kfwyre's recent activity
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Comment on I Wanna Lockpick: a free puzzle game in ~games
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Comment on Colossal Game Adventure Schedule: September 2025 - March 2026 in ~games
kfwyre LinkThe remake of The Secret of Monkey Island, our December game, is on sale over at GOG for 50% off in case anyone needs to pick up a copy. See @vili’s comment here if you prefer a more classic...The remake of The Secret of Monkey Island, our December game, is on sale over at GOG for 50% off in case anyone needs to pick up a copy.
See @vili’s comment here if you prefer a more classic experience.
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Comment on November 2025 Backlog Burner: Week 4 Discussion in ~games
kfwyre (edited )Link ParentOnce I’m done with my actual Backlog Burner writeups, I’m going to post a “sidequest” runthrough of a bunch of stuff I tried out or got running but didn’t follow through on (yet). Most of them are...Once I’m done with my actual Backlog Burner writeups, I’m going to post a “sidequest” runthrough of a bunch of stuff I tried out or got running but didn’t follow through on (yet). Most of them are oddities and curiosities rather than full games.
One of those was Dead Space Demake which is a pitch perfect interpretation of what the game would have been like had it come out on the PSX (with swimming textures and everything!).
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Comment on November 2025 Backlog Burner: Week 4 Discussion in ~games
kfwyre (edited )Link ParentDRL AKA D, the Roguelike AKA DOOM, the Roguelike So, DRL has a storied past. Here's a brief rundown of some of the major events: It starts development in 2002 using ASCII-only graphics in the...DRL AKA D, the Roguelike AKA DOOM, the Roguelike
So, DRL has a storied past. Here's a brief rundown of some of the major events:
- It starts development in 2002 using ASCII-only graphics in the classic Rogue style.
- Development on it finishes in 2012, and the game officially adds a graphic pack made by Derek Yu (you know, the Spelunky guy).
- The developers begin working on Jupiter Hell, a legally distinct follow-up.
- ZeniMax hits the game with a cease and desist in 2016 for using "DOOM" in the name, so it changes to "DRL" or "D, the Roguelike."
- Development resumes again in 2024 and the game goes open source.
- There are now enough fans of the legally distinct follow-up that the devs have now demade the new game in the original DRL engine.
Pretty wild, right? Plus we love a full-circle moment.
(Also, imagine working diligently on a fan project for a decade and finally putting it behind you, only to get a legal threat four years later.)
Anyway, DRL is a delight. It's a very competent mix of traditional roguelike trappings (e.g. grid-based and turn-based levels) with familiar DOOM elements (or should I say D? wait that's a different game).
Unlike a lot of traditional roguelikes, the learning curve is quite shallow. Because it uses familiar weapons, ammo, enemies, etc, it's easy for anyone who's played DOOM to drop in and automatically know what's going on. You already know that radiation suit is going to let you traverse green goop without damage, for example.
Also, unlike a lot of traditional roguelikes, this manages to capture DOOM's famous fast-paced gameplay, which is pretty remarkable for something that's turn-based. The game's systems are simple enough that they let you move quickly once you get the hang of things. It's not as frantic as standard FPS DOOM, but it plays WAY faster than any other TRL I've played (which, granted, isn't very many -- shout outs to Castle of the Winds and Dungeons of Dredmor).
Anyway, the game is quality. I can see why they made their own commercial follow-up, because I would be happy with paying for DRL. Jupiter Hell has now jumped up the priority list in my backlog, because I love gatling-gunning imps in turn-based, tile format.
It's great. It's free. I can't recommend it enough.
Also:
DOOM → catastrophe → breakdown → roadside assistance → AAA → beginning of phonebook → small businesses → entrepreneurship → new ideas → creativity
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Comment on November 2025 Backlog Burner: Week 4 Discussion in ~games
kfwyre Link ParentI utterly adored The Forgotten City. I feel about it the way that people feel about Outer Wilds, and it’s definitely one of those “I wish I could go back and play it again for the first time”...I utterly adored The Forgotten City.
I feel about it the way that people feel about Outer Wilds, and it’s definitely one of those “I wish I could go back and play it again for the first time” games.
