weh
2018
it's really good. i have to knock it down a star for some minor issues with the unnecessary loot/upgrade systems and certain story beats - yes, especially the ones regarding the women in the game, no i don't feel like i'm nitpicking, it's amateurish.
2024
as a big fan of lucah: born of a dream, i knew this was a day-one purchase for me. what i didn't expect is that i'd finish it in a single 10-hour sitting. i quickly became very invested in the story, which is much less opaque than the souls-like minimalist surrealism of lucah.
death of a wish's combat is essentially the same as lucah's, though it feels extremely smooth and responsive in this one. i think the attack telegraphs from enemies are a lot more readable (something that was sometimes an issue for me in lucah given the shaky art style). it's challenging, fair, and feels great when you find your groove. and if you're just playing for the story, no worries, there are lots of modifiers you can turn on to trivialize it (but do give it a try first, it's really good).
[edit: i just went back to replay lucah, and one noticeable difference is that death of a wish doesn't have a stamina meter! you can dodge, sprint, and attack to your heart's content! that's why it felt so much smoother to me. death of a wish also has a wider variety of playstyles available. so really, it's sort of the same, but it plays much quicker. and in my opinion, death of a wish's combat is way more fun in the moment-to-moment.]
i don't want to spoil anything about the story because it takes some fantastic and unexpected turns, so i'll just say that a lot of the writing really got to me. the themes explored resonate with me a lot on a personal level, and there's an emotional depth of examination here that i don't usually find in games.
the developers have said that you can play these two games in any order, and that's true, but my personal opinion is that you'll get more out of this game if you've played lucah already. that said, i'd be really curious to hear from someone who played death of a wish first and then went back and played lucah, i bet that's an interesting way to experience it too.
anyway, i strongly recommend death of a wish, i really really loved it. i'm going to sit with it for a little while before hopping into ng+ and hunting around for secrets i missed.
death of a wish's combat is essentially the same as lucah's, though it feels extremely smooth and responsive in this one. i think the attack telegraphs from enemies are a lot more readable (something that was sometimes an issue for me in lucah given the shaky art style). it's challenging, fair, and feels great when you find your groove. and if you're just playing for the story, no worries, there are lots of modifiers you can turn on to trivialize it (but do give it a try first, it's really good).
[edit: i just went back to replay lucah, and one noticeable difference is that death of a wish doesn't have a stamina meter! you can dodge, sprint, and attack to your heart's content! that's why it felt so much smoother to me. death of a wish also has a wider variety of playstyles available. so really, it's sort of the same, but it plays much quicker. and in my opinion, death of a wish's combat is way more fun in the moment-to-moment.]
i don't want to spoil anything about the story because it takes some fantastic and unexpected turns, so i'll just say that a lot of the writing really got to me. the themes explored resonate with me a lot on a personal level, and there's an emotional depth of examination here that i don't usually find in games.
the developers have said that you can play these two games in any order, and that's true, but my personal opinion is that you'll get more out of this game if you've played lucah already. that said, i'd be really curious to hear from someone who played death of a wish first and then went back and played lucah, i bet that's an interesting way to experience it too.
anyway, i strongly recommend death of a wish, i really really loved it. i'm going to sit with it for a little while before hopping into ng+ and hunting around for secrets i missed.
2015
One of my favorite games. It was my first Yakuza game, and I've never smiled that much while playing a game. I was giggling with delight from start to finish. I laughed, I cried, I beat the shit out of buff men with sick back tattoos. Having played many other games in the series now, this is still my favorite one. It's a magnum opus of a game.
2019
yesterday i went on a first date, and later that night i decided to replay this, and she saw it in my discord status and laughed at me
2013
It's a small game about depression, a lot of it is relatable, some of it is very well-articulated. I've got depression/anxiety, so I felt like most of it was pretty spot on. It's different for everyone.
2022
just go play it, it takes less than an hour.
everybody loves splendidland's apple quest monsters dx, and now we've got that vibe but in a fun little adventure game. the humor is cute and clever, and genuinely got some laughs out of me.
everybody loves splendidland's apple quest monsters dx, and now we've got that vibe but in a fun little adventure game. the humor is cute and clever, and genuinely got some laughs out of me.
2015
Flawless. Such a good puzzle game, and there's a LOT of it too, which is good because I'm still waiting on a sequel...
It is what it is. You pick it up because it's a funny joke in 2015, but there's really nothing to this and now it's 2021 and the joke is 6 years old, I don't need to revisit the joke again.
