Category: Free

JUMPGRID is a Punishing, Heart-Pounding Puzzler

JUMPGRID is a game of aggression. Right there in the all-caps title it lets you know that it means business. Death comes fast and often, and the electronic soundtrack never stomps thumping to mourn. Instead, a violently flashing screen and a screech greet you at every end. It’s reminiscent of Super Hexagon, in that you’re the only thing keeping the party’s pace down. You have to move, and you better move fast.

In JUMPGRID, you’re tasked with hopping between 9 dots on a grid. Like this:

You’re the glowy thing in the middle, and you can jump to any of the ones directly across from you, i.e., up, down, left, or right. Once you dodge whatever obstacles are flying through the grid and collect all nine green pieces, a warp hole to the next level opens up in the center and you hop along from there. Doesn’t sound too bad, huh?

Well… it gets rough. After a dozen or so screens, JUMPGRID feels like it’s just getting started. Very specific sequences of jumps have to be performed at exact times in order to collect all the shards and make the warp. Some are time limited, others have you follow a fast-moving maze and collect shards in order, and others just send way too much at your way to comprehend until you’re at least a handful of deaths in. You’ll respawn immediately though with every mistake, giving the game more than a passing resemblance to any number of precision platformers.

https://youtu.be/Ag-xI72ReUA

If you’re ready to make the jump, give JUMPGRID a shot on Ian Maclarty’s itch.io page.

March 6, 2018
Butterfly Soup is 2017’s Best Visual Novel

There were a whole bunch of good visual novels this year! But out of Dream Daddy, Doki Doki Literature Club, Danganronpa 3, Tokyo Dark, etc., Butterfly Soup is the one I wish I had played as soon as it released. Not only is it my favorite of the aforementioned onslaught of 2017’s VNs, it’s one of the funniest and most genuinely sweet games of the year. Imagine Night in the Woods with more gays and fewer cats.

If you’re not hooked after the first five minutes of Butterfly Soup… I just don’t think this thing’s for you. The goofiest of its humor is front-loaded into the introductory scenes, and I was laughing out loud harder than I had at a game since Yakuza 0.

Not content with being just one of 2017’s funniest games, it decides to take the crown for being one of the most progressive as well; the game’s main cast is 90% queer women of color. It’s great! As a straight white dude, I was offered a unique perspective that I would rarely be afforded the opportunity to see otherwise. I 100% recommend it to anyone whose ever had a passing interest in visual novels, teen drama, or laughing. So go play it.

If you’re up for chuckling along with a wonderful group of high schoolers, check out Butterfly Soup for free on its itch.io page.

(Min-seo is maybe the best new character of 2017. She just rules.)

December 30, 2017
Games of the Month – September 2017

So uh, wow. Right?

This end-of-year-rush isn’t showing any signs of slowing, and it’s great! 2017 has been a wild year for games. I’m super pumped to see everybody’s end of year lists, because outside of, say, Super Mario Odyssey and Zelda, I’m not sure what’s going to fill out the average Top 10. I’m fairly certain where mine’s headed thanks to a handful of wonderful surprises, (including one of the decade’s best platformers and one of the greatest multiplayer games of all time) but this year’s been such a smorgasbord of releases it’s hard to nail anything down for certain. And there’s still plenty more on the Horizon. But… let’s wrap September up so we can truck through Wolfenstein, The Evil Within 2, Mario, Assassin’s Creed’s potentially good soft reboot, and more. Jeez, there’s a lot to do.

1. Cuphead

Cuphead isn’t a game without issues. The platforming stages aren’t great. Too many of the bosses have cheap, unavoidable attacks leading to unnecessary trial and error. The discussion around the game has become so toxic that I feel like I need to distance myself from the worst of its fans. But still, I find myself wanting to return to its beautiful, brutal world again and again.

Though I don’t feel difficulty balance is among its strongest suits, Cuphead does do a lot of things well. It recaptures the feeling of facing off against a foe in a game like Mega Man or Duck Tales while amping up the scale tenfold. You’re still just a tiny dude with a peashooter, but now the boss battle is against a screen filling monstrosity with four or five forms. It makes an excellent case for boss-rush platformers… and if we don’t see a half-dozen riffs on this in the next couple of years I’ll be disappointed. And I’ve only barely mentioned the art, but oh man, that art. I would pay more money than I should for another handful of boss fights just to see what these brilliant artists would draw. Watching the bosses reel from an attack and change into an entirely different beast made each fight exciting, and I could never wait to see what was going to pop from the screen next. Remember when that boss girl was a blimp, then angels, then the MOON? Yeah, that was wild.

