Quantum Replica: A(nother) Game Review

This post was originally published at Sub-Cultured.

As always, thanks goes to the unshakable Kimmie Britt, for keeping me occupied.

It's no secret that I have the attention span of a cracked out gnat and, as such, I desperately crave the occasional sensory overload of a fast-paced, hyper-colored, action-packed, Skrillex's wet dream type game.

What I was in the mood for was Geometry Wars.  What Kimmie gave me was the frenetic love child of Fusion Frenzy and Deus Ex.

And you know what?  It's pretty friggin rad.

Pictured: Rad McShreddington

Developed by ON3D Studios and published by 1C, Quantum Replica made its debut in Prague in September, 2017.  While the premise is a touch generic - AI runs the futuristic dystopian mega-cities, while massive corporations run every aspect of life.  You wake up with no memory of your past, or clear vision of your future, to a hostile security force currently placing the city on lock-down and that has you at the top of its wanted list.  Explore, fight, and use your powers to save the day - the game play is downright fun.

Look at those colors! Look how pretty it all is.  Look, and don't stop looking.

Over the top, third person view with a simple point and click mouse control (and the occasional hotkey) makes things simple.  Stealth systems, puzzles, hackables, lootables, upgradables, makes things interesting.  Freezing time, replaying certain events, inventory management, the ability to choose lethal or non-lethal take-downs, makes this unexpectedly awesome.

You want mindless entertainment for short stretches of time?  It's got that.

You want some in depth level exploration in the back alleys of a seedy giant city? Yep.

How about a surprisingly compelling story line to keep up with and the occasional likable NPC? Yes.

Gun, bombs, grenades, tranqs, special sneaky close combat moves? Oh yeah, but don't forget to drag the bodies out of sight.

Bugs and or technical issues?  Honestly, haven't seen a single one.

Play this.  It's got a little something for everyone, and a lot everything for people like me.  Worth your time, worth your money, and if you'll excuse me, I just unlocked another power that I'd like to try out.

Downward Spiral: Horus Station - A Choose Your Own Review

This post was originally published at Sub-Cultured.

As always, thanks goes to the unflappable Kimmie Britt, for keeping me occupied.

Of the three games I've been given the opportunity to review in the past two weeks, Downward Spiral: Horus Station was last on the list for one very particular reason: Looks.  It looks like Subnautica on the lowest res setting.  But, as I've learned, beautiful games can be terrible (Star Wars: Battle Front), and even the most coarse of games can be incredible, like Galaxies:

Galaxies: Ugly and perfect.  He was an NPC and he responded to unwanted advances.

  So, despite my initial bias, I opened my mind, and my heart, to Downward Spiral: Horus Station.

From developer 3rd Eye Studios, Downward Spiral: Horus Station is the closest thing to Myst In Space that we're gonna get for a while.  Taking players through an abandoned vessel, the game focuses on visual storytelling for single player or two player online co-op. Using their wits, players will have to piece together the mystery based on observation and interaction all while accompanied by the electronic ambient soundtrack composed by platinum selling HIM frontman Ville Valo.

It needs to be said, that without a doubt, this game needs to be played in  VR, otherwise Downward Spiral is nigh unplayable.

For the first few hours, my time was spent try to get the hang of the:

[VR] Innovative 

[Normal] Utterly Frustrating 

directional controls.  Moving forward is realistic, and just like real movement in a zero gravity environment, you're expected to grab handrails or shove yourself off walls to propel your body across a room.  As it turns out

[VR] This system is awesome, as you can grab surfaces, reorient yourself, and launch off a matter of seconds.  It forces a slow, methodical pace through levels that adds tension, and gives a sense of pride as you progressively learn how to best manipulate your momentum in each confined space.

[Normal] This system makes the game impossible to play.  Even after turning mouse sensitivity up to maximum, the look speed is too slow to react to threats, look around naturally, and the max is about 15 degrees a second.  Look, grab, look, shove shouldn't take upwards of 10 seconds in a game that's already painfully slow.

Environmental and object interaction is equally

[VR] Innovative

[Normal] Utterly Frustrating

as the physics involved are the same.

