Wes's recent activity

  1. Comment on May 2024 Backlog Burner: Week 5(ish) Discussion in ~games

    Wes
    Link Parent
    Bingo or not, 14 is still a very good number! I'm actually surprised at just how difficult your board ended up being. At least you are one away on the angle, with "Is beatable without killing any...

    Bingo or not, 14 is still a very good number!

    I'm actually surprised at just how difficult your board ended up being. At least you are one away on the angle, with "Is beatable without killing any enemies" being the missing piece. But with every other line being 2-3 away, I'd almost have guessed you deliberately chose a pattern to make it hard on yourself!

    Looking forward to your final thoughts when closing the event out.

    1 vote

  2. Comment on Former US President Donald Trump has been found guilty of thirty-four counts of falsifying business records to influence the outcome of the 2016 election in ~news

    Wes
    Link Parent
    No, I don't mean that. Voter turnout is a very important metric in elections. Politicians spend a lot of money and effort not only in trying to turn votes, but in getting people to the polls. This...

    No, I don't mean that. Voter turnout is a very important metric in elections. Politicians spend a lot of money and effort not only in trying to turn votes, but in getting people to the polls. This is often a major focus of advertising, and is a large consideration when choosing the issues that campaigns will focus on.

    You can expect that abortion will play a very large role in the upcoming Democrat campaign strategy. Not because it's likely to change any minds, but because it has so much potential in driving voter turnout.

    3 votes

  3. Comment on May 2024 Backlog Burner: Week 5(ish) Discussion in ~games

    Wes
    Link Parent
    In this comment, I'll submit an entry for the Backlog Burner event, which you can read if you've opened this thread. Alright, so I'm submitting Overgrowth, which I instinctively almost called...

    In this comment, I'll submit an entry for the Backlog Burner event, which you can read if you've opened this thread.

    Alright, so I'm submitting Overgrowth, which I instinctively almost called "Overgrowth Alpha". This is a game I followed for years through development, due to David Rosen's excellent game dev videos showcasing new changes and features each week.

    At that time, game development was not nearly as open as it is today. His videos offered a fascinating look into all of the technical details of making games, like how light baking worked, what the UI considerations might be, and - in Overgrowth's case - how sophisticated the physics engine needed to be.

    I think this series had a pretty big following at the time, and it always seemed to garner interest. Unfortunately, the game itself was a bit of a flop. It sits at only 5,000 reviews on Steam today, and development seemed to peter out shortly after release.

    A couple years ago, Overgrowth's engine was open-sourced. Like most open-source game releases it doesn't include assets, but the license is permissive, and you can make changes and compile from what's there. For that reason I'm submitting this game for the "Is open-source" category.

    As for the game itself, I enjoyed my time with it. I completed the main Overgrowth campaign in about three hours. There's two other campaigns, on of which the original campaign from Lugaru which has been ported over. Overgrowth is its spiritual successor.

    The main focus is the combat, which is very fast. Faster than I have reflexes for, most of the time. I think this made me a little more "button mashy" than the game really expects of the player, but it worked well enough and I got through the game.

    I did actually begin to adapt my strategy as I progressed. I got better at prioritizing enemies with weapons, and started aiming my kicks to send enemies into rocks or walls instead of blinding attacking. The game remains extremely quick though, and if you get cut with a sword it's probably game over. Whichever of you delivers the first big blow will probably be the victor.

    Despite the incredibly low "time to kill" though, I think one could get extremely good at this game. It almost seems like it had potential as a fighting game, if it ever found a community. There are other modes like an arena that I didn't try out, though the campaign did include some arena-style stages.

    As the number of enemies ramped up, I also started comparing the game to Hitman. There is stealth, so sneaking up on a dog and stealing their weapon can actually make a huge difference in battle. Weapons are important, and if you don't have one you should find one.

