Recent reviews by Jigurd

A fun pack of well-designed levels. The levels start by exploring some of what Portal and Portal 2 didn't touch on so much in the core mechanics, and then proceeds to introduce a few new and interesting mechanics. There's the occasional chamber where the exit is hard to spot or where the puzzle hinges on an easily missed lever, but it's broadly good and makes you feel clever in the ways Portal should.

The story fits the setting quite well, but the moment-to-moment writing doesn't quite hit the mark. There's quite a bit of clunky exposition, and the jokes just don't land as well as they do in the main game. A few of the achievements made me chuckle, though, so it's not like it has *no* comedic chops.

As for length, my first playthrough clocked in at 4.2 hours. If I were to go through a second time to get the achievements I missed, that might bring it up to the advertised 8.

An excellent little puzzle game. The puzzles very much feel like Escape Room puzzles in the best possible way, and I personally found them challenging without being frustrating. Not very long, but also does not overstay its welcome. If the developer ever makes a sequel, I'll be there for it.

A fascinating and evocative game that somehow manages to make an eldritch underworld come to life just through the books you read and the visitors you interact with. If you played Cultist Simulator you'll be right at home here. If you like wordy games, resource managment, and Neil Gaiman books, you'll find something you like too.

A great stealth game that offers a wide range of options for taking out your targets. It suffers a little from somewhat unclear rules. (When can I poison things without it being considered a crime, can this civilian see me, will an accident kill void my No Bodies Found bonus, and so on) The new maps are nothing to write home about. They're fine, but they don't quite reach the levels of scale that you find in Hitman 1 or 2. The new features like the camera and keypads feel like gimmicks and don't really add much. The mission design is quite fun, though - the Dartmoor and Berlin missions are both cool and creative.The new Freelancer Mode is an awesome implementation of the Hitman formula that lets you appreciate three games worth of solid stealh maps from new perspectives, and is the only incarnation where I don't find myself immediately slamming the Load Save button the moment I get seen.One thing that always disappointed me in Hitman 1 and 2 is how the unique kill challengers are sort of pointless? Shooting a target, meleeing a target, drowning a target, and killing a target with fiber-wire are all basically identical. Do the story that gets you alone with the target and take them out. In Freelancer, these weapons feel meaningfully different. And because you can't reload, bringing contingency gear in case the mission goes loud actually makes sense.Unfortunately, despite the fact that I will likely play more of it, I can't recommend this game to anyone. Especially not people who already own Hitman 1 and 2. It's an entirely singleplayer game that requires a constant online connection. If your internet is a little spotty like mine, the game will literally force you to pause until your internet comes back if the connection drops out. Additionally, if you own earlier hitman titles you can carry over your progress and the maps from the earlier games, but not access to the DLC maps outside of the Freelancer mode. For that you'll need to buy the Hitman 2 pack, which is not discounted by already owning this content. Oh yeah, and of the most useful pieces of gear in the whole game is locked behind these DLC maps. ♥♥♥♥ that.

Tinkus Winkus was an Optio in Scipio's Africa campaign in 205 BC. He died after trying to fight the leader of a Numidian infantry unit in single combat.

Biggus Dickus, another Optio in the same campaign, died after a retired badass challenged him to a duel and he was stupid enough to say yes.

Marcus Manius had a much less silly name and a lot more wits. He got out while the going was good and retired after Scipio's war in Hispania.

This game is an excellent Roguelike take on what life in a Roman legion might have been like. You can die fairly easily if you make a dumb decision, but your next roman will be stronger than the one before, so you won't mind so much. The combat is tactical and out-maneuvering your opponent feels satisfying, and it's the first game other than Total War that I have seen depicting actual military units in combat, so two thumbs up for that!

The choose-your-own adventure element isn't quite a branching narrative - your roman will always fight in the same battles in the same order, with some minor variations - sometimes you can volunteer for a harder duty for greater share of the booty, or you'll be selected for special duty if you're a good enough soldier. But unless you get promoted to Centurion there aren't a ton of decisions to be made. Once you do though, some additional mechanics open up. Firstly, a lot of events give you choices on how to approach them. Also in battle you have more control over when you fight, and can choose to hand command to your Optio and take a break, though that will cost you some goodwill with the troops and Command.

