If you aren't turned off by the sugary sweet aesthetic, Glittermitten Grove is worth a deep look. It can be difficult to start with its intricate economy and barebones explanation, but those who crack the nut can find something special hidden inside.
Blade Ballet can be a lot of fun in the right setting, but even then it won't set the world on fire. It won't supplant Samurai Gunn or TowerFall as a go-to indie party combat game, but it does a fine job supplementing those titles for a raucous evening. Add it to the list of stuff to bust out when friends are around, but don't even bother going in solo.
It's business as usual in terms of the moment-to-moment happenings, but it benefits from the altered structure that eschews multi-episode arcs in favor of singular experiences. For the first time in the series, I'm looking forward to continuing onward, if only a little.
Ultimately, Dynetzzle Extended is a decent experience. It starts with a cool idea, but doesn't expand on that idea enough, and once it finally reaches a point where it takes more than just mindlessly following the algorithm, it ends. It's a neat distraction for puzzle enthusiasts, but it won't be setting the world on fire.
Perhaps it's unfair to compare Minecraft: Story Mode to Telltale's more adult-oriented series. This is built for a particular demographic, and it seems like it's really hitting with that audience. The Last Place You Look is more of the same -- and slightly better, if anything -- so those who have enjoyed the series thus will be pleased to just keep on trucking.
I'm not chomping at the bit to keep playing, but I am curious to delve deeper. Different combinations of explorers can beget different tactics both in and out of battle. That thought alone is enough to keep me from uninstalling it.
Volume is not a bad game. But it still leaves me wanting for something more out of it.
It's not a must-buy, not even for platformer fans, but it's a cute little game that most people can find some fun with.
Perhaps that is why its shortcomings are so glaring. What is good here is really good, but what is bad detracts enough that the entire package is a bit of a disappointment. A great piece of science fiction may ask a lot of hard questions and make the audience think. Halfway is not a great piece of science fiction, but it is a good strategy game for those willing to put some effort into it.
Its greatest strength is the surprisingly poignant narrative about the muddy area between good and evil. I almost want to play through again to see how different choices will affect the later battles and the story's conclusion, but at 25-30 hours for one playthrough and combat that wears thin toward the end, it is just long enough for me to shy away from that idea.
The proof of concept is here, and I would certainly look forward to a hypothetical There Came an Echo 2 if it were announced. The groundwork has been laid, and with more content and finer polish it could be great. But knowing Iridium, the studio's next project will be something completely different, taking its science fiction stories into another unusual genre mashup.
In the end, Constant C is a solid puzzle platformer that takes a few familiar ideas and mashes them together to create something partially new. The difficulty of the puzzles ranges from trivial to diabolical, with most falling somewhere in between. Its greatest sin is the repetition of certain puzzles, but if that is the worst aspect of Constant C, then it should still please fans of the genre.
Despite that glowing praise, I am torn, because I also recognize that it is far from perfect. The environmental art direction gets dull too quickly, the level design is lacking in basic conveniences, and a general sloppiness is present when looking closely. Some of the cool new features like multi-leveled areas and combining weapons could have been enhanced further if the user interface and systems had been updated to play to those strengths. Borderlands: The Pre-Sequel is a solid entry to the series, but I hope that the development team takes some of the failings to heart and delivers excellence in the future.
Cosmophony is like a firework. As it's flying up and sending out sparks, interest builds. Once it detonates it's an awesome show of color and sound. After that it's over and everybody goes home. It's short and intense, but it stops being interesting once it oversteps the line between fun and frustrating. I played it and enjoyed it until it felt unfair, and now I probably won't ever touch it again.
There are still great things to be found in the Temple of Osiris, and those who care less about scoring points or who have some good partners to team up with can still find some fun in it. For me, Lara Croft and the Temple of Osiris is a lot like Horus's staff: it is a treasure that can do great things, but it is cursed.
Overall, The Lost Lords is a fine episode for Game of Thrones: A Telltale Game Series, but it does not stand out. It is not exactly filler, but it does feel like it exists almost entirely as exposition, putting the pieces into place for all of the really exciting stuff to happen in a future episode. It does begin to demonstrate the far-reaching consequences of each character's choices, but it lacks the truly memorable scenes found in the first episode. If Iron From Ice felt like a punch to the gut, The Lost Lords is the throbbing pain afterward.
None of those waste as much time as the procedurally generated levels, which are easily the biggest flaw in Schrödinger's Cat and the Raiders of the Lost Quark. They take up about half of the play time, present very little worthwhile gameplay, and feel like a drudge by the end. If it cut all the fat and featured only the smart puzzle-platforming found in the hand-designed levels, Raiders of the Lost Quark would be a leaner, more engaging, and ultimately much better game.
It's a decent adventure with varied combat, cool boss battles, and semi-interesting locales. I'm going to keep at it until I've obtained everything there is to obtain, but even then I know I won't have seen everything there is to see. Some of the neatest stuff possible isn't scripted in by the designers, it's waiting to be imagined and created by an aspiring magician.
Attikus and the Thrall Rebellion whets my appetite for more like this. It's quick enough to play just a round or two and still make progress, and it's varied enough to play several in a row without getting too bored. But now I'm looking more forward to the other four Story Ops releasing so we can have that same solid gameplay with even more variety.
In a way, it's refreshing to get a game that knows exactly what it wants to do, executes on that idea, but doesn't overstay its welcome. The central mechanic of precision projectile motion is unique, and Lichtspeer plays with the formula enough to keep the experience fresh right up until the end.