Also it totally fits under the “time limit” category. You are on the clock each and every loop.
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Comment on How right-wing superstar Riley Gaines built an anti-trans empire in ~lgbt
kfwyre LinkTough (but good) read. This stuck out to me: That’s quite the about face. I think it’s easy for us to see the shift and consider the ramifications of it, but I want to point out that it...Tough (but good) read.
This stuck out to me:
As she made more media appearances, Gaines’ rhetoric grew sharper. In her initial Daily Wire interview, she’d said of Thomas: “I am in full support of her and full support of her transition and her swimming career and everything like that, because there’s no doubt that she works hard too, but she’s just abiding by the rules that the NCAA put in place, and that’s the issue.” Yet by the following spring any empathy she once had for Thomas had vanished: “He is an arrogant, cheat who STOLE a national title from a hardworking, deserving woman,” she tweeted.
That’s quite the about face. I think it’s easy for us to see the shift and consider the ramifications of it, but I want to point out that it unfortunately won’t hold much weight for people that agree with her current virulently anti-trans viewpoints. In fact, her earlier support paradoxically affirms those even more.
One of the more insidious things about hate is that it will frame itself as truth, which has the effect of making non-hate look like a denial of the truth. Hate conveys the idea that “everyone, deep down, actually feels this way, and anyone who doesn’t is lying or bowing down to pressures to conform to a lie.” It makes the hate feel bold, iconoclastic, even admirable because it makes it look like speaking truth to power if you squint.
This allows people to cast Gaines’ initial comments that were supportive of Thomas not as an earnestly held belief at the time but as a lie that Gaines said because she had to. Her later shift actually emboldens her authenticity with fellow anti-trans people, because they view her new position as one of radical honesty.
This phenomenon isn’t limited to just Gaines, of course, but I thought that paragraph was a very clear example of it. We unfortunately see it all too often these days, because, in our current environment, hate gets you attention, clout, and esteem. I, like many, hope we have a societal reckoning with that at some point soon — a resetting of the weights that makes hate have a social cost again — but until then I’m just going to keep earnestly not hating instead as a way of keeping the fading warmth of those dying embers alive.
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Comment on Looking for recommendations for a new home router in ~tech
kfwyre (edited )LinkUpdate: I spent a significant part of my workday looking up information about router models and standards and brands and WiFi 7 versus 6 vs 6E and reading everyone’s comments here and diving in to...Update:
I spent a significant part of my workday looking up information about router models and standards and brands and WiFi 7 versus 6 vs 6E and reading everyone’s comments here and diving in to learn more about those options.
I even got close to selecting a replacement.
Then I got home and went to measure the space that my current router is in to make sure that any new ones would fit.
What did I find there? Not the aforementioned Netgear Nighthawk that’s no longer supported, but the router I replaced it with two years ago.
That’s right: I legitimately forgot which router I even had in the first place. 🤦♂️
The only reason I was considering replacing it was that I had gotten an email from Netgear letting me know about the end of service, and it didn’t occur to me that it wasn’t talking about my current router.
I was even a little miffed, because I could have sworn my router was new-ish! Didn’t I buy it not that long ago?! I looked up the Nighthawk and found out I’d bought it in early 2019. Hmm, guess I was wrong. Six years is a long time. I thought that was a “time wasn’t real during COVID” dilation or a product of my bad memory.
So, it turns out I don’t actually need a new router at all! Looks like I’m saving 100% on my networking hardware this Black Friday.
Thanks to everyone who gave me recommendations. For what it’s worth, I did enjoy looking into them and I always appreciate the communal tech wisdom this place has.
Also feel free to share stories of other similar gaffes so I can feel a little bit less embarrassed.
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Looking for recommendations for a new home router
I currently have a Netgear R6700 - Nighthawk AC1750 router that has reached end of service and am looking for a replacement. When I set up the router, I had issues with some of my devices not...
I currently have a Netgear R6700 - Nighthawk AC1750 router that has reached end of service and am looking for a replacement.
When I set up the router, I had issues with some of my devices not connecting to either WiFi 6 or the 5 GHz band (I can’t remember which was the issue) so I had to set up a guest network for those devices to live on.
