Desnio
Easily the best written game of all time. It's not even close.
However, for game that is so unique and incredible, how is it even possible to get hard-locked and soft-locked at so many different point? You can pass a savoir-faire check to jump over ledge to reach the harbor almost immediately. The only way out of the harbor is to ask the union boss, Ervrart Claire, for a keycard. Ervrart Claire will hit your morale, so without preemptively upgraded volition or buying morale charges, you are effectively stuck in the harbor. The only option is to pass the time by by repeatedly talking to same union worker until Ervrart is asleep so you can steal the keycard at night.
More egregiously, if you fail to collect enough money to pay for rent on either of the first two days, you can NOT even pass the time, and you are forced to load a previous. I.e. you MUST save-scum at least few white-checks.
Somehow, this is something the creators seem to be ok with this stuff: https://steamcommunity.com/app/632470/discussions/0/1755772078710323472/
I also wish there was a little bit more player agency. Instead of Kim telling you you could use his car headlights to read your ledger, maybe that could have been left up to you to try out.
However, for game that is so unique and incredible, how is it even possible to get hard-locked and soft-locked at so many different point? You can pass a savoir-faire check to jump over ledge to reach the harbor almost immediately. The only way out of the harbor is to ask the union boss, Ervrart Claire, for a keycard. Ervrart Claire will hit your morale, so without preemptively upgraded volition or buying morale charges, you are effectively stuck in the harbor. The only option is to pass the time by by repeatedly talking to same union worker until Ervrart is asleep so you can steal the keycard at night.
More egregiously, if you fail to collect enough money to pay for rent on either of the first two days, you can NOT even pass the time, and you are forced to load a previous. I.e. you MUST save-scum at least few white-checks.
Somehow, this is something the creators seem to be ok with this stuff: https://steamcommunity.com/app/632470/discussions/0/1755772078710323472/
I also wish there was a little bit more player agency. Instead of Kim telling you you could use his car headlights to read your ledger, maybe that could have been left up to you to try out.
2016
This review contains spoilers
Most of time, the difficulty of the puzzles comes more from obfuscation and less from genuine challenge. An entire section of puzzles involves listening to really fast audio cues. If you're deaf, you're just fucked.
For other sections, if you're colorblind, you're fucked.
Some puzzles might require you to just remember the solution to previous puzzles. That's it.
For one puzzle, you have to watch an hour-long video preaching pseudo-science, while holding left-click.
I suspect Jonathan Blows knows this, so he doesn't add accessibility that plenty of successful games include, like colorblind, caption, or fast-forward animations options.
There's also a lot of wasted potential in the environmental puzzles.
For other sections, if you're colorblind, you're fucked.
Some puzzles might require you to just remember the solution to previous puzzles. That's it.
For one puzzle, you have to watch an hour-long video preaching pseudo-science, while holding left-click.
I suspect Jonathan Blows knows this, so he doesn't add accessibility that plenty of successful games include, like colorblind, caption, or fast-forward animations options.
There's also a lot of wasted potential in the environmental puzzles.
I was really into the story when I first played it, but now, I don't get how Rafe was the only person who read the CNN breaking news headline that Hector Alcazar had already died. It would actually be more interesting if Hector Alcazar was a late third faction to add more fodder, maybe even a different enemy type(s), for Nathan to shoot and add another PoV to the game's themes on greed (man Alcazar had such a great voice actor too! TT).
Playing the game again, it's too easy to notice how the game is so unnecessarily bloated by climbing sections and basic puzzles that Naughty Dog still thinks are too difficult for their audience that an npc companion and Nate's journal need to walk the play through them. E.g. there's a puzzle in Scotland that involves filling a bucket with water carrying it to the right spot. But there's no prompt to pick up the bucket until Sam exclaim "Hey look, a bucket! Maybe Henry Alcazar coughs Naughty Dog* coughs wants you to pick up hte bucket, and i don't know, maybe fill up with water. Why else would there be bucket perfectly laying under the light after several hundred years? HMMMMMMmmmm?"
It's annoying Zelda games, it's annoying here.
Unfortunately, Naughty Dog's next game only gets more bloated and more incoherent.
Playing the game again, it's too easy to notice how the game is so unnecessarily bloated by climbing sections and basic puzzles that Naughty Dog still thinks are too difficult for their audience that an npc companion and Nate's journal need to walk the play through them. E.g. there's a puzzle in Scotland that involves filling a bucket with water carrying it to the right spot. But there's no prompt to pick up the bucket until Sam exclaim "Hey look, a bucket! Maybe Henry Alcazar coughs Naughty Dog* coughs wants you to pick up hte bucket, and i don't know, maybe fill up with water. Why else would there be bucket perfectly laying under the light after several hundred years? HMMMMMMmmmm?"
