cryber
2021
He thought the cycle of death and rebirth was for one lifetime only! He MAD!!!
2018
Very fun and satisfying gameplay held back by a baffling combo system whose timer is so short it punishes you for playing "too cool" and getting multikills with the same specials that combos feed, because a cleared screen means a reset combo if the next enemy takes too long to show up. Plus weapon specials take time to charge, which is time not killing, which kills your combos.
This along with multiple unlocks being tied in this system makes replaying again and again to go faster become less satisfying instead of more.
This along with multiple unlocks being tied in this system makes replaying again and again to go faster become less satisfying instead of more.
starting to think homicide is the greatest expression of love but idk
This review contains spoilers
The comparison to Doki Doki is tacky and overdone considering this predates it by about 4 years, but unavoidable.
When I played DDLC in 2017 I heard the ~whispers~ of this ~other game~ that ~wasn't officially translated at the time~. I saw some screenshots from a certain happy birthday, and moved on with life.
Now 6.5 years later with more VNs under my belt, more life lived, and with memories hazy enough to have not quite remembered being spoiled fully, I rounded back onto reading Totono.
It was certainly an experience worth that wait, and a great of example of using the meta of your genre to tell an extremely effective story. Totono builds its main heroines wonderfully over the course of normal play, making the choice between them feel hard to make even before the curtain begins to get pulled back. Being railroaded into Miyuki naturally makes you feel bad for Aoi, which leads you into her route, which leads to abandoning Miyuki's, which leads to everything falling apart as it does. Despite me pushing in Aoi's direction as hard as possible as soon as I had the ability, they still brought me back to almost picking Miyuki in the end. The emphasis placed on your choice really did make it hard to make in a wonderful way, no saves, no reloads, just a binary with no right answer capping off an extremely memorable commentary on the genre.
When I played DDLC in 2017 I heard the ~whispers~ of this ~other game~ that ~wasn't officially translated at the time~. I saw some screenshots from a certain happy birthday, and moved on with life.
Now 6.5 years later with more VNs under my belt, more life lived, and with memories hazy enough to have not quite remembered being spoiled fully, I rounded back onto reading Totono.
It was certainly an experience worth that wait, and a great of example of using the meta of your genre to tell an extremely effective story. Totono builds its main heroines wonderfully over the course of normal play, making the choice between them feel hard to make even before the curtain begins to get pulled back. Being railroaded into Miyuki naturally makes you feel bad for Aoi, which leads you into her route, which leads to abandoning Miyuki's, which leads to everything falling apart as it does. Despite me pushing in Aoi's direction as hard as possible as soon as I had the ability, they still brought me back to almost picking Miyuki in the end. The emphasis placed on your choice really did make it hard to make in a wonderful way, no saves, no reloads, just a binary with no right answer capping off an extremely memorable commentary on the genre.
2016
I feel like you could lock Shouzou Kaga in a room with sticks and rocks and he'd have started making a new SRPG within a few days.
Despite some limitations of the SRPGmaker engine, Vestaria manages to perfectly capture the spirit of past FE games Kaga has directed. A charming cast, a focus on narrative events happening on the maps themselves, and of course busted prf weapons everywhere as has become common in his games.
When Vestaria shines, it shines extremely bright with both challenging and interesting maps. But along with the unrestrained creativity that makes these moments so good, there are multiple maps where the event/secret hunting devolves into tedium instead. Especially some of the later chapters, whose length and size manages to dwarf Fire Emblem 4 maps that spanned entire countries, taking multiple hours to complete even before things like resets. The last chapter specifically is a monster of a challenge, whose roughly 6 hour clear time must make it the longest in the series.
This all comes together to make Vestaria a mix of both the best and the worst the Kaga Saga games have to offer, but overall it comes out to an unforgettable experience that continues the FE legacy even 25 years since Kaga has touched the series officially.
Despite some limitations of the SRPGmaker engine, Vestaria manages to perfectly capture the spirit of past FE games Kaga has directed. A charming cast, a focus on narrative events happening on the maps themselves, and of course busted prf weapons everywhere as has become common in his games.
