It's your same old Larry and it's not. I see the Lounge Lizards being a classic some people want to play it in a modern way and backed with Kickstarter Leisure Suit Larry Reloaded did happen. But it's not worth mentioning to me in more than just a few words.

See, the VGA remake of the original that already was sort of a remake of a text adventure called Softporn, did that job quite nicely though it might still be too old school for the kids. I, having played the original over and over, especially when it was installed on a school computer, would still prefer the parser version, that gives the game something truly mysterious and therefore adventurous no remake can offer.

In case of Leisure Suit Larry Reloaded, that I like the general art style of, but can't familiarize with the digitally brushed close ups, I also sense a big difference in tone. It's basically the same story with slight changes that won't stop you from finishing in four hours even if you try out all the possibilities. But it's a lot less innocent, more like unnecessarily nasty.

Leisure Suit Larry Reloaded doesn't display the protagonist as a clumsy charming creep that can use your help and that might actually help you finding out a few things not to do if you're still an adolescent looking for love yourself. To me in Reloaded Larry isn't much more than a creep anymore and you don't have to try what phrase could cause something funny to happen. You just click through the icons looking for an effect that usually isn't played out anyway.

The magic has worn off, so despite the modern voice acted Point'n'Click outfit it's probably frustrating if you don't know what to do and a rather boring chase if you do. It wasn't as exciting as letting Larry finally score in the original, because the setting, that also doesn't punish your failures anymore, doesn't even allow for it. The original was short and not the best game after all, but it kinda drew me in having goosebumps whenever I could make Larry advance in his world. That's gone. Even more than in the VGA version.

It's not a secret Stern are dominating the pinball business of the last 20 years, so giving them their own treatment just like Farsight did with Gottlieb and Williams wouldn't seem weird, if Pinball Arcade wasn't in-between. That framework for plenty of awesome pinball table DLCs did the job and tied a brilliant arcade together, well, until they started losing their licenses, which now makes Stern Pinball Arcade a great opportunity, so hear me out.

I've mentioned in my Zaccaria Pinball review that I'm again late to the party, so I've missed Pinball Arcade's golden era and though Zen did something right at sometime, I'm not entirely convinced by the recent Pinball FX plus they're missing out on Stern so far, even doing their own licensed versions of the same franchises and it might be a matter of taste if you prefer Zen's fantasy tables. I rather like simulations of existing pincabs with fundamental physics.

Anyway, noticing some previously released Stern tables missing from the eShop versions of either Pinball Arcade and Stern Pinball Arcade of which I at least wanted the missing AC/DC pincab, I understood why the retail version of Stern Pinball Arcade was actually a good idea to conserve those contents beyond the DLC availability. This also causes the Nintendo Switch cartridge to be offered between 45 and 110€ though, so I was willing to experiment if an Italian code in box version would work for me as well.

Good news is it does, so for 16€ shipped I got all the 11 tables of Stern Pinball Arcade unlocked as the retail version, which I think is a splendid deal considering Zen asks 15€ for the Indiana Jones table separately. The question though is, if it's something you'd be happy with as there are many gaps ranging from Lord of the Rings to Metallica or more recent Deadpool, Stranger Things and Godzilla that will probably never be available. I for sure would trade these against the Harley Davidson or Mustang licenses from this package and even Star Trek in a way is just a poor man's Attack From Mars, though all of them are entertaining for at least a while.

The highlight of this collection undeniably is the still available Ghostbusters Premium pincab, which is as challenging but fun as found in the wild when still running the unrevised 2016 code. It's a perfect representation of how Stern at best teaches you how to pinball these days, because it's easy to lose the ball without ever touching a flipper if you've got no idea how to play, but if you do, you'll hit over 100 million in bonus on one ball alone. It's a journey to activate the stages, toys and wizard mode, so don't be discouraged as an inexperienced player. Pinball is a game of skill after all and Stern learned to embrace that for the enthusiasts, making the games increasingly rewarding rather than just producing unfair moneymakers.

Best advertisement is probably Farsight giving away Frankenstein with the free download version, so you can already try one of the top titles. The remaining tables are Phantom of the Opera, Ripley's Believe It Or Not, Starship Troopers, Last Action Hero and High Roller Casino. The latter is a bit odd, incorporating the gambling aspect pinball was criticized for, but despite the chance element the real table is a joy with its toys and the representation gives a good impression.

Being based on the aging Pinball Arcade engine, Stern Pinball Arcade does the job quite nicely, though for vertical play on the Switch screen I'm missing my favorite angle from Pinball FX3. It's also unfortunate the B button is used for the angle and as well to exit the score screen, so don't press too early in an impatient rush or your settings change between plays.

You could of course argue if the ball physics are really 100% accurate or if there should be more precise hd rumble, but Stern Pinball Arcade on the other hand is far away from detailed settings available in Zaccaria Pinball anyway though it's also not as keen on challenges or upgrade systems as Pinball FX3 is, that I've learned to love as my sole key to play Bally/Williams classics on my Switch. There's a rudimentary challenge mode nonetheless and table achievements as well, but I'm not yet very interested.

In the end it's a substitute until I will be able to revisit some of the original Pincabs on my next arcade trip in a few weeks and for that it does the job perfectly. I'm not a kid that's got to be lured into playing pinball by things I wouldn't find on the cabinets. Gee, I'm old enough to have enjoyed Space Cadet on Windows as a welcome throwback to my past, when despite not thinking of myself as a pinball wizard I still frequently found sponsors paying credits to watch me play.

These days I really want to play, but it's gotten even harder to find any pinball machine in the wild, so either Pinball Arcade, Pinball FX3 or Zaccaria Pinball are the closest I can get and all of them offer me basically the same satisfying use of the Pro Controller I'd like to add. So much at least, that I'm thinking of how to padhack the rumble into my planned pinball controller, something I hadn't considered when randomly buying leaf switches to add to an arcade stick project before even finding out all these games are available on the Switch.

Whilst I love building those controllers, it's not an ideal world for being a pinball aficionado due to those licensing issues that make the standalone Stern Pinball Arcade relevant at all, because the tables should just be available to one of the engines, not even dreaming of having a single framework to feature all pincabs ever produced. Right now it doesn't look like the virtual situation for Stern is getting better, so to purchase this set is the only chance to still get them.

You maybe want to at least have Attack from Mars and Medieval Madness before expanding into the cabs featured in this selection, but with AC/DC as a representation of a decent rock license and Ghostbusters as one of the best recent Pincabs plus a nice selection of other fun tables Stern Pinball Arcade is a must have package for any good pinball collection.

It's always been a niche with the best sales for a real table more than often produced in Chicago being hardly over 20k units, more commonly 3-6k, usually at a price of a couple of thousands bucks and even if I wish, I'm not amongst the collectors having space and money for a manager man cave, so I'd sure love to add Metallica as my favorite music pinball or look forward to a coming Godzilla adaptation to Stern Pinball Arcade, but this is as good as it gets until maybe things sort out - possibly for a newer platform to come.

Perhaps you're interested in other of my related backloggd reviews like
Psycho Pinball
Pachinko Challenger
Puzzle Uo Poko

Why must there always be a tragic hero in the third row? Ok, I know I'm late to this party again, having played my old pinball simulations for ages, totally ignoring what's happening more recently. I also have to admit, that I'm not investing enough into PC hardware to keep track with the state of the art in general and I actually don't have to, because most games I'm interested in are old enough or not very performance hungry. I did know of the Pinball FX family though and have heard of other projects, but Zaccaria Pinball wasn't amongst them.

Could be because it still seems to be early access on Steam, which makes me wonder why I found Zaccaria Pinball on Nintendo Switch recently, but having not seen Pinball FX/FX3 or Pinball Arcade pop up on the e-store as well when I was looking for the genre, I'm wondering about the quality of my searches in general anyway. With any of the three platforms coming with at least one free table I was having a blast nonetheless and having fun with the HD rumble on my pro controller and the OLED screen in vertical, I was also beginning to buy DLCs.

And here's where the tragic journey begins, the reason I'm picking Zaccaria Pinball as my review subject at this very moment, but let's please emphasize first that it's actually me spending dough on a free platform to buy everything extra for. Yeah, that's not me, except for deals on Capcom Arcade Stadium for instance, because I did find some sales for Pinball FX3 and though I don't see me buying individual tables for bloody 15€ to use on the recent Pinball FX, I just had to spend another tenner on the FX3 Williams three-pack containing Attack from Mars, the machine I was doing two hour train rides to play back in the nineties.

