Day 14 - Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light and Chantelise

Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light

This spin-off Tomb Raider game was quite well-receive, and definitely unique.You control a spear-toting, grappling hook wielding Lara from a fixed-camera perspective. Gameplay in this game is a lot more fast-paced, with enemies often spawning all around Lara, but dying relatively quickly. the puzzles are still here, you'll have plenty of boulders to drag, spikes to avoid, items to climb. Your grappling hook can be used on the rings, but the spears really stand out. You can throw them into walls and then climb on top of them.

Each level gives you a series of goals to achieve, usually rewarding items for you to equip later. Some goals require finding the red skulls hidden throughout the level, or scoring above certain thresholds. The goals can be conflicting though, for instance some require that you beat the level, or at least a certain part of it, in under X minutes, while others require that you be quite thorough. My biggest gripe about these goals, however, is that the levels often prevent you from backtracking. For instance, I did not realize that destroying all the trucks was an objective until I had progressed passed a broken bridge that did not allow me to cross back. This happened again later on the same level, where I was forced forward with no way to return to where I was for the red skull.

The game is interesting enough, I imagine it would be decent fun in coop. As it stands, though, I'm not terribly interested in playing this game further, and I think I'll leave it at the 47 minutes I played.

Chantelise - A Tale of Two Sisters

Recettear is a great game, and the primary reason I bought this title. Chantelise, despite releasing later in English, is actually an older title. Gameplay consists of hacking and slashing your way through dungeon levels, eventually making your way to the end. You collect magic crystals, which can be used to cast spells, but otherwise you spend the majority of your time pressing the attack button. Of course, this is an asian-made game, so it really doesn't play well without a controller. Do people in Japan not have mice on their computers?

The gameplay is very simple. Aside from being able to equip two, and eventually three items, there isn't much in the way of character growth or customization to be had. I'm hesitant to even call this an action-rpg, and would lean more towards action-adventure. The game is also stupidly difficult for no reason. I made my way to the boss only to get destroyed in under a minute several times before finally giving up. Keep in mind that there's no checkpoints, so if you lose to a boss you must redo the entire dungeon.

I love Recettear for it's interesting take on shop-running, with ok dungeon battles in between, but Chantelise is nowhere near as good. There's no shop-running at all, of course, but even the dungeoning is unnecessarily difficult and unrewarding. I played this game for another 36 minutes (after having already given it a shot a while back), and still have no interest in playing it any further.

Notes

I've played 30 games so far during this challenge, with 39 hours having been spent so far. It's been a challenge, but rewarding nonetheless.

Album: Steam Challenge - Day 014

Day 13 - SOL: Exodus and Swords and Soldiers HD

SOL: Exodus 

I bought this game because it reminded me of Freelancer, but I knew full-well it wasn't anything like it. In SOL: Exodus, the planet has become unlivable and toxic, so space ships are sent out on scouting missions in an attempt to locate a new world they can mess up. The game starts off with you locating a liveable planet, but quickly being attacked by a hostile alien race and forced to run away. Fast-forward to 10-years later, the newly promoted commander reaches SOL to inform everyone of the planet, and is quickly attacked by COD fighters.

I'm not really sure what's going on here, the story didn't make a whole lot of sense, and felt more like an excuse to trigger a lot of battles. Combat is similar enough to freelancer, but faster paced. Controls are a bit weird, though. Sure, you use the mouse to move around, and Q and E rotate your ship along the third axis, but W and A fire two of your weapons. Even after 41 minutes of playing, I was still accidentally firing unlocked missiles thanks to the W key. Enemies dies pretty easy, and there's always a dozen more for you to take on.

What really feels odd about this game is that you're always on your own. Sure, you'll have a large ship by your side, but that's really just a giant target with a health bar, ensuring you beat the level in an appropriate amount of time. Mostly it's just you against the hordes of smaller ships. Those aren't so bad, but when you have to take on a frigate or two by yourself, it's just doesn't make any sense.

