Source: Cashmoneys
Price: £14.99
Where To Get It: Steam

Stop me if you’ve heard this one: A game that has a great idea, a good – Oh, you audibly heard the “But” from where you’re sitting? Yes, that’s the deal with Starship Corporation, a starship building and management game. But…

“No, you can’t shift a schematic that’s close enough to your spec that it only needs a reshuffle or parts added here, why would you want that?”

…It really, really isn’t friendly. It’s tried, and tried pretty hard, as, during the Early Access period, the game’s power, water, fuel, and air distribution was via laying pipes, whereas now, it’s done by floor and network. An auto-resolve system for the missions (The yardstick by which ships are judged) was introduced. The former genuinely helps. The latter feels more like avoiding the problem than fixing it.

Okay. Let’s back up a bit. Starship Corporation is a game about managing your own starship construction company. It’s a fixed universe, with some events, but progression is pretty fixed in both campaign and sandbox modes, with the main difference being that, in sandbox mode, you can change the amount of currency you own and your goal. The campaign goal? Get loaaadsamoneeey.

Of course, to get money, you have to spend money, and, at a first glance, without YouTube tutorials and the like to back you up? It’s daunting. Okay, I need to buy a sickbay. Oh, and connectors for fuel, water, air, and power between ship floors. And some shields. And a mining laser. Oh, and a better cooli- There’s a lot of options, and you can get rather a way into building a ship before realising “Oh wait, I don’t have enough space for that cargo I need” , or “Wait, crap, this really needs a better [insert] than I have now to save space.” Time to save design, hit up R&D, to spend some of your budget, and back in until finally… It’s testing time.

Expect to be spending a fair amount of time in the research screen, hunting for what you need.

At which point, many people will hit “Auto-Resolve” and shuffle things around if the score isn’t good enough, wondering their first time through, for a minute or so, where the heck the “Save and Finish the Blueprint Already” button is (It’s to the left of the auto-resolve, once you’ve resolved or played enough missions.) Which is a dual shame, because, again, this is an interesting idea, but the execution is painful enough that yes, auto-resolve really is the better option in many cases. The manual will tell you that it’s ctrl+number to assign people to a group, shift+number to actually control that group, and number is for switching between decks. This is about as useful as it gets, sadly, and there’s a lot that doesn’t get explained.

Unfortunately, with auto-resolve, the game is less interesting, being a somewhat clunky and chuggingly slow ship building and management game with some story elements, and without it, half the game is a hell of micro-management to make the other half less friendly.

It took me a vital few seconds to realise that there were several parts overdue for maintennance… On the SOP mission. ARGH.

So… Great idea. Great idea. The execution, on the other hand, means I can’t really recommend this beyond said idea.

The Mad Welshman is always sad when a good idea is buried under unfortunate design decisions. He knows the baby gets thrown out with the bathwater a lot in this industry.

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Source: Cashmoneys
Price: £5.19
Where To Get It: Steam

Long time readers may have noted that I have a taste for the minimalist. After all, the less elements there are to a design, the less there is that can go wrong. And so, when I saw Seek Etyliv, I was intrigued. A dungeon puzzler consisting of a 3×3 grid.

I have, it seems, somewhat borked myself. I can’t kill this skelly on the right with my batwings, and flying down is certain death.

Yes, that’s right… The game’s puzzles are on a 3×3 grid. There aren’t a ton of them, but they’re sometimes quite devious. A fine example is a grid with two Brain Skeletons (One hit knocks their brain to the nearest available tile clockwise) and a grave marker. Or, more accurately, the fact that half of its orientations have a different solution to the other half. In any case, the rules of the game are very simple: Move into enemies to attack them (Batwings require the target to be two tiles away to attack rather than shove), anything adjacent when you end your move (or are pushed) pushes you away from it, don’t get shoved off the board or into a hole, shove every enemy and their grave markers off the board or into a hole.