    Every few levels you'd leave combat and there'd be a platforming challenge. These were longer, and a little more frustrating. I liked the areas that felt more organic. Sometimes I found my character (Turner the rabbit) would fail to grab a ledge I expected him to, or just didn't respond in the way I hoped. But that's really just a consequence of physics-based platforming. If you jump and miss, it's your fault. The game won't cheat on your behalf.

    It's pretty different than Mirror's Edge: Catalyst which I played earlier in the week. It's still easy to mess up there, but the game is a lot more willing to snap you to certain platforms or actions. Get close enough to a wall run and the game says "Sure thing, we've got you!". Overgrowth is less kind. And I can appreciate that honesty, in a weird way. It's up to you to get good.

    The game's story is functional but not flashy. It moves very quickly, like the game itself, and you'll be excused if you miss it altogether. It's unvoiced, but the model rigging is actually very expressive and works by itself. There's a few cute touches like the rabbit's ears will flicker as they talk.

    Turner's dialogue was a bit much for me. Half of his lines are about how he'll kill those who get in his way, how badass he is and that he's unafraid of any creature. Not what I was expecting, but I guess it fits the ludonarrative of the game. And I thought it was hilarious when another character referred to us as "The war bunny".

    It's an interesting game. More technical than I think most people would care for. In many ways it still feels like a game engine that happens to include a playable campaign, but I think that may have been the goal. I did appreciate the number of exposed settings this game offers, and it broke convention in a few pleasant ways like making the resolution picker a text field instead of a dropdown, and not setting Master Volume to 100% by default. A native Linux build is always welcome, too!

    I'm glad to have finally given this game a proper go after all these years. I may have tested it once or twice during the alpha development days, but this one has definitely been sitting on my backlog for far too long.

    That's it for this comment. If you'd like to try the game for yourself, you can buy it on Steam, or from wolfire.com/preorder.

  4. Comment on Monster Hunter Wilds | First trailer in ~games

    Wes
    Link Parent
    I was thinking about that too. It seems like it may encourage more generalized builds. If you're rocking both a blade and a gun, you might need to compromise on skills. Which I think is fantastic....

    I was thinking about that too. It seems like it may encourage more generalized builds. If you're rocking both a blade and a gun, you might need to compromise on skills. Which I think is fantastic. Building for your specific playstyle would become a lot more interesting (and complex).

    For example, instead of a "moar bowgun damage" jewel, it might make more sense to use a specialized damage jewel like coalescence, which would benefit both weapons. Maybe the skills themselves will be more designed for hybridization and focused on synergies this time around. Damage boost for 30 seconds after swapping weapons, or even more specific like an ammo type that weakens a monster's hide against blades. (Uh oh, have I reinvented the clutch claw?)

    Of course, I really, really hope they don't just do the Iceborne thing of putting randomized skills together in combination jewels. That would be a super tedious grind, and really unfun for designing armour sets around.

    Either way though, it seems like it'll be a lot harder to simply copy your build from some "meta" guide that's probably more aimed at speedrunners than regular players anyway. I think this is a trap that a lot of beginners fall into. It's best to know which defensive and quality-of-life skills you rely on. There's no bigger damage loss than dying in a hunt.

    Those are my thoughts so far anyway. I expect a lot of people will still create a hyper-focused build for a single weapon and ignore the weapon switching altogether, and that's probably fine. I do hope they lean into that mechanic and make it worth pursuing though.

    1 vote

  5. Comment on Former US President Donald Trump has been found guilty of thirty-four counts of falsifying business records to influence the outcome of the 2016 election in ~news

    Wes
    Link Parent
    I like the point you're making but it feels a little contradictory. Can a candidate be virtuous and upstanding while also promoting racist and homophobic policies? I understand why it's important...

    I like the point you're making but it feels a little contradictory. Can a candidate be virtuous and upstanding while also promoting racist and homophobic policies? I understand why it's important to not ascribe morality to general policy (eg. increasing tariffs or reducing immigration), but I feel like bigotries in general are much closer aligned to the ethics of a person.

