MaxyBee
A tiny little mystery for smart frogs and/or detectives, now accompanied by their trusty and/or decorative notebooks. It feels like the most limited entry in the series, but I checked with a few people and it turns out that doesn’t matter on bit! Phew.
The perfect “children at play” writing is here again, and many a chuckle was had. Like… genuinely, I have so few gripes, especially for price. It was kind of a pain to find one of the pies, I guess? But it’s a tiny little bunch of houses so who cares, it can only delay THIS detective so long.
The perfect “children at play” writing is here again, and many a chuckle was had. Like… genuinely, I have so few gripes, especially for price. It was kind of a pain to find one of the pies, I guess? But it’s a tiny little bunch of houses so who cares, it can only delay THIS detective so long.
Like all good trilogies, this ends with the third one.
Everything is nicely connected, characters return, TWISTS HAPPEN, jobs change, bad rooms are entered, hats are stolen and/or worn, poems are written, and a scooter is rode. My God, is a scooter ever rode.
I don’t know how you could ever make a longer experience out of these games, and I don’t care to imagine, but it does seem a crime that our time with Frog Detective ends here.
crime is, of course, not real, and I should not have made up this crime. I am sorry.
Everything is nicely connected, characters return, TWISTS HAPPEN, jobs change, bad rooms are entered, hats are stolen and/or worn, poems are written, and a scooter is rode. My God, is a scooter ever rode.
I don’t know how you could ever make a longer experience out of these games, and I don’t care to imagine, but it does seem a crime that our time with Frog Detective ends here.
crime is, of course, not real, and I should not have made up this crime. I am sorry.
I’m beginning to feel two things when it comes to Lego games. One, that the story mode can get in the bin, a pain in the arse hand-holding exercise that blocks you from maximum enjoyment of free play/open world stuff. That this game also uses a small amount of characters for mmmmmmmost of the game’s story only irritates me further in this regard. Two, I think we should institute a global law restricting each human being to only playing any one Lego [franchise here] game to actual completion. It feels damaging to my general state of being to have done so across Lego Batman, Lego Indiana Jones, and now this. That’s too much Lego. Traveller’s Tales must pay for their crimes*.
On positives, the available characters captures both a neat moment in time (Ultimate versions, F.F. versions, Heroic Age Iron Man, Astonishing Cyclops) and a nice variety of deeper cuts. Moon Knight may feel an obvious choice now, but in 2013 Moon Knight was still a year out from his successful comic reinvention by a suicidegirl botherer and some artist pals of mine seem to dislike on a personal level, but I’, buggered if I can remember why.
I just wish I knew how to slow Hawkeye’s skycycle. And how to incrementally alter my flight trajectory as a flying character without accidentally double tapping A and boosting a mile away from a race. Or how to laugh at Deadpool’s schtick.
Played on a Steam Deck, and that feels like a perfect way to play, honestly.
On positives, the available characters captures both a neat moment in time (Ultimate versions, F.F. versions, Heroic Age Iron Man, Astonishing Cyclops) and a nice variety of deeper cuts. Moon Knight may feel an obvious choice now, but in 2013 Moon Knight was still a year out from his successful comic reinvention by a suicidegirl botherer and some artist pals of mine seem to dislike on a personal level, but I’, buggered if I can remember why.
I just wish I knew how to slow Hawkeye’s skycycle. And how to incrementally alter my flight trajectory as a flying character without accidentally double tapping A and boosting a mile away from a race. Or how to laugh at Deadpool’s schtick.
Played on a Steam Deck, and that feels like a perfect way to play, honestly.
2021
Despite having a control scheme devised by a lunatic, this managed to be one of the smoothest and most thrilling gaming experiences of my life. It's no Super Metroid, but at this point aspiring to be that when it's a monolith of game design, the face of speedrunning, a king of randomisers and mods... well, it would just be foolish.
Instead we have Metroid sped up. Everything moves faster, you need to react quicker, counter attacks, execute some truly bananas speed boost puzzles, and memorise the attack patterns of some truly heinous bosses.
I got every item. I died EIGHTY times. I'm not a speedrunner, and love exploring, so this was just under ten hours, which will do fine. I've never cared for the ending screen stuff and never will. I just want Metroid, forever. And this is that.
