donproject
2013
You see, there's 4 related pictures and you have to guess the word.
It is a pretty simple concept but entertaining for what it is: A casual game you play on the bus or while waiting for something to happen. The game shows you four pictures, a bunch of letters, and some slots for those letters, then you use them to type in the word that goes with all the pictures. Solid brain teaser and one your mom probably still loves to play.
At this point, it's been a million years since I downloaded this and actually played it, but opening it up in the modern era, there's a lot more going on than I remember. The haptic feedback is maybe a bit over the top but kind of fun. There's a number of currencies and things to pay for, of course. There are Daily Puzzles and a minigame that is just Wordle, apparently? They'll also keep track of your "IQ" which all the mobile ads tell me is very important. It has all the little dopamine triggers that casual players love interspersed between ads for other puzzle games that are basically the same quick-paced, microtransaction-filled addictions harvesting our data to sell us more addictions...
At any rate, if you're waiting for your appointment or you just need to see a lot of stock photography, this game could be a choice you make.
Review from thedonproject.com
It is a pretty simple concept but entertaining for what it is: A casual game you play on the bus or while waiting for something to happen. The game shows you four pictures, a bunch of letters, and some slots for those letters, then you use them to type in the word that goes with all the pictures. Solid brain teaser and one your mom probably still loves to play.
At this point, it's been a million years since I downloaded this and actually played it, but opening it up in the modern era, there's a lot more going on than I remember. The haptic feedback is maybe a bit over the top but kind of fun. There's a number of currencies and things to pay for, of course. There are Daily Puzzles and a minigame that is just Wordle, apparently? They'll also keep track of your "IQ" which all the mobile ads tell me is very important. It has all the little dopamine triggers that casual players love interspersed between ads for other puzzle games that are basically the same quick-paced, microtransaction-filled addictions harvesting our data to sell us more addictions...
At any rate, if you're waiting for your appointment or you just need to see a lot of stock photography, this game could be a choice you make.
Review from thedonproject.com
2021
A beautiful way to punish yourself, I guess?
Honestly, I died too many times playing this game. Look, some people are into experiencing pain - I get it - but just give us soft ones a difficulty option! As it is, I made it to the second boss, almost beat it first time, and then, as I died due to my own clumsiness once again, said out loud, "Well, that's enough for me."
The game is wonderfully crafted and a joy to play (until you die). It looks exactly how it should, the control of the character is precisely what you'd expect and feels intuitive as well as exciting, the sound is flawless, and the DualSense magic is magical. The story, from what I could piece together, seems weird, maybe? The level design is pretty interesting for being a bunch of "rooms" that are sort of randomly connected together. Finding new weapons and alien tech was a decent addition, though the randomness of what you discover and therefore had available to use on each run could be annoying. There were definitely enough projectiles.
I think it needed a bit more of the roguelike feature where you unlock a powerful thing (like the yellow sword) and you get to use it in the next run. Every run feels too much like starting over instead of building on the last one. Really, the only thing that improves after a run is your brain and who wants that?
"Oh hey, what's this?" DEAD
Review from thedonproject.com
Honestly, I died too many times playing this game. Look, some people are into experiencing pain - I get it - but just give us soft ones a difficulty option! As it is, I made it to the second boss, almost beat it first time, and then, as I died due to my own clumsiness once again, said out loud, "Well, that's enough for me."
The game is wonderfully crafted and a joy to play (until you die). It looks exactly how it should, the control of the character is precisely what you'd expect and feels intuitive as well as exciting, the sound is flawless, and the DualSense magic is magical. The story, from what I could piece together, seems weird, maybe? The level design is pretty interesting for being a bunch of "rooms" that are sort of randomly connected together. Finding new weapons and alien tech was a decent addition, though the randomness of what you discover and therefore had available to use on each run could be annoying. There were definitely enough projectiles.
I think it needed a bit more of the roguelike feature where you unlock a powerful thing (like the yellow sword) and you get to use it in the next run. Every run feels too much like starting over instead of building on the last one. Really, the only thing that improves after a run is your brain and who wants that?
"Oh hey, what's this?" DEAD
Review from thedonproject.com
2022
I'm sure everyone calls this game Tony Hawk with guns but that's exactly what it is.
Maybe dystopian future Running Man + Tony Hawk is a little better? Either way, you roller skate around and shoot stuff, doing tricks to magically reload your guns, as a part of some sort of fight to the death tournament. The game is heavily stylized as a 1970's cartoon with the Atari font everywhere. There is a subtle story of a revolution happening outside the tournament that I would have liked to explore a bit, but the game focused on winning the championship and keeping politics out of sports just like all the oppressors desire.... Anyways, it looks wonderful. It sounds great. It plays... fine.
