Just Playing

 I loved this games romantic moodiness. It almost noir, with it's delightful dramatic vocals. It was sci-fi, but still off-beat / original enough to hook me in. Visuals were smooth / great.  ...but that was it.  The only thing you do in this game is run around a tiny bit, pick what fight moves you have and - as with any RPG - run into a hoard of baddies. I simply do not receive joy from games like this. There's no running/jumping/climbing trees (to quote Eddie Izzard), there's no puzzle you must solve, there is only you, your partner in crime and an unrelenting amount of enemies to defeat.  I do this every once in a while: I think "do I actually not like RPGs? Or was I simply too young at the time? It has  been years - perhaps I should try it again. I'm older and more refined, now". Turns out: I just don't like RPGs. And that's okay. Other than Zelda: OOT / Majora's Mask, there really are no RPGs that have even gotten surpassed the "I'm bo...

This game is smarter that I will ever hope to be.  But if you are also  smarter than I am (the odds are high): You should totally play this game! I bought this one because I LOVE a puzzle game and I really dug the animation - how simple and squiggly and stylized it was. The idea is: you're Baba - a lamb - and in each level, you have to be very clever in order to get to the "WIN" flag. Sometimes you have to avoid harrowing lava or streams of water. Sometimes, just a simple pile of rocks stands between you and the finish line.  There's wordplay to it, there's thinking outside the box to it and it's honestly a perfectly simple-yet-full concept for a game.  I just can't seem to get past certain levels! I was doing great until I wasn't. Perhaps I should stick to Untitled Goose Game . More my speed.  There's not much to say about this little indie charmer, but I really do recommend it to anyone who is even slightly more able than I am to "think outs...

Don't play this game if you just want to play a game. It's not a good game. I assumed it was due to it's perpetual exposition / magnificent number of excruciating dialogue, like whenever I would attempt a great Final Fantasy game when I was ten/my attention span would not allow (where are the difficult jumps and guns and puzzling levels??). Or perhaps it was just my inexperience with point-and-click adventure games. Regardless of how boring this game was at times: This game is one of the coolest experiences I had last year. It's because it felt less game, more impending doom. Less fun activity and more existential exercise. More moody - think Twin Peaks, first run through season one. More cold, quiet, unrelenting nightmare. The unease this game is able to achieve - without ever being a horror game, per se - is incredible.  There were few parts to enjoy throughout a long gameplay, but those times were fantastic!  Fever dream events and scenes and settings and characters ...

 So.. truth be told: it's been a damn minute since I have played any of the games I am about to cover. I would normally say something optimistic like "maybe I'll come back to this after another play-through", but I think we all know by now that I do not tend to "come back" to anything. When it's done: I release it into the wild, only to ever think back on it fondly before moving briskly onward.  I honestly don't even know how much I'll be able to cover in the next few entries / I won't promise incredible quality / "Done is better than Perfect" / Let's go! I will  say: if there ever was a game that deserved another playthrough for refresher: it is Neva . The sister game of Gris , Neva  is another masterfully beautiful visual with the depths of emotion one would expect coming hot off the heels of Gris .  You are a woman in the woods (relatable), you have this giant, beautiful, Mononoke-esque white wolf companion. Much like its sis...

 This'll be a one-sentence entry if I don't put us on a bit of a ride, so! I spent even less time playing this one than I did Limbo  and it has even less cool lore to look into. But something in me (probably the Obsessive Compulsive Disorder) will not allow me to skip writing about a single game played. Not from the beginning era, anyway. If I run into a real stinker later on in my gaming, I can see myself sweeping it under the rug / never to be discussed. But this entire blog (so far) is a dedication to and appreciation of my Gaming Renaissance. Something I don't mind romanticizing. Not only do I not mind - I would love to! So I shall. I'm rambling.  So at first: I figured I could download games I had been wanting to play. (Something I accomplished after downloading Don't Starve  and deciding to wait on the super expensive Breath of the Wild. List wasn't as long as I thought.) I watched a youtube video on cozy games ( Cozy Grove, Gris).  I perused the online sh...