Given that favorite pinball tables can be very autobiographical, I actually appreciate at least a split to affordable bundles, but on the other hand I would maybe be interested in more tables, would I have the option for a demo that the Switch versions of both Pinball FX and Pinball Arcade don't offer. It's another huge problem Pinball Arcade lost a part of their licenses, so my only chance to access the AC/DC table for instance was ordering the Stern Pinball Arcade package sold individually. I still hope the code in box version will work when it finally arrives.

However, Zaccaria Pinball did impress me instantly with next to the two free tables every other installment is playable as a demo. They have nothing to hide and that's for a good reason. Zaccaria Pinball is a simulation dream. You've got everything essential from the competitor's systems,but you can go much deeper by setting ambient light or wear on the table next to physics and camera. It can take minutes to study the possibilities before even thinking of playing and the attention to detail is plainly awesome. Having played, you get statistics for each ball's points and the distance they rolled. You immediately recognize Magic Pixel Games love what they're doing.

I'm willing to believe simulations of their signature tables are authentic in design as much as they are in physics, but here starts that issue because of which I'm not dumping all my money into Zaccaria Pinball right now. What they do have is fifties to sixties style retro tables I'm not sure existed. Then you've got the original electromagnetic and solid state Zaccaria tables from the seventies and eighties I can't remember having played, though it's possible long ago at a bar or something. I just don't have a relation to those tables with typical themes from sports to space etc. and as much as I love pragmatic old school designs, none of them catches my attention enough.

Whilst you can set the gap in the middle to a more modern narrow spacing on the old tables, Zaccaria Pinball actually offers remakes of their popular themes not like fantasy tables by Zen, but more like an authentic built as if the company had released them at the beginning of the nineties when their production had ceased. Those tables use elements that could just work as well as a real table and they're really fun to play. Same goes for deluxe versions that are comparable to Pinball FX interpretations of cabinets like Fish Tales, where you have digitally animated figures enhancing the design.

It really seems like they're doing everything right, having something in store for any generation of classic pinball fans and though they might not have the captivating music and knocking on the remakes, they still manage to add more familiar elements without denying typical leveled structures for instance. I appreciate this a lot, but do they want to be a sleeper like that?

Licensing is a very big issue in this segment and on one hand Magic Pixel Games are my heroes for creating their own level of simulation, but on the other it was very brave to enter competition just with one catalog available. I'm sure there are ecstatic fans who are very satisfied, but in this niche of gaming, Zaccaria Pinball occurs to be a whole niche on its own, for that alone I'm willing to spend a few Euros.

They're not even asking too much, I think. The contents of the packs between 5 and 10€ still appear generous, even though single tables can be purchased for between 2 and 3€ each. So what Zaccaria Pinball at least is doing is showing how it's done to the other big players Pinball Arcade (who need to really be revived) and Pinball FX who are going in the wrong direction right now.

But of course right now I want to play tables I've once found in the wild or I'm still looking forward to. It so happens I have a huge history with cabs from the Williams sets on Pinball FX3 and I've just played the Ghostbusters table in the Stern pack a few weeks back at the Dutch Pinball Museum in Rotterdam. I'm still looking for Data East stuff as a simulation, especially the Batman 1989 license that I visited a local ice cream parlor for after school as a kid. But I doubt Zaccaria Pinball will ever go that direction.

So in conclusion this is probably the best game I'm not going to play very soon, which is sad, but Zaccaria Pinball seems like built on a limitation from the start being nothing but an impulse as a great example maybe, but I don't feel the table have enough charisma to carry the game on their own. It's great for fans and except for slight bugs of caught balls on at least one remake, which might actually rather add to realism, it looks finished enough to me to play it. On Switch that is, of course.

I don't know if we can encourage Magic Pixel Games to just use the same engine on a follow up simulator for other licensed tables, but we should at least honor them with a purchase or two. As soon as I'm back on budget I will start buying everything just to enlarge the collection and send my thanks for an operation that doesn't seem to make a lot of sense but that they mastered anyway. It's maybe only adding to the variety of my tables, but when I'll start Zaccaria Pinball, I'll sure enjoy it.

Perhaps you like other of my related backloggd reviews like
Psycho Pinball
Stern Pinball Arcade
Pachinko Challenger
Puzzle Uo Poko

Unlike the vignette Swampstar by independent collective Geography of Robots, Norco is too much of a game to spare it from a rating in favor of an appreciation as a piece of art on its own and in that context, it might look like I disagree with a majority of critics, giving the interactive amalgam of an RPG and a Visual Novel raving reviews, but I will actually not be able to say much different about it. My astonishing conclusion though is, that I'm still not all that impressed.

In theory, alternate Louisiana in Norco could be a fictional alien world to me just like Neo Tokyo or a city on Mars. I was even joking if the title describes narcotics for Trollans until I found out it was actually a brand name for pain medication. Little did I know, however, that Norco is also an actual census-designated place in St. Charles Parish, Louisiana that derived its name from the New Orleans Refining Company and is home to a major Shell manufacturing complex. I'm learning every day.

You don't have to think much about why the company in the game Norco is called Shield and with the Shell facility having experienced catastrophic explosions twice the story sure appears less far fetched. I recommend reading the Honeysweat interview with GoR's Yutsi if you'd like to know more on his growing up in sight of that factory, comparing it to Midgar in the world of Final Fantasy.

Even without knowing Norco specifically, I was of course aware of the condition our world is in and I think it's hard to not see how close the narration stays with things happening in reality. It sure is condensed and emphasized, but we have everything from AI to ponzi schemes, messed up religious beliefs, unregulated capitalism or privately organized space travel. It's not like Orwell is predicting the future a couple of decades away, it's more like holding up a mirror, showing us the dystopia we're creating for tomorrow or a day after.

Born and raised in a small town bordered by the dilapidated ruins of an industry, having watched a company burning down to the foundations and knowing the history of a group buying out farmers to build a production plant in the area, I can nothing but relate to protagonist Kay returning to Norco. It's what you recognize best at a carnival. There are those who are too young to escape and those who never made it out, but then there are other people in their thirties or rather forties, returning to family business - taking care of parents or bringing up children of their own in an environment that appears at least more family friendly than the big city.

For Kay it's late. She has tried to cut loose and ignored her cancer infested mother trying to get in touch. Time doesn't stand still when you're away and as much things don't seem to change as long as you're there, everything is weirdly different once you turned your back and tried to start a life of your own independently.

Norco uses pixel art to illustrate this story and I don't really understand how this can be seen as innovation, because digitizing photographs for instance is something going back to the old Amiga days at least. It's not ugly at all, but, especially with the retro trend of recent years, something I'd rather call standard opposite to some of the reviews I've read. Recreating that off grid Amiga feeling especially with the first person solo adventure layout is another cup of Grog.

I've mentioned it before in my review for One Night Stand, when playing Our World Is Ended as one of my first actual visual novels, I was missing interaction with the screen other than clicking text. Despite being described as a point'n'click I was lucky to read up enough on Norco before to not expect it being the familiar third person story puzzle, so I was merely amazed at first that Norco was allowing me to dive into the scenery as much as I'd define the character by text choices.

One thing I also enjoyed was the use of a mindmap to elaborate a thought process and reflect on the information received via dialogue, even though it often rather bothered me as doubling what I already understood. That tracking though also led to me speeding up reading to pass the character's annoying mumble (doesn't have to be voiced, but please…) and therefore forgetting key information I would have needed to authenticate for additional lore via the follow up Shield Nights (available for free on itch.io) that seems to consist mostly from background information I dug out elsewhere or could make sense of on my own, so I'm not tempted to replay Norco just to read some more liner notes.

The reason I'm not keen on revisiting Norco, not even to check for different character developments rather than the endings I think I caught the best from anyway, is that despite its captivating atmosphere it wasn't that much of a revelation to me. The fictional elements are better seen as surreal than to be dissected for a consistent explanation and the mood isn't the most welcoming happy place, so that adding an awkward fight system (autofight available after patch), clumsy boat ride or text adventure staircase mechanics acts as a repellent on me.

From a standpoint of classic graphic adventure gameplay Norco isn't very good even after the added expert mode. Most of the time it's either just not challenging, which is fine as long the plot goes on, or it's nerve wrecking in execution, which is destroying the flow. What Geography of Robots don't understand is guiding the player through puzzles alongside with the narration to unfold information seamlessly.