It took me a big chunk of playtime to get used to the controls. As a long-time THPS player, I kept using button combos from that game and being a little miffed when the character didn't do what I wanted. Adding in aiming and shooting made focusing on tricks tougher and playing the game, overall, felt more difficult than it needed to be. That is, until the Semi-finals when I gave up on trying to progress without assists. Turned on invincibility and no challenges needed to progress and I found the gameplay way more enjoyable! In other words, just managing the controls was enough of a challenge for me to have fun with this game. Got my championship trophy and feel fine having cheated my way to the top.
Victory!
Review from thedonproject.com
Maybe dystopian future Running Man + Tony Hawk is a little better? Either way, you roller skate around and shoot stuff, doing tricks to magically reload your guns, as a part of some sort of fight to the death tournament. The game is heavily stylized as a 1970's cartoon with the Atari font everywhere. There is a subtle story of a revolution happening outside the tournament that I would have liked to explore a bit, but the game focused on winning the championship and keeping politics out of sports just like all the oppressors desire.... Anyways, it looks wonderful. It sounds great. It plays... fine.
It took me a big chunk of playtime to get used to the controls. As a long-time THPS player, I kept using button combos from that game and being a little miffed when the character didn't do what I wanted. Adding in aiming and shooting made focusing on tricks tougher and playing the game, overall, felt more difficult than it needed to be. That is, until the Semi-finals when I gave up on trying to progress without assists. Turned on invincibility and no challenges needed to progress and I found the gameplay way more enjoyable! In other words, just managing the controls was enough of a challenge for me to have fun with this game. Got my championship trophy and feel fine having cheated my way to the top.
Victory!
Review from thedonproject.com
2014
Pretty fun and interesting for about 2048 seconds.
If you haven't heard of 2048, it's a puzzle game where you slide to smash equal blocks together and they add up to powers of 2 (obviously). I'm surprised the New York Times hasn't purchased (or cloned it) it and added it to their puzzle section, actually, as it was just about Wordle-level popular about ten years ago. It's easy to access and gets moderately difficult unless you look up a strategy guide. Then, you'll see there's not a ton of difficulty to get a good score, but there is still a small community out there searching for high scores and large tiles. Must be exciting for them.
As with all puzzle games for me, I do pretty well at the start but don't have the perseverance to do better than that. One of my math nerd colleagues stuck with it much longer than I did but it didn't spend long on the part of my phone I look at, even with social pressure. It had a good run and I'm sure it will pop up in some retro game content in the future, where us olds will say "Oh yeah, I remember that game!" and then go back to our nap.
If you like a simple puzzle and haven't played it yet, it might be worth a power-of-two minutes of your time...
Review from thedonproject.com
If you haven't heard of 2048, it's a puzzle game where you slide to smash equal blocks together and they add up to powers of 2 (obviously). I'm surprised the New York Times hasn't purchased (or cloned it) it and added it to their puzzle section, actually, as it was just about Wordle-level popular about ten years ago. It's easy to access and gets moderately difficult unless you look up a strategy guide. Then, you'll see there's not a ton of difficulty to get a good score, but there is still a small community out there searching for high scores and large tiles. Must be exciting for them.
As with all puzzle games for me, I do pretty well at the start but don't have the perseverance to do better than that. One of my math nerd colleagues stuck with it much longer than I did but it didn't spend long on the part of my phone I look at, even with social pressure. It had a good run and I'm sure it will pop up in some retro game content in the future, where us olds will say "Oh yeah, I remember that game!" and then go back to our nap.
If you like a simple puzzle and haven't played it yet, it might be worth a power-of-two minutes of your time...
Review from thedonproject.com
2020
The inverse of Death Stranding? Or maybe the baby sibling of Cyberpunk 2077?
It is a dark and brooding night and you just want to drive your delivery ship to the place to get a thing to deliver to a different place. It is raining and hard to see due to all the pixels. You land, but you have to walk very far to get the package which takes forever, so you chat with a friendly stranger but it seems no one wants anything other than deliveries or transportation from you. There's a mood, but I think it might be slight annoyance? Anyways, you should probably save the city on your first night here, I guess.
There are a lot of good ideas in this game but they don't quite hit right. It is interesting looking but hard for me to maneuver around in a ship with squishy steering and moderately poor depth perception. It is an ambitious story but the voice acting is kind of a letdown and characters don't seem to be speaking to each other at times. It's a moderately large world, but there isn't a ton of difference between regions and having all the items on the map right from the get go makes navigation repetitive and kind of boring.
Overall, the 9 hours I spent with Cloudpunk were fine but not awe inspiring. I really could have used a chapter select or something when I messed up a timed delivery, and fast travel would be a wonderful addition, but otherwise I think just a slightly better execution of these good ideas would have made this great for me.
I did like Camus, even though they pronounced his name wrong.
