Demo Play Thursday - ISLANDERS: New Shores On Switch

For this week's Demo Play Thursday i played the #NintendoSwitch version of ISLANDERS: New Shores from Coatsink.

I'n my personal time, i have tried the original ISLANDERS game on PS4. whilst i appreciated the art and music, i kept butting up against it's rules and logic. With this sequel, i had hoped that the puzzle aspect would've been tweaked a little and focus would've been put on to the user experience with the game. unfortunately, playing this demo was perhaps more confusing that when i played it on PlayStation 4.

Simply put, ISLANDERS: New Shores came across as a Soulslike. the rudimentary tutorial failed to teach the buttons, with iconography that would be confusing to Switch players, rules that can only be learned through experience, and bonuses that are only spotted when they're briefly mentioned on screen at the result screen though how to get the bonus is never taught to the player.

The game is too quick with the information and this was evident from the start when loading the demo when the message about high scores and auto saves was on screen for 3 seconds or less. it took completing the first two island, if not all three, before i saw all the bonuses that were applied for the score. with such a chill atmosphere, it's weird to see information appear and disappear so quickly.

With randomly generated islands, it's unclear if the islands i played in this demo would be the same as what other players had. if they are, please let me know. this island generator makes it difficult to know how the high score system works. it's unclear in the messaging if the game itself generates the islands so everyone is playing different levels or if the developers used Ai to generate the levels in this game and everyone is playing the same. 

After playing the demo, i know ISLANDERS: New Shores isn't for me. i bounced off the first and you can hear my enthusiasm diminish whilst playing this demo. i'm not saying it's vibe is bad, i enjoyed the art and especially liked the music. i just don't find it approachable and to me it feels more like an expansion of what worked from the first with none of the changes i felt it needed to be even better. So as a demo, it worked for me as i know that it's not for me.

Backlog Conquering - Guacamelee! Super Turbo Championship Edition On PS4 - Part 9

Welcome to Backlog Conquering. This is a series were i play a game from my backlog that i may or may not have played before. the goal isn't necessarily to finish the game, the goal is to play it. that way, i can have an opinion about it.

It finally happened, i got to the boss fight. well first i had to finish the fight that crashed on me during the previous part. but once that was done the same combination of tricky platforming "puzzles" and fights with enemies had to be tackled. one of the things that slowed me down was actually a simple bit of platforming going up to the top of the temple! But once i was there i aimed to defeat the bos ... and failed. that fight with the boss was unlike anything we've encountered so far. for me, it felt like an unnatural spike in difficulty. i spend around 30 minutes of this part failing over and over with the boss, not really understanding how or why. so there'll be at least 1 more part!

You can watch other parts:

Part 1 - https://youtu.be/y20ZZ5IllmY

Part 2 - https://youtu.be/OxoUuZ8dYno

Part 3 - https://youtu.be/aSABHs1VrF4

Part 4 - https://youtu.be/RkrZPlBT1f4

Part 5 - https://youtu.be/WZHkHZEaD0Q

Part 6 - https://youtu.be/VMNT2XpjDhE

Part 7 - https://youtu.be/RX5hM88wIyM

Part 8 - https://youtu.be/TJZAYKYTjrM

Stories on Tuesday - Visual Novel: I.B. - Part 6 - Chapter 6

The new game in the Stories on Tuesday series is the iOS version of Visual Novel: I.B. from Entabridge. 

This is Part 6 and it covers the game's fifth chapter titled The Future.

You can check out the previous parts at these links:

Part 1 - https://youtu.be/yclMfGCp1Uo

Part 2 - https://youtu.be/pKZdQNymjhk

Part 3 - https://youtu.be/I0W5ejOVq6I

Part 4 - https://youtu.be/TenlvcJHmDk

Part 5 - https://youtu.be/I7g8FoFqT1Y

Cloud Monday - F.I.S.T.: Forged in Shadow Torch - Part 1 - No Manual Saves

This week's new Cloud Monday video is part 1 of playing F.I.S.T.: Forged in Shadow Torch on PS4, via the PlayStation Plus Cloud Streaming Service to my Japanese launch model PlayStation 4.

This is a game i've been wanting to try for a while. the artwork of the world looked so good and i've always been curious as to what type of sidescroller it would actually be. But as part of this series, the most important question is going to be how suitable is it as a game being streamed to my #PS4 via the cloud.

