Alright. August is in the books. I spent almost 50 hours playing Ruzar - The Dark Stones. I’m at the final boss currently. I also have another almost 20 hours logged into Skald - Against the Black Priory, which I’m on the back half of. And I’ve continued my slow playthrough of The Legend of Heroes: Trails from Zero. Sovereign Syndicate was the standout game from this month. Really cool. Anyway,

August Completions

1. Tachyon Dreams Anthology (Steam). Very cool old school text parser PnC.
2. tomorrow won’t come for those without ██████ (Steam). Interesting existential experience.
3. Backspace Backspace Backspace (Steam). This one is a bit of a thought experiment reflecting on AI and social media.
4. Sovereign Syndicate (Steam). The first Disco Elysium-like? Super cool setting, dialogue, and overall experience.
5. 8/8/88 Needle AL (Steam). A game that highlights the horrors of racism and religious fundamentalism. In very stark and disturbing ways.
6. Twenty-second: Stories of Underground Kharkiv (Steam). A Ukrainian propaganda piece presented in game form. With some cool history lessons included. I thought it was interesting from the perspective of how people are conditioned to think in society, and especially when in the midst of a war.

August Retirements

1. Assassins Guild. Poorly crafted game.
2. NORTH. Confusing AF walking sim.
3. Distant Space. Aight Galaga-like with annoying UI.
4. Infinity Castle Dungeon. Difficult AF for me. Kinda like Exanima, but in a more Isaac-ish fashion.
5. Deadlock (Playtest). Meh
6. Urban Explorer (Playtest). Needs a lot of work. The actual game shows promise though.
7. Moonring. Didn’t know what to do in this one.
8. Seaside Racing. Zero player base. Fun concept though.
9. SpaceEngine. Terrible UI IMO.
10. Hoa. Meh platformer. Made more for children I think.
11. Eve of Calamity. Decent JRPG, but with a lot of RPGMaker issues.
12. Cats on Duty. Actually quite fun and recommended mash up of Plants vs Zombies and Match-3. Just not my cup of tea overall though.

Games Paused

Invaders Tower Defense Online (pending it possibly getting a wider player base to try out mp)
Goblin and Coins II: The Lost Recipes (I’m objectively bad at platformers, so it’ll take a bit to complete lol)

Plans for September

Chat with the developer of Ruzar about tweaking some aspects of the final boss fight and wrapping that up.
Finish Skald - Against the Black Priory
Continue The Legend of Heroes: Trails from Zero and Armored Core VI
Beyond that, I’ll probably play Venba, Chants of Senaar, and a few other things I’m sure.

I don’t believe I’ll finish another game today, so I think my list is complete for July. I’m currently playing Ruzar - The Dark Stones, Sovereign Syndicate, Armored Core VI Fires of Rubicon, The Legend of Heroes: Trails from Zero, Last Stop, and those will definitely carry into August. Other priorities for August include Venba, SKALD: Against the Black Priory, Gobs and Gods, Eve of Calamity, Tachyon Dreams Anthology, Chants of Sennaar, Cats on Duty, and to try out the new biome in Easy Breezy Drive. That’s a pretty full month already.

I spent a large chunk of July actually playing Vampire Survivors and American Truck Simulator, but I set them down for now to attend to other stuff in my backlog and paused Fargone after trying it out, to wait for more updates. Cool game though.

July Completions

EYE TO ME (Steam) An interesting but ultimately failed gaming experiment.
Drizzlepath: Deja Vu (Steam) A fresh perspective on a walking sim classic
Vampire Survivors: Operation Guns (Steam) So cool
Space Station Escape (Steam) I lucked my way through this one, but if you like anomaly hunters, this one is pretty cool
A Highland Song (Steam) This was a very cool Indie with some interesting mixes of genres
Psychroma (Steam) Trippy cyberpunk-ey psych horror with an interesting story
The Nameless City (Steam) Lovecraft. As Lovecraft should be.
Another Crab’s Treasure (Steam) Silly but faithful Soulsborne. Instant classic
Cryohazard (Steam) Fun little bite sized roguelike
The Lost Condor - Walking Simulator (Steam) Interesting Machu Picchu simulator, but definitely overpriced for the content
Coffee For Cthulhu (Steam) Fun little flash style game
Little Kitty, Big City (Steam) Maybe the most wholesome game on Steam and a lot of fun
Moksha Space (Steam) Interesting philosophical thought experiment

and July Retirement

Back to Home Needs work
Last Whisper Bad behaving dev, lots of bugs. Poor combo.
The Day of Survival Tons of bugs and basic QoL issues
For What Will Come Retired temporarily due to the ending sequence being softlocked as a result of a bug. The dev says he’ll reach out if he finds a solution to the issue I encountered.
Stolen Realm Very cool but very repetitive
Time Re:Quest Barely a game. Stare at the screen simulator more or less
Long Way Cool ideas, poor execution

