NaissanceE is a beautiful abstract maze filled with interesting architecture, though at other times it can feel like a confused first person journey through Autodesk Maya… perhaps I should explain.

NaissanceE is a game with no narrative, no clear objective, no hand holding… You start the game waking up in god knows where, and the entire game is pretty much you just walking through… god knows where. You journey through abstract structures and deserted city geometry just taking in the sights and continuing down the (often hidden) path to the next space.

The lack of objectives and guidance in the game serves as both a strong asset, as well as its worst feature, at it’s best, the game turns into a puzzle of sorts, encouraging the player to find the right path and navigate through the abstract mazes the game presents, and at its worst you’ll become stuck for huge periods of time, only to find out you missed a corridor because everything is the same colour (this happened to me. I had to watch a lets play to find the corridor.).
Becoming stuck in NaissanceE appears to be something which increases in frequency over time, I found the first chapter of the game fairly straightforward and mostly enjoyable, but by the end of the second chapter I had become lost enough times to quit the game twice, resorted to watching a lets play twice, and somehow become stuck in an endless loop of staircases akin to mario 64 (except I couldn’t even descend out to normality anymore).

NaissanceE also seems conflicted as to what genre of game it wants to be – combining platforming, art, light puzzles and exploration, but paired with a soundtrack and sound effects that vary from calming revelation music to that from a horror game. It’s not clear whether the game is intended to be scary in any way, but the developer’s use of music made me incredibly anxious through extended periods of the game, something which isn’t helped by the game’s monochrome colour scheme and broken gamma settings (the game defaults to ‘hilariously dark’, and putting the gamma up to the maximum results only in ‘dark but just about visible’).

The game isn’t without its charms however, giant environments await the explorer and seemingly everything you can clearly see may turn into your next destination. The architecture of many of the structures is beautiful and interesting.  Dynamic lights are also handled very well in the few sections that properly use them, I wonder if NaissanceE was originally intended to be a light based puzzle game?

Admittedly, the game was a little bit too boring and confusing for me to finish, the total lack of direction or way for myself to orient myself just left me stuck too many times and the game didn’t seem worth looking up a letsplay video every time I got lost.
I’ve heard this game get compared to Antichamber, but it isn’t as interesting or novel as that, perhaps it’s more like Dear Esther – but without the narrative and vibrance… hm…

Verdict:

NaissanceE is a mixed bag, and whilst not a bad game by any means, it’s distinct style of gameplay means it isn’t for everyone. I personally would find it very hard to recommend for the price of £13, however If literally getting lost in an expansive abstract world sounds appealing to you, then by all means give this one a shot.

Approximate Game Length :  2.5 – 5 Hours (depending on how lost you get)
Actual Worth / Steam Price:  £4 / £13 = 0.30
Should you play it : No, Despite spending a few hours on this game, I can’t say I enjoyed my stay, sure there are worse ways to spend your time and money, but then there are much better ones too.

Rating: 2/5

Jazzpunk is the funniest game i’ve ever played.

There, did I get your attention yet? Seriously though, I’ve played way too many games to count, yet there are only a handful of games which have properly made me laugh out loud, Jazzpunk sits at the top of this handful, championing a golden wrestling belt, a medal and a tiara.
What makes it so good? The sheer unpredictability of it, mixed with a ton of curveballs and a giant dose of funny writing and puns, the world of Jazzpunk is never quite as it appears, something you’ll understand from the very first 5 seconds of the game.

Lets dial back to some more normal review talk, in Jazzpunk you play an agent sent out to complete ridiculous missions in ridiculous fashions, the game doesn’t really hold your hand at all in this regard, just giving the occasional hint to push you in the right direction – the real meat of the game however arent the missions, but the worlds they are in, wandering 5 feet off the metaphorical beaten track is an absurd world of side missions, short sequences, and even games. The game itself is fantastically self aware and uses this to its advantage, borrowing from pop culture and other games when it needs to, and using them to full effect rather than the borderlands 2 style of just throwing memes at you at any given opportunity (the street fighter noises in the map stage had me in tears).

The graphics are odd to describe, they are essentially shitty, yet at the same time complement the style of the world so well that after playing, you’d have trouble imagining the graphical style being any other way. The environments themselves are bright with strong outlines, the characters are simple yet quirky and everything has just enough detail to be clearly understood, without having so much that the cel-shaded style becomes cluttered.
Music and sound are used to fantastic effect through the game, with noises straight out of cartoons and stock sound packs, along with sounds borrowed from other sources. The voice acting for most characters is also fantastic (and im thinking in particular of a certain waitress at kai tak resort).

This is a game that does almost nothing wrong, I did have a minor graphical glitch, and a crash upon trying to DJ with a record player, but other than that and the games short length and relative high price (game runs at around 90 mins for the core experience) this is a fantastic game. Also worth noting that it’s rare for a game to get the humour so spot on.

