September 2026
It is what it is. Not a bad month but Harvestella is such a long game that I feel I only played it and still haven’t beaten it, so progress feels slow. I bought a Steam Deck which helps to play in the off-hours, but I’m playing mostly nostalgia PS2 games there so I don’t know how much it will help my Steam backlog. Whatever.
I used the earlier part of the month to finally beat Beast Breaker. Having beaten it, I stand behind my negative rating, explained in the dedicated review post. Having beaten it, I returned my focus to Harvestella, my Very Long PoP game. Previous VL PoP games were usually 25-40hr max, which were manageable. Harvestella alone already consumed 60 hours from me and I’m still in Chapter 8 of 10, so clearly VL is a category where the sky is the limit and should always be left for last in PoP. It’s good not great, and definitely overstays its welcome, which is tragic because it could be a great game with a few mechanical and pacing fixes. After getting my hands on my Steam Deck, I played Aperture Desk Job which was so short I didn’t even review it. Played some more of my forever games: Slay the Spire (cleared A5 with Defect) and 2024 Mosaic. Tried to play another of my PoP picks, Snake Pass, but did not have fun and dropped it after rage-quitting at the end of Level 6 (out of 15), clearly showing I still had a lot to suffer before I rolled credits.
For October, I have been playing a lot of Vexx on my PS2 emulator which will have it’s own review in due time, and hope to beat Harvestella before I start my Q4 PoP picks.
Happy gaming!
| Game | Playtime in September |
|---|---|
| HARVESTELLA | about 32 hours |
| Beast Breaker | about 6 hours |
| Slay the Spire | about 3 hours |
| Snake Pass | about 2 hours |
| 2024: Mosaic Retrospective | less than 1 hour |
| Aperture Desk Job | less than 1 hour |
SG Wins
Beast Breaker
12.2 hours, 33 of 37 achievements
Backlog
None!
Abandoned Games
Snake Pass
6.3 hours, 4 of 33 achievements
SG Wins
Dead Trash
0 hours, 0 of 25 achievements
V Rising
0 hours, 0 of 49 achievements
Noxcode
0 hours, no achievements
Dead Cells (Bad Seed DLC)
14.2 hours, 22 of 121 achievements
REPLIKATOR
3.2 hours, 0 of 33 achievements
Gifts and Freebies
Tangle Tower
7.9 hours, 0 of 10 achievements
Time Loader
4.5 hours, 0 of 29 achievements
Akimbot
0 hours, 0 of 51 achievements
Purchases
Hardspace: Shipbreaker
0 hours, 0 of 27 achievements
I seem to hear that a lot about Snake Pass..
Congratulations on winning V Rising - I found it really enjoyable!
Snake Pass’s controls are very polarizing, I don’t doubt some people love it but for me it’s a gimmick taken too far. If the level design was a bit more forgiving I would at least beat it, but it constantly forces you to redo parts of the level you already beat because of poor checkpoint placement, and for me that’s unforgivable
Thank you re: V Rising! Everyone raves about it, and even though it is long I think it’s somethign I can take advantage of the Steam Deck for :)
Hmm bad checkpoints is already very off-putting to me so it will not be a game I play any time soon!
V Rising is great - I like how you can edit the server to be easy in one aspect (such as resource gathering), but have a different combat difficulty. Usually I like normal mode, but the achievements required hardest difficulty haha. I actually really enjoyed playing the brutal difficulty. I played on PC, so unsure how it is on Steam Deck, but could see it playing well with the perspective you play in.