Instead we have Metroid sped up. Everything moves faster, you need to react quicker, counter attacks, execute some truly bananas speed boost puzzles, and memorise the attack patterns of some truly heinous bosses.
I got every item. I died EIGHTY times. I'm not a speedrunner, and love exploring, so this was just under ten hours, which will do fine. I've never cared for the ending screen stuff and never will. I just want Metroid, forever. And this is that.
Not a perfect game by any means, but a fucking funny one
2017
Charming AND weirdly unpleasant (complimentary), be still my beating heart.
2021
Getting Over It with Bennett Foddy for people who CUM
2022
All the fun of a slot machine without the crippling addiction that tears families apart, loses people their homes, and turns people into crank-pulling automatons.
Very good, wildly so. But I'm increasingly aware that this could have been an incredible tool for evil with very few changes, which adds an undercurrent of... not fear, but an eeriness to it.
Very good, wildly so. But I'm increasingly aware that this could have been an incredible tool for evil with very few changes, which adds an undercurrent of... not fear, but an eeriness to it.
A nice quick mystery visual novel, with more polish and care put into it than a lot of Sonic’s back catalogue. Gorgeous, very evocative of the IDW era we now live in comics-wise, to the point that this could have been an arc and I wouldn’t have blinked at all.
The shockwave-ass minigame is incredibly limited, to the point of just having certain routes you NEED to take by the end, but being so much like an old shockwave game means that I get a nostalgia hit and love it anyway, to say nothing of the aesthetic reminding me of Battle Network.
So thumbs up. More companies need to use April Fools as an excuse to make a good game. It can’t just be Sega and Arika.
The shockwave-ass minigame is incredibly limited, to the point of just having certain routes you NEED to take by the end, but being so much like an old shockwave game means that I get a nostalgia hit and love it anyway, to say nothing of the aesthetic reminding me of Battle Network.
So thumbs up. More companies need to use April Fools as an excuse to make a good game. It can’t just be Sega and Arika.
Am I mad, or did it feel like all the villagers had more individualistic personalities in earlier games? The limited patter from them transforms them from neighbours into particularly fleshy furniture, lifeless behind the eyes, but maybe they have an errand for you, or dropped their purse or whatever. Maybe I’m only noticing it now because of the sheer number of villagers. Who knows.
The game itself is fun. The need to build and expand gives you a nice, structured way to grow and change the island, introducing new elements a good bit after you’ve got the hang of what’s come before. Eventually you buy everything you want, expand everything you wanna, and you end up with a sort of endgame of carving the island up into whatever design you’d want most.
And then I got bored and moved on. And that’ll do. Despite the design of these sorts of games, no game should last forever. I wanna be able to say I’m done with more games and play new experiences. I’ll remember this one fondly.
The game itself is fun. The need to build and expand gives you a nice, structured way to grow and change the island, introducing new elements a good bit after you’ve got the hang of what’s come before. Eventually you buy everything you want, expand everything you wanna, and you end up with a sort of endgame of carving the island up into whatever design you’d want most.
And then I got bored and moved on. And that’ll do. Despite the design of these sorts of games, no game should last forever. I wanna be able to say I’m done with more games and play new experiences. I’ll remember this one fondly.
2022
An important conversation about game development, the state of the industry on the ‘AAA’ level, the beauty and function of developing in the niche end, for self-fulfilment, because you have something to say, all in the guise of a game boy game based on a gag in The Simpsons.
Video games are great.
Video games are great.
A fun enough Mario mod at times, unlocking moves as you collect stars. But when it stops being fun, and frustration sets in (usually at the limitations of stuff like Mario's turning circle or the less than ideal wall jump, which just wasn't that fun in 64), it becomes a horrific chore. Certainly worth a punt for all the ideas at play
2016
This review contains spoilers
I loathe Playdead's previous game, Limbo. Kieron Gillen once famously called it 'Rick Dangerous for Goths', and that stuck with me. Utter trial and error nonsense with a shadowy aesthetic. Ooh you're not moving a box, you're moving a CORPSE. You fight a giant spider by pulling its legs off, just like the sort of misanthrope who designs a game like that does to real spiders. I hate it.