    If I alter your example to where "the other guy" is a great person, but I disagree with their general policies, I'd not be completely against voting for them. Tact and how we treat each other is important, and they're setting the example for the country. So yes, I'd consider changing my vote.

    Or if I feel the policies I do disagree with are too important to ignore, I may simply abstain from voting in that election. Yes I lose the ability to complain about the results when I do so, but a low-voter turnout can also send a message that voters are unhappy, and that too influences future elections.

    I appreciate your thought experiment though, and I think your point is true for a lot of people. "Hold your nose and vote" is an unfortunately common sentiment.

    25 votes

  6. Comment on May 2024 Backlog Burner: Week 5(ish) Discussion in ~games

    Wes
    Link Parent
    That sounds awesome. I'm downloading it now not to play as part of the event, but just to play, because your description really drew me in. I enjoyed the first OlliOlli game way back in 2014,...

    That sounds awesome. I'm downloading it now not to play as part of the event, but just to play, because your description really drew me in.

    I enjoyed the first OlliOlli game way back in 2014, though the second game didn't hook me as much for whatever reason. It's great to see their art style and technical abilities evolve with each game though, as OlliOlli World looked great, and Rollerdrome even better.

    I'm glad you found a good one to send off the event with.

    1 vote

  7. Comment on May 2024 Backlog Burner: Week 5(ish) Discussion in ~games

    Wes
    Link Parent
    Nicely done on the second bingo. Oxenfree is a game I've had recommended to me on multiple occasions, and it seems like a good pick for the category. The funny thing is that I can imagine the...

    Nicely done on the second bingo. Oxenfree is a game I've had recommended to me on multiple occasions, and it seems like a good pick for the category.

    The funny thing is that I can imagine the dialogue perfectly from your description. Most of the time I'd be turned off by that style of writing, but if I'm being honest I know that sometimes it hits me right in the nostalgia and I can sit back and enjoy being a kid again. I mean, playing the first Life is Strange sent me back in time for my entire playthrough.

    Loved Donnie Darko too, by the way. Imagined all kinds of meaning that was probably never intended.

    3 votes

  8. Comment on May 2024 Backlog Burner: Week 5(ish) Discussion in ~games

    Wes
    (edited )
    Link Parent
    I'm snagging a second bingo across the bottom with Pid for the "Has gravity manipulation" category. I'm going to be a little harsher on this one, but unfortunately I didn't enjoy Pid. I found the...

    I'm snagging a second bingo across the bottom with Pid for the "Has gravity manipulation" category.

    I'm going to be a little harsher on this one, but unfortunately I didn't enjoy Pid. I found the controls awkward and too numerous. The difficulty was erratic, with levels alternating between trivial and technical challenges. And as it pertained to the category, the gravity physics themselves didn't feel very fun to interact with either.

    I will say that the art and overall design was nice. The levels were easy to understand at a glance, and the cutscenes featured some nice low-poly art that I'm a fan of. I think a possible concern might be that they rely on colour information to convey some mechanics, but it's possible there is a colour-blind mode I missed.

    I didn't play Pid for too long, so I'll keep its review shorter.

    I actually tried playing another game first: Control, by Remedy Entertainment. Unfortunately I'm a bit sensitive to motion sickness and I found this game rapidly made me queasy. When sprinting the camera would quickly jump away from the character, and because the character is off-center, the camera pivots in a way I found uncomfortable too. Usually adjusting the FoV helps me, but Control doesn't offer that setting.

    I might have been more enduring if I weren't already feeling under the weather this week, but I did find I needed to quickly stop playing. It might be for the better - I also found Control does the frustrating "hold X to interact" thing that games have started implementing lately, and that mechanic really turns me off for some reason.

