valoderso
29 Reviews liked by valoderso
Kid Icarus: Uprising
2012
One of the best games for the 3ds tho I'm pretty sure playing this was the root of my wrist problems
Kid Icarus: Uprising
2012
Based arthritis simulator
Kid Icarus: Uprising
2012
God really made a game that looks super interesting and then made me left handed. LOOK WHATEVER I DID IN A PREVIOUS LIFE I'M SORRY
Cities: Skylines
2015
It always feels like you just barely can't do what you want but that just might be a skill issue
Cities: Skylines
2015
I pumped too much sewage and my river became brown
Cities: Skylines
2015
there was a garbage infestation and everyone at Tilted Towers died so I have to build 3 cemeteries.
Cities: Skylines
2015
basically what you want to do is take the base game and add as many mods as possible to make it less american. every time you see something american in the game you need to find a mod to get rid of it. i recommend this approach for all games, but this one especially.
Slay the Princess
2023
Love the central idea of perception shaping reality and some of the clever ways they use it. The short with wild diverging choices structure is great and the way the game guides you through interesting areas of its possibilities is good but took a little away from the sense of discovery for me. The final choice was not very hard for me and I feel like a lot of my perception was shaped by the opening title card telling me I was in a love story.
Slay the Princess
2023
This is a game you only play for the first time once. Absolute masterpiece.
Slay the Princess
2023
i'm still not sure if i'm going to play this game again. i'm sure there's probably some true ultimate ending i can get if i bang my head at it for a few more playthroughs, but i loved the ending this game gave me too much to do that i think. it's a good game. the kind of game only the people who made it could've made. it's one of those games where every time it comes up in conversation, the people who have played it before will say "dude, you gotta try it. go in blind. just trust me." and that's a sentiment i will echo here, if you haven't played it i think you should!
in formula, this game is a lot like something like the stanley parable or there is no game. you are being directed by a snarky narrator to do something and given the power to either bark along like a good little dog or be a little shit and do what you want. the premise is simple: there is a princess in the basement of a cabin. if the princess leaves the cabin the world will end and everyone will die. you are here to slay the princess. past this point i'll be spoiling the basic twist of this game.
there are a lot of ways you can act when interfacing with the princess. generally, no matter what you will die. then you are back where you started and you notice what's going on. it's a loop. things are a little different though. in the first encounter, the only voices that spoke were the narrator and the voice of the hero, which could easily be understood as the voice of the character you embody. generally this voice was hesitant to harm any princess, but when it saw the princess behaving strangely became concerned. on the next loop though, you will be joined by a new voice. and holy shit there are so many voices it could be, all depending on how you acted. were you skeptical of everyone and everything? meet the skeptic, here to be accusatory and untrusting of everything around it. did you wait until the princess turned her back to do the deed when nobody looked? well let me introduce you to the opportunist! a smarmy, fence-sitting asshole willing to side with anyone or anything that looks remotely advantageous. do you believe every word the princess says and do anything it takes to save her? well now the voice of a dumb asshole desperate to fuck her lives in your ear. it quickly started to remind me of disco elysium, with these different voices giving me new ideas and dialogue choices. it's a really well done system and i'm impressed they pulled it off so seamlessly. also props to the incredible voice actor who plays all of them as well as the narrator, jonathan sims, who i guess did some kind of magnus chase fan-podcast or something.
you're not the only one who changes each loop though. the princess remembers everything each time too, and the way you chose to treat her changes her. stabbed her in the back? she hides in the corner, baring her fangs. saved her like a damsel in distress? now she lays with a hand to her forehead waiting for the brave knight to come rescue her. you get the idea. it makes for a story you always feel like you're steering even if you can't be sure where it will end up. these loops will end though. as soon as you see the princess leave the cabin. to explain further would give away the grander meta-narrative of the game and i don't want to delve into that, but i promise you it's very interesting.
as much as i enjoyed this game, it did almost lose me a couple of times. it's biggest issue is it can come across as far too cute. the player's relationship with the narrator can veer pretty far into stanley parable territory, and as much as i love this game i would get really frustrated at every argument with the narrator turning into comedy bickering of the same tone. i wanted to immerse myself in this game in a way that felt counter to that. at the end of the day, this content only showed up because i chose the "obstinate video game player" dialogue choices, but i think often the game is worse for including those choices at all, even if they can lead to some pretty interesting places.
the thing that assured me i would love this game were some of the first words on the screen.
