Animal Well really is a thing you need to experience with a controller in your hands and full focus because it is a living, breathing art piece that sucked me in. I bought this game 5 hours ago and I haven't put it down since. The way everything animated is like drinking cool water on a hot night. Refreshing.

Seeing the previews of this game, I thought "ok big youtuber videogamedunkey is firmly in his 30's and wants to expand beyond making shitposts and make money by becoming an indie publisher". I wasn't moved at all by any of the promotion for Animal Well. I am bored to DEATH of 2D platformers and this game only teased a pleasant art style which is not enough to make me care. Most 2D games all mostly play the same. I'm sleep.

Thing is I got 24.68 on my Steam Wallet, so why not give it a try.

It is a Metroidvania logic puzzler. There are no tutorials in Animal Well. You are left as to guess how you progress forward. It's not Baba is You go FUCK yourself hard. It is quite simple and natural gameplay that leads to bigger and bigger "ah-HA!" moments. The kind where you feel dumb and smart. Smumb. Darmbt. I felt like I was one of those things.

The gameplay mixed with the environments and ambient music just clicked with me hard. I was 45 minutes into the game after being cynical about the whole thing and my brain just snapped after a certain puzzle solution and I realized this game has a hidden power level of cleverness. It is so meticulously well thought out. It's not trying to reinvent the wheel. It just was catered for you to have a good time.

I recommend this game for everyone. I've been in a gaming slump where no new game releases has really excited me, but Animal Well is the game that pulled my brain out of that fog. Not saying it will do the same for you, but if you give it a shot, it just might.

It ain't as good as Hollow Knight, but this is right under that (so far) as a jaw dropping 2D game with content that keeps upping the ante in amazement.

Jamal Dunkey picked a banger to kick off his publishing venture.

My first Donkey Kong Country game was Returns for the Wii. I got it for Christmas the year it came out (that or it was 2011 I forget) and I remember being so excited to play it. While nowadays, I'm not the biggest Returns fan personally, I can't deny it started my love for the DKC series. Once I got into Super Nintendo games with Super Mario World and Yoshi's Island, I decided I wanted to play the very first Donkey Kong Country game since at that point I still only played Returns. I bought it at my local flea market I believe and really enjoyed it. I mentioned how Yoshi's Island always reminds me of the weekend, since I would play that a lot during that time, and the same applies here too. While I think the sequel does everything this game does but better, I still think the original is a really fun time.

The general gameplay of Donkey Kong Country is you run, jump and roll. Those are basics of course, as each level has other aspects that change gameplay up like barrel cannons you can shoot out of or ropes you can jump on but the general gameplay is pretty simple. The controls are basically perfect, rolling feels super good to perform, and if you know the layout of the levels it's very easy to just speedrun through levels since both Donkey and Diddy are relatively fast. Speaking about the characters, Diddy Kong's first appearance was in this game, and he honestly upstages Donkey Kong. If you get a DK barrel, you can get the other Kong along and they basically act as a 2nd hit. You can switch freely and this is helpful since they each have different attributes to them. Donkey Kong is slower but heavier so he can kill certain enemies that Diddy can't. Diddy just feels better to play as he's faster than Donkey and also has a smaller hitbox. Both are valuable, but Donkey is more situational and is mostly just used for one enemy type (and even then, Diddy can defeat them by rolling into them) so Diddy Kong is my much-preferred Kong to use.

As for collectables in the levels, you have bananas of course. The main plot involves King K Rool stealing DK's banana hoard and he must go after him and his baddies to obtain them back. I think the reasoning behind there being so many littered throughout the levels is he just dropped them or something but either way, they act as coins and getting 100 earns you a life. You can collect letters that spell out KONG and they also give you a life. You can also collect these animal buddy tokens, and getting three of a specific buddy lets you collect these stars, and every 100 you collect ALSO gives you a life. Besides all this, you can also find secret bonus rooms. These all contain all the aformentioned items, or just lives straight up, but these can be a pain to find. I wouldn't have an issue normally since these are optional bonus rooms so it makes sense they'd be really hidden, but getting every single one is how you get 101% in the game, so if you're a completionist you must find them all. The real issue then is, a good chunk of them are just kinda bullshit. You'll have some that are very easy to spot and are self-explanatory. But then you have ones that are completely hidden and sometimes even require blind jumps into pits. I know they wanted you to buy a guide or a Nintendo Power back then to find these locations, but I don't find random pit bonuses or random breakable wall bonuses fun ever. I used a guide for like 80% of these cuz I only ever 100%ed this game once before, so I forgot most of these. The sequel can be like this too, but it generally handled bonus room locations a lot better. Alongside all the collectables and bonus rooms, you also have animal buddies. These are fun as they change up the gameplay slightly. Rambi can kill usually unkillable (unless you have a barrel) enemies by running into them. Expresso can jump a bit higher and float over large gaps. Enguarde swims faster in water and has an attack you can perform. Winky...well Winky just jumps really high, tho he can also jump on usually harmful enemies too and he's honestly underrated. These guys appear enough where they don't just feel like one-off gimmicks or anything.

