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I play the vidjo gaem
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GOTY '23

Participated in the 2023 Game of the Year Event

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Submitted feedback for a beta feature

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GOTY '22

Participated in the 2022 Game of the Year Event

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Journaled games at least 15 days a month over a year

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Gained 750+ total review likes

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Found the secret ogre page

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Created a list folder with 5+ lists

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Journaled games once a day for a month straight

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Journaled 5+ games in a single day

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GOTY '21

Participated in the 2021 Game of the Year Event

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Gained 10+ total review likes

Epic Gamer

Played 1000+ games

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Elite Gamer

Played 500+ games

Gamer

Played 250+ games

N00b

Played 100+ games

Favorite Games

Ōkami
Ōkami
Rayman Legends
Rayman Legends
Shadow of the Colossus
Shadow of the Colossus
Return of the Obra Dinn
Return of the Obra Dinn
Gravity Rush 2
Gravity Rush 2

1821

Total Games Played

007

Played in 2024

3425

Games Backloggd


Recently Played See More

Boomeroad
Boomeroad

Mar 28

Severed Steel
Severed Steel

Mar 18

Murasaki Baby
Murasaki Baby

Feb 28

Mini Metro
Mini Metro

Feb 19

Again
Again

Feb 08

Recently Reviewed See More

Bandai-Namco released Boomeroad worldwide two days ago as part of a suite of simple and experimental games to train new recruits from their indie developer Gyaar Studio. The concept here combines a standard 3D platformer with boomerang throwing that creates grindable rails that can be chained for extended mid-air traversal. You refresh your energy gauge by passing through rings and landing on platforms, and you can increase the gauge's capacity by collecting optional artifacts. Unfortunately, the gameplay is undercooked. You can't adjust the shape of the boomerang's arc besides flattening the upward curve a little, there's very few interactable objects (switches and fans) that force the player to throw the boomerang at them for activation, and you can in fact avoid most of these elements entirely by throwing two chained boomerang arcs to climb up and walk on top of the level's walls, skipping entire sections of the level while never running out of gauge. While I thought speedrun mode would mitigate most of these shortcomings, I don't find the movement satisfying enough because there's fairly little momentum conserved upon jumping off of rails for speeding up, so the movement itself lacks weightiness and route planning isn't very interesting when you're incentivized to just follow the set path of rings for time bonuses. I suppose there's only so much I can complain about a free game nevertheless, and although I don't see Gyaar Studio returning to this, I do think they've got a solid concept on their hands that could prove to be an interesting 3D puzzle-platformer if thoroughly fleshed out with more committal movement and tighter level design.

There's not a ton of complexity as to how Severed Steel operates and some elements need fine-tuning, but I can't help but appreciate how much the game accomplishes with surprisingly little. I'm a fan of the simple and effective UI; your aiming reticle is surrounded by two bars that convey how much ammo and slo-mo time is left (so these gauges are always near the center of attention) and the flashing light on your gun also changes color (from light neon colors to yellow to red) so you're constantly keyed in on when you'll need to pick up a gun early or engage/disengage when running low on supplies. Enemies stand out from the environment thanks to the cel-shaded enemy outlines, and upon death emit a distinct explosion sound-effect so there's no ambiguity when quickly rifling through targets during firefights or when picking off enemies from afar. Guns feel great to aim and fire in slow-mo, mainly because there's very noticeable recoil when firing in real-time; the contrast really helps sell the necessity of the feature. I also love Severed Steel's kick as both a form of attack and traversal; the obvious purpose is your primary melee attack while holding a gun if you don't want to expend your limited magazine to finish off an enemy as well as kicking open doors, but it can also be used to quickly ascend up walls or kick off of grounded/aerial enemies if your double jump isn't enough. The same goes for the arm cannon; you can fire holes into any surface if you don't feel like hunting down stairs/doorways for objectives, but it also provides a nice desperation option to instantly eliminate shielded enemies or drop heavy grunts down to another floor if you find yourself without a weapon.

Despite the appealing core gameplay, Severed Steel can often feel a bit repetitive. Enemy variety feels lacking since the player is usually approaching enemies in a similar manner (that is, entering slo-mo while using stunts to efficiently dispatch foes while firing into their heads/backsides), and I would have liked to see enemies that had to be specifically eliminated using the arm cannon or melee as mix-ups. The Rogue Steel mode does touch upon this with random enemy buffs that force such approaches, but at times I feel like this mode prefers to lengthen combat by overwhelming the player with excess enemies with more health. I do think the game could have also leaned a bit more into its parkour elements with additional stages that focused upon traversal and dodging/quickly disposing of enemies, as there were only a couple of timed story missions that necessitated a rush to the end. Finally, I have to agree with HotPocketHPE that the slo-mo gauge is unbalanced; you'll practically never run out of bullet time as long as you're staying in stunt mode (super easy since there are floors and walls aplenty to slide and wallrun), though this is again addressed from playing Rogue Steel via the "Rebalanced Bullet-Time" unlockable modifier. Even with these gripes however, Severed Steel is a pretty easy recommendation considering how content-rich the game is from its many different modes and extra campaign/workshop levels to tinker with. It was an absolute steal at 80% off on the Steam Spring Sale, and I can't wait to see how Greylock Studio iterates and improves upon their already fantastic formula.

Developers have long since exhausted the trope of "child trapped in a scary world," yet despite that, Murasaki Baby remains compelling in a way that none of its competition ever was. Simply put, it quite literally puts the child's fate at the player's fingertips. Your goal is to ferry a young girl across screens of hazards by manipulating hazards using both the Vita's front touchscreen and the back touchscreen to cycle through various backgrounds unlocked by popping colored balloons. I find the Ico comparisons to be on-point, as the player must physically guide the girl by the hand via holding and dragging on the touch-screen, taking care not to stretch her arm too far lest she stumble and fall. While the game isn't mechanically complex or challenging, it nevertheless constantly engages the player by gradually introducing more elements that require the player to micromanage dragging the girl and the balloon out of harm's way and switching/tapping the background to progress. The best example of this occurs during the final stretch of the game; after another character pops a hole in the girl's balloon, the player must juggle dragging the girl around, tapping the green background to repeatedly pump air into the leaking balloon, and switching/tapping additional colored backgrounds to flip the stage with the Vita's gyro controls and powering moving platforms with electricity. Though the path forward remains clear, the game demands a strong degree of attention and precision to quickly recognize and solve the game's many puzzles while building the bond between the girl and the player.

Murasaki Baby has unfortunately been more or less forgotten by the public. A slew of technical issues does hold the game back somewhat, as others have reported that saving sometimes breaks down in the middle of playthroughs and a few more (myself included) have experienced crashes. If I really had to nitpick, the game also could have done a bit more integrating all of the Vita's control functionalities into the gameplay (unlike say, Tearaway), as the face buttons/triggers/cameras are never used and the joysticks are used for exactly one exclusive segment outside of the menu screen. While I do feel as if the game was fairly short (about an hour and a half) and wrapped up just when I was beginning to feel a bit more pressured, I'm still glad that I got to try another overlooked title that showed real promise of how far a game could utilize controls to create an emotional and completely new experience. Until the day Astro's Playroom gets a follow-up, I suppose we'll just have to dream of a world where Sony invested wholeheartedly into its hardware and the Vita was seen as more than just a glorified control gimmick.