"Whatever horrors you may find in these dark spaces, have heart and see them through. There are no premature endings. There are no wrong decisions. There are only fresh perspectives and new beginnings. This is a love story."
it makes an impressive piece of prose and a genuinely useful guide for how to play the game. you don't have to worry about wrong choices or missed opportunities. you will have time to explore and make mistakes without severe consequences. but you don't have forever. in the end, it's not a loop. it's a spiral.
in formula, this game is a lot like something like the stanley parable or there is no game. you are being directed by a snarky narrator to do something and given the power to either bark along like a good little dog or be a little shit and do what you want. the premise is simple: there is a princess in the basement of a cabin. if the princess leaves the cabin the world will end and everyone will die. you are here to slay the princess. past this point i'll be spoiling the basic twist of this game.
there are a lot of ways you can act when interfacing with the princess. generally, no matter what you will die. then you are back where you started and you notice what's going on. it's a loop. things are a little different though. in the first encounter, the only voices that spoke were the narrator and the voice of the hero, which could easily be understood as the voice of the character you embody. generally this voice was hesitant to harm any princess, but when it saw the princess behaving strangely became concerned. on the next loop though, you will be joined by a new voice. and holy shit there are so many voices it could be, all depending on how you acted. were you skeptical of everyone and everything? meet the skeptic, here to be accusatory and untrusting of everything around it. did you wait until the princess turned her back to do the deed when nobody looked? well let me introduce you to the opportunist! a smarmy, fence-sitting asshole willing to side with anyone or anything that looks remotely advantageous. do you believe every word the princess says and do anything it takes to save her? well now the voice of a dumb asshole desperate to fuck her lives in your ear. it quickly started to remind me of disco elysium, with these different voices giving me new ideas and dialogue choices. it's a really well done system and i'm impressed they pulled it off so seamlessly. also props to the incredible voice actor who plays all of them as well as the narrator, jonathan sims, who i guess did some kind of magnus chase fan-podcast or something.
you're not the only one who changes each loop though. the princess remembers everything each time too, and the way you chose to treat her changes her. stabbed her in the back? she hides in the corner, baring her fangs. saved her like a damsel in distress? now she lays with a hand to her forehead waiting for the brave knight to come rescue her. you get the idea. it makes for a story you always feel like you're steering even if you can't be sure where it will end up. these loops will end though. as soon as you see the princess leave the cabin. to explain further would give away the grander meta-narrative of the game and i don't want to delve into that, but i promise you it's very interesting.
as much as i enjoyed this game, it did almost lose me a couple of times. it's biggest issue is it can come across as far too cute. the player's relationship with the narrator can veer pretty far into stanley parable territory, and as much as i love this game i would get really frustrated at every argument with the narrator turning into comedy bickering of the same tone. i wanted to immerse myself in this game in a way that felt counter to that. at the end of the day, this content only showed up because i chose the "obstinate video game player" dialogue choices, but i think often the game is worse for including those choices at all, even if they can lead to some pretty interesting places.
the thing that assured me i would love this game were some of the first words on the screen.
"Whatever horrors you may find in these dark spaces, have heart and see them through. There are no premature endings. There are no wrong decisions. There are only fresh perspectives and new beginnings. This is a love story."
it makes an impressive piece of prose and a genuinely useful guide for how to play the game. you don't have to worry about wrong choices or missed opportunities. you will have time to explore and make mistakes without severe consequences. but you don't have forever. in the end, it's not a loop. it's a spiral.
NieR: Automata
2017
i discounted this game for so long because all i knew about it was 2B and just how much people were going crazy about her. What i didnt know, was that automata tells an unforgettable story filled with just about every emotion you can think of. call me easy to please or whatever, but its seriously one of the most beautiful games ive ever played. the combat is extremely fun and satisfying and dont even get me started about the soundtrack. the characters and story are extremely compelling, and it only gets more complex as you progress through the story.
ganondorf when he has to fight the korok i’ve strapped to a faithful recreation of an Evangelion: 😦😦😦
Persona 3 FES
2007
This review contains spoilers
Its weird to think that without this game, there may have been a chance that I wouldn't be around now to review it nearly a year later. The games underlying themes of death and rebirth spoke to me in a period of my life when I was at my lowest, and I think in a way, it also allowed me to begin the process of closing that dark chapter of my life and to keep moving foward to other doors that lay ahead of me.
