Amitte

Progress report: June 2019

Okay, this past month I have been in a much better headspace than back in May. I believe this let me get much more stuff done, game-wise. And now that I’m off school, I’m planning to get even more gaming time in! I mean, it’s Summer, so it’s time for summery games, am I right?! Oh, and I forgot to add: I categorized my completed games by the year I finished them in. Is anyone interested in that? I mean, I know I didn’t play much before 2018, but hey, life is peculiar like that. Would any nerds out there like categorization by month too? By all means, let me know :D

(You’re welcome to check the progress I may or may not have made on my ABC challenges: General, Hidden Object Games, Point and Clicks, Visual Novels)

Without further ado, here’s the progress I made in June:

404Sight - I have to admit, I watched someone play this game online ages ago and that’s why I thought I could try it out as well. I mean, it’s free and it has achievements, right? Riiight. I ended up not playing the game the way it was meant to be, and rather going back and forth between the levels just to fulfill requirements needed to obtain corresponding achievements. The game is so poorly optimized it hurts. Even on lowest graphic settings it worked awfully, which is why I struggled so much to 100% it. It has a definite feel of “baby’s first work” to it as well. (Makes sense when you consider that it’s the first, and, so far, the only game made by Retro Yeti Games.) The music is passable, but the longer you’re stuck on a level, the more it will grate on your ears. The jump pad mechanic was annoying in its own right - the game shows you clearly that you’re not supposed to move around when your character is busy jumping, but at times you’re gonna have to navigate to another jump pad to keep the sequence going… and then the character keeps either not reaching the ground or totally overshooting it. Why?! That should not happen. But whatever, I guess. After a combined 3 hours of raging and powerlessness, I’m done. Moving on to something nicer.

Agent Walker: Secret Journey - It seems this one has only been published by Artifex Mundi and was actually made by a Serbian studio - Brave Giant. Agent Walker follows a woman of the same name on her undercover mission to find the Spear of Destiny and assure that whichever side she’s on gets to… uh… win the war. Yeah, the story’s set during World War II. That aspect I actually find interesting. I’m not sure about the protagonist, I didn’t really… bond with her, I suppose? The only time you see her is when you look at the banner of the game before you buy it, and in the game itself, she doesn’t have a voice. As for the mechanics of the game - the HOS are really well drawn, objects are hidden, but at the same time… who invented those freaking objects that just morph into other objects? What, did you seriously think your game wasn’t going to be long enough without that or something?! There are a lot of minigames and most of them are pretty easy, but a few of them made me angry (I really don’t like gear placement and spinning dial minigames, ugh). Not to mention, the collectibles… they’re thematically appropriate and cool to look at after you find them, but not fun when you have to replay the game to find them all. All in all, it’s not bad, but not the best either. It might as well be closer to than farther from Dark Angels on my list, but I’m not sure it’s a favorite - there are still a lot of Artifex Mundi HOGs for me to go through, after all!

Angel’s Love - Disclaimer: I read this one after The New Girl. Yeah… What can I say? Angel’s Love is… is not good either. It features a certain trope which I can’t remember the name of - it happens when most characters have fitting names, but then a few of them just don’t - for example, you have a Lindsay, Mark, George, and then you have an Aiko. Or you have a Yumi, Haruka, Makoto and Steven. I’m really late with describing this though, it happens in most of those shitty VNs. They never look the way they’re described in the script, either. Bonus point if the original script had considered a certain name for any character(s), but then whoever wrote it into the VN decided to rename said character(s) without caring about the original script. Also, the UI is the same as in The New Girl, but I suppose I like it better in all white. Nothing more to note about this one, moving on.

Belladonna - I couldn’t believe how short HLTB claimed this one was gonna be, so I had to pick it up. And they were right! Belladonna tells the story of… well, Belladonna (although she’s not who you think she is, initially) and the twists and turns of her life. My main problem with the game is that pretty much all the lore is given to the player on pages torn out from journals belonging to the main cast. I admit it’s a valid concept, but it was irritating to have to read everything to get the whole picture and the chilly ambient didn’t help. I also expected to get more out of the ending than just a “The End” card. That being said, the basic premise was what got me interested and it didn’t disappoint.