    Still, I've heard good things about this one and I'll probably revisit it when feeling a bit better. I was intrigued by the X-Files theme and did appreciate that you are essentially playing as agent Scully. I mostly-enjoyed Alan Wake 1 when I played it, and that had some of the same issues. I hope I can find some mods or tweaks to address my pain points, but as it turns out "Control" is a really tough term to Google, so we'll see.

    Forgive the more negative post. I considered finding a third gravity game that I might have more positive things to talk about, but I don't think I have the time or energy to do so. I think instead I'll try to get one last entry in before the event wraps up for good.

    3 votes

  9. Comment on Tildes as a bug tracker in ~tildes

    Wes
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    Interesting idea. I know Tildes isn't currently set up for easy distribution/setup, but it could be developed in that direction one day. Useful features I see for a bug tracker: Groups allow for...

    Interesting idea. I know Tildes isn't currently set up for easy distribution/setup, but it could be developed in that direction one day.

    Useful features I see for a bug tracker:

    • Groups allow for separation of bugs, feature requests, discussion, etc, with ease of moving between them.
    • Bumping keeps important issues at the top
    • Votes work for "me too"
    • Tags for linking issues (maybe they'd need to be more locked down)
    • Nested commenting is always useful

    Things that are missing:

    • No way to mark status, like "complete" or "in progress".
    • No integration with the actual project/organization. No simple way to reference lines of code.
    • No way to assign tasks. You can ping someone, but can't manage current assignments.
    • No features at the organizational level. eg. requiring two-factor, or a permissions hierarchy.
    • No way to mark issues as sensitive, such as for security disclosures.
    • Topics can't be "archived" once completed, to clean up the list

    In short, Tildes handily solves all the communication problems like nested commenting, but would require a fair bit of work still for the tracker-specific features we're all used to.

    This is of course assuming it's just a bug tracker for any organization, and not a full fledged development environment like GitHub with repo support, code reviews, continuous integration and so on.

    Neat idea anyway.

    8 votes

  10. Comment on Honest Question: What benefits can I hope to achieve by switching from jquery to react? in ~comp

    Wes
    Link Parent
    That's fair, and you're right that "batteries included" does often mean an easier onboard. Though I'll argue that it also means that there's more complexity under the hood, and at certain points...

    That's fair, and you're right that "batteries included" does often mean an easier onboard. Though I'll argue that it also means that there's more complexity under the hood, and at certain points the developer does need to start making decisions and implementing the solutions made available by the framework, even though they don't really have the necessary context for that yet.

    I'm a believer in the idea that you need to understand a problem before you can understand the solution. For example, if you haven't run into a situation where you have had to keep lots of DOM elements in sync with browser memory, then you probably won't see the value in data bindings. Or if you haven't created an SPA with components acting as "pages", then you probably won't understand why a routing library is helpful to you.

    Once you've come across these situations, the tool's purpose just clicks. Oh, it lets me use the back/forward buttons, and the URL updates! That is useful. But until that point, it's just a bunch of words. Routing logic, bindings, hydration? You can follow a guide and everything will seem to be working, but you just don't have the context for what these things are actually doing yet.

    That's why I recommend a more bottom-up approach. Start by identifying a problem, learn the tool, adopt it into your workflow, then move on to the next thing. It's slower, and I can see the argument that it's more complicated, but I really think this approach gives you a deeper understanding into the why as well as the how.

    Of course at some level, a top-down approach is necessary too. You can't exactly teach kids to use computers by first soldering microchips. But for development, I think it's the better approach. I see a lot of cases of bootcamps churning out people that only know React, but don't understand any of the basics of how websites actually work. To them, it's all just magic under the hood.

    I don't mean this specifically as a knock against Next. I haven't even used it, though I've heard good things! I just wanted to address the topic from more of a pedagogical angle.

    4 votes

  11. Comment on May 2024 Backlog Burner: Week 5(ish) Discussion in ~games

    Wes
    Link Parent
    So far my only entry for this week is Lumino City. I wasn't able to play much from bed, and I mostly just slept or listened to audiobooks (currently Death's End by Liu Cixin). However, while...

