Source: Cashmoneys
Price: £10.99
Where To Get It: Steam

Enter the Gungeon is, at its core, entertaining. But it is definitely not the kind of entertaining that suits everybody. I’ll try to unpack that as we go along, but essentially, it’s a procedurally generated twin stick shooter set in… The Gungeon, home of more ammunition and projectile weapon puns than you can shake a boomstick at, along with a gun that can kill… The past. CUE OMINOUS MUSIC!

The game itself is pretty responsive, and, much like other procedural twin-sticks like Binding of Isaac or Nuclear Throne, I almost never feel like dying is anything but a failure on my part, as there’s quite a few tools to deal with the swarm of bullets that will head your way, including that most important one, the dodge roll with generous invincibility frames, and the limited “Blanks”, which destroy all visible bullets, and slightly knock back enemies. There’s a variety of guns, a variety of enemies, and a number of secrets and unlocks that were enough to stump the collective player base for all of a week or two (Which doesn’t sound like much, until you look at the guides, and realise how much was there to be discovered. So, er, go you, fellow players of Enter the Gungeon!)

However, the game likes keeping its secrets perhaps a little too much. I thankfully know what most of the items do as I get them, although rarely before I’ve used them for the first time, but the guns? I have no idea if a Wind-Up Gun (Which gets weaker the further into the clip it goes, as its spring firing mechanism winds down, presumably) is better or worse than the Barrel of Fish (Shoots fish, and an associated small puddle. Oh, and it sometimes stuns enemies), or the trusty RPG (Which… Well, blows things up but good, and is slow to fire and load.)

I get it, really I do. It’s like potions and weapons in a “proper” Roguelike (Quote marks fully intended), where you don’t know what a thing will do until you try it or somehow identify it, but I’m specifically mentioning the guns because I know that’s going to be a turn off for some, and I’d rather they knew now than getting all ranty later. Similarly, the difficulty in levels can also be somewhat erratic, to the point where I dread the mention of certain bosses, such as the Beholster (Has quite a few potential attacks), or the Gatling Gull in a completely open arena (Where I know most of the fight is going to be dodge rolling rather than shooting), while simply shrugging at others, such as The Bullet King, whose patterns are pretty easy to pin down. Enemies, also, are somewhat inconsistent, as a room full of bullet bats is a case of “Er, is this threatening?”, while Lead Maidens and the setup of a certain possible level 1 encounter (Screenshotted below) makes me break out in a cold sweat.

Basically, I’m saying it likes its mystery a bit much, and I think the difficulty “curve” is a bit… Inconsistent.

Otherwise, the music isn’t bad, the sound effects are varied and, in some cases, suitably meaty, the visuals are consistent and well put together, so the main thing I’d really have to say about Enter the Gungeon is that your mileage will vary a little, but will vary a lot more if you don’t like mystery about those things wot you’re firing other things from. I’m not really going to comment on the story, firstly because I have yet to complete a loop of the Gungeon, and secondly because… Well, you’re not really encountering all too much of it except towards the end. Overall, Enter the Gungeon is definitely a case of “Your Mileage May Vary.”

The Mad Welshman rolled behind a table. Someone was trying to kill him, and they were bullet shaped… THINK, DAMMIT, THINK… Do I know this casing?

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Source: Birthday Gift
Price: £14.99 (£18.99 with Soundtrack)
Where To Get It: GOG, Steam
Other Reviews: Release

StarCrawlers, by Juggernaut Games, is the latest in a few games this year and last that’s exploring the ol’ step based RPG formula that we know and love, and… Honestly? I’ve never been more scared of those galactic punching bags, Space Pirates, even if… I don’t think that’s entirely intentional at this stage. More on that later on.

If you’ve played more recent step-based RPGs (So named because they involve taking single “steps”, rather than smooth first person movement) like Legend of Grimrock, and older step-based games like the Might and Magic series (A heavy inspiration), then you’ll know what to expect with StarCrawlers: You go into dungeons, occasionally solving simple puzzles, but mostly using your party to beat the stuffing out of various beasties and achieve their objectives with the power of TEAMWORK. The kind of teamwork that RPG heroes do, that is… Maximizing the amount of pain they can lay onto a group.

There seems to be more on the way, but the basic gameplay is already there: You kill things for XP (Although not as much as you’ll get for doing the job overall), and loot things in order to make your pretty numbers go up, and occasionally take on story missions that seem to hint at Shenanigans (Capitalised because these are Space Opera Villain Shenanigans, the kind that results in the death of worlds, rather than banana custard over somebody’s face), and allow you to pick your side between various players in a sci-fi universe (From the UFP, Corporate Overlords, to people like the Workers’ Collective, essentially one of the few unions left around in the far future, it seems.) In between said story missions, you’ll do procedurally generated dungeons, with the puzzles and encounters being based on the tileset and objective. Mines, for example, have Radiant Ore, which, as far as I’m aware, only an Engineer can deal with, while Corporate Offices are the Hackers’ main playground. Similarly, protecting a scientist means exactly that, with no sweet reward if he dies before you leave, while one of the few mission types that doesn’t involve pissing someone off involves doing them a favour while fighting off animal or robot type enemies.