The answer so far is that it's not that suitable. that's not a knock against the game for how good it is as a game. this is about how suitable it is and how well adapted it is for the PlayStation Plus Cloud Streaming Platform. The biggest problem F.I.S.T.: Forged in Shadow Torch has is that there are no manual saves. the biggest issue this platform has is that there is only a 20 second warning before disconnection.

Another potential issue is that the game zooms out quite a lot. the world on screen does look great, there's no issue with the artwork tho the pop-in can be a little distracting. a couple of times in this part the video we're playing gets some macro blocking or stream tears. because the camera is further out and our character on screen is therefore quite small, these disruptions are quite noticeable and do impact gameplay.

As for the game itself, i'm mostly enjoying it. getting around the world is easy and there are a lot of little short cuts and places to check out. the combat is taking a little time to get used to, you'll hear me say more than once that i would like a dodge. as we're early on, i'm still unlocking abilities. as for the story, it's not revealing too much right now but that could be because it feels like we're still in the tutorial first main mission. some things have been teased and i'm looking forward to playing again in Part 2.

Mobile Friday - Pompo: Backpack Heroes - Good Graphics And Mechanics But Wasted Story And Tutorial

For this week's Mobile Friday i tried Switching Pompo: Backpack Heroes from developers Tae won Go and Dave Studios on my iPhone 14 Pro.

I checked the App store on Friday and saw this newly released game topping the Free to Play Charts on the Japanese App Store. i was really curious as to why this was doing so well so that's why i've checked out Pompo: Backpack Heroes.

The game starts strong with a story introduction that hints that this group of characters  might be accidental heroes. But the next hour or so with the game almost ignores all of that. what i played didn't match the set up at all. if the game hadn't started so strongly with it's story and characters, then this wouldn't have been much of an issue. but because it does and them seemingly ignores so much of it, it really sticks out as a waste.

A new world is introduced to us by a character who seemingly knows about it. But that's it. the game makes little to no effort in tiring the game's mechanics into the world it's introduced. For example, the game introduces miners as a way to earn extra money. but this isn't done via a story beat, it's not done via a tutorial either. it's introduced as a mission that needs to be completed, there are no explanations as to who these miners are, where they are, or how it ties into anything in the game.

Pompo: Backpack Heroes is simple a bunch of mechanics tied together with great art and ease of gameplay. The game has a character who seems to know the world, but that character never acts as our guide or even helps with a tutorial. The weirdest part of the gameplay is how we started with a group, lost the group, and then spend no time trying to find our friends. instead a summon mechanic is added. and like most things in this game, there's no reason given for it, it's not tied into the story or the game world, and there's no summon animation. 

But Pompo: Backpack Heroes is mostly easy to play at a basic level. there are menus and abilities and power ups that i never touched in this first hour and it didn't seem to matter. that's not to say they won't in the future, but for now the game's lack of a tutorial and explanations don't seem to matter much as we're able to stumble through the opening section. However, a major mechanic, that i didn't expect, was introduced near the end of the video called Rebirth.

This concept is one i know of as it used to be popular in mobile and idle games a decade or so ago. but it's not one i've seen much of nowadays. essentially put, when the game starts to plateaux and you're unable to make any more progress or level up you're meant to use the Rebirth mechanic to rest some of your stats and gain a new currency that can be used to enhance your team. But with no tutorial on how best to use it, i can only hope that the game's missions are designed well enough to force the player to do it at the appropriate moment.

Pompo: Backpack Heroes looks great, with our team looking like Pixel Art but the world having a more water color look to it and there are giant monsters that look huge and very different to our team. the music is nice to, tho the gaps between songs/loops could've been dealt with better. the screen is smartly used, too. i only noticed one small issue with the Dynamic Island and a small issue when levelling up the miners. the placement is smart and enabled me to play most of the game with just one hand.

Pompo: Backpack Heroes is a fine game but there is so much wasted potential. if you're looking for an idle game that's easy to quickly pick up and play that maybe feels a little "retro", then this would do fine. but understand that even tho it makes a fantastic first impression, that's the only time any of that matters. it's possible the game will remember it's story later on, but in this first hour it doesn't and i can't guarantee it will.

Version 1.0.4 Played.

Demo Play Thursday - Pokémon Friends On iOS

For this week's Demo Play Thursday i played the iOS version of Pokémon Friends from The Pokémon Company.

