Recent reviews by Sithodah

Turns out the true cosmic horror is the nightmarish wage prison we made along the way.

Not really for me at all.
Art style is cool, but the animation is janky at time and a little lacking considering it’s a game set in one room staring at other character models. They feel robotic and lifeless, which doesn’t convey the lively style that the models themselves seem to want to convey.

Voice acting ranges from amateurish to fine. The audio quality is very poor on the character voices, clipping and mixing is of very mixed quality and can be very distracting.

Beyond that the game is just fine.
It’s not offensively bad or anything, it’s two mini-games: liars dice and liars deck. They are both games about bluffing that boil down to fairly menial guess work, the social aspect here is the main appeal and it just doesn’t do it for me. It’s a game that I felt I had seen all on offer after about 30 minutes. The price is too high for me, but I’m perhaps not the target audience.

(Worth noting that the devs have indicated that more content is to come for this game, with two new games being added in the future.)

Each round that concludes with a bluff being called out successfully ends in the characters shooting themselves in the head in a Russian roulette elimination chance.
It’s not overly violent or gross it just feels unnecessary, but if you take that away it would just be a card game with furry character models. Feels like a shock gimmick, and again, just not very appealing to me.

If you love bluffing games or social deception games, and the art style is appealing to you then this may be something you enjoy.

For me it’s too much for too little. There isn’t enough of a hook here to keep me coming back.
If the game was cheaper (or free) perhaps I’d try to convince some friends to download it for an evening of play together.
Unfortunately, there are plenty of other cheaper, more polished titles that fit into this niche so it’s gonna be a refund from me.

Played on the steam deck and it runs very well.
Missing some crucial settings in the menu like control stick sensitivity, unless I just can’t find it.
It looks nice, you can be a dwarf, and you can dig a hole into the ground.

You can throw the poop.

Balatro is a fine example of a simple concept executed perfectly in basically every aspect.

It's not designed to be mechanically challenging, you will understand the concepts quickly and once you do it will already be too late.

Balatro will have it's hooks in you and it becomes a compulsively fun, engaging, and often relaxing game about trying to get a higher number based on the cards you play.

Balatro is definitely worth your time and money.

Now I am become theHunter, destroyer of turkey.

An excellent Detective mystery game. Played perfectly on the steam deck. The plot and puzzles can get mega complicated towards the end but figuring things out feels satisfying. It took me just under 7 hours to complete the original missions but I am very much considering the DLC. Beautiful artwork and music. Highly recommend.

Nothing will make your group of friends angrier. Highly recommend.

Against the Storm is one of the most unique rogue-like games and the most engaging city building games I have played in a long time.

Often times the biggest issue I have with city building games is that I have no goal beyond just “don’t go bankrupt” which in most cases is laughably easy. Once you learn the flow of making money there isn’t really a gameplay mechanic that keeps you engaged, it’s more based in your own creativity to come up with an aesthetic city, but in ATS you are being constantly challenged and you are always at the brink of failure.

You need to stop and think carefully about every decision. Every use of resources and every risk taken means the difference between winning and losing, and sometimes there really isn’t an easy way to know which choice is right.

In a round of ATS, you are assigned tasks by your distant monarch who expects them to be done quickly, their impatience grows when you do not complete tasks and if it gets too high you will lose. These tasks are usually gathering a resource, but can also be related to exploring and completing certain map tasks.

On top of that, every time you complete tasks, you get some rewards and occasionally you will get to choose a new building to either your production or your resource gathering for a wide variety of items that will assist you throughout a run.

It sounds simple, but the minutiae of everything in the game makes these challenges extremely engaging. Everything has an effect how difficult it will be to manage your task: the resources available to you on the map, the randomly generated weather effects of your biome, the race of your inhabitants, and even the type of food they consume or what luxuries they can access. It all comes together in this beautiful machine, where you are always trying to learn how best to overcome each challenge and what new buildings to commit to in the long run.

All of this just flows so nicely, it feels good to overcome the challenges and figure out a way around your need. If you like strategy, simulation, and rogue-like games, this game should definitely be on your radar.

Also worth mentioning is the high amount of developer involvement, I have only recently gotten the game relative to this review date but they have been pumping out updates and new features pretty consistently since launch. This game is worth your money, provided what you see is something you’re interested in.

Excellent party game meets “Crusader Kings-lite” experience.
The game owner plays as a monarch to a kingdom rife with problems and issues.
Other players join through a website portal not unlike the “Jackbox” series and take on the role of nobles representing different nations in the monarchs kingdom.
The game itself is very simple, each player has a set of different stats with a number associated.
At the beginning of each game each player decides what their win condition will be, which is just increasing or lowering either their own stats or their monarchs stat.
The actual gameplay comes from the discussion and arguments amongst players trying to further their own goals and hinder the goals of rivals through the voting process.
Every season there are 3 new problems that must be dealt with, some are decisions left to the Monarch to decide alone, and others are put to a vote.
Every decision should be weighed against how it affects different nobles by furthering or punishing their respective goals.
Helping someone succeed now could mean the leverage you need at a critical moment later on, or it could very well guarantee a victory for your enemy without you even knowing it. This creates a very playful but cutthroat environment that really makes you question your decisions at basically every junction.
The game takes a while to play but not too long that betrayal feels genuine and bitter.
The game balances all of this very well with wonderfully well written flavour text for each of the events that occur in the seasons, and the artwork is excellent and colourful.
Not to mention, this can handle up to 24 people at a time, and all they need to play is the ability to see the screen and a web browser.
For $6.49 CAD this is a no brainer for me, I already love party games and combining that with political diplomacy brings a longer more in depth experience that I have been looking for.
The only “complaint” id have is that this does borrow quite a bit from the board game Oath, without having quite the same depth. However this game uses the simplicity to its advantage and having more involved mechanics for managing your realm might muddy the waters and make it confusing for new players.

Regardless, this game rules. I highly recommend it without a doubt. If what I described above sounds even remotely interesting I would give it the 2 hours with some friends and see how it plays out. Getting each player to voice their own character is also a great way to involve everyone in the story and have some laughs.