Try it Tuesday: November 8, 2022
YES, IT’S BEEN A WHILE!
Things have gotten righteously busy here at the church of skinnedteen, which is a good thing so I can’t complain. But that means some aspects of content creation – like this blog – have taken a bit of a backseat. I’m intending on creating more here though, and getting back to some of these short-form opinions from Try it Tuesday sessions. I’ll hopefully, likely, even get some of this up to TikTok and YouTube Shorts! But I digress: keep an eye out on this space for more musings.
Tonight’s Try it Tuesday show had a loose theme of “Hand-Crafted” because I felt like each game had a unique, almost hand-crafted style to it. Or at the very least, something kitsch and outside of the norm for video game design. I would say I was correct as well. Each game also had a demo available, and happened to be pretty good! Shall we dive in to the details?
The Last Hero of Nostalgaia
Immediately off the bat, I feel bad because I kept mispronouncing this game’s title. The title isn’t NOSTALGIA, it’s NOSTAL-GAIA, emphasizing the GAIA part of the end of the word so as to create a sense of whimsy and parody to what the game was. The Last Hero of Nostalgaia says it is a Souls-like, and that it is: a parody of the Souls genre to its core, with some actually good gameplay attached. A lot of Souls-like games are ones that I feel try to hit too close to the mark with what they’re doing: vague but ancient universe that is distinctly its own in style, but presented so very seriously and in such a way that it is mimicking Dark Souls far too closely. I say this, and I deeply enjoy a lot of them, but I have to call a spade a spade when I see it. Nostalgaia does a lot of this as well, but with an edge of humor to it. It’s self-aware. Another thing I noticed that a lot of Souls clones don’t entirely nail is the feeling of controlling the character: a big problem I get with some of them is that the main character feels weightless and floaty when I’m controlling it. Attacks don’t feel like they have any heft to them, almost like I’m on ice while moving. I didn’t get that feeling with Nostalgaia: I actually felt like it was, unironically, one of the better feeling Souls clones I’ve ever played. That being said, it still had some jank. Hitboxes felt like guesswork sometimes, and because I was essentially controlling a stick figure, I was having some difficulty nailing down the timing for certain situations. Eventually you pick up on it though, and I enjoyed my time with the game quite a bit. Would love to return to it, actually! The best part, however? The character creator. Very in-depth.
Links for the game:
Bramble: The Mountain King
I’m a big sucker for Nordic folklore, and I’m an even bigger sucker for a pretty game. Bramble: The Mountain King‘s demo checked both of those boxes, and then some, which makes me utterly excited for its eventual release. Bramble: The Mountain King appears to be a uniquely stylistic take on the formula of games like Limbo and Little Nightmares, where you play as a boy trying to rescue his sister. Of course, the demo is pretty limited and designed merely to give you a taste of what’s to come, so none of this narrative really translates in. All we know is that we’re a boy frolicking through a gorgeous landscape of lush terrain and living creatures. Then, things get dark and foreboding quite quickly. The short demo ends on a bit of a cliffhanger, which left me wanting more – and surely I’m not alone. Dimfrost Studio has clearly put in a lot of love into this project, and although currently there is no date other than 2023 for Bramble: The Mountain King‘s release, it’s sure to be something I play as soon as it is available.
Links for the game:
Paper Cut Mansion
I’d been sitting on this game for a few weeks, and couldn’t wait to stream it. Paper Cut Mansion bills itself as a “roguelite survival horror” game, which obviously means I only heard the survival horror part and assumed this would be an isometric Resident Evil kind of game. That it is not, but cute roguelike with puzzle solving mechanics and a lot of whimsy it definitely is. Paper Cut Mansion has some light horror aspects and it does prove to be challenging the further you get in, and I found myself stuck in perpetual “one more turn” mode by the end of my time with it. Graphics are uniquely styled to look like papercraft and were easily my favorite part of the experience, the sound effects are on point and the music is delightful. Sometimes I would randomly hear a voice egging me on to do something, which got pretty annoying. There are three levels of difficulty but I can only speak to the lightest one, which meant I had a pretty casual experience. If puzzles and encounters are relatively similar in harder difficulties, however, I predict some people may find tedium in the routine. I enjoyed my time with Paper Cut Mansion, however, and the game will likely become a fast favorite for me to play on the couch with Steam Deck.
Links for the game:
