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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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Truco (Other) by brenolleite |
| The game is really funny to play with your friends, and despite all the lucky elements that it has you have to be smart enough to play the right cards in the right time. |
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most recent entry: Tuesday 10 February, 2015
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Truco - Brazilian Card Game
Introduction:
Truco is one of the most popular card games in Brazil, it might be played with two or four players. The main goal is to get 15 points before the other player or team, more about the rules will be explained in the rules section. Truco is not played only in Brazil, it is mostly played in south America. Moreover, other countries as Spain, Italy and France also play this game. Some theories say that Truco is a derivation from a game created in France called Truc. However, it is not very clear how Truco was created. There are some different types of Truco all over the world, this log will explain the Brazilian version.
Rules:
Deck: The game is played with a French deck, and the cards 8, 9, 10, and jokers are not used.
Players: It can be played with 2 or 4 players, basically singles or doubles. Each player cannot see the other players hand, but they can communicate using signals to let their partner know his or her cards. In this log, all examples will be shown as a 4 players game because it is the most popular type, and all rules also can applied to 2 players game.
Cards Ranking: The cards are ranked in crescent order as follows (4,5,6,7,Queen,Jack,King,Ace,2,3), where 3 is the highest and 4 the lowest, the card's suit does not matter. Moreover there is a card in the game that is called "The Joker", this card is higher than every other card in this sequence, note that the "joker" in this game is not the joker's card. The joker is chose every turn depending on a card that is draw, basically every single turn a new joker is chose. Different from normal cards, the joker's suit matters in order to choose the winner card. And its sequence is (Diamond, Spade, Heart, Club), where club is the highest, and Diamond is the lowest. The joker's choosing process will be more explained on the examples.
Points: The winner of each turn(mini game) earn points, a normal turn gives the winner team/player 1 point. However, the teams could increase this value to 3 calling "Truco". Every time that a team calls "Truco", the turn points is increased by 3. So if one team call "Truco" and win the turn, it would get 3 points instead of 1. More than 1 "Truco" call can be called in the same turn, but they need to be divided between the teams. A same team cannot call "Truco" twice in sequence, team 1 needs to call "Truco" then team 2 calls "Truco"(Turn holding 6 points) and now team 1 can call "Truco" again. This rule will be more clear in the game example, where we call this turns mini games because every minigame has 3 turns. So in order to make it simpler, it will be called mini game.
Dealing cards: The dealer has to give 3 cards for each player, the dealer shuffle the cards and gives to his or her left player cut the deck. After the cut, the dealer is going to draw a card that will be the card used to choose the joker, which was explained in the cards ranking section. This card is placed in the center of the table faced up, and the card right above to this card in the ranking scale is the joker in this turn, example: drew card is a 7 of diamond(suit does not matter), the joker will be the Queen that is the card right above 7 in the ranking sequence. After choose the joker, the dealer will give one card by one card to all players following an anticlockwise pattern.
Turns: Each turn could be called a mini game as told before, so each winner of a mini game earn x points(x points depending on "Truco" calls). Every mini game is a best of 3 turns, each turn all players need to play 1 card, the winner of the turn is the team/player that played the highest card in the sequence counting with the "Jokers", which are the highest cards in the turn. So, the winner of 2 turn is the winner for the mini game summing x points to total team's points.
Game ending: The game ends when a team gets 15 points; In order to get those points the team/player has to win mini games, and in order to win the mini games the team has to win the 2 of the 3 turns of the mini game.
Truco: Every time that a team/player calls "Truco" the other team can either accept or decline the call, if the team accept the turn(mini game) will be counting 3, if the team decline the call the other team gets the mini game points counting in that instant. Every time that a "Truco" is called, the mini game points is increased by 3 except the first call that is increased only 2.
