FearfulPresence
1998
2010
1993
2016
2020
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1996
2023
2020
An interesting if very frustratring real-time action roguelite / particle simulator thing. I don't entirely know what to make of this, it's incredibly hard---not itself a dealbreaker for a roguelike by any means---and pretty frustrating, but I'm not necessarily against the idea of going back to it sometime to do a proper deep dive. Time will tell if that ever happens, though.
2023
The charitable read on this is that it's a really good proof-of-concept. There's a lot of technical ambition here and tons of in-jokes and such about the DOOM modding community, but that's put in service of an actually interesting experience only intermittently. The part that actually takes place in the regular house itself? Technically impressive but not anything crazy. The weird little meta-tricks with looping through Underhalls and back to the main game? Now we're getting somewhere. The liminal space-themed areas where you have to fight weird monsters? That's the good shit. And I wish more of the game were that and less "look at this cool stuff I can do in GZDoom."
Also, not to put too fine a point on it; "Everywhere At The End of Time meets House of Leaves as a DOOM wad" is an interesting synthesis of ideas but by its very nature it's leaning heavily on those influences. I could completely understand someone playing through this whole thing and coming out underwhelmed.
Me though? I'm whelmed. I thought it would be cool and it was cool.
Also, not to put too fine a point on it; "Everywhere At The End of Time meets House of Leaves as a DOOM wad" is an interesting synthesis of ideas but by its very nature it's leaning heavily on those influences. I could completely understand someone playing through this whole thing and coming out underwhelmed.
Me though? I'm whelmed. I thought it would be cool and it was cool.
2023
Really love this one. Excellent visual novel with some interesting themes going on; what love really is, what it means to be human, and how much that's actually worth, if anything.
I dock half a point for the cheap pop at dating sims in the Damsel route (despite this being a dating sim) but that's a very minor complaint in the grand scheme of things. Game's also absolutely gorgeous to look at and has a lovely soundtrack. You really can't go wrong with this one.
I dock half a point for the cheap pop at dating sims in the Damsel route (despite this being a dating sim) but that's a very minor complaint in the grand scheme of things. Game's also absolutely gorgeous to look at and has a lovely soundtrack. You really can't go wrong with this one.