The levels themselves are generally well designed. They're simpler than the sequels, and I feel like there's generally more bullshit due to enemies suddenly appearing on screen randomly, but there's a nice flow to the levels. Visually, I think it just looks alright. The characters themselves looks good, I just think some of the backgrounds don't look great compared to others, and definitely compared to 2's backgrounds. I think it also doesn't help that the level themes aren't too interesting in this game. You have jungles and mines and factories and Mayan temples and some of these are more unique than others, but they don't exactly lead to very vibrant colors. When it hits, it hits. The one jungle level with the sunset is really nice and I like the ice caves. The factories are kind of cool near the end too, but overall, I think the level settings can be a bit bland here. Not like Returns tho, since that is very formulaic with its level themes but compared to 2, 1 is not as good in that regard.

The bosses in this game are kind of a joke. All of them, besides King K Rool, are incredibly easy and just feel like a slightly tougher regular enemy. They could've easily had no bosses and it would've been fine so I guess it's not like they detract from the game too much, however 2 did bosses way better.

This may be my hottest take though. I don't love the OST. A big reason for that is most of the OST was in Returns, and so I had always felt there was an identity crisis with this game which is not the game's fault and is more a me thing because I played Returns first. Even outside of that, some of the songs I just never really got into...but objectively the OST is quite solid. There are still bangers like Aquatic Ambience and Gang-Plank Galleon of course. Also a shoutout to Fear Factory, that one's nice too. Even though I don't love the OST, it's still good overall, I just much prefer 2's tbh.

I've kind of been complaining about things here or there despite praising the gameplay. Something else I'll praise about this game tho is its Rare charm. Animations are very charming between characters. Donkey and Diddy both get terrified when you're at the edge of a cliff. They do a charming celebration whenever you defeat a boss or complete a bonus room. Diddy Kong throws his hat down and stomps on it when he loses a bonus room. The dialogue between the other characters like Cranky or Funky or Candy are very charming too. There's a fake-out Kremlin credits that happens when you get halfway into King K Rool's fight, and the actual credits have humorous cutscenes between characters. Not only is this game charming as hell, but it also created all these well-known characters too. We wouldn't have Diddy Kong or Cranky Kong or Funky Kong if it wasn't for this game. We wouldn't have my man K Rool either, he's such a memorable villain. The Kremlins themselves are very memorable and cartoony. I think besides the actual gameplay, the best thing DKC1 does is the worldbuilding and charm. Before this, we just had DK and DK Jr. It's all thanks to Rare, that we have as many memorable characters as we do now.

I may have some issues with this game, and I think 2 fixes them all pretty much, but this is still a classic for a reason and is staple Super Nintendo game. I was honestly thinking about dropping this to a 7, even up until writing most of this review, but it wasn't until the paragraph before this did, I really ponder and think about how many staple characters this game created and just how charming this game is in general. It's very important to entire DK series as a whole and is a very fun platformer at that! However, as I've said several times in this review, 2 is better in every way and I'm going to be replaying that soon so stay tuned for that review!

Ghost Trick was one of the first games I put in my Amazon wish list back when I made an account in 2017. I remember a Youtuber I liked, Nintendocaprisun, streamed the game and the little I watched from the stream looked really cool. It sat in that wishlist for ages, eventually skyrocketing in price. It wasn't until last year, that I decided to bite the bullet and buy the game physically off eBay. It was expensive but it was a game I wanted to own for a while now, and I figured playing it on the DS would have been awesome. By this time, I was already a big Ace Attorney Fan, and knowing that this was another Shu Takumi game..I was pretty excited to play it. While I personally still prefer AA1 and AA3 over this, this was still a great time overall.