Ironically the distributor Raw Fury also has Kathy Rain and Whispers of a Machine by Clifftop Games in their catalog and Norco would fit perfectly as the spiritual tie in I was wishing for between those two brilliant point'n'click adventures. It's almost frightening how precise Norco combines ethereal elements from the first and a probably more obvious futuristic technology from the latter to another mystery plot. It's possible that makes me biased, but I'm actually more dreaming of how exchange of expertise between those indie developers could be a benefit to all of us.

With a splendid post-industrial depressive black metal track scoring the rolling credits it was rather a relief to end this adventure. I couldn't stop playing but didn't really enjoy Norco in the true sense of the word. For that, it's too much a reminder how fucked up this world is, it's too close to the somber atmosphere of a rat's nest I tried to escape but always returned to somehow after traveling around no matter how long. It also causes awareness, not only for losses of the past, but also how my parents are becoming older, giving me a hard time deciding to move to the other end of the country for an actually awaiting future.

Told from both the perspectives of Kay and her mother with party members joining on and off Norco to me is a maelstrom that should at least offer satisfaction by putting some things in order, though it treats its puzzles rather as part of a minigame cocktail, so you won't just click text and look at some scenic pictures. I always appreciate media including toilet needs, but I would have required a little more than a few gags to possibly miss while exploring the environment.

It feels harsh to say after an otherwise enthralling story, but maybe that's what you get after spawning from a multimedia documentary by a pseudonym collective that might not yet have the experience to make a full grown game rather than a gaming part within the initial project. It's sad that Norco could have been the equivalent to calling Grave of the Fireflies the best anime you never want to watch again, but it wasn't meant to be. It's far from being comparable as a full emotional experience.

For that reason and hoping Geography of Robots can find a way to create a more wholesome product, I don't even think their demo End Millennium is a step in the wrong direction. Maybe writing is their strongest capability, so focusing on a text adventure would be a logical conclusion until they find support in puzzle design should they want to attempt the genre at all.

Sure, Norco can also function as an exercise for the collective to improve on, but then we should not hype for something that isn't present. I wouldn't mind supporting them with my purchase as much, had I been downloading the game from a niche indie platform, but I bought it from a major distributor for way above my average price.

My expectations weren't sky high and maybe I'm wrong when so many others seem to love it anyway, but I would rather have preferred the packaging to say "This is the best we can do at the moment, support us so we can improve on our promising art", because that's what it comes down to. And with that in mind it's something like an unpolished gem for an atmosphere of desolation and despair, justifying a generous playthrough.

Check out more of my backloggd adventure reviews for games like:

Full Throttle Remastered
Detective Gallo
Broken Age
Thimbleweed Park
Gibbous: A Cthulhu Adventure

Calling Swampstar "A brief meditation on the broken swamplands of Louisiana's future." sums it up quite nicely. You can "play" Swampstar for free on itch.io and being called a vignette or micro-narrative there hits the nail on its head, I think.

I'm not entirely sure where to put Swampstar in the ludography of Geography of Robots, like if it is a demo before or along the way the development of Norco, their first full release, but it kinda sets the mood for that nicely with a text monologue over some pixel art.

You press a couple of times to activate and continue the text, multiple choice at the end all leads to the same animation. Hardly two minutes and Swampstar is over. For that reason I won't rate it.

Swampstar seems to have the same melancholic origin as Norco and therefore underlines my understanding the latter is more focused on ambience than gameplay or even a very tight narrative.

It's a bonus, so I take it. It's art, so you can't hate it.

Spielberg franchises didn't have the best start in video game history. Even though E.T. for the Atari VCS wasn't as bad (still not good though) as many say it is, it became the figurehead of the big crash in 1983. Steven Spielberg didn't show much interest in video game development back in the day, which many believe lead to a lack in quality control, but with his creative input to GameWorks, a 1996 joint venture of Sega, DreamWorks and Universal, things must have been different on the 1997 arcade adaption of The Lost World: Jurassic Park, right?

Fast forward to 2023, I'm at the arcades again, looking for the machines I haven't played yet and on a six hour gaming spree having a cabinet to sit down is always nice for a change. I'm just too old to stand at western cabinets like Gyruss forever, so I even started liking the Candy Cab section more recently. Anyway, I skipped The Lost World: Jurassic Park before, because it's been ages since I watched the movies and coming from a time when licenses had been almost a guarantee for a turd, my prejudice held me back as well.

On display was the original theater cabinet with two lightguns, a 50" rear projection screen, four speaker surround sound and a shaker. That might seem like a downgrade from the hydraulic Ford Explorer seat on Sega's 1994 Jurassic Park arcade game, though I didn't mind much as we've been playing plenty of racers like Midnight Maximum Tune 6R that day already and I prefer a lightgun over the then used joysticks. I sure wouldn't have played The Lost World: Jurassic Park in its standard upright version though, which has the same stereo sound cabinet as The House of the Dead.

That's actually a thing with the arcades, you know, having to draw from something to catch your interest. And even trying to spot hidden gems, I've got a little snob inside me, looking for something special. Producing a good game in that context could mean hoping for a sleeper hit, it seems, looking at cabinets from the nineties that I mostly remember as fighters or maybe NBA Jam and the larger cabinets, racers and lightgun shooters.

Now, I'm not saying I didn't have fun back in the day, especially with Daytona USA and Sega Rally or Time Crisis and Point Blank, but there might be a temptation to cheap out once you lured in your players with large advertising and there might not necessarily follow a lot of creativity, just like within every other established genre. So that plus a The Lost World: Jurassic Park license could make you suspicious.

I kind of needed that as an introduction to look a bit deeper into why I didn't feel The Lost World: Jurassic Park wasn't very convincing, at least played today. It's still a somewhat decent railshooter, please get me right, in my opinion still better than the 2008 Rambo arcade game or Transformers: Human Alliance, the latter looking much better, but playing like shit and having been outsourced by Sega to chinese developers rather than making it a prestige inhouse project illustrates quite well how the arcades had to compete with games you could play at home but just like cinemas still have a hard time when there's no substance.

The Lost World might not have created the same excitement like the original Jurassic Park at the cinemas. I fondly remember the queue being so massive back in 1993, the theater owners brought out extra foldable chairs and after a screening you had to use the emergency exit, because the lobby was packed. But I can imagine as a kid, who wasn't as disappointed those CGIs just didn't look as familiar as the awesome practical effects we were used to before, it might have been great to do anything related to a huge dinosaur parade like that and every cinema or shopping center that could wheel out this cabinet might have made more than their money back.

I trust others though The Lost World: Jurassic Park doesn't stay exactly true to the movie, because I've read up a little on the history of this arcade cabinet developed by Sega's AM3 division who in early 1997 started into a quite promising project given the above mentioned liaison between the japanese video game producer and movie mogul Steven Spielberg. It didn't turn out all that well.

First off, the ambitious AM3 team was the first to use the Model 3 board, allowing for 60 frames and 100k polygons a second, on a lightgun shooter and having a tight schedule didn't exactly help solving the difficulties they had to overcome in programming and researching. Announced in the first quarter of 1997 The Lost World: Jurassic Park was already unveiled at E3 in June of the same year. For that, AM3 had to start from just the script to compile action scenes for the game.

It was only three months before completion they received additional materials, but with little to none communication with the movie creators they had to go from what the promotional team provided. Developers sent to the US to visit the sets had been ghosted by ILM and as a fan of Stan Winston it was nice to read that his dinosaur creations had instead been available. Still, the procedure sounds very familiar to what I've heard from other Spielberg related video game projects and it makes you wonder less about the quality of licensed games back then, when they've been seen as nothing more than additional merchandise.

So if you wondered why I'm beating around the bush so much, it's because I don't want to be too harsh on a game that might actually have been supposed to be better. Usually you don't see these circumstances as a customer, especially at the time of release and having received quite generous contemporary reviews might speak for some of The Lost World's shine wore off over time, because polygons had been still wearing baby shoes compared to what beauty classic 2D graphics were capable of and I'd argue developers still have the tendency to overdo 3D objects for state of the art instead of making them look good.

However, with all that aside, in The Lost World: Jurassic Park, you're on a mission to save Dr. Ian Malcolm and Dr. Sarah Harding with your trusty lightgun. Having to reload by shooting off screen is a standard and to be honest, as nice as the hordes of mostly small raptors and fewer big ones are, they could as well be any kind of alien creatures. The game just keeps you occupied enough that you don't have much time to think about.