There’s quite a cast of characters, too, with eight being playable off the bat, and at least one unlockable through the first story mission, each with their own uses, quirks, and mechanics. The Prototype (A stupidly advanced killer robot with some programming issues, and the aforementioned unlockable), for example, is all about massive damage, but with the caveat that if you use their powers too much, they’ll malfunction, and odd things will happen, eventually leading to them being out of the fight. So far, of course, this is reading more like a feature list than a critical review, but it’s important to get across how complex the game is under the hood, before examining how accessible it is, and whether that complexity is good or bad.

Funnily enough, it’s fairly easy to get into, as the first few story missions are balanced around a single character, two at most, and it’s entirely possible to either get three out of the nine or so characters in your party (Four can be taken on any one mission), or two well kitted ones by the time you hit the Aurora Starliner (The third story mission, and the one where the game’s story starts kicking off.) There are also multiple saves, skill respecs (There aren’t, currently, enough skill points to achieve all of more than a single tree, out of three per character), and each character’s role is well explained, even if their quirks may take a little getting used to. Also helping is that characters are not, strictly speaking, gendered (Male or female is fine), although their characters seem firmly fixed at the present time (And are likely to remain so): The Void Psyker is a bit monkeycheese, because it turns out messing with the dark between the stars messes with your perception of reality, the Smuggler is morally grey, the Prototype is torn between being violent braggart and friendly, poetry creating nice person…

…The writing, as a result, is okay. It’s not going to win any awards, except perhaps Good Use of Archetypes/Stereotypes. But the combat is accessible, the tilesets are pretty nice, with some variation between them (Grimy starship, Nice starship, and various Plot Starships, as one example of the subsets), and their own little quirks (Including, in some missions, faction loot, which, if you take it, will worsen your relationship with… Very possibly the very person who hired you.) So far, it’s seeming like it’s well worth the money if you like step-based RPGs, with some cool stuff. And yet, as I often say, no game is perfect, and definitely no game that’s still in development. So what do you have to watch out for right now if you buy it while it’s still being made?

Balance. As I’ve mentioned, this is a complex game under the hood, and while it tutorialises quite well, new things get introduced, and then have to be fine tuned. A good example of this would be the aforementioned Space Pirates. Yes, I did get there.

I don’t take Space Pirate missions anymore. At least, not until they’ve been through the balance grinder… Because that “Normal: For Level 3” or the like? It Lies. Space Pirates come in groups of 1… to 5. And there’s rarely just one group. They have pretty average hit points for humans, and pretty average damage for humans… But they’re the only human group right now that I know of, that can start with a full group… Nearly everything else is monsters or some variety of robot, mostly individually weaker than the party. Space Pirates, on the other hand, are only “below par” because they don’t have the wide ability grouping that the party does… And this actually makes them more dangerous. They take time to whittle down, and all that time, the only thing they’re going to be doing is a constant stream of damage, damage that, of course, whittles you down. As I mentioned… There’s rarely one group, and nearly all of my sadquits (I can’t really call them ragequits, because I wasn’t angry, just resigned) have been through either missions involving them, or missions involving Corporate Officers (Who have at least twice the normal human HP, and can summon other monsters.)

The latter set of encounters, by the way, was my fault. This game already has the beginnings of a faction system, and, as it turns out, pissing off Chimera Biopharm (Think the Umbrella Corporation) was a bad idea. Because the very next mission after I’d hit the “Okay, we want you dead now” threshold (Something like -60 Reputation), I’d decided to raid Chimera… And they welcomed me with a series of encounters that rapidly picked my party apart, even turning up in some missions only slightly related to them because… Well, they really wanted me dead!

So, right now, StarCrawlers is in a place that interests me critically, but I’ll freely admit isn’t for everybody: The midgame so far (About Level 5) currently feels a little grindy, and is about where the missions started blending into one another for me (Mainly because I had to do more of them to get to those aforementioned Story Missions), and I’ll happily admit that I have yet to get to the current “endgame”, the full levelling of my characters, because sooner or later, I run into one of those balancing issues, and it kills my interest in that save.

