Recent reviews by Neonetik

Penguin's Arena is a good game. I say this without a hint of irony. It is a genuinely fun and skill based experience, and the time I have spent with it has been a lot of fun.

It's a fairly simple and straight-foward arena shooter. You play as a penguin shooting snowballs at other penguins to try and knock them out of the Arena. The snowballs have a reasonable amount of knockback, but they are also projectiles with travel time. This makes leading shots and aiming well important. Getting 2 snowballs on one penguin in a row is certainly enjoyable, and doing this whilst avoiding getting hit yourself takes some level of effort. There is no life bar, so matches can go on for a while, if you want them to.

Snowballs aren't the only weapons you have. There are several items in the game that give you different types of ways to accomplish the same goal. There are a few defensive items like bear claws that reduce knockback, and also an egg that gives you temporary invincibility. For weaponry, apart from your snowballs, you have explosive dynamite fish that explode after a few seconds, but have ENORMOUS knockback, flinging enemies into the air. You have fish that have low knockback but that can be thrown rapidly, and you have mines with only 1 use, but that are a bit more common than the dynamite, and also have extreme knockback on a single target. Using these weapons effectively takes skill, but it's also chaotic in the heat of battle, with snowballs, rocket-jumping, explosions, fish, and all sorts of stuff in the mix. In addition, you also have a small slap, just to create a little distance if required, and finally, your entire body is a weapon! You build up very powerful momentum when moving and jumping in this game, and running straight into an enemy at top speed is an effective way to send them flying over the edge. It's very satisfying, though of course, you risk sliding right off the stage if you miss.

The music is ok, but there's only 1 track and it gets boring quickly. I'd recommending turning it off. The visuals however, in my opinion, are fantastic. Character and level design fits well for the overall style of the game, and frankly, I find the dark levels to actually be quite atmospheric and comfy in a pleasant way. It's fun to exist in this world of penguin deathmatch.

Now, here's the bad part. This game is dead. You can still play multiplayer with friends and stuff if you want to, but there is NO one online. However, most of my own play time has been against the AI, which, at the highest difficulty, is serviceable enough for a fun time. The game is also quite limited in content. There's a decent amount of levels, and a few different game modes, but honestly, after playing for a couple of minutes, you'll basically have seen everything the game has to offer. There's also a few exploits you can take advantage of, but it doesn't really matter. In my opinion? It's enough to justify a purchase, though perhaps waiting for a sale would be a good idea.

There's also a Penguins Arena Map Editor in existence (which I have), if you're interested in trying out that sort of thing, but I don't believe the download link exists any more. Nice.

All in all, an enjoyable, if limited experience, and a decent non-violent skill-based introduction to FPS that's totally suitable for kids, if you care about that sort of thing.

Want to keep updated on games I recommend? I'm a curator! Follow me here!

https://steamcommunity.com/groups/Neonetik/curation

Getting Over It is not a game for most people. Bennett Foddy is a man with a consistent approach towards game design, that is, making games with extremely frustrating, but absolutely consistent and fair controls. Whatever movement that occurs in the game is due to a choice you made, not due to any sort of random luck element. This has been his method of design from the very beginning, even before he achieved any level of popularity. Following titles like Qwop and Girp (bring Girp to Steam damn you!), we now have Getting Over it, the most advanced and developed game he's made yet, both in terms of technology included, and narrative.

The goal is simple. Reach the top. The top of what? Well, the game says it's a mountain, but there's so much more than that. You'll have to navigate through rocks, narrow passageways, floating balls of ice, piles of garbage, various cliff-sides, construction material, and other such things. This would be hard enough to do if you were a regular rock-climber, but that'd make too much sense. Instead, you play as a man sitting in a cauldron, who, instead of a more conventional ice-pick, or something similar, wields a sledgehammer, and must climb higher by flinging yourself and the cauldron using the sledgehammer, the environment, and your own absurdly strong muscles. Yes, it is weird.

The controls are the main thing that causes this process to be difficult. It's not that the controls are bad. They are both responsive, and make sense within the confines of the games rules, but it requires adjustment on behalf of the player to utilize them properly. Let me give you all a bit of advice if you choose to buy this game. First of all, turn on trackpad tuning in the options, as it disabled mouse acceleration. Secondly, you need to remember that the hammer has a set maximum speed. Just because you move your mouse extremely quickly, doesn't mean the hammer is moving at that speed. Imagine holding down the "W" key when moving in a first person shooter. When you press it, your character moves at their fastest speed (disregarding sprinting and stuff). Even if you press it down harder, your character will not move any faster. Same with a controller. Sure, if you wanted to, you could push the analog stick so hard that you break right through the controller, and go even further, but your character won't move faster, because they've already hit their max speed. This is extremely important for the game, as it basically gives you consistent results when preforming maneuvers at high speed, and prevents people from simply pushing the mouse down really fast and reaching the top of the mountain instantly. A lot of people have trouble getting used to this, and blame the game because "I ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ PUSHED MY MOUSE TO THE RIGHT BUT HE DIDN'T ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ GRAB ONTO THE LEDGE!!!", not realizing that the character was moving as fast as they possibly could, and that you just left the action too late.

