 |
|
Smashing Bottles (PC) by jp (May 30th, 2026 at 18:16:28) |
Heard about this one recently and got stuck playing the demo on itch (though it's also available on Steam) for a few hours until I got to the final (demo) ending!
It's an incremental game with some interesting things going on - you have a bat and smash bottles, but you have a limited time to do so (in seconds, like max 25 or so after all the upgrades?). When time runs out you can go again or go to the shop to buy upgrades. As expected you want to get more money from smashing bottles and there's ways to do that - spawn golden bottles, champagne bottles (when they smash the corks fly out and can smash other things), and even molotov cocktails (that explode, smashing other things).
There's a few things I thought where nice/clever:
a. The game has two distinct phases (once you unlock molotovs, everything changes, really) - the "you smash" and the "maximize money in the time allowed". In the latter, the game mostly plays itself as the molotovs keep everything getting smashed.
b. The "you smash" has rotating bottles, and since the smashing can take a few hits, there's some interest in smashing champagne such that the cork flies in a certain direction for more damage.
c. The champagne corks are pretty clever - since it gives you a reason to, in the short time you have to smash, choose what to smash a little more carefully. Go for golden or champagne hoping for a productive chain reaction?
Of course there's also a prestige/reset mechanic - from which you can lock a separate bat that smashes.
I'm curious how far things will go once the full game is out - and what the nature of the upgrades will be. I'm really hoping for more variety in the experience beyond the simple "number go up" - in that sense the molotovs seem like they're capping the experience in a detrimental way (even as they were super fun to smash when I first unlocked them.
read all entries for this GameLog 
- add a comment 
|
|
Donkey Kong Bananza (NSW2) by jp (May 30th, 2026 at 18:07:32) |
Still playing!
It has an interesting structure in terms of its levels and such - the core metaphor is that you're going deeper into the planet with each level, and they're both thematic and numbered. I got to a point where there's a bifurcation - go right into what I thought was "jungle land" or left into "snow land". I went right did a few more levels, cleared the boss (it was plant/poison land) and in order to continue going deeper I was then told to go back to "snow land"! There's a fast travel/teleport system involving giant worms that can move your around, so it was easy enough to do this, but I was surprised to learn that the fork was just a "choose what order to do these" situation... and also, the entire "fork" makes little sense thematically so I'm curious to see how it's explained and communicated in the interface - will it look like a fork in the "hole" going into the planet's core?
The titular ability (bananza mode!) was a bit underwhelming - you turn into a bigger DK and can now punch things you couldn't before - it lasts a limited amount of time. But, I've since unlocked a new one - DK-bird - where you can glide around (and after paying to unlock) and drop an egg on enemies. The gilding around was important/necessary in the plant/poison levels, and I'm expecting it to be similarly required in the snowy ones. We'll see!
read all entries for this GameLog
- add a comment
|
|
Hollow Knight: Silksong (PC) by dkirschner (May 13th, 2026 at 14:58:07) |
Kicking myself for not writing an entry when I was playing this 6 months ago. I am cleaning up my wishlist, backlog, and etc., and the FEELING I get when I see Silksong "in progress" is anxiety. I had jotted a few notes in December, as follows:
"It’s true, Silksong is hard. Like, really, frustratingly hard. Like punishingly difficult. I hit a wall at the end of Act 1 trying to beat the Last Judge. The game likes to place benches far away from boss fights, such that retrying boss fights involves slogging back through tough platforming and other sections of the map."
I did kill the Last Judge and complete Act 1. I remember that took a very long time, and that after the Last Judge, I died a few more times and, probably, with shaking hands and rapid heartbeat, said, "I can't do this anymore." Actually, it may have been in one of those rooms with waves of enemies. This innovation is new and unwelcome to Silksong, rooms that lock upon entering and spill several waves of challenging enemies at you. Yeah, I think that is what got me, just being pummeled over and over in one of those rooms, getting tired of exploring the maze-like map, tired of dying, tired of corpse runs, just exhausted. The game became a chore.
