Indie Game

Time To Go Nuts!

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Ever since the idea was conceived of a squirrel wreaking havoc using a gun (and other handy items) I knew I had to get in on the action. Squirrel with a Gun finally released today and I was there for it! Already spent a couple hours learning the controls and doing some squirrely crimes against humanity.

You start off in a top secret facility where you steal your first Golden Acorn, that’s how you know shit is serious. Afterwards your only exit opens where you’ll meet your first Agent who is none too happy to see you. Not that it matters, he dropped his gun and he was nothing more than a funny ragdoll to kick around the room once I was finished.

Eventually, you make your brilliant escape you make your way to the surface, where you don’t have to be so secret anymore. This game has everything that you would never think of; a house where you literally have to play Hot Lava, holding up human victims to make them drop their acorns, a cookout to disrupt, a minefield to traverse and a tank that I’ve yet to steal among whatever else I’ve yet to discover.

Of course, it’s not all crime and violence. I did make a sad human happy by stealing a birthday cake and giving it to him… after using it to make a propane cylinder in a BBQ grill to explode. I also let some humans take pictures of me when I found out I didn’t have to resort to violence to get their nuts. Overall it was a fun couple of hours. My only complaints with the game so far are the inability to use a mouse in the menus, and the severe lack of photo mode. I’m looking forward to seeing what the modding community delivers!

I Finished Bastion! (Or Did I?)

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Finally finished Bastion! Well, got one of the two endings at any rate.Now that I’ve unlocked NG+ I’ll have to go back and get all the other swag and achievements I missed. Not even half of them are unlocked, something I’ll have to grind on an evening where I feel less tired.

Essence Of The Shadows

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Ending my zen weekend with a zen game. Finished a mission in Aragami 2 without any detection or murders whatsoever, plus grabbing additional in world booty (not what you’re seeing in the photo). Only had time for one mission tonight, but I made it count! I’m one achievement richer.We’re still having nice warm summer days, so when the evening hit it felt nice to feel the cool wind drift through the window as I drank some cherry blossom green tea. Needless to say it helped with the atmosphere a bit.

Meanwhile, on Steam Deck last night I started Aragami in NG+ to set myself up to gather more achievements. On my first playthrough I did a mix of stealth with a bit of killing here and there. This time around I’m going to go for the murder medal. Surprisingly killing all the enemies is harder than you might think, especially when you’re trying not to get detected. There’s also an achievement for killing 100 enemies, all in due time.

Kid Just Rages For a While

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Spent the evening conquering more trials in Bastion, and advanced the plot a tad bit. I’ve unlocked another proving ground that I’ll have to force myself to finish before hunting for the final shard. It took me awhile to win First Place on all of the other trials, but you’d be amazed at what you can achieve with the right power-ups and tonics.

I can tell this is made by the same team responsible for Hades. It has a specific level of hard that you can eventually overcome with enough practice and the right load-outs.  Usually I play it with a controller, but every once in awhile I felt the need to switch to a keyboard and mouse for some of those moments that called for proper precision. Though the winner is usually the controller, with the downside being that my hands cramp up after a good fight. Probably why it’s taken me awhile to advance things along, and why tomorrow I’ll probably play something else. 😛

A Game Ends and a Weekend Begins

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Finishing Shantae and the Seven Sirens wasn’t what I planned to do to kick off my weekend… but here we are! I still need to go back to 100% the game, but somewhere between my Desktop and Steam Deck I finally beat the game. When I left off months ago I didn’t realize how close to the end I was!

I still need to go back and 100% the game (only got 80% on my first playthrough), but much like Half Genie Hero I had a great time playing. My only complaint is the 60 FPS lock, but on Steam Deck it doesn’t really matter, and to me anything above 60 for a Metroidvania is cherry. Since I’ll have to replay it to get the remaining achievements and missing items I may consider streaming this one, when I can finally be bothered to stream! 😛

Scratched The Surface… Twice

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My trip to the surface didn’t last too long, but I’m back on the dungeon crawl with a blade this time, and new powers never before used. I made it out one last time tonight before inevitably being sent back, but if I can do it twice in one evening I can surely do it again next time.

Suddenly Haven Moon

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Once upon a time, a slightly younger Overlord purchased an indie game called Haven Moon but didn’t get very far due to ping-ponging between different game universes. You are MYSTeriously teleported to a Moon containing four islands, and you have to figure out how to teleport between them with the equipment located on each island. So far I’ve managed to find four out of the 10 achievements/trophies in the game, which are also a mystery (you can’t see what they are until you solve them).

For being a one guy dev team it has nice visuals, though mouse movement looks a little strange when playing at a higher refresh rate. It isn’t too jarring, but next time I play I’ll have to see if there’s a cfg or ini that I can tweak to make it friendlier on my monitor. The visuals hold up pretty well in 4K, and the soundtrack is as relaxing as the game itself. I wasn’t feeling too good when I got off work today, and wanted to play something a bit more on the peaceful side. I’m not sure when I’ll come back to this one, but I did leave a note for future me so that I hopefully won’t be too confused.

Now For Something Completely Different

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Hey look! A game that isn’t Horizon Zero Dawn! Decided to give my Steam Deck some love while doing an SFM render. I got 100% in Hollow Grove and Thornfelt Swamp, now I’m uncovering new ground in Black Root Burrows, or I was just starting to… but it’s getting late for me. My iced tea is ready for tomorrow, a nice Watermelon Oolong with enough caffeine and flavor to wake me up tomorrow.

Speaking of work, a co-worker of mine has been delving more into Linux lately, and he’s actually been taking a liking to it! Although I’ve had to help him with a few things. On Saturday he was complaining to me about how much gaming sucks under Linux still, and it turned out he never even enabled Proton, the compatibility layer for playing Windows games and a large chunk of why the Steam Deck is able to rival so many other handhelds. I’m sure he’ll give me an update the next time I see him. 🙂 It’s nice seeing more people tinkering with Linux, and I own a good portion of that to the Steam Deck! Now gamers will slowly learn Arch commands! :v

A Walk Through Nibel

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My desktop has been rendering the last chunk of animation for the Skyrim video, so I’ve been making some more progress in Ori and the Blind Forest on Steam Deck. It’s actually kinda funny to think that last night I was playing a Playstation game, and now I’ve shifted over to an XBox game, and I don’t even need to own both consoles! 😛 I mostly ventured through Black Root Burrows., and doing what you would typically do in a metroidvania and circle back to older areas after learning new abilities. Mostly finding life and ability cells, and opening up sealed off areas. Fun stuff.

Was actually having a conversation about this at work the other day with another co-worker bud. One of her fave genres is metroidvania, we actually talk about Bloodstained Ritual of the Night on a few occasions, and I’ve also shared other ones with her like the Shantae series and recently Dust. She plays on Playstation, though we do like to dish out on games in general, among other subjects. It’s nice having a few work friends to help the day feel less hellish.

Another Scorcher

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Another warm summer like day means another day on my Steam Deck! Something about playing Hades in the hot heat seems immersive enough. Still haven’t been able to get past the Champions of Elysium, but I am getting stronger and making the place look a little lived in, even gave Cerberus the best bed a good boi could deserve. I’ve been seeing more people play this, probably to prepare for Hades 2. It’s been tempting to buy, but my current collection makes me slap myself on the wrist at the thought of doing so. I at least need to finish the first one first! 😛

Besides… it’ll give the game some time to mature in Early Access while I go about climbing Mt. Backlog.