Really quite a fantastic game. It's got huge SCP vibes, with the same concept of hidden paranatural events being covered up constantly. This game manages to keep the characters human though. The game manages to keep you feeling uneasy the whole time with just how anomalous everything is. Within the first 10 min (before you get the first gun) there's a moment that completely disoriented me but it's hardly mentioned by the characters. I don't know what else to say here, but if you enjoy slowly feeling out a new expansive world, then this game's writing does it pretty damn well.

Oh, but the DLCs are not good.

Really great game. A good atmosphere paired with good shooting gameplay makes me happy anyday. STALKER has an intriguing story, varied gameplay, and a good range of difficulty. You start wearing nothing but a leather jacket and a pistol, and end wearing an exoskeleton with two rail guns strapped to your back, mowing down an entire military force. I might recommend some overhaul modding to fix up some side quest completion bugs, but otherwise the game is very playable from start to finish vanilla. I really recommend this, it's a classic that you'll really regret missing out on.

Alright, first off, I would consider this an overall good game with some big flaws that either might not emerge until hours into the game, or will turn you off right away. Getting right into it with what most negative reviews (rightfully) complain about: the bugs. The bugs in this game are not graphical, sound based, or physics based. In fact I saw none of these bugs and can heartily recommend the game on the quality of these parts alone, not even mentioning the game's unique concept and execution. Instead of these normal bugs, the bugs I encountered were all softlocks, forcing me to purge my save each time I encountered one (about four times). Each time this happened was disheartening, but it only set me back a little because of the game's chapter system.

I was a little confused and weary of this feature at first, afraid of what it might do to my carefully laid out base, but after I was forced into using it I was pleasantly surprised. The chapter system provides "checkpoints" at every major milestone in the story, and places important items you have collected prior in easily spotted and well organized places in the hub area. So, although these bugs really shouldn't be in the game at all, they can be resolved with these chapter saves without putting too much effort into repeating content.

One more complaint before I get into what makes this game good; I really don't like how they've implemented grabbing. Wanderer uses the standard "if you're far away, gesture your palm towards it and force grab" method of interaction, but they add something different; the same rules apply to drawers and ALL interactables. You don't need to be near something to interact with it, and as much as I would like to put some well thought out reason as to why it affects gameplay negatively or whatever, I really don't have a reason why I hate it so much except that it feels bad. Eventually you will get more used to it of course, but it just leaves a bad first impression and then keeps feeling weird for a long time.

OK, now the good stuff. Wanderer has great graphical fidelity and solid immersion through its entire 7-ish hour story. I have an i-9 and 3080RTX, so I was lucky enough to play on the highest settings and wanderer feels like its just under Half Life: Alyx in its setpieces and individual detail. Most things in the game can be picked up, interacted with, stored in your inventory, and taken back to base all in the span of 10 seconds with how much freedom you are given. These devs know the value of letting people mess about in their downtime.

The puzzles ranged from okay to good, but my opinion on them might be swayed the fact that I broke them and repeated them a couple times. The story was confusing, but it's meant to be, it's time travel. You don't really need the story anyway, if you treat the whole game like one big escape room. It's kind of like bonus to put all the story pieces together while you solve the real puzzles.

TLDR: I guess to tie it all together I'll say this: Wanderer struck a good nerve with me with its creative environments and fun ideas. It's a good game for all experience levels of VR gamers, but its not without flaws. Its small problems and sometimes big bugs can put a hamper of your fun, but I implore you to either wait until it's fixed up or push through the issues to experience the game. It was worth it for me, so it might just be worth it for you.

2016

Gameplay? Bullet hell fun with some neat twists with later bosses.

Soundtrack? Bangin.

In conclusion, well worth the price.

This game is so worth the price. Go in blind and you'll experience every emotion under the sun in five hours or less. Again, goddamn this game is incredible with how much it does with so little. Cannot recommend more, it doesn't matter if you aren't used to games or if you're an absolute pro, the devs have you covered 100% of the journey.

What a strange game. What begins as survival as a necessity... actually, never really leaves that part behind, really!

Rain World is gruelingly punishing. It has a fairly long play time, not because the content available is massive, (although it is considerable in size)but because you will die MANY times. By the end of my playthrough I was encroaching on 110 deaths. Still, the breadth of things to do and discover in the game result in a rewarding experience I have not seen replicated elsewhere. Entire regions are simulated at a time, leading to complex emergent behavior that you must identify and potentially exploit if you are to trick your assailants and progress. It's an expertly crafted game that does a good job at always pointing you in the correct direction, and does a terrible job at letting you know it is doing so. I got "lost" and looked up a guide many times, only to discover I was 2 rooms away from my destination and if I had just persevered, I would have made it just fine.