SOL: Exodus isn't bad, but there's nothing about it to draw me in. Mindless combat that doesn't do much to draw me, and a story that makes no sense at all, and is just full of cliches. I do not foresee myself playing the game any more than I have so far. Freelancer on the other hand...

Swords and Soldiers HD

Yet another game that feels like it was once a flash game, turned into a full title. Gameplay consists of building units and casting spells. Most levels start with you creating a few more gold-gathering wenches, then using your upgrade panel to make a few other units and spells available. Once you start creating battle units, they will start walking forward until they reach an enemy, and will then fight to the death. If victorious, they will continue walking forward. What you get, then, is a steady stream of units constantly moving towards the right of the screen.

The story was mildly amusing, at least on the Viking campaign. These guys love meat, and most of the campaign revolves around protecting your meat, and then eventually seeking the largest chili in order to make the best hot sauce. It's ridiculous, but fun, and lays down a loose reason for each encounter. The enemy types vary quite a bit, with some of the larger units being quite challenging.

Overall I found the game fun enough, but it's also extremely repetitive. You don't have a whole lot of control over things, so it's mostly repeating the same setup, build and fight phases each level. It takes a long time for the units to make their way to the front lines, even with the rage spell, so you're better off just constantly making units. My favorite spell is definitely heal, and I find it the most useful as these guys do not last long when being focused on. I played this game for 60 minutes and almost completed the first campaign, but I don't see myself coming back to what is essentially a mobile game ported to PC.

Notes

I beat the Massive Munich campaign in CiM, and attempted to move onto the US Cities DLC. Unfortunately the San Francisco map is causing me quite a bit of difficulty. It's a fairly large map, and they don't give you any basic lines to start from, so I'm finding being profitable and building a base to expand upon incredibly difficult. I will keep trying, though, and see if I can succeed, as San Francisco is definitely a cool city. I've always been fairly impressed with the combination of Muni, BART and Caltrain, so I'm looking forward to trying to improve upon their model.

I've met the goal for 28 games so far, with 233 still to go!


Album: Steam Challenge - Day 013

Day 12 - VVVVVV and Dear Esther

VVVVVV

This platformer is similar in looks and style to Super Meat Boy, but with a slighter lower difficulty. The game is of very simple design, giving very few options and just generally feeling old. This was also the only game I've played so far that didn't support steam screenshots or fraps either, so I was much more limited in my screenshot taking.

Gameplay is fast-paced platforming. You have three controls, left, right and action. The Action button does the basic things such as progressing the text and activating menus, but in gameplay this button reverses gravity for you. This means the majority of puzzles involve flipping the world around to get by obstacles. This makes the game simple and fast paced, but challenging nonetheless.

The world is fairly unique for a platformer. Each screen represents one tiny section of the world, and the levels are tucked into different corners. If you look at the map I uncovered (potential spoilers, I guess, don't click if you want to explore on your own), you'll see that there are different colored areas that represent the levels, typically a series of rooms you must take on in order. The grey area represents the overworld, and your oportunity to locate other levels. Just to make sure you don't get loes, computer screens will show you key areas on the map.

Despite the very basic graphics and the fact that it's a platformer, I really enjoyed this game. It's simple but challenging, and fast-paced and action packed. The one-big map is definitely cool and reminds me of Castlevania. I will likely come back to this game when I'm looking for simple platforming.

Dear Esther

Originally a mod, Dear Esther was recently remade as an indie title. There isn't much game to this title, which bills itself as a "pure story-driven experience", in fact I was able to beat the whole thing in 70 minutes. You're given free reign to explore the largely linear island, and occasionally the narrator reads from some letters. The controls are very simple, WASD to move, Q to swim up and that's it. Your character walks at a normal pace, giving you ample opportunity to admire the surrounding landscape.