The soundtrack by Ville Valo is

[Objectively] Tolerable in short stints if you enjoy 80's sci-fi ambiance.

[Subjectively] Annoying to the point that I had to mute the music.

So, what's the mystery?  Who are you fighting?  Where does this adventure take you?

Look, I gave this game my best shot, but I had to stop playing.  In addition to having 

[Subjectively] A terrible tutorial system, absurdly slow movement

[Objectively] A plethora of technical bugs that, while not game breaking, were collectively a hindrance to game-play 

[Both] No clear sense of direction of plot or story past going forward and figuring things out for yourself, generally by accident; 

what killed it for me was the fact that whenever you enter a compartment of the station at a different orientation to the previous, there exists no mechanism to reorient yourself to that room, adding another layer of difficulty to movement, and the extra punch of disorientation.  

I won't discourage anyone from playing Downward Spiral, but I cannot, in good conscience, give my recommendation.

Smoke and Sacrifice: A Game Review

This post was originally published at Sub-Cultured.  

Thanks goes to the unbreakable Kimmie Britt, for throwing some stress-free game related work my way. 

Pictured: Whimsy

Don't be fooled by the whimsically beautiful, hand-drawn aesthetic of this game like I was.  In fact, the only reason I decided to play this game, out of a choice of several others, was purely visual.  So, being the habitual lazy mug I am, instead of doing research, watching the entire youtube video, reading about Solar Sail Games, or, you know, doing literally anything at all before just jumping into this, I... just jumped into this.

Smoke and Sacrifice goes from cutesy and innocuous to immediate psychic scarring in the span of its own intro scene.  How is that even possible?  Might have something to do with you taking an active role in sacrificing your first born child upon an altar surrounded by sun-worshiping religious acolytes.  Maybe.

Yeah, so about those tiny houses...

Then the real nightmare begins: Flash forward seven years, the lights go out, the smoke pours in, the monsters come into the village.  You use the ensuing chaos, wrapped in a thick blanket of panic, to check out the temple and alter where you lost gave up your child, only to be teleported to a hellish landscape of terror and smoke shrouded danger.

That guy on the right?  That nightmare fuel right there?  Friendly NPC.

Set underground and spanning multiple biomes, Smoke and Sacrifice is a wonderfully crafted survival adventure with an engaging story, and an infuriatingly steep learning curve.  Fans of diesel-punk, the crafting elements of Ark, and games like Penny Arcade's On the Rain Slick Precipice of Darkness should definitely give this one a go.

Look, I'll be the first to admit that I'm not the brightest lighthouse on the coast, and I generally like my games fast and simple.  But, had I taken the time from the outset to pay attention to the background environment, I probably wouldn't have died 20 something times before making any significant progress in my play-through.

Actual transcript of this fight: F*** this game is hard... No wait, I got it... Never mind, I'm dead again.

Without you ever being involved, the ecosystem carries on with its bad self.  Polyps (little jellyfish enemies) mate and produce offspring, plants swallow glowbugs and emit protective light, anglermoles eat fireflies and belch flames at you.  Why does any of this matter?

See that monstrosity in the picture up there?  That was the first big enemy I was asked to kill.  How many times did he kill me instead?  An embarrassing amount.  It wasn't until I accidentally brought him too close to that wasp nest, that the coin finally dropped.  The wasps killed the boar, I killed the wasps.  I then applied that lesson to every other big-bad in the game.  Environmental interactions are the key to playing this game.  It was this revelation that made S&S go from impossible and 'why am I even doing this, Kimmie can go to hell,' to 'oh, this is way more fun now.'

Even the sound design is amazing.  Flapping insect wings, gnashing teeth, screen rumbling explosions, and prosaic music all contribute to a perfect symphony to accompany you on your quest.

Of course, no game is without its flaws.  However, in this particular case, they are few and far between.  Sometimes items you try to pick up are inaccessible because of the placement of permanent objects and how items drop.  Also there's...um...no, that's about the only bug I found.

TLDR:

Looks perfect, sounds incredible, plays great, gave me actual nightmares, not a tedious amount of grinding, virtually bug free, and I cannot wait to play more.


PS: SAVE.
PPS: SAVE OFTEN.