Review from thedonproject.com
It is a dark and brooding night and you just want to drive your delivery ship to the place to get a thing to deliver to a different place. It is raining and hard to see due to all the pixels. You land, but you have to walk very far to get the package which takes forever, so you chat with a friendly stranger but it seems no one wants anything other than deliveries or transportation from you. There's a mood, but I think it might be slight annoyance? Anyways, you should probably save the city on your first night here, I guess.
There are a lot of good ideas in this game but they don't quite hit right. It is interesting looking but hard for me to maneuver around in a ship with squishy steering and moderately poor depth perception. It is an ambitious story but the voice acting is kind of a letdown and characters don't seem to be speaking to each other at times. It's a moderately large world, but there isn't a ton of difference between regions and having all the items on the map right from the get go makes navigation repetitive and kind of boring.
Overall, the 9 hours I spent with Cloudpunk were fine but not awe inspiring. I really could have used a chapter select or something when I messed up a timed delivery, and fast travel would be a wonderful addition, but otherwise I think just a slightly better execution of these good ideas would have made this great for me.
I did like Camus, even though they pronounced his name wrong.
Review from thedonproject.com
2019
Space: the time loop frontier. These are the voyages of a four-eyed alien. Your mission: to explore some planets and figure out a story, to boldly go where you've probably been before!
Outer Wilds is an incredibly creative puzzle/adventure game. I'm not usually a huge fan of time loop games, but this one had enough elements to make the repetition interesting. Plus, being blasted by a supernova after a nice little tune is probably how I'd like to go in real life.
While the visuals were purposely simplistic, low-polygon style, the story and diverse exploration tactics made the visuals seem more alive. Sound design and subtle music were also key to bringing life to this doomed universe. Though it was full of life, I did find myself just wanting to be done with the game after visiting all the planets a couple times, so online walkthroughs guided me through the deadly anglerfish towards the incredible and weird end scenes. Though, they chomped my ship a few times so I got to see two of the game's several endings.
Would I go back to explore some more? I don't think I would, honestly. This keeps the game at an excellent rating for me instead of bumping it up to life changing.
Maybe if I look away and look back again...
Review from thedonproject.com
Outer Wilds is an incredibly creative puzzle/adventure game. I'm not usually a huge fan of time loop games, but this one had enough elements to make the repetition interesting. Plus, being blasted by a supernova after a nice little tune is probably how I'd like to go in real life.
While the visuals were purposely simplistic, low-polygon style, the story and diverse exploration tactics made the visuals seem more alive. Sound design and subtle music were also key to bringing life to this doomed universe. Though it was full of life, I did find myself just wanting to be done with the game after visiting all the planets a couple times, so online walkthroughs guided me through the deadly anglerfish towards the incredible and weird end scenes. Though, they chomped my ship a few times so I got to see two of the game's several endings.
Would I go back to explore some more? I don't think I would, honestly. This keeps the game at an excellent rating for me instead of bumping it up to life changing.
Maybe if I look away and look back again...
Review from thedonproject.com
Cowabunga, dude!
All of the joys of a classic Double-Dragon style beat 'em up action 2-D side scrolling romp without all of the auction site trolling for a console from the 90s. Is it a complex story line? No. Is it a technical revolution in any sort of way? Not really. Is it a solid nostalgia-filled, button-mashing couple hours of entertainment? Yes. 100 times yes. Old folks who grew up with the cartoons and many similar games in our youth will be transported back to a time when our back didn't hurt when we woke up in the morning. We might even order a pizza and invite a few (six?) fellow olds over to enjoy lactose intolerance and level bosses together.
Now that my partner and I have couch co-oped through the story and leveled up a couple characters, I can pronounce this game as pretty good. I don't think I'll have the same nostalgia for this as I do for the original NES game and will probably not head back for more play time, but it was fun while it lasted. There are definitely a couple small things to pick on, like the tutorial being "Here's the moves, hope you remember, old man" and the pacing of a couple cutscenes being too slow, but overall this is a well-crafted tribute to a time gone by.
Partaaaaaaaaay!
Review from thedonproject.com
All of the joys of a classic Double-Dragon style beat 'em up action 2-D side scrolling romp without all of the auction site trolling for a console from the 90s. Is it a complex story line? No. Is it a technical revolution in any sort of way? Not really. Is it a solid nostalgia-filled, button-mashing couple hours of entertainment? Yes. 100 times yes. Old folks who grew up with the cartoons and many similar games in our youth will be transported back to a time when our back didn't hurt when we woke up in the morning. We might even order a pizza and invite a few (six?) fellow olds over to enjoy lactose intolerance and level bosses together.
Now that my partner and I have couch co-oped through the story and leveled up a couple characters, I can pronounce this game as pretty good. I don't think I'll have the same nostalgia for this as I do for the original NES game and will probably not head back for more play time, but it was fun while it lasted. There are definitely a couple small things to pick on, like the tutorial being "Here's the moves, hope you remember, old man" and the pacing of a couple cutscenes being too slow, but overall this is a well-crafted tribute to a time gone by.
