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Phantom Abyss (PC) by jp (Apr 6th, 2025 at 19:14:27) |
I'd heard of the game's hook (or gimmick if you will) as, everyday it's a different 1st person platforming game/run, and if you die - that's it. Play a different run later.
I'm guessing stuff changed along the way, though the concept is still here - it's a reasonably challenging rogue-like 1st person platforming game. I've had fun, you have a whip to help you climb and each level has different modifiers (the whip has an ability) and you can pick up boons in your run (if you have enough coins to afford them) and hopefully make it to the end. BUT, you see a bunch of ghosts for everyone else who played this level - if someone died, you can collect their spirit or something for a small heal! During each run you collect keys you can use to buy permanent upgrades, and so you go up the progression ladder of many roguelites...
Someone described this as first person temple run, which is close enough? I mean, the levels themselves are a lot more interesting than the "mere" reaction times that temple run goes for, here you can side-step/etc. stuff - and there are different paths, and in all you can be a bit creative for how you approach stuff...I've had fun so far - unlocked all the green levels and I've started on the blue ones!
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Cuphead (Switch) by jp (Apr 6th, 2025 at 13:37:03) |
I only get to play this when my son comes around - and we play together and I realized, yeah - I need to either start practicing seriously or just give up. And, I enjoy playing it co-op, so there's not much sense in practicing, so I decided to give up.
We did make it to the 2nd island(?), and played some of the levels there - but I was clearly starting to see a steeper path to success. As in, it too us (mostly my fault) more and more tries to make less progress. He's already played it, beat it too? So, not much point for him really.
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Sonic Rush (DS) by jp (Apr 6th, 2025 at 13:34:08) |
I started playing this from the saved game - with new(?) character Blaze on "area 2" (I don't remember the exact name). And, I just could not beat the level - it was set in the casino world, and everything was moving super fast and on "automatic" - so, you just press move and the character zips along, bounces, etc.
It's actually quite boring! Because you just do this, at some point you hit an enemy (very few enemies in the game!), lose your rings, and then carry on. But, I'd lose because I'd fall into a bottomless pit, lose three lives and then out.
I'd say it wasn't so much frustrating as it was a disappointment. Yes, the point of Sonic is that it's "fast" - that's it's thing. But I find that there's little interaction to the game for most of the levels - you just "go along with the direction". It's neat when sometimes you get bounced around automatically, but for the most part I like to control the character.
So, I deleted the save file and started a new one, this time with Sonic in the equivalent of green hill zone. This level has two areas and then a boss. So, it's like 3 levels make up a level.
And, the experience was pretty similar - run on automatic for a while, lose rings suddenly or die, repeat with a bit more caution...etc. I did make it all the way to the boss fight - which I almost beat one too many times, and I just realized - ok, this is dumb - at least the boss fights have more gameplay ( you dodge, make an attack when the weak spot is open, etc.) - but it's still a pretty boring/uninteresting platforming experience.
So, off to the shelf it goes!
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Secret Files: Tunguska (DS) by jp (Apr 4th, 2025 at 19:16:25) |
I think there's a weird moment in time when everyone thought that point-and-click style adventure games were dead, but they were not. And, I think this game is an example of a game that was under the radar of "mainstream" games press at the time? Or at least under the radar of the average consumer of videogames...
This particular game is also a strange little time capsule - it's a port of what I think was a PC game...also at a time when people where porting all kinds of things to the DS. And, it works! Well, from a UI perspective at least. And it works pretty well. At least compared to another adventure game I played recently on the DS whose name I'm blanking on as I write this. I bounced on that one because it had some character/3D interactions that were awkward and unintuitive. Here, they were much smarter about it (I'm assuming they made UI "concessions" because it's on the DS). So, while you have a 3D character that navigates a static space - you don't actually have to move the character around directly in order to interact with objects/places in each scene. Press one button and all the interactive spots highlight, and you can just tap on them directly. I LOVE this solution - especially because I was never a fun of the "hunt for the pixel" approach that many games had (on PC) - and I'm super glad it didn't come across into this DS version (for all I know, the "here's all the highlights" was also possible on PC).
But, the UI triumph aside, I still kind of bounced off this. I got stuck on a puzzle (how typical!) - and what I had to do was leave a location to visit another location and then continued...this seemed really "unfair" to me - as in, unintuitive - mostly because I had assumed I could not leave the locatio in the first place. It wasn't entirely unintuitive - but it was the sort of puzzle where I was sure I should be able to (in this case) get the key out of the aquarium - but it turns out that no, I had to leave the place, do some other stuff, and then come back. At this point I was well into the tried-and-true "try all the things with all the things", except that I did not know I could leave the location I was at. Sigh.
