Recent reviews by Chet_Awesomelad

The Good:
* Amazing puzzles and game play.
* Incredible visual design.
* Really unique story and setting.
* Satisfying ending.
* Surprisingly fun to play with friends.

The Bad:
* Some puzzles felt a little like guesswork, especially towards the end.
* Easy to lose track of where you've been, what you've seen, etc.

Overall I have never played anything like this game before and it was a really fun experience.

If you like base-building games, survival games, Dwarf Fortress, or Prison Architect then you will love RimWorld!

Take control of a small colony on an alien planet: Grow food, tame animals, build shelter, defend your settlement from raiders, craft new technology, trade with other factions, and recruit more settlers. Overall you must ensure the survival of your colony.

Each colonist has a randomly-generated backstory and traits. They interact with each other socially, falling in love or developing bitter rivalries. They each have their own requirements that need to be met and their own tasks to be completed.

There are a number of different difficulty levels which mean this game can be a relaxing, peaceful base-building game or it can be a daunting, terrifying Dwarf Fortress-like scramble for survival.

Most importantly of all, there is a THRIVING mod community with tons of amazing mods that will improve or alter the gameplay in major ways.

I just finished the game and I can honestly say I was so upset that it was over - I didn't want it to end!

FAR: Lone Sails is a story-driven, side-scrolling adventure game where you control a tiny character who operates a huge vehicle. As you travel through a haunting - yet beautiful - dystopian world, you find locked gates and bridges where you need to complete small puzzles to pass. Between these puzzle areas, you must operate your vehicle by managing a number of levers, switches, and fuel sources - which get more complicated as the game progresses and you add new modules to the vehicle.

The gameplay is never overly challenging, but is always engaging. In the brief moments where you have the various needs of your vehicle under control, you can hold a button to zoom out and admire the stunning world design, or listen to the amazing and emotional soundtrack.

It took me just under 3 hours to complete the game, but I thoroughly enjoyed every moment. I would definitely recommend this game.

Caves of Qud is a unique roguelike game set in the a post-apocalyptic future setting. It combines classic roguelike gameplay (procedurally-generated levels, RPG-style stats and levels, turn-based action, etc.) with an extremely fleshed-out setting that includes rust-covered caverns, cybernetic assassins, cloning devices, and all sorts of other fun sci-fi items, creatures, and locations.

The game allows you to choose a true human or a mutant - true humans start with higher stats and have the unique ability to rebuke robots, while mutants can choose from a massive number of awesome and interesting mutations (such as teleportation, flaming hands, two heads, etc.). There are a number of classes and backgrounds to select, which also give you new abilities or change your stats.

There is a mind-boggling amount of equipment and items to discover: equipment ranges from simple RPG-style fare such as daggers, bows, leather armour, right up to advanced sci-fi gear such as sniper rifles, carbide wristblades, and powered exoskeletons. You can find all sorts of mysterious and handy gadgets that allow you to access new areas or control certain creatures. You will find books that contain masses of lore.

Defeating creatures and finishing quests will earn experience to level up. Levelling up means you can increase your stats, unlock new skills, or increase the potency of your mutations. Over time your powers and abilities get stronger and add new effects.

The game has permadeath, and you will die a lot as you first learn about the world and begin to master the combat abilities of the various types of characters. Enemies in this game are unforgiving, and will often gang up on you so you need to manage multiple attackers with your abilities. Over time you will get better and better, and learn which enemies to challenge and which to avoid. The individual levels are procedurally-generated, but the overall world layout remains the same so you can take your knowledge of the world from one character and apply it to the next.

I highly recommend Caves of Qud to fans of roguelike games, and also to fans of compelling sci-fi stories and lore.

Celeste is a 2D action platforming game with tight controls, ingenius puzzles, and adorable art. You play as a girl climbing Celeste Mountain, a treacherous abandoned ruin filled with deadly traps. Along the way you face your fears and discover some unsettling people and places.

Celeste is made by Maddie Thorson, known mostly for TowerFall but also the creator of other old-school platformers like An Untitled Story and the Jumper series. Celeste definitely has that signature Thorson action - tight control inputs, precise timing, and quick reflexes are a MUST if you want to master this game. The game doesn't punish failure, however - failing simply puts you back at the start of your current screen, meaning you can immediately leap back into action.

If you're looking for a challenge, there are optional collectibles scattered throughout each level, and some of them require true precision and timing to collect. There is also an unlockable B Side for each level, and the B Side variant of each level doubles down on the challenge. There are also EXTRA hard C Sides for each level.

Don't let the pixel art fool you - there is some incredible character art in this game. Each time you complete a chapter, you're rewarded with a piece of incredible artwork. The characters you meet along the way are funny and interesting, but you aren't forced to listen to the whole story if you want to just get back to the action.

I would definitely recommend Celeste to anyone who enjoyed any of Maddie Thorson's previous games, or to anyone who just loves fast-paced platforming with clever puzzles and satisfying challenges like in Super Meat Boy or VVVVVV.

Subnautica is an underwater survival game with a heavy focus on exploration, crafting and atmosphere. Your character has crash-landed on an alien planet that is covered by a vast ocean, and you must survive while you await rescue.