The Nameless City was probably most memorable this month, but Another Crab’s Treasure and Little Kitty, Big City were unquestionably the best games completed.

Alright. The Nameless City is done and dusted. This is true Lovecraftian horror rather than a game that simply has the tag slapped on because it touches upon madness of psych horror in general. It is very much a walking simulator, takes about an hour to complete, give or take a few minutes, and was in my opinion a really cool game thick with those Lovecraft vibes.

You play as a researcher who has decided to try to unveil the mystery of the Nameless City. A place whose memory was lost to time, sitting in anonymity somewhere in the Middle East. A place that predates Babylon, Sumeria, etc…As you explore, you begin to realize that this was potentially not a place that had been inhabited by humans. The implications of this are enough to literally drive our intrepid researcher mad, although in typical human fashion, his mind attempts to partition the reality he witnessed in these ruins from the reality we mostly all live and breather in. Without diving too far in and getting into spoiler territory, this is pretty much the story as it is presented.

As mentioned, this is a walking simulator, albeit one with adventure game sensibilities. You will walk and crawl through these ruins, triggering a couple lite puzzles, interacting with objects by walking into them, and learning to use specific runes to form spells. This latter system was particularly fascinating to me. It’s not enough to simply want to, say, create or destroy a barrier. You need to know the rune that represents creation or destruction, and the rune that represents a wall or barrier. In combining said runes by utilizing their corresponding words in Ancient Cthulhu (as I’m calling it), you are able to cast a spell whose effect corresponds to the verb and noun you used. Not only is this a super cool way to represent spellcasting and its limitations, but the effort that goes into finding even one rune guarantees that people aren’t just wandering around casting spells willy nilly. Each casting really means something as does the effort that went into finding the means to do so.

You do have a madness meter in this game, represented by how much of your spine you have left, lol. And casting spells has an impact on your meter, positive or negative depending on the spell being cast. Additionally, the amount of light available in an area also factors into your madness or lack thereof. Which makes sense when the implications of investigating remotes and ancient ruins of being likely of eldritch origin are factored in.

The graphics are PS1 era, and actually, in the credits, they do credit a PSX program that allowed them to do this. And yet, despite the very granular and simple nature of the graphics, they were super evocative and creepy. This game did a great job of making you feel every bit of trepidation, uncertainty, and fear your protagonist felt. If anything, I think the use of fifth gen graphics was the ideal choice for this game. If the devs had chosen something more modern, I’m not sure the emotions it evokes would be the same. Audio-wise, there are creepy background tracks, and there is a fully voice acted script, and I really enjoyed the way that was handled. The dude who voiced the protagonist really sounded like an explorer/researcher. It was very effective in building some attachment to what he was experiencing.

This is a short game and I enjoyed it quite a bit. I’m not really seeing any replay value, but it is pretty memorable. Releases on July 12 btw (tomorrow). No idea how it will be priced, but give it a look.

Alright. June is in the books. Finished a fair amount of games this month. The Planet Crafter and Geneforge 2 really consumed most of the month though. And were my two favorite games played this month as well.

1. Nomad Survival (Steam)
2. Kili’s treasure (Steam)
3. The Planet Crafter (Steam)
4. Easy Breezy Drive (Steam/Steam Deck)
5. The Dead Tree of Ranchiuna (Steam)
6. Geneforge 2 - Infestation (Steam)
7. It Comes In Waves (Steam)
8. Stray Gods: The Roleplaying Musical (Steam)
9. The Elision Effect (Steam)
10. Roundguard (Steam)
11. Vampire Survivors (Steam)
    11a. Vampire Survivors: Tides of the Foscari (Steam)
    11b. Vampire Survivors: Legacy of the Moonspell (Steam)
12. Getting There (Steam)
13. Buckshot Roulette (Steam)
    11c. Vampire Survivors: Emergency Meeting (Steam)
14. Minit Fun Racer (Steam)
15. The Cub (Steam)
16. Deep Beyond (Steam)