Do I think the game has promise? Yes, it’s pretty damn clear that Juggernaut knows their RPGs, and knows how to put them together. They’ve shown, over previous updates, that they do know they have to balance things, and I’m as confident as I can be that they can get that mix right. Similarly, a lot of effort has gone into both accessibility and environment, and even the placeholder designs for newer enemies such as Security Turrets shows that mix of wanting to give an impression of the final design, while concentrating on how they work. Do I think it’s worth a gamble of £15? Yes. But the usual Early Access caveat applies: Be Aware It’s Still In Development. It may only start to seem obvious after your twentieth or so mission, which hints at why I feel this game has promise, but it will happen.

In the meantime, I’m going to keep plugging away until release. The game definitely seems worth that.

The Mad Welshman drew the powers of the Dark to him, and giggled. He had such sights to show!

Filed under: Early Access Releases, Game Reviews by admin

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Source: Birthday Gift (From family, to clarify)
Price: £10.99
Where To Get It: Steam, GOG, Humble Store

Hoo boy. When you spend time on a game knowing you have other things to do, important things, you know you’re onto a winner. On that note, I need to eat. Both of these things are fitting for Stardew Valley, and I will elucidate more once I’ve got some food in my belly.

Stardew Valley, by Concerned Ape, is quite obviously inspired by Harvest Moon and its fighty cousin Rune Factory, as you are an office worker who has decided he wants to get out of the rat race, and, er… Into farming, which is a whole different kind of rat race. Pastoralism, Ho! So he moves to the village of Stardew Valley, and starts a whole new life, with backbreaking labour, and never enough time in the day.

Or, like me, he could largely ignore the farm the moment he got a fishing rod and a sword, beating up slimes and catching new and amazing fish. It’s the sort of game where yes, Farming is a focus of the game, but by no means the be all and end all. There’s the social aspect of the town, the collecting, and… I need a wiki to keep track of everything I might possibly want to do. Which, strangely enough, is a problem. Either you’re going to go to a wiki to know “How do I do thing?”, or you’re going to be playing more than once. Part of the reason this review has come out so slowly is that I took the latter option. The game does some tutorialising well, but expects you to learn other things on your own.

But the thing is, it’s also a good thing that there’s so much to do. The world is relatively small, but you don’t feel that, because it’s jam packed with interesting decisions and interactions. It has character, from the visual design (Friendly and cartoony), to the sound design (The music is lovely, and the sounds support your actions.) I even enjoy the collectathon of the Community Center, despite normally hating such game measures, because it feels part of the spirit of the game. Essentially, it’s pretty cohesive, and even some of the bugs are amusing, such as Abigail’s seeming desire to eat Quartz (“Oh, how did you know I was hungry?”.) Also helping is, hey, relationships aren’t limited by your gender, and there’s a lot going on there, too! As such, I find myself drawn in, because there’s that “Just one more ho- Wait, it’s 5AM?” factor to the game.

Of course, the final problem with so much to do in Stardew Valley is… How can I cover it all? I could give you lots of examples of both good and bad (The well, for example, seems largely useless to most players in the early game… But it is useful if you’re farming extensively), but all I can really say is “It is mostly good, and enjoyable, if you liked Harvest Moon, Rune Factory, or Recettear, this game may well be worth laying down your money for.”

There. Now, if you’ll excuse me, I have a budding geologist to woo, and a dungeon to fully explore, and all the fish to find, and –

The Mad Welshman was not found for several days after this review, whereupon somebody realised that what they thought was a duvet was playing Stardew Valley.

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Source: Cashmoneys
Price: £10.99
Where To Get It: Steam
Other Reviews: Early Access

The satirical computer board game of being a capitalist douchebag (and Gremlin) released earlier this week, and I finally got a chance to properly give the multiplayer a go. As it turns out, I’m an evil, evil man. But you knew that already. So let’s talk about the game.

Gremlins Inc, essentially, is a tactical race for points, where the cards you use don’t only affect other players and give you points, they’re also the way you move. As such, you have to change your plans on the fly quite often, as while you could try holding on to that lovely card with all the victory points, you might need to get to a more immediate reward in a hurry… You know, before others do to you what you would do unto them. Despite being competitive as all heck, ranked multiplayer seems pretty relaxing, although due to one of the reasons it’s relaxing (Chat is mostly just emoticons and some stock phrases), it can be hard to tell sometimes.

Either way, playing against players is a very different experience than playing against the AI. Because the players are less likely to dick you over. Which segues nicely into one of the “problems” of Gremlins Inc. : Challenge mode is tough, because the AI is good. Or, more accurately, because the AI is aggressive. I have yet to gain three lamps in any of the challenges, despite them mostly being longer games than ranked. Because the AI players take every chance they get to dick you over if it looks like you’re winning.