Getting over it does partially involve playing by reaction, if you need it to, but it is largely a game of playing by planning, as in you need to plan ahead and decide what movement you need to do ahead of time, just by a small moment, in order to succeed. If at any point you believe that a moment in the game is unfair and or based on luck, just remember that, theoretically, this game can be beaten in 1 minute, and it has been done through TAS speedruns. The fastest time by a human being is under 2 minutes. In addition, there are many runners of this game, as well as ordinary people, who consistently get very fast times of just a few minutes, one after another after another. This game has no RNG. You have no one to blame for your failure except yourself... with the possible exception of the times when the hammer clips into the environment and spazzes out, but that's pretty rare.

The gameplay itself is relatively engaging, and having a plan of movement come together is a thing of beauty, and leads to moment to moment accomplishments and pride, but there's also another factor that engages well, and that is the commentary from Bennett Foddy himself. Throughout the game, Bennett Foddy provides narration about several topic, including his inspiration for making the game, the idea of trash products, staying determined, being masochistic, NOT RIDING THE ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ SNAKE SERIOUSLY DO NOT DO IT, and other such issues. Bennett has a pretty enjoyable voice, and though at times sarcastic, is pleasant to listen to. This functions as another driving motivator for progressing through the game, and is enjoyable on repeat playthroughs as well. You can tell that making this game was a passionate deal, and that he is thankful for the people who took the effort to play the game as it was meant to be played (and not just watched on some stupid EPIC RAGE FAIL :O :O :O GETTING OVER IT youtube video from someone who screams like a child at every minor ♥♥♥♥-up).

Visuals are good, with nice use of color and different environments, but the game isn't a visual feast like Crysis or something. Not that it really matters much for a title like this, but the visuals there are, are nice enough, and don't conflict with the tone the game sets. They are simple, and yet striking enough to be effective, but also timeless. The music is also comprised of pleasant piano and light jazz type instruments, as though trying to calm the player down during their infuriating climb up the mountain. There isn't always music though, and there will be long periods of quiet, so it doesn't get annoying.

The game also has several moments of hilarity, and extreme tension, but these are best left unspoiled, as is most of the experience.

Getting Over it is the sort of game that forces you to get good. You could spend 8 hours on your first run, and them immediately beat the game a second time in half an hour. You will quickly find yourself getting better and reliably beating sections that you've failed a dozen times before, and it's a nice feeling to have. If you're the kind of person who gets extremely upset over being strongly punished for making mistakes, this game is not for you. If you're buying this game simply because you watched someone like Pewdiepie play it or whatever, and are thinking "lol so funny le random cauldron hammer man XDXDXD gona rage soooooo hard lol", then you're going to miss out on the point of the game, and on a lot of potential enjoyment. However, if you're the sort of person who is willing to keep getting back up no matter how many times you're knocked down, I'm sure you'll find more than enough in Getting Over It to keep you engaged and entertained for hours.

I look forward to seeing what Foddy comes up with next.

Want to keep updated on games I recommend? I'm a curator! Follow me here!

https://steamcommunity.com/groups/Neonetik/curation

What can I say about Zeno Clash? Zeno Clash is one of those games that takes place in a totally different sort of world to ours. However, it succeeds where many others fail, due to the fact that it not only LOOKS like it takes place in another world, but it actually FEELS like it takes place in another world.

The world of Zeno Clash is one unlike anything else. In this world, several different races live together in relative harmony, from the anything-but-typical humans, to anthropomorphic bird/rat people who communicate through hissing and pained squawks, to huge elephant and boar-type beings who charge and trumpet, to disfigured grotesqueries. Though they may all be humanoid in shape, their speech, behavior and way of thinking go far to show that the world they exist in is nothing that we can truly relate to. Even the humans can be so vastly different to one another in terms of abilities and behavior, it can make you wonder if anyone in the game truly understands anyone else. The world is a flimsy patchwork, held together through sheer brutality, and you've become public enemy number one.

Zeno Clash is a first person shoo... well, more of a first person brawler, rather. Oh, there's shooting alright, and a reasonable amount of it, but the focus is clearly on the fisticuffs, more than the firearms (or what pass for them in the world of Zeno Clash, aint no magnums here, but how about duel-wielding spitting fish?). See, if Zeno Clash has one constant with our real world, it's that punch + face = unconscious being on the ground. And this constant is what's going to keep you going in this unforgiving reality.

The combat in Zeno Clash is frantic, but skillful. You have a variety of moves at your disposal. From quick jabs, to long wind-up punches, to uppercuts, to charges, to kicks, to kneeing, to blocking, to parrying, and that's just with your own body! There's also about 4 or 5 different types of guns, which do behave mostly like equivalents you'd find in the real world, though with some mechanical differences, and wildly altered designs. And of course, what would a beat em up be without enormous clubs? They work how you'd expect. Of course, enemies also has access to most of these tools, and will gladly use them against you, even when you're in a fist-fight against two others. Come on, did you really expect them to play fair?

