Kirby Star Allies is a four and a half stars of fun! This should not be controversial to say!

I’ll be honest. When I first started, I thought… “meh”. But then something clicked and I realized how much fun I was having! If you like Kirby, you’ll like this. If you don’t like Kirby, then go try Kirby and the Forgotten Land. If you don’t like Kirby and the Forgotten Land, then we have nothing more to say here!

Kirby Star Allies has all a Kirby fan needs - Kirby, familiar friends, new copy abilities, new friends, and a vaguely deep and ethereal lore drop. Great animation, great score, and great characters. My favorite copy abilities being the spider, Como, and the artist, Vividria. My favorite atmosphere was the underwater section… and that last boss fight. So cool.

Kirby and the Forgotten Land is everything you could want and more out of a 3D Kirby game. Step back Mario Odyssey!

Just so charming and beautiful throughout the entire runtime. I spent my time playing in "Spring Breeze" mode because really should a Kirby game feel like anything other than a spring breeze?! Great gimmick with the familiar concept of copy abilities and the extension into the Mouthful mode. My favorites being the cone and the lightbulb. C'mon!

Love the final sequence. So ethereal, transformative, and unusual!

Finished sometime early 2023.

For the sake of full disclosure - I started this game sometime last year and got frustrated at one (what I now know to be easy) puzzle and quit. But... after playing Pikmin 4 I was inspired to restart my save and boot it back up again!

I love the Pikmin franchise! Pikmin 3 feels like a good, middle of the road Pikmin game for me. The graphics are smooth, the gimmick with the 3 characters is fun, and something about playing on the Wii U with the tablet just makes the experience all the more charming (Do people still hate on the Wii U? Is it based for me to praise it?).

What really makes Pikmin 3 stand out to me is the atmosphere changes the devs were able to display with the weather changes. I loved when I would log into a rainy day. This helped break up the monotony of grinding through multiple days in the same area. Just something about the graphics and music was so cozy! Especially for 2013 Wii U capabilities.

Pikmin 3 would be a great starter for anyone looking to get into the series. The performance is clean and it is not too challenging! ... Well except that last area, I struggled with that and recruited the help of my gamer bf :3

But really, it's not that hard I just dislike combat.

Insert Pikmin noises

I am feeling a bit conflicted on this review. On one hand, I am so impressed with the writing and the unique world created within Sable... while on the other hand I found myself often frustrated with the performance issues and the lag that gave me motion sickness. I combatted the motion sickness by turning up the FOV, turning down the camera sensitivity, and windowing the game on my screen.... but the way the graphics loaded in and out of focus still really challenged me!

If it weren't for the aforementioned issues, this would've easily become one of my top games this year, and I likely would have spent more hours exploring. There is so much to love and explore in this world! I would love to see the devs come back together with an amped budget and create more for this story. It truly is a 10/10 concept, just needs a bit of tuning up.

Also - love the presence of Japanese Breakfast in the soundtrack. It is the perfect addition.

I hope to circle back to Sable some day and continuing exploring.

5 stars for concept - art, music, lore, writing
2 stars for performance

Lets even it out to a .... 3.5? Idk. This story IS worth hearing. Just expect some bugs (and beetles) along the way.

I think there is a lot of good to say about Cozy Grove regarding an interesting premise / gimmick with the ghost characters and the overall atmosphere created. It’s extremely wholesome and heartwarming! I enjoyed picking this up for 20-30 minutes every so often for a little sense of calm within my day.

Unfortunately, despite the things that I enjoyed, I ended up tabling this. I struggle a bit with the cluttered village aesthetic in games that I feel is popular in the indie sphere right now. With such a cluttered screen, everything blurs together and I often find myself wandering around the map multiple times and missing the items I am looking for. :/ This could just be a me problem though!

All in all, this game is cute, cozy, and a positive experience! Maybe I’ll pick it up again someday.

Shelved in 2021

Unpacking presented itself to me at the moment when I most needed it. I was home sick from work with the flu, and two days on the couch meant I needed something to distract me from how rough I felt. Scrolling through Game Pass, I landed on Unpacking and was immediately hooked. The light and creative puzzling juxtaposed with storytelling that needn’t say anything at all kept me engaged while also allowing my mind to wander about the life that I am playing out.

I ended the game feeling so connected to the story and the character’s life. It prompted me to reflect on my own life and the many moves that I have made. I wonder what sort of story my belongings could tell?

Finished Winter 2023

This is an incredibly grounding experience for such a short story (~10min). I will be thinking about this piece for far longer than the time I spent interacting with it.