Easy idea, devious execution in places. Aesthetically, it is, like the game itself, minimalist, small sprites scaled to however you’ve set it in the options (Personally, 5x seems good enough, and this does appear to be one of those games that’s better off windowed.) , with some good lo-fi sound, being eerily silent otherwise. Works for me, but obviously, taste may differ there.

Well, here she is. We’ve found her, un-named imprisoners! We can go home now!
…Please?

There is a story, of a prisoner, trapped in a dungeon, seeking Etyliv, the Sorceress of Hope, it’s a little surreal (Presumably because there are only skeletons and chests in the dungeon, and not an ounce of food) , and it constitutes one of my few niggles with the game. It’s not that the story is bad, it’s that it’s mostly presented as a poem… Except when it’s not. And the meter feels off. Still, it is a thief imprisoned in a deadly dungeon writing this from starvation, I maybe shouldn’t be expecting Dickinson.

Beyond that, there’s a replayable dungeon mode, in which you unlock characters with which to play… A random selection of the levels from the story. That’s niggle 2: Needs a few Dungeon mode exclusive puzzles to shake things up a bit. Otherwise, this is also somewhat interesting, as it begins you with two letters to name yourself (“You do not deserve more letters” … Shocking dehumanisation there, un-named imprisoner!) , and the more characters you unlock, the closer you get to 6 letters, which, you may have guessed, allows you to rescue Etyliv. Alas, without a third act, leading to niggles 3 and 4: 1.7% of folks have unlocked all characters at the time of the writing, and I have confirmed with the creator that there is no third act to the story. Nonetheless, some of the character unlocking is clever, such as breaking the fourth wall and trying to select a character you can’t select yet to unlock them. They will not, for the sake of spoilers, be named.

I’m glad you’re aware of that, Prisoner… But that doesn’t stop you being here, and also doesn’t stop me wondering why you haven’t told me I won’t get information… Information!

Beyond that, well, it’s small, it’s cheap, and interesting on a couple of fronts.

The Mad Welshman also wouldn’t be here if it wasn’t his fault. In his case, however, he’s often luckier.

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Source: Review Copy
Price: £3.99 (Soundtrack £5.19)
Where To Get It: Steam
Version: 0.94

Those who’ve been keeping track of my future racing endeavours may have noted that I’d had my eye on BallisticNG for quite some time, but, for one reason or another, I’d never actually gotten round to a review. So you can perhaps imagine my surprise when, after a break, I’d taken a look at this Wipeout fangame, and found… A lot of polish. The game’s come a long way from its early roots.

Yup, this is a fitting opening. The only way is indeed up… 😀

So, yes, BallisticNG is a future racing game heavily inspired by the earlier Wipeout games (1, 2097/XL, and 3) , and the usual rules apply: Several craft, each with their own quirks, pros, and cons (such as the Scorpio, which steers awfully, but goes like brown things flung from a stick), undertaking tournaments at various speed classes, with time trials, races (with and without weapons), survival mode (where you speed up regardless, and merely control steering), airbraking for harder turns, and a low poly aesthetic. To say this is extremely my jam on many levels is an understatement along the lines of “The Atlantic’s a bit damp” , and, funnily enough, this led to a lot of early criticism from me during the Early Access process, mostly to do with track design and time trial times.

Thankfully, that critique, and that of other folks, seems to have been taken on board, and the track design and difficulty curve is quite pleasant. A low pressure series of tutorials, the easier tracks in various modes… It handles pretty well. In fact, a nice touch I’ve not seen elsewhere is arranging tournaments, not by difficulty class overall, but by track groupings, so the introduction to each track is on the easier speed classes. The higher speed classes are as twitchy and nightmarish as you’d expect (Spectre and above requiring good track memorisation), and the lower speed classes feel fair, yet frisky. Good!

A beautiful place to live, ruined only by the noise of AG racers certain times of the year…

Aesthetically, the game is very much on point, with a variety of environments, craft, and tunes, all feeling good and looking fine. Add in some modding ability, with the power to import craft, create track layouts, and the like, and, honestly? There’s not a lot I can say that’s more than a niggle on the negative side, such as the base sound balance needing work.