Partaaaaaaaaay!
Review from thedonproject.com
Hades-lite roguelike does the genre proud.
COTDG is a solid roguelike with speedy gameplay and enough variation to keep you interested. It is challenging, so you die a lot if you're not good, just like with all roguelikes, but you usually get a solid run in before you run out of the pixels in the red meter. The graphics are fantastic and everything looks and sounds wonderful. There are a ton of different weapon and bonus combinations to keep each run feeling somewhat fresh, and unlocking further levels and power ups provides a bit of a goal to achieve.
I haven't progressed too far in the game because I die a lot due to lack of skill. It's still a good time to power it up every once in a while, though. I do wish there was more of a story other than "You were looking for treasure, now you're stuck in this dungeon purgatory". Honestly, that is where Hades excels compared to Curse Of The Dead Gods. Hades has more character and flair, whereas COTDG is solid if a bit unspectacular.
If you're looking for an action-filled game to play for about 30 minutes or so, you don't mind some setbacks, and you can't afford Hades, this is the one for you.
Review from thedonproject.com
COTDG is a solid roguelike with speedy gameplay and enough variation to keep you interested. It is challenging, so you die a lot if you're not good, just like with all roguelikes, but you usually get a solid run in before you run out of the pixels in the red meter. The graphics are fantastic and everything looks and sounds wonderful. There are a ton of different weapon and bonus combinations to keep each run feeling somewhat fresh, and unlocking further levels and power ups provides a bit of a goal to achieve.
I haven't progressed too far in the game because I die a lot due to lack of skill. It's still a good time to power it up every once in a while, though. I do wish there was more of a story other than "You were looking for treasure, now you're stuck in this dungeon purgatory". Honestly, that is where Hades excels compared to Curse Of The Dead Gods. Hades has more character and flair, whereas COTDG is solid if a bit unspectacular.
If you're looking for an action-filled game to play for about 30 minutes or so, you don't mind some setbacks, and you can't afford Hades, this is the one for you.
Review from thedonproject.com
2016
In a dark world, we could use some simple color, but maybe also a little more.
The premise of Hue is simple enough: use colors to solve puzzles. It is a good mix of some mild platforming and some mild to medium puzzling. A lovely artistic style would be necessary for a game about colors and this particular game about colors delivers a solid aesthetic. It is cartoony but not cartoonish, cute but not cutesy, and simple but not simplistic. Visually, it is crafted well.
As I played through, I started off thinking this game was great and was going to land in a solid 4-star review, but as I progressed I found myself wanting to just get through it. It started feeling repetitive. The puzzles varied, but maybe weren't challenging enough? I did watch a video or two for the last couple, but most could be figured out without too much difficulty. Adding new colors and features was a nice progression, so I don't think it was only the puzzles. After some reflection, I think the music made the puzzles feel more repetitive than they actually are. Each music choice appears to be on about a ten-second loop. Maybe they were royalty-free loops the devs got for cheap and decided just to play to death, but I found myself playing without sound for some time, particularly when staring at a puzzle for several minutes making my plan of attack.
Slightly spoilery bit: I think the mom was a student when she fell in love with her professor? That made me feel a little weird despite the calming British accent the story was told in. Maybe they were both professors? It does say that he's not much older than her, but still... it feels weird and weirdly specific. Anyways...
A pretty and fun little game to play during some dark times while we work on how to get out of them.
Review from thedonproject.com
The premise of Hue is simple enough: use colors to solve puzzles. It is a good mix of some mild platforming and some mild to medium puzzling. A lovely artistic style would be necessary for a game about colors and this particular game about colors delivers a solid aesthetic. It is cartoony but not cartoonish, cute but not cutesy, and simple but not simplistic. Visually, it is crafted well.
As I played through, I started off thinking this game was great and was going to land in a solid 4-star review, but as I progressed I found myself wanting to just get through it. It started feeling repetitive. The puzzles varied, but maybe weren't challenging enough? I did watch a video or two for the last couple, but most could be figured out without too much difficulty. Adding new colors and features was a nice progression, so I don't think it was only the puzzles. After some reflection, I think the music made the puzzles feel more repetitive than they actually are. Each music choice appears to be on about a ten-second loop. Maybe they were royalty-free loops the devs got for cheap and decided just to play to death, but I found myself playing without sound for some time, particularly when staring at a puzzle for several minutes making my plan of attack.
Slightly spoilery bit: I think the mom was a student when she fell in love with her professor? That made me feel a little weird despite the calming British accent the story was told in. Maybe they were both professors? It does say that he's not much older than her, but still... it feels weird and weirdly specific. Anyways...
A pretty and fun little game to play during some dark times while we work on how to get out of them.
Review from thedonproject.com
"I'm not touching youuuuuu, I'm not touching yooooouuuuu!"