Of course you wouldn't finish off a T-Rex for example with just one shot, as lucky as it might be, so the big birds are sort of divided into sections to hit within a time limit and that repeated over and over. Might as well be a calibration thing, but it turned out I'm a lot more precise shooting from the hip than aiming like a cop, which might correlate with me spending more time with water pistols than on a firing range, despite I've actually performed a Robin Hood with a crossbow at the age of twelve.

So it felt a bit random not having that much control over the aim and having numerous enemies thrown at you in waves without any dodging option, but I somehow got used to the situation, so that I kept clearing screens also to help my girlfriend who joined me halfway through. I was happy she got into it for a while, but neither having a relation to gaming history other than through me nor being interested in dinosaurs, you could sense increasing boredom and that she'd have enjoyed butchering me at Mario Kart again a lot more.

I found it a welcome variety that you can save people in The Lost World: Jurassic Park in trade for refreshes and upgrades. That you've actually also have to rescue your teammate was a surprising function that we had to comprehend at first and I'm not sure we knew exactly what we've been doing though it seems to have been enough to finish the game on a couple of credits anyway.

It ain't over till the fat dinosaur stops roaring and with not much more clearly established in the heat of battle within a humble hulk of a story rolling, the short runtime of The Lost World: Jurassic Park is rather exhausting. With the shaker massaging the back quite nicely and the volume natively cranked to eleven it's probably the loudest and most stressful kissing booth I've ever been to.

I could conclude that it might have been a rather nice looking performance in its day and that I won't probably play The Lost World: Jurassic Park again although it was a still decent ride while it lasted considering how rushed development was, which actually showed in being rather average. It seems though AM3 wouldn't let that sit on them and so by January 1998 came out with a special edition I just did not have the honor to find in the wild, so please tell me if it's worth it.

With rotating and rocking seats, an 80" screen and an air blower they sure were after a fresh breeze and being rewritten to follow the film's plot more accurately and the inclusion of ideas left out from the original sounds like they might have really been wanting to make up for the original flaws with The Lost World Special. Now the problem is, it was only released in Japan where it might actually be hard to find these days, so all we're left with in the west is what AM3 could finish until the original release only a few months prior. I wish updates would have been easier back then.

You're welcome to read more of my backloggd arcade reviews for games like:
Teki Paki
Gunforce
Superman
Aliens
Stagger I

I'm not very invested in scandinavian crime stories, so I might have been rather puzzled about what to expect from Whispers of a Machine, commonly described as a Sci-Fi Nordic Noir take on graphic adventures. With my love for pointing and clicking and long after the purchase also learning this is the second game by Joel Staaf Hästö's Clifftop Games after the awesome Kathy Rain, whose Director's Cut I just reviewed, I was looking forward to give the follow up a chance and wasn't disappointed.

Indeed I was very happy to have been recapturing the predecessor Kathy Rain just before, because whilst you can see technically the Director's Cut draws from the experience on Whispers of a Machine, Whispers just as well took over some establishments made previously via the Adventure Game Studio engine. But it's actually more than just a process in development. With recurring topics you can actually see a handwriting emerge.

Wait, how can a sci-fi story about AI and transhumanism be anything similar to a typical nineties mystery with Twin Peaks flavor? Well, first this is post collapse of AI, so what's hot these days and might still have been discussed rather on a philosophical level during the making of Whispers of a Machine is actually a thing of the past during the plot. So when we follow another turmoiled female protagonist to a remote village, there's not much tech involved besides some useful cybernetic augmentation.

It's true that as a legitimate investigator sent to solve a murder there's more of a case in the beginning of Whispers of a Machine, but with the involvement of another church and new questions like if humanity wants to create god in their image, it totally feels like jamming new riffs within the same scale. It's like both stories could be independent from each other, but also happening in the same universe at opposite ends of a timeline, that could, but doesn't have to cross our present. We kinda decide on that as we go.

Aside from functions like the notebook known from Kathy Rain, Whispers of the Machine also incorporates the use of devices like computers, which isn't exactly a throwback to parser games, but requires using a simple text interface that might not be familiar with the younger folks. It won't require a handbook for that reason, but it feels nice having a glimpse back on the past, when that was how we ran programs.

Another similarity to Kathy Rain is digital restoration. Then, you had to adjust sliders to make picture content visible. Whispers of a Machine caters to that virtual nostalgia by a form of retro futurism. Despite (or because?) in a world past the collapse of AI, not only are the computer interfaces old, the player also picks up audio tapes and in one case has to de-noise and compress them, which should fall into place easily if you at least tried that in Audacity before.

To me personally Kathy Rain had more of a hang around factor, because the two roommates felt like two outcasts that could have easily been part of our clique back in the day. It makes sense though Vera in Whispers of a Machine feels more cold and distanced in the beginning, because the player is supposed to give her a personality via irreversible decisions that define between the paths "analytical", "assertive" or "empathetic". Depending on what is tracked on a meter throughout the game there will be two additional out of six possible augmentations for example.

After one playthrough that felt natural to me and two other intentional attempts at the opposite extremes I can say in theory my first individual version of Whispers of a Machine would have been enough, though I'd like to acknowledge slight differences especially in the puzzles related to the specific augmentations. It comes in handy that the ending independently allows for three decisions, so it can be worth it, especially if you leave more time in-between your plays and don't end up rushing your third playthrough in two and a half hours like me.

Having said that, my first eight and a half hour playthrough really satisfied my analytical urges, especially with the scanner augmentation allowing me to search for traces. Whilst the possibility to double click for swift exits more or less compensates for having to walk a luckily confined area, the replays, for which a start from the beginning is mandatory, showed limitations quite distinctly.

After you know what to talk about with whom, you might want to create a little more havok by using augmentations like mind control or mimicry on random NPCs, but as the principle of Whispers of a Machine is to guide you gently through this sci-fi murder mystery, there's no chance to use your forces on anybody you're not supposed to. On the other hand that also underlines the absence of moon logic. Listen and watch for the clues and you'll be fine. It's quite thought through.

Knowing the dimensions of additional effort required to supply non-linear multiple choice like I was suggesting before keeps me aware that's nothing I should expect from an independent developer that's basically Joel Staaf Hästö hiring additional artists for artwork and Dave Gilbert to return for directing voice actors. For that, he's been doing another awesome job in giving us a fresh take on classic point'n'click gameplay and I can't thank him enough for trying to be significant with less stereotypical topics.

I know it's hard to rely on players to interpret a work of art in a world where any loose end has to be winded up by canonized sequels, prequels or spin-offs and the easiest way to find financial backing is to trigger some nostalgia with typical catchphrases on Kickstarter. But whilst the latter often can't come up with a story at all, Clifftop Games has become a quality seal for outstanding and slightly surreal adventures.

I can't wait to play another one of these, be it Kathy Rain 2 or another Whispers of a Machine, both of which have been presented as possible in the future by Hästö. With the required attention to continuity though I'd be fine with more of an independent expansion on his topics rather than a sequel - something that could happen in the same universe but at another time or place.

The worst that could happen is the Robert Eggers effect, like when you directed the brilliant The VVitch and The Lighthouse all it takes is some budget to make a nugatory The Northman. I'd say don't throw your money for that reason, but the truth is, you'd be missing out on some of the most relevant graphic adventures of our day and age and in reality there can't be enough support for this rather niche of gaming.

As long as you're not trying to squeeze it, but rather aim to make one definitive playthrough your personalized version of Whispers of a Machine, there's not much to criticize. It's a splendid, story driven mystery with moderate puzzles to solve and as long as you see playing the other paths as a bonus you're most likely keep enjoying this game.

I was one of the few who bought Kathy Rain back in the day and I enjoyed the point'n'click adventure enough to purchase the Director's Cut shortly after its release despite knowing those improved versions often are more likely intended to cash in. In this case though it was about an independent project in "hobby" production alongside a full time job between 2011 and 2016 that in some parts still felt rushed and showed some inconsistency.

It didn't matter that much in a surreal story highly influenced by David Lynch and his Twin Peaks, but to get this out of the lane, what I also wanted to support to pave way for a possible sequel turned out familiar but more polished, so I decided against dissecting Kathy Rain for a comparison, accepting the Director's Cut as the definitive version intended by Clifftop Games' Joel Staaf Hästö.

Hästö regrets a couple of his original decisions according to the interview linked above, but Kathy Rain sure profits from taking place in the mid-nineties. Recapturing the atmosphere of pixel art and a revival of the supernatural via shows like the X-Files goes very well with the absence of mobile phones and google that can destroy a lot of the mystery tropes.

