Amedama – 56 minutes completed demo. This one was a somewhat open world (very limited IMHO like a worse Way of the Samurai) Samurai game where you die early and they take your sister. Your soul wanders and you learn you can take over dead or dying animals/people. Of course this leads to a 2D action adventure Samurai game about finding your sister and getting revenge. The music was the best part of this game. It was a little typical Japanese sounding, but pretty cool. The graphics look like Code of Princess for characters, and frankly don’t look good IMHO. The controls also feel super floaty and the main way to win combat is to block and push a button (X on the Series X controller) and counter attack. The characters and story was okay enough but way too on rails. I love Samurai games, but this one feels more like a get on heavy sale or bundled. 6.5/10
Balatro – 2.1 hours did a few runs. This is video poker the rogue lite in a weird old school graphics feeling complete with CRT filters. The main quirk of this one is levels which you need a certain score to pass. You get better scores for better hands of cards and have a limited amount of discards (can discard up to 5 cards). You play as many cards as you want. I recommend playing out the max 5 if possible since you start with a 52 card deck. The main quirk to this game is you can get up to 5 jokers that give you passive powers. This can be upping the multiplier, counting some cards twice, giving you more points for certain cards, and other powers. These are one of the main ways to get big points. You also can get one time use zodiac glyphs which do special things like upgrading cards or changing cards suits. Also cards themselves can get powers such as being worth more points, being counted twice for points, giving more multiplier, etc… This game reminds me of when I was in Vegas playing video poker when I didn’t want to go to bed. It’s a pretty fun game overall and becomes very challenging after the first area. I’m not sure I’d buy this full price, but there is fun here and kind of a laid-back chill atmosphere. 7.5/10
Pepper Grinder – 13 minutes beat three levels. This one is a 2D platformer drill game where you get a drill in the beginning and use it to go through dirt and collect things and move around. This one is a momentum-based platformer so you will often go from one dirt patch to the other. The graphics and sounds are nice. The story is nonexistent for the most part. Levels are like in Super Mario Bros 3 on a world map. Well worth it on sale or bundled. 7.5/10
Searching for Rest – 14 minutes one playthrough. This was not a very good game IMHO. It was pretty much like that one Price is Right game where you punch holes in a wall with a lot of money to be gained. In this case you’re trying to find boots to get you to the end of an area and having to pick a lot of graves. These graves could contain dirt, bones (heals you), swords, enemies or some other things. You get some powers after a few stages. The enemies do damage to you before you do it to them. This game was super basic looking and sounding, as well as extremely random. You get to peek at graves some rounds, but it’s still extremely random. I wouldn’t even want this one bundled as it felt so repetitive already and had so little strategy. 5/10
Swappy World – 2 minutes. This felt like a horrible mobile port on PC. To play this game you have cards and energy. The cards are items and have a number on top of them. This shows how much energy to get the item. You click on these to gather and craft stuff. This felt like a mess to play with a mouse, as it was slow and unresponsive at times. The graphics and sounds are mobile like and look generic. Card Survival: Tropical Island on Steam looks worse than this, but plays better in so many ways and has a demo as well. 4/10
Yohane the Parhelion - NUMAZU in the MIRAGE – 38 minutes beat first area and demo. This wins my award for cutest art for a very generic game. In this one you play Yohane a mage girl who gets sucked into a mirror. In the mirror you get choices to go around and get in Slay the Spire card battles. There is one quirk where you can call an ally and get buffs at anytime if you got their card. They also provide buffs if you play cards with their character on it. The gameplay is very straight forward and plays well enough. I feel the playing of cards itself is a little laggy and not as clean as Slay the Spire’s drag up out of your hand to play cards. The graphics were pretty clean and nice looking. The girls were cute, the voice acting decent, the story simple but OK enough like a slice of life anime, and the challenge just barely enough. This feels like a generic Slay the Spire like game overall and will feel better if you watched the anime or are familiar with the IP. I would never buy this game and would only get it on the deepest of sales if you’ve exhausted all the Slay the Spire likes. Just another average anime game. 5.5/10
