Finally, a backlog breaker. This is probably going to destroy my desire to play any other games for a while. I have long had obsessions with rougelike games. Binding of isaac and slay the spire both managed to capture inordinate amounts of my gaming time. Maybe on the same level as street fighter and other fighting games in general.

I was extremely skeptical about this game upon initally seeing it. It's just poker and cards I thought to myself. But I took a chance because slay the spire and inscryption showed me that deck builders and rougelikes can an incredibly engrossing combination(also I had a friend recommend it).

I have absolutely no regrets, the way a lot of people talk about vampire survivors is how I feel about this game. It is visual, auditory, sensory joy. When I take a run my mind is awash with potential systems I can tweak to solve the ever daunting goal of the game(which in this case is to finish 8 antes of cards a series of 3 games with different challenges).

There is something about the clustering of strategies, the immense difficulty and constant encourage to keep trying and the myriad of systems and how they work together that is so so wonderful. I have always had a mind for statistics(I worked as a data analyst for a couple years) this game rewards understanding of statistics and critical thinking. All you are really doing is organizing poker hands with powerups but the amount of ways the games powerups allow you to do that is just atonishing. The game has a shop that you can access in the middle of the game and in that you find the main way you go about acquiring power in a run which can take you anywhere from 2-3 hours(possibly shorter if I can get more efficient at playing this game). The game has both temporary and permanent powerups. The temporary powerups coming in 2 flavors: the arcana cards and the joker cards. Arcana cards are single use, they affect the money you spend or the cards you are playing, joker cards can be held in a hand of 5 and as long as you hold them you can use their power(the powers can range from being able to make straights with gaps like 1 to 3 can be considered a straight or adding multipliers to hands with certain conditions met like a hand with diamonds). The games permanent powers come in 2 forms as planatary cards and vouchers. The vouchers are the most expensive items in the game and provide a permenant bonus and the planetary cards gives bonuses to which hands you play.

I took the time to explain a system because this game doesn't just have that it has other systems as well and they all work together to create a meta that even the creator of the game says he does not have completely figured out.

I think this game is a wonderful testament to what can be possible even with the most seemingly simple ingrediants.

Man I am kinda disappointed in myself for not being able to finish this one.

First I tried balanced mode and I kept getting my ass whooped then I switched to explorer and then to story and kept losing and I decided to pack it in.

I really like this game, I think I built my character and team very poorly. At chapter 4 they said you are supposed to be level 13 and I was level 9 basically soft locking me out of completion.

This game is the game Larian needed to make before they did baldur’s gate 3. In many ways it’s better than bg3, I think the combat can be at times much more interesting but I was so much more motivated to do better in bg3. I really put in the research into that game.

No excuses, I just suck and should have tried harder. Oh well.

I am very enthusiastic about Godhand, a game that never quite got it's time in the sun but left an impression on anyone that played it.

There is a genre of action games that blends very elements of fighting games and sports games into it's presentation. I seen the roots of it in super smash bros melee but also Godhand. As of late I see this in games such as vanquish, doom eternal and even calisto protocol(the illfated horror brawler game from late 2022). For those games I would refer to them as Trick shooters. There is a fluidity of movement, a flow, a sort of comboed movement that at times needs to be practiced and improved upon iteratively. In a way it's more like tony hawk pro skater than an action game.

Godhand I believe to be a kind of precursor game to this phenomenon, a trick brawler. Released towards the end of ps2's lifecycle around the same time as DMC3. Godhand is very much an oddity in the history of video games. It's an old school brawler set in a 3d environment. It does not have a block button, it has a dodge button and you can flick it very fast and it looks hilarious. You have a wheel of special moves you can use, one of which is spanking your opponents. It's set in the old west, it has a surf rock soundtrack. You can juggle opponents, it's ridiculously difficult. It might be one of the funniest games I have ever played, it's dialogue is like camp kung fu b movie. It's intentionally bad, "you need to feed your brain, not your ass" he says to the fat demon named "Elvis". What makes me liken this game to doom eternal and the like is the fluidity of the game. You do so many things so fast and when you master it, you feel like a God. You combo a guy, see some other guys come at you, dodge everything they do. Hit them with a baseball bat, throw the baseball bat at some other guys approaching. Launching lunge kick into another guy. Kick some guy off the ledge. And all of this can happen in seconds.

I know it might not be for everyone, but this definately feels like a game for me. It's everything I love in a game, it's silly, it's got a high skill cap, performing it feels amazing, there is room for learning and creativity. God bless clover/platinum games, those guys get it.