Like I've mentioned in my recent review for Full Throttle Remastered (the playthrough actually interrupting my Kathy Rain sessions because her Corley Motors vehicle reminded me of having Schafer's game in backlog) it was also a good time slot for bratty girls to take over and protagonist Kathy, a student of journalism, appears a lot more gruff than Veronica Mars as one of the other possible inspirational sources.

It's quite possible it shows that the sarcastic and motorcycle riding Kathy Rain was written by a male, but what draws me into that game from the first minute is that both Kathy and her christian roommate could have totally been part of our clique back then. If you grew up watching Roseanne rather with a crush on Darlene than Becky you might instantly like her as well.

With Kathy Rain returning to her hometown for the funeral of her grandfather we get an insight to her shattered family structure leading to putting clues together for what might have happened in the past. Though this builds up in proportion, in a way it's the opposite of another retro Twin Peaks adventure from the same era, Thimbleweed Park, that geeks out on Plato's cave allegory to have us look to the outside, whilst Kathy Rain is rather pushing us to look for the insides.

That makes sense though, as Kathy Rain's hard shell as so often is put up as protection with her being actually vulnerable. What connects the inheritance of trauma to the incorporation of environmental abnormalities into a religious narrative and its misinterpretation sums up the absurdity of how human beings seek for a truth in their own selective perception to legitimize their actions quite nicely. With an ambivalent internal logic set up in the best surreal sense, this graphic adventure has all the potential to speak to you depending on your individual point of view either.

In that vein, Kathy Rain is a lot more concerned about its plot and creating an interconnection of events than to bore you with countless red herrings and weird item combinations. For the most part, even though you might drive back and forth between a limited number of locations, it's quite rewarding to try the possibilities and only a few lock puzzles might distract you from the atmospheric flow. It only happened on one occasion I got stuck, because I didn't combine two inventory items to trigger an obvious conclusion. It's possible to fail in some situations, but the game will reset to a convenient point.

Having spent my teenage years in the nineties, I can't deny Kathy Rain feels somewhat natural to me. It doesn't depend on obvious reference as much as a lot of the recent retro games and with the detailed pixel graphics and voice acting directed by Wadjet Eye's Dave Gilbert, it might as well have been released as one of the earlier CD-ROM exclusive adventures of the time.

Even though the Director's Cut improves on the controls and drops the dial for a perfectly functional cursor, Kathy Rain is an almost perfect in-between of when point'n'clicks have been quite laborious and when they got streamlined into graphic novels reducing interaction to a better page flip. That means the game has rather modern features without erasing the unwieldiness to a point it couldn't be authentic anymore.

See, I understand young folks being bothered by having to climb the Katmobile for any change of scenery in Kathy Rain for instance, but from a perspective of having to run around on maps extensively even in the nineties, just having to click on an icon with even some of the obsolete territories being grayed out is darn tootin convenient. I wouldn't go as far as declaring it a feature, but instead of being a bug, it rather celebrates the grace of imperfection.

Depending on how you rush through the game you can finish Kathy Rain in between six and ten hours and as much as I'd love to dwell in that world forever it's probably for the better to leave me wanting more as long as there are interesting ideas to incorporate. Whilst you find clues via communication as much as hacking and lock picking, you will have to use contemporary technology as much as encourage hilarious performances, yet the game isn't overwhelmingly comical.

Sure there is room for more and as well I feel about the game, at the age of 43 I've just seen plenty enough to not have my mind completely blown by what Joel Staaf Hästö achieved with Kathy Rain. But I don't expect that these days as much as well. To me it's like the graphic adventure equivalent to a party at a random house where you join a discussion in the kitchen at four in the morning chatting about wildest theories with like-minded people you didn't even know before.

It makes me look forward to that other occasion, hoping Whispers of a Machine (check this review how it turned out), that I've had in backlog for too long now, can live up to that overall pleasurable impression I've had from Clifftop Games so far. What I hope for even more is Hästö expanding on Kathy Rain, if he's got the ideas. It sure can't be the same and it was probably for the best to straighten up the original first, but now I'd really like to hang out a couple of days more with those characters.

Would you like to read more of my backloggd adventure reviews?
Detective Gallo
Broken Age
One Night Stand
The Little Acre
The Wardrobe - Even Better Edition

Today everybody seems to remember the CDi, 3DO and maybe Mega-CD as platforms for clumsy attempts to do revolutionary FMV games on CD, but the truth is a lot of the early generation CD-ROM titles in general were either enhancements of the floppy versions or might not hold up very well today with pixelated cutscenes in tiny window boxes.

Lucas Arts had to dump $1.5 million into Full Throttle pushing the envelope on the point'n'click genre they helped to define. Despite the legendary status over here in Europe those games had not exactly been a cash cow, so backing Tim Schafer's pitch for his debut as a leading producer can be seen as a bold move on behalf of graphic adventures.

Unlike today, there wasn't a nostalgic way of referencing classics like Maniac Mansion or The Secret of Monkey Island. Whilst it usually still is the intention of most of the old designers to renew and reinvent the genre, that motto was as much intrinsic as mandatory. But does that excuse what came out as Full Throttle?

It's not like they didn't try. I'm tempted to say Full Throttle came out like Reservoir Dogs, which sure had an impact on movies and impressed many people at the time, but with its limitations looks rather unwieldy compared to True Romance and Natural Born Killers for which Tarantino also didn't have control what happened to his scripts. But when Pulp Fiction was released, that was the big bang.

Obviously Grim Fandango burned too much budget to deny it might have rather killed point'n'click adventures monetary and as I've promised after Broken Age, I will have to catch up on Schafer's 1998 release to decide if I'm on the side of the fans, but there seems to be a generation remembering it benevolently.

It's true that I missed both, Full Throttle and Grim Fandango, because I wasn't owning a PC that was more than a better typewriter at that time. Whilst I enjoyed Discworld and Broken Sword on my PlayStation, I only got to play some genre titles like Day of the Tentacle, Leisure Suit Larry: Love for Sail or The Curse of Monkey Island at friend's places. I might have confused Full Throttle for a racing game anyway because the title is not exactly an adventure trope.

Whilst it might be true the previous Lucas Arts point'n'clicks had been somewhat cartoonish, I wouldn't see them as family friendly as some compare them to a "more grown up" Full Throttle. It just so happened a lot of us played the earlier games as kids, but at least Sam & Max Hit the Road is far away from what I'd call suitable. With Full Throttle being a gritty unique noir blend of The Wild One, Yojimbo, The Road Warrior and Akira it might as well have been part of the Heavy Metal anthology movie and that way stands out as more adult.

That might also give a hint it's short. Now, I've suggested for Detective Gallo that less is more and I actually have nothing to say against the story. Full Throttle has everything that's needed for a gnarly one man show of stumbling into being the innocent suspect for a murder. An interesting point here is that neither whodunnit nor howdunnit are ever in question. The worst thing to happen in this semi-apocalyptic parallel dimension is the production of minivans.

Thematically, I would have loved Full Throttle back in the day, being a movie buff since I'm able to think and digesting an increasing number of genre films as a teenager in the early nineties. At the same time, I transitioned into the more adult side of franco-belgian comics and beyond, especially from the seventies.

Another thing to point out, I think, is that Full Throttle has a rather independent female in mechanic Maureen, though in a short period of time defined by Tank Girl and Barb Wire or girly brats like in Clueless the Eastwood/Bronson type somehow reflected in protagonist Ben feels a little out of time, especially as above mentioned comics often had female leads maybe even out of place.

Full Throttle on one hand forces us to use violence instead of talking sometimes, but on the other hand limits us with what we can actually use our mouth or extremities on via the newly introduced icon based radial interface a lot of us learned to love in point'n'clicks. I'd sure have wreaked much greater havoc if they let me, like in Edna & Harvey: The Breakout, that's pushing the boundaries of nonlinearity in graphic adventures.

Whilst the main engine remains SCUMM, Full Throttle also profits from the INSANE animation engine previously used on Star Wars: Rebel Assault II - The Hidden Empire. Being the first Lucas Arts adventure solely released on CD-ROM, this actually comes at a cost.

Because now there's room for professional voice actors like Mark Hamill, a quite decent licensed rock score by The Gone Jackals (they sadly couldn't afford "Kickstand" by Soundgarden) and extensive full motion video sequences with good enough compression to work full screen, there doesn't seem to be much left for an actual genre game within the cinematic presentation.