Visually, the game is great. The Source engine has always been a winner, and it's certainly used to its full effect to make an absurd world devoid of the structure and order that govern our own. Colour is used to fantastic effect to set mood, and whether the game wants you to feel worry, or fear, or tension, or to feel like you are trapped within a mystical dream, it can and does so. The soundtrack is equally as effective in accomplishing this, ranging from the beats of war drums and chanting to make you feel like this could be your last stand, to music that makes you feel both elated, but also that not all is right with the world.

To divulge any of the story in this review would be a massive mistake, as seeing all the twists and turns the story takes is one of the main enjoyments of Zeno Clash, but I will say this. The story is bizarre, but in its own way, still makes sense. The characters are insane, but still respectable. Each character has their own motivations for their actions, and unraveling these motivations is a strong driving force for the player. You want to see where things are going, and what happens to the strange and wonderful characters. Why is everyone after you? Who is this father/mother figure? Everyone seems to hate you, but you're not even slightly regretful for your actions. For how long can you keep running until you're caught?

The pacing of the game is flawless. No environment stays the same for too long, and changes in what you're fighting and how you fight it are frequent. In some places, you're locked in a small area and fighting a few enemies at once. Other times, you walking on a long path, fending off wild creatures. Then you're fighting a blind crab-faced assassin, then you're going through a dark freaky environment fending off living shadows, and then you're on a ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ boat. Things change rapidly. The game doesn't feel boring, because it doesn't allow for the opportunity to let boredom set in. Never-mind the fact that the moment to moment gameplay changes quite often, the changes in the environments are enough to keep you invested.

Now, the game isn't perfect. Sometimes combat can be a bit clunky, with your kicks missing at times when they shouldn't, and the story, whilst wonderfully fantastical, is quite short, and ends on a cliffhanger, which continues in the (IMO, drastically worse) Zeno Clash 2. Despite this, overall, Zeno Clash is still a fantastic experience, and a great game. Every hour of it is an experience worth having. I highly advise picking it up to anyone who's interesting in a impactful first person brawler with a unique world.

Want to keep updated on games I recommend? I'm a curator! Follow me here!

https://steamcommunity.com/groups/Neonetik/curation

VERY MINOR SPOILERS AHEAD
Bioshock Infinite is a game that seems to have so much, but almost everything that it has, has been managed so poorly, it would have been better off if half the content was just removed.

The story is... alright I guess? To be honest, and this is largely subjective, I found it incredibly boring. I suppose things start off alright with a bit of a twist as to the nature of the floating city, that being that the town is extremely racist, and that black people are treated awfully, and like slaves, but then the story goes into a heavy time-travel focused direction which gets convoluted, and it seems to jump so fast from point to point that it just gets overwhelming. The whole "racism" aspect of the story is presented in a really primitive kind of way, where it's a simple case of "hey look, we have cages with blackface pictures on them, how shocking!" and the game seems to really want to shove this into your face, but it just becomes obnoxious with how much there is and how it really feels like surface level stuff that doesn't need any deeper thought. My point is, it's not really engaging, at least not to me. You get to make some choices in the game, but they don't change anything. Still, covering a topic like racism and showing off the suffering of its victims isn't the worst thing to do, but I felt it was generally presented in too simple a way and was boring because of it. It felt like it was trying to show something that would shock 12 year olds, without actually asking them to think about it any deeper than beyond "this is bad".

This wouldn't have been that big of a deal if you could have skipped this, but you are CONSTANTLY being interrupted during gameplay to either listen to, or watch, or take part in another story section. Maybe I'm just an old retro ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥, but ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥, this game does not just let you ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ play. It's constantly making you stop, and do something that could have easily been accomplished without taking control away from the player. Half-Life figured this out decades before this game came out. But you know, I'm actually not extremely angry about this. Usually, this pisses me off to no end in games, but not as much here...

...mainly because the actual gameplay isn't fun either.

Bioshock Infinite is a game where it feels like the developers had a million different ideas, and then shoved them all into a game without actually giving any of them any real depth, or considering how they interact with the other ideas around them. There are many examples of this, but I'll just list a few (8000 character limit).

-You get 8 vigors (same thing as plasmids, literally identical in function, many of them being copies of the ones in the first Bioshock), but they almost all behave in the same ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ way. Bucking Bronco, Murder of Crows, Shock Jockey, and Undertow are all focused more on stunning enemies, and whether it's by a flock of birds or by a bolt of electricity, the end result is the same with little changing other than the visual effect. Charge, Devil's kiss, and return to sender are all used for direct damage (and RTS for slight defence), and it honestly doesn't really matter which one you use in MOST situations. Possession makes an enemy target friendly for a few moments, though on the biggest targets that you WANT to possess the most, it lasts all of 5 seconds before running out, making it more of a chore to even bother using on them. Each of these vigors has 2 different upgrades you can get for them, but these upgrades are EXTREMELY PRICEY. You will not be able to afford more than a few for the majority of your play time. I did not feel a need to even bother with most of the vigors, since shooting enemies with a gun gave me the same effect, but more reliably and faster.

