Godhood (Early Access Review)

Source: Cashmoneys
Price: £22.39 (£9.29 for Supporter Edition upgrade)
Where To Get It: Steam

A nonbinary option for a deity is, honestly, just common sense. Sometimes, you want to manifest as a rock, and sometimes, you want to manifest as an enby. Sometimes, you want to be a wholesome deity, and… Well, it will come as precisely no surprise to anyone who keeps up with me that I have mainly been playing a Dark God of Endless Thirst. Chastity? PFAH. War or Peace? PSHAW. My deity advocates for shipping!

There are currently six potential virtues, two of which are locked off for now, in the next step. But this, honestly, is not a bad character creation screen.

Getting back to talking a little more specifically about the game (ahem), Godhood is a turn-based strategy title by Abbey Games, where you, the newest religion in the mesoamerican world in which the game is set, are kicked out of your home village for your beliefs, and swear, as a result, to spread the name of your deity, by force, by cunning argument, or, as is the case with my head prophetess, by flirtings and smoochings. And it’s a good idea to mix it up a bit, as some enemies are immune to your core attacks when you go looking for believers.

There’s a fair bit going on in the back of this game (to the point where the “Stats” subtab is an intimidating list of numbers), but the main elements are actually pretty clear. You level up by converting folks, it’s a good idea to keep your prophets of various types as happy as possible, and, over time, you build up a village capable of proselytising to ever greater audiences, balancing the faith and levels of your prophets against improving the village through the fact you can only inspire three prophets a day.

The virtue of Lust, obviously, means that pre-battle barks are more “Come hither…” than “Come at me!”

It’s good stuff, and I felt challenged so far without being overwhelmed, and, due to the ability to see what a village has by planning to convert it then painlessly backing out to the city (not wasting my turn, as normally a conversion uses a turn) allowed me to use my prophets efficiently (as, after all, the turn will go on, so anyone you don’t send can do prophet things at home)

Aesthetically, it works pretty well so far. Everything (except the stats tab) is clear, you know what resists what while you’re planning things, you get some idea of what keeps the faithful faithful, and what builds what, and the animations are alright.

So, while it’s obvious there’s more development, it’s got a pretty good start, and I’m quite enjoying my time as a thirsty deity.

The Mad Welshman would become a dark deity of Endless Thirst in reality, but alas, Vaudevillain Union rules dictate that I keep my quota of three failed grand schemes a year.

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Simmiland (Review)

Source: Cashmoneys
Price: £3.99
Where To Get It: Steam

If there’s one thing that God games have taught me, it’s that being a God is hard. So much to manage, so little time, so many plates, just spinning in line… But, more recently, God games like Crest, Reus,and now Simmiland, have brought me to the conclusion that while being a God is hard, it’s not helped by humans. Demanding, contrarian, and often hard to teach humans.

(Citation Needed)

It also doesn’t help when the Manual for Good Godding gets mislaid.

Simmiland is, in essence, a real-time, puzzle God-game. You have cards, most of which have different effects on different biomes of the randomly generated world, and placing cards (Starting with your humans) takes Belief. From there, it’s working out what, placed where, gets the results you want. For example, minerals on grass gives you bog standard rock, useful for setting up. But placing rock in the ocean gets you coral, which, after you’ve researched medicine, needs to be Inspected for better medicine.

I’m not quite sure yet what Plague teaches my little Simmians, but it sure is cathartic when I get frustrated.

Sometimes, nuking something from orbit is the only way to be sure. And yes, there is a reason for this. A confusing reason… But a reason.

Nonetheless, the clock is ticking, and the clock is the size of your deck. So, at first, The End is guaranteed, you harvest belief based on what you managed to achieve, buy more God Cards at the God Shop, look at your compendium…

…And start all over. Aesthetically, the game is simple, but this doesn’t necessarily translate into being accessible. Cards in certain spots in your hand, for example, become a little difficult to select, be that for playing them, or selling them for belief in the tighter moments. The Compendium is the main source of remembering what a card does, and… You can’t see that from in-game. Two windows (Camp, and Wishes) are recommended to be open a fair bit of the time (Wishes all of the time, in fact, as they give you belief), but they clutter up the view. So part of the difficulty comes from struggling to remember what does what on your eventual, ideal path. Achievements at the end do help somewhat with this, giving you goals to shoot towards, but part of the “fun” is in finding out how the heck to get to these rewards.