The Pokémon Company released Pokémon Friends this week across Switch and Mobile. On Nintendo Switch, the game is released as a cheap base version with optional DLC. but on Mobile, there is a free to start TRIAL/DEMO of the game as well as the Paid DLC base game and optional Paid DLC. The free to start nature of this version of Pokémon Friends is why i included it as part of the Demo Play Thursday series and not as part of Mobile Friday.

In this free to start version, we're severely limited in what we can do. we can only do one set of puzzle per day, when the base game lets us play many. there are further limitations in the amount of Pokémon Plushes available to make, puzzles in the game, and there are no quest puzzles from the town's folk.

From what we get to play, i enjoyed this game's approach to new players. it felt modern. a key example is that the tutorial messages only appeared when they were needed instead of overloading with messages at the start. another great approach is how for each puzzle there is a gif/video showing the type of puzzle it is. we saw something similar to this in the Hogtie demo, and just like that it doesn't reveal the actual answer to the puzzle. when it came to putting our plushes on display, i greatly appreciated that the game didn't rely on the shadow of the plush and instead put an icon on screen showing exactly where it would be placed. 

As a free to start game, Pokémon Friends isn't great as it's just too limited. but as a trial/demo, this version of Pokémon Friends works great. if you're curious about Pokémon Friends, try this before you buy the base game on your platform of choice.

Backlog Conquering - Guacamelee! Super Turbo Championship Edition On PS4 - Part 8

Welcome to Backlog Conquering. This is a series were i play a game from my backlog that i may or may not have played before. the goal isn't necessarily to finish the game, the goal is to play it. that way, i can have an opinion about it.

In Part 8 i tried a few more times to complete the Mine section by doing the third Mine challenge, but again i couldn't defeat the final boss. so i gave up and decided to go after the game's final boss. this final area has some decently hard platforming but what was really evident was how much harder it was getting from place to place because of the enemies. it was full of them! Thankfully the checkpointing seems to be keeping up with this pace so whilst i died a few times i was never far from where i was. The biggest disappointment was that the video ended with a game breaking bug.

You can watch other parts:

Part 1 - https://youtu.be/y20ZZ5IllmY

Part 2 - https://youtu.be/OxoUuZ8dYno

Part 3 - https://youtu.be/aSABHs1VrF4

Part 4 - https://youtu.be/RkrZPlBT1f4

Part 5 - https://youtu.be/WZHkHZEaD0Q

Part 6 - https://youtu.be/VMNT2XpjDhE

Part 7 - https://youtu.be/RX5hM88wIyM

Stories on Tuesday - Visual Novel: I.B. - Part 5 - Chapter 5

The new game in the Stories on Tuesday series is the iOS version of Visual Novel: I.B. from Entabridge. 

This is Part 5 and it covers the game's fifth chapter titled The Past.

You can check out the previous parts at these links:

Part 1 - https://youtu.be/yclMfGCp1Uo

Part 2 - https://youtu.be/pKZdQNymjhk

Part 3 - https://youtu.be/I0W5ejOVq6I

Part 4 - https://youtu.be/TenlvcJHmDk

Cloud Monday - Battlefield 2042 - Part 2 - Go To "Portal" And "Browse" For Online Matches

This week's new Cloud Monday video is part 2 of playing Battlefield 2042 on PS4, via the PlayStation Plus Cloud Streaming Service to my Japanese launch model PlayStation 4.

In Part 1, i was unable to find an online match. so my goal in this Part was to try every online game mode and give said mode 5 minutes to find a game. Because i did this, i found where the Battlefield 2042 community is, they're in the Portal Section, so use the Browse option to pick the best game near you.

The video i got from PlayStation Plus Cloud Streaming service wasn't as good as in Part 1, nor was the audio. with how short you're alive for in this game, the visual issues weren't much of a problem. but the audio was a little frustrating. it sounded either low quality or like it was too loud for the speaker but then that sound is played back to me at a normal sound. 

What was frustrating about Battlefield 2042 in Part 1 continued here. if the community is all in one place, why haven't the developers changed the UI to send us straight there. there was a Conquest 64 mode being highlighted instead. it baffles me why the developers chose to copy the poor Call of Duty UI and then have no tutorial for how it plays. i still don't know how to lay on the ground.

But with how bad the game is, streaming it does become an option. there's not much of a community behind it so installing the game onto your PS4 could be seen as a waste of space. but now we can stream it from the cloud, well you can check which, if any, modes are populated without having it take up space on your PS4.