-You get a somewhat varied selection of weapons, but half of them are just copies of previous versions with somewhat different effects. Would you like a machinegun, or a red machine gun that shoots slower but does more damage per bullet? A shotgun, or a shotgun that has less shots but does more damage per bullet? Oh, and each weapon also has like, 4 different upgrades you can get for it, all being purely statistical upgrades (faster reload, more damage, ect) and they are PRICEY! In addition, weapons don't actually carry around much ammunition at all, so if you want to stick to a certain few weapons that you like, you're going to have to buy ammo constantly (there's an extreme shortage), and even still, you may run out in the middle of fights at times unless you're carrying a generic machinegun with a high clip size.

-The game world is absolutely LITTERED with ♥♥♥♥ to look through and scavenge. There are boxes and trash cans and bodies EVERYWHERE, and they all contain ♥♥♥♥ that the game expects you to pick up, like money and bullets and healing items and stuff, but they contain it in such small amounts, that if you actually want to amass a decent amount of money for upgrades and such, you need to go through EVERYTHING you can find, which means that a large chunk of the game is just looking at piles of ♥♥♥♥ and pressing "e" as fast as you can. Was there a ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ reason that the devs had to place 8 coins in the same spot, but have them all be separate individual items that I have to individually press "e" on every single time? Am I having fun going around to every single ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ shelf in a room and pressing "e" on it? No, no I am not, but the game DOES expect you to do this to actually have enough supplies to buy upgrades, because they are expensive as ♥♥♥♥. I was doing everything I could to get the most money, and by the near-END of the game, I only just barely got like 3 of my Vigors maxed out, and 4 weapons fully upgraded.

-Speaking of Gear, gear is basically perks you can pick up and equip on yourself, maxing out at 4 pieces. You pick it up fairly often, like, every 20 minutes or so. About 95% of it is COMPLETELY USELESS. Tell me, what's better? A perk that gives you a 75% higher clip size for all weapons, which is useful for... the entire time you're playing the game, or one of these 4 other pieces of gear that give you effects like moving faster for 5 seconds after jumping off a sky-line, something which, by the end of the game, will literally only have an effect for about 2 minutes of game-time in total? Yeah.

Maybe this could have all been forgiven if the actual base gameplay was fun, but it's not. Enemies hardly react to attacks, and when they do, it's not satisfying. You blow up an enemy with a rocket launcher, their intact bodies flings away comically without any real weight. Guns all sound weak. Killing is not fun. Oh, and you can only carry 2 ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ GUNS AT A TIME! For ♥♥♥♥'s sake. The game gives you so many options, but none of them are enjoyable to use, and at worst, it's overwhelming. Except it's not, because the game is piss easy. Seriously, if you are at all decent at FPS, max out the difficulty. It's unbelievable how easy this game is.

That's not to mention ♥♥♥♥ like backtracking for secrets, boring lockpick rewards, shield regen waiting garbage, boring damage sponge enemies, crap navigation support, constant control-stealing button prompts, annoying weapon placements, audio logs being placed in areas where you are about to encounter a story section (cutting off the audio for them), an unimportant melee system, ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ of scripted sequences, nonsensical ending, plot-holes, constant yelling and noise with minimal downtime, and other ♥♥♥♥.

I must say, I'm honestly blown away at by how so many people think this game is so great. It was an absolute slog for me to get through, and just made me wish I was playing DOOM or STALKER or something. If you liked this game, that I'm happy for you, genuinely, but for anyone who just wants a fun game to actually PLAY where combat is enjoyable, then stay away.

Want to keep updated on games I recommend? I'm a curator!

https://steamcommunity.com/groups/Neonetik/curation

Note: I have not beaten the game, and have not played particularly much, but this is the sort of game where you can pretty much see everything it has to offer in the first 6 minutes.

Dead End Road is a visually and aurally neat game. Both the graphics and sound design are quite good, and are enjoyable to look at and listen to. However, the gameplay itself is pretty garbage.

The game is kind of similar to FTL in terms of how you navigate. Your mission is to collect a Bell, a Book, and a Candle. Simple enough. All you do is drive from town to town (different nodes on the map), and you cannot actually turn around once you start driving to a particular area, the game doesn't let you. You spend the journey avoiding obstacles (including cars speeding towards you which result in a one hit kill and make you restart the entire game again), and stopping at shops (just a menu screen) to buy drugs that reduce stress (the game never actually explains what this does but I assume it makes less crazy stuff happen on the screen), buy food, and buy car upgrades/fuel, or random stuff, and occasionally explore an alley.

Unfortunately, whether or not the game is actually beatable seems to be largely a matter of luck. The stops you make randomize what is available, and it's likely to get a few stops in a row without a mechanics to refuel your car, which you NEED to actually win. Not only that, but if you try to do the smart thing and buy the book, bell, and candle, and still save some money for fuel, well, then you'd better hope that you have enough money to fill the tank completely, because otherwise, the game doesn't let you buy ANY fuel. What? You have $35, but you need $36 to refill the tank? And the next 3 stops probably don't have gas refills? Tough s**t! Start again!

This wouldn't be nearly as much of a problem if there was some reliable way to earn money, but there isn't. It's all based on luck. Explore an alley? Might get robbed, or find $50! Who knows! Buy a scratch ticket? Hey, you failed again! 4 times in a row! Man, I sure hope you weren't trying to get just 2 extra dollars to actually pay for some more gas, because that would really suck, huh?