In a way, though, this is still revealing, because it shows how the entire game is built around threat perception. And there are lots of threats to perceive, from a player having lots of money (Used to buy cards, especially ones that give you those sweet, sweet victory points), lots of votes (Meaning they’re going to become governor, get a victory point, and become immune to bribe or police search tiles, letting them keep their money in places you wouldn’t want them to), lots of EEEEEVIL (An indicator of how many “selfish” cards they’ve played, such as Robbery… 350 easy money, but also lowers everyone’s income), and even the not often seen Prison Experience (Which establishes how much of a threat they can be if you’re in the Jail with them.) The computer is good at establishing this, whereas in multiplayer? It’s much less certain. You could slip by unnoticed for many turns, not considered a threat until BAM, one Infernal Machine and an instant jump to the top of the board. Or, of course, you could be heading toward the Astral Plane, somebody will say “Aha, they are about to play a good card” , and slap you down for your hubris.

I haven’t had this much fun playing ranked since Bad Company 2. And the game is cunning in that your rank slowly goes down for each day you don’t play, allowing newer players a chance to climb the ladder when others get tired of playing. The game also tries to keep the interactions friendly by limiting them, and it seems as though that’s working. Seems. It’s kind of difficult to tell, but I’m pretty sure most people are being friendly, gasping at others’ misfortune, asking if they’re alright, and cheering each other on as somebody makes a canny play.

Overall, this is a tightly designed computer board game whose main flaw is the same flaw of any board game… Once you become familiar enough with it, the entertainment lessens. But nonetheless, I’d recommend it as a good example of computer board games, and a game at a reasonable price.

(Other reading: The Early Access Review)

The Mad Welshman smiled as the gremlins told him he’d be “Right at home in Clockwork Town.” As another failed experiment due to lax safety measures (They cost money, after all!) exploded, he smiled. Yes… He was… Home.

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

I didn’t really want to take a look at Soul Axiom before release, as it was a puzzle adventure, and game fatigue would possibly have made me forget this one was being released. I’m sort of glad I didn’t, and sort of frustrated. Oh, and it’s by a team of Welsh developers, specifically Wales Interactive. Let’s see how my countryfolk have done, eh?

Soul Axiom is a sequel of sorts to Master Reboot, an earlier game, but knowledge of what happened there isn’t strictly required, as the digital afterlife has gotten a 2.0 upgrade… One which has, as you might expect, gone horribly wrong. So it’s up to you to, er… Solve puzzles using contextual abilities like deleting/repairing things, blowing things up, and a sort of object-rewind feature. Also collecting PEMO data (Memory documents shaped like the creepiest banging cymbal monkey I’ve seen in a long time) and the eyes of G.O.D (Acronym deliberate for plot reasons) to expand the story. With them, you get a more complete picture of how exactly everything went wrong, and without them… It stays pretty confusing for three quarters of the game. Which is a problem.

Why is it a problem? Because I’m spending more time looking for monkeys than I am moving the story forward, and, while it’s possible to go back and get monkeys, I have one shot at it, because… One save.

So, nice things: It has pretty good colour blindness support for the actual puzzles. Thank the Holies, somebody listens when the word “Accessibility” is used. The soundtrack is fairly emotional, from the melancholy bells of the Lighthouse area to the beats of the aztec monkeyland (Although, as a Welshman, I’m confused. Why all the talk about food in the jungle song? I mean, they are saying “Bwyta”, aren’t they, Wales Interactive?) Once the story gets going, it’s okay, with a four character tragedy unfolding that affects the very concept of death itself. Dr. Davies, who discovered Deus Energy; Solomon, a politician and ex-soldier; Dana, a movie actress; and Anastasia Strazh, who had previously worked with Dr. Davies.

Of course, it’s balanced out by the bad in this case: The story is pretty hammy at times, and until you realise one of the characters is a movie star, their “Memories” will make absolutely zero sense. Many of the puzzles seem there for the sake of puzzles (The “Move the skulls to match colours” puzzle is possibly the most egregious so far), and that single save thing is a real git, considering there are three possible endings, one for three of the characters, and the trigger isn’t obvious as to which you’re going to get. The paths genuinely don’t have any differences I’ve noticed except for the end, although getting all three leads to something extra. Just as, y’know, collecting everything does.

This, in essence, is my core problem with Soul Axiom: Whether you think you do or not, not collecting everything is a lesser experience, while collecting everything… Sometimes requires either a guide, or doing everything to everything you can. For example, in the museum… Look up from time to time. Most people I know don’t do that so much. The game is often fun (With the possible exception of the drones in the War Zone. I hate timing puzzles with instafails), and death doesn’t seem to have much of a consequence except for achievements, but it’s constantly reminding you that it is a game, and a potentially interesting story suffers as a result.

I’d still say give it a go if you like first person puzzle games with FPS style movement, just be aware that… Well, the collectables might not be as optional as they first appear.

The Mad Welshman edited his memory of this article after writing it, but he keeps finding creepy cymbal monkeys in his apartment as a result. The IT Helpdesk at TMW has remained unhelpful in solving this problem.

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