Status: Completed (Platinum Trophy)
Date: 01.18.2021 | Play Time: 8 hours

A fun, lighthearted collectathon that lets you be creative with an easy-to-use art template.
While most games structured like this will have you going around collecting a bunch of random stuff only to have the end reward be a costume or something, every collectible in Concrete Genie has a purpose.
I wanted to get every single page not because of the end reward, but because every page would unlock one more design in my art arsenal (artsenal). I’d find a wall I need to paint with some specific designs, so I’d take to the streets hunting for the pages so I could circle back and paint the wall only to see it come alive. It’s an incredibly satisfying collection loop.

What makes this process more fulfilling is that this dark, dingy, deserted fishing town completely comes to life with the colorful paintings you put everywhere. I would go out of my way to cover every single surface with art even if the game wasn’t asking me to do it. I wanted to see that place come alive, and the end result was very satisfying.

+ Extremely good collectible loop with great payoff
+ Great art system that lets you feel like you’re making cool art even if you aren’t an artist.
+ Fun, colorful visuals

- Surprise new mechanics at the end of the game felt a bit tacked on
- Motion controls are sometimes a bit finicky. But when you turn them off, it’s clear the game was designed with motion controls in mind.
- The bullies were occasionally annoying. Just leave me alone and let me paint.

The only video game that holds the prestigious honor of making me fall asleep while playing it, not once, but three separate times.. I’ve nodded off in other games but I straight up fell asleep, controller in-hand, playing Kentucky Route Zero. I cannot stress enough how boring the actual act of playing this video game is. Which is a bummer because I liked the characters and thought the story had potential.

The game started off walking the line between intrigue and taking itself way too seriously before toppling head-first into pretension. I really just do not think this game is for me in any capacity. It feels more like an experimental art piece than anything else. I honestly think this could have made a trippy and very interesting HBO series.

+ Terrific art direction and generally just wonderful art style
+ Phenomenal sound design
+ Great original music. Seriously some of my favorite parts of the game.

- Holding a controller in your hand and hitting buttons to play this video game is incredibly boring
- So much reading. It’s all reading. First time that's ever bothered me.
- Is this a video game?

Status: Completed 100%
Date: 04.14.2021 / Play Time: 105 hours

The Rogue-lite genre perfected.

I know “perfect” is a pretty bold word to use when describing a game, but Hades gets pretty close to it. Don’t get me wrong, it has some stuff in it that I would absolutely change, but I truly think Supergiant Games have absolutely perfected the Rogue-lite formula with Hades.

I think one of the trickiest things in Rogue-likes/-lites is making your runs feel worthwhile - making loss not feel like an enormous setback, because in many Rogue games, it is. The story of Hades is built around your repeated runs in such a way that makes it feel like every single run builds on the story, even when you die. Win or lose, some aspect of the story moves forward. Yes, you do need to successfully escape a few times to roll credits. Beyond that, however, most progression with upgrades, characters, side-quests, etc can happen regardless of whether you make it out or not… provided RNG is on your side and you happen to trigger a conversation or find a boon needed for a quest.

Which leads me to my only complaint about the game - randomness. RNG playing into which boons you find in a run is fine - it forces you to adapt and make the best of what you’re given. However, I don’t like RNG when progression is locked behind it because you can’t find a specific boon or you can’t get a conversation with a certain character to trigger. I spent countless hours looking for a very specific boon to finish my last side quest. That said, even during that frustrating hunt, I didn’t stop playing because the core gameplay is a dang blast.

I also need to give a huge shout-out for how well Hades includes LGBTQ themes in extremely normal ways that are unfortunately not found very often in video games.

The cast of characters in this game is phenomenal. One of my favorite ensembles in a while. I was eager to continue doing runs not only because the gameplay was fun, but I wanted to keep seeing everything the characters had to say. And after 105 hours across a total of 96 escape attempts (73 of which were successful), I was still hearing new dialogue when I finally finished the game.

I could speak at length about how much fun I had thinking of cool builds and trying to create them, the wonderful cast of characters, or the excellent hook of collecting resources to upgrade your gear or hub. But honestly this review is already getting a little long. Go play Hades.

+ Perfect attempt/die/repeat gameplay loop with meaningful upgrades
+ Amazing cast of characters with great voice acting
+ Supergiant’s typical gorgeous visuals
+ Great soundtrack
+ Good LGBTQ representation
+ Good accessibility/difficulty options

- RNG impacting story progression