Another negative if you don't know much about ancient history: the game doesn't really go out of its way to explain a lot of its terms. You get a short blurb for your current rank and the choose-your-own-adventure bits give you a lot of context on the war, but if you don't know what a Hastati, Principae or Proconsul is, you may want to watch some Historia Civilis videos on youtube before getting stuck in. If you are interested in roman history I thoroughly recommend that channel, but that's neither here nor there.

The game would really benefit from some kind of in-game wiki like what Civilization has, where you can click on a name or term to get some information, but that is not in the game.

The game does at least give you news about the war your character would have, and if you are familiar with the events of the wars the game depicts it's very cool to see them from the perspective of someone who actually fought in the battles. Feel the panic as elephants charge you at the Battle of Zama. Be frustrated as you, a lowly grunt, fail to see the bigger picture of Scipio's strange strategic moves. Or, if you're a smart enough lowly grunt, be impressed with his brilliance as you follow along!

At the end of the day I can thoroughly recommend this if you're interested in Roman history, or if you're interested in turn-based roguelikes with some light roleplay and decision-making.

If you're a roman history nerd AND like roguelikes (like me) then this is definitely worth the price.

A charming myst-like puzzle game with the visual fidelity of something like The Room. Short and sweet, clocking in at just under 3 hours for me, but those hours are packed with interesting puzzles. I recommend keeping pen and paper around, and to take notes of things that seem like they might be relevant. They probably will be!

Excellent zombie-killing strategy game with Tower Defense elements. The core of the gameplay is to rescue as many civilians as possible out of a city being run over by zombies. You have a variety of units at your disposal, and after every round you get another unit. Which unit you get is randomized from playthrough to playthrough making each playthrough feel unique. You also have access to upgrades for your units between missions.

The only caveat is that the game won't run on modern operating systems, so if you are running Windows 10 (some people are reporting issues on 8.1 as well, but I can neither confirm or disprove those claims) you are ♥♥♥♥ out of luck.

If you are still back on Windows 7 and enjoy strategy games or tower defense, definitely give this game a ♥♥♥♥.

There is certainly potential here, and the graphics themselves are solid. The issue is that it is extremely buggy and unpolished. The movement is clunky, the camera is locked in a way that feels very unnatural and when in walking around in the lizard form the camera frequently clips through the world. I will be keeping an eye on it and might buy it at a later date, but for now I can't possibly recommend it.

This game is a bit difficult to summarize, but here goes.
It's a Turn-Based Roguelite RPG with Match Three mechanics, set in a steampunk Victorian England where you play as a mech pilot and go around blowing up other mechs. This is why I initially bought the game, and as it turns out it was pretty damn good!

The gameplay is tactical and challenging and this game borrows Ziggurat's best mechanic, where every time you level up you are offered a choice of three unique and special passives or abilities. The item progression is mostly just linear stats, but there are quite a few different varieties of weapons, and rare items often offer higher-than-average power with a drawback.

Including the one you start with there are four Ironcasts and four pilots. Each Ironcast has different strengths and weaknesses (one is a beast with a lot of health, one is really good at dodging et cetera) and come with a unique ability, such as a missile battery or a temporary damage reduction. Each Pilot also gives you a passive ability. The only problem is that some of the pilot abilities are quite rubbish, and you are better off sticking with the first pilot.

The story is nothing special, really. There are some funny conversations with your superior officer, but mainly it's just "this is the reason why we are murdering this mech".

Performance should not be an issue unless your computer is literally a potato - I ran this on a dell laptop with an i3 and it ran just fine. During my entire 9 hour playthrough I have only run into two visual bugs - once the between-missions workshop became a black void, but all the menus remained so I could get out of it, and once a particularly clingy piece of equipment refused to let go of my cursor until I went into a battle.

I beat the final boss after 9 hours, totalling up in the area of 10 attempts. All in all, I think the game is great for the price, and I am excitedly waiting for any DLC announcements.

TL;DR - It's like Puzzle Quest, but with Steampunk Mechs, and it's pretty damn good for the price.

Came for the novelty value. stayed for the story. It made a menagerie of rectangles interesting characters, and that's a thing not many games have managed.