So, from glancing at my list of DS games I still need to play...well, I wasn't THAT interested in the story so far and the puzzles didn't feel particularly interesting either..so, it was an easy game to put on the shelf.
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Shogun Showdown (PC) by dkirschner (Apr 4th, 2025 at 18:33:00) |
Clever little tactics roguelite. It reminds me of Into the Breach and other tactics games where you are given clear information about what enemies will do each turn. It's also reminiscent of Into the Breach because of the small play space. Basically, the game takes place on a 2d plane that is divided into like 8 or 9 spaces. Any given character occupies 1 space and can move left or right. You build a "deck" of "tiles" that include attacks and other special abilities, many of which involve movement (e.g., a forward dash that moves to the nearest frontal enemy and deals 1 damage). Your goal is to build up your tiles and progress stage by stage until you kill the Shogun.
During each run, you can purchase and upgrade tiles, mostly increasing their damage or decreasing their cooldowns, purchase passive abilities, use items, and other standard roguelite stuff--make yourself stronger by strategically handling whatever random things you get.
Most every action you do takes a turn, and all characters take turns at the same time. So, you move right (1 turn) and all the enemies do a thing (one might move left toward you, one might queue up an attack). Then you queue up an attack, and those two enemies might queue up an attack and attack, respectively. Actually, it also reminds me of Crypt of the Necrodancer, which works like this, where all characters act simultaneously. In that game, when you move, everything else moves. Shogun Showdown is like that. When you do something, the enemies do something.
I beat the Shogun for the first time this evening, which was maybe my fifth run or so. I had what felt like extremely overpowered weapons, a sword that I'd leveled up to deal 5 damage with only a 2-turn cooldown. I also had a bow-and-arrow with 4 damage and a 3-turn cooldown. The kicker though was a curse that doubled the next damage on an enemy. So, I'd just queue the curse, the sword, and the arrow. That took literally half the Shogun's health bar. Did it again, dead and into phase 2. No problem. Did it two more times. Dead. Easy. When you beat the Shogun, you unlock "day 2", which is the next difficulty level. You can also unlock additional characters with different skills, and you can keep unlocking new tiles and stuff. I consider it beat after taking out the Shogun once. It's a fun game, really tight, and makes you think ahead. It doesn't do much that you haven't seen before though.
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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.
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2285 registered gamers and 3255 games. 7787 GameLogs with 13264 journal entries. 5110 games are currently being played.
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most recent entry: Thursday 27 January, 2011
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---------Magic: The Gathering----------
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Type: CCG (Collectible Card Game)
Players: 2 or more
Objective: Win by reducing opponents life to 0, opponent no longer able to draw a card when required, certain cards have a win condition that over-writes these conditions, and forfeit.
Components: A deck (consists of at least 60 cards, with no upward limit)
Optional Components: dice (for keeping track of life), token cards or coins (to keep track of token creatures)
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Terms:
Spells: All cards in the game other than lands are considered spells. These are divided into multiple different types (defined in the "Types of Cards" section)
Tap: Rotate a card 90 degrees to use certain abilities, or to activate Land to get mana.
Untap: Return a card to its normal vertical position.
Mana: Used to cast different spells.
Summon: Bring a creature to the field.
Field: The game play area.
Graveyard: The pile that made of cards as they are used or destroyed.
Deck: The player's deck that they are playing with.
Hand: The cards that the player is currently holding during the game.
Mulligan: When the game starts each player draws 7 cards, and if their hand is not satisfactory then they may reshuffle their deck and draw their hand over again, but with one less card. This may be performed until the player has no cards in their hand.
Stack: The Stack is the order of cards played in response to one another. When all parties are finished the stack is resolved with all effects taking place from most recent back to the bottom of the stack.
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Types of Cards:
Lands: There are 5 different colored lands (and also colorless lands as well), which are used to tap for mana that is used to summon creatures or cast spells.
Creatures: The main type of spell. creatures are summoned by using enough mana, which is gathered by tapping lands, or from creature abilities.
Sorceries: Spells that a player can play during their 1st or 2nd main phase and can have a wide variety of effects.
Enchantments: A Subset of Sorceries. These can be attached to creatures to alter them in some way, or are just placed on the field providing a lasting effect as long as they are in play.
Instants: Spells that a player can play at any time in the game, usually used as counters.
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Colors:
There are 5 main colors of cards (as well as colorless cards). These cards are divided into: Red, Black, Green, White, Blue. Each subset has a general theme to it that cards of that color usually embody.