There were also a fair amount of retired games

1. My Jigsaw Adventures - Forgotten Destiny
2. Sand Land
3. Lighthouse Keeper
4. Entropy
5. Banana
6. EGG
7. Ship Graveyard Simulator
8. Pathfinder: Gallowspire Survivors
9. Infinite Innocence

Plans for July

I’ll prioritize The Legend of Heroes: Trails from Zero; Another Crab’s Treasure, and Hades II. The rest will be a matter of whatever strikes my fancy lol.

Oh yeah. And the Summer Sale additions:

Thymesia; Glitchhikers: The Spaces Between ; Carry Onward; EQQO/Dark Days bundle; Orwell’s Animal Farm; Buckshot Roulette; American Truck Simulator Northwest Bundle (Montana/Wyoming/Retrowave Paint Jobs); Legie; This is the Zodiac Speaking; Vampire Survivors: Emergency Meeting; Last Stop; Fire Tonight; Deep Beyond; Booth: A Dystopian Adventure; Songs of Silence (bought off Steam); Fanatical NSPCC Charity Bundle

And won: Another Crab’s Treasure; Hades II; ARMORED CORE™ VI FIRES OF RUBICON

Alright. May is in the books. Wrapped up New Vegas, caught up on some curator licenses from way back when, got sucked into Balatro, and played a few very memorable games (The Quiet Apocalypse, Lunacid, Dread Delusion). I also played a fair amount of Palworld. It’s definitely fun. I will revisit it when it exits early access.

April completions

Fallout New Vegas: Lonesome Road (Steam Deck)
Fallout New Vegas (Steam Deck)
Lucid Cycle (Steam)
Sunlight (Steam)
The Whisperer (Steam)
A Living Room (Steam)
Balatro (Steam)
The Darkness Below Prelude (Steam)
Some Distant Memory (Steam)
The Light Remake (Steam)
Dread Delusion (Steam)
Under the Sand REDUX - a road trip simulator (Steam)
The Quiet Apocalypse (Steam)
Cubic Light (Steam)
A Story About My Uncle (Steam)
My Name is You and it’s the only unusual thing in my life (Steam)
Building 847 (Steam)
Isolomus (Steam)
Scarytales: All Hail King Mongo (Steam)
Oneons: Prisoners (Steam)
Hexa Path (Steam)
Lunacid (Steam)

But, also retired quite a few games. Some just weren’t my cup of tea, others were outright bad and/or buggy messes. Many also fall into the category of catching up on curator licenses from way back when.

Clock Simulator
Mystery Solitaire Cthulhu Mythos
Time on Frog Island
SKYHILL: Black Mist
Hi-Fi Rush
FUREA UERZT
The Long Drive
Gravity Snake
Star Tank
Delta0
Dragon’s Dogma 2
A Wanderer’s Adventure
Rogue Robots
Marble Trap
DIG THE GROUND
Epic Adventures: La Jangada

Currently playing/June agenda

I’m currently in the middle of both Sand Land and Tales of the Neon Sea.

I’ll also definitely be playing The Legend of Heroes: Trails from Zero and Geneforge 2 - Infestation.

Alright, April is in the books. I spent most of the month playing Helldivers 2, Fallout 3, and Fallout New Vegas. I’ll be playing New Vegas for a few more days to start May off as well.

Anyway, April completions:

Helldivers 2 (Steam Deck)

Fallout 3: Game of the Year Edition - Operation: Anchorage (Steam Deck)
Fallout 3: Game of the Year Edition - The Pitt (Steam Deck)
Fallout 3: Game of the Year Edition - Mothership Zeta (Steam Deck)
Fallout 3: Game of the Year Edition - Point Lookout (Steam Deck)
Fallout 3: Game of the Year Edition (Steam Deck)
Fallout 3: Game of the Year Edition - Broken Steel (Steam Deck)

Purpose 1951 (Steam Deck)

Great North Shelter 2 (Steam Deck)

Fallout New Vegas: Dead Money (Steam Deck)
Fallout New Vegas: Honest Hearts (Steam Deck)
Fallout New Vegas: Old World Blues (Steam Deck)

And retired games

Kill It With Fire 2. Fun but not the type of game that can hold my interest.