So it's a miracle in itself that I even wanted to play Inside. But the aesthetic was... smarter. More ambiguous. Deaths are more akin to thinking fast and adapting well, a la Another World (Out of This World) than anything a miserable experience like Limbo or, now that I've been reminded of it, Heart of Darkness. Death isn't frustrating, it's just more cause to think on what you did wrong. Everything is graspable. Death isn't a guaranteed part of the experience.
The story isn't vague so much as unexplained. As it went on I was convinced this was a mute take on a 80s horror scenario for a modern age. Something like these weird worms in the pigs having taken over the world, and hunting down you, the only free mind left (with the vague floppy inactive humans being somewhat lobotomised, unoccupied victims). That it ended up not being this at all, and quickly becomes a strange post-apocalyptic body horror ending in a thrilling escape sequence as a monstrous blob, boy absorbed, pushing for freedom with the help of some humans, and a peaceful... death? Sleep? on a shore, as credits play out. It's excellent. Brilliant in its room for interpretation, even. I'm told the secret ending gives you even more to think on, but we all have to move on eventually.
So I'm glad I pushed past my hate of a prior work, and embraced the developer's growth into something proper. Second chances can pay off, now and then.
So it's a miracle in itself that I even wanted to play Inside. But the aesthetic was... smarter. More ambiguous. Deaths are more akin to thinking fast and adapting well, a la Another World (Out of This World) than anything a miserable experience like Limbo or, now that I've been reminded of it, Heart of Darkness. Death isn't frustrating, it's just more cause to think on what you did wrong. Everything is graspable. Death isn't a guaranteed part of the experience.
The story isn't vague so much as unexplained. As it went on I was convinced this was a mute take on a 80s horror scenario for a modern age. Something like these weird worms in the pigs having taken over the world, and hunting down you, the only free mind left (with the vague floppy inactive humans being somewhat lobotomised, unoccupied victims). That it ended up not being this at all, and quickly becomes a strange post-apocalyptic body horror ending in a thrilling escape sequence as a monstrous blob, boy absorbed, pushing for freedom with the help of some humans, and a peaceful... death? Sleep? on a shore, as credits play out. It's excellent. Brilliant in its room for interpretation, even. I'm told the secret ending gives you even more to think on, but we all have to move on eventually.
So I'm glad I pushed past my hate of a prior work, and embraced the developer's growth into something proper. Second chances can pay off, now and then.
2017
This review contains spoilers
There’s something refreshing in playing a well-made romhack that properly replicated the feeling of being lost in a game pre-internet. Well, maybe refreshing isn’t quite the right word. In the first chunk of this game I was losing my mind, desperately trying to find anything resembling progress, but for each power-up found the world became a bit more understandable, a bit more explorable, and far more bearable. Before the bombs, before the hi-jump, and before the wall jump, this is a nightmare. Once they’re equipped, it’s a bouncy, violent jaunt across different biomes, collecting energy tanks, access codes, and powerful new beams that do not prepare you AT ALL for the final stretch of the game, something just as hard and painful as the original game’s march to Mother Brain.
Clever touches like faux-NPCs, talking to you via text in the background, gives this a unique flair over Metroid’s normal story, and Dawn Aran is a neat design, especially whenever the suit comes out on the surface. That she actually gets to feel like a person in the ending is a pleasant surprise. This has plot, baybee.
Can’t avoid mentioning the new game+ as well, with you all armoured and beamed up. A true NES touch that elevates this short romhack to something that feels believable as the genuine article. This is a good NES game, and you should all play it. Just remember that some of the spawning points for enemies can also be passages and you’ll be fine.
Clever touches like faux-NPCs, talking to you via text in the background, gives this a unique flair over Metroid’s normal story, and Dawn Aran is a neat design, especially whenever the suit comes out on the surface. That she actually gets to feel like a person in the ending is a pleasant surprise. This has plot, baybee.
Can’t avoid mentioning the new game+ as well, with you all armoured and beamed up. A true NES touch that elevates this short romhack to something that feels believable as the genuine article. This is a good NES game, and you should all play it. Just remember that some of the spawning points for enemies can also be passages and you’ll be fine.