It's annoying Zelda games, it's annoying here.
Unfortunately, Naughty Dog's next game only gets more bloated and more incoherent.
With so many fun party games, it blows my mind that this is not just as Mario Party or even Battle for Bikini Bottom.
Taking off points because when I was kid, I was too stupid to understand how to manually save the game.
Taking off points because when I was kid, I was too stupid to understand how to manually save the game.
2017
Imagine if Smash Bros Ultimate had next to zero customisation options to even toggle items/hazards. Suddenly, it feels like Smash Bros Ultimate has far less content and replayabiliy. Sometimes, I just want to drift without getting lightning-bottled off the track, just like how sometimes I don't want to have to deal with Rathalos in an online Ultimate game.
2021
Stephen's Sausage Roll (SSR), but (a) Bonfire Peaks (BP) actually eases you into the game, (b) it's not visual vomit, (c) it has some banger tunes, and (d) movement feels much better even though there are similar limitations (i.e. gamefeel).
I bring up Stephen's Sausage Roll because both have initial similarites. In SSR, the aim is to cook large sausage over grills. In BP, the aim is to set fire to a crate of belongings. Both player characters occupy one grid space, and with a fork/crate it becomes two grid spaces. Both characters rotate in 90º.
However, I think the movement in BP is much snappier and smoother, so solving/experimenting with a puzzle usually faster.
The beauty of puzzles in BP come from how difficult they can be, yet the puzzles can be manually completed in mere seconds once you have the solutions.
Although it does pretty good job for the most part: I think of one mechanic that isn't properly introduced and does not have a dedicated set of puzzles to introduce it: you can put ANY crate over the fire to char it. Doing this makes the crate break when you step off it, like the standard breakable blocks in the game.
I bring up Stephen's Sausage Roll because both have initial similarites. In SSR, the aim is to cook large sausage over grills. In BP, the aim is to set fire to a crate of belongings. Both player characters occupy one grid space, and with a fork/crate it becomes two grid spaces. Both characters rotate in 90º.
However, I think the movement in BP is much snappier and smoother, so solving/experimenting with a puzzle usually faster.
The beauty of puzzles in BP come from how difficult they can be, yet the puzzles can be manually completed in mere seconds once you have the solutions.
Although it does pretty good job for the most part: I think of one mechanic that isn't properly introduced and does not have a dedicated set of puzzles to introduce it: you can put ANY crate over the fire to char it. Doing this makes the crate break when you step off it, like the standard breakable blocks in the game.
2016
Easily the prettitest pixel game.
2015
My big gripe with the game is, even though the game gives so many great story reasons to back-track, back-tracking can still be super annoying without a run option (especially when walking all the way to the start of the game for some secret dialogue at the end of the pacifist run).
Even Deltarune Chapter 1 makes fun of it in a pretty funny gag.
Even Deltarune Chapter 1 makes fun of it in a pretty funny gag.
2018
Easily one of best the roguelikes (roguelites?). On top of platinuming the game on Steam, I have also beaten the game with every squad, on every number of islands, all on hard mode.
It's so incredible at reducing the impact of any rng, it makes almost every other tactics game unplayble. Whenever I pick up Xcom or Wildermyth, I can't help but want to switch to Into the Breach when the rng in those games seems like it's lying to my face (e.g. repeatedly missing ~90% attack). It's exactly because of the reduced impact of rng elements that IoB can allow for really organic puzzles and creative solutions. I.e it's as if the best moments of Hearthstone happened all the time instead of once a full-moon if you're lucky.
However, rng can still completely destroy ~1% of runs on hard mode. You can never know which Vek will spawn from burrows, and you can never know how those newly spawned vek will move in the next turn. It's also much easier for runs to be ruined if you pick one of the weakest squads (Blitzkrieg, Secret Squad). Sometimes, a scenario that looks impossible at first glance is still impossible.
Into the Breach could have also benefited from some more narrative context like in Hades, or Enter the Gungeon. It's so hard to not wish for the squad select screen to also be a hub area where you can talk and interact with the pilots and co. Just some opportunity for the pilots to show off some more chemistry and personality than just the interspersed bits during battles.
I also wish this game had an easy squad/vek/level editor like Baba is You and One Step from Eden. Some of the mods I've tried from github are fantastic, but it's github so it's not very accessible.
