2020 GAMING DIARY

April::..
1. Gothic
I discovered that before giving away my dvds from gaming mags, I installed Gothic and Gothic 2 on my computer. I really dig the fiction and the worldbuilding but the game is slow and you can see the time sink from ten miles away. I spent some five hours with it so far and lost at least two hours of progress as the game is hardcore without autosaves.

I finally got myself a new phone and I have 4G internet now, so I can work on school projects again.

2. Porklite
It's a neat little retro rogue, you can play in your browser. I think it's really polished and a great example of well scoped project. I tried few runs before rage quiting, but the game certainly is a good one if you're in hardcore dying.


Also, I continued with Gothic and now I'm some twenty hours in. I'm finally stronger, I'm engaged, but there are also things, which make me feel like I'm wasting my time with the game. And it is the case as I'm supposed to have my thesis almost finished and I haven't written a single line in last two weeks.

3. Forward
Today, I suddenly got in mood for card driven games. I played some Star Realms on my phone and several browser games on itch.io.
Forward is an interesting little almost rpg. You have a character, collect items and move forward. In front of you, there are always three cards and you can choose your path. Monsters take from your health, potions replenish it and so on. It's quite an addictive affair with nice presentation. I recommend trying it out if you feel out of ideas too as it made my mind racing.


4. The Snake Mother
This isn't a card game but a beautiful choose your own adventure bitsy game with great lore. The story is dripping with atmosphere and I was thrilled for the whole duration of this micro game. It was partly thanks to great music too.
Play it here.


5. Patient Rogue
Another card driven roguelike. This one's really cool, addictive and has cool graphics. Overall it's a super polished package and I can see myself playing some more. It's also very difficult and little frustrating due to randomness. You die of hunger way too often. And if you happen to come across a sufficient amount of food, you end up being out of weapons. The game presents some really cool idea, which I might prefer in this rough and simplistic form over something more sophisticated (and better designed in terms of fairness). Try it out.


6. Mondar's Dungeon
Mondar's Dungeon is another beautiful permadeath with very pretty art, but the gameplay is too frustrating and not us fun as Patient Rogue. It's even more board gamey and more random and you usually die super fast because of its unfair mechanics.


7. Heartscape
A Ludum Dare entry is mere one level of a possible future puzzler combined with deck building. I love the presentation, which reminds me of Princess Remedy, music is banging and mechanics tight. I hope to see more of this game soon.


8. Tiny Islands
A digital version of flip and writes is fun and rules of this game definitely more digestible in a digital form (counting all of these points would kill me in a physical game). Also, daily runs add it a lot. It's a cool concept, but i got bored rather quickly as it's probably better played with competition.


9. Dragoon Drop
The game's a turned based platformer, where you use a deck of cards for movement and attacks. Yes, you need to lick the right card to attack and sometimes it takes a while. Definitely a brain burner but a great idea.I think that the deckbuilding could work better or offer either more interesting or more defined variety of commands (on one hand I like the simplicity of cards in Dragoon Drop, on the other most commands aren't satisfying. I think your hand could be way tighter). I dig the retro look, feel and sound of the game. Drag and drop on the other doesn't feel quite smooth as I would like it to be. Burning cards is boring, I'd try to add little more to it.
Anyway, this design has a lot of potential.


10. Star Realms
A simple card deckbuilder in its digital form. The campaign is very challenging and I can't keep myself from trying again.

11. Card City Nights
In this game you collect cards and battle citizens of card city. The game's extremely charming with characters from other Ludosity games such as Ittle Dew and Muri and many older smaller games. The core gameplay is addicting and fun but the real gem are lines of dialogue. The story itself is light but you can talk with every character multiple time and they usually have more than ten things to say. There's so much flavour to this. The jazzy soundtrack definitely adds to overall positive vibe.