As many people here have mentioned, cars driving headfirst into you at a fast speed is also an issue that makes the game kind of annoying, especially during a longer run. It just feels cheap and unfair.

It's also not particularly scary at all. If the idea of a distorted voice saying "I will eat your soul" and "You are out of gods reach here" frighten you, and 10 screaming ghost faces coming out of literally f**king nowhere to yell at you in the middle of driving make you p**s your pants, then prepare to be crazily spooked!

It's not good.

Want to keep updated on games I recommend? I'm a curator!

https://steamcommunity.com/groups/Neonetik/curation

Ahhh VectorPark. These guys really do have a way with animation. Whatever sort of engine they are using for their work, and whatever sort of methods they use, it cannot be denied that anything that comes out of them looks as though it is filled with life and joy. Having only one game previously on steam called "Windosill", a short, simple puzzle game about going from room to room as a little car, and solving the puzzles in the room, all while watching and interacting with the environment, VectorPark decided to try their luck again with this "game", Metamorphabet. So, does it hold up?

Well... yes and no. I'll say it like this. If you're expecting anything that gives you any sort of challenge, look away. If you want something with replayability, this aint it. If you want something that can at the very least keep you occupied for more than an hour... I'm sorry, but this just isn't what you are looking for.

Metamorphabet is exactly what it advetises itself as. An interactive alphabet. It really is that simple. Letters appear on the screen, you click the letters, and stuff happens. Stuff that you can interact with further. For example, you could click the letter "S", and 2 striped socks that cover both sides of the letter itself. What happens if you click on the S again? The S becomes a snake, which you can now move around, and after a few seconds, the snake gets a shadow, which mirrors it's movement. S, sock, snake, shadow, you can see the pattern. It's like this with every letter. I'll try not to spoil much more, because that really is all the game has going for it for anyone who already knows the alphabet. Every letter has maybe 5 or so ways that you can interact with it. Some of these ways include dragging things, using vacuum cleaner, unzipping things, all fairly simple things, but there's a fair bit of variety with each new letter. There's usually stuff you can play with on the screen that doesn't actually affect the game, which is fun, if limited.

As for sound and visuals, the sound is nothing special. Things sound as you would expect them too. A drum sounds like a drum, a door opening sounds like a door opening. There's hardly any music, which I believe is a good thing, since the game does have sort of a relaxing atmosphere. As for visuals, it's VectorPark. If you expect anything other than beauty, then I don't know what to tell you. Everything reacts to what you do with fluid movement, and it all looks gorgeous.

So, if the game offers no challenge, and you can finsh it in under 20 minutes, is there any reason to spend money on it? Well, if you have a child just learning the alphabet, I suppose this can be a useful tool, though I feel like children who can't speak the alphabet wouldn't really know how to use a computer. I could be wrong, as the controls are really simple, but even if they could use the mouse, it's not guaranteed that they wouldn't just be distracted by all the stuff happening, instead of learning anything. The game is entertaining for what it is. With every letter comes a new surprise. Sure, the surprise only lasts a few seconds before you get bored with what's in front of you, but it's neat nontheless.

Can I recommend this game? Well, check out the trailer. It gives you all the info you want. I personally don't really see why this company, who have proved the can make good games that challange players, decided to make an interactive alphabet (probably just for fun, which I can respect), but for what it is, it's good. It's pretty, it's entertaining, and it's resonably cheap, though for $5 there's not really much value for your money. I personally enjoyed windosill a lot, and love anything that comes out of these guys, so I hope they keep making games/animations. I just hope that in the future, they make actual "games" that challenge players in some way.

The game doesn't lie about what it is. It's an interactive alphabet, and that's it. The interactions are nice, it covers every letter in the English alphabet, and it looks beautiful. If that's enough for you, then sure, pick it up. If you're looking for a something challenging, maybe try Ninja Gaiden or something.

Want to keep updated on games I recommend? I'm a curator!

https://steamcommunity.com/groups/Neonetik/curation

The game makes no sense. It explains practically nothing, except to collect red dolls or something, and the text there is is hard to read and gives you all this story that you frankly have no reason to care about in one long paragraph. The whole thing is very confusing, and all that you do in ride around collecting coloured objects until some guy who keeps appearing on the screen tells you to leave before you freeze to death, and then you freeze to death because the game never explained how to leave.

It feels like the dev was trying to make a "Whoh maaaaan, the game is like, abstract maaaaaan, you gotta experiment and see what works maaaaaaan" kind of game. Sometimes, I like that kind of stuff, but this just isn't fun. This is coming from a guy who loved Kane and Lynch 2, and WAKE.

Usually my reviews are very long and detailed, but since the game just got released I wanted to get this message out quick. Maybe there's more to this game, and I might delete this review if I ever see it, but as it is, it just seems like a confusing mess to me.

Want to keep updated on games I recommend? I'm a curator!

https://steamcommunity.com/groups/Neonetik/curation

I don't usually recommend games that are physically painful to play, but Kane & Lynch 2: Dog Days has managed to defy the odds and gain my love.

I'd like to preface this review by saying that I have not played the first game, Dead Men, in the series, but I am fully up to date with the story and many of the gameplay elements. The first one never drew in my attention because of certain mechanics it used, but this one did.