Speaking of landscape, it's gorgeous. This is the source engine at it's finest. So much effort was put into every little bit of the island, with amazing detail. The landscape is bright and lively, the caves are amazing and unique and the sights are breathtaking. Even the insides of long abandoned buildings are detailed with little touches that add to the detail. Dear Esther is littered with tiny details so subtle you probably won't notice them the first time. Check out the album for more screenshots, but be warned, the screenshots encapsulate the majority of the game. I avoided taking any screenshots of the subtitles, to not give away anything, but the pictures themselves show me progressing through the entirety of the extremely short experience.


I guess this one counts as complete, because I was able to beat the whole thing. I'm not counting it towards the 10 games I've set as my goal, however, as the who experience was done in a little over one hour. I definitely suggest experiencing this game for yourself, but not at $10.

 

Notes

I'm still playing CiM. I'm into the second scenario of the Munich Madness campaign. This one sets you up with a much better metro system, which I've expanded upon, so I'm now filthy, stinking rich.

Album: Steam Challenge - Day 012

Day 11 - Woody Two-Legs: Attack of the Zombie Pirates and Guardians of Graxia

Woody Two-Legs: Attack of the Zombie Pirates

This game was surprisingly fun, actually. You pilot a ship and must protect your treasure from the zombie pirates by using your cannons, duh. As the enemy ships die, they drop crates which come in three flavours: good, bad and random. If a ship makes it to your treasure it'll start loading up then run away, but worry not, if you shoot them down you can get it back (or at least some of it).

Controls can be a bit flimsy at times, as the collision detection turns you sharply when you come into contact with something, and you don't have a say in where you're going to turn. Enemies come in huge volume, and you will likely die, but it's not such a big deal. I lost on level 4 due to too much treasure being taken, but I guess it would have to be impossibly hard at some point as there appears to be only 5 levels.

The game was fast-paced and enjoyable, but I can't imagine it lasting too long, as there's only 5 levels. I played for 40 minutes before losing, so I may come back for more and beat those final 2 levels. There are leaderboards, but they don't do much to encourage my playing. The game also have 2 extra difficulty levels that were locked.

Guardians of Graxia

GoG bills itself as a card-based board game, but lacks what makes TCGs fun and interesting. Gameplay is relatively simple, you use mana to summon units, or cast spells. You can engage in battle, during which both players can play cards that increase one of two defense types (magic and physical), or attack power. Units on the board can move one or more tiles per turn, and positioning have an effect thanks to bonuses for having nearby allies.

I found this game very slow paced. It takes a long time to get going despite the boards being very small. Battles are fairly brutal, as my units tended to do very little damage, and there's a penalty for attacking and not defeating your opponent. I found myself pouring cards into battles and constantly sacrificing cards for that little bonus they provide.

The game may look like a TCG, but it's definitely not. There doesn't appear to be any way to customize your deck, so you're very much relying on the luck of the draw to decide what you can do on any given turn. Many of the cards were borderline useless, and ended up being used for sacrifices and not much else. I didn't care for this game, and I don't think I'll be coming back to it.

Notes

Lots of relatively short games lately, nothing that's worth more than the minimum time in a while now, but it looks like there's some interesting titles on the horizon.

24 games down, 237 to go.
Hours of CiM played so far attempting to finish the campaign: 7.83

Album: Steam Challenge - Day 011

Day 10 - Diner Dash: Hometown Hero and Peggle Deluxe

Diner Dash: Hometown Hero

In this game you play a waitress named Flo, and your task is to make sure all the guests at your restaurant are happy. Basic tasks consist of seating the guests, taking their order, bringing their food, giving them their bill and finally busing the table. All this is achieved by clicking the appropriate location and watching Flo go.

The game is relatively simple, but can be challenging. There's always a lot to do, and the customers aren't terribly patient. As the game progresses, more advanced things get added, for instance there are teenagers with their cell phones who will annoy nearby customers, but if you seat them next to teenagers of the opposite gender they'll be too busy flirting to use their phones. Certain tables are reserved, and customers will expect to be seated for their reservation almost immediately. With all that in mind, many of the level goals are actually fairly challenging, requiring precision and thoughtful seating.