2. Gloomy Room

Grab Google translate on your phone to translate a bit of Japanese text, and get ready for the spookiest ten minutes of your life. Though the Gloomy Room demo isn’t the most complex room escape around, thanks to some stellar sound design and clever scares, it’s one of the most terrifying.

SPOILER: Kill some time in the first room if you escape too quickly and don’t get the hype. The part after the bathroom is pretty meh, so the first main scare is what you’re looking for here. Or just watch the first ten minutes or so of this.

3. SteamWorld Dig 2

…I bet the first one of these was really good too! This is my first entry into the SteamWorld series and it was a good one. Half Metroidvania and half grindy Skinner box, it somehow lands right in the middle and works well. Complete with surprisingly solid platforming challenges and more skills and upgrades than you can shake your Level 5 Flaming Pickaxe at, this one’s an early contender for best indie on the Switch.

Honorable Mentions:

Danganronpa V3: I bet if I had gotten further than the first chapter by now it would be much higher on this list. But hey, that first chapter was a trip, huh?

Golf Story: Again, a lot of stuff came out this month! My first couple of hours with Golf Story were good. I hope to have many more.

The Tomatoes are OK: Weird, surreal, and spooky. Me likey.

Metroid: Samus Returns: I haven’t enjoyed it as much as the hype surrounding it might have suggested, but it’s not bad by any means. The combat is satisfying, the upgrades come quick, and the pace is mostly solid. But, man, I do not enjoy killing the same boss 20 times in a row. Why did anyone think that was a cool premise?

Destiny 2: It’s more of what the first one was but slightly different! Yeah!

October 21, 2017
The Tomatoes are OK (But You Might Not Be)

So I went into The Tomatoes are OK knowing… not really much of anything at all. I hit the strange landing page after hearing that it was little unnerving, and jumped straight in. I suggest you do the same.

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September 9, 2017
Dead Horizon is My New Favorite Video Game Western

Every once in a while I stumble across a tiny game that I know I’ll remember for as long as I keep doing this. Remember Crawlies? I do… I still think about it a couple times a month. Level 2: The Virus Master? Yup. 2017’s excellent Baba Is You? That’s a hard one to get out of your head.

Let’s add @Matthewmritter‘s latest, Dead Horizon, to that list. I’m a sucker for Westerns, and this is right up your alley if you’ve ever romanticized the hat-wearin’, gun-totin’ cynicism of moseyin’ from saloon to saloon.

Dead Horizon is probably the most satisfying 10 minutes you’ll spend with a game this week. You’ll end the lives of several villains and possible heroes, point ‘n click your way through to the end of a well written narrative, and and remember the sweet sweet aesthetics of the Super Nintendo era complete with appropriately beautiful art and music. All of that in ten minutes. If you’re as much of a proponent of short games as I am, Dead Horizon is a godsend of an example.

There’s not a whole lot more that I’m willing to spoil, because the barrier to entry is so small. If you have a computer that can download a 50mb game and a few minutes of free time… I can’t think of anything else lately that I can recommend more than Dead Horizon.

Even if Westerns aren’t typically your thing, Dead Horizon is totally free and I urge you to give it a shot. It’s a surprisingly strong piece of art made my a tiny team of people, and they aren’t charging a dime. Check it out on the game’s itch.io page, and support this kind of talent if you want to see more of it.

September 9, 2017
Cat Bird! – A Hearty Helping of HAL

After playing a couple dozen hours of something like Dark Souls or Hellblade, if you’re like me, you want to balance that out with something light, happy, and not-at-all soul-crushing. Games like Kirby and BOXBOY! are prime examples of games that exude joy. HAL Laboratory is a company filled with people who make magic fit onto a cartridge, and with Ryan Carag’s latest, now we have a tiny ball of HAL inspiration that fits in a tiny app on your phone. Cat Bird! is here! (more…)

September 1, 2017