Recent reviews by JoeForLong

Saw this on a youtube thumbnail and immediately bought it before the video's contents spoil the game for me. This game was a short yet very enjoyable experience. The progression kept me engaged to make sure I can more easily catch the new fish I was encountering constantly. There was also enough easter eggs and chests hanging around to reward exploration, especially as you drain the water level more and more.

The dock system is cool but is part of my biggest gripe.
The importance of the drop dock pieces completely outweigh the other pieces to where it felt like I was using that one five times as much as the others, but the loot deck system gives you pieces at random. I ended the game with about 280 of the straight line pieces. There was also at some point in the beginning I tried to re-connect split dock pieces but then ran into an invisible wall, which was disappointing.
I would also like an easier to way edit dock pieces after placing them down beyond just working backwards from the tip of the dock you've built out to, like changing a corner piece to a split dock.

Also towards the end of my playthrough, my frames tanked immensely and I wasn't sure if it was because of all of the docks I had built or something with rendering the entire empty lake.

Despite that, I very much enjoyed my time and the novelty of spitting fish into the bucket after you suck them up through a straw and it did not wear off. Would drain an entire lake again.

Short and simple puzzle game with an adorable art style. Had some nice brain teasers but never felt unfair or unreasonable.
Only bit of feedback I can suggest is a way to flip chairs in the Stadium level without having to remove a shape from the seat first.
Would love to play more levels in the near future.

A fun, short way to enjoy an afternoon.
- The map is great. It's real time with the world and if you zoom in far enough you'll actually see buildings and even hear the whistling of the mob enemies. Only gripe was the forks in the tracks not showing on the map making longer distance travel somewhat annoying if you are unsure if you have to stop your train to fix the direction, as well as getting out to changing it which can also be a small inconvenience if you stop too late and have to reverse to get back on track.
- The fights with Charles were pretty fun. The dreary build up of train horns in the distance as well as being able to spot his glowing red body was great for ambiance. When he finally engages in a fight, he goes FAST. Definitely startling. I liked the gameplay of swapping between weapons during their cooldown period, which felt like it made the fights much easier, but it might have been because I maxed everything out pretty quickly.
- The train progression felt kinda quick considering how few times you have to fight Charles in the earlier stages (or maybe I just got lucky). The first time I encountered Charles I was already about half-way done with upgrading my train, but I still got my ass kicked a little bit. Once I got more upgrades and all the weapons, Charles showing up felt more like a fun inconvenience rather than something I needed to dread.
- The "stealth" sections with the Mob were alright, felt weird to not have crouching with stealth sections in games, as well as it feeling very "get caught and lose," but the death setback isn't too much. The peaking mechanic didn't really feel like it did much and towards the later sections I basically just sprinted and dodged their bullets as much as I could.
- There's only one section I did not like and it was the 8-pages Slender section side quest where you're being chased 100% of the time by a ghost who statics your screen, has horror audio playing, and is constantly on a bee-line towards your position, giving you little actual time to either relax or even find the pages. On a first run through I was able to easily find about 5-6, but then struggled to find the last ones between being caught by the ghost, disorienting me, and having to constantly run from the ghost making it difficult to gain bearing and know where I've been before.

I had a fun time with this game. Although short, it was a great concept and I hope that the developer is able to scrounge together a team and create a more ambitious sequel with larger map, more quests, even more train bosses potentially.