Demo Play Thursday - Howl on Switch

For this week's Demo Play Thursday i played the Nintendo Switch version of Howl. This game, from developers Mi'pu'mi Games, is out now.

I was curious about this game. it's visuals are unique and interesting but the trailer made the game look like it was really difficult, not just in terms of difficulty but also in gameplay. So i went into this demo hoping that it would give some answers. 

This demo doesn't appear to be bespoke, it appears to be from the start of the game. on one hand it's good because we get the back story and tutorials, but on the other hand the tutorials aren't great and there's not much added to the story during this demo.

Frequent viewers will know i don't like the use of tutorial cards. this game does add a picture to the cards and tries to show the cards one at a time rather than all at once. but i don't think it works as the cards, when they come, feel out of place and not as useful as they would've been if they were shown earlier. i can't help but feel the game missed out on using the story to do the tutorial, or at least a large part of it. for example, instead of saying in the story that we were trained, why not let us play that. more backstory could be added, more character stuff and world building would help us care more. and once the tutorial finished, the game would start where it does in the demo.

In the video i complain that the tutorial cards are also underutilized. the biggest one was when a card told us how to turn on assist mode. it never said what that mode does, on the card, and just gave instructions on where to find it instead of giving us the option to turn it on from that tutorial card.

All this helped answer the question i had about this game in that it doesn't tell you enough and expects you to work it out for yourself. so it's not very accessible to new or less experienced gamers. So, as a demo, it does work as i now know this isn't the game for me.

Backlog Conquering - Abzû On PS4 - From Start to Finish

This is a video of my playthrough of Abzû on my #PlayStation4. I have edited together all 3 parts into one long video. the cut between each video is a little rough but i don't think it gets in the way of enjoying this playthrough. there is no commentary either.

You can watch each part at:

Part 1 - https://youtu.be/R_MvXOPcm4o

Part 2 - https://youtu.be/FiugN2sszG0

Part 3 - https://youtu.be/hIo3HzPfiug

Puzzle & Dragons Tuesday - Nintendo Switch Edition - Pixel Zuoh Cup Revival - Achievement Run

Welcome to Puzzle & Dragons Tuesday! Sit back and either watch me play through, with no commentary, the cup or leave it running in the background as BGM!

I play and earn all the achievements from The Pixel Zuoh Cup Revival! ( 2023/11/13 9:00～2023/11/20 8:59 JST) in Puzzle & Dragons: Nintendo Switch Edition whilst using a GamePad and a docked Nintendo Switch.

This week is the  Pixel Zuoh Cup Revival. i have played this cup before, https://youtu.be/eREeSANOKVg. I think i did better in that cup than in this one!

It wasn't a great cup this week. i only played against two other players in two games. the rest of the games were up against the computer. i found it fairly difficult to make the needed matches for this cup quickly. it meant that whilst i got to the final boss a few times, i just didn't have enough time to defeat them. Without making the needed combos to get the big points, i wouldn't attack the enemies hard enough. so throughout this cup there are times when it looks like i'm about to make a big attack but i don't because i haven't triggered the attack bonus.

This week i played against:

ルーチヤ - Rank 67

お※ - Rank 65

Cloud Monday - Elite Dangerous - Part 2 - A Game Well Designed For Being Played Via The Cloud

This week's Cloud Monday video is part 2 of playing Elite: Dangerous. I streamed this game, developed by Frontier Developments, via the PlayStation Plus Cloud Streaming Service to my launch model PS4. 

Part 1, https://youtu.be/0tB-9Q96zZgl, went really well and surprised me with how accurate and responsive the motion controls were. This video carries on where part 1 finished. the goal, in game, was to do as the game suggested, take on some trials. This section continued on with the game not really giving enough information on how best to do things. there were a lot of labels so it wasn't too bad, but these small accessibility issues do add up.

Something worthy of praise is how the game has automated certain things. As this is somewhat accurate, the distances between planets and solar systems is vast. so to help with navigation, the game has a system where it locks-on to the planet, takes control of our ship, and gets us there. this has been used to help us dock at stations, too. Having such an accessible feature also becomes useful if the internet connection isn't good. if we lose it, we know what we were doing. if the connection stabilises, then we've probably arrived at our destination.

Whilst the game itself may not be fore everyone, it is well designed to be streamed from PlayStation Plus to us. So much so that i would recommend it. 

Switch Funday - Splatoon 3 - Getting November's Salmon Run Item

This month's Splatoon 3 Salmon Run item is the Brinestone Boots and like the other Salmon Run items, my goal is to get the item twice and pick the best of the two to keep. This went better than last weeks Eggstra Work Event, https://youtu.be/fohHFUg29QU, not just in that my teams and i were able to complete all waves but also in that it was much quicker getting into a game and there was better rotation of the weapons, too. What was also nice was how the weapon selection today went from good to great. often in Salmon Run there's a weapon i really don't want to use. but today, there were a couple of "OK" and some i had a lot of fun with. 

It only took 6 games to get the item twice, but as the video was short in comparison to my other Splatoon 3 videos, i did an extra video to get to 1,000 points. we also had a game where we went up against the King Salmonid but we were only able to do about half damage. There were many games today where there was great team work and i try to call it out when i see it. these games weren't just fun to play because we did all waves, they were fun because of the teamwork. 

Switch Funday - Tetris 99 - 36th Maximus Cup - Super Mario RPG

This weekend there is the 36th Maximus cup in Tetris 99. the prize this cup is a Super Mario RPG theme. I haven't played the game since the last cup, https://youtu.be/5t4uTf9zjAg, and i definitely felt rusty this time. it felt a lot more difficult and it felt like there were more mistakes. some of those are mine as i have a cold and was coughing. some were down the the poor d-pad on my #Switch Pro Controller. but it also felt like some of it is down to the game and it not registering my button presses. it's an odd sensation.

Demo Play Thursday - South of the Circle On iOS

For this week's Demo Play Thursday i played South of the Circle on my iPhone 14 Pro. This game came out on the iOS App Store in October and it downloads as this trial of the game. once the trial is finished, there's an option to purchase the rest of the game. 

It's an interesting trial as on one hand it feels maybe too short but on the other hand it ends at just the right place in the story that i want to know what happens next. so i'm a little conflicted about that. I feel that the game could do a better job at promoting the full version of the game. the trial finished and i don't have any sense how big the story is or how much is left. the trailer that plays in the App Store would've been a nice addition at the end of the trial to give a sense of scale of what's ahead.

Another weird choice is that the game starts without subtitles, almost requiring the game be played with sound or headphones. at the very least i would've appreciated having a choice. The game also doesn't highlight the options either. when you make your first choice in the game, i didn't expect there to be a circle that fills up. it caught me off guard a bit and i forgot the start of the story. i feel the game needs to do a better job at introducing these things so when the story starts, that's the sole focus. for example, just before the story starts, a white screen and in the top corner the option button appears. there's text saying what it is and something like an OK button. so when you hit the OK button, you see how the game uses circles as conformations. 

The game appears to make smart use of the iPhone's screen. not once did i feel like the Dynamic Island got in the way of gameplay. the game also looks really good. the art style they've gone with works very well. it's distinctively different but, in this trial, everything was clear. in a way, this game could be one to show off the graphical capabilities of your phone. 

So it's not the best demo i've played, but in the end it did succeed because once it was finished i was still interested in playing more of it.

Version 1.0.1 Played.