Besides that, I loved it, haha. I was definitely into it for a while. It was sublime until it wasn't.
read all entries for this GameLog
- add a comment
|
|
Turnip Boy Robs a Bank (PC) by dkirschner (May 12th, 2026 at 17:20:35) |
I meant to quickly beat this back in April so I could have a "completion" for the month, but I got really busy after spending barely an hour one afternoon with Turnip Boy Robs a Bank, a bizarre little twin-stick shooter about a turnip...who robs a bank. The game builds off previous games in the series, which I have never played, in which Turnip Boy commits tax evasion and, according to this game at least, seems to have started a war. Work has slowed down for the first time in nearly two months, and while I wait for my next contract to begin, I figured I'd knock this out.
The whole game is silly. The world is populated by sentient fruits and vegetables. You are employed by a pickle / mafia gang leader to rob a bank of a garlic bulb / bad guy / killed your dad. You have a base, where you can get new weapon loadouts by bringing weapons from the bank (always try to return with something new or high-powered!), purchase progression items from the "dark web," and upgrade stuff at another vendor. You go on "runs" to the bank, which are timed (starts at 2 or 3 minutes, goes up to 5 or 6 with upgrades). Runs are over when you die or when you exit the bank. Die and you lose half the cash you accumulated in the run. Survive and you are handsomely rewarded. Upgrade stuff. Go back to the bank. It's a roguelite too.
The bank has a specific layout of rooms, but you'll encounter some randomized areas too, and enemies and treasure are somewhat randomized. Throughout the bank are tons of NPCs with little fetch quests that usually reward you with pictures (fun/ny to look at) or hats (fun/ny to equip). A blueberry might want you to find its wedding ring, a lime wants you to get divorce papers from her lemon husband, a scientist pineapple wants you to find a philosopher mango and ask it an ethical question about experimenting on fruits, etc. I had some good laughs.
In each corner of the bank is a boss. Boss fights were fun, but the most challenging were early on. Once you start upgrading stats, the game becomes easy. It definitely ends up being an "upgrade everything and go nuts on all the enemies!" type game, experience being overpowered.
I haven't played a twin-stick shooter in a while, and while this wasn't revolutionary or anything, it was fun and scratched the itch. I gotta get back to Divinity: Original Sin 2. I might have some extra time till my next gig, so maybe I can boot it up, remember what I was doing, and make some progress this week.
read all entries for this GameLog
- add a comment
|
|
Castlevania: Dawn of Sorrow (DS) by jp (Apr 27th, 2026 at 22:04:52) |
I got to that point where I hit a monster/boss that just wasn't that much fun, and then I got a bit lost in terms of where to continue making progress, and the backtracking started to get a bit tiresome...as I explored and searched for different paths. So, time to bail!
read all entries for this GameLog
- add a comment
|
|
|
|
|
GameLog hopes to be a site where gamers such as yourself keep track of the games that
they are currently playing. A GameLog is basically a record of a game you started playing. If it's open,
you still consider yourself to be playing the game. If it's closed, you finished playing the game. (it doesn't matter
if you got bored, frustrated,etc.) You can also attach short comments to each of your games or even maintain a diary (with more detailed entries)
for that game. Call it a weblog of game playing activity if you will.
[latest site fixes and updates]
[read more]
|
view feed xml
|
 |
|
2323 registered gamers and 3358 games. 7895 GameLogs with 13390 journal entries. 5126 games are currently being played.
More stats
|
 |
|
Metal Gear Solid V: The Phantom Pain (PC) by dkirschner |
| Great stealth sandbox. |
|
most recent entry: Saturday 7 September, 2024
|
MGSV, on the other hand, was incredible. It took me around a month to get through it. The story is batshit crazy, as per usual, so I will not even attempt to comment on it. The stealth-action sandbox is one of the best around. And this one adds some persistent online features and reimagines the series in a semi-open world.