Kane & Lynch 2: Dog Days is the second instalment in a third person cover based action shooter game series focused around the stories of two guys. Kane, and Lynch. Kane, a man with a questionable past and morals (who was the main playable character in the first game) has come to Shanghai to visit his... partner, Lynch, a literal psychotic with who he has worked with before, in order to do some business with him. I won't help into too many details, but as expected, things go bad really quickly, and you're thrust into a non stop action thrill ride that will either make you violently ill, or wanting more.

What do I mean by this? Well, if you've played the first game, you'll know that it was a fairly normal feeling third person shooter, in which you played as Kane and focused on his story. Now, the focus is put on Lynch, the psychotic. And boy, the game sure does feel like it was made with you actually controlling a psychotic. If Dead Men was a Kane focused normal third person shooter, Dog Days is a Lynch focused psychotic trip.

The way this is accomplished is mainly by the visuals and camera, which I feel is one of the biggest draws in the game. The visuals in Dog Days behave as though the entire game was being filmed by someone with a camera. There are visual artefacts, intense glare, and blur/pixelation effects used throughout the game. When you get shot, you might see your screen go fuzzy in some areas. If you see a bright light, you might get intense glare. If you shoot a civilian in the face, you might get a pixelated area where their face should be. These are all really neat features and really help to make the game feel like a video. While these have a relatively minor impact on gameplay, there is one more effect that is always in use that may make or break the game for you. The screen shake.

The screen in this game is ALWAYS shaking. And I do mean ALWAYS. Even when you're crounching behind an obstacle, the screen is still shaking slightly. Sprinting make the camera shake like you'd expect someone sprinting with a video camera would. You get shot? Shaking. You need to run? Shaking. Getting into cover? Do you even need an answer? And considering this game really is non stop action with hardly even a minute of relaxation every now and then, the screen is going to be shaking more than wet dog that's had 50 cups of cold coffee in the snow. This shaking, along with the other effects, can make the game more difficult to play, and can make it difficult to see enemies sometimes, it is also the cause of many headaches from many people, and it's clear to see why. And yet, I absolutely adore this feature. Once again, it really helps with giving the game a gritty feel, and a sense of speed and urgency. Everything is always moving so fast, and Lynch, being a psychotic, obviously has a harder time dealing with it than most people. He's in constant pain, and to a degree, you feel this as well.

Speaking of fast, by god is this game fast paced There's no collectables or anything to slow you down, and the game in constantly RUN AND SHOOT COVER AND SHOOT RUN AND SHOOT COVER AND SHOOT REPEAT FORVER! The game can be pretty difficult as it doesn't take much for you to get killed, but you also regenerate life fairly quickly and this works really well. Since you play as Lynch for the majority of the game, you always have the computer (or other player) controlling Kane, who is with you for almost the entire game. You can't give him any commands or whatever and he just deals with things himself, and he can't die, so there's no reason to pay mind to him. But the banter between the characters in game is really enjoyable and he doesn't have any negative effect on the game at all. The game is build around having these 2 together and it does so well. If you hate having an extra character constantly tag alone, like Ashley is RE4, Shiva in RE5, or Alyx in HL2, I assure you, the game works really with both of these characters and you are still in complete control the entire time. No waiting for the other character, no inventory management, no revival, or anything like that exists. At least not in single player. In multiplayer, a revival mechanic does exist, but not the other stuff.

However while the game is really fast paced, naturally, the game is also over really fast. It takes only 4 hours to beat the main campaign, and I'm counting deaths. If you managed to beat this game without dying (extremely difficult even on normal difficulty and probably on easy, I'd say I died about 100 times on my first playthrough, and don't worry, there's VERY frequent checkpoints) then you're looking at maybe 3 or 2 and a half hours of straight gameplay. While this is a con, the game is VERY jam packed and never has a dull moment to lengthen it out. It also have several extra missions that you can play alone or in multiplayer which add a few hours. I also feel the game is very replayable, as there are no skills trees or anything to worry about. This is a game that starts fast and keep going.

The story, while nothing particularly noteworthy, does at least draw you into the feelings and thought of the 2 main characters, who are still totally jerks, but ones that you can't help but feel sorry for.

Music that shows up now and then isn't very noticeable and very forgettable, but isn't bad, and sound effects are fine for the most part. There are some glitches in the game, like the screen going grey and not showing the game, but these are rare and usually fixed just by restarting the game. The weapons feel pretty good to me to be honest, but some seem to not like the sound of them. True, they don't feel overly strong, but since you're shooting 90% of the time anyway, I feel that they feel strong enough. Some of the guns also feel as though they have little to no accuracy to them (except the shotguns, which have a pretty good range for most videogame shotguns) but these weapons are quickly replaced by much better guns with better accuracy. In general, the gunplay feels quite good, covering works fine (most of the time), and it's a joy to play.

Sometimes, it also feels like the game hates you, as some parts are incredibly difficult, even at the start, and the ending really seems to come out of nowhere and leaves you asking "was that it... seriously?", but to be honest, I feel this is very refreshing, and sort of goes along with the struggle of Lynch through the game and his deranged mind.