BallisticNG, it seems, has finally achieved its potential. One set of updates before release. And that actually makes me somewhat happy.

Fly me to the moon, and let me raaaace among the space debri- ah, wait, doesn’t scan quite the same. The sentiment’s there, though!

I mean, if I wasn’t after some of the moaning I did, there’d be no pleasing me… Ehehe.

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Source: Review Copy
Price: £4.79
Where To Get It: Steam

Beat Em Ups, as they’ve long been known, have had some pretty interesting subject matter in the past. Failed Sega Mascots. Baseball (in the player sense) robots fighting Baseball (in the ball sense) aliens. Being a bad enough dude to save the president. And now… Two baristas, fighting those dirty custome- I mean, aliens leeching the world’s WiFi.

I’m, as confused as you are, Ashley.

I honestly can’t say I’m not charmed by the concept. It’s just it’s rather odd in places, execution wise. And only some of it I really understand. Let’s go back to basics, though, for a beginning.

As a beat-em-up, it’s a fairly old school setup: Attack, jump, jump attack, grab, and a special that costs health and is, extra damage aside, somewhat underwhelming. There are ranged enemies, who are a pain in the ass, there are tough and weak enemies, there are bosses, there are stages. Heck, there’s even level codes, which I kind of appreciate, even if they’re the older kind that doesn’t, for example, preserve number of lives and the like. It inherits the weaknesses of older beat-em-ups, such as lack of decent counters to ranged enemies, a lack of feedback (It took a level or so for me to notice the healthbar), and wall-locking enemies being the ideal strategy for the majority of encounters, but, as a beat-em-up, at its core, it isn’t bad.

Where it gets a little odd are the “spectacle” additions, Mods and “Special Effects.” Both can be turned off, but the game leaves them on by default, and… Honestly? They don’t really add all that much. Some of the mods change the way the fight works, but not all that many have a noticeable effect, and Special Effects? I’ve never been a big fan of involuntary shader funtimes, and to have fights randomly turn into greenscreen, or all wibbly, or with that “Metal” shader (You know, one of the ones that bears little resemblance to actual metal) is more offputting and artificial than anything else. Nonetheless, they can be turned off in the options, and it merely remains for me to point this out.

Not gonna lie, I had my fill of greenscreen CRT around… Ooh, 1987?

Aesthetically and narratively, it’s hit and miss. Some of it is that there’s obviously some local cultural references I’m just not getting. Some of it is enemies for the sake of enemies (Why are the aliens possessing OAPs?), and, aesthetically, it feels more than a bit chaotic, and the coffee OD level in particular has some eye-searing colour choices. Like… Ouch.

So, overall, Coffee Crisis is in an odd place for me. I’ve had some fun with it. I appreciate the coffee chugging minigame, both as part of the game’s odd world, and a reference to older minigame bonus stages. I appreciate that having a separate “Grab Enemy/Pick the weapon up” button is a damn useful thing to have. It doesn’t outstay its welcome, being short and punchy. But at the same time, I find some of its decisions odd and offputting. It is, I’ll say, worth at least a look if you like old school beat-em-ups.

Yup, this is indeed a beat-em-up. You can tell by whaling on several enemies with one swing of my coffee bag.

The Mad Welshman sips his coffee appreciatively, safe in the knowledge that Baristas are deadly brawlers who will forever protect his coffee drinking rights. Or something.

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Source: Review Copy
Price: £33.99 base game (£21 for the “Added goodie bag” content, or £54.99 for the whole deal)
Where To Get It: Steam

NOTE: Conan: Exiles is a game that comes in 3 flavours with the same base game/maps – PvP, PvE, and Single-Player/Co-Op. The majority of the review touches on the Single-Player experience. Thankew.

Conan: Exiles is a lot of things. The problem being, it takes a hell of a time to get to a lot of it, as, originally, Conan was a survival MMO. It shows, as the single player, on normal difficulty, is… Hell. To the point where I look at other reviews, and wonder what game these folks have been playing.