Thing is, I can’t deny it isn’t interesting, for the same reason I found Reus interesting. Bashing things together to see what does what, building up a picture of the path I want, then aiming for it. But I also can’t deny it can’t be a frustrating experience. Human demands are sometimes very specific, and sometimes include things you just don’t know how to do yet. Heck, sometimes, it includes things that are a little irritating to do, like tropical biomes (Three suns, followed by a rain, presumably in a grass biome),or avoiding locking yourself into some dead ends. Individual games are short (Around 10 to fifteen minutes at most), but getting those achievements, those endings, that progress… That takes time.

Why… Why would you even wish for that? WHY?!?

A cool experiment in doing God Games a little differently, with elements that frustrate, and others that somewhat confuse (Why, precisely, does having a church limit your Simmians IQ to 120?)…Worth checking out, considering its price, but some unintuitive elements do bring it down somewhat.

The Mad Welshman reminds all those who haven’t discovered the secret of fire to Bang The Rocks Together, Folks!

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Crest (Review)

Source: Review Copy
Price: £6.99 (£9.99 Supporter Edition, £1.59 each for Art book and Soundtrack)
Where To Get It: Steam
Other Reviews: Early Access

Last time I looked at Crest, the indirect god game in which you set commandments for your tribes (and they try to weasel out of them as soon as they humanly can, using their faith as a bargaining chip) , food was a bit of a problem. I am, on the one hand, happy to report that this is no longer the case for the majority of your early to mid game.

At times, priests of cities will travel to others, to spread their version of The Word. In this particular case, I suspect the villagers were confused about this mention of berry bushes, although “Nookie” was understood.

Sustainability, on the other hand, is a bit of an issue, and, as you might have guessed… I mainly think it’s because my followers are a bunch of gits. My own fault, I suppose, because keeping your followers happy, and keeping them sustainable is, as it turns out, a bit of a struggle.

“Feed thyself!” , I cried. “Go forth, and plant many berries!” And lo, they did, and, for a while, it was good.

“Go forth, those of you with children!”, I declared. “Go forth, multiply further, and be fruitful!” And lo, they sort of did, grumbling a bit because they were currently into gathering as many resources as possible, not all this babymaking business. But eventually, and for a while, it was good.

“My children, now that you know about these Antelope things I have created, go forth, and eat well (But sustainably!)” I called. And lo, they went to that one with gusto, and, for a little while, it was good.

“Spread further, and learn more of this world!” I proclaimed. And funnily enough, not everybody was happy with that one. Or the one where I asked the folks near metal to mine it so they could grow strong (and maybe defend themselves against what I knew, in my omniscience, to be Lions, but they hadn’t quite gotten the picture yet.) At various points, these turned into things like “Let us make more children if we already have them!” , “Let us hunt ostriches if we’re near antelopes, because we’ve suddenly decided we like ostriches more!” , and, most odd of all, “Let’s expand this whole Desert thing until everybody can share in our bounty!”

And yea, did WelshGod look down upon what he had wrought, and mightily he did facepalm.

I hate to break it to you, my (sometimes, conditionally) loyal ones, but that doesn’t spread metal, gems, or even ostriches. So, er… I did nix these commandments, as far as I could with the faith I was given, and lo, faith in me did drop, so they did what the hell they wanted for a short while, until I had another bright idea.

“Young of the world, socialise with thy brethren, learn more of thy neighbour!” And lo, that one went down rather well. Of course, by this time, the antelope were looking a little thin, and the lions (they’d finally learned what they were… Painfully, in at least some cases) not very thin at all. Hummm…

“Go forth, those of you near lions, go forth with all that metal you have, and bang it loudly near the lion, to scare it from you unto the territory of those people you dislike!” I spoke. Well, more generally than that, working in Noun Verb Noun isn’t exactly a science, but they at least looked like they had the idea.

But, apart from, like, *one* war, everyone was talking, so most people were at *worst* apathetic! <3

And lo, that wasn’t very good at all. In fact, that’s the story of how a deity managed to kill the second city its followers had ever built, in under 10 minutes. Of course, by this time, I’d also taught my followers all but the final tier of words, which would have included useful things like “Ocean” (for sending my followers far, far away, to new lands), and firmly reached the point where, beyond keeping my followers alive and (relatively) faithful, there wasn’t really much of a goal.