When Vestaria shines, it shines extremely bright with both challenging and interesting maps. But along with the unrestrained creativity that makes these moments so good, there are multiple maps where the event/secret hunting devolves into tedium instead. Especially some of the later chapters, whose length and size manages to dwarf Fire Emblem 4 maps that spanned entire countries, taking multiple hours to complete even before things like resets. The last chapter specifically is a monster of a challenge, whose roughly 6 hour clear time must make it the longest in the series.
This all comes together to make Vestaria a mix of both the best and the worst the Kaga Saga games have to offer, but overall it comes out to an unforgettable experience that continues the FE legacy even 25 years since Kaga has touched the series officially.
2020
Great level of content/quality for a free VN and I love the art, but the route endings tended to fall a bit flat and the True ending just completely loses me.
Reggie, Twyla, and Mary are cute though.
Reggie, Twyla, and Mary are cute though.
2018
There's magic in these dungeons, something enthralling.
Funger's atmosphere is magnetic, it had me hooked from the very first run until the end with its cruelty, enemy design, and world. There's just something so wonderful about a game willing to kick your teeth in so thoroughly. As soon as I lost to a guard and ended up legless in a fleshpit with no idea where I was I knew it would be a special experience, which after mastering the first few floors proved to be true. What comes after those floors, while not as punishing since you're more used to the game's tricks, is still magical.
It's not flawless by any means of course, there's bugs and RPGmaker jank, but both are overshadowed by the level of love put into crafting it. If there's one main criticism I have it's that battles as the game goes on start to feel either routine(attack X part on Y turn) or lacking some complexity(spam attack torso). But battling isn't even the game's main focus so this isn't that important.
Funger's atmosphere is magnetic, it had me hooked from the very first run until the end with its cruelty, enemy design, and world. There's just something so wonderful about a game willing to kick your teeth in so thoroughly. As soon as I lost to a guard and ended up legless in a fleshpit with no idea where I was I knew it would be a special experience, which after mastering the first few floors proved to be true. What comes after those floors, while not as punishing since you're more used to the game's tricks, is still magical.
It's not flawless by any means of course, there's bugs and RPGmaker jank, but both are overshadowed by the level of love put into crafting it. If there's one main criticism I have it's that battles as the game goes on start to feel either routine(attack X part on Y turn) or lacking some complexity(spam attack torso). But battling isn't even the game's main focus so this isn't that important.
Love the art, very charming at what it goes for, and made me buy a Tiger-chan plush halfway through.
Log Wild/10
Log Wild/10
2017
I love this game(I nearly quit 30 times)! Exploring and adapting to the world was amazing(putting this death system in a platformer should have you tried at The Hague)!
Somehow still want to come back for every campaign too.
Somehow still want to come back for every campaign too.
2018
Did not go into this expecting to love it as much as I did, but the charm put into every character really creeps up on you.
I have small gripes here feeling that there were some missed opportunities to explore the rules of the death game, but they are minor in the end and far overshadowed by just how great the character writing was. Miharu especially was a star of the show in that department, though Rinka, and almost everyone else endeared themselves to me by the end. Really great read overall!
I have small gripes here feeling that there were some missed opportunities to explore the rules of the death game, but they are minor in the end and far overshadowed by just how great the character writing was. Miharu especially was a star of the show in that department, though Rinka, and almost everyone else endeared themselves to me by the end. Really great read overall!
Troubleshooter is not a perfect game. There are problems I could list with the story as it stands, or small issues in gameplay that largely live in the later game of the DLCs.
But those nitpicks pale in comparison to the passion and ambition dripping from every inch of it. A small studio decides to spend the better part of a decade on a project, one which in essence is a prologue for a somehow even larger planned story despite being well over 100 hours long, and it works.