    So far my only entry for this week is Lumino City. I wasn't able to play much from bed, and I mostly just slept or listened to audiobooks (currently Death's End by Liu Cixin). However, while tinkering on my phone I did find that I'd previously bought Lumino City on Android. I looked through my available categories and "Known for its art style" fit perfectly.

    You see, Lumino City doesn't just use hand-drawn art. It uses hand-modeled art. The environments are actual dioramas that were created for the game. It's a proper art piece that shows the kind of creativity the indie scene is capable of. You can read more about its design in this RockPaperShotgun article.

    Now I have to say, the game isn't perfectly adapted to mobile. A lot of the tap targets are very small and there's no zoom feature. It also didn't actually work for me at first, until miraculously an update dropped that mentioned 64-bit support. Strange timing, but sure enough the update did allow the game to start working.

    The game is also available on desktop and that's probably the better place to play it. I think it'll be easier to interact with the puzzles, and to observe the unique environments that they've created.

    The puzzles themselves are... okay. I think they rely a bit too much on the included guidebook which just gives you the answer, and it has some of that "try random interaction" logic that is prevelant in point and clicks. But I'm more interested here in seeing what's on display than feeling clever after solving a difficult puzzle, so I don't mind too much.

    Lumino City is actually a sequel to their previous game, Lume. Though I haven't played that one, so I can't make any comparisons.

    I have to admit that I have not played a very strategic game of bingo. I have lots of random entries that are nowhere close to making a new line. But taking a meandering path and seeing where I ended up was sort of my goal. I'm happy to have found an opportunity to play a game like Lumino City, even if it didn't net me much "progress".

    If you're looking for a cozy point and click puzzler with a very unique art style, I think it's worth checking out!

    3 votes

  12. Comment on May 2024 Backlog Burner: Week 5(ish) Discussion in ~games

    Wes
    (edited )
    Link
    I was really hoping to get more entries in last week, but I fell ill and spent three days in bed. I'm back up now and hoping to squeeze in one or two more before the event ends. But I did...

    I was really hoping to get more entries in last week, but I fell ill and spent three days in bed. I'm back up now and hoping to squeeze in one or two more before the event ends. But I did thankfully already secure a bingo last week, and today crossed the halfway point to a blackout, which satisfies my goal for this event.

    I'll save my closing thoughts for the wrap-up thread on the 1st.

    Bingo Card (15/25)
    Mode: Standard Winning Bingo! Finished 15/25
    Has driving
    ✔ Open Roads    		 Has a lives system Is open-source
    ✔ Overgrowth    		 Has/uses cards
    ✔ Vault of the Void    		 Has time manipulation
    Music/rhythm-focused
    ✔ Metal: Hellsinger    		 Set in a historical world Your friend loves it Uses a unique control scheme Has a time limit
    ✔ Cook-Out
    You can complete it in only a few hours
    ✔ The Corridor    		 Has more than 50 achievements ★ Wildcard You have to tinker to get it running
    ✔ Dark Souls 3: Archthrones Mod    		 Is considered “abandonware”
    You heard about it in our weekly gaming topics
    ✔ Blasphemous    		 Has a skill tree
    ✔ Mirror's Edge: Catalyst    		 Known for its art style
    ✔ Lumino City    		 Popular game you never got around to playing You own it on physical media
    Uses procedural generation
    ✔ ScourgeBringer    		 Nominated for a Steam award
    ✔ To the Moon    		 A solo-dev project
    ✔ A Short Hike    		 You can create your own character
    ✔ Trailmakers    		 Has gravity manipulation
    ✔ Pid
    3 votes

  13. Comment on Honest Question: What benefits can I hope to achieve by switching from jquery to react? in ~comp

    Wes
    Link Parent
    Previously, the standard way was Create-React-App (or CRA), which downloaded the dependencies for you from NPM. Nowadays it looks like React encourages you to use a "React framework" (sorry for...