PolyRoyale. Great foundation, but needs some work to make it playable in the fashion it’s intended to be played.

Alright. Great North Shelter 2 is done and dusted. I don’t know if there actually is a part one or if the title is one of the numerous meta jokes the developers thrive on lol. It is a walking simulator with hidden object elements.

You know how you watch something like a Will Ferrell movie and while you’re laughing and laughing, you’re also like “this is so stupid”? That’s this game. It’s so gamer-centric meta filled to the brim that you’ll find yourself laughing and giggling even as you’re proclaiming how stupid it is lol. However, that does not extend to the actual story, which is an exploration of time, behinnings and ends or a lack thereof, etc…although I do wonder if the serious nature of the story is itself a meta joke about walking sims.

There are also a couple jump scares and some lite horror elements despite the game very definitely not being a horror game.

The graphics are what you’d expect. Beautiful forests, lakes, mountains and so on with nicely done houses and other structures. And the audio is also what you’d expect. A mix of whimsical pieces and pretty piano tunes. Gameplay is as simple as walk or run around, click on objects, etc…and solve a couple really easy puzzles that gate progression.

It was fully Steam Deck compatible although the start up screen itself is not gamepad compatible for some reason. It did get just over an hour of battery life.

I thought this was a lot of fun. Took a little under two hours to complete although YMMV there. It retails at six bucks. That’s fair IMO. That said, this was a Winter sale purchase for me. Anyway, I highly recommend giving this hame a look. It’s pretty unique in several ways.

Alright. Purpose 1951 is done and dusted. This is the latest release by Tonguç Bodur, and a return to the more straightforward style of walking simulator he is well known for. I feel like each time I play one of Tonguç’s games, I find myself thinking it’s his best so far, and this is no different. Which is a testimony to his ability to continue refining and evolving his skills as a writer and developer.

In this game, the setting of the story is a bit different as the name suggests. You are a doctor in the post WWII era, who through circumstances beyond his control, is blacklisted from the community he lives in. The game follows his reflections on the medical community, his relationships, and the events that led him to this moment in time in his life.

The story format will be familiar. It begins somewhat wistful and contemplative, turns dark, but then closes out on a hopeful note. It was very well written. As a side note, I was a department director at two hospitals in real life for many years, and I have some of the same perspectives regarding the medical community and healthcare as are expressed in this game.

Gameplay is very straightforward walking simulator through some stunningly beautiful locales. Each chapter offers some new things to enjoy. And, as a first for Tonguç to my knowledge, there is even a city setting for one part of the game, which was cool. Each full chapter (other than the game ending itself) ends with a puzzle that upon solving, provides a story recap for the chapter.

I really thought the area transitions were cool as well. Starting in black and white, then changing to full color or sepia tones (depending on the area) once you have control of your character was a nice touch.

Something I noticed that I thought was interesting gameplay-wise. When you’re moving downhill, you actually move faster. It’s a minor detail, but I thought that attention to detail was really cool. Additionally, there was one part of the game where the controls started the section very stiff. Then I realized it’s because you’re actually not walking. You’re riding a bike. Completely made sense.

The voice acting was comfortable and believable. Nice job there. Similarly, the soundtrack was perfect, and varied based on the moment in the game. Each track was highly reflective of the story at that time.

I played on the Steam Deck with zero tweaks required. The controls are all analog stick movement and FoV, so this comes as no surprise. I also experienced no bugs at all, although I note that the game would start to blur a bit with quick turning. However, it never quite did.

It took me right at an hour to complete this game, and I enjoyed every moment of it. If you’re looking for a walking simulator with story depth and a fantastic soundtrack, you need look no further.

Well, I spent quite a bit of time last month and this month playing Helldivers 2. I unlocked all difficulty modes and personally found eight to be my sweet spot for challenge and gameplay. But, despite its awesomeness, I did eventually get bored of the gameplay loop despite the gameplay itself never being dull. So, I’m calling that one done. I then moved on and spent the rest of this month so far playing:

Fallout 3: Game of the Year Edition, which is also now done and dusted. I played this many times on console, but this was my first playthrough on PC. And for me, on an unmodded Steam Deck with the current version of Proton, and with no game mods, this ran immaculately.