Mobile Friday - Switching Heroes: Action RPG - A Good Looking Simple Action RPG With Poor Widescreen

For this week's Mobile Friday i tried Switching Heroes: Action RPG from developers ZillionGames on my iPhone 14 Pro.

I've had Switching Heroes: Action RPG on my phone for a while and had seen that it's been regularly updated by it's developers. the only reason why i hadn't played it earlier is simply that i forgot it came out this year.

The screenshots in the app store made it look like the game had good graphics and decent action and after playing for nearly an hour i would agree. i wasn't disappointed by the artstyle either. i thought the monsters looked good and the different places we went to also looked distinct from each other. it would actually be the music and sound effects that stand out as being particularly poor in comparison.

There is a story, but it really didn't add anything to the experience and is very rarely mentioned again. every now and then on screen an image of the tower would appear and we'd overtake someone. but i didn't really know what was happening. Switching Heroes: Action RPG does have a tutorial and at times it's great. but they fail to have a consistent level of quality throughout the experience and the tutorial never talks about the icons on the top right or top left.

i didn't know that the game had both a vertical and horizontal mode. unfortunately, it's hard to recommend the horizontal landscape mode. it feels more like the game can do it, like a check box could be ticked, rather than being designed to use it. it's weirdly zoomed in, the UI doesn't cover the whole screen, and all the text is tiny on the screen. switching to vertical makes things much clearer. 

The core gameplay to Switching Heroes: Action RPG is good. as i've played a few of these before i know what to do. it took about 35 minutes before the grind kicked in. it was only brief as i was able to continue to make progress fairly quickly. it's easy to play Switching Heroes: Action RPG one handed and in short bursts, which makes it a good choice for those who commute. i would say that Switching Heroes: Action RPG is a good one of these, but it's probably not making it into my top 5 free to play mobile games of the year.

Version 2.70 Played.

Demo Play Thursday - BUSTAFELLOWS season2 On Switch

For this week's Demo Play Thursday i played the Nintendo Switch version of BUSTAFELLOWS season2 from Nippon Cultural Broadcasting Extend and PQube.

I haven't played the original game that came out back in 2019 so going into this, and any continuation of a story, i'm interested to see if that lack of knowledge would be a hinderance. 

This demo is the prologue of BUSTAFELLOWS season2 but it is also different from the start of the game. this means that the save data from this Prologue will NOT work with the main game. for spoiler reasons, it's not made clear what the differences are between this version and the final retail version. I did like that the demo makes this clear before it starts. there's a memo from the developers about this prologue. unfortunately, it's only on screen for less than 2 seconds so for this upload i have extended the time it's on screen so you can read their note.

Personally, i'm not a huge fan of how this prologue told it's story. i admit that i didn't get to the end of it, but with this video already over an hour 15 and my enthusiasm for the story dropping, i thought this was long enough. we start with an introduction to a lot of people who know each other, in a way that didn't quite feel as natural as i'd hope. there's a shocking development, and then the story goes back in time a little. we're introduced to more people who seem to know each other, but then we do get introduced to two new people who seem like they're going to be important to the story.  then i ended the demo.

Backlog Conquering - Guacamelee! Super Turbo Championship Edition On PS4 - Part 7

Welcome to Backlog Conquering. This is a series were i play a game from my backlog that i may or may not have played before. the goal isn't necessarily to finish the game, the goal is to play it. that way, i can have an opinion about it.

In Part 7, I got ever closer to the game's Boss. we beat the Jaguar guy and reached a point where the game suggested checking out previous places we've visited before going forward to the end game. i decided to go back to the chicken trainer and finally beat the last set of combo's. it took some time but i got a trophy for it. the next goal was to go back to the mine and finish it. i didn't realize that when you finish a shaft, it unlocks the next one. i had already finished the first shaft so in this video i did the second shaft and then struggled with the third. i came soo close to defeating it's boss, but this video was already over an hour so i decided to give up for today and try again in Part 8.

You can watch other parts:

Part 1 - https://youtu.be/y20ZZ5IllmY

Part 2 - https://youtu.be/OxoUuZ8dYno

Part 3 - https://youtu.be/aSABHs1VrF4

Part 4 - https://youtu.be/RkrZPlBT1f4

Part 5 - https://youtu.be/WZHkHZEaD0Q

Part 6 - https://youtu.be/VMNT2XpjDhE

Stories on Tuesday - Visual Novel: I.B. - Part 4 - Chapter 4

The new game in the Stories on Tuesday series is the iOS version of Visual Novel: I.B. from Entabridge. 

