Recent reviews by ZeSmith

It's a cute little game. It's not very long, but it's cheap, and it's for the most part enjoyable. There's some jank in the controls, but the penalty for failure is never very big, so you just grit your teeth and try again. As a 3D platformer, it's competently executed, even though the level design could get some more polish.

The writing is a bit, as the zoomers say, cringe, but I guess that's part of the appeal (even though those same zoomers weren't alive when the games this is referencing came out).

So, yeah. I had fun with it, but I won't give its Anxiety Tower a try. That sounds exhausting.

This game gave me pretty big Tunic vibes. Let me explain.

First, some context. The goal, so to speak, of Animal Well is to escape the titular well. To do so, you will have to defeat four bosses, each of which is represented by a statue found near the start of the game, in order to open a hole in the ground and go through legally distinct Tourian.

The stranglehold Super Metroid has over the indie metroidvania genre is really impressive. That being said, Animal Well does several things differently: first off, you're usually defenseless. Your only weapon, if we can call it that, is a very limited supply of firecrackers, which mostly serve to scare away certain enemies. Most of the time, when facing something hostile, your only option is to run. And by run, I mean precision platforming. Sometimes it can be very precise, even.

Your arsenal of abilities and moves is quite unique this time around. Nothing as pedestrian as a double jump, a dash or a speed booster, no sir! Every item is weird in its own way and has a number of interesting uses that, when the controls cooperate, are really fun to use.

But back to my Tunic comparison: the main point of this game is to solve puzzles, most of which are of the environmental variety (and the rest falling under the "minigame" category). You get barely any clues, and whatever text is there is cryptic. Where it gets like Tunic is that once you beat what can be nominally considered a boss, you realise that there's actually a true ending, and that most of those puzzles are backloaded in the end game quest for that true ending. Just like Tunic was a at times janky Soulslike that eventually turns into an adventure game, then Animal Well is an at times janky metroidvania that eventually turns into an adventure game.

At least this time the puzzles are better integrated, in that they usually use your actual core set of skills (instead of having you draw up stuff on graph paper and doing logic), so I would say it's a puzzle metroidvania instead of Tunic's "two different games in the same box" deal.

In the end, it's pretty good, but I did find a lot of frustrating things. For example, the damage model is strange: stepping o spikes deals one point of damage, but getting squished is an instant kill. And save points are always further than you want them to be. Some of the world's state (like the direction of moving platforms) resets when you die, but not all of it. And, of course, you always respawn with zero firecrackers, just to spite you.

And just like in Tunic, concentrating the cool puzzle treasure hunt at the end of the game is a genius move: it means that what your players remember last, and thus what they'll base their final verdict on, is the fun adventure that made their brains feel big, not the fiddly action that killed them dozens of time and sent them back to a faraway respawn point.

I'm sure it's going to be a blast to see speedruns of that, though.

The best deduction puzzles I've seen since Return of the Obra Dinn.

Obra Dinn is probably the closest equivalent. But unlike it, there's a much bigger narrative focus. And since it's set in a fictional world that is only roughly inspired by our own, you're going to have to reverse engineer the world building to figure some things out.

Your task is always to fill in the blanks, and there's always multiple ways to get to a conclusion, which rewards lateral thinking. They get tricky quickly, but once you get the answer, it always feel like it was the most obvious thing in retrospect. Which is what good puzzles should be.

While the art style was, huh, repulsive at first, but it grew on me since then. It's very effective, and it's distinctive. I like how most characters are ugly (because most of them are pieces of ♥♥♥♥). The music contributes very well to the atmosphere of every scene, especially in the DLC.

Oh, yeah, there's DLC. They're both great, and they offer a slightly more difficult challenge since it's expected you'll be doing the main game first.

In short, if you liked Obra Dinn, you'll love this. Just make sure you play with highlights enabled, otherwise you'll be doing a lot of pixel hunting. Dragging and dropping keywords can get a bit tedious, but never enough to detract from the whole experience.

I can't wait for the sequel.

Well, that sure made my eyes a little bit wet. My throat a bit tight.

My feelings... complicated.

Okay, so, this is another one of those "indie games that are about mental health". And it's weird at first but then the whole plot becomes incredibly obvious somehow and then the ending is both gut wrenching and also touching but most importantly happy. Which is an interesting combo.

Mechanically, it's a visual novel with a few minigames thrown in to spice up the monotony of reading text boxes. You'll be reading a lot of text boxes, and also running from one text box to the next. There are some clever puzzles in there, though, which made my brain feel big, and that's always a plus in my book. But it made me wish how that combat button press QTE thing was a JRPG combat system. Think about it.

But really, the ending makes it all worth it. There's a very mature message there. Yes, it's about mental health, but it doesn't cut corners, and it avoids the common traps you see when people try to turn those themes into game mechanics.

So, give it a shot if you like reading, thinking and crying. Oh, and cats. So many cats.

It's impressive how this game was essentially made by a single person. Sure, it's short (you'll be done in less than eight hours), but it has some gorgeous pixel art, an incredible soundtrack, and very witty writing. I wasn't expecting to be as emotionally invested in the lives of a bunch of rodents but here we are.

The combat system is interesting, but ultimately both shallow and also incredibly easy. In fact, that would be my one negative criticism: the complete lack of challenge. I've never lost a fight. Really, you're in this for the world and its inhabitants.

And yeah, those characters are awesome. I love how grounded the world feel, how every element of it is tied to a real life object or idea. There's so much imagination on display, all the time. Yeah, it's short, but I played most of it in one sitting. The fights might be playing themselves, you'll still soldier on just to see what happens next, especially because of how tight the pacing is.

