Recent reviews by Rook

Islets is a not-too-hard, but challenging metroidvania. While there's nothing particularly new that it does, it's a breezy 8-9 hour playthrough to 100% a main game that does everything well: controls, graphics, characters, music. There are even ways to assist you when you encounter that familiar "where do I go next" which happens with most games of this ilk, and that pertains to both optional collectables and main tasks. I was never stumbling around as to what needed to be done. Islets almost felt "cozy" to me.

Additional note: Even though the store page says it isn't supported on Steam Deck, I played through the whole thing on it with no issues except minor screen artifacts outside of the playable area that probably could have been resolved if I cared enough about them (it wasn't bad).

This may not be for everyone, but for those that get it, you will think about it in your dreams.

Do you like Limbo? Little Nightmares? This is like those but way better.

There's a semblance of a good game here, but the developer has abandoned it apparently. The performance and framerate is not great even on modern machines, and there's a progress breaking bug on the 3rd chapter that has existed for apparently years. Gameplay really exists of walking along a neat environment performing fetch quests with different items. Too bad. I'll try the next one though, maybe they did better.

Almost everything I ever imagined a D&D computer game to be. Just wonderful.

I'm not quite sure what I was expecting, but this wasn't it. What I played was a boring trek through a lifeless, sterile environment presented somehow as "horror." The only thing scary was the awful, procedurally generated, mini-golf course that never ends.

There's an interesting game in here somewhere, but in 2 hours I couldn't break through. I'll probably try it again some other day.

Corpse Party is a great game, but there's something broken with the save system in this version which causes you to lose progress. A real shame.

Judging by the number of players on SteamDB, it doesn't look like Arcade Paradise is successful at all but I bought it on a whim in one of the recent sales for $15 and am having a very hard time putting it down. There are a couple of genres it falls into but mostly it can be probably categorized as a time-management sim as your day is bound by the workday and there are tasks to complete before going home.

The story is that your dad lets you run his laundromat instead of having you work at his meat packing factory. You'll start out your journey doing laundry and picking up trash but almost immediately after doing a good job, you'll get a key to the "backroom." There you'll find a few arcade machines and an office with a Windows 95 themed computer (complete with the Maze screensaver running).

As time progresses and work days continue, dad stops paying attention and you're starting to pull in cash primarily through the arcade. You and your sister work to expand the space available while ordering new cabinets from a reseller through the computer. You're able to rearrange the space and adjust game settings to get them more profitable (put really popular games near less popular ones to increase output, change difficulty and cost per play to maximize hourly income).

That alone may make for a fun game if you're into business management though it's a bit lightweight, but what makes it special is that each and every cabinet is playable, and just about every one is based in a real, old school title.

For example, Barkanoid is a Breakout/Arkanoid clone, Cyber Dance is Dance Dance Revolution, Bugai is Puzzle Bobble/Bust-a-Move, and Line Terror is Qix. Each game has unique goals to complete which increase the game's popularity (thus increasing money output), and because this is based on old arcades, many of them have online leaderboards that you can view through your palm pilot. They're not all winners, and some of them, like the Qix-clone, could be tweaked to improve them (it is just too slow in movement),

I'm roughly 22 hours into it and will probably see the credits for the main story roll soon, but I understand you can keep playing afterwards. There are also some DLC cabinets, which I thought was a little silly when I started playing, but am honestly considering picking them up now as they aren't very expensive and one is based on a real Steam game partnership (Kung Fury). Overall, I highly recommend giving it a shot. On sale it was $15 (US) and I think that was probably the perfect price.

Holy smokes. This is Super Puzzle Fighter 2 Turbo without the Capcom characters, but with updates that make a ton of sense. Very well done and so good... oh, and Peter Cullen is the announcer.