[Games] Papers, Please (PC)

I've heard a lot of good things about Papers, Please over and over again over the past few months, but it was only during this year's Steam Summer Sale that I finally got a copy for myself. And after my first playthrough, I ended up getting copies for two other people, thus pretty much negating any savings I might have gained through the sale.  But such is the nature of really good games - they're worth every penny every single time and you become eager to get more of your friends into the game as well.

And there so many things that I want to say about this game, but it's hard to pinpoint exactly what I should talk about first. Papers please has been one of those unique gaming experiences that just blow your mind and I'm grateful to the development team for coming up with such a unique and clever game.

[Games] XCOM: The Board Game

I've had a weird history with the X-COM franchise over the years. In the PC world, I've always been fascinated by the story behind the game. It's a classic science fiction concept after all - humans trying to deal with alien abductions all around the planet. The slow crawl of fighting alien UFOs, defeating alien ground troops, and salvaging their technology all made for a compelling game. The turn-based nature really drove the strategic element of the whole thing, although it had one heck of a learning curve. And the slow crawl through unexplored alien landing sites led to a lot of creepy moments. The X-COM games really created a distinct experience and I'm thankful the games were made to begin with.

When news of a board game based on the franchise came out, admittedly I was pretty excited. I wanted to see how they were going to translate the various strategic layers of the game including resource management and squad-based tactics all in a static board game. As things progressed, news that the game was going to require an app to run the different scenarios certainly upped my curiosity factor and it certainly provided new ways to make this game even more unique.

[Games] Costume Quest (PC)

I had been without a gaming-capable computer for some time, and so I often feel like I'm still playing catch-up with several games. And it probably doesn't help that I've invested in quite a number of Humble Bundle deals over the years in anticipation of getting a better computer. But now that I have one, I'm a little overwhelmed with how any games I have in my Steam library.

Costume Quest wasn't exactly a game that I thought I would get into based on the title alone. But given it's a Double Fine game, I figured that it wouldn't hurt to try it out sooner or later. A few Humble Bundles later I realized that I already "owned" a copy of the game and it was just a matter of installing it and trying it out.

The game looks pretty simple compared to a lot of games on the market, but it has turned out to be nice little casual game that once can pick up after a long day at work. And while it was originally designed for consoles, the PC translation works pretty well and has eaten up quite a bit of my time.

[Games] Game Dev Tycoon (PC)

I've played my fair share of business simulation games including the quirky Pizza Tycoon and others back in the day. They're clever enough games that really get you in the right mindset for business, albeit typically in a more humorous way. And it's probably my nostalgia for such games that prompted me to pick up a copy of Game Dev Tycoon during one of the more recent Humble Sales. I wasn't quite sure what I was getting into, but at the time the game was cheap enough to wash away all guilt over spending money on yet another game.

This game turned out to be a lot more fun than expected, although still nicely challenging, as is the case for many such "tycoon" games. Plus it was a quaint little indie game purchase, and it's always fun to support the little guys.

[Games] Gratuitous Space Battles (PC)

I'm a bit of a Humble Indie Bundle junkie for one reason or another. As long as I'm interested in a few of the games in the bundle, I'm pretty likely to dive right into things. Plus those addictive bundles come with soundtracks for some of the games, which make for rather fun listening at times.

I had picked up Gratuitous Space Battles as part of the Humble Indie Bundle 6, along with a number of other interesting games. But I sort of forgot about it at the time since I didn't have a gaming-capable computer at the time. So I finally found the time to play the game recently and was rather surprised at how things turned out.

[Games] FTL: Faster Than Light (PC)

It's only this year that I finally got back onto a laptop that can decently handle games versus my old netbook. As much as that trusty little bugger served its purpose in terms of my blogging while traveling, it just couldn't cut the mustard when it came to games. And now that I have something that I can work with, I'm still playing catch-up with a lot of games that have been tied to my Steam account. The positive side of DRM.

One of the games that I had always been eager to play was FTL: Faster Than Light, which had the science fiction feel that excited the Star Trek geek in me. But at the same time, it was also somewhat infamous for for being brutally difficult - not that this is not a bad thing in itself. It really depends on your perspective on gaming in general.

But to be honest, there are few games as enjoyable as FTL despite how well they demonstrate why humans are an inferior race.

[Games] Wallace & Gromit: Fright of the Bumblebees (Grand Adventures Episode 1)

I fell in love with the Wallace & Gromit animated features as soon as I watched The Wrong Trousers - I just have a thing for penguins, I guess. Plus Gromit is downright adorable despite not having a single line of dialog in any of their little adventures - and he just works out that way.

With Telltale Games exploring different franchises like Sam & Max, The Walking Dead and even Back to the Future, it's a great thing indeed that they decided to set their sights in creating graphical adventure games for Wallace & Gromit. And thus we've received the episodic adventures that start with Fright of the Bumblebees, the first of four separate adventures featuring the two lovable characters.

[Games] Little Inferno (PC)

I really enjoyed World of Goo when it came out. It marked an interesting time when a lot of indie games were getting a lot more notice (think early Plants vs Zombies time) and such. It was a novel game with an interesting aesthetic and endeared itself to a lot of puzzle gamers everywhere.

So I was rather interested when it was announced that developers Kyle Gabler and Allan Blomquist had joined up with Kyle Gray (who created Henry Hatsworth in the Puzzling Adventure) to start a new game company called Tomorrow Corporation. Their first project - a game called Little Inferno that gave little clue as to what the game was going to be like. I eventually picked the game up as part of the Humble Bundle: PC and Android 8 and only really got to try it out recently.

It didn't take me all that long to finish the game, but it certainly took me a while to figure out just how I felt about the game.

[Games] Broken Age - Act I

So I finished the first act of Double Fine's new adventure game, Broken Age, in about 4 hours. And that's not a bad thing at all - if anything the whole experience felt almost religious at times. I was actually back in one of the amazing stories crafted by the mind of Tim Shafer - and it was like being home again.

The signs were everywhere - the design of the puzzles, the way the different dialog trees touch on clues that become important later to finding more solutinos. And of course there's the humor - the quirky, oddball jokes and puns that are pretty much a signature of Tim's creative efforts.

I can't really say that this is a formal review yet - we only have one half of the game after all. But I do have some things that I want to say about this game now that I've come this far.