I bet the zombies in this zombie game are pissed. As an older brother, I've definitely played the "I'm not touching you" game and watched younger siblings turn apoplectic. I bet if they were trapped in a futuristic prison on a cold-ass moon of Jupiter and had some action bro walking around taunting them all day they would definitely mutate into zombie-like creatures and slowly try to murder that bro.
And I mean slowly.
The combat in this game is infuriatingly slow. And most of the actions are running away or dodging left and right. Running is slow, dodging is in slow-motion, walking is slow... everything is slow except your death. Well, the animation of it is entirely too long sometimes, but dying happens pretty quick if you make a mistake or are learning the patterns of a new zombied up thing. It's sort of rogue-like if you're not great at games, and some of the respawn areas can put you pretty far back in fighting an array of monsters or in the middle of a fight. (If you die on the end boss, for example. Which you will.)
The story is a fine sci-fi/horror thing, the graphics are quite pretty, and the sound is good. You can mix up Control-like telekinesis, melee, dodging, and shooting, but it all just feels so tedious! On top of the molasses-drenched pace, none of the attack options seem to do that much different of a thing? In other complaints, I'm not a big horror game or movie fan, so was a bit annoyed at how the game relied on pretty standard tropes like jump scares, lots of blood, and "hey what's that in the shadows?" gags. I might have gotten a bit scared a couple times, though. Essentially, if you can stomach the combat choices, it is a good enough game to play, but man those combat choices are a pretty solid drawback.
"Stop hitting yourself!"
Review from thedonproject.com
I bet the zombies in this zombie game are pissed. As an older brother, I've definitely played the "I'm not touching you" game and watched younger siblings turn apoplectic. I bet if they were trapped in a futuristic prison on a cold-ass moon of Jupiter and had some action bro walking around taunting them all day they would definitely mutate into zombie-like creatures and slowly try to murder that bro.
And I mean slowly.
The combat in this game is infuriatingly slow. And most of the actions are running away or dodging left and right. Running is slow, dodging is in slow-motion, walking is slow... everything is slow except your death. Well, the animation of it is entirely too long sometimes, but dying happens pretty quick if you make a mistake or are learning the patterns of a new zombied up thing. It's sort of rogue-like if you're not great at games, and some of the respawn areas can put you pretty far back in fighting an array of monsters or in the middle of a fight. (If you die on the end boss, for example. Which you will.)
The story is a fine sci-fi/horror thing, the graphics are quite pretty, and the sound is good. You can mix up Control-like telekinesis, melee, dodging, and shooting, but it all just feels so tedious! On top of the molasses-drenched pace, none of the attack options seem to do that much different of a thing? In other complaints, I'm not a big horror game or movie fan, so was a bit annoyed at how the game relied on pretty standard tropes like jump scares, lots of blood, and "hey what's that in the shadows?" gags. I might have gotten a bit scared a couple times, though. Essentially, if you can stomach the combat choices, it is a good enough game to play, but man those combat choices are a pretty solid drawback.
"Stop hitting yourself!"
Review from thedonproject.com
2021
Guys will literally do anything other than go to (couples) therapy.
Having read basically nothing about the creation of this wonderful game, I'd nearly guarantee there's a dude behind this game somewhere who was on the precipice of divorce and developed this whole game to rescue that relationship. Look, I get it, us dudes don't wanna talk about our problems. Creating a whole game where a talking book with a Puss In Boots-level Spanish accent therapizes a newly comatose and miniaturized and doll-ified couple by dropping them into softly life-threatening situations that they need to work together (CO-LAB-O-RATE!) on to just return to their normal life is next level avoidance, though. Maybe.
Anyways, shout out to that dude, because this game is great. It is accessible to differing levels of gaming ability yet can be a challenge for either player (from basic gaming technique like using both sticks at once to the challenge of scaling a rotating tower by some pretty tough platforming). It has a number of touching moments interacting as tiny dolls with a big ol' world. The game is never boring since it constantly changes your character skills, incorporates tons of different modes of transportation, and throws mild puzzles, mini-games, and entertainment options at you throughout the decently long play time. The graphics couldn't quite find a balance between realistic and cartoony for me and the story wasn't as heartfelt as intended, so I can't go with a perfect score for this game, but it was one of the best couch-co-op games we've played in our house since Cat Quest II.
Side note... Did anyone notice that the couple had to ditch their sad and weird kid in order to repair their relationship or was that just our own purposely child-free bias showing? Man that kid was weird. Like, just shake your parents to see if they're dead, already!
If gaming is you and your partner's passion and your relationship is at the "it might be time to find an apartment" stage, maybe It Takes Two will save you from divorce? If not, there's always couples therapy.