A sort of coming of age story centered around ideas of perception and acceptance. Cannot recommend enough for anyone to take a few minutes out of their day and relax with the calming music, visuals, and story that is "You and I and the Long, Long, Drive".

Much respect for the creator, Caramel, for their art and vulnerability!

Loved the first iteration of this series and was so excited to immediately jump into episode 2! I love the addition of the new characters and a few of the features that were added onto this one. Still felt familiar and comfortable but didn't feel like I was just playing the exact same game again.

I love the sense of calm this game makes me feel while playing! The soothing ambiance with warm, caring characters and their relationships are really the triumph with this series.

All in all, love this series and am excited to play more visual novel-type games.

That being said.... I definitely was disappointed to realize that they chose to do the same post-game style in the way of unlocking alternate storylines/endings as they did in the first game. This time around, I did better with my gameplay and was able to unlock all of the "good endings", but from looking at guides you need to unlock ALL endings in order to unlock the "secret ending" and that just doesn't sit right with me! To me, this is a slow, narrative based, story that deserves attention and intention. The thought of replaying through my save multiple times just to quickly skip through days of dialogue to change minute details in order to fulfill achievement requirements to unlock a mystery ending feels like it would taint the whole meaning and intention of the gameplay! Idk, I am just not about that grind culture and would have rather seen a post game that simply progressed the story with the opportunity for more days.

Felt a little empty ending this playthrough when I realized what the post game looked like. Just felt a little abrupt! I suppose I am harping on this so much because this is such an influential and important game to me with stories I keep close to heart and gameplay that helped me feel calm in an otherwise overwhelming world. I want to end my review by reiterating how much I love this series, because I really do.

Will probably leave it at this and try to remember the good endings I got :)

Superliminal solidifies itself as the most important game to me because it is the game that launched me into gaming as an adult hobby in the fall of 2021. At the time, my partner and I were long-distance and alternating free weekends at each other's places. Hi Zach :)

Zach is and has been a big fan of playing games and I, having been interested myself but unsure of where to start, begun to show more interest in sharing this hobby. Of course, we started by playing Mario Kart/Mario Party together, before graduating to Overcooked and It Takes Two. I also spent time watching him play Animal Crossing or Stardew Valley and seeing the joy/excitement/relaxation these titles brought him, I wanted to find that for myself too!

At the time, he was also working long days on most weekends... so I often had time to fill during the days I visited. One weekend, he downloaded Superliminal for me to try out while he was gone. I felt so special that he thought of me and set up this cozy day for me. I LOVED it. I played it in one sitting and then immediately started a replay with the overlayed commentary.

This is less of a review and more of a retelling to as why this game is so meaningful for ME, but seriously, it is so good. You should go play it.

A note - as someone that experiences motion sickness while playing first person perspective, I also appreciated being able to alter the FOV and go at my own pace. That is so important.


EDIT - Can someone tell me why under the genre section of the game page on here it is listed as a "shooter"????

This game has been really monumental to me because it has opened up a new genre of games into my backlog that I did not even know I was interested in. Gaming is a hobby that I have only gotten into seriously in the past few years or so, and I am constantly learning about what interests/engages me. Honestly before discovering Coffee Talk, I don't think I even knew this sort of game existed. I have been a long-time lover and supporter of Lofi Girl, as a channel that was a place of calm for me through my four years of college...Now I am finding that same vibe in a quirky visual novel! So fun.

I love all of the characters, and the fantasy beings that they represent. I also appreciate how they wove in social commentary without being too dark or in your face about it. Felt like they stayed on tone with the cozy-vibe, while also being grounded, realistic, and meaningful.

I love the art direction, I love the simplicity of the gameplay, and I LOVE how it made me feel to play!

If I had any gripes to mention... I do wish it was longer! I also unlocked the, I guess you could call it, secret ending... but I did have to look at a guide. I think I may have liked a little more specific instructions/an easier way to unlock new parts of the story without having to skip through tons of dialogue. I also wish there were more opportunities to make drinks so that I could unlock every special drink in story mode rather than doing it at the end!

As far as the post game goes, while there isn't a ton to do, I did love being able to scroll through the official art (including early renderings of characters) as well as comic strips. These additions, along with the daily newspaper, made the small scope of the coffee shop really feel like it was a part of a much larger world.

All in all - beautiful art direction, and a beautiful story. I wish I lived in the Coffee Talk world! Will be starting Episode 2 shortly.