Approximately 15 seconds before the *first* time I lose all my kit to this small Darfari camp, and about 30 minutes before I switch to Easy difficulty.

For example, the usual survival game rule of “You die, you lose all the stuff it took you ages to craft” comes into play. In the very early game, this isn’t so much a problem. Woo, you need to get some stone and wood, and make a sword, some plant fiber, make some clothes. Big deal. But the further you get, the more of a pain this becomes. Got iron weapons? Odds are high this means you’re taking on things that need iron weapons, which means… Good luck getting your corpse back, and equally good luck with the trek to your nearest iron deposit (hopefully restocked), fending off the beasties there, harvesting, trekking back… It’s a game with a pretty hefty buy-in to each stage of the game, time and resource investment wise, and even the gains you’ve made in terms of buildings can be undone by… The Purge. Aka “A horde of AI that attacks at randomish times once you’ve gotten to capturing Thralls.”

CONTENT WARNING: Aside from the naked bits that people joke about, Slavery is a core mechanic of the game, treated pretty much as *a mechanic* . You have been warned.

If you’ve guessed that I very quickly switched to easy mode once learning how painful it can be to progress on Normal? You are, like me, a person of sense. Although, unfortunately, this doesn’t make building (a necessary element) any less of a pain. Want those neato iron weapons? Okay, first we’ll need 540 stone for a furnace. This is the easy part. Next, we’ll need 50 bricks, and 100 iron for a blacksmi- wait, you don’t know how bricks are made? Easy, that’s 10 Stone a brick, chuck it in the furnace, and use Wood or Coal to fuel it, and… What do you mean, “WHAT?!?” , it’s only another 500 stone and 200 ironstone! Oh, and the 40 ironstone you’ll need for a basic sword, ta.

Oh, you don’t know where ironstone is, or what it looks like? Look around, or look at wiki, like… Look, if you’re going to keep complaining, player, about stupid things like “Unreal Engine games disliking alt-tabbing”, I’m just going to take my crocodiles and go home!

I detect… Mystery! Also History! Mystory?

I’m sure that Conan: Exiles has an interesting world. What it’s shown me so far has been hints of awesome locations, and, for the early game at least, I’ve been levelling up like a levelling thing (Level 24/60 as of this review.) But it hides it behind so… So much grind. Even with a couple of friends to help out with the buildings, I definitely wouldn’t be playing this on normal difficulty, because of the pain of keeping everything going, and 7 hours of play and more than a third of the way through the levelling process before hitting iron weaponry can best be described as “Extracting the Michael.”

“And PvE?” I hear you ask. “Is it any different?” Well… Yes and no. Yes, once you have some friends or have managed to join a clan, it is. Your survivability goes up. You can descend like locusts on a resource node and gobble it up. But until that point, it’s like playing on normal difficulty, with the disturbing addition of the Unconscious, players registered but not logged in, littering the landscape like the introduction of Phillip Jose Farmer’s “To Your Scattered Bodies Go.” Oh, and the core narrative conceit, that Conan himself frees you (there’s your tie in), and that Thoth Amon, for some odd reason, is the one who put the murder-bracelet on you… Kind of falls apart.

See? Disturbing as hell.

Sometimes, you have to keep going, to get a better picture of how the game pulls together. But this is one of those times where I can see my future stretching out in front of me, and, funnily enough, it does not involve gathering 200 corrupted stone, whatever the hell else that Map Room which finally lets you access the equivalent of quick travel in the game, and beating Thoth Amon’s demons. Theoretically, having a friendly group of, say, 5 or 10 players clanning up immediately would make the game flow that much easier… But even then, this feels like Game as Job, which is a distinct turn off for me.

Ironstone, so you know what to look for without a god-damn wiki, and one of the many and varied beasts that will try to kill you on the way to or while harvesting it.

The Mad Welshman is already underpaid in this job. He has no desire to take on a second for nothing.

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