This game makes great use of the touch-screen. So, the basic premise of the game without going into story details, you the main character have died. You are a ghost and find out you have the ability to go back to the past, four minutes before someone has died, and have the potential to save them. You also have the ability to move to different objects and control them. You do this by going into ghost mode and moving your little wisp icon from object to object. The catch is, you can only move it a specific distance away. If something is too far away, you have to figure out how to get there by possibly interacting with the object you're on. This is called "tricking" and it can vary depending on the section of the story you're on. Some can be very simple while others you need to time specific actions in the real world. It might seem a bit confusing with how I explained however, it's very easy to understand in game. Either way, this gameplay loop is really fun and is perfect for a DS game. Near the end of the game, it also throws another character at you with some different mechanics. And it even combines the two at once and it can lead to some really fun puzzles. The game was never that hard, I never even had to look up a guide, however I never found them super easy.

Story-wise, like I said the premise is you die at the start. You play as Sissel, someone we know nothing about, and not even he knows who he is. His main goal from the start is to figure out who he is and how he dies, but along the way he meets a colorful cast of characters, and the game gets more complicated from there. Overall, I enjoyed the story and cast of characters for sure. Like Ace Attorney, they're all very distinct and can be very goofy. The main cast is very good tho I have to say I didn't connect to them as much as I do with the main cast of Ace Attorney. Probably because this game is shorter than your average AA game, and I was able to connect to that game's cast through the span of three games! Either way, while I didn't love any character here, Sissel..Lynne..Jowd..Cabanela..Missile..the entire cast is memorable and entertaining. The story is also full of twists and turns throughout. The ending may be a little convoluted imo but I think it was executed well and I did not see it coming at all. While not mind-blowing overall, I can at least commend the story and overall concept of the game for being unique. Always love seeing really out there stories like this.

This may be weird to here, but I don't think the absolute best aspect of this game is the story or the gameplay. It's the visuals. Honestly, some of the best sprite-work I've ever seen in a game. Every animation is so buttery smooth and really gives the game a lot of character. The look of each character sprite too, idk how they did it, but it has this very distinct look to it. Since the game is very goofy at times, the characters animations are goofy as well. The art style on the portraits is very distinct too tho those aren't animated. They're nice but it would have been cool if they had little animations as well, like Ace Attorney. Along with the sprites being full of personality, so is the dialogue. If you played Ace Attorney before this, you'd be right at home here. It feels just like Ace Attorney. Goofy and witty when it wants to be, serious when it wants to be, and full of heart throughout. In this regard, it may be better than Ace Attorney because I didn't notice any spelling errors lol.

The OST is probably my biggest disappointment compared to Ace Attorney tbh, especially since the AA1 composer did this game. The first Ace Attorney's ost is now in my top 10 OSTS of all time. I just love it so much, so I might've hyped myself up too much with this game. That's not to say this game has a bad soundtrack, I just don't find it comparable to the Ace Attorney games personally. Maybe I just haven't listened to the OST enough, as I know this is probably a hot take and others will disagree. Still, there were songs I did like. Four Minutes Before Death probably being my favorite since it reminded me of Ace Attorney the most haha.

I do wish I ended up liking this a bit more, especially since this game is praised so much and has a 4.5 average, however in this case I can totally see why it is as this game is really great. I guess maybe it just comes down to my personal preferences. Or maybe I'll like this even more on replay, who knows. Either way, while it seems I do prefer the Ace Attorney series more (sorry I keep comparing them, it's just hard not to with the type of game this is), this is still must-play DS game imo and worth all the praise it gets.

>Removed all Platinum content (Trainer teams, Gym layouts, Pokémon variety, E4 Rematch, Battle Frontier, Distortion World, Map/Puzzles, Villa, Improved narrative)
>Removed Secret Base customization
>Removed Game Corner
>Removed 2/3 Contest minigames
>Removed numerous Online Features (GTS, Draw, Egg Spin, Mix Battle, and Platinum’s poffin cook, minigames, WiFi Plaza, and WiFi Club)
>Removed GBA-insert Pokémon encounters
>TMs are finite, but EXP Share is forced, PC is now portable, and HMs are removed
>Level curve is FUCKED as a result of forced EXP share https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-tUdDSA11xo
>Following Pokémon receive affection buff (increased EXP, dodge chance, crit chance, attack, remove status conditions, and ability to survive moves that would faint you)
>Game is poorly optimized and crashes at random https://www.youtube.com/watch?t=320&v=308IkypGo9A&feature=youtu.be
>Horrendous presentation, trainer models just snap in place
>Music is STILL trash midi, the trailers were doctored
>Copy and pasted animations from XY/SS that aren’t faithful to the DPPt animations
>Non-existent Pokémon scaling
>No Ranked Battles, no new battle modes
>No real new content like FRLG, HGSS, and even ORAS all got
>$60 game (DPPt was $40)
>$50 online (DPPt’s was free)