Be quick, be witty, stay determined, stay alive.

2019

I really couldn't recommend Effie. The world seems mostly empty and uninspired, the writing is... bad. Go here, collect McGuffin, kill witch, repeat. The boss fights are uninspiring and repetitive, at least from what I've played, and the combat is worse. The combat is just mash light/heavy until all enemies are dead, but I guess you can throw in one other, objectively inferior bonus move if you feel like it. The surfing mechanic shown in trailers was the main draw for me, but it's disabled everywhere except the overworld, which is empty save for sparse time trials and small unrewarding outposts. The narrator speaking over all actions gets old really fast as well. Every chest, and nearly every collectible is paired with ONE voiceline. Said voiceline also does not make sense for the context of the action. Lots of stuff in the game is reused just as much as the voicelines too, and the game just feels unpolished overall.

Great little game. Story's not too deep, so it's easy to figure out what happened about halfway through, but the puzzles provided a little challenge. Rough around the edges but provides great framework for the later games.

A very short game that doesn't overstay its welcome, Rocket of Whispers feels like a nice addendum to the OPUS universe. The story lingers on the dead, the hardships that people go through in trauma, and the connections that make us human. The characters are well written and although there is no massive plot twist or anything, I don't think it needed one. RoW is adept at creating a haunting and lonely atmosphere and allowing you to explore the environment -- discovering, reliving, and eventually releasing the past into the cosmos.

Hooo boy this is a true gem. I literally don't know where to start. The stroytelling, character development, writing, and music are all crazy good. Ending made me cry, like Makoto Shinkai movie level of cry. Playing through all the past Sigono games to prep for this one was such a trip, because in the span of a couple days of playing I saw this tiny mobile game dev studio put out this lore rich intensely polished experience that blew me away. Highly recommend, had a great time playing it (Side note, don't try achievement hunting, I was frequently given achievements for things I did not do and was not given them for things I did do)

Quite a nice little game. The bugs and glitches that did rear their head did so because of age, it seems, but they never hindered my progression. Mostly visual bugs and models failing to animate. A stark improvement on the original, SGW 2 seems to still hold up, and for the price I would say its worth the three hour story you get from it. I liked playing as a little sniper dude with my compadres, faithfully taking out whomever, whenever they told me to.

Wow wow wow. I got this game by recommendation through a bundle, and wasn't expecting much from it, but it's got sizable lore, an exploration aspect, and extensive freedom. I would really recommend going in blind, because Aground really fosters the spirit of exploration and choice with every bit of gameplay. Not much grind either, which I wasn't expecting but certainly appreciated.

QB isn't without flaws. The entire game is very slow, from the story to the gameplay, and to the fact that to get the whole picture you need to watch videos with no speed playback options. There are quite a few moments where you might just want to jump into action but the game uses everything save for direct force to get you to slow down, which I felt was annoying. Difficulty wise, the game is a joke, but that's pretty intentional, I believe. You are a time-wielding demigod, and the game does its best to get that across with its sound design and visuals, similar to Control. However, the more bullet spongy enemies late game tend to take away that feeling once you know that three mags won't take them down.

In terms of story, I was surprised at how competently written it was. This being time travel we're dealing with, there was restraint and logic used accordingly to tie up threads as needed. The characters were more hit or miss. Some of the voice lines at times just felt off, but at other times they felt completely believable. Other times, it was up to you whether a character made a decision that made sense for them, but whatever choice you made, the consequences rippled down nonetheless.

Play it if you really like the idea of time powers, but don't expect anything ground shaking. Also, if you're having trouble with the final fight, don't be afraid to turn the difficulty down. That fight can be some real BS.

Fulfills the urge in hitman games to just go through the whole level massacring and hiding every body, but hiding bodies takes 2 seconds instead of 2 minutes. Depending on the upgrade points you find you really can go whatever playstyle you want, but I chose GENOCIDE. Slashing my way through enemies, LITERALLY sending them to the in universe shadow realm was great. The story was pretty generic but it was by no means terrible. Give it a go if you like stealth, it really puts its all into the genre and doesn't waste time with side tangent mechanics. Everything is there to make you have fun. Except the checkpoints, which function in absurd ways that I do not like. I'll leave it at that, and you can find out what I mean if you're sloppy enough to die 20 times in the same place like I am.