The Playstation Vita, for me, is a system that demands you experience a lot of early indie games, especially those that you might have missed. Newest on that list for me is the First of the Steamworld games.

Honestly, this has been in my backlog and downloaded to various systems for a good four or five years now, and finally getting to it felt great. Rusty's adventure through his Uncle's mine is a fun, relatively quick metroidvania style adventure, and I'm excited to try more of the series!

While historic and essential to the canon of the rise of indie games, Isaac's story leaves a lot to be desired in 2022. Many games tell a story opposing religion in a more nuanced, creative way, and just as many other titles handle the "Nintendo hard" playstyles of early modern indie games in a more fun, natural way. While the rogue-lite gameplay can be enjoyable, and the NES Zelda inspiration can be cute, ultimately the gross-out humor and so-so story failed to hold me.

What a beautiful game that I am nowhere near smart enough to play well- off to try the Switch version and see if I can make that work for me!