It’s over. This is the worst mainline Pokémon game ever released.

i just dont care

i think the biggest problem with this game is its lack of direction does not work in its favor. im just bored. im wandering around aimlessly and i guess im learning stuff but none of it feels helpful or useful? especially since everything is on a time limit which just stresses me out and makes me not want to explore.

the biggest sin is that it just is extremely boring and uninteresting. i like relaxing games. this is not fun to me.

also the controls fucking suck

I should love this game. I wanted to love this game. I tried to love this game. Even now I am disappointed—mostly in myself—that I did not.

I think it's a "me" problem, not a problem with the game itself. Most players don't seem to find Outer Wilds even half as frustrating as I did. I resorted to using a walkthrough pretty quickly, and even with the guide, I still almost gave up out of frustration. It's not just that the controls are tricky, but that the way to progress is often unclear, the puzzles are obscure, and the physics-based challenges are no cakewalk, either (%!$& that #$&!ing cyclone to the end of the universe and back). The moments of pleasure and discovery I had with the game, and there are plenty, were fighting a constant war with a horde of annoyances, and on many occasions the annoyances almost won.

The fact that they didn't is a testament to the game's many good qualities, which are real, so please believe all the other reviewers when they tell you about them. I just wish all the lovely parts didn't have to coexist with so much stuff that bugged the living hell out of me.

Oh, and while the game receives a lot of praise for its story, I found it...a bit less than revelatory? It suits the style of gameplay perfectly, but you more or less know the basic contours from the beginning, and there aren't many surprises along the way. I think part of the reason I didn't enjoy the game more is that I was playing mostly for the story and was impatient to learn more, which is the wrong way to go about it. Really Outer Wilds does not mix well with impatience of any kind. I think you are meant to explore haphazardly for the sheer fun of exploring, piecing things together little by little, in which case I can easily imagine this game lasting a good 30-40 hours or more. I don't think I personally would have had the endurance to play that way, but kudos to anyone who does have what it takes to get the most out of the experience.

This is a game at odds with itself. It wants to be about exploration, but it provides no incentive or reward for poking about, minimal and clunky tools for actually moving about, and only has a central story to uncover. Very quickly the answer to "I wonder what's over there" is "lethal environment, annoying traversal, and random story scraps". Too much time is spent on mechanics that aren't relevant to much of the uncovering, and not enough on those that are. The loop is exhausting, the writing generic, the story (as much as I got in 8 hours) uninteresting. Supposedly the ending is fantastic, but I've lost all interest in getting there.

Look, it's a good setting, and it's good sci-fi, but I can't shake the feeling that I paid $25 for this game to call me an idiot over and over again. Is the time loop really necessary? Do I really need an excruciating flashback of my slow and oncoming death because the sun kidnapped my ship while I was trying to find the exact place to stand on a travelling meteor? Do I need the creeping time pressure of a collapsing planet as I try to figure out the exact non-Euclidian route I need to take to get inside a tower that maybe has the next breadcrumb that might maybe make me feel like I've made progress?

Again, the setting is good. Each planet is different. It does fun things with gravity and perspective and it's genuinely creative. I just wish I was playing a walking simulator sometimes, because I'm old, and I get frustrated when I know that jellyfish are electrically resistant and this surface is electric but I can't figure out the exact sequence of steps I need to take in order to combine those two facts before the sun explodes and I get to watch a playback of my jerk avatar failing to solve a puzzle for 15 seconds over mournful music.

My primary emotions are embarrassment, anger and exhaustion instead of wonder and awe.