2013
This review contains spoilers
This feels like the emblem of a certain age, which feels appropriate for something that came some 8 years into its generation. It's Uncharted, it's Assassin's Creed, it's Gears of War, it's inexplicably still Tomb Raider despite this, it has a needless multiplayer mode, it has a definitive edition with a face change and downloadable content. It has a distinct ludonarrative dissonance. It isn't very colourful and falls apart in the final stretch, because of glitches and a rushed finish. Quick-time events up the arse. RPG/upgrade mechanics. Special editions and retailer-exclusive bonuses. The only way it could be more emblematic of the seventh generation of video games is if it had fucking some sort of needless motion control in it. Which... I mean I played this on deck, no guarantee it didn't have some basic gyro on ps3 or something.
To be so emblematic of its generation isn't in itself a bad thing. The game is good. I mean... outside the multiplayer, I'm too cool to waste my life trying that out, but that aside the game is eminently playable, with some fantastic feeling mechanics, such as the near-perfect strain of the bow, or the nice chunky shotgun. The platforming (arguably the most crucial thing to get right) is fun, despite a weird magnetism to Lara that flings her across to the nearest bright white object at any given moment. You forgive a lot when the scramble of Lara across a map is still zippy and does (largely) what you want it to do.
Story's a big pile of wank. Bunch of arseholes I don't care about making stupid decisions all the time, with a clunky selection of mentor, obvious villain, nerd, angry woman, chunky kiwi, and lesbian life partner that feel less cookie cutter and more like someone trying to drearily recreate the shape of a cookie cutter by tearing at the dough. They're just boring box-ticking exercises for what you'd expect from a AAA game of the time, or a mid-budget action flick of the time.
There is a villain. He's Salazar from Resident Evil 4, as played by a mercenary who didn't quite know how to play the part. There are other men of various sizes available throughout. At one point a large man immune to headshots appeared, and I can't even remember if we knew about him beforehand. He felt important, but wasn't exactly a thrilling boss fight.
Despite this, the scenarios feel pretty good. Lara's big murder journey around the island is a thrilling jump from location to location, usually with a chaotic and irreversible sequence pushing you between them. Her transformation from hesitant murder machine to resolute murder machine is great to follow. It's just the characters surrounding Lara that let it down.
So what, where is this going? Do I like it? Yeah, to about the measure of three stars. Would I recommend it? Yeah, if you like finding trinkets and killing people until a bunch of things say 100%. It satisfies in that regard. Just don't expect anything different to anything else that had come along that generation.
Oh, it has inexplicable quick travel, too.
To be so emblematic of its generation isn't in itself a bad thing. The game is good. I mean... outside the multiplayer, I'm too cool to waste my life trying that out, but that aside the game is eminently playable, with some fantastic feeling mechanics, such as the near-perfect strain of the bow, or the nice chunky shotgun. The platforming (arguably the most crucial thing to get right) is fun, despite a weird magnetism to Lara that flings her across to the nearest bright white object at any given moment. You forgive a lot when the scramble of Lara across a map is still zippy and does (largely) what you want it to do.
Story's a big pile of wank. Bunch of arseholes I don't care about making stupid decisions all the time, with a clunky selection of mentor, obvious villain, nerd, angry woman, chunky kiwi, and lesbian life partner that feel less cookie cutter and more like someone trying to drearily recreate the shape of a cookie cutter by tearing at the dough. They're just boring box-ticking exercises for what you'd expect from a AAA game of the time, or a mid-budget action flick of the time.
There is a villain. He's Salazar from Resident Evil 4, as played by a mercenary who didn't quite know how to play the part. There are other men of various sizes available throughout. At one point a large man immune to headshots appeared, and I can't even remember if we knew about him beforehand. He felt important, but wasn't exactly a thrilling boss fight.
Despite this, the scenarios feel pretty good. Lara's big murder journey around the island is a thrilling jump from location to location, usually with a chaotic and irreversible sequence pushing you between them. Her transformation from hesitant murder machine to resolute murder machine is great to follow. It's just the characters surrounding Lara that let it down.
So what, where is this going? Do I like it? Yeah, to about the measure of three stars. Would I recommend it? Yeah, if you like finding trinkets and killing people until a bunch of things say 100%. It satisfies in that regard. Just don't expect anything different to anything else that had come along that generation.
Oh, it has inexplicable quick travel, too.