I would like, if possible, to have one network that everything in my house can connect to, but that’s a preference not a necessity. Are modern routers fully backwards compatible with older devices?
I’d also like something with a relatively long life ahead of it (though security is paramount and I’d rather have a secure router that I have to replace sooner over an insecure one that lives longer).
My house is just over 1000 square feet so coverage area doesn’t need to be huge. I do stream a lot of games to my laptop via Moonlight though, so being able to continue to do that without lag/hiccups is a necessity for me.
Let me know your recommendations and avoids, as well as any advice you have.
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Comment on CGA-2025-11 🔴🟡🔵🟢 REMOVE CARTRIDGE ⏏️ PlayStation WHAT? in ~games
kfwyre LinkFrom my Backlog Burner writeups (with minor edits): (Note: I'm still playing PaRappa and Incredible Crisis and will post about those when I'm done) Pepsiman A few scattered thoughts: It is...From my Backlog Burner writeups (with minor edits):
(Note: I'm still playing PaRappa and Incredible Crisis and will post about those when I'm done)
A few scattered thoughts:
- It is remarkably not terrible, which is high praise for a licensed game.
- It was a runner game long before the runner game genre was standard (my mind wants to say Canabalt from 2009 was one of the first major games to be identified with the genre)
- The recurring "PEPSIMAAAAAAN" vocals in the soundtrack are hilarious...
- ...at first. By the end of the game I found them kind of grating.
- The cutscenes were entertaining in a deliberately bad sort of way.
This game is a perfect example of what I will henceforth call "The @vili Principle:"
Nowadays, a game often contains 100 hours of content, of which you play 50. Back in the day, games contained 2 hours of content, of which you also played 50.
The game is short. I probably beat it in about an hour or so?
But that's only because I abused the crap out of save states.
If I hadn't, it would have taken me hours, maybe dozens of them, to see the game all the way through. It relies on you learning its patterns and cycles through repetition so that you can avoid them. The game has a lot of cheap deaths or obstacles. If you don't collect enough Pepsi cans you can run out of lives and have to start all the way over. It's a bit unfair by modern standards to the point of potentially being unfun by modern standards as well.
That said, this isn't exactly a criticism. Back in the day, I was the kind of gamer that would have eagerly put those dozens of hours into this game. It was just how we played back then. I'm glad I was able to try out the game, and it was genuinely enjoyable playing it with save states. Without them, however, I think I would have hit a frustration wall pretty early on.
Similar to Midtown Madness (which I also played for the Backlog Burner), this is another 1999 game that always interested me but that was completely inaccessible to me as a kid (it never came out in North America).
I don't think I even knew about the game in 1999. Instead, what put it on my radar was when I started making my own custom DDR stepfiles for Dance With Intensity (anyone else remember that?). I embedded myself into several online stepfile communities, including one that had a custom map for the track "Laugh & Peace" from this game.
I was entranced by the song. It was odd. Quirky. It had drastic tempo changes and memorable lines. It feels like something that would fit right in on the amazing Katamari Damacy soundtrack.
My knowledge of and interest in the game stopped there for decades, until I finally picked the game up for CGA.
The game is a delight. Full of personality and charm. Its minimalistic, monochromatic graphics punch well above their weight in making the game feel lively, exciting, dynamic, and cute. Vibri is adorable.
The soundtrack is also excellent. I have since acquired a copy of it and uploaded it to my Apple Music account, so that I can listen to the tracks from the game whenever I want.
The gameplay is, well, there.
Unfortunately, for a rhythm game, Vib-Ribbon has some timing issues. I suspect even the built-in tracks for the game were procedurally generated rather than hardcoded in, because there are obstacles that do not follow the song's beats correctly. I took to watching Vibri's footfalls to know when to press buttons, rather than going with the "feel" of the song, which takes a lot of the fun out of it.
I did still enjoy it, particularly the wrinkle the game throws at you in the final Hard stage. I'm also still planning to get a custom disc going with my emulator (but I need to finish PaRappa and Incredible Crisis first).