2020
Finally, the first major game release to have a trans protagonist, and it's... boring. The characters are all good, the writing is generally good, but I didn't care for the plot, didn't feel like any of it really paid off in the end.
It was never bad, but I still left it on a low note and was overall somewhat disappointed. It had all the ingredients for me to love it, but it needed longer in the oven or something.
It was never bad, but I still left it on a low note and was overall somewhat disappointed. It had all the ingredients for me to love it, but it needed longer in the oven or something.
This game sucks. I saw they announced a sequel and went to see what they've been up to for the past several years and they made a "Karen outrage simulator," just to give you an idea of what level these guys are operating on.
Back to this game: It sucks, the narrative is badly conceived and poorly written.
Back to this game: It sucks, the narrative is badly conceived and poorly written.
2017
I loved it. Hard to talk about without spoiling anything. I loved the ending, I liked finding all the documents and reading all the flavor text, I liked the cool rewinding hologram mechanic. I love being told a solid story in an interesting way, and this felt like the natural evolution for environmental storytelling and audio logs.
2013
The only bummer about this game is that it's hard to play after playing the games it inspired and informed. When this came out, it was the first exposure most people had to this genre of storytelling.
I think Tacoma has a more mechanically interesting delivery. Edith Finch has more varied tones and an incredibly dense environment. Gone Home feels like the precursor to the bigger walking sims, in that it really is just a house with one optional puzzle, a story told almost entirely through poking around the environment, and all the lights turned off.
But, if you can put yourself in the shoes of someone playing this back during its release, engage with it on its own terms, what you'll find is a layered story of struggles at home, family tension, and the secrets we keep from each other. A narrative that culminates in an ending that suggests it doesn't quite matter that people are messed up, everyone is messed up, what matters is that you allow love to inform how you move forward together.
I'd love to replay it with this in mind, I think this game has the potential to hit home, but it gives you the freedom to completely miss the point, which might make it less impactful for some.
Hugely influential, well done, and still unique to this day, standing apart from those that came after. It's a modern classic, just know that the significance of the game isn't in its "walk around a house" gameplay. Your enjoyment of this game will be almost completely personal and self-informed.
I think Tacoma has a more mechanically interesting delivery. Edith Finch has more varied tones and an incredibly dense environment. Gone Home feels like the precursor to the bigger walking sims, in that it really is just a house with one optional puzzle, a story told almost entirely through poking around the environment, and all the lights turned off.
But, if you can put yourself in the shoes of someone playing this back during its release, engage with it on its own terms, what you'll find is a layered story of struggles at home, family tension, and the secrets we keep from each other. A narrative that culminates in an ending that suggests it doesn't quite matter that people are messed up, everyone is messed up, what matters is that you allow love to inform how you move forward together.
I'd love to replay it with this in mind, I think this game has the potential to hit home, but it gives you the freedom to completely miss the point, which might make it less impactful for some.
Hugely influential, well done, and still unique to this day, standing apart from those that came after. It's a modern classic, just know that the significance of the game isn't in its "walk around a house" gameplay. Your enjoyment of this game will be almost completely personal and self-informed.
It's so obtuse, and incredibly overwhelming upfront, but I love the flavor of it all.
it's hard for me to give a star rating to something that feels so personal. obviously it's very amateurish, but i picked it up for a dollar after being curious about its sequel.
parts of it are genuinely unsettling, and parts of it are humorous in a way that doesn't land (which feels almost intentional, but not quite). it's a really interesting mix of tones.
i found some of the prose relatable because of how specifically it portrayed mental deterioration and pharmaceutically-induced brain fog.
i think there are some conveyance issues, and not because it's intentionally surreal, but because the writing is really uneven. but i like games like this. i don't feel affected by it, but it was an engaging half-hour.
parts of it are genuinely unsettling, and parts of it are humorous in a way that doesn't land (which feels almost intentional, but not quite). it's a really interesting mix of tones.
i found some of the prose relatable because of how specifically it portrayed mental deterioration and pharmaceutically-induced brain fog.
i think there are some conveyance issues, and not because it's intentionally surreal, but because the writing is really uneven. but i like games like this. i don't feel affected by it, but it was an engaging half-hour.
2010
I feel like this game gets dunked on too hard sometimes, but also I have no desire to defend it, it's an embarrassing entry to the Metroid series and isn't even a good action game if you divorce it from the Metroid context.