Getting to the credits and seeing that the game had TWO programmers was an extreme shock. Seeing that the devs have a 400 page thread on Steam to take ideas and feedback they've been maintaining for 6 years was too. The fact that such a small team created such a deep and intricate TRPG is downright inspirational.
Every character is unique and fun to use. Every character has a ridiculous amount of customization. Many maps provide a challenge even on the normal difficulty. It's a massive pile of ideas and systems built up over years that should collapse under its own weight, but never does.
But those nitpicks pale in comparison to the passion and ambition dripping from every inch of it. A small studio decides to spend the better part of a decade on a project, one which in essence is a prologue for a somehow even larger planned story despite being well over 100 hours long, and it works.
Getting to the credits and seeing that the game had TWO programmers was an extreme shock. Seeing that the devs have a 400 page thread on Steam to take ideas and feedback they've been maintaining for 6 years was too. The fact that such a small team created such a deep and intricate TRPG is downright inspirational.
Every character is unique and fun to use. Every character has a ridiculous amount of customization. Many maps provide a challenge even on the normal difficulty. It's a massive pile of ideas and systems built up over years that should collapse under its own weight, but never does.
2022
A game with art direction this inspired should not be so agonizingly dull to play.
2022
Despite a story that sometimes stretches the suspension of disbelief near its limits and a somewhat rushed ending that could have used 1-2 more hours to clean things up, Corpse Factory makes for an enthralling Halloween season read.
The main cast's voice actors do wonders with their performances. Loved the story's prose and the look into multiple twisted perspectives.
Also, I want to inject Noriko and Kojiro's characters into my veins.
The main cast's voice actors do wonders with their performances. Loved the story's prose and the look into multiple twisted perspectives.
Also, I want to inject Noriko and Kojiro's characters into my veins.
2023
A stale subgenre made great by injecting The Sauce™ aka an actually cool artstyle, music, and putting real bullet hell in it that makes late game/bosses feel frantic instead of routine.
2022
Jishogi is great game, and one I would consider quite underappreciated compared to its quality. Thankfully it's gotten a bit of a spotlight since I put it in the backlog last year, but since as of writing this it has no reviews on the site I figure it deserves at least some level of write-up.
Jishogi tackles some very dark subjects and features 2 wonderfully fleshed out characters, the player character Mayu and the witch Fifield. Their interplay as well as the consequences of the choices you can make were definitely a highlight of the game as a whole to me. Whether it's diving into memories or deciding whats best for both characters, the story had me hooked pretty much from the start. There's quite a bit of freedom as to how things can play out, from places I'm surprised the dev was willing to go to much more positive resolutions. Worth experiencing and not spoiling here for sure.
The one larger criticism for this game, one it seems the dev is aware of, is that the puzzles can actually be a bit reductive to its goal sometimes. There are multiple between every story beat, meaning getting stuck on even one can very well kill the pacing of the game. Either placing a memory between every puzzle or reducing the number of them would have helped. Though the puzzles themselves are still clever and enjoyable for the most part, even reflecting the personalities of the 2 characters well.
All said a great work for a solo dev, and I hope they continue in the future with more projects on this level!
Jishogi tackles some very dark subjects and features 2 wonderfully fleshed out characters, the player character Mayu and the witch Fifield. Their interplay as well as the consequences of the choices you can make were definitely a highlight of the game as a whole to me. Whether it's diving into memories or deciding whats best for both characters, the story had me hooked pretty much from the start. There's quite a bit of freedom as to how things can play out, from places I'm surprised the dev was willing to go to much more positive resolutions. Worth experiencing and not spoiling here for sure.
The one larger criticism for this game, one it seems the dev is aware of, is that the puzzles can actually be a bit reductive to its goal sometimes. There are multiple between every story beat, meaning getting stuck on even one can very well kill the pacing of the game. Either placing a memory between every puzzle or reducing the number of them would have helped. Though the puzzles themselves are still clever and enjoyable for the most part, even reflecting the personalities of the 2 characters well.
All said a great work for a solo dev, and I hope they continue in the future with more projects on this level!