Recent reviews by Hotaru

Fantastic callback to the golden age of 3D platformers. In a lot of ways this was the game I wanted Super Mario Odyssey to be. It's very well paced with enough variety in the story to feel like you got your money's worth, but it also offers a huge set of collectables for those that want more after the credits roll. Fantastic experience all around, with good decent graphics, funny aesthetic, and some really dark secrets hidden in there.

Words are the principle way in which humans communicate. We loved them so much, we gather them into languages with grammars and syntax so we can put them together to express the all but simple thoughts in our minds. We can not imagine a world without words, and yet how often do they fail us. "It's something I just can't put into words." Sometimes words are not enough to say what we want to say. Sometimes you need to communicate without them.

This is the form of communication that When The Past Was Around chooses to utilize. It tells a story without words. Music, images, actions and reactions. Anything that can perk your senses and move your attention, but isn't a word, is utilized by the game to slowly unravel a mysterious and emotional plot. Along the way there will be puzzles to solve and things to remember, and even a few fun secrets. When you finish the game, not a single word will have been spoken, and yet you'll feel like so much was said. You'll feel emotions in your heart that were placed their directly by the creators, but that you didn't actually interpret through language.

It's an amazing sensation and will hopefully open your mind to a bigger world as we continue to explore the very limits of the medium of interactive entertainment.

Because of this I highly recommend you go in as blind as possible and try to solve every puzzle without looking them up. It will be quite difficult at first, perhaps even frustrating. The very tool we use everyday in our speech is being robbed from us and taken away, of course it's going to feel foreign. But there will be a moment it begins to click, and suddenly your conscious mind will begin to fade and you'll start thinking in concepts rather than vocabulary. You'll see what's going on and understand it, but not need to say it.

The story will end. You'll cry. And then you'll say, with words once again, "Wow, that was a good point-n-click game."

The first thing to note is that this game is only about 40 mins long, as it serves as prequel to the full story coming in Bright Memory: Infinite. Think of it like a Gound Zeroes to a Phantom Pain. However, since both are included for the single price (as of right now), then I think this game is currently worth it.

It has awesome visuals (especially if you have an RTX card) and I got stable performace maxed out @ 1080p on my RTX 2060. Music was great, with a DOOM like flair. English voice acting was...okay, I guess. I set it to Japanese instead and enjoyed it much more. The gameplay is very smooth and gunplay felt great on a Dualshock 4. The bosses where also interesting and there's a few puzzles to solve to.

If all of this is a taste of what is to come in the full version, then count me hyped!

My favorite game of 2020 so far. Simple, effective fun. Sessions can last less 10 mins or 2 hours and you'll always walk away feeling satisfied. Lots of fun costumes to unlock, and season updates keep you coming back. Even more fun with friends. Cannot recommend enough.

A pretty simple, but fun game. It takes about 2 hours to 100% all achievements. Note that one of the achievements is bugged, but can easily be unlocked by following the solution on one of the community forums posts.

Fun game. Takes only about 1 hours to beat, and maybe 2-3 to 100%. There's even a casual mode if you just want the achievements where you basically get infinite health.

The game itself is fantastic. Good art, great soundtrack. Challenging on normal difficulty, but not punishingly hard either. Characters are charming, and if you see it on sale, I wholeheartedly recommend it.

I think some of the other reviewers went in expecting more than they should have. For a 99 cents game this seemed more than fun enough. It's simple. Build a fire and don't let it die. Warm up by it then venture out into the forest, find wood, stoke the fire and fill a box with the extra. Fill a box of wood before nightfall and you'll survive. And that's about it, but like I said, for the price it's not bad. The graphics are actually crazy good, and the game runs quite well. There wasn't any music for me, so I recommend playing your favorite movie or anime OST in the background, especially thriller type music to add suspense.

Overall I've enjoyed my time with it so far. If you're looking for a game you'll boot from time to time for a 15 minute round this really fits the bill.

Found this hidden gem in my steam library, but I don't remember where I got it lol. Regardless I think it's great for beginners t this genre. Shmups have always been something I'd be interested in, but most are designed for already experienced players and have a deep learning curve.

Steel Vampire softens this learning curve, but without killing the essentials of what makes bullet hell games good. For starters, it simplifies the shooting to two buttons. You get a normal button, which if you hold down turns into your sub. You also get a special that requires charging. That's it. Then there's the way the game awards you for different risks. Killing enemies up close gives bigger drops (which recharge your special and shield), but it's also easier to get hit. It leaves it up to the player to figure it out on their own and that's essential to honing your skills and becoming better at managing your resources. Finally the game includes the mechanic of being able to control the difficulty via power ups that spawn from killing enemies. Red ones make it harder, green make it easier. You can really feel the difference between say level 10 and 20. Obviously this is good for new players to not get overwhelmed, but increasing the difficulty rewards you better, so it also is an incentive and resource to manage. Maybe crank it early and lower it before a boss to get ready? Keep it low until that hard part to go in full health then crank it up for a big reward? It's up to you. It also leaves the player with a sense of reflection of their own skill. What I'm only on level 5? I can do better! I'm gonna crank it up to 10! You gotta judge for yourself, but your own pride will make you want to work harder.

Overall if you're new to shmups and feel like you can never make progress in the genre, give this game a shot! It's definitely worth it!

Game is still very rough, but devs are active and willing to communicate with players. I'll keep checking in every once in a while to see progress. Currently the game lacks a good tutorial to ease you into all the mechanics. The info is there, but you gotta figure it out through experimentation. Realistic, but not the most fun. Performance is pretty good, and I'm running off integrated graphics :O Overall game is promising. We'll see :D

There's not a lot to say about this game so I'll bullet point it to save your time.

Pros:
- Short (around 30 mintues)
- Nice graphics

Cons:
- Only one track
- AI presents no challenge, so it's basically time trial only.
- Music gets stale fast.

If the game's achievements actually counted, I'd recommend them since they're so easy. I 100%'d the game and then found out they don't. That's a half hour of my life I'll never get back...