KARAKARA - I originally planned to play this one for Golden Month, but ultimately finished a little too late… which doesn’t change the fact that this VN is incredibly boring. Its premise is ridiculous when you think of all its elements lumped together, and even with how weirdly thought-up it is, it’s still a slice-of-life and not a mystery and/or drama title. The characters are so one-dimensional it hurts. I’ve read reviews where people praised the protagonist for being one to sit down and think about his predicament before taking action, but I find that more often than not, it takes way too long for any of the characters to realize what’s been going on right before their eyes. If you’ve read about what’s the deal with X happening or Y being Z, you really don’t want to wait until the characters come to that same conclusion. Particular elements of the story are really interesting, but are being walked around as slice-of-life takes the cake. What kind of disaster fell on Earth? Why is Sagami Francisco the only town that currently exists? How were animal ears and tails supposed to help humans survive in tough situations? Who are the “Others”? Nah, screw that, let’s listen to the main cast discuss how they’re going to split the duties in their restaurant. sigh Other than that, the art style is pleasant to the eye, the sprites are dynamic (can change halfway through sentences), which is a nice touch and the soundtrack always matched the scene well, although I found that two or three tracks felt too distracting for a VN. And no, I won’t be paying 10 bucks for adult content, unless a friend of mine decides I should go back to the game just for that and gets it for me as a gift. (There probably aren’t even any scenes including Aisia, because it wouldn’t make sense in context, and at this point I can’t even decide whether I find that good or bad.) I guess I’ll play the second game whenever I feel like torturing myself again.

Mahjong Strip Solitaire: Harem Guild - Call games like this one out on being ridiculous attempts at erotica, but they’re far better than a lot of media being made nowadays (If you’re as interested in VNs as I am, you’ve definitely noticed the trend of Patreon-funded 3D “OELVNs” with 99% of protagonists named “Karl” and- eh, you probably get my point.). For me, getting this game was just like ordering my favorite sandwich at my favorite fast-food place - I knew its taste from before, I’ve had a craving for it, it’s just that they didn’t restock for too long. As to what’s inside, if you played Delicious! Pretty Girls Mahjong Solitaire, for example, it’s basically the same thing. There are pretty girls (who are also characters from various VNs) and you change their clothes/undress them by passing levels. Then you can get a better look ( ͡° ͜ʖ ͡°) at them in the dressing room. That’s pretty much it. The only real difference is that in this game the characters were all from one and the same VN.

Midnight Mysteries: The Edgar Allan Poe Conspiracy - I can’t really write a lot about this one, seeing as I have no knowledge regarding Edgar Allan Poe’s works, other than what this game introduced to me. The hint-to-hard-to-find-objects ratio was balanced and the music got repetitive at times, but it’s always nice to play a HOG without achievements. And that’s also another SG win done!

Narcissu 1st & 2nd - So I only finished reading the first one at the time of writing this, but here’s what I have to say. You know, if you dive into the genre, you will probably hear a lot about Narcissu. After you learn about the subgenres, you’re going to realize that it’s also one of the staples of the utsuge (lit. “depression game”) subgenre. Which leads me to my next point - the plot of Narcissu is nothing surprising, even if you try your best to stay away from possible spoilers. It’s also a peculiar work - neither the visual nor the auditory aspect play a big role - everything is minimalistic. Voice acting is only provided for the main female character and it’s hard to judge it quality-wise - it just annoyed me more than it brought in value. The voice does not sound like a woman in her early twenties and the things she says aren’t interesting for the most part either. A conversation would usually look like this:

MC: Are you hungry?

Setsumi: No.

MC: I’ll get something anyway.

Setsumi: Okay.

MC: Aren’t you cold?

Setsumi: Not really.

MC: It’s freezing outside, I’ll cover you up with this blanket.

Setsumi: breathes out in a surprised-but-positive manner

MC: Oh, and also, can I rape all of the women in your family?

Setsumi: Sure.

MC: Wait, really? You seriously wouldn’t mind?!