Review from thedonproject.com
Having read basically nothing about the creation of this wonderful game, I'd nearly guarantee there's a dude behind this game somewhere who was on the precipice of divorce and developed this whole game to rescue that relationship. Look, I get it, us dudes don't wanna talk about our problems. Creating a whole game where a talking book with a Puss In Boots-level Spanish accent therapizes a newly comatose and miniaturized and doll-ified couple by dropping them into softly life-threatening situations that they need to work together (CO-LAB-O-RATE!) on to just return to their normal life is next level avoidance, though. Maybe.
Anyways, shout out to that dude, because this game is great. It is accessible to differing levels of gaming ability yet can be a challenge for either player (from basic gaming technique like using both sticks at once to the challenge of scaling a rotating tower by some pretty tough platforming). It has a number of touching moments interacting as tiny dolls with a big ol' world. The game is never boring since it constantly changes your character skills, incorporates tons of different modes of transportation, and throws mild puzzles, mini-games, and entertainment options at you throughout the decently long play time. The graphics couldn't quite find a balance between realistic and cartoony for me and the story wasn't as heartfelt as intended, so I can't go with a perfect score for this game, but it was one of the best couch-co-op games we've played in our house since Cat Quest II.
Side note... Did anyone notice that the couple had to ditch their sad and weird kid in order to repair their relationship or was that just our own purposely child-free bias showing? Man that kid was weird. Like, just shake your parents to see if they're dead, already!
If gaming is you and your partner's passion and your relationship is at the "it might be time to find an apartment" stage, maybe It Takes Two will save you from divorce? If not, there's always couples therapy.
Review from thedonproject.com
2021
A wonderful game that just barely functions at times.
I really wanted to love this game. So much so that I made myself get the platinum trophy even though it was a real pain. Sable theoretically has a lot of the elements I enjoy these days in games: a sad soundtrack and story, a chill gameplay experience, interesting graphics choices, a bunch of quests, fishing, and a hoverbike. When the game works right, it's beautiful, well written, heartfelt, and relaxing. My only complaint (other than the paragraph below) was that I was hoping for a bit more of an in-depth exploration of the story. However, the story definitely wasn't what made this game a bit of a disappointment...
Something is wrong with this port, that's for sure. After about an hour of play, the game struggles to render the lovely backgrounds and the framerate is noticeably impacted. Occasionally, while cruising through the desert, the gap between textures will cause your hoverbike to get deflected like it hit a tree. Textures and shading do weird things quite often. A few times, I'd be on a mountain looking around and the sun would magically decide to cast a harsh shadow and the wind would start raging out of nowhere. The hoverbike sounds frequently were garbled enough for me to wonder if it was intentional. Sable's cape often sliced her in half when it flapped in the wind. One of the interiors of the mask maker tents was rendered entirely one pale blue color. Many times, the game would refuse to acknowledge my inputs, usually when sand fishing but sometimes in menus, and I resorted to restarting my console like it was a Microsoft product or something. I managed to crash the game a couple times... basically I'm pretty sure this is the buggiest game I've ever played on any console. I thought my hard drive was dying, so I switched to other games only to find them working as intended. This game strongly needs someone to take a look at it, but it has been on PS5 for a year and I don't see that happening.
Personally, I'm glad it didn't set me back more than what I pay Sony every month anyways. However, if you don't mind restarting your console many times during gameplay, and you like a sad-ish exploration game with a mild sci-fi RPG feel and a story about discovery, then this game might be for you.
Review from thedonproject.com
I really wanted to love this game. So much so that I made myself get the platinum trophy even though it was a real pain. Sable theoretically has a lot of the elements I enjoy these days in games: a sad soundtrack and story, a chill gameplay experience, interesting graphics choices, a bunch of quests, fishing, and a hoverbike. When the game works right, it's beautiful, well written, heartfelt, and relaxing. My only complaint (other than the paragraph below) was that I was hoping for a bit more of an in-depth exploration of the story. However, the story definitely wasn't what made this game a bit of a disappointment...
Something is wrong with this port, that's for sure. After about an hour of play, the game struggles to render the lovely backgrounds and the framerate is noticeably impacted. Occasionally, while cruising through the desert, the gap between textures will cause your hoverbike to get deflected like it hit a tree. Textures and shading do weird things quite often. A few times, I'd be on a mountain looking around and the sun would magically decide to cast a harsh shadow and the wind would start raging out of nowhere. The hoverbike sounds frequently were garbled enough for me to wonder if it was intentional. Sable's cape often sliced her in half when it flapped in the wind. One of the interiors of the mask maker tents was rendered entirely one pale blue color. Many times, the game would refuse to acknowledge my inputs, usually when sand fishing but sometimes in menus, and I resorted to restarting my console like it was a Microsoft product or something. I managed to crash the game a couple times... basically I'm pretty sure this is the buggiest game I've ever played on any console. I thought my hard drive was dying, so I switched to other games only to find them working as intended. This game strongly needs someone to take a look at it, but it has been on PS5 for a year and I don't see that happening.