This is Part 4 and it covers the game's fourth chapter titled Malice.

You can check out the previous parts at these links:

Part 1 - https://youtu.be/yclMfGCp1Uo

Part 2 - https://youtu.be/pKZdQNymjhk

Part 3 - https://youtu.be/I0W5ejOVq6I

Mobile Friday - Space Squad Survival - Assortment Of Bugs Keep This Great Game Off Game of the Year

For this week's Mobile Friday i tried Space Squad Survival from developers Rebel Twins on my iPhone 14 Pro.

I was quite excited to play Space Squad Survival. the screenshots and video on the App store reminded me of FTL: Faster Than Light, a PC game i've played but never finished. 

the game starts explosively and the first thing i noticed is how weird the controls are. it certainly took a little bit of time to understand how it worked. all the while, the game's story is still going. when it came to stuff on our ship, the tutorial was simple but effective, perhaps lacking a reason why we're doing what we're doing. But when it came to the planet stuff, that first planet was a blur. the ship is talking to us, there was my shipmate and I trying to adjust to the controls, dodge what's attacking up, whilst there's a timer, and then the whole stage blew up. and wow, it's a lot to take in. i didn't really grasp what to do until by the end of the second planet we visit. 

Quite quickly the loop of what's expected of us is revealed. we need to go to other planets to gather resources. we then use them on upgrading or building new elements on/in our ship. at the end of the video i discover there are other 300 stages, i only got to stage 5 in an hour. so there is a lot of content in the game.

Unfortunately, the game is too buggy for me to recommend right now. i encountered a game ending bug where i was stuck in the ship. the game forgot i had completed a stage by watching a video and by using gems so i lost the games and had to do it all over again with no compensation. 

As these bugs effect gameplay, they will knock Space Squad Survival down the list of the best played games this year. but i still had fun playing it. perhaps the biggest surprise was how Space Squad Survival does adverts. there is an actual countdown to when the advert plays. that's absolutely fantastic and something i've been asking developers to do for years. and it's not just text on a screen, they've created art that fits the game's to tell us this. I cut out about 6 minutes of adverts from this video, but as the player it never really bothered me because of the game's approach to it.

I would recommend Space Squad Survival in it's current state. i think that there's enough to it and enough that works for it to be an enjoyable experience, i know i had one. at the very least, it's worth downloading now and checking update notes when they come out. it may not make the number 1 spot, but it could still make it into the top 5 of my free to play mobile game of the year awards just 'cause it's fun to play.

Version 1.0.06 Played.

Demo Play Thursday - Hogtie On Switch

For this week's Demo Play Thursday i played the Nintendo Switch version of Hogtie from RedDeer.Games and Alacrity Games.

there were a decent number of puzzles to playthrough in this demo for Hogtie. as you play it, it's clear where the cut off for the demo is. as there appears to be no story, such a cutoff doesn't feel weird. what's nice is that we're given puzzles across two different biomes, which means a greater number of types of puzzles are available. in this video, i played through all the puzzles i could, but i didn't get all the stars. for the purpose of this video, getting all of them wasn't important. but it does seem that progress is gated behind ability. So if you're bad at this game, you won't gain access to much of it. it's not ideal but as this isn't a story based puzzle game it is understandable. What's unknown is whether our playthrough of the demo would carry over to the final game or if we get a bonus start or two in the main game for playing it.

i'm not great at puzzle games, so i always hope that there's a clear tutorial or a sensible ramp up in difficulty, or preferably both. With Hogtie, i appreciated how they showed each new ability in action and the controls needed. what they didn't show was when to press the controls. so i had to experiment a little with tapping, holding buttons until i understood. but the videos were very clear in showing what the goal of the puzzle was. i also appreciated how quick the puzzles were to restart by hitting the replay button on screen during the puzzle or the replay option at the end. but i don't know if "replay" is the least confusing word to chose. when it's after the puzzle i would suspect it means watching a replay of our game. i think retry would've been a better choice.

This communication problem occurs at least one more time. some of you may be watching and thinking the audio is quiet, and i would agree. i have not turned down the game audio. actually, i've turned down my commentary audio a little. and yet, i show in this video the audio options and i genuinely couldn't understand what it meant. if you have labels, they must be universal and clear. but i've seen all 3 of those labels used for all sorts of audio stuff. i even turned it up in-game. so i have to imagine the audio is a little broken in the demo so let us know if the final game fixes it.