In fact, this may have been one of the best games I’ve played on the Deck performance wise. Which is crazy to me considering how often the game would freeze stutter and crash when I played it previously (on console). I had one instance of stuttering in Operation: Anchorage during the final push and another instance of stuttering in Mothership Zeta, but beyond that, I literally had zero stability issues and it ran at a consistent 60 FPS on maxed settings with an average of around 25% CPU usage.

It took me forever to get around to buying and playing this on Steam due to its compatibility issues, but thankfully, those were nonexistent for me. The home screen for some reason wasn’t gamepad compatible, but everything else was and the default settings were fine.

So, with that out of the way, I want to talk a bit about the experience itself. For one, this game still looks great. Does it show its age? Yes and no. Things like character models actually look better than they do in Skyrim and Fallout 4 for some reason. But they don’t look modern of course. However, the world itself has aged very well. The audio is pretty legendary, and that will never change I’m sure.

The gameplay also holds up to modern games quite well. Gunplay is fun and VATS never disappoints. Early to mid game, I would recommend keeping a Dart Gun on you. It makes fighting things like Deathclaws much easier, especially if you use it to target legs. Once you get the Gauss Rifle though, you won’t need the Dart Gun or much else lol. It does great damage AND typically knocks enemies down as well. Nearly game breaking in its OP-ness, but it’s also incredibly satisfying.

Btw, special weapons aside, Deathclaws are still panic inducing and terrifying lol. They’re the fastest, strongest and meanest things in the game, and they have a sixth sense for being able to find you. You could be forgiven if you scream like a child when one leaps at you.

Exploring the DC Wasteland is quite memorable, and I went into this playthrough with a clear agenda for what I wanted to do and see outside of the main story. Given how well written a lot of the side quests are, there’s a lot of good times to be had.

As far as the DLC goes, I’d recommend doing Operation: Anchorage first. It’s the easiest, and although it lacks any nods to loot whores, the final payoff includes the other nearly game breaking piece of gear in the game: the Chinese Stealth Armor. Once you acquire that, the world is your oyster. Especially if you’ve leveled up your stealth. Takes maybe three hours to complete and is basically set up as a corridor shooter. If it weren’t for the armor, I’d probably skip this DLC.

The Pitt is probably the most heavily reliant on the morality system and the one with the largest grey area in that regard. The actual setting is cool and does feature the best melee weapon in the game should you be playing that way. You can roll through this in three to four hours, but it can also take longer depending on how thorough you are. Fairly easy overall.

Mothership Zeta is the quirkiest DLC. You get abducted by aliens, but you and some other abductees rebel and eventually take over the ship lol. Features some good weapons and some excellent healing/repair items. It’s probably the funniest DLC and is moderately challenging.

Point Lookout is the most difficult DLC, is at least partially inspired by Deliverance and Southern Comfort, has some good next tier versions of weapons you’ve probably been using a lot, has some cool story stuff including an important item for concluding a Cthulhu story arc in the base game, and is also the largest DLC.

Broken Steel is an endgame DLC, so once you’ve finished the main story, this one kicks off. I honestly wrapped this up in about two hours, maybe a bit less. But you could potentially get eight-ish hours out of it depending on how you handle certain situations and how much you explore and loot. Personally, I already had more ammo and healing stuff than I’d ever be able to use, so I took a more direct approach with this DLC. It does tie a bow on the Fallout 3 story, and is definitely worth experiencing.

So yeah, I was very glad to get one final playthrough in. It was still awesome in this age of gaming, and while not perfect, each individual aspect of this game holds up immaculately.

Alright. March assassinations

Mosaic (Steam Deck)
Jusant (Steam Deck)
Sea of Dreams (Steam Deck)
Scampr (Steam Deck)
Forest Fantasy (Steam Deck)
Answer Knot (Steam Deck)
Something (Steam Deck)
Chained Echoes (Steam Deck)
The Thaumaturge (Steam Deck)

and retired games

Elevator Experience Although, the devs reached out and assured me they would sort out the issues I had with this one, so it’ll probably get unretired once that happens.

Ant-Gravity: Tiny’s Adventure

Dragon’s Dogma 2 (pending some serious optimization updates)

ongoing

Helldivers 2
Azarine Heart (early access)
Umbra Fields (should be early access)