    Previously, the standard way was Create-React-App (or CRA), which downloaded the dependencies for you from NPM. Nowadays it looks like React encourages you to use a "React framework" (sorry for the overloading of that term). They are projects that build on React to handle additional problems like routing and server-side rendering/hydration. I think this is overkill for a starting place however.

    You can still use React without those additional framework features, and the best way to do that is probably with Vite, which I mentioned above. It's a development server that also handles all the rollup/build steps out of the box. It supports plugins for common frameworks like React and Vue.

    If you just want to dip your toes in, I'd say download Vite, and use its guided install process to set up a basic React app. It should provide a basic Hello World example, which you can then experiment with from various online guides/resources.

    I'm not a React developer myself, so unfortunately I won't be able to answer any further questions in that area. But take it slow, and try not to get discouraged from the hodgepodge of different tools/names. A lot of them are just iterations on previous ideas, so once you understand one thing, it helps you better understand the next thing.

    2 votes

  14. Comment on Honest Question: What benefits can I hope to achieve by switching from jquery to react? in ~comp

    Wes
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    Since I feel my comment may have contributed to you feeling this way, I should probably add some additional thoughts here. I understand the desire to avoid node/npm and just load libraries...

    Since I feel my comment may have contributed to you feeling this way, I should probably add some additional thoughts here.

    I understand the desire to avoid node/npm and just load libraries directly. There's so many different technologies now that it can feel overwhelming. But it's important to remember that tools are there to help you. If you have a problem, a tool likely exists to solve it. That tool adds complexity to the process, maybe by introducing a dependency or build step, but it also makes your life easier in other ways. It's up to the developer to decide if that tradeoff is justified.

    Before we get into it though, I'd like to ask a question: are you using jQuery standalone, or jQuery + jQuery UI? You've talked about building dashboards with line charts and tabbed interfaces. There's a number of popular jQuery UI plugins such as DatePicker and Tabs that you might be used to, and I wonder if that's what you're trying to replace. If so, while there might be React components that perform similar tasks, that's not really the end goal of React. I might suggest looking for newer libraries instead such as Chart.js, or even implementing native solutions where feasible (eg. tabbed UIs can be done with no/minimal JS).

    It's probably best to stop thinking of React as an upgrade or replacement for jQuery. If anything, jQuery has been mostly "replaced" by vanilla JavaScript. jQuery was never bad, but it's best features have now been adopted into the standard JS library so it's just not as necessary today as it once was.

    React and jQuery do very different things. jQuery implements a unique API for selecting elements, acting on them, and performing certain tasks like network requests. It's more of a library that sits on top of your application, and you can call in to it for helper functions. React meanwhile is a larger framework for component-based design. It uses a custom templating language called JSX, and one of the most useful features is data bindings (sometimes called Signals).

    Using a component-based framework is useful in a lot of ways. It lets you compartmentalize your logic and display into smaller chunks, keeping things readable without turning into interconnected spaghetti. It encourages more explicit APIs and reuse of data, which is great when working with a team. It also allows for reusable components to be shared with others online.

    The thing to keep in mind though is that React, or similar frameworks, are not suited to every project. While they may reduce your code's complexity in the long run, there is a higher upfront technical cost. It often means integrating node, a local dev server like Vite, and using some sort of bundler/packer to convert the site from "React" files to pure HTML and JS. There will be dependencies and build steps. If you wish to integrate server-side elements like Next, that also adds additional complexity.

    If you're building a simple app by yourself, there's often no need for this complexity. Using jQuery or even just vanilla JS is perfectly fine, and usually more performant. I typically start new projects this way to maintain lower complexity. But not all projects are simple, and sometimes "frontloading" the complexity by building on a framework like React can be better in the long run. The actual application code will often be more maintainable, and easier-to-understand at a glance (due to enforced conventions). So it's just a matter of choosing the right tool for the job.