Despite what I see as an unignorable issue with the game's obstacle timings, I was ultimately won over by the game's irrepressible charm. It's got a personality all its own, buoyed by a bright, endearing, wacky cuteness.
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Comment on November 2025 Backlog Burner: Week 3 Discussion in ~games
kfwyre Link ParentYou're not wrong! I've been quite inconsistent in getting these up at the right time.I swear, each week seems to have one fewer day than the week before!
You're not wrong! I've been quite inconsistent in getting these up at the right time.
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Comment on November 2025 Backlog Burner: Week 4 Discussion in ~games
kfwyre (edited )Link ParentA blackout bingo is a beautiful thing to behold! That is NO small feat. Well done! Also, your writeups, with their wonderful sprinkling of screenshots, have been consistently great. I remember...A blackout bingo is a beautiful thing to behold! That is NO small feat. Well done!
Also, your writeups, with their wonderful sprinkling of screenshots, have been consistently great.
I remember making my dad take me to (I think it was) Circuit City on the release date of the original Gran Turismo. When I booted it up, I remember thinking how amazingly REAL the game looked, which is sort of a rich thought to have for a game that looks like this. (That's, admittedly, not quite what it looked like on a CRT TV though.)
Regardless, it was really convincing at the time! I feel like graphics were initially so simple that every time there was any sort of advance in them, we were blown away by how much better and more "real" they looked, even if now we can easily see how far from "real" we actually were.
While the original hasn't necessarily aged all that well visually, I will say that GT3 still looks pretty good! I think the 4:3 ratio gives away its age, but if that race screenshot were in widescreen, it could probably pass for something newer than it is.
Also, I love to see a Playdate game join the fold! I was considering playing some Season 2 games on it myself, but given that I did Playdate games for the last Backlog Burner, I was excited to change over to something different for this one.
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Comment on November 2025 Backlog Burner: Week 4 Discussion in ~games
kfwyre Link ParentCome for the games writeups; stay for the shockingly deep exploration of gacha game design. It genuinely never occurred to me that compelling characters and plotlines would be found in a genre...Come for the games writeups; stay for the shockingly deep exploration of gacha game design.
It genuinely never occurred to me that compelling characters and plotlines would be found in a genre that I largely consider a cash grab, but it also makes perfect sense the way you laid it out: those are the exact kind of thing that could get people to get so invested in it that they would want to throw lots of money at a game in the first place. Really insightful stuff.
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Comment on November 2025 Backlog Burner: Week 3 Discussion in ~games
kfwyre Link ParentI've added these to the week 3 recap and adjusted the stats (Starsector gave us yet another single word name!). It felt right to have them go there rather than carrying them over into next week's...I've added these to the week 3 recap and adjusted the stats (Starsector gave us yet another single word name!). It felt right to have them go there rather than carrying them over into next week's because you've been CRUSHING these mini-cards each week. That's quite a commitment and I'm impressed that you're pulling it off.
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Comment on November 2025 Backlog Burner: Week 4 Discussion in ~games
kfwyre (edited )LinkConfession time: I've just been picking games at random for this event instead of diligently planning out my card like I usually do. The freedom has been nice, but now it's coming with a cost: I...Confession time: I've just been picking games at random for this event instead of diligently planning out my card like I usually do.
The freedom has been nice, but now it's coming with a cost: I am going to have to aggressively shoehorn some of the games I've already been playing into categories on my card in ways that will almost certainly strain a good faith interpretation of them.
In terms of pacing, I'm feeling really good about being able to hit a blackout this time. Deliberately choosing shorter games has really helped me keep things going, with my only obstacle being that I keep going back to Inkbound instead of playing new games.
I think that's actually a solid endorsement for the game: I'm drawn to keep diving back into it hour after hour, even during a month where I intentionally want, even MORE than usual, to hop between different new games.