All in all, Dog Days is a fantastic game, but one that most people will not enjoy. I feel as though a game like this will never be made again considering the reception it got, so this is one of a kind. It's sick, twisted, sad, and psychotic, just like Lynch. And I wouldn't have it any other way.

Want to keep updated on games I recommend? I'm a curator!

https://steamcommunity.com/groups/Neonetik/curation

Note: This review has been GREATLY shortened to be under the steam character limit. Post a comment if you have questions.

Generally, I stay away from these sorts of games. I tend to dislike all those various free flash games on the internet. You know, the ones that contain pretty much no depth in gameplay and just involve you moving to one side of the screen while shooting? They are usually not particularly enjoyable to play, and often don't keep me entertained. However, Deadly 30, although it has some issues, has managed to hold my attention long enough for me to beat it, and it may even get a revisit from me in the future, which is incredibly surprising considering the sort of game it is.

Much like all those free flash games online, Deadly 30 is simple. VERY simple. If you're looking for any complex mechanics at all, look away. In Deadly 30, your aim is to survive for 30 days, and 30 nights. These go by very quickly, only a few minutes per day and per night. During this time, your main aim is to collect scrap, and kill zombies.

In Deadly 30, you start off as a machinegun weilding US army solider, trying to survive the apocalypse. You can move left, and right. You can go to 2 areas to the left, and 2 areas to the right, as well as going to your base which is in the middle. This never changes. There isn't much to explore, and you will most likely reach a wall in your first few nights, as the paths only take about a minute or 2 of traveling to get to the next. On these paths are A LOT of zombies. The game starts out with a few dozen zombies on each of these screens, and then gradually builds up to have hundereds of them. Some of you may be asking "If there is nothing but zombies on these paths, why should I go down them? Am I not safer in my base?" The answer is simple. Scrap.

Scrap functions as your main resource that's used for upgrading your weapons, armour, speed, and barricade, as well as purchasing ammo, turrets, medkits, and boxes. It's basically cash. Scrap can be found in 4 ways. Killing zombies, finding it on the ground, surviving nights, and breaking down vehicles/boxes. Zombies don't give you that much scrap, so you'll need to focus your effort on finding the stuff on the ground, and breaking down vehicles to get it. These are only found on the main paths left and right, You need as much of this stuff as you can get. Scrap is your lifeblood. Without scrap, you can forget about surviving at all. If you think this is a game that you can play as some sort of cheap tower defence, you're DEAD wrong.

The reason you need so much scrap is to upgrade and buy things, which you NEED to do because this game is... well, it's sort of hard, but at the same time, not really. It's not difficult to aim and shoot. It's not difficult to move left of right. This is really all you need to do. But the game is relentless. It throws so many zombies at you, and gives you such a small amount of time to do what you need to do, that it makes it feel that if you don't spend every second collecting scrap and killing zombies, that you're doomed to fail. This gives the game a pretty good sense of tension. The enemies constantly get harder and more numerous every night. This basically forces you into buying stuff, otherwise, you stand no chance, which is why you need scrap so badly. However, as long as you collect scrap, aim for the head, keep an eye on the time, are semi focused, learn to hold down "e" to repair your base walls while crouched and shooting, and don't waste too much of your scrap on temporary crap (boxes), you should be able to win without an issue.

There's also an experience meter in the game, but it's nothing that you need to pay attention to. As you kill zombies, you level up. Each time you level up, all that happens is is that you unlock a new gun/store upgrade. That's it really. There's no skills to choose from, and you'll pretty much want every upgrade anyway, so there's no sense to worry about this at all.

While playing and going through the game, you will also find 2 companions. A Russian sniper and a German shotgunner. Once found, you can switch between them. Not that it really changes the game that much, but it's nice to be able to use a weapon you like. You will NEED these companions to survive the game, so be sure to explore far every night, at least until you find them. Don't lose them. They may be dumb, but they can at least keep themselves alive and are useful for surviving the nights.

While you can explore the areas to the left and right during the day, you all but need to get back to your base before night, since at night, the number of zombies multiplies drastically. You might get away with this early in the game, but later, you have no chance of survival. The zombies come faster than you and your 2 teammates can fire. Your base has fences/walls that you can repair, as well as higher ground, turrets, and other such things that you will need to live. It's nothing complex, but it's absolutely vital for staying alive.

As for the music, sound and visuals? Well, the music/sound is fine, if forgettable and nothing special. The visuals are from a guy known as Gonzossm, who makes pretty damn awesome (if offensive and dirty) youtube videos. Gonzossm also made the visuals for a semi well known newgrounds game called "Toss the Turtle", which while simple, was also a great deal of fun. Personally, I absolutely love his art style, and I think it really suits the game, and greatly improve it from what it could be otherwise. There's not that much animation in actions, but blood splurts out fine, and everything is pretty clear. Of course, not everyone will like this style, and it could make or break the game for some.