    I will note however that newer JS APIs do require a local web server anyway, so it's likely that some sort of local dev server will be required either way. I often use the integrated Python3 web server for this purpose.

    A lot of people are suggesting React alternatives like Preact, Vue, Angular, and so on. I would say don't worry too much about it yet. Most of these frameworks accomplish the same goals, and even though they accomplish them in different ways, their designs are largely converging on the best practices discovered through years of use. If you learn any one, your skills will be mostly transferrable and the concepts will be familiar.

    Now with all of that said, I'm not sure I'd recommend you learn React at this time. Based on your posts, I think you would be better served by first catching up on the foundations of modern JavaScript. I would spend some more time with ES6. Learn fetch(), arrow functions, .map(), destructuring, and promises. Test out modules and strict mode. I think you'll find that modern JavaScript affords many of the conveniences that you once derived from jQuery.

    Once you're more comfortable with some of the newer ways of doing things, it should be a lot easier to pick up newer frameworks since they often rely on these ES6 features as part of their design. That will give you a better onramp for React, or any other modern JS-based tool you wish to learn.

    9 votes

  15. Comment on May 2024 Backlog Burner: Week 5(ish) Discussion in ~games

    Wes
    Link Parent
    Congrats on the bingo! I didn't know GameFreak made anything outside of the Pokemon factory. That sounds like an odd premise, and is actually more interesting to me because of it. When I...

    Congrats on the bingo! I didn't know GameFreak made anything outside of the Pokemon factory. That sounds like an odd premise, and is actually more interesting to me because of it.

    When I accidentally skip intros in games, I usually go find a YouTube version. There's usually one that's uploaded without commentary, but if not you might be able to find a Let's Play which includes it at least.

    3 votes

  16. Comment on Secrets from the algorithm: Google Search’s internal engineering documentation has leaked in ~comp

    Wes
    Link
    Late last month, Google accidentally leaked thousands of internal documents with API information used in the Google Search algorithm. While it doesn't include weight information, it offers a...

    Late last month, Google accidentally leaked thousands of internal documents with API information used in the Google Search algorithm. While it doesn't include weight information, it offers a treasure trove of information on different ranking factors and parameters (some of which are likely historical/deprecated). It also describes a number of systems/services used when building a search results page, such as different index tier, and twiddlers (post-ranking adjustments).

    I've read through this article and found it to be a comprehensive dive into the leak. For a more accessible (less in-depth) article though, Search Engine Land put out a piece as well.

    19 votes

  18. Comment on May 2024 Backlog Burner: Week 4 Discussion in ~games

    Wes
    Link Parent
    For my maybe-final entry, I'm submitting A Short Hike. I'm putting this in the "solo-dev project" category. Although the credits list help for translators and play testers, I think the important...

    For my maybe-final entry, I'm submitting A Short Hike. I'm putting this in the "solo-dev project" category. Although the credits list help for translators and play testers, I think the important thing is the design and development was by a single author.

    This was an awfully cute game. You can tell right away from the colour palette that it has a cheery, optimistic vibe. It mixes expressive pixel art with a 3D world to create an inviting place to explore.

    The HowLongToBeat for this game lists only an hour and a half, but I spent two and a half hours before finally "beating" it. I spent a long while exploring the main island and surrounding regions, collecting upgrades, helping townsfolk, and hunting for secrets. Actually by the time I started the "hike", I had so much gear that I completely trivialized the whole thing. Oops.

    The game features a lot of secrets to find, which always draws me in. I will forever be checking behind waterfalls or examining strange outcropping, so it's nice when a game rewards you for that kind of thing.

    Outside of hunting for secrets, there's lots to do. Foot racing, motorboating, digging up coins, growing flowers, or regular old treasure hunting. And I am a sucker for any game with a fishing minigame.