Mode: Custom Winning Bingo! Finished 19/25 Distribution
✅ PepsimanOrder
✅ Irritating StickCalm
✅ CursorbladeSimple
✅ Rocket Skates VRVerticality
✅ ROTAFragmentation Annihilation
✅ Cozy Space SurvivorsCollaboration Creativity
✅ DRLRebirth
✅ Spin HeroStyle Emergence ★ Wildcard
✅ Incredible CrisisPeace
✅ Vib-RibbonDeception
✅ DreamBreakOpen
✅ Midtown MadnessDiscovery
✅ A Simple Garbage Sorting GameSwift
✅ Skator GatorAbundance
✅ InkboundIsolation
✅ FirestarterRepetition
✅ Mask of MistsSound
✅ Paradise MarshDestruction Maneuver
✅ Arctic EggsComfortable This was the first complete miss of the event for me.
I was initially excited for this game. It's got great graphics, good music, vibrant colors, and a compelling Soviet cyberpunk setting. I even got used to the game's clunky controls pretty quickly. The game has grid-based movement despite being a side-scroller, so it doesn't play like you expect. It reminded me of Another World though, which I love.
I hit a mandatory minigame about twenty minutes into my playthrough. You're flying a car and drones are attacking it. You're given a very clunky method for targeting the drones and getting rid of them.
Now, I am admittedly bad at games, so it's possible that what follows was entirely a skill issue (but I'm pretty confident it wasn't): I literally couldn't pass it. For one, the game seemed to eat some of my controller inputs. And for another, the rate at which the drones attacked seemed to be calibrated to be way too fast. I tried it several times, playing optimally, and I would still lose.
I can't help but wonder if it's one of those things where, like, the wrong framerate causes the game to run in unintended ways or something.
Anyway, after beating my head against that minigame for fifteen minutes (almost as long as I'd been playing the rest of the game), I gave up.
Kind of a shame really, because I had been liking the game up to that point.
Oh, and, uh... you've been framed for murder in the game so (::looks at card::) there is some deception involved (like I said, fitting these remaining categories is going to get pretty bad pretty quick).
A game with permadeath is really, fundamentally about rebirth, right?
Depending on how you feel about inspiration, this game is either a shameless ripoff of or a loving homage to Luck Be a Landlord. It's the same exact concept (slot machine roguelike) with a very similar setup, skinned and themed to be an RPG-style adventure where you fight monsters instead of a predatory property owner.
Now, I know what you're thinking: Kefir, this game was in this month's Humble Choice, so how can you play this for the November Backlog Burner if you got the game in November?!
But HA, do I have one over on you! I owned this game and didn't play it BEFORE the Humble Choice. If there's one past time I like more than buying bundles, it's getting games in bundles that I already own because I foolishly bought those titles ahead of time instead of waiting for them to be in bundles. Take THAT! I bet you feel SO foolish now!
Anyway, I haven't yet had like, a bonkers runaway run like I know is possible in Luck Be a Landlord. Instead, the game has been more subdued with its power curve. I'm still learning all the different items and options and optimal way to play though, so I'm sure it's possible and I just haven't gotten there yet.
I'll keep playing runs of this one in between other games. I don't love it yet, but if it can scratch the itch that Luck Be a Landlord did, then I'll get a good amount of time out of it.
Okay, I guess I lied about having to work hard to fit categories to titles. This game is going in my wildcard spot -- not because I can't fit it anywhere else, but because "wildcard" fits it like a glove. This game is genuinely wild.
When broken down, the game is little more than a series of minigames glued together with cutscenes. It feels like so much more than that though because the game's production value and charm is off the charts. They execute a simple concept very well.
I mean, the game opens with a 2001 parody played by a ska orchestra (did you know that a "ska orchestra" was even a thing?)
Here's a brief rundown of the opening minutes of the game: you start by doing a dance workout with your officemates but then a boulder breaks through the wall and you have to run away from it after which you're able to get into an elevator but that elevator falls after which you land on a horizontal flagpole and then have to balance your way back to safety.
It goes on like this, whiplashing from scene to scene, each one with its own little minigame in which you usually fight for your survival in cartoony, over-the-top ways. The game is intentionally slapstick; intentionally bombastic; intentionally weird; intentionally ridiculous.
I dig it.
The quality of the minigames varies. Most of them are deliberately clunky but fun in keeping with the game's ridiculousness, but some are either a touch grating or go on too long. The second one (running away from the boulder) is actually bad enough that we're talking about it over in the CGA topic. It's a shame that such a misfire comes so early in the game because it's never fun to kick things off with a lowpoint.