Personally, I'm glad it didn't set me back more than what I pay Sony every month anyways. However, if you don't mind restarting your console many times during gameplay, and you like a sad-ish exploration game with a mild sci-fi RPG feel and a story about discovery, then this game might be for you.
Review from thedonproject.com
2023
I apologize in advance to the devs, but I fell asleep a couple times while playing Diablo IV.
Of all the Diablos, this is definitely one of them. Likely the fourth one of them (if you ignore the mobile one of them). I mean, look, what are you really expecting from this game? Something different? Or just more Diablo? Because you're going to get more Diablo. That's not necessarily bad, it is just pretty uninspiring. It looks better than the previous Diablos, it has many quests and challenges, and it has a massive map. However, combat is pretty tedious and the quests are all just "kill x number of things" or "find a pretty obvious trinket". I FELL ASLEEP. (Full disclosure: probably because I'm old).
I played through the story as a Rogue because I tend to like stealth and shooting things from a distance. I must have messed up my build because there was no stealth and shooting things was supremely tedious. That's on me, since I didn't read anything about how to build a character or any of that because I figured winging it would be more fun. The character building was not particularly exciting but you're not overwhelmed with choices, so I think they found an okay balance there.
As with the rest of the Diablos, my main reason for playing is the story progression, so I was disappointed to be very bored for the first four acts. I very much liked the snake part of Act 5 and Act 6 finally hooked me in a bit, just in time for the big boss fight. Overall, the story wasn't my favorite part of Diablo IV. The combat wasn't either. Finding randomly generated items... not it. I'm struggling to find my favorite part, actually. After being a minor Diablo fan for 20-some-odd years, I'm actually starting to wonder if I like the Diablo games at all? I mean, this should have been the greatest one, right? But... I don't think it is!
Also, Activision Blizzard is on the naughty list for treating workers terribly, gender discrimination, and being owned by microsoft now.
Review from thedonproject.com
Of all the Diablos, this is definitely one of them. Likely the fourth one of them (if you ignore the mobile one of them). I mean, look, what are you really expecting from this game? Something different? Or just more Diablo? Because you're going to get more Diablo. That's not necessarily bad, it is just pretty uninspiring. It looks better than the previous Diablos, it has many quests and challenges, and it has a massive map. However, combat is pretty tedious and the quests are all just "kill x number of things" or "find a pretty obvious trinket". I FELL ASLEEP. (Full disclosure: probably because I'm old).
I played through the story as a Rogue because I tend to like stealth and shooting things from a distance. I must have messed up my build because there was no stealth and shooting things was supremely tedious. That's on me, since I didn't read anything about how to build a character or any of that because I figured winging it would be more fun. The character building was not particularly exciting but you're not overwhelmed with choices, so I think they found an okay balance there.
As with the rest of the Diablos, my main reason for playing is the story progression, so I was disappointed to be very bored for the first four acts. I very much liked the snake part of Act 5 and Act 6 finally hooked me in a bit, just in time for the big boss fight. Overall, the story wasn't my favorite part of Diablo IV. The combat wasn't either. Finding randomly generated items... not it. I'm struggling to find my favorite part, actually. After being a minor Diablo fan for 20-some-odd years, I'm actually starting to wonder if I like the Diablo games at all? I mean, this should have been the greatest one, right? But... I don't think it is!
Also, Activision Blizzard is on the naughty list for treating workers terribly, gender discrimination, and being owned by microsoft now.
Review from thedonproject.com
2022
An excellent balance of... everything!
At its most basic, Cult Of The Lamb is a fantastic thematic successor to a game I loved in my youth: ActRaiser. You're essentially a god building a following and you intersperse the sim aspects with some action. In Cult, the action is roguelike instead of limited to a number of lives and everything is more complex than in a game from 30 years ago, but the spirit is still there. For me, it is a great mix of action and planning that both excites and relaxes the player.
The graphics are impeccable, the gameplay is smooth and fast-paced, the story is decent, and the sim parts are not too tedious. The fake-language voices of the various folks you meet are wonderful. The variation in the weapons and other attacks that you have for each run are enough to keep you coming back for more action, if you're into that. The customization of your cult (base) is enough to keep tinkerers entertained, as well. My only complaints are that the music is pretty repetitive and that it could use more levels instead of repeating the same four worlds twice. Oh, and I came across some bugs a few times (like, why does everything stop for a couple seconds at dawn?).
All in all, it is fun, pretty, and you get to be a cult leader while killing some demons and gods. Excellent.
Review from thedonproject.com
At its most basic, Cult Of The Lamb is a fantastic thematic successor to a game I loved in my youth: ActRaiser. You're essentially a god building a following and you intersperse the sim aspects with some action. In Cult, the action is roguelike instead of limited to a number of lives and everything is more complex than in a game from 30 years ago, but the spirit is still there. For me, it is a great mix of action and planning that both excites and relaxes the player.