Verdict:

Jazzpunk is a comedy masterpiece. Though it’s length is short and it’s price high, you can be sure that every minute spent playing will have a stupid grin on your face.

Approximate Game Length :  75 mins – 2 hours
Actual Worth / Steam Price:  £8 / £12 = 0.66
Should you play it : Definitely, consider acquiring through other means if the price is too steep for you, but you this is a game which deserves to be played.

Rating: 5/5

So in a futile attempt to try and breathe some life back into this blog, as well as occupy myself for a bit, today I will be looking at a game called ‘Guise of the Wolf’, which has a metacritic user score of 0.7. Now granted most of this hate will likely be because the creators issued takedown notices to youtube videos which talk badly about the game, including someone called totalbiscuit who is apparently a big deal.
I care not for such drama, however upon playing the game, it quickly becomes clear why they were trying to censor game coverage because holy shit, this game is on an entire other level of bad.

It’s hard to properly structure a review around a game which is so universally bad at everything, that I thought I would just take the easy way out and detail everything wrong with the game.

1. Barren level design

2. Textures which only slightly more detailed than that found in minecraft

3. Input Lag

4. Lack of video options, or options in general. Game forcibly runs at 1280×768 with black bar letterboxing to give it that movie feel (lol.)

5. Everytime you find something, a jingle plays which sounds so hilariously out of place compared to everything else in the game

6. A Map screen which was probably made in MS Paint

7. Lack of direction combined with shit level design, the game doesn’t really tell you what to do or where to do it, you have to just stumble around and click everything until something happens.

8. Unskippable dialogue

9 Combined with these character models and flappy mouth when talking, which looks like something out of a badly dubbed chinese film.

10. This guy, whose mouth is as wide as from the centre of each eye, it somehow stretches horizontally when he talks, because that’s how mouths work.

11. Doors which seem to require a certain point to be clicked to open, yet sometimes the point changes.

12. This guy’s missing cheeks, and visible nose polygon.

13. This guy that encourages you to burgle the castle he is supposed to be guarding

14. Them textures tho.

15. These incredibly tedious lock puzzles which are about as fun as dipping your face into acid.

16. I actually think Goldeneye on the N64 might have had better graphics.

Aaaaaand thats about all I could stomach. Eventually I hit a dead end, in a castle full of locked doors and no idea of what im supposed to be trying to do or where im supposed to be trying to do it, the shitty map at my side which offered little guidance in terms of direction or even where I was.

After closing down the game and having a look, apparently the game at points wants you to put an amulet on a random statue, and pickpocket a key even though it never mentions you can actually pickpocket.
This game is just a mess. I’m not saying work didn’t go into it, because clearly it did, but when you try to charge £10 for a piece of work which is as bad as this, it’s kind of inevitable that you’re going to get some awful reviews.

Verdict:

A first person adventure game without the adventure, if you enjoy wandering around a shitty looking environment looking for god knows what then maybe you’ll find this interesting, then again, maybe you need to have your head checked too.
Guise of the Wolf is every bit as bad as people say it is, stay well away.

Approximate Game Length :  As long as you can tolerate it
Actual Worth / Steam Price:  £0  / £10 = 0.0
Should you play it : God no. I paid nothing for the game and still feel ripped off.

Rating: 0/5

Pid is made by unknown developer ‘Might and Delight’, and is a basic platformer with some anti-gravity beam stuff thrown in.
The game visually is very nice, and is somewhat similar looking to modern day CGI films, the developers clearly are adept at modelling and graphical work, however they forgot to add a crucial element into their game, fun.

According to steam I have been spent an hour or so playing Pid but honestly it feels like i’ve been at it for hours, the game is a slow paced gauntlet of environmental traps which are often easy to both complete and execute, it is likely this ease that makes the game drag on like it does – the player knows what they have to do, but executing the moves and getting yourself from A to B is hindered by the main character himself, who runs slowly, and floats along at his own pace. Not once in the time i’ve spent playing have I found myself actually entertained to any extent, rather just forcing myself to play through to see if it gets any better.

Granted for all I know the game might magically transform into something actually fun after another hour or so of gameplay, but i’m not prepared to force myself through any more of this ‘game’ to actually find out.

Verdict:

Pid should serve as an excellent reminder to game developers that art, direction and gameplay mechanics can only carry a game so far, if the game isn’t actually fun or interesting to play, your game is trash.

Approximate Game Length :  As long as you can tolerate it
Actual Worth / Steam Price:  £0.20  / £7 = 0.03
Should you play it : No, if you are looking for indie art shite, there are better games for it, if you are looking for a platformer, those are around in abundance too.

Rating: 1/5