Despite the success and cult status of Full Throttle, for me, this is a bitter pill to swallow. And I'm not talking out of disappointment over the new artwork of the Full Throttle Remastered edition. I've looked deeply at both versions and as I don't have any nostalgic relation to the original, I like it as much as I think the remaster doesn't only look more up-to-date, it also brings Full Throttle even closer to the above mentioned Heavy Metal style. I could have lived without the shiny 3D modeling, but that seems to be true to the original that might have looked like the remaster had it been state of the art back then.

I can sit back for good cut scenes, that isn't an issue either. But the few puzzles kind of annoyed me entirely. It's ok most of them are more environmental than icon based, but they're all but self-explanatory. Even though that characteristic is typical for Lucas Arts if you're thinking of moon logic and pixel hunting, Full Throttle for instance does nothing to lead you to the idea you might have to hide in a situation or use a fluent sequence of actions.

It's possible the original gave away hints in the manual that doesn't come with the GOG release of Full Throttle Remastered and the idea might have been to mimic Another World/Out of this World, but framed for an actual point'n'click adventure this is almost as irritating as the real action passages, which ruin an otherwise still pleasurable game for me.

I know, this isn't a first in Lucas Arts adventures and I've read at least for the original that you could bypass the bike fights and destruction derby with a code, but then there's not much of a game left to beat, honestly. So I've gone through everything with a mouse, which isn't the best way to control a vehicle.

It's not a license game for Batman '89, where the chases weren't exactly highlights and if I wanted to play Super Cars II, R.C. Pro-Am or at best Rock'n'Roll Racing, then I'd do that. In my impression the designers just wasted space here for very linear minigames that awkwardly rely on you to find that one path to get past them.

And I get they canceled a planned peyote trip scene for glorification reasons, whilst I might have liked a complete bike gang subplot that seems to have been dropped as well. I would have preferred that over any of the agility parts I neither expect nor miss in a graphic adventure, just like the chance to try again doesn't compensate for the time limits during the final scenes that will make you die and watch the same FMVs over and over.

So with the credits rolling after two sessions cut even shorter with a guide when I was absolutely clueless what Full Throttle wanted me to do, I was still kind of relieved it's over. And that's probably an issue with the game being made when it was made. A CD-ROM of course has new limits again if you pack it with data and the fancy presentation can only get you that far if besides cinematics the game is rather weak.

It has to come with an expiration date when you alienate your puzzle geeks that aren't satisfied with a few items to look for, even though two things had been hard to spot, in trade for an underdeveloped upgrade that appears like a few unfocused ideas cobbled together. Full Throttle Remastered doesn't fix that, which would have been a chance, actually, but an extended director's cut would have needed more budget and the support of the fans.

In conclusion Full Throttle Remastered is the refreshed look of a game that is more style than substance anyway. It can't have the same impact, because it doesn't come with the same unique selling points it had when it was first released. It would have been a nice base to work from nonetheless, but two game sequels had been canceled during production and pitches at MTV and Disney+ seem to have failed.

With the death of Ben's voice actor Roy L. Conrad in 2002 any real follow up is out of the question and so we might take this as an actual reason Full Throttle Remastered wasn't expanded. The question though is, who really needed this then, besides people like me wanting an available version to close another gap?

Too hung up on trying something else Full Throttle just lacks the charme and challenge of the early Monkey Island games for example, that are written so well they work in any version, from Amiga to Special Edition.

If anything, Detective Gallo was probably the most cock I found in a crowdfunded point'n'click adventure and I'm not even sure the italian studio Footprints Games dressed their anthropomorphic rooster in yellow with the intention of emphasizing a reference to a certain Mr. Tracy, when a complex pun would have worked based on him being a private dick anyway. I would have smiled honestly, if he had been a Gaul as well (because to my knowledge besides cock that's the second possible translation for Gallo). It's just that the game itself isn't all that deep and complicated.

An adventure taking place in an area like a decrepit part of Duckburg doesn't necessarily have to be that and I could imagine inspiration was drawn from Sam & Max Hit The Road, judging from the cartoonish presentation that even improves on the simple icon based user interface. It doesn't seem like coincidence Detective Gallo's partner is a cactus, because the case to solve is actually the murder of exotic plants.

As a debut game, it might have been a good idea to restrict the number of locations and characters. On the other hand Detective Gallo starts out as rather straight forward until I hit the wall of having to hunt for tiny hotspots that I could of course have identified earlier by pressing space. With running back and forth to find the right combination of items, the decently dubbed humor wasn't enough to pick up the game between my first session in April and early July 2023, when I finally wanted to get Detective Gallo off my list.

Luckily, the adventure expands with some relatively surprising plot twists, but even though items usually don't end up as red herrings, the linearity is partly annoying. The designers had a path in their minds for Detective Gallo, so sometimes other actions are required to finalize a thought I had before. This usually leads to getting lost on parts of a puzzle that just isn't next in the queue or that seems self-explanatory, but the realization makes it kinda work counterintuitively.

I ended up looking for hints on the internet for some of them, because I didn't feel like running circles until I accidentally fit the pieces together. It would have helped to keep up contact with the informant for this, but he sadly ignores the private eye's calls later. Instead a limited variety of one liners complement the denial of combinations, making Detective Gallo feel underdeveloped in a world where OG designers make their games more user-friendly these days.

It's sad that compared to another italian genre title, The Wardrobe, Footprints Games tried to establish a more original creation sans all the pop cultural references, but their fellow competitors CINIC Games understood to design the more pleasing product. Whilst the plot is fairly adequate for a cartoon story, Detective Gallo seems to overstay its welcome a wee bit by trying to implement too many puzzles for its narrative limitations of the environment and especially shortage of acting roles.

The almost anticlimactic ending, despite occurring quite rapidly, actually satisfies as a welcome exit, because it fulfills the foreshadowed incompetence of our grumpy investigator in a surprise twist. The humor of Detective Gallo is neither deranged nor overly clever, but would simply work much better in smoother condensing.

It's an interactive sordid Saturday morning cartoon drawn and animated on a gorgeous level, which raised my interest in the first place. I can't say if my expectations are too high for a debut like Detective Gallo, because a lot of things have been done right. But as too often in this day and age what is presented as a final product to me feels more like what should have been a pitch to raise funds for completion.

What's missing maybe was a little more time and money to refine the ideas or, another issue with small teams of independent programmers, the ability to kill darlings. An executive would have had to keep track during a test phase and balance out Detective Gallo much more to the extent of what is an equivalent to a cartoon show episode than the feature film they were trying to cobble together.

Under the maxim of less is more this could have very well functioned as a pilot to a series or maybe even a shorter standalone release shining brighter without its ballast. Assuming nothing was lost in translation from the italian original this I feel would be what I had preferred as a backer as well, looking for a bang for the buck not in playing time alone.

Of course it could have been much worse. I remember Encodya wasting a lot of potential by referencing tropes to a painful degree without reflection. But then there's also Gibbous - A Cthulhu Adventure, that sure still ain't perfect, but gets plenty of things very right as a crowdfunded debut. It sure plays a role the latter operates at a higher scale of content and Detective Gallo still is kind of promising for future releases, but it's also the game they sent out to their backers and us regular customers spend their well earned money on as well.

It's hard to criticize, when today's big players ship barely more than demos if a physical copy is made available at all and all you get on day one is a beta version to be hopefully patched after the early birds assisted in a testing phase like they purchased green bananas.

Unlike that, independent studios usually are not looking to sell additional content via a game as their shopping platform and so there's often hardly any update unless heavy glitches cause the program's crash. I've read this has been the case during Detective Gallo's finale for some players, but with the version 1.21 installed, I can't confirm any of that, so kudos for providing a working game, I guess?

It's because of these structures I tend to acquire a huge amount of my software via sales to get the most refined game in return and whilst this is a monetary no-brainer, I'd prefer the publishers putting in more effort to satisfy us for full price to make smaller productions like this lucrative. It's a give and take that in my world feels as unbalanced as the creative direction in Detective Gallo.

There's too much "if", not enough that exceeds being just potential which simply doesn't cover the requirements of an independent game anymore, when there are so many studios trying to get a foot on the ground with exactly that as a business model. We can't just accept flaws on a regular basis to give newcomers a chance, when almost everybody is trying and there's no board of trustees to sift through the sheer amount of possibilities.

