Recent reviews by Ninjadeer

This game is setting a foundation for PC pump. There's a lot of polish here and has the potential to be an arcade alternative (but not replacement) with the right pads. However, at the end of the day, this is quaver/stepmania with 5/6 keys, PIU songs, and a pretty UI. If you're a pump/ddr/itg player and you're looking at it, yes it's worth the $40. But if you're coming from some other rhythm game, imo it's not worth $40. I'll put this as "recommended" since it's probably mostly piu/ddr people looking at this.

Also, MUCH better company/Monetization than Konami with DDR Grand Prix, which is pay per play. Support good developers!

And bring back Don't Bother Me.

It's "fine".

The game is basically a walking simulator collectathon for 8 hours while you go talk to people and collect evidence. I'm sure there's an audience for that type of game, but I'm not it.

The trial felt underwhelming. I was expecting a Danganronpa/Phoenix Wright style trial where you need to select proper evidence/rebuttals, but you basically just pick a person and show the evidence to convict them. No real deduction is needed.

Following the evidence and piecing together the story was pretty fun, but there's at least a 2-3 hour time investment of mundane searching before you get to that point.

There's a good game in here, but I don't think the time investment is worth the payoff.

But you can abuse physics to wavedash to move stupidly fast once you get a certain upgrade, which made grinding a bit more bearable. The "fast travel" ironically takes too long and is a waste of time imo.

Excellent rhythm game. Gives a strong dopamine hit with a very high skill ceiling (but you don't have to hit that to have fun). Devs are actively improving the game.

Also one of the best games to play on the Steam Deck.

Does not support older formats, such as Goat, Edison, Providence, Tengu-Plant, etc.

Add support for older formats. Us "boomers" want to enjoy our nostalgia and play games that last longer than 3 turns.

Very unique game. Impressive how the devs can take such a simple concept and introduce oodles of creativity and imagination into it.

I have pretty significant rhythm game experience (osu, stepmania, PIU, etc) and I found the game to be pretty easy overall. However, I would say the difficulty curve for someone who does not play rhythm games (or plays them occasionally) is absolutely perfect. It doesn't throw you in immediately with songs but eases the challenge on you. If you do play rhythm games and want a challenge, you can change the timing window to "hard" and it will kick your ass.

Most importantly, the game is FUN and SATISFYING TO PLAY. Also, there is at least one point in the game where it does something so incredibly cool that it makes you go "♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ this is ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ AWESOME" and then you get that amazing feeling where a game breaks the subconscious barrier that you're playing a game and you just lose yourself (no spoilers here, those of you who have played it know what I'm talking about). VERY FEW games can do that.

Only negative I could think of is the amount of content (as of March 27, 2021) is a bit small, but I would put that akin to how Portal is a short game, but the entire game is extremely high quality. I imagine that will be resolved when the game gets out of Early Access and workshop content is created.

In my opinion it is worth your $16.

TBH, the only reason I finally ended up playing this game over everything else in my backlog was because Gabe Newell said in an interview that he really liked the game.

I liked it too. I would put the genre closest to this game as a "choose your own adventure" Visual Novel, but without a lot of the VN tropes.

To complete the game is about 5-6 hours. You serve the role as "investigator" and find information on suspects involved in crimes. Another government official makes arrest decisions based on the information that you choose to (or not to) give him. You cannot directly communicate with this official, only send him certain pieces of information.

This creates an interesting dynamic. You can present misleading evidence to get people arrested, or you can try to protect those who you think are not troublemakers. You feel like you have a lot of power, but at the same time, you'll often have information misinterpreted. A complaint that I have is that sometimes, certain pieces of information seem completely irrelevant, but are needed to be sent to progress the story. At some points I just found myself essentially uploading everything to make the plot advance.

At certain points in the game you'll be given a choice between 2 conflicting pieces of evidence, where you can only upload one. Sometimes, it was completely unclear which evidence was the "truth". However, other times, I was able to take a logical guess as to what was correct based on other information I had found.

Supposedly, there are multiple endings based on the decisions you make (I have not replayed the game yet). I elected to NOT savescum to get the most desirable outcome (though I think my run was mostly clean), and I highly suggest you don't either. Believe me, it's more !!!FUN!!! that way.

As a whole, it's a very good game with a couple of flaws. Worth buying on a sale. Probably not worth full price unless this type of game interests you.

First Day:
Oh this is really cool, it's like DDR and Osu! had a child.

The next morning:
OH MY GOD MY ARMS ARE ON ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ FIRE ♥♥♥♥.

Reviewed as of build 40 (Weather).

This is essentially a complete game in its current state. Don't let the early access tag dissuade you.

Project Zomboid is a highly realistic isometric zombie survival rogue-lite with a steep learning curve, permadeath, and highly unforgiving gameplay. And it does an excellent job at that.

There are no objectives set for the player other then to survive as long as you can. Before beginning a game, you have a selection of difficulty options (One Week Later, Survival, or Six Months Later) or a series of scenarios. It is recommended to play on the first difficulty for a bit just to get used to the basic mechanics, then play "Survival". "Six Months Later" is for masochists experts only.

You have to option to customize just about any setting you can think of (zombie spawn, speed, population distribution, loot spawn, etc). There is also character customization at the start of the game with traits that you can give to your character to make them stronger or weaker (i.e. better sneaking, stronger/weaker with weapons, poor vision). This allows you to create the game YOU want to play.

Multiplayer exists, but it is essentially dead. Setting up a server with friends is still a good and fun way to experience the game, however.

There is tension in the game, however it's unique in that YOU as the player create the tension, by assessing the risk/reward in looting certain high-density areas. It's a type of thrill that you get which is different from other generic linear games where high stress/tense areas are just thrown at you randomly.

Now, the negatives:

Steep learning curve: As a new player, the game can be frustrating to play and some things may seem completely impossible. Rest assured, with time you will improve at the game and make better decisions looting, checking corners, etc. Some people may not consider this a negative.

Minimal end-game content:

You can build a base, fortify it, etc, but eventually you will be in a situation where you are self sustaining (having a farm) and can't really die unless you go looting cities. At this point, there's not a whole lot else to do in the game other than create a new save file.

Overall, if you want a realistic, unforgiving zombie survival simulation that isn't a traditional rogue-like (Cataclysm: DDA), this is it.

These are the end times.

There was no hope of survival.

This is how you died.

Better than Artifact.

There are two major portions to this series: The escape sections, and the novel sections.

The escape sections are basically "escape the room" sequences, like what you would find in old flash games. However, they are well presented.

The novel sections are where the story progresses. It basically takes the form of a "choose your own adventure", where you can make decisions that influences the branch you take, similar to a lot of Visual Novels. You can and are encouraged to go back and play the different branches (and not doing so would be a huge mistake).

I personally did not like the escape sequences that much, but they are not my style of game. The story for this game, however, is ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ amazing and the reason you buy it. It beats out the strories of AAA games.

The series deliciously mixes science fiction, drama, game theory, mystery, and puts a beautiful bow on top of it. Pacing is perfect. If any of those topics appeal to you, you will enjoy this.

Definition of a Hidden Gem.