Bonus:
This is very rare in games, but the some of the achievements in IoB can clue you in into how you can play the squads better. Usually, achievements just spoil moments for you.
It's so incredible at reducing the impact of any rng, it makes almost every other tactics game unplayble. Whenever I pick up Xcom or Wildermyth, I can't help but want to switch to Into the Breach when the rng in those games seems like it's lying to my face (e.g. repeatedly missing ~90% attack). It's exactly because of the reduced impact of rng elements that IoB can allow for really organic puzzles and creative solutions. I.e it's as if the best moments of Hearthstone happened all the time instead of once a full-moon if you're lucky.
However, rng can still completely destroy ~1% of runs on hard mode. You can never know which Vek will spawn from burrows, and you can never know how those newly spawned vek will move in the next turn. It's also much easier for runs to be ruined if you pick one of the weakest squads (Blitzkrieg, Secret Squad). Sometimes, a scenario that looks impossible at first glance is still impossible.
Into the Breach could have also benefited from some more narrative context like in Hades, or Enter the Gungeon. It's so hard to not wish for the squad select screen to also be a hub area where you can talk and interact with the pilots and co. Just some opportunity for the pilots to show off some more chemistry and personality than just the interspersed bits during battles.
I also wish this game had an easy squad/vek/level editor like Baba is You and One Step from Eden. Some of the mods I've tried from github are fantastic, but it's github so it's not very accessible.
Bonus:
This is very rare in games, but the some of the achievements in IoB can clue you in into how you can play the squads better. Usually, achievements just spoil moments for you.
2009
Easily the worst part of this game is how the game is patched with more of an intent to just keep the game in constant flex and have streamers engaged than to actually improve the game.
There are so many patches over the years where both verteran players and the larger community of players feel unanimously dumb-founded by. Then a few weeks later there will be a patch mainly to just revert all those changes.
The patches almost feel to exist to just get you ask "maybe the game will fun if I return to it after all these years?"
Who knows, maybe I just want Aurelion Sol to be playable.
There are so many patches over the years where both verteran players and the larger community of players feel unanimously dumb-founded by. Then a few weeks later there will be a patch mainly to just revert all those changes.
The patches almost feel to exist to just get you ask "maybe the game will fun if I return to it after all these years?"
Who knows, maybe I just want Aurelion Sol to be playable.
2018
Mario Odyssey moons, but actually good
This game now makes me permanently livid when I go back to the Witcher 3 and Geralt activates his witcher sense to tell me that the monster footprints look like they were left behind by a monster.
2019
Easily the best written game of all time. It's not even close.
However, for game that is so unique and incredible, how is it even possible to get hard-locked and soft-locked at so many different point? You can pass a savoir-faire check to jump over ledge to reach the harbor almost immediately. The only way out of the harbor is to ask the union boss, Ervrart Claire, for a keycard. Ervrart Claire will hit your morale, so without preemptively upgraded volition or buying morale charges, you are effectively stuck in the harbor. The only option is to pass the time by by repeatedly talking to same union worker until Ervrart is asleep so you can steal the keycard at night.
More egregiously, if you fail to collect enough money to pay for rent on either of the first two days, you can NOT even pass the time, and you are forced to load a previous. I.e. you MUST save-scum at least few white-checks.
Somehow, this is something the creators seem to be ok with this stuff: https://steamcommunity.com/app/632470/discussions/0/1755772078710323472/
I also wish there was a little bit more player agency. Instead of Kim telling you you could use his car headlights to read your ledger, maybe that could have been left up to you to try out.
However, for game that is so unique and incredible, how is it even possible to get hard-locked and soft-locked at so many different point? You can pass a savoir-faire check to jump over ledge to reach the harbor almost immediately. The only way out of the harbor is to ask the union boss, Ervrart Claire, for a keycard. Ervrart Claire will hit your morale, so without preemptively upgraded volition or buying morale charges, you are effectively stuck in the harbor. The only option is to pass the time by by repeatedly talking to same union worker until Ervrart is asleep so you can steal the keycard at night.
More egregiously, if you fail to collect enough money to pay for rent on either of the first two days, you can NOT even pass the time, and you are forced to load a previous. I.e. you MUST save-scum at least few white-checks.
Somehow, this is something the creators seem to be ok with this stuff: https://steamcommunity.com/app/632470/discussions/0/1755772078710323472/
I also wish there was a little bit more player agency. Instead of Kim telling you you could use his car headlights to read your ledger, maybe that could have been left up to you to try out.
2020
Fuck Hell Pass 13 and Tier 7 Reva
2018
A perfect video game