Overall, i thought this was a good demo for Hogtie. if you're curious about the game and the puzzles in it, trying this demo is a great place to start. remember, the game is skill based so if you struggle to complete the demo then you're unlikely to get enough stars in-game to progress. the controls are good, the tutorials are great, the art is fun, and the mood is casual. it's a nice game to have and to make slow progress through.

Backlog Conquering - Guacamelee! Super Turbo Championship Edition On PS4 - Part 6

Welcome to Backlog Conquering. This is a series were i play a game from my backlog that i may or may not have played before. the goal isn't necessarily to finish the game, the goal is to play it. that way, i can have an opinion about it.

In Part 6, the platforming got more challenging overall. instead of one long section of difficult platforming, it felt like there were more shorter segments instead. the buff the enemy got was still felt here, but i did think the boss fight at the end was easier than expected. we also got the final ability so this could mean we're a part or two from the end of the game.

You can watch other parts:

Part 1 - https://youtu.be/y20ZZ5IllmY

Part 2 - https://youtu.be/OxoUuZ8dYno

Part 3 - https://youtu.be/aSABHs1VrF4

Part 4 - https://youtu.be/RkrZPlBT1f4

Part 5 - https://youtu.be/WZHkHZEaD0Q

Stories on Tuesday - Visual Novel: I.B. - Part 3 - Chapter 3

The new game in the Stories on Tuesday series is the iOS version of Visual Novel: I.B. from Entabridge. 

This is Part 3 and it covers the game's second chapter.

You can check out the previous parts at these links:

Part 1 - https://youtu.be/yclMfGCp1Uo

Part 2 - https://youtu.be/pKZdQNymjhk

Cloud Monday - Battlefield 2042 - Part 1 - Unwelcoming For New Players, No Online Matches Found

This week's new Cloud Monday video is part 1 of playing Battlefield 2042 on PS4, via the PlayStation Plus Cloud Streaming Service to my Japanese launch model PlayStation 4.

It turned out i knew nothing of this game. i thought it was a traditional Battlefield game in that it would have a single player mode and a multiplayer mode. but from this video it looks like there's only online mulitplayer.

Apart from a cool opening cinematic, the rest of my experience with Battlefield 2042 wasn't great. there was no tutorial, it placed us into a game mode that resembled some sort of Dynasty Warriors Muso game. but with no context, i set of walking to the objective not understanding how large the map was. there was no tutorial on the controls. there were tiny icons with controls on them but when selected they had even tinnier text. 

What was frustrating about this first mission we did was how un prepared for it i was. if i new there were going to be tanks, i wouldn't have picked a class that can't deal with them. i never found a weapon to deal with tanks either. it was weird that the game made us choose a class without really telling us what the class does or even how suited it would be for the map we're forced to play. it's an immediate example, and one that's repeated over and over in this video, of the game simply not giving us the information we need.

I have tried on 3 separate occasions 3 different Call of Duty games, Call of Duty: Warzone 2.0 https://youtu.be/-F5LygJiO2U, Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War https://youtu.be/Iudl4sz5Kd8, and Call of Duty: Warzone Mobile https://youtu.be/4PhpBH6yceQ, and all 3 games have the same problem with poor UI and a poor user experience. i don't know why Battlefield 2042 has copied this. what's weird is that there are great accessibility options presented to us before the game starts and then we're presented with some copy of the Call of Duty messy home screen and interface. it really made me think that the game isn't designed for new players, rather they set out to poach Call of Duty players by offering them a familiar experience. 

Once i worked out that this was a multiplayer only game i set about to trying it. i picked a mode and after some waiting the game would connect me to a match. But it didn't. It says "Game Searching" so i understand what that means. then it changed to "Game Starting" but what happened next was not what i expected. instead of joining a game or lobby, it actually created a lobby for me and we have to wait for people to join. in this video, no one ever did. i don't know what region the servers are connecting to as that was never revealed to me. all i can say from this first video, or two, is that no one is playing Battlefield 2042 online. even with cross platform play enabled.

The stream held up fine and i noticed no issues with the video or audio. but this PS4 version was suffering from long load times, pop-in, and the image quality didn't feel 1080p, rather it felt a little soft and under textured. 