Also, later on in the game, there is a very unexpected not-safe-for-what-I-initially-thought-was-a-family-friendly-game moment in which you give a woman a "massage" that is, uh, quite questionable. It feels very out of place in an otherwise bright, cartoony game that seems directly aimed at kids.
Regardless, I've had fun with it overall. I'm abusing save states again, but not as bad as I did with Pepsiman. With this one, I'm allowing myself to save only at the beginning of each new scene (which is still way more security than the game intends you to have). I'm not fully finished with the game yet, so I can't give my full thoughts on it, but I've been thoroughly entertained by it so far.
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Comment on November 2025 Backlog Burner: Week 4 Discussion in ~games
kfwyre LinkPinging all Backlog Burner participants/conversationalists: here's the new topic for the week! Notification List @aphoenix @1338 @BeardyHat @CannibalisticApple @dannydotcafe @deathinactthree...Pinging all Backlog Burner participants/conversationalists: here's the new topic for the week!
Notification List
@aphoenix
@1338
@BeardyHat
@CannibalisticApple
@dannydotcafe
@deathinactthree
@Durinthal
@Eidolon
@J-Chiptunator
@JCPhoenix
@knocklessmonster
@Pistos
@sotix
@sparksbet
@Wes
@ZeroGeeIf you would like to be removed from/added to the list, let me know either here or by PM.
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November 2025 Backlog Burner: Week 4 Discussion
Week 4 has begun! Post your current bingo cards. Continue updating us on your games! Quick links: Backlog Bingo Site Week 1 Discussion and Event Guidelines Week 2 Discussion Week 3 Discussion Week...
Week 4 has begun!
Post your current bingo cards.
Continue updating us on your games!Quick links:
Week 3 Recap
11 participants played 11 bingo cards and moved 40 games out of their backlogs!
There were 3 bingo wins. Congrats to u/dannydotcafe, u/kfwyre, and u/Wes! 🎉
- Nearly 70% of the games played this week had a one or two word title (one = 38%, two = 28%)
- The kitchen was a feature this week, with "knife", "eggs", "coffee", "garbage", and "Pepsi" being mentioned in game titles.
- If you play magnetic poetry with the titles, you can uncover some sage wisdom:
The darkest coffee must fandango.
Literature is irritating; torment.
Die, prodigal robot beasts of the midtown.
Katamari Caravan: stick, room, Tokyo, SunGame List:
- Agatha Knife
- Arco
- Arctic Eggs
- Baba Is You
- A Bird Story
- Cassette Beasts
- Children of the Sun
- Coffee Caravan
- Cursorblade
- Darkest Dungeon II
- Death Must Die
- Doki Doki Literature Club!
- Firestarter
- Grim Fandango
- Hacknet
- Inkbound
- Irritating Stick
- Katamari Damacy REROLL
- Lunacid
- Midtown Madness
- Moonlighter
- No Straight Roads
- Paper Beast
- Patron
- Pepsiman
- Planescape: Torment
- Prodigal
- Pushmo
- A Simple Garbage Sorting Game
- Skul: The Hero Slayer
- SOMA
- Starsector
- Super Robot Wars 30
- The Room 4: Old Sins
- Tails of Iron
- Titan Quest
- Tokyo Dark
- Trek to Yomi
- Vib-Ribbon
- Wanderstop
Week 2 Recap
11 participants played 11 bingo cards and moved 43 games out of their backlogs!
There were 2 bingo wins. Congrats to u/Wes and u/J-Chiptunator! 🎉
Also, in my rush last week to get the recap up, I forgot to celebrate u/Wes's win from Week 1. So, additional congratulations!
- Only 1 game this time had an ALL CAPS TITLE, but 9 games had PARTIAL CAps titles.
- The shortest title was 5 characters: Venba
- The longest title was 12 words: Tales from Toyotoki: Arrival of the Witch (The witch of the Ihanashi)
- We had the numbers 0, 1, 2, 3, and 7 represented. Half of the digits!
