frogclown
9 reviews liked by frogclown
Left 4 Dead 2
2009
everyone's in a rush to pump out a social game with live service elements these days so you can bro down with your best friends but not one person has considered the social value of something like left 4 dead 2: blitz through two or three campaigns, spend half of one campaign trying to fuck each other over out of boredom, then spend the next half of the session chatting shit about feelings, opinions, and the state of our lives in the saferoom
Balatro
2024
In Other Waters
2020
What starts off on a high note with its otherworldly soundtrack, interesting narrative and feeling like you're exploring an alien ocean drags itself to a hault by the third hour. The clunky traversal system means you spend most of the game waiting to get to your destination. And the overwhelming amount of text thrown at you can get super tiresome. It sort of has some survival mechanics but they are easy to manage and ignore. Where they just shouldn't have existed.
I don't like criticizing games that are different like this but this really should have been a book. Or even a visual novel but there is just so little visual storytelling going on. To the point where I skipped large amounts of world building because it was large text info dumps. Which don't really do anything for the marrative and arguably hurts the world building.
Exploring alien oceans is one of the things I enjoy most in gaming but In Other Waters it was mostly exploring the world in my mind and listening to the music. That makes it hard to recommend.
I don't like criticizing games that are different like this but this really should have been a book. Or even a visual novel but there is just so little visual storytelling going on. To the point where I skipped large amounts of world building because it was large text info dumps. Which don't really do anything for the marrative and arguably hurts the world building.
Exploring alien oceans is one of the things I enjoy most in gaming but In Other Waters it was mostly exploring the world in my mind and listening to the music. That makes it hard to recommend.
In Other Waters
2020
The writing, UI, and audio really help create a sense of atmosphere in what is otherwise a visual novel with very a basic gameplay layer. It was too repetitive and slow for me, but I admire it for what it was trying to do and would love to play a 3D version of this that more fully immersed me in the world and mystery, ala Subnautica.