An example of which could be seen in the Death Arcana, one of the 22 major arcana present throughout the entire series. While negative connotations have been previously associated with it, there is also an alternative meaning behind it. It can signal that one major phase of your life is ending, and a new one is going to begin.
That is partly why I have come to cherish this game, and to an extent, the franchise, so much. Even though from here and there it does seem to have its.. rather dated flaws in some places (e.g the hermit/magician s.l), the positives that the game, the story, the writing (in most parts), the character arcs have shown me throughout my near 731 hour playthrough far outweigh said negatives in my mind.
(P.S.
As for how i got so many hours in a game that only has 90-100 hours of content in... Tartarus was quite addicting in its gameplay suprisingly, even if it was merely just a spiritual predecessor to Mementos in a way. Also i thought that the final boss needed to be fought at like max level so there was a lot of grinding involved. I can definitely say that im never going to spend that much time on something like that again lol.)
An example of which could be seen in the Death Arcana, one of the 22 major arcana present throughout the entire series. While negative connotations have been previously associated with it, there is also an alternative meaning behind it. It can signal that one major phase of your life is ending, and a new one is going to begin.
That is partly why I have come to cherish this game, and to an extent, the franchise, so much. Even though from here and there it does seem to have its.. rather dated flaws in some places (e.g the hermit/magician s.l), the positives that the game, the story, the writing (in most parts), the character arcs have shown me throughout my near 731 hour playthrough far outweigh said negatives in my mind.
(P.S.
As for how i got so many hours in a game that only has 90-100 hours of content in... Tartarus was quite addicting in its gameplay suprisingly, even if it was merely just a spiritual predecessor to Mementos in a way. Also i thought that the final boss needed to be fought at like max level so there was a lot of grinding involved. I can definitely say that im never going to spend that much time on something like that again lol.)
When I saw TWEWY was getting a sequel after 14 years, I was shocked. I'm so glad it lived up to the wait.
TWEWY follows a story with much more dire stakes, but a similar format to the first game. Rindo is indecisive and relies on others, but must make his way through the reapers game.
Gameplay doesn't use the touchscreen mechanic anymore, but the gameplay is still really fun. It mixes the original's RPG combat with hack and slash action, making you use basically every button on your controller. It rocks.
The game's art and music are stellar as usual, and the transition into 3D is so nicely done. (Thank god they didn't use the kingdom hearts models)
There are far more characters in this one to emphasize the stakes. Everyone has motivations, but some fall short. Returning characters appear too, and ones like Sho are just as mathy as usual. The game does rely on your knowledge of the first, and is very fanservicey, but it's not bad at all, and I just had a big smile on my face at a lot of these moments.
NEO TWEWY is a love letter for fans of the original cult classic. It delivers another action packed, heartfelt story with new and old characters. The game utilizes an amazing artstyle and score, and is truly a unique modern hit that shouldn't go under the radar. Play this one!!!
TWEWY follows a story with much more dire stakes, but a similar format to the first game. Rindo is indecisive and relies on others, but must make his way through the reapers game.
Gameplay doesn't use the touchscreen mechanic anymore, but the gameplay is still really fun. It mixes the original's RPG combat with hack and slash action, making you use basically every button on your controller. It rocks.
The game's art and music are stellar as usual, and the transition into 3D is so nicely done. (Thank god they didn't use the kingdom hearts models)
There are far more characters in this one to emphasize the stakes. Everyone has motivations, but some fall short. Returning characters appear too, and ones like Sho are just as mathy as usual. The game does rely on your knowledge of the first, and is very fanservicey, but it's not bad at all, and I just had a big smile on my face at a lot of these moments.
NEO TWEWY is a love letter for fans of the original cult classic. It delivers another action packed, heartfelt story with new and old characters. The game utilizes an amazing artstyle and score, and is truly a unique modern hit that shouldn't go under the radar. Play this one!!!
chumps. nyeheheh.