Playing Crymachina!

Sometimes you pick a game despite mediocre reviews and it turns out to be just what you wanted to play - this was one of theses cases.

People complain about this game being repetitive and limited and they are correct - you just navigate through menus, watch some conversations, then choose a destination for a short hack-and-slash stage. Scenarios are very similar and kinda bland, everything is too grey and mechanical.

But it's definitely clicking with me so far. The action parts are fun, the bosses are challenging without being too hard, the plot is a bit of a technobabble mess but the real focus is on character interactions and I'm enjoying those.

It reminds me the original Blue Reflection on the PS4, a game where the developers clearly had passion and ideas but lacked the skill or the budget to realize it. However, some of this still shines through the game's flaws and make it enjoyable.

Replaying 13 Sentinels: Aegis Rim!

One of the highlights of the week is that I received a lot of games that were stuck on transit due to local customs going on strike for over two months. I had already finished this game on the PS4, bought it again just for collection purposes, but could not resist replaying at least the early portions again.

This is a brilliant gem from Vannilaware. It's made up of a weird mix of point-and-click adventure sections and tower defense battles, with a crazy and complex storyline involving 13 different characters that end up having to pilot mechs and fight an alien invasion.

One of the interesting parts of the storyline is how things are told out-of-order and you have to gradually piece together the events - at the same time you're playing the tower defense sections which are chronologically the last part of the story, you're also rotating between the background of each of the 13 pilots and learning how they ended up involved in this mess.

Vanillaware's art is beautiful as usual, and the OST is fantastic, I'm a huge fan of the battle themes used for the tower defense sections.

If you like story-focused games and haven't played this one, please do. It's absolutely worth it.

I've been playing the first Legend of Zelda game. I'm surprisingly having fun, but I think it's due to save states. The combat in the game is brutal.

It's inspired me to try making a 2D open world game in Godot.

Well, I haven't played anything since my comment on last week's thread. But I am planning to play (and hopefully finish) Paper Mario over the weekend. Let's see how that goes.

Have been playing the Ace Attorney Trilogy, Trials and Tribulations to be exact. I'm only at the second case, and it's already pretty good. I love the storytelling and characters!

Still on my journey through Tears of the Kingdom. No spoilers, but one of the side quests that includes taking photos of monsters is so cool!
Splatoon 3 Side Order also just came out, so I'm going to make some time to play that as well.