Red magic: Usually a fast aggressive style with many Sorceries and Instants that cause damage to the enemy player and/or creatures.
Black magic: Usually revolves around leeching life from the enemy or draining it from different sources, as well as reviving dead Creatures.
Green magic: Usually the strongest creatures as it revolves around nature. Is great at spawning many Creatures quickly.
White magic: Is generally used for life gain and great defense and utility.
Blue Magic: Usually revolves around countering enemies moves and preventing the opponent from being able to act.
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Game Rules:
Each player starts by making a deck of at least 60 cards, but no more than 4 copies of any one card unless it is a land. Each player then shuffles their decks and cuts the opponents deck (take the top off and place the bottom on-top of it, many variations are possible).
The players then decide who goes 1st (many different way to do so, decided upon by each set of players). Each player draws 7 cards, if they do not like the cards in their hand they can elect to Mulligan. When both players are satisfied the game begins with which ever player is going first.
The player that goes first does not draw a card on their initial turn.
----Normal Game Flow----
(These are the normal rules. All rules are subject to being modified/changed/added to by cards that are played during the course of the game. Also, instant spells may be played at any time in the game.)
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Upkeep:
Player untaps all their cards.
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Draw:
Player draws a card (number of cards drawn may be augmented by certain game cards)
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Main Phase 1:
Player may play only 1 Land each turn (unless modified by a card's effect). Player may summon any Creatures or play any Sorceries, Instants, Enchantments that they can afford the mana cost of.
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Battle Phase:
Player decides if they wish to attack the opponent with any of their creatures, this is done by tapping the creatures that they wish to attack with. The opponent that is being attacked may then chose to block creatures with their creatures (no limit to the amount that can block, but they must be untapped and able to block the specific creature). Players then go back and forth in response to the other's actions with instants until both pass, then the stack is resolved. Creatures that block compare each other's strength/toughness to decide which creatures die and which live (strength is subtracted from all opposing creatures' toughness, and is cumulative during the Battle Phase), if any are brought to zero or less toughness they are destroyed. Any creatures that were not blocked deal their strength worth of damage to the opponent's life.
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Main Phase 2:
Same as main phase 1. If a land was played during main phase 1 the player may not play another.
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End Phase:
Player resolves any effects on the board and the next player starts their turn.
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Summary:
Magic: The Gathering is a very complex card game that can be played in a variety of ways and is constantly being added to in terms of cards and different game types. The game is equal parts strategy/skill and luck, with the deck construction being the strategy beforehand and the luck of the draw combined with how skillfully the player plays with what he is able to draw.
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First Session:
I played with my elf deck, which is a Green-mono deck, against Trey who was using a Red/Green deck. I started with a good hand of land and land gathering. After a few turns I had taken a little damage, but had my Wellwisher out which is an elf that heals me for each elf on the field, so I was fine for health the rest of the game. Trey started to get some bigger creatures on the field so I was unable to attack without losing creatures, so I waited a few turns then got a Taunting Elf onto the field which has the ability that forces all enemy creatures to block it when it attacks. The next turn I drew an Alpha Strike, which is a sorcery that boosts both strength and toughness by +2 for each 2 mana that you spend, and I put 6 into it, and then attacked with everything including my taunting elf which won me the game in 1 attack since all of Trey's creatures had to block the taunting elf allowing all my damage to hit him directly.
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Second Session:
This session I decided to use my Sliver Deck, which like the Elf Deck has creatures that work off of having more of the same type of creature on the field. Each Sliver has a global ability that they give to each Sliver on the field, so with each one you get on the field your entire force gets stronger and stronger. I was again playing against Trey's Red/Green deck. In this game I got off to a rough start with lands, but luckily had a few of my low cost Slivers in my hand so I was able to get at least something on the field. Trey again got out his hard hitting combos which took me down to half health before I managed to start getting some more land and defend myself. About 7 turns in I finally had a handful of slivers on the field including my Slithering Sliver which makes all slivers unblockable as long as he is on the field, so I was finally able to start getting some damage in on Trey and evened out the score. Trey then came out with a series of instants and sorceries that blew up several of my powerful slivers, but then I got out my sliver that has the ability to regenerate slivers by tapping a sliver (regenerate is used in reaction to a creature about to be sent to the graveyard, which brings it back from the dead). With this sliver on the field I was able to get another slithering sliver and then proceed to chip away at Trey's health without losing any creatures, but just as i was about to land the final blow to his health, he cast an instant to deal 4 damage to my regenerating sliver (killing it) and 2 damage to himself which killed him before I could do so myself.
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