Please get me right, Detective Gallo is enjoyable on average, but I would like to see the team compete with the legends on an elaborated level and not just give away hints that they might be able to do that. It's great to see more potential is there to keep point'n'click adventures one of my favorite genres, but who's winning when Detective Gallo ends up being the introduction for young gamers, when for instance Broken Age would be a much better amalgamation of old and new?

Facing the truth, Detective Gallo ain't more than just another one of those games to consume because you can't get enough of its type and you hope for a hidden gem. It comes the day you might spend a few hours with this mildly entertaining hardboiled detective story, but I don't see anyone dissecting each and every detail for analysis. You play it, delete it from your hard drive and probably forget about it. The way Detective Gallo is cocky is that the graphic presentation is a lot better than the actual substance.

Who knew shmup epitome Toaplan had their puzzle game as well and after a lot of you seem to have enjoyed looking at Cave's Puzzle Uo Poko and Puzzle! Mushihimetama with me, I think it's about time to review this exceptional genre manifestation . Teki Paki - Sennô Gêmu, translated for the west as "The Brainwashing Game", fell right into place after the impact of Tetris and its first epigones, though despite being reported a favorite to play at the developer's office wasn't among the most successful arcade cabinets for the company.

Ports for the Sega Mega Drive and Super Nintendo had been canceled just as a planned sequel was never finished. Teki Paki was made available for home consoles for the first time more recently, so if interested, you will find conversions for PS4, Nintendo Switch and Evercade.

One reason Teki Paki was overlooked back in the day could be that it doesn't appear to be more than Columns at another angle. And that's not entirely wrong. Instead of the greek framework the design was more like retro futuristic and it can't be denied that the player has to organize groups of three falling blocks in random colors. Beginning with those three blocks coming in an L-shape though, the game mechanics make Teki Paki an entirely different game at an advanced level.

It's not as obviously set apart like Dr. Mario, Panel de Pon or Puyo Puyo from Tetris, but just as you have to wrap your head around the system freshly, even coming from Columns a new way of thinking is required to even start mastering Teki Paki. The reasons are simple as they should be in a puzzle game.

First, the three combined blocks always come in three different colors, unlike in Columns, where there can be doubles. And then, whilst the L-shape makes it actually increasingly challenging to place your blocks, in Teki Paki it's not enough to combine just three blocks to make them pop out of the way.

It has to be an incredible amount of five blocks, but it gets more interesting by the fact those just have to be neighbors vertically, horizontally or diagonally, so you could clear a whole labyrinth spiraling through your pile should you be able to place a block accordingly.

On my first credit at Teki Paki I managed to hit like 8000 points and thought "WTF?!", because I used to make quite decent scores on Game Boy Tetris, GBA Puzzle League and Game Gear Columns a while ago. I must admit though, having played the Columns arcade for comparison directly, that the cabinet started out at a more challenging level, but I still could keep up with the pace for a while.

Now, Teki Paki doesn't hold back for long, adding two colors swiftly and only offering the smiley block (can connect with any color) for help and tries to lure you in with the promise to clear the screen for 100k should you be able to combine five dynamite blocks, which I never did yet, just as I haven't seen any silver or golden blocks the Toaplangames website says will give bonus points.

It doesn't matter to me that much for this review though, as Teki Paki soon turned out very addictive to me and the feeling of an existing chance to beat more of the 999 possible levels, but probably never actually finishing the game adds to that as much as I will unlikely ever report from a master's perspective. I leave that to the pros and just enjoy whatever I will accomplish.

Raving to the driving score by Tomoaki Takanohashi (published together with the Vimana OST by Scitron/Pony Canyon), who was also introduced into programming on Teki Paki, the game sounds quite different to the typical allaying music of the puzzle genre. Thinking ahead for rather complex combos is crucial to not end up filling the screen completely without any remaining chance. Though you can proceed on another credit, this alternative is reflected in your points and doesn't turn out as an option for me.

Still focused too much on the gameplay, Teki Paki in my case also doesn't qualify for the versus mode yet, like I particularly enjoy with Puyo Puyo Tetris and Super Puzzle Fighter II Turbo, but if you're into it, it's there. You'll probably just have to get your opponent on the couch for the conversions just like you would have to stand next to at the arcade.

I don't know why a fully grown puzzle game wouldn't be considered for a stand-alone release by today's standards, but included with the M2 Kyukyoku Tiger-Heli compilations for Switch and PS4 or the Toaplan Arcade 1 Evercade collection getting your hands on Teki Paki is ensured to be a bang for your buck.

Teki Paki might have been one of too many in its day, but as a fan of falling blocks, especially if you wipe your ass with Columns or Tetris 2, it's exactly the different of the same you want and by addressing the similar 1cc ethos of Shoot'em'up players it's actually a more than adequate addition to Toaplan's ludography.

Given that it turned out it was actually only the final boss I was struggling with in Puzzle! Mushihimetama when I was reviewing Puzzle Uo Poko, I've changed my mind a little about Toshiaki Tomizawa's second bubble shooting game. It might have been harsh to call it a bubble hell, when it wasn't anything but a little more challenging and I could finish it on my second attempt within a good hour when I was more awake. I might even become tempted to try a 1cc one day, because it should be totally possible.

Having that out of the way, Puzzle! Mushihimetama is obviously the successor of the more obscure Puzzle Uo Poko with the Mushihimesama theme added, so other than the Pachinko vs. Puzzle Bobble gameplay, it finally has an anime girl with the Princess from the Shoot'em'up. She doesn't do much though, except for some cute sounds and poses when you free the bug babies to finish the puzzle instead of erasing all bubbles like in the predecessor.

The presentation appears more wholesome than Puzzle Uo Poko though, which was something I criticized in that game. In fact, with that bug theme included it of course makes sense to implement the bosses from Mushihimesama to create a new challenge. Coming from the more relaxing and forgiving Puzzle Uo Poko though, I wasn't expecting Puzzle! Mushihimetama to require that much velocity, reaching its peak in said final boss. You really have to hit relentlessly to succeed.

With the credits rolling, I must admit it was more about me than the game though. I was exhausted after failing to beat the final boss in Varth, had finished Puzzle Uo Poko for recreation and expected Puzzle! Mushihimetama to be just another game to chill before I finally go to bed. Had I not known the predecessor and been alert enough for the pace, I might have enjoyed Mushihimetama instantly. The only real downside is that you've got to push your lever up between stages instead of having you pull as well like in the game, which to me feels more awkward than satisfying.

In conclusion both games have their limitations drawn from their puzzle game niche, but also their individual strengths in that I might still pick Puzzle Uo Poko with my brain in zombie mode and Puzzle! Mushihimetama if I'm up for the more arduous sequel that's also far from unbeatable once you've zoned in. It's just a little more struggle compared to the rewarding emotion of cleaning up in Uo Poko and it might be my OCD is triggered by the fact I can't always remove all bubbles before the stage is done.

Most western Cave fans will tell you about their Shoot'em'ups like DoDonPachi or Espgaluda, but actually Puzzle Uo Poko, one of their most obscure games done singlehandedly by Toshiaki Tomizawa, was my first exposure to one of their products. Published to the arcades by Jaleco approximately in February 1998, this is obviously sort of a puzzle game that has not much in common with their usual output.

Quite recently I reported about Pachinko Challenger that I have problems familiarizing myself with that Pinball variant, though I had forgotten about Puzzle Uo Poko being one of those japanese oddities I actually enjoy - despite it has all the indicators to call it a stupid program you could have a moderately trained monkey finish at least ten of the thirty stages.

At a time all we could play on our mobiles was Snake, if there ever was a stereotypical japanese salaryman, Puzzle Uo Poko would have been the perfect game to be complemented by a drink and a smoke after a 23 hour work day, before he's got to be back at the job again. Because all you do is pull the lever intuitively.

In my case today, it was after two hours of trying to beat the final boss in Varth and though I might not be in the mood for Puzzle Uo Poko everyday, to get rid of the remaining caffeine and adrenaline in my system, impersonating a cat that's shooting bubbles at the sea, because it wants fish, is absolutely appropriate.

So no cute anime girls here, just you, a cat and a plunger, pulling at various intensities to engage differently coloured balls on a pile of others. Let's just call Puzzle Uo Poko a simplified bastard of said Pachinko, Puzzle Bobble and Puyo Puyo. You're combining at least three bubbles of one color to have them explode and hopefully create a chain reaction.