Mobile Friday - Can't Work Today - Ads Get In The Way Of A Fun Hammock Gaming Experience

For this week's Mobile Friday i tried Can't Work Today from developers ponos corporation, on my iPhone 14 Pro.

The screenshots and video for this game on the App Store looked ridiculous in a fun way. i was really curious and genuinely wanted to try it for myself. so that's why this week's game is Can't Work Today.

There is no tutorial at the start of the game. it wasn't entirely obvious how to even start the game. it doesn't come across as particularly welcoming even tho it's premise is so whimsical. as you'll see in the video, i did stumble upon the solution, we touch our speech bubble to start it and use the arrows to move our hammock.

Once things get started, Can't Work Today is a lot of fun. it doesn't tell us a lot and there's no list of things it suggests we do. as there's no tutorial we didn't know what happens for a lot of things. throwing our character up gives us points and money. for some reason there's cake that gives us points. there are things trying to wake us up which we need to avoid. thankfully we're given 10 snoozes. so when an alarm hits us, the snooze keeps us asleep. but, as you'll see in the video, if our character falls out of the hammock they wake up and it's game over.

The biggest frustration with Can't Work Today are the adverts. even tho it told us there would be some, it never said when they would appear. so it immediately took me out of the experience when the first one appeared. the adverts feel like a lazy addition to the game and could've been implemented in a smarter way.

There's no doubt that the core gameplay in Can't Work Today is fun. but very little that's been built around it works to add to the fun. it's needlessly obtuse, adverts appear and take us out of the experience, and it doesn't tell us to spend the money we earn even tho we could get costumes and hammocks that have positive modifiers which could make the next runs go better. 

Version 1.0.1 Played.

Demo Play Thursday - Day of the Shell On PS4

For this week's #Demo Play Thursday i played the #PlayStation4 version of Day of the Shell from Duper Games.

I didn't know about this game before trying this demo. i thought the icon art was cool and that was the main reason i chose to try it out. But i'm glad i did. whilst it was a tough time and i didn't complete the demo, overall i'd say it was a good demo.

I liked the personal message at the start from the developers. the message also gave some hints as to what was in the demo and what extra stuff could be in the final version. a trailer or a message to check out the latest trailer would've been a nice addition. 

the game starts with a good tutorial. it uses videos/gifs to show us what we need to do. i found the explanations to be quite clear as well. but i found that it ended too quickly. i discovered i could move the camera by accident, it's something that the game should've told me about itself. i found that the game keeps too many secrets in general. when there's such a good tutorial at the start and then a helpful goddess and priest, it seems out of character for them to not reveal more about the world.

the story we got told to us didn't quite work with the retrying element of this games' roguelite elements. for example, it's clearly mentioned that one of the gods is sinking the island we're on. but we come back to that island and nothing is said as to why the island is back. nothing is said if we're travelling back in time and doing a loop. so the game tells us one thing, shows us it, and then shows it's been undone without any reason why.

the core gameplay is solid and how it ties in cover is smart. the music and graphics they use are also great. it's just the tutorial and story aren't as cohesive. the tutorial stands out because it starts strong and just stops, for example. but i would say Day of the Shell is worth checking out. for roguelite players they may find it easier than i did and would be able to complete the demo.

Backlog Conquering - Guacamelee! Super Turbo Championship Edition On PS4 - Part 5

Welcome to Backlog Conquering. This is a series were i play a game from my backlog that i may or may not have played before. the goal isn't necessarily to finish the game, the goal is to play it. that way, i can have an opinion about it.

Part 5 saw a level up from the enemies. we were introduced to new enemies that can teleport to avoid us. we also had a boss fight in this part that proved tricky. the platforming was also tricky as we gained the ability to run up vertical walls. thankfully the challenge was obvious, just tricky to pull off.

You can watch other parts:

Part 1 - https://youtu.be/y20ZZ5IllmY

Part 2 - https://youtu.be/OxoUuZ8dYno

Part 3 - https://youtu.be/aSABHs1VrF4

Part 4 - https://youtu.be/RkrZPlBT1f4

Stories on Tuesday - Visual Novel: I.B. - Part 2 - Chapter 2

The new game in the Stories on Tuesday series is the iOS version of Visual Novel: I.B. from Entabridge. 

This is Part 2 and it covers the game's second chapter.

You can check out Part 1 for the prelude and first chapter.

https://youtu.be/yclMfGCp1Uo