Example: T1 = Team 1 | T2 = Team 2 | (T1, Truco) = Truco called by team 1 | p = mini game total points(as the pot in the poker) =>
Game start p = 1
(T1,Truco) p = 1
T2 Accept p = 3
(T2, Truco) p = 3
T1 Accept p = 6
(T1, Truco) p = 6
T2 Decline
Team 1 gets 6 points from this turn(mini game).
Game Example: In this section, it will describe an example of the game play for 1 mini game.
Team 1: Player 1 and Player 4
Team 2: Player 2 and Player 3
d = Diamond q = Queen
c = Club j = Jack
h = Heart k = King
s = Spade a = Ace
==================================================================================================
Turn 0 - Dealing cards and joker
Player 1 = ([k,c],[q,s],[a,h]) *
Player 2 = ([4,d],[3,s],[k,d])
Player 3 = ([j,h],[2,d],[k,h])
Player 4 = ([5,s],[7,d],[k,s])
() = Represents the player's hand.
[x,y] = Represents one card, where x = card's value and y = card's suit.
* = Represents the dealer in this turn.
- The card [j,d] is the drew card to determine the joker, in this case the joker is all king cards.
===================================================================================================
Turn 1
Player 1 = ([q,s],[a,h]) *
Player 2 = ([3,s],[k,d])
Player 3 = ([j,h],[k,h])
Player 4 = ([7,d],[k,s])
Table cards: {[4,d],[5,s],[2,d],{[k,c]}
{} = Represents the cards played in this turn in order, note that the first player was the next one from the dealer in a anticlockwise pattern, in this example Player 2.
-Team 1 won this turn, with player 1 highest card [k,c]. Note that this card is a joker, that's why is higher than [2,d].
==============================================================================================
Turn 2
Player 1 = ([a,h]) *
Player 2 = ([k,d])
Player 3 = ([j,h])
Player 4 = ([7,d])
Table cards: {[q,s],[3,s],[k,s],{[k,h]}
-How player 1 played the highest card in the last turn, he has to start on this turn.
-The highest card on this turn was [k,h] played by Player 3, so Team 2 won the turn. By now the mini game is tied 1 for both teams.
==============================================================================================
Turn 3
Player 1 = () *
Player 2 = ([a,h])
Player 3 = ([k,d])
Player 4 = ([7,d])
Table cards: {[j,h]}
Player 1 calls Truco
Team 2 Accept call
Player 1 = () *
Player 2 = ()
Player 3 = ()
Player 4 = ()
Table cards: {[j,h],[a,h],[k,d],{[7,d]}
-Player 3 is the first on this turn, he starts playing the card [j,h], so player 1 see a chance to call "Truco" because he has a card higher than him. So he calls "Truco", then Team 2 could accept and the mini game would be counting 3 points or they could decline and team 1 would get 1 point. However, They accepted the call because player 2 has a joker of diamond in hand, and knowing that the joker of club was already played he is pretty sure that he has the highest card on the game.
-So as told before, the highest card on this turn was [k,d]. And team 2 won the mini game adding 3 points to their total points. This process is repeated until a team gets 15 points.
Strategies:
Truco is a turn based card game, some of its strategies are similar to poker. You can bluff calling a "Truco" when you do not have a good card, and even though get the points. There is also strategy that involve the player's time to play, if player one start playing and he knows that the other player in his team is going to play a high card is better he plays a card with low value. However it may be trick some times, as the game showed above, the team 1 has ([k,c] and [k,s]) cards against the team 2 ([k,d] and [k,h]). In theory team 1 has higher cards than team 2, but team 2 won the mini game because they knew how to play the cards in the right time(second turn [k,h] was higher than [k,s]), which means that team 1 wasted a joker for nothing. It is basically a game where you have to play as a team, and make sure that you are playing the cards in the right time.
Additional rules:
- Truco cannot be called when 1 team has 14 points.
- When both teams has 14 points the players have to play their cards without see them. This turn is called Dark Hand(maybe the translation is not that good, sorry).
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