As for story, The Walking Dead this aint. This is a cheap flash game about shooting zombies and walking one direction. The story is completely ignorable, but at the same time, sort of charming.The characters are likable for the most part, despite having nothing to them. The voice acting is hilariously bad (the first time I heard the voice for the Russian guy, which was an obviously English speaking person trying their hardest to be as stereotypical as possible, I burst out laughing), and lines are repeated often, though it never interrupts the game or gets annoying. There are a few cutscenes, which are pretty short (around 20 seconds each), though cool, but these are generally just to give us a quick joke or 2. The jokes are usually funny and I have no problem with them. If you like Gonzossm's videos on youtube, you'll like these. There's no le random le funneh may may XD spouting to be had here, which is a huge plus.

As for cons, apart from being incredibly simple (seriously, you don't EVER need to use the jump button), the game also has issues with slowdown, and framerate drops, which is sort of expected from flash. These are generally fixed by putting the graphics settings to low, and possibly turning the resolution down, which doesn't make the game look that much worse. I hear making the game play in windowed mode also helps greatly, but that's kind sucky. The game is also solo only, which may be a deal breaker for some.

Now, if you're actually been reading all this, which 99.99% of you won't be, then you're probably wondering why I still recommend this game, even though there's not much too it. Well, it's because despite its simplicity, Deadly 30 is still a lot of fun. Killing enemies is fun, shooting weapons is fun. upgrading youseld and collecting scrap is fun. It's just fun! It's tense, and it looks awesome. I know it's strange, but despite it's simplicity, it has charm and is engaging enough to play through at least once. It's also cheap, so that's a plus. Deadly 30 is not for everyone. In fact, it's probably not for most people. But if you want a short thrill, this is it.

Want to keep updated on games I recommend? I'm a curator!

https://steamcommunity.com/groups/Neonetik/curation

I gotta say, I'm dissapointed. It's my own fault really, but I'm dissapointed. Looking at the screenshots, the game looks fairly good. Heck, it looks fantastic. I miss when games had such nice colours in them, and such visually enjoyable environments. Nowerdays, everything seems so dull in an effort to be more realistic. Watching the trailer and seeing that you could pick up coins and stuff made it seem like this game would take some classic elements of videogames and that it could be a lot of fun. Sadly, even though I've only played through one full mission, I'm not seeing it.

A bunch of people are probably already going to hit the thumbs down button on this review because it's negative, and they are fans of Avenged Sevenfold or something and can't accept the fact that they could be accociated with a bad product, but I am a fan of them as well. I'm not a hardcore fan of pretty much anything, but I enjoy their music, at least some of it. But you need to understand, I don't want to give this game a bad review, it's clear that effort went into this, as for how much though... I'm not sure.

The biggest problem, like it is most of the time, is just the gameplay. It's... well... there's nothing to it. Nothing to it at all. Do you like clicking the mouse button? Does that one thing alone make a game fun to you? Then I guess you might like this. But that's really all there is. There's no complex mechanics here for fighting. It's literally just pressing the left mouse button to swing your sword over and over, or the right mouse button to fire a quick magic spell. You can't even aim in this game, your mouse is used for clicking the buttons, and pressing "next" on the text boxes in the game. You do not, you CANNOT, actually aim with it. The mouse cursor is on the screen at all times as well, but that's not a big deal really.

What is a big deal, is the fact that to actually hit an enemy, you need to walk towards it first.

This doesn't sound that bad, but when the only possible way to dodge attacks is to walk AWAY from enemies, this makes it practically impossible to avoid damage a lot of the time, unless you play the game as though you were a manual balloon pump, taking a single swing, moving backwards, and then moving in again to take another single swing, for however long it takes to kill a single enemy, which judging by the enemies in the first level, is about 5 seconds per enemy. With quite a decent number of enemies, combat becomes very boring, very quickly. If it was fun to kill enemies, this wouldn't be a problem. But it's not fun. There's hardly any feedback to your blows, and it just doesn't feel good smacking things around with your sword.

Why is it like this? Why is this game so utterly mind numbingly simple? Well, probably because this is a mobile port.

Yeah, a mobile port. Hopefully this made some of you turn away already, because you know how badly this usually ends up. Mobile ports of games don't really change the gameplay, and since they were made for mobile devices, they are generally VERY simplistic in terms of gameplay. Oh, and it used to have microtransactions, though those are not in here any more. Take that as you will.

So, what exactly does this game offer? It has fantastic visuals, that I can't deny, it has pretty good music from what I can tell, though not all of it really sounds like what Avenged Sevenfold would make. And the voice acting is... non existant. Punishment for death is pretty much non existant as well, as every time you die, you just respawn at a frequent checkpoint with no consequence. Seriously, not even more effort, as enemies do not respawn. Except for the bossses of course. And with no way to dodge attacks other then just... moving slowly... bosses can be somewhat annoying to a degree. As like I said before, you need to move towards an enemy to attack them, and cannot attack while dodging in pretty much any way.

The incredibly simple and obvious mobile port type gameplay is not something that can be overlooked, and leaves this as a very boring and occasionally frusterating game. It's a shame really. I did not have high hopes for this, but it looked good from the screenshots. It ends up being more of a chore than a fun game. If only it was a bit more complex, or at least made it fun to kill things, this could have been good... but alas, it is not.

Want to keep updated on games I recommend? I'm a curator!

https://steamcommunity.com/groups/Neonetik/curation