January Roundup

Small Beginnings

Games I beat this month:

Beaten in January 6 games

• Snail Trek - Chapter 2: A Snail Of Two Worlds
  

  21 minutes playtime

  6 of 6 achievements

• Watson's Watch
  

  3 hours playtime

  7 of 7 achievements

• Tacoma
  

  10 hours playtime

  12 of 12 achievements

• West of Loathing
  

  39 hours playtime

  23 of 23 achievements

• Hatoful Boyfriend
  

  11 hours playtime

  16 of 16 achievements

• A Fistful of Gun
  

  28 hours playtime

  14 of 14 achievements

Well that was certainly a very slow start to the year. I knew it would be slow, but this is literally the least number of achievements I've earned in a month for the last 3 years. But I have good reasons.

For a start, my daughter was born in the second week of the year. Much happiness and joy all round. She is too perfect. But she also means a lot less free time. Because while my wife has been recovering and looking after the baby, I've been doing a lot of the things she was doing and looking after the older 2 kids. There were a few times where I'd finally get round to playing a game at 10 in the evening and it was a stretch to even get one achievement just to keep the streak going. But honestly, she is worth it.

Secondly, I had a computer break down. Basically my company got me a new i7 computer, but it was a stupid compact box, with some proprietary plugs in it. So I needed a new motherboard to house the chip and ram and ditch the lame motherboard. So I got a new case to put everything in, and when moving my old rig into there, while I waited for the new motherboard, I think the power connector got damaged as it was quite stiff. (Hadn't been unplugged for the last 4 years). So it just had zero life when I tried switching it on. Luckily I had the old cheap motherboard I got with the processor 7 years ago, but unluckily it didn't fit my graphics card. My graphics card also didn't fit into the stupid compact box. So I put my old graphics card in there with a dodgy fan, and had to party like it was 2009, as anything too intense and the fan would go crazy and my computer would freeze. Anyway, after a few weeks, my new motherboard arrived, and I put it in the new box, and I'm now rocking an i7-8700 with 16 gigs of ram. The i7-2600 will be built into the old box with the old graphics card and do quite nicely as an upgrade for the wife come occassional game station for the kids. Anyway all of these troubles wasted time and also meant I could only play a limited library of games

And then thirdly, I also spent a lot of my time playing longer games. Ones that don't throw achievements at you. Assassin's creed origins, Sniper elite 4, Deus ex mankind divided being the main ones. And then after over a year space cat finally had mercy on me and I won Insurgency: Sandstorm from Mousewithbeer. It was a playing appreciated giveaway, so I was 'forced' to install it right away. Oh so tough being forced to play such a cool game. I played a fair amount there and have plans to keep on. It's multiplayer obviously, but I've already earned a lot of the achievements I think would be 'harder' for me, so I think this will definitely be completed some time in the future. Well worth the wait between wins I think

So that was my January. I suspect February might still be a slow month. Here are more opinions on the games I did beat.

MORE THOUGHTS ON THE GAMES I BEAT

Snail Trek - Chapter 2: A Snail Of Two Worlds

6 of 6 achievements (100%)

Picked this up on the last day of 2018, after having enjoyed the first game. It's a fun little throw back to the old Sierra games, and I liked the plot. Will definitely pick up the other games in the future and finish the saga.

Watson's Watch

7 of 7 achievements (100%)

Another one of these games where RPG maker was used to build something that wasn't an RPG. The plot was interesting, but the last 2 achievements I needed were a little annoying and required me to go through the game a couple more times.

Tacoma

12 of 12 achievements (100%)

I heard good things about this game, and it was certainly used an interesting narrative device with following the conversations. It felt a bit short but I enjoyed the ending. I know I wasn't the only one who met the AI in the game, and thought, "oh boy here we go with the trope about an evil AI manipulating the crew of a space craft". So it was nice when the twist was the opposite of that

West of Loathing

Playing in 2018
23 of 23 achievements (100%)

This was a winter sale 2017 purchase and I never finished it. It worked nicely on toaster-mode PC so I jumped back in it, and loved it. You have to beat it 4 times for all the achievements, and even on the 4th time round I was discovering new things. And opposite to what normally happens, I think my 4th run was actually my longest as I made it my mission to finish every sidequest and get the 'best' ending for every thread possible. I loved the sense of humour, some very silly gags, but also a lot of very subtle jokes that I don't think everyone would get. And it's also a pretty solid RPG all things considered. Not long by any stretch of the imagination, but well put together.

Hatoful Boyfriend

16 of 16 achievements (100%)

Hey look at that. I finally played a visual novel. And at first, I was rolling my eyes pretty hard. The whole romance element was just as cringey as I thought it would be. And honestly, if that's the kind of prose one can expect in a VN, I won't be playing too many more. But anyway, it was all so far, so cheesy, until I hit the ending of a certain doctor. Then there was an RPG battle. And a crazy gang bird. So by the time I got to the finale, 'hateful boyfriend', I was already engaged. And the ending is just nuts. Still pretty melodramatic, but I loved the way it brought everything together. Very clever, and I get why people recommend this game. Coming in 2020, Formidolosus will play another VN.

A Fistful of Gun

The Almosts
14 of 14 achievements (100%)

When I first played this game it had a bunch of really difficult, or possibly broken achievements, and so I bounced off. Then I noticed a few months back that the achievements had changed and suddenly it's a lot more fair. I played it more then, and got to the point when I needed only 1 more. Which I finally got this month. It's a fun little action game, with 9 characters that all have control quirks that offer a nice choice to the player. It also has a co-op mode so it can be fun with a couple of people playing together.