Still, it was a fun time, being a deity, even if I was well on the way to cocking it up royally by the time I started writing this review. A shortish time (It takes only a few hours of judicious commandmenting to get the majority of words), but one I enjoyed a fair bit, due to a fair tutorial, an improved word discovery system, the fact that followers now fed themselves (and procreated, once they got the idea), and the lovely, low poly aesthetic of a sub-saharan world where survival very much meant living in balance with nature.

I didn’t get the hang of that bit (or rather, was heading toward the point where it was clear I hadn’t got the hang of that bit, not the point of no return), but for all my mistakes (and the aforementioned weaselling of my followers) , I can tell you this: Unhappy was a word they never learned. Also, annoyingly, Gems. But I’ll take the fact nobody knew they were unhappy as a win.

Mere days (minutes, in DeityTime) before the final follower of the village realised a single villager is not, in fact, scary to a lion that’s already eaten so many delicious humans.

The Mad Welshman is gonna be a god, he’s gonna be a naughty god…

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Crest (Early Access Review 1)

Source: Review Copy
Price: £7.99 (£10.99 Supporter Edition, £1.59 each for Art book and Soundtrack)
Where To Get It: Steam
Other Reviews: Release

Crest is a god game, and one that intrigues me. How can it not, when rather than direct control, doing quests, or building buildings for my worshippers, I’m giving commandments, telling folks things like “Peoples of the Savannah, explore your new home!” (With the caveat, added later of “Peoples of the Savannah, please don’t go near my lions, I haven’t ironed out that whole ‘Killing you’ thing yet… Soz.”)

TFW you want to say “YES, DO THAT!” , but don’t have the energy.

Alas, right now, I’m having to remind them, every now and again, to make food to eat. And considering my power is limited, moreso if I haven’t given them commandments they liked, replenishing every half year, it’s a little bit of Goddery that I can do without.

Well, still plenty of time for rejigging, and I can wait for that, as, beyond this niggle, the game is quite cool, both aesthetically and in terms of ideas. A low-poly, Sub-Saharan world, the lions and hippos and antelope (Oh my!) breed, wander, eat each other, while my stylised tribesfolk breed, wander, and… don’t eat each other. Unless commanded. Maybe. The UI, while a little confusing at first, is helped along by a tutorial that plays with each new game, teaching you about giving commandments in the form of [Worshipper type] – [(Do/Do Not) Verb] – [Target] .

It’s quite clever, really. There’s not a lot of ways you can outright order the destruction of resource based items, you can check what a commandment actually says before you send it, and, as noted, you have the twin considerations of limited, worshipper based power, not only to give commandments, but also to approve or deny when followers… Get creative with them. Silly me, not writing these things in sto- What, those got futzed around with too? Bloody humans.

I’m somewhat proud of myself for establishing trade among my chosen people. Even if, a few months later, most of them starved from being too busy to fish or farm.

Yes, commandments are, over time, either forgotten or changed (or both), and, as it turns out, followers are averse to three things: Commandments that don’t fit their (shifting) philosophy, being told “No, when I said build farms here, I didn’t mean turn everything nearby to a different terrain type”, or silence on whether their hot new idea for a commandment impresses the boss that gave it to them. On the one hand, it’s an interesting idea, and has some interesting balancing acts. On the other, that balancing can, with too many commandments, quickly turn into micromanagement, and oh boy, do I want to give commandments, because without things like exploring, I and my followers don’t get new words to play with quickly. Words like “Lion” (Important for “Don’t go near the lions, they’re bad for you”) , Metal (“You can make shit with this.”), or “Socialise” and “Trade” (Important once they’ve got more than one settlement.)

So, in essence, Crest is a God game trying something different, something potentially very interesting, but also has bits of micromanagement that, honestly, it could do without. Everything breeds on its own, can they maybe, once they have the idea, realise that farms and fishing are kind of important to their lives? I don’t know, maybe my commandments are interfering with each other. Maybe I’m just a Bad God. But I’m certainly waiting to see what comes closer to relea- PUT THAT DOWN, ABDU! NO, ROCKS ARE NOT FOR EATING, THEY’RE FOR MINING OR – ZOYA, HOW MANY TIMES HAVE I TOLD YOU NOT TO PLAY WITH LIONS, LOOK AT THE STATE OF Y-

If it’s dancing or has hearts over it, odds are it’s something going forth and multiplying. That constitutes a *lot* of this screenshot.

Eesh. Kids.

The Mad Welshman proooobably wouldn’t make a good parent. “Your Father Commands You To Lay Waste To The Sweet Shop!” probably wouldn’t go down well.

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