It's not all that easy, though. Sometimes you've got to crack blocks by placing the falling ball on them. At other occasions the bubbles require having a chain explode next to them to be unlocked. As weird as the synopsis already was, you'll also find a yellow submarine at sea level that will be of assistance if you hit it.

Just having watched a video for co-op mode due to the lack of a gaming partner, I can only assume the two player version being an interesting variation where shots of the other can get in the way if not properly communicated.

Everything is a race against time as well. You've got a few seconds to aim and the bottom will raise constantly. Having the top row touching the surface has to be avoided at all costs. And with the cute meow sounds and a score that partly reminded me of a happy version of the Akira OST it's actually satisfying.

It's probably for the same reasons mobile apps are successful, comforting us with simple tasks of putting random things in order. It's anticipation and reward, dangerously close to gambling maybe, because at the arcade you're losing money for enjoying a flickering display, sounds and minimal participation. Maybe the only difference is there's no chance offered to win your dough back, so the addiction has limits.

Whilst in our day and age, games like Puzzle Uo Poko would be perfect for cashing in on data and advertising via your phone, it would lack one crucial factor that to me means the world. It's so much more satisfying to play on an actual arcade lever than swiping a screen!

Sadly I couldn't verify if Puzzle Uo Poko was really shipped including a cat paw top for the joystick like it's rumored on the internets, because that would have given a nice touch in connection with the protagonist. I've only seen it with a regular ball top though.

For the minimal effort put in a machine like Puzzle Uo Poko it was quite possibly lucrative anyway and for the fun I frequently have with the smooth gameplay, I'll probably have to forgive Cave that they didn't come up with a more elaborate theme and design. Studios need their moneymakers.

I don't know if it would be legit to say the same about the 2005 Puzzle! Mushihimetama, with Tomizawa returning to merge the Mushihimesama franchise with Puzzle Uo Poko routines. But as much as you'd think a more Cave appropriate theme and additional boss and bonus stages would spice things up, here I am, stuck with the boss at stage 5-6 in a game that feels too hectic and too long.

I don't want a forced Bubble Hell Shooter. I would have appreciated just an improved environment, some nicer artworks in particular. More doesn't always equal better, it seems. (Edit: After realizing 5-6 was the final boss and it just required swiftness I wasn't in the condition for, I've made my peace with Mushihimetama.)

At least to me the predecessor is just the right kind of plain relaxation that doesn't overstay its welcome and opposed to Puzzle! Mushihimetama it's Puzzle Uo Poko with its nice flow of some slightly challenging but never unsolvable puzzles that leaves me wanting to play just one or two more stages.

Golf Club: Wasteland is definitely one of those indie oddities that aren't too good in gameplay, but still manage to come up with great atmosphere and a storyline you wouldn't expect. If you were just looking forward to simple golf entertainment in an innovative setting, like me and it seems quite a few did, you might want to replay and capture all the details you might have missed in the experience.

The game itself isn't more complicated than playing Bowmasters. You aim via a curved arrow and set the intensity with your left analogue stick. The courses of Golf Club: Wasteland incorporate future Earth's ruins, so you have to place your shots on platforms, use switches and have to pass mechanics like automatic doors or conveyor belts. Like in Worms you can zoom and scroll the map to plan how to reach the target.

I understand it can be frustrating in some stages, when you miss and have to find your way all over again, especially if it takes a while for the protagonist to catch up. On the other hand, that contributes to the depiction of the environmental condition we are indeed creating today.

Golf Club: Wasteland isn't exactly pointing a finger by sketching out a possible apocalyptic scenario where mankind had to evacuate Earth to live on Mars and only the rich can use our planet's remains to play golf. It's kind of a retro futuristic melancholy, woven into a radio performance that complements the protagonist's longing for home.

The game asks us to put on headphones to fully embrace the isolation accompanied by a brilliant score (downloadable via qr code) and informational talking bits (English with a selection of Subs available).
Then, strolling the ruins of our future, Golf Club: Wasteland tenously confronts us with the now meaningless achievements of mankind, not without the word Weltschmerz being brought up.

Serbian Demagog Studio announce themselves as a transmedia operation and seem to have expanded on this universe now with Highwater and The Cub that I both don't know yet despite from trailers.
Both games seem to incorporate radio stations and especially The Cub looks like a possible puzzle platformer sequel to Golf Club: Wasteland, which I'm highly interested to check out after this somber, almost satirical world building.

Included with Golf Club: Wasteland also comes a set of about 50 art panels further describing the story's background. To me, that's a greater bonus than the diary entries you unlock as achievements and possibly have to replay maps for, when you needed more shots than required. Even those small texts have something to add, but it doesn't motivate me enough to master the courses I struggled with.

The golfing to me is something to keep your fingers occupied in an interactive art performance to immerse yourself in for almost two hours. It's more like the unique moveset for a puzzle platformer and with its expedient graphics Golf Club: Wasteland even unfolds its qualities just like it could be a late successor of Inside. The game won't unleash a wave of post-apocalyptic golf games for sure, but for this instance it works out.

I really appreciate how Demagog create a depth of layers they risk to lose some players with by being too enigmatic with uncommented bits of putative chatter. Golf Club: Wasteland is also depending on what you bring to the experience on both an intellectual and emotional level.

That way it's the sophisticated version of a simple mobile game especially for those being aware how close to the edge we actually are. And then it will probably be narrowed down by the required gallows humor to nihilistically dwell in the future wasteland we could actually try to prevent during that same time.

Golf Club: Wasteland is not just the random post near future apocalypse, it's about a future nostalgia for Earth by people who had to escape the inhospitable environment whose emergence we have to witness with bitter acceptance of the fact we might not be able to turn around.

It feels a lot more tangible due to latest findings, the lockdown situations we just went through, the war and because Golf Club: Wasteland is more based on feelings of desperation in a conceivable refugee scenario rather than a more abstract fictional one with aliens or other external threats. It just leaves the question who of us might even hope to make it to another planet once shit finally hits the fan.

In my previous reviews for Blade Master and Undercover Cops I've already mentioned developers moving on from Irem to form Nazca and unleashing Metal Slug. What I held back so far was they actually did Geo Storm with Irem before and that game pretty much feels like a blueprint for the now classic Run and Gun series.

In the west though, Geo Storm was renamed Gunforce II and it was about time for me to find out if that actually means the original Gunforce is a spiritual predecessor of the Metal Slug series as well.

It is… kind of? See, the thing with this 1991 side scrolling shooter is that it's not only less comical like Geo Storm is compared to Metal Slug. Gunforce is in general more dull, which of course in a way feels natural, looking at games in retrospect.

I must admit, I'm not the world's biggest Run and Gun aficionado. I sometimes challenge myself with those hard games like Contra or Metal Slug, but I would have to put more effort in to call myself reasonably good. So without free play and continues allowed on this machine, I would have gotten nowhere.

What I can talk about after checking out Gunforce though is in most parts it did feel hard but not unfair, unlike my criticism on above mentioned Irem Beat'em'ups. With some training, especially proper handling of the diagonal shots, I might manage quite a lot of the parts until the enemies really swarm you.

That was also one of my problems with the final boss that has an increasing number of gnomes taking your attention, so you can't fire enough rounds at the actual target. For the last phases I found a sweet spot where I only had to evade occasional firing, so there might be a pattern to get through all of this.

Does this encourage me to pick up on that and truly beat the game like an honest warrior? Not quite. And that's not even because Gunforce had wacky controls, I got pretty good at them over time. But one detail I hated for instance was when the screen scrolls up, it doesn't count if there is a platform below. A gap on the recent screen means instant death.

But the major bummer is that it's so barebone in comparison. It's got the weapon upgrade system and you can use different vehicles, even tanks and a helicopter. Maybe that was more fun in 1991, but Gunforce didn't really entertain me enough with it.

I can live without the hostages, because I'm not expecting Gunforce to be identical to later games in that lineage, but the enemy and level design don't offer much variation and the bosses are very pragmatic, not to say uninspired.

Maybe at a point when you're really looking for another genre title to 1cc, then Gunforce might come up, but other than that, I don't see much sense in putting coins into this cabinet for more than historical curiosity, which is maybe why it's not very prominent in the wild anymore.

The sad truth is, that Gunforce might not even be bad, but with the exciting Geo Storm or Metal Slug available for example, there's just no real demand for it. If your arcade has it, and you're done with their eclectic selection so far, yeah, then go for Gunforce, because we always need new old games to play. Same probably goes for the announced five volumes of an Irem Collection.