achievements on GOG.

Oh yeah, and if you die it just resets to right before you died. Definitely a good thing.

tl;dr Not as good as Primordia, Unavowed or Shardlight, but definitely worth a look. Depending on where you place episodic titles like Dreamfall: Chapters, it might even be the best 2015 game Iā€™ve played.

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Iā€™m playing Unforseen Incidents too. :slight_smile:

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Regarding Unforeseen Incidents, I can safely recommend it to anyone who reads this forum without reservations. Itā€™s a gorgeous, fun game if you like the point & click genre.


Since I played Unavowed, Shardlight and Technobabylon over the holidays (in that order), I decided to continue with The Blackwell Legacy now that itā€™s still more or less that time of year.

The graphics arenā€™t as good (but decent enough), the sound is overcompressed, and it starts with one of those typical contrived adventure game type puzzles. (The doorman wonā€™t leave me into my own apartment? Really?) Weā€™ll see where this goes once the ominous foreshadowing turns into whatever itā€™ll turn into.

PS One thing I forgot to mention about Technobabylon is that I liked the longish (for a modern adventure game) unvoiced textual descriptions, like in Space Quest.

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The gameā€™s notebook mechanic is cute in theory, but borderline annoying in practice because you need to use it for really obvious stuff. Also the game failed to point out that it existed. At first I thought it was just a diary reminder kind of thing. Combine Alexander and Adrian to come up with the idea of gender-neutral Alexā€¦ Totally unnecessary mechanic for the sake of the mechanic. Similar story with the ghost refusing to perform a distraction unless you talked about it elsewhere with him first. The goals were somewhat unclear.

I thought Unavowed didnā€™t really have puzzles, but so far itā€™s a matter of being better off without these kinds of fighting the game puzzles. I realize the game is over a decade old, but of course itā€™s also a decade and a half after Monkey Island. There were also a couple of reasonably decent puzzles though.

Anyway, on to the next puzzle: figuring out the order again, just like I did yesterday to figure out Legacy was first. Itā€™s Legacy, Unbound, Convergence, Deception, Epiphany.

tl;dr Itā€™s a decent effort, but based on this first episode I wouldnā€™t rush to play this one. Iā€™d just read a paranormal ghost story instead.

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Good to knowā€¦ putting it at spot #50 of games Iā€™ll play in 2019 (which means 2025 or so)

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Iā€™ve compiled a list of games I still need to finish or start. Seems I have over 50 in the category Point & Click alone :confused:

My strategy for this year will be to select 1 game from each category so I wonā€™t be playing more than 3 games at the same time.

The other categories are

  • FPS/action (anything 3D, really)
  • RPG/strategy (heavy time investing stuff)
  • Platform/others (the Cave would be here)
  • Retro (console/arcade games that can be as quickly picked up as they can be put down again)

In every category, I will follow a certain order to play the games and whenever I finish a game in one category, Iā€™ll start a new one from another category just to keep things mixed up (I really donā€™t want to sit through 10 years of RPG)

Still not sure whether Iā€™ll count episodes of a season as individual games. Probably notā€¦

Oh and I have also foreseen a column ā€œratingā€ in my tracking sheet.

#NewYearResolution1

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Blackwell Unbound (2) is more polished, yet much worse. It introduces the new mechanic of switching to Joey at will, the implementation of which is where this particular entry is at its most interesting as a game.

The gameplay can unfortunately be aptly summarized as follows. Visit a location, look around a bit or talk to someone. You see a name or they mention one, the latter typically after a dialog puzzle of some sort. Go home. Look up the name in your phone book. Give them a call and/or visit. Rinse and repeat.

This game went from a promising start in Legacy to large swaths of boring slog in Unbound with amazing rapidity. Itā€™s not entirely clear to me why I didnā€™t dislike Unavowed for doing more or less the same thing.

Perhaps itā€™s mainly that all too often you have to perform too many redundant actions. Sure, itā€™s realistic to look up a name in the phone book after you hear it, but itā€™s the adventure game equivalent of killing a hundred sewer rats in an RPG. The puzzle is getting the name, not looking it up in the phone book. Nevertheless I have to compliment them for trying something different, and the story isnā€™t half bad.


Iā€™ve started Convergence in the meantime, and so far it seems more promising.

Sounds about right. Btw, if you havenā€™t played it yet, I think Primordia ranks quite highly.

Also note that these Blackwell games only take a few hours each, so basically they all go together as one game. Itā€™s quite possible that the whole experience will raise this into something much more memorable than just the first two episodes.

Care to share any of the list? :slight_smile:

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I definitely liked Convergence (3) better. I started Deception (4) and I think itā€™s better still. The basic description I gave for Unbound (2) is not entirely inaccurate for the both of them, but the pacing and quantity is better so that it doesnā€™t feel like itā€™s all youā€™re doing, and the amount of needless busywork is greatly reduced.

@tasse-tee might like the Blackwell series for its game breaking potential. One cute-sy thing I just did was to try to turn off the light in a situation where the game only thinks you might want to turn it on. So I got a scolding about trying to turn it on and then I automatically turned it off (when it was actually supposed to be on by that time).

Iā€™m not quite as deeply into that kind of stuff as @tasse-tee, but it does amuse me. :wink:

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Ooooooo, Iā€™m intrigued :grinning:

Yep, Iā€™m sold! :joy: Thanks for the recommendation!

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Well I just got Super Animal Royale for free in a giveaway!! Woohooo!! Gonna have some fun with it!!!

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Enjoy your fight for furvival!

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I finished the Blackwell series. The fifth and final game was decent enough in story, up and down in gameplay. I think it had more ā€œtraditionalā€ adventure moon logic type puzzles. I liked the fourth game best as a game, possibly also as a story. Ben Chandlerā€™s pixel art is always amazing to look at. The guy also created the graphics for the fourth Blackwell game, Technobabylon, Shardlight, and Unavowed.

This is a case where youā€™ll definitely want to experience the first two or three games to get the whole story (plus they only take a few hours, whereas the last game is definitely a lot larger), but you could potentially also just play the (third,) fourth and fifth game. As I said, I thought the second game was a bit of a drag, and the fifth game basically tries to tie all previous games together, partially reintroducing the same drag. The principle is the same, but itā€™s less bothersome due to slightly improved character control. Double click to speed up room navigation and instant map access wouldā€™ve been nice to have as well.

Overall Iā€™d recommend checking out the series, but with some reservations.

My order of Wadjet Eye recommendations:

  1. Primordia (must play)
  2. Technobabylon (more than decent, story a bit clichƩ)
  3. Unavowed (bit Telltale-like, enjoyable)
  4. Shardlight (itā€™s nice, sort of Primordia light)
  5. Blackwell (bit rough, but good graphics/music/atmosphere smooth things out during lesser parts)

I havenā€™t yet played The Shivah or A Golden Wake.

(One might note that my top two ā€œWadjet Eyeā€ games were only published by them, and perhaps I should tie Unavowed and Shardlight for third placeā€¦)

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:open_mouth:

In the meantime, I finished 3 more puzzles in Sam & Max.
(Admittedly spent only 1 hour playing as I started it up at 1AM or so)

Definitely need to put in some more time playing games apparentlyā€¦

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