Outer Wilds is the perfect example of why you should always approach games that are considered "All time classics"/"Masterpieces" with a shit load of skepticism because despite all of the praises I hear about this game I can't for the love of god even bring myself to say anything remotely positive about it

First off, who thought putting a time restriction in an exploration focused game was a good idea? The amount of backtracking you need to do because of the supernova that triggers every 20 minutes coupled with the amount of annoying unforeseeable traps that also lead to your death is absolutely ridiculous, which was also the main motivator behind killing my intrigue to explore somewhat of a cohesive world with neat ideas and puzzles.
Now onto the elephant in the room, the controls are fucking abysmal which makes simply moving around quite annoying and they had the gall to design multiple segments that revolve solely around controlling your spaceship, which I can only describe as janky. Most of the deaths in this game either happen due to poor controls, random traps that you cant see coming & of course the stupid supernova which is basically the game's way of saying "Uh oh you couldn't explore everything within the measly 20 minutes we gave you? Time to send you back to the very beginning of the game with no way to fast travel" And I have a massive bone to pick with incompetent game devs that don't respect the player's time.
The story here is also quite non-existent and the people who insist otherwise are just plain out wrong because gathering wiki articles and putting them together does not make up for a very cohesive narrative that suck you into the experience, it's jarring if anything. I also don't see the appeal of the tracks here either, they don't fit the tone of the game at all but honestly speaking they're simply just lame.

Whoever thinks Outer Wilds is a masterpiece or a timeless classic, stop lying to yourself
This game sucks

Outer Wilds made me less convinced of Games' potential as an art form. Im being provocative on purpose but How many goddamned times is the message of a game that is praised for its artistic merit be, to one degree or another "Memento Mori"? Spiritfarer, What Remains of Edith Finch, Persona 3, Pentiment, now Outer Wilds. I like all of these games to varying degrees but it just makes me hopeless if time and time again thats seemingly the only subject games are praised for tackling. "Your life is limited and you will eventually die" Yeah thanks game, I already knew that, I literally think about it every single goddamned day, to a degree that actively makes me miserable. I know its stupid but I cannot help it and no amount of whimsical space banjos is going to change that!

In fairness my main issues with Outer Wilds are personal. When you make a game such as this its going to be loved by some and utterly alienate others and that is fine. Outer Wilds is a game that requires patience, and I have none. Fuck it, this is already way too personal of a review : I'm 80% sure I have ADHD and am in the process of getting diagnosed. All of my academic pursuits thus far have been failures because I physically cannot pay attention to anything for more than a few minutes at a time and get extremely frustrated when things don't go my way. When I am forced to queue at the Supermarket I grit my teeth and subequently fantasize about bludgeoning the customers in front of me with my shopping so I can cut in line.

So whilst it was a valiant effort on the part of Outer Wilds fans to tell me to never look anything up because this is a game of information, it was never going to happen. I tried, believe me. I figured some things out and especially in the first few hours or so I had a great time just leisurely exploring stuff and reading text and trying to puzzle it all together. Unfortunately Outer Wilds is a game that is 90% failure and 10% victory/discovery. As much as there is no consequence for failure other than time, figuring out how to get to a place and having to redo the loop twice cause the autopilot killed you or a tiny mistake on your part is demoralising. And that is the word I would use to describe Outer Wilds, it demoralised me in almost every aspect.

Now, I did keep playing the game and finished it, which still puts it better than most games and for sure there is SOMETHING here I enjoyed. Once you get used to the slighltly clunky controls and learn to never use the stupid autopilot unless the planet is literally in a straight line from you with only empty space between its pretty fun to fly around and discover stuff. The couple of "Aha" moments I did have were gratifying but sometimes I had figured out what I had to do but hadnt quite figured out exactly what the game meant me to do (the detective game problem). The artstyle is quite good and the music is great.

The high points of Outer Wilds are high, but to me its low points are so low It just left me cold. The amount of times I left a play session after failing to do something and just feeling shitty for the rest of the day, I just dont play games for that man. I would still recommend Outer Wilds. It is better than Outer Worlds, but I would only recommend it to people who have a lot of patience.

SPOILERS
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
-
On a last note, I can see why people like the ending but I didnt. I was already just wanting the game to be over after the nightmare that was the Dark Bramble which I left for the end, and the dumb item gather quest I found irritating and after all that the ending is just a downer. Yes I know its on purpose blah blah dont struggle against the end etc but it just makes the quest seem kind of pointless to me. I think the Nomai writings about the Eye wherein one of the scholars wonders if the Eye of the universe actually didnt call the Nomai at all, they just ascribed it that significance and in fact the eye may not give any amount of shit about them was supposed to be metaphorical about religion and the indifference of the Universe towards us, as well as mirroring the player's own realization that the timeloop was just a coincidence. You were not on some supernatural quest to stop a supernova, you were coincidentally roped in to a system no longer manned or overseen by anyone. And I get it, but again I just don't like it, it bums me out. Idk, I have no better way to end this unhinged essay so heres a song I like : https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hzfoSLP_w1I