Andy

December'22 overview

I'm not even sure if this month was productive or counterproductive...

I will not do any huge “summing up the results of the year” or any kind of “top of best games” (also Steam by itself made a pretty good job). Just a short summup. For me the gaming year started around March. According to Steam Stats I have played 1% of time in January and 0% in February…

Before joining BLAEO in May I had 255 games in my library and now 334. Yap, +79 new games. Almost +31% to the size of my library (and I started to use Steam 16 years ago, on 29 of December 2006 (oops, missed my steam cake day)). So I failed hardly in my attempt to get less games…

Now:

10% (32/334)
16% (54/334)
18% (61/334)
45% (150/334)
11% (37/334)

In May’22:

4% (9/255)
9% (24/255)
21% (54/255)
55% (141/255)
11% (27/255)

While my library has grown impressively - the number of finished games has also increased: from 33 to 86 (sick!). While the percentage of unplayed games has dropped from 55% to 45%. Maybe I wasn’t successful with fighting my backlog, but I did play games! A lot of games! As I said earlier - more than in recent years! And I didn’t quit while playing! I’m pretty happy with it :) Special thanks to BLAEO, PAGYWOSG, “Playing appreciated” and “Playing matters” SG groups and a huge THANK YOU to our local SG community - you bring up in me a responsible approach to games! Also I have joined PoP and think it will be a nice addition to the list of people/events I’m grateful to :)

And now, back to December:

Date Games owned Added this month Never played (monthly change) Beaten/Completed during month
December'22 334 +22 150 (+6) 11

Library has grown a lot in size in a month, hasn’t it? Blame people’s generosity! :D Lets count together: 9 games I won on SG and 6 games I got as gifts. 15 out of 22. Damn sneaky generous people!… I love you all and thank you for all these great games that I can enjoy!
Although the number of finished games is also not small - blame my “luck”, I got pretty heavily sick in mid December and was locked down at home, so I had an extra time for playing my games. According to steam same time I had the longest strick of consecutive days I played (14).

Games highlights of December:

Cuphead: HLBT says the main story can be beaten in 10½. It took me 26 hours… Well, maybe I shouldn’t play games when my body temperature is above 39C° … Nevertheless I really enjoyed playing it (besides the King Dice. He can twist himself through his own ass until he won’t fade into nothing!). Every part of the game is great. Gameplay, graphics, sound, levels design. It is really difficult (at least it was for me) but the feeling of victory over the bosses balances the negative “component”. Already got Cuphead: The Delicious Last Course and plan to revisit game soonish. 9/10

The Adventure Pals: Simple colorful game with a lovely story full of absurd humor. Slightly addictive, not very challenging. Definitly deserves ones attention, especially if you already have it in your library and it is still unplayed ^) 7/10

Little Nightmares II: I’m huge fan of the Little Nightmares and LNII is definitely worthy of the first part. For the first 2/3 part of the game I even thought that it was better. Little Nightmares made me fall in love with those emotions/experiences that it gives during the first play. The atmosphere and gameplay create such a great oppressive feeling (not to be confused with all sorts of horror stories where you are just marinated and prepared for fear). Run? Crawl? Stand still? Is it a threat or an entourage? You can’t be sure of anything and you always have to be on the alert. At the same time, you do not feel fear when playing.
The atmosphere of the game has grown compared to the first part. And the sound, and the light, and the work of the camera - everything is much better than in the first part. It immerses you even better in the game. But the Sixth itself periodically ruined the whole atmosphere/immersion. You are hiding from the boss in every possible way, sneaking around - the tension is colossal… And then this child of flowers just follows you across the open space, right in front of the boss and everyone doesn’t care - nothing happens… Despite this, the first 2/3 of the game is just great, but the last third is like a different game. More like a puzzle. Beautiful, interesting - but the feeling is generally different. It doesn’t look like the first part, not like the first two-thirds of the second. I enjoyed the game and I think I will return to it at some point to collect more achievements. 7/10

Lost in Play: Played it with my daughter and both of us had a blast! Pretty simple, very beautiful game with a lot of absurd humour. A living fairy tale in which you take an active part. Cudos to illustrators and story writers! That was the first quest I played with a controller and I liked it that way! All previous attempts to play quest with anything beside moue were terrible… Also game has a very well thought out system of hints, that help to progress without spoiling the experience. 8/10

Wunderling: I haven’t yet finished playing it but I hope I will find several hours to beat it this year (huge doubts). For me this game is from category of Steam hidden gems for all for all lovers of fast paced arcade puzzle games. It is not punishing (like for example Meat Boy). It is challenging just right. I was continuously getting positive vibes from the game without any negative emotions. Every level so far is doable without taking any hints on the internet, the most hard ones for me were taking just around 15 minutes maximum to beat with all secrets unlocked (while every level once solved can be beaten in between 14 and 60 seconds).
And while playing I physically felt that developers put love and soul into this game. If you found of such games - give it a try: it is bloody cheap on sale. 8/10