(Note that this only works if I read "I Expect You to Die" as "One: Expect You to Die", which I do)
Game list:
- Afterlove EP
- AKIBA'S TRIP: Undead & Undressed
- Call of the Sea
- Citizen Sleeper
- Cozy Space Survivors
- Crimson Shroud
- CULTIC
- Devilated
- Drox Operative
- Eastward
- Hades II
- Haustoria
- NYT Lunch Break
- I Expect You to Die
- Intravenous
- Katamari Damacy REROLL
- MAKOTO WAKAIDO's Case Files
- Mask of Mists
- Metro Gravity
- Nine Noir Lives
- Oddworld: Abe's Oddysee
- Out There: Ω Edition
- Pacific Drive
- Paradise Marsh
- Pumpkin Jack
- Rocket Skates VR
- Resogun
- The Room Three
- ROTA: Bend Gravity
- Shipwreck
- A Short Hike
- Sid Meier's Civilization VII
- Skator Gator
- Super Fantasy Kingdom
- Tales from Toyotoki: Arrival of the Witch (The witch of the Ihanashi)
- UnderRail
- Untitled Goose Game
- Vegas Stakes
- Venba
- Weapon Shop de Omasse
- We Were Here Expeditions: The FriendShip
- Zenith: Nexus
- Zero Escape: Zero Time Dilemma
Week 1 Recap
12 participants played 11 bingo cards and moved 24 games out of their backlogs!
- 25% of the games played started with the letters P and R
- 13% of the games played have ALL CAPS TITLES
- 21% of the games played have a number in their titles
Game list:
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Comment on Tildes Book Club Discussion - October 2025 - The Poisoner's Handbook: Murder and the Birth of Forensic Medicine in Jazz Age New York by Deborah Blum in ~books
kfwyre LinkAnother similar book by Deborah Blum, The Poison Squad, is available right now for $2 wherever you buy your ebooks (including Amazon.ca!). Given how much I appreciated The Poisoner’s Handbook, I’m...Another similar book by Deborah Blum, The Poison Squad, is available right now for $2 wherever you buy your ebooks (including Amazon.ca!).
Given how much I appreciated The Poisoner’s Handbook, I’m picking this one up and figured I should share it here in case people feel similarly.
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Comment on CGA-2025-11 🔴🟡🔵🟢 REMOVE CARTRIDGE ⏏️ PlayStation WHAT? in ~games
kfwyre Link ParentThat second scene from Incredible Crisis really is awful. I was able to get through it by mashing X at a regular, somewhat rapid rate, but it took me several tries and didn’t at all feel intuitive...That second scene from Incredible Crisis really is awful. I was able to get through it by mashing X at a regular, somewhat rapid rate, but it took me several tries and didn’t at all feel intuitive or like I knew what I was doing. The scenes beyond that are definitely better, though even those have a general clumsiness to them that’s right in line with the game’s aesthetics and narrative.
I also had similar issues with the timing in Vib-Ribbon and PaRappa. In Vib-Ribbon I got in the habit of looking at Vibri’s feet which usually touch down in time to the music. That trick becomes especially useful in the moments which, for whatever reason, the game isn’t synced with the music and you can’t play by feel. That’s a major sin for a rhythm game, but I was pretty forgiving of it because I was so charmed by everything else.
I do wonder if the timing issues for these games are byproducts of emulation? Maybe these play better on original hardware.
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Comment on Weekly US politics news and updates thread - week of November 17 in ~society
kfwyre LinkOver 30,000 Charlotte students absent from school in protest of ICE operation, reports sayOver 30,000 Charlotte students absent from school in protest of ICE operation, reports say
Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools said on Tuesday that the attendance data showed that 30,399 students were absent. Initially, it was reported that 20,935 students were absent.
Officials said that the number is still unofficial and the data needs to be finalized by the state.
Charlotte-Mecklenburg Schools did not say if the absences were connected to the ongoing immigration operation in the city.
With operation “Charlotte’s Web” entering its fourth day in the Charlotte Metro area, hundreds of students across four different schools staged walkouts to protest Border Patrol.
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Comment on November 2025 Backlog Burner: Week 3 Discussion in ~games
kfwyre Link ParentThat is very cool. When I was a kid