#psilosybil

You Are Peter Shorts: bought it because i saw clips from the dev that looked neat while knowing very little about it, wasn't expecting it to be a smash bros metroidvania. like the last level of the subspace emissary if the whole game were designed around that. haven't finished it yet but i'm experiencing a problem that brawl also kind of has: smash bros movement is not necessarily ideal for platforming. plus the enemies are similar enough that i rarely have to switch up my technique when fighting them. it's got all these fairly laborious combat encounters that all kind of feel the same. at least the enemies stay defeated. i do think making defeated enemies into a collectable, thankfully marked on the map, is a genuinely interesting design decision. needs wavedashing imo (<- statement from someone who doesn't play melee)

Balatro: let's be real here, you don't need me to tell you balatro is good

The Void Rains Upon Her Heart: i'm pretty hit or miss with roguelites but i am really into this one. fun shmup gameplay, unique and appealing art, good writing, good music, compelling and more importantly interesting meta-progression mechanics, like a bunch of game modes... it's got it all. a problem i have with many roguelites, more because of my taste than because the games are doing anything wrong, is that randomly generated levels often quickly end up feeling less like i'm playing infinite variety and more like i'm doing the same thing over and over. somewhat counterintuitively, TVRUHH being a boss rush game with random order, difficulty, and upgrades that is otherwise actually the same fights over and over feels less repetitive to me. i am learning their patterns and weak spots and how to get a high score (necessary for more meta-progression currency). i am fighting them with slightly different abilities that require slightly different strategies to their slightly different patterns. it's fun. i told myself i'd wait for it to leave early access before coming back to it (mostly i want the story cutscenes to be complete) and it's genuinely a little hard for me to stay away

ENDER LILIES: Quietus of the Knights: actually bought this during a previous sale but i only got around to playing it now so i'm including it. it's alright! i think it's a little more style than substance but i had a good time. a perfectly serviceable hollowtroidbornelike. i do have to note the gender politics of the game being about a group of pure little girls who cannot defend themselves and have the duty of taking on the burdens of their predominantly (though admittedly not exclusively) male protectors. what the hell is a quietus of the knights anyways

Cavern of Dreams: good 3d platformer. colorful and creative environments and characters. rolling and tail boosting both feel great, and are great speed vs. precision mechanic. a little on the short side, but that means it doesn't overstay its welcome. i give it a big thumbs up

👍

^^^ thumbs up for cavern of dreams. i don't have a lot to say it's just good. my number three recommendation after TVRUHH and anthology of the killer (coming later in this post)

YumeCore: bought three games from this dev because of this toskarin post saying the dev somehow was making new types of games. gotta be honest here, this one's pretty much a beat-'em-up with some adventure game elements. not a BAD one, but not really a new type of game. i like the music and theming!

AISZplus: this one's basically a regular shmup (with a neat risk/reward mechanic) but i don't think it advertises itself as anything else so i gotta give it a pass on that. 1cc'd it on my first try (but only just) and didn't feel particularly compelled to play more than that. still fun!

ADEN: now THIS one... is still pretty much a beat-'em-up. but it IS a new type of beat-'em-up! by far my favorite of these three. despite the player character only having two attacks — dash/body slam and grab/slam — the combat stays fun throughout the game. zipping around enemies with your dash then slamming them into other enemies with the grab remains a good time. boss fights are more bullet hell-type affairs, requiring more skillful dodging and positioning. there's also some light rhythm game elements that honestly aren't integrated super well into the gameplay but are still fun. features a weird and interesting story and presentation (PRO TIP: don't do the game's alternate route first or you'll be really confused) and some pretty great music. this one gets the coveted fourth most recommended slot of this batch. if anyone figures out the significance of the red girl let me know

Momodora: Moonlit Farewell: it's been a while since i've played the first three but i think this is my least favorite entry in the series? i don't like the stamina meter. combat is faster than 4 in a way that feels less deliberate. the player animations are too bouncy for my tastes - like, usually when people walk they look straight ahead instead of swinging their heads side to side, y'know? the sprint animation looks particularly goofy to me. the environments are a lot less atmospheric than in 4 and feel less like semi-plausible locations with a reasonable structure and more like videogamey metroidvania zones attached to each other with little rhyme or reason. the addition of varied body types for several male characters but only one female one means what was previously anime sameface disorder is now the much more sinister eichiiro oda syndrome and i'm prescribing the lead artist to draw 10 non-sexy women before it becomes terminal. the very anime "i fight... for my friends!!!" bit during the final boss would have landed better if the people in the village did anything at all and also if like a half hour earlier the protagonist didn't tell her best friend that if she were selected to be a human sacrifice she'd say yes. still mostly good but like, ehh. i'm not doing two more playthroughs for the last achievements

Frogun: a little stiff compared to cavern of dreams (honestly, it's stiff even compared to fellow inexpressive platformer psilosybil, which i played a few months prior) but still a good time. kinda neat beating a level the regular way then figuring out how you can use your frogun to skip massive chunks of it (at one point i skipped basically an entire level with a grapple i was only barely able to make by abusing the fact that using your frogun in midair stalls your downwards momentum). you can tell the developers really cared about this game

let's review PsiloSybil too why not: it's like crash bandicoot but hard. i had some occasional issues telling the depth and hitboxes of obstacles but overall i enjoyed it a lot. creative levels and some on-point theming help give it its own identity despite how closely its gameplay hews to its inspiration. i feel that this game shows the strengths of a game with limited but precise movement options, where the dangers of the obstacles mean minor differences in timing and movement are as meaningful choices as using entirely different moves in more expressive games... and yet, i also feel it shows this type of game's limitations, in that my interest fizzled out while pursuing 100% completion. ah well, i still had a good time. fair warning that this game is like, HARD hard

Psilosybil

Psilosybil is a PS1 styled Crash Bandicoot inspired 3D platformer where a mushroom woman battles her way through a land of hogs!