It's cute, it's queer, it's great. What more do you want?

Full disclosure: I couldn't finish this game. I know what I have to do, but in order to do it, I have to show some piloting skills that I don't have, and I'm not sure I want to actually learn them. I was never good at those six-degrees-of-freedom flight experiences. Thankfully, you don't have to be for like 95% of the game. Most of the time, what Outer Wilds does is give you some clues and then asks you to connect the dots. And I love doing that, so that's great.

Anyway I watched the ending on YouTube and yeah, I wasn't really that far from it. Still took me a while to get there, lots of puzzles to solve, most of them of the environmental variety. And the soundtrack makes my eyes well up a bit.

In short, it's probably the second best time loop game ever made, after Majora's Mask. High praise, I know. It's certainly a bit niche, but if you're the kind of person who enjoys just solving mysteries, there's your game.

So in a post-Undertale (or heck, even a post-EarthBound) world, I don't think anyone can be surprised by meta twists on game mechanics. But it's the first time I've seen them being used in actual puzzles instead of only as narrative elements. Undertale didn't do anything outside of the game, after all, it only commented on the fact that this is a video game that you can choose to stop playing.

So OneShot definitely does more with the medium than its closest equivalents. It's also a really funny story with well written dialogue and endearing characters. It's very short (you can probably finish it in one playthrough, even if you go for all the endings), but it's tightly packed with stuff to see and feel.

The puzzles are generally clever and often require thinking outside the box (sometimes literally). I won't really go into details because I don't want to spoil the fun, but I will say this: they made me feel smart.

So, yeah, it's strange, it's funny, it's heartrending, and while there was no crying until the end, those were happy tears.

Yeah, yeah, this is 2D cyberpunk Resident Evil with a side of Silent Hill.

I've heard they patched in a better inventory system just before I got to play it, and that's a relief, because I swear half my play time was done backtracking to a chest to swap items in my inventory. The combat is a load of butt, but thankfully there's not too much of it (enemies are nearsighted and dumb, just sneak or run circles around them).

As a result of the top down perspective, the game is not scary at all. There are no jump scares, just an foreboding sense of dread. The environments range from "spooky abandoned area" to "almost Hell", with a hearty helping of meat moss to gel things together. If you've played Silent Hill, you know the type. And, of course, the plot is pretty much impenetrable.

I'm going to give a recommendation because it is otherwise very competent, the puzzles are clever, the feeling of exploration is always there, and the atmosphere is really good at drawing you in. Oh, and there's just enough mind screws to tie things together. And while the story won't make a lot of sense while you're playing it, it does give you a lot to think about once you're done with it.

Also, putting German everywhere gives everything a completely different feel than in other sci-fi settings, as if the world itself is angry. Which I guess is something nobody else has done.

So, yeah, it's a bit rough around the edges, but I had trouble putting my controller down while I was in it. Perhaps it is hell, eh.

I'm going to be honest up front: I didn't finish this game. I played for quite a bit, and then I got to a point where I figured out what the main objective of the game was, then realised in order to get to the end, I'd have to deal with RNG, time-of-day sensitive events, and most importantly, one of the worst fishing minigames I've ever seen.

But still, it's overall pretty interesting. I especially like how everything is a neat puzzle, how you have to pay attention to context cues, your environment, put multiple things together. It made my brain feel big. I like the world, the characters, and how both unhinged and grounded everything is. It's weird, but in a way that makes sense.

In short, I really like the premise, the themes, and the overall ideas on display here. It's just the actual execution I have problems with. But then again, this game is over 25 years old, so I won't hold it too much against it. Games were literally built different back then.

It is a recommendation because what it does, it does very well, and as a historical artifact, it is very compelling. I would definitely play a modern reinterpretation of this formula, with better controls, quality of life improvements, an in-game calendar, and less punishing timings.

Oh, and a better fishing minigame. Or no fishing at all, that'd be good too.

Although at that point I could just be playing Undertale again.

It took me a while to finish this game.

I initially picked up near its release, then stopped playing for a while, and then went back and finished it. I liked the idea of a game where you play as the boatman ferrying souls through the gate and helping them with any unfinished business. It deals with grief, loss, and remembrance. It's an intriguing proposition.

I don't really know how I feel about it. It's a recommendation because its art and music and atmosphere and writing are all great. But as for the game itself, I don't know, I don't think it's that good.

Okay, let me qualify that. It's not that it's not good. It's more that it's not for me. I like sad games, difficult games, complicated games. I've cried through a few endings in my time. But in, say, Celeste, the emotional payoff is gated by tight and satisfying platforming. In Undertale, it's bullet hell and puzzles. Here, it's... farming.

I'm not a fan of grindy stuff. I don't like when my games are routine. Routine is for my daily life, not my virtual escapism. I know all games are ultimately repetitive, but I prefer those that at least make an honest effort at hiding this repetition.

But the thing is, the grind here is also part of the experience. It's one of those "story supported by mechanics" type deal. Your daily tasks represent Stella's journey through the underworld. After all, taking care of those around you is often a routine, and it's often not very fun. That is the whole point.

So I can't really knock off points off of it. Yeah, I thought the gameplay was painful, but so is Stella's story. You can't really extricate one from the other. And at the end of each of those quests, you do get a very emotional scene with an interesting character. But I wish I could just skip through most of it. But then, wouldn't that cheapen the experience?

I guess it's good. Not my game of the year, but good. Yeah, okay, let's make that a recommendation.