The graphics are impeccable, the gameplay is smooth and fast-paced, the story is decent, and the sim parts are not too tedious. The fake-language voices of the various folks you meet are wonderful. The variation in the weapons and other attacks that you have for each run are enough to keep you coming back for more action, if you're into that. The customization of your cult (base) is enough to keep tinkerers entertained, as well. My only complaints are that the music is pretty repetitive and that it could use more levels instead of repeating the same four worlds twice. Oh, and I came across some bugs a few times (like, why does everything stop for a couple seconds at dawn?).
All in all, it is fun, pretty, and you get to be a cult leader while killing some demons and gods. Excellent.
Review from thedonproject.com
2019
Fallout: Sweden forgot to add some features, I think...
Alright, I read the reviews and decided to try this critically panned game anyways when it came up for free. I started out hating it, then gained understanding as I progressed, then gave up in frustration. I never played multiplayer because that's not my jam, but I did make an effort to get through the game, really!
I think what the developers were going for here is a post-apocalypse-by-robots sim, not necessarily a fun game. There appears to be no aim assist at all, which, if I'm being nice "took some getting used to", but in reality was an infuriating mechanic in the very early minutes of play. Trying to shoot a robot dog with a handgun was nigh impossible and you have to shoot these robots four thousand times for them to die. There are cave paintings on buildings telling you where to shoot them for maximum damage, I think, but again, aiming is impossible. There is not a single one-shot enemy in this thing. I kid you not, multiple clips to kill the first robot dog. And it only gets worse. You need to launch tens of rockets into the big robot boys in order to take them down. When I got to the base in the airfield where there were four of the large robots guarding it, even after trying to lure one away at a time, I got tired of dying. This was even after I hid in a church and used up most of my ammo destroying robots for an hour as "rival" bots discovered me and sent waves of dogs, walkers, and two of those big ones. To top it off, leveling up is soooooooooo sloooooooooooow, armor/clothing gets you massive rewards of 2% bullet resistance or explosion resistance, and some weapons maybe do more damage? It's hard to tell from the menus, which I guess is like real life...
The attempted sim aspect continues throughout the rest of the design choices as well. A big open world with lots of nothing in between some houses. NPC's who sound like real people because they don't sound like voice actors (some people say this is bad voice acting, but I found it kind of endearingly quaint). Lots of time spent on making it obviously Sweden, like including Volvos and Saabs (but rebadged). There was definitely a lot of effort put into this game. There are a good amount of side missions and the base-capturing/building/defending thing exists even though I did not like it one bit. The main story is kind of far-fetched but fine for as far as I got through it. In general, I think it was a good game idea but the combat is just an absolute nightmare for a single player, both mechanically and difficulty-wise.
So, if there's a robot apocalypse, don't escape to Sweden, I guess. The robots are extra tough there.
Review from thedonproject.com
Alright, I read the reviews and decided to try this critically panned game anyways when it came up for free. I started out hating it, then gained understanding as I progressed, then gave up in frustration. I never played multiplayer because that's not my jam, but I did make an effort to get through the game, really!
I think what the developers were going for here is a post-apocalypse-by-robots sim, not necessarily a fun game. There appears to be no aim assist at all, which, if I'm being nice "took some getting used to", but in reality was an infuriating mechanic in the very early minutes of play. Trying to shoot a robot dog with a handgun was nigh impossible and you have to shoot these robots four thousand times for them to die. There are cave paintings on buildings telling you where to shoot them for maximum damage, I think, but again, aiming is impossible. There is not a single one-shot enemy in this thing. I kid you not, multiple clips to kill the first robot dog. And it only gets worse. You need to launch tens of rockets into the big robot boys in order to take them down. When I got to the base in the airfield where there were four of the large robots guarding it, even after trying to lure one away at a time, I got tired of dying. This was even after I hid in a church and used up most of my ammo destroying robots for an hour as "rival" bots discovered me and sent waves of dogs, walkers, and two of those big ones. To top it off, leveling up is soooooooooo sloooooooooooow, armor/clothing gets you massive rewards of 2% bullet resistance or explosion resistance, and some weapons maybe do more damage? It's hard to tell from the menus, which I guess is like real life...
The attempted sim aspect continues throughout the rest of the design choices as well. A big open world with lots of nothing in between some houses. NPC's who sound like real people because they don't sound like voice actors (some people say this is bad voice acting, but I found it kind of endearingly quaint). Lots of time spent on making it obviously Sweden, like including Volvos and Saabs (but rebadged). There was definitely a lot of effort put into this game. There are a good amount of side missions and the base-capturing/building/defending thing exists even though I did not like it one bit. The main story is kind of far-fetched but fine for as far as I got through it. In general, I think it was a good game idea but the combat is just an absolute nightmare for a single player, both mechanically and difficulty-wise.
So, if there's a robot apocalypse, don't escape to Sweden, I guess. The robots are extra tough there.
Review from thedonproject.com