    The actual orientation of world confused me at first. It took a while to realize that the map was a 360 degree panorama, and moving left-right actually looped around the world. I found this a little hard to reason about when trying to line up certain flight paths, or just remember where things were relative to each other.

    In some ways the game reminded me of Grow Home. They offer a similar "indie" charm (despite Grow Home being created by Ubisoft Reflections), and are focused on collecting upgrades to better ascend. This one definitely focused more on the characters and story though.

    The dialogue was interesting. There's a certain style that I'm not sure how to describe. It's as if all of the characters are holding conversations using text messaging rather than speaking face-to-face, if that makes sense. I got a similar sense from Donut County when that released.

    A Short Hike is a pleasant game. I'm still missing a couple things so I might even dip back in for more. It was given away free on Epic Game Store previously, as well as included in some of the itch.io mega bundles if you've picked those up. Well worth a play if you've got an hour or two.

    1 vote

  19. Comment on May 2024 Backlog Burner: Week 4 Discussion in ~games

    Wes
    Link Parent
    Congrats on your first bingo! Hacknet has been on my backlog too. I played Uplink many years ago and have been wanting to find something that scratches the same itch, but I just hadn't gotten...

    Congrats on your first bingo! Hacknet has been on my backlog too. I played Uplink many years ago and have been wanting to find something that scratches the same itch, but I just hadn't gotten around to playing it yet.

    I'm also glad to know the game is accessible and fun, even for non-techies. You never really know with some of these terminal-focused games.

    1 vote

  20. Comment on May 2024 Backlog Burner: Week 4 Discussion in ~games

    Wes
    Link Parent
    Coming in with a fresh bingo, I'm submitting Blasphemous for the "You heard about it in our weekly gaming topics" category. I thought this would be a really easy category. I was wrong. Trawling...

    Coming in with a fresh bingo, I'm submitting Blasphemous for the "You heard about it in our weekly gaming topics" category.

    I thought this would be a really easy category. I was wrong. Trawling through the last dozen threads, I couldn't find any games that I already owned, hadn't played, but were on my backlog. That was until I stumbled across this little reference to Blasphemous in April.

    First though, a possible confession: This is not the first time I've heard about this game. And more than that, I actually Kickstarted it back in 2017. Technically the category doesn't ask that you first heard about it on Tildes though. I've already called my lawyer and am prepared to defend this technicality to the ends of the Earth.

    But really, I was actually thrilled to find this mention because Blasphemous has been sitting on my backlog for years, and I'm ready to stop feeling dumb about helping fund a game that I haven't even played yet. Apparently my name is even in the credits.

    So the last time I looked at Blasphemous, it was a simple engine test with blank assets. Now it's a well-reviewed series with a sequel, and with the devs branching out into other spaces (like their VR title All On Board... which I also Kickstarted).

    So to the review. I liked it! I'm a huge fan of soulslikes, and seeing all the different takes on that formula always interests me. Blasphemous includes some of the common elements such as estus-style healing, enemies respawning when resting, and a combined currency for upgrades and purchases. Some of the differences come from the death penalty, where you keep your currency but build up (aptly-named) "guilt", and the decision to split up certain interactions like upgrades across the world in a more Metroidvania-style design.

    The combat feels pretty good so far, though I'm still unlocking abilities. The charge and plunge attacks add a lot of damage to your repertoire. Parries seem very rewarding which I'm always a fan of. I've felled a couple bosses so far but still have a lot of map left to explore.

    The pixel art is great, if a little disturbing at times. The story meanwhile is heavy on lore and text dumps. I couldn't really tell you what's going on, except I know I need to kill the big bads.

    So far I'm enjoying the game, and I think there's a good chance I'll finish it. I ought to play more metroidvanias, because I tend to enjoy them whenever I do.

    I'll probably begin to slow down on my submissions from here on out, but I wouldn't discount the possibility of another bingo.

    2 votes