The game occurs in Afghanistan and the Angola-Zaire border region. The environments are totally war torn, and the only really negative thing I can say about the game is that the settings are dull, locations are drab. I got tired of running across endless desert and grassland with scant interesting features. But these are two semi-open world locations. Missions take place in either region, and once you take a helicopter to either one, you can run around the whole place if you want to doing side ops (which I mostly ignored), gathering resources, and doing whatever else you want, or you can just land in your mission area, do your job, and leave.
There are 40-something main missions and another 150-ish side ops. Of the main missions, completing the first 30-something will get you to the credits. Then, you enter "chapter 2," which...is optional I guess...and continues various story threads. The missions in chapter 2 are a mixture of story missions and replaying old missions with new constraints (e.g., total stealth, extreme difficulty, etc.). I actually didn't complete the last two story missions because I didn't know how to trigger them. Previous ones seem to have been triggered by completing some other mission or side op, or just letting enough time pass. I let a lot of time pass, and nothing. Finally looked it up, and oh my gosh, it's grindy! You have to max out your relationship with Quiet, a sniper companion, do something with her, upgrade your base to a certain point, and do various other tasks. This would have taken who-knows-how-many more hours, so I'll watch the "true" ending on YouTube.
Anyway, who cares about all that. The fun in this game for me is playing with all the toys. There are all manner of weapons: pistols, semi-automatic rifles, sniper rifles, tranquilizer guns, grenade and rocket launchers, C4 explosives, a water pistol (seriously), an arm that you can detach and fire at people, a rideable mech with its own armaments, a dog companion that will distract, stun, or kill enemies on command, a sniper companion, vehicles like tanks to drive around in, ability-boosting drugs, inflatable decoys, shields, sleep grenades...I mean TONS of stuff. You can approach missions in a hundred different ways. I never ever got tired of jumping out of that helicopter, creeping up to the mission area, scouting, deciding how I was going to go in, trying out different equipment, companions, and tactics, and playing on my feet as the mission unfolded, sometimes according to plan, and other times not. Sometimes I'd be spotted and enemies would engage; other times, I'd pick up a fun looking weapon and decide to use it instead; or an enemy chopper would appear and I'd have to complete the mission without being seen from above; or I could steal a mech to pilot; or I'd try to get no kills; etc., etc.
In addition to the stealth combat gameplay, there is also a big base management aspect to the game. You build and operate a whole war effort. The basis of this is using your "Fulton device" to capture enemy soldiers. Snake literally attaches enemies to a balloon and they fly away to Mother Base. It's so silly and I love it. They lift off the ground a little bit, pause, then the balloon whooshes upward and they go, "Whoooa, aaaaaah!" Haha. If another enemy is nearby, they might notice. They'll panic a bit, call their buddies, and say, "One of our men just got carried away by a balloon! Should I check it out?!" Then you Fulton them too.
Captured soldiers become part of your army and fill various roles, from intel to medic to R&D. They all have graded strengths and weaknesses. The more soldiers you get, and the bigger your various teams become, the more the teams' skills upgrade. So, level up R&D and you can research more weapons. Level up intel and you'll have more information about the battlefield, like enemy locations. Level up medical, and your wounded soldiers recover faster. You can send soldiers off on missions to collect resources, fight enemies, recruit others, and so on. All in all, your goal is to accumulate resources to upgrade your base, which helps you on the ground.
There are a lot of interrelated systems, and they work together beautifully. I didn't mess with the online stuff much, but you can Fulton defenses to put on your base. Other players can invade your base, and you need to defend it. There are also a ton of challenges that grant rewards, animals to Fulton and a zoo to build, and other collectibles like posters and photos. The game is big, truly.
I'm working on getting a friend to start playing it. He will love it (he digs military and sniping games and MGSV has solid sniping). Looking forward to watching him play!
[read this GameLog]
|
|
|