Exploration is THE major focus in the game. As you explore, you will discover new resources to gather, new blueprints to build, and new creatures to hunt (or will they hunt you?). The game environments range from peaceful, sunlit shallows (filled with playful fish and colorful plants) to deep, haunting chasms (filled with mysterious caverns and terrifying monsters). The different areas in the game are varied in look and sound, as are the creatures you will encounter.

Exploration is complemented by the crafting system, which allows you to build upgrades and vehicles that allow you to access new areas. Crafting is intuitive and the UI is easy to understand. You can also build your own underwater base to store your collected resources and upgrade your gear - craft a rifle that puts aggressive creatures into a stasis so you can flee, or a vehicle that maps out the area around you so you know what areas lie beyond your flashlight.

These blueprints must have been left by someone before you - there is a story going on while you explore, gather, and craft. You are not the first person to crash land on the planet, and there are even more ancient secrets to explore. Where will you start - Your crashed ship in the distance? Some ruins atop a floating island? Perhaps the wreckage scattered across the ocean floor?

I would highly recommend Subnautica for any who enjoy survival/crafting games, as it offers a unique underwater experience that cannot be found elsewhere and it definitely has that "just five more minutes" factor that will have you playing into the night.

The Good: Great visuals and amazing music. Combat is challenging but fun - it's kind of like Zelda crossed with Dark Souls, because you have to time your attacks carefully and dodge the enemy attacks. Exploration is rewarding - tons of collectible upgrades to find. The puzzles in the dungeons are mostly clever and interesting, and the dungeons themselves are always well-designed and look cool. The design of the world is really impressive too, with different areas and obstacles and creatures to encounter.

The Bad: The movement can be a bit frustrating at times, as the game uses a fixed camera so you sometimes will jump expecting to land in one position and you'll end up falling or landing somewhere else. The story is difficult to follow at times because there's no dialogue - everything is conveyed by the characters pointing and gesturing - and sometimes I had no idea WHY I was going somewhere, I was just following the marker on the map. The map also doesn't show dungeon entrances, and since dungeons contain collectibles it's very difficult to find them later and collect 100% of the items.

Overall this is a very good game and I would highly recommend it for anyone who likes ARPGs with a focus on the Action, like Zelda, Dark Souls, or Torchlight.

Divinity: Original Sin 2 has really improved on the original in so many ways! I must admit that while I found D:OS1 interesting, it failed to capture my attention for long. D:OS2 is the opposite - I can't put it down!

The story in D:OS2 is a huge improvement on the first one. The characters are all unique and interesting, the plot is compelling and you always understend what your goal is.

I love the dialogue - TONS of choices that have a very real impact on gameplay. There are some dialogue choices that will give you quests, or start a fight, or earn a reward - when you replay the game, you can choose a different approach and experience a different outcome!

Combat is challenging, but very rewarding. You can choose which role each character plays and each role has abilities that synergise with others - e.g. use Decaying Touch, which makes healing cause damage instead, then get your healer to cast Regeneration on the affected enemy! The game autosaves at the start of combat, so if you fail you can always try another tactic or just flee.

The visuals in D:OS2 are another impressive improvement on the original. Everything looks amazing - backgrounds, characters, attack animations, lighting. I particularly like the design of the equipment - changing your gear will change your character model, and different races/genders have unique designs for the same type of armour.

I definitely recommend this game to anyone who loved D:OS1, or who loves D&D-style RPG adventures, OR who loves turn-based tactical combat with lots of options.

it gud

[First impressions - Played for about 30 minutes]

Downward has some great platforming gameplay and gorgeous graphics, but it suffers from a lack of polish that can be frustrating at times.

Sound-wise, the game needs improvement. The VA is passable, definitely, and the music fits, but there are actions that have no sound effects (for example wallrunning makes no sound) and it feels like they should - the game sounds like your protagonist is in a vacuum as the only sound effects you hear most of the time are the character's grunts as he runs and climbs.

Gameplay-wise the parkour so far is very good - the level design usually makes the various paths clear and there is a good sense of flow - you rarely need to stop to reorient yourself, you can usually just keep moving. The enemies do have a few attacks that are difficult to see coming or avoid, which I found frustrating.

Graphics-wise, the game looks gorgeous, with very good use of lighting and effects. In the game you get to see various alternate versions of the same area, and the devs have used lighting and colour really effectively to differentiate between the different versions of the same place. Unfortunately the game lacks graphical optimisation, and it struggled to run smoothly on my PC which usually has no issue with AAA titles. I had to turn down some of the settings, but even after doing that the game was only able to maintain 50 - 55 fps and not a smooth 60. I think the action in this game would look incredible at a fluid 60 fps so hopefully the devs are still working on optimisation.

In its current state I'd recommend this game only if you're a fan of first-person parkour games such as Mirror's Edge, or a fan of third-person platformers like Prince of Persia - but you MUST be very forgiving when it comes to the level of polish that can be expected in an indie game. For everyone else, I think it's best to give the devs a bit more time to smooth out the issues.