Setsumi: Not at all.

and that was really annoying. Also, I can’t remember which translation I might have picked, but it surely remembers the time when people didn’t care about quality and just took anything. I don’t suppose it was bad enough for machine translations to come out on top, but it was hard to read at times. Maybe I shouldn’t have been putting off reading this one for so long. Maybe I should have picked the other translation. Maybe I should have read it unvoiced. Maybe I should have been in the mood. I honestly don’t have any idea why it didn’t pull me in. I’ll try reading again for the sake of it, but I can’t promise it will happen soon.

Pixel Puzzles: Japan - Another puzzle game and another SG win, done and dusted! Looking at the guides to this one, it seems people figured out a trick the devs tried to implement into the game (or not?) - making solving puzzles easy by suggesting what piece you should pick up in order instead of letting you pick up whichever piece you think fits. As it usually goes for me, the trick was too complicated to perform, so I settled on solving the puzzles like a normal person would. Plus, music always helps. I like that this one doesn’t feature puzzle rotation, as opposed to the Pixel Puzzles 2 games (seriously, if you don’t believe me, check my playtimes). What I don’t like, however, is how blurry the images were (some of them, at least). And also, why would you implement “bonus” puzzles if you’re not even gonna mark the fact that I finished them in any way, shape or form? Anyway, I’m glad it’s done. Moving on.

Puzzle Agent - I have to say, I’m ashamed of starting this one, like, 2 years ago or so and then leaving it be. (I mean, Telltale Games went bankrupt in that time. Oops.) Anyway, having picked it up after so long, I had little idea about the plot aside the fact that I’m playing as the titular “puzzle agent” and the antagonists are gnomes. Puzzle Agent plays like a point-and-click, but its main focus are riddles you need to solve to do pretty much everything except for picking up hints and noting strange occurences. The riddles’ difficulty varies greatly - some are so easy it would be unexpected of anyone to come up with an incorrect solution and some are hard enough for me to actually want to show them to my family members to watch them be puzzled as they try to solve them. You can, of course, use hints and present incorrect solutions, but it will count towards the final rating of your solving process, which is in and of itself, an interesting concept. I also really like Graham Annable’s art style, maybe I should check out some of his comics in the near future. And, hey, I’m kinda sad Telltale Games is gone now. Hadn’t had a chance to say that online yet, I suppose. But then again, there were glaring faults in how the studio was handled, so there wasn’t any other way out of it. All that’s left to do for me is picking up the sequel whenever I’m up for some more of this kind of thinking.

Repentant - Picked this one to play because of its extremely short duration (according to HLTB) and realized that it’s actually related to Little Kite (which I do have in my backlog!) only after I booted it up. Oh, well. As for what the game’s like… it has to be the smallest point-and-click I’ve ever seen. Belladonna also took only about an hour to play and it had way more locations than this game. It also had better voice acting. Repentant is hard to stomach because not only does it have mediocre voice acting, it also has a terrible script and it doesn’t let you perform some of the most obvious interactions until you “are properly informed” that you have to perform them. The art is the only thing that stands out in this game and the cutscenes make for good screenshots, but other than that, it’s a big “meh” from me.

The New Girl - Did anyone want proof that I’m still not done with shitty VNs? Well, here you go. This one is from a studio named Bee’s Tower; honestly no idea what that might be related to. The premise of The New Girl is that the protagonist, who is receiving love confessions from pretty much all the girls at school (which he rejects, so people talk around about him being gay), and yet isn’t courageous enough to talk to girls without stuttering, is one day tasked by a mysterious girl to start dating his new classmate, who seems to be in a nearly identical situation as him - guys flock to her, but she rejects any further advances. The writing isn’t as bad as in Hanae Novels’ works, but it’s still tough to read. The music is pretty bad, although more often than not it tries its best to match the situation. The character depictions look really meh; I get the feeling they’re basically stolen from somewhere and cut out of the background they were placed against originally. The background images look cool for the most part, although some are very blurry. The in-game UI looks really nice, but I think the game could do without the annoying typing sound whenever any next text box was being written in. I suppose it was enough to warrant a 2/10 on my VNDB account, but at the end of the day, it’s just another dumb VN made in Unity by someone who could write fanfiction at best, just for the sake of putting another achievement fountain out there in the Steam world. Too bad it’s removed now (lol).

almost 5 years ago* 0 comments