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Forums > Contributor Zone > RotW // 8th - 14th MARCH //

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Author: EmP (Mod)
Posted: March 15, 2021 (11:36 AM)
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Back from the depths of PC repair hell, my absence from the site ends with one of these hellish things. I’ve not been active much recently because my only access to the Internets when my PC is down is an ancient laptop I keep around to play ancient adventure games on that modern rigs have zero chance of playing. It’s fine for playing stuff like that, but the keyboard doesn't quite work, and several letters do not function, no matter how hard I mash them. This makes typing anything the stuff of rage triggers, so if my absence has been felt, you were better off without me. If it hasn’t, all the better; I beat Gabriel Knight 3 during my ‘off time’, which I’ve been wanting to do for years and now I’m back on a platform where Jason can continue to shovel all the weird crap the rest of you turn your nose up at periodically. Back to Loop Hero I go!

I had just three reviews to put into order this week, all predictably good. It was a genuine struggle deciding between third and second, and, even now, I’m prone to change my mind again if I dwell on it further, but this week’s winner was especially good.

THIRD - Raiden Trad [GEN] Overdrive

Brave Rob has a go at perhaps the least appealing thing we all suffer -- the blehy not-awful-not-great mediocre game review which he initially tackles by relaying on type. He has a little ramble. But all is well; the small delve into history lessons was appreciated by (at least) me, comparing ports between consoles and arcades while picking away at the fact that Raiden is, kind of okay, I guess? It’s a little rough going at the start, with some word repetition and the subject matter floating about haphazardly, but the focus and writing grows as the review goes on. Uncharacteristically, I’ve only ever played the SNES version, which I considered awful, so never bothered with the Mega Drive port, so had no idea it was different. I mean, I suspect I’ll still not bother with it, but now my absence is better informed! I really hope we never stray too far from our Retro coverage; it was a massive reason as to why I started writing at this site in the first place.

SECOND - Cathedral [SWH] Joe

The best part of Joe’s review were the bits talking about the game’s Zelda influences. Not only were they well explained, but it was a good counter for the ‘not another Metroidvania’ vibe the opening paragraphs were going for. I also thought the ending line was especially strong, suggesting that you don’t need to reinvent the wheel on every attempt; you just need to make sure your wheel can roll. I think the review struggles a bit at the start, because you try to put it up on a pedestal as the title that’s good enough to steamroll through your genre fatigue, but then most of your descriptions come across as very standard descriptions of metroidvaniaing. I think the angle ultimately works, but it’s pretty clunky going to begin with.

FIRST - Sakuna: Of Rice and Ruin [SWH] Mariner

What an excellent review. Mariner starts this off on exactly the right foot because he’s aware that this is a game that isn’t for everyone, so ensure that’s made clear from the start. Distancing it completely from the Harvest Moons of the world, you sell the framing aspect as a purposeful chore and are careful to never frame it as anything else. Then you begin the hard sell on how this laborious chore is necessary for the weight of the eventual pay off. I thought the explanation about how the protagonist learns alongside you while still weathering expectations towards the grind of repetitive busywork was very well explained. In theory, this should have been a very hard game to review, but you made it look easy.

[Necroedit: it’s been lightly bugging me that I recognise the developer but couldn’t place them until exactly now -- they made Ether Vapor, which is a real hidden gem scrolling shooter]


For us. For them. For you.

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Author: honestgamer
Posted: March 15, 2021 (11:47 AM)
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I'm glad your PC is back in working order so I can bury you in games again, EmP. Mwa ha ha ha ha!

(Congratulations to all who participated this week, and to Mariner especially for the win with a review I also quite liked.)


"Too often we enjoy the comfort of opinion without the discomfort of thought." - John F. Kennedy on reality

"What if everything you see is more than what you see--the person next to you is a warrior and the space that appears empty is a secret door to another world? What if something appears that shouldn't? You either dismiss it, or you accept that there is much more to the world than you think. Perhaps it really is a doorway, and if you choose to go inside, you'll find many unexpected things." - Shigeru Miyamoto on secret doors to another world2

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