I was kind of bored playing through this, as I'm stuck in the campaign mode. I cannot beat the final zoo level for the life of me, and for some reason the game crashes when I select the ballpark. Endless Shift mode is alright, but it always ends the same way, with getting overwhelmed and having too many customers leave. I busied myself with re-playing the middle levels until my 37 minutes were up.

 

 

 

Peggle Deluxe

I imagine everyone has heard of Peggle by now, it was the casual game of choice a few years ago. For those who haven't, the goal of Peggle is to shoot your balls into pegs, trying to collect all the orange pegs to finish the level. Gameplay is simple enough, and the random nature means that even if you're having trouble beating a level, a bit of tweaking can lead to the run you needed to finish it up.

Peggle Deluxe comes with a ton of levels. The adventure mode includes 55 levels, after which Challenge mode is unlocked. It's a fun distraction, not requiring much thought, but still not mindlessly easy. I'm sure I'll come back to this title over the years when I'm looking for that quick distraction.

Notes

I'm still playing CiM, the campaign I started is progressing nicely, and the tweaks I made seem to have rendered the game more stable. For those wanting to know, I lowered the settings significantly and started launching the title without Steam. I'm not sure which is doing the trick, but all is well now.

Album: Steam Challenge - Day 010

Day 9 - Quake II and Max and the Magic Marker

QUAKE II

I've played a lot of Quake in my day, and Quake 1 was a little too early for me, and I didn't play much beyond the shareware version, but I spent many hours playing Quake 2 online. All that, I'm ashamed to say, was done with a less than legitimate copy of the game, so I was happy to give this another go, for nostalgia's sake.

Quake is an ugly game, no doubt. Even the addition of OpenGL didn't help that much, and it wasn't until Q3 that color was added to the pallet. Still, the game is the same old fast-paced action-fest it's always been. I opted to start a new single-player game on hard, which is a higher difficulty than I typically take, but I felt anything less would be an insult.

There isn't much to say, really. I would go out and suggest you play Q2 if you don't have a solid reason to. It's a corridor shooter, that is insanely fast paced, and has no storyline to speak of. Yes, there are a few cutscenes, and this title actually gives you mission objectives, but I ignored all of it and it didn't change a thing. The weapons are satisfying, the enemies are challenging, but not absurd, and the levels give you the freedom to pass through using multiple paths.


I may decide to come back to this game and finish my playthrough, as there I definitely hold a soft-spot for this game, but we'll see. Singleplayer was never the strength of the Quake series, and there's only so many brown corridors you can shoot your way through before it gets old. If I do opt to continue the playthrough, I'll definitely lower the difficulty so that I can breeze through everything. What can I say, I'm lazy!

Max and the Magic Marker

Physics-based puzzle games are quite popular these days. Max and the Magic Marker takes on the genre but gives it a kid-friendly spin. Gameplay is basic platforming with one exception, your magic marker. As you play you'll collect ink orbs, which allow you to draw with your magic marker. Anything you draw becomes physical, and can then be interacted with. For instance, earlier puzzles have you making a basic plank bridge, nothing fancy. You'll make a lot of steps to climb things as well. You can retrieve ink from an item at anytime, so puzzles are more based on your effective use of the available ink, and trial and error is encouraged.

There's a few interesting challenges, but nothing too difficult. I managed to get the majority of the collectables that I could find, and only really got blocked in one instance, and orb that was just slightly out of reach with the amount of ink I possessed. Checkpoints are littered all over the levels, which is good because death is instantaneous if you touch one of the many hazards that Max hates. Each checkpoint also saps all your ink, making each checkpoint a unique challenge that's not dependent on your success or failure in previous parts of the level.

I don't really care for platformers or physics-based puzzle games, so I don't foresee myself playing this game further than the 47 minutes I did today.

Notes

I keep wanting to play more Cities in Motion. I considered making it one of my games to beat, and even started a new campaign with the intention of progressing through it. Unfortunately, the game has proven quite unstable, and lacks an autosave. I can't seem to play the Tokyo map for more than 5 minutes without a hang, and I spent an hour working on the Munich map without saving when it froze on me. I'll do a bit of research, as if I could make it stable then completing a campaign would be a lot of fun.

Album: Steam Challenge - Day 009

Day 8 - Just Cause and Borderlands

Just Cause

I've heard a lot about Just Cause 2. I've never tried it, but I've heard many people say that it's a large, crazy game and swear by the parachute and grappling hook mechanic. I'm looking forward to trying JC2, but it's number 157 on my list, so it may be a while. Today, however, I gave the original Just Cause a spin.

The game starts off with a cutscene that told me nothing, and then throws you out of a plane over the island. You're quickly taught how to use your parachute which can open and close mid-freefall. Or maybe the chute doesn't close, but you just have an infinite supply? Gameplay can be best desribed as GTA on steroids set on a tropical island. The shooting was very fast paced, with the enemies coming in waves, but not being altogether that threatening. After a bit of ground combat, the game throws you into the back of a jeep where you operate a mounted machine gun for an on-rails segment. You'll shoot down a dozen other jeep and a few helicopters too before everything is said and done.

Back at the base, you start getting a bit more story, but really not that much. My first mission was to liberate a prisoner, so I set off towards the prison. Breaking him out really wasn't difficult, you don't need to use cover (and in fact I don't believe there's any cover mechanic here), and you can easily dispatch the cops with only a few hits. I did a bit of driving, and it's very arcadey. You steer easily no matter what type of vehicle you have, or what terrain your own. I took a downhill trip through the jungle and came out completely unscathed, but if you hit a fence you will come to a complete stop. It's all very weird and doesn't play right.

I didn't get the grappling hook, although the controls screen tells me it's in here. I don't really want to spend more time on this game than I have already, 43 minutes was enough to tell me that this isn't some amazing gem of a game that I must experience. It does, however, hint that everything I've heard about JC2 could be amazing, if done in a game that's more developed than this one. I'm very much looking forward to trying Just Cause 2.

Borderlands

This is another very popular game that I never got around to playing. It's been described to me as "Diablo with guns," and with the sequel right around the corner I was looking forward to giving it a try. The opening scene was really well done, setting the tone and style, and I really enjoyed it.

This game acts as a first-person shooter with RPG elements. You have to aim and hit your opponent for the damage to take, but damage is calculated based on the weapons stats. Critical hits appear to be based on aim, for instance shooting a human in the head. There were several different weapon types, but I gravitated towards a pistol with a zoom for picking off those headshots, and an SMG for more close range action.

Through the first few quests, I was slowly introduced to a few characters and mechanics, learning how to purchase a shield and weapons / ammo, and shooting a lot of skags. I eventually made my way to the first boss, and got my ass handed to me by his two dogs. Luckily I was able to kill one of them while down, which gives you a second wind. I say luckily, but the whole thing felt like a scripted way to teach you about second winds, I'm not sure I even could have died there.

The game looks beautiful. Cell shading in 3D first person titles is rather rare, but when done right it looks gorgeous. This game is just oozing style all over the place. Unfortunately it's somewhat ruined by the constant forced travel through the same locations. I got very tired of running back to Zed very quickly. Perhaps I missed the option, but I really did not enjoy having to run all the way back to the town after defeating 9 Toes. Perhaps it unlocks later, but not having at the very least a Diablo-style waypoint system really hurt the experience.

I only played for an hour, wanting to save the full experience for Borderlands 2 which releases next month, but this experience did confirm that I will buy the sequel. The heavy focus on FPS elements, as well as the weak point criticals also lead me to believe that I should buy the title on PC again, and not switch to a console.

Notes

 I went back and played more Cities in Motion. The game is really appealing to me now that I've moderately successful. That being said, I'm still not rich and my infrastructure is not great. I have a lot of stops with tons of angry passengers waiting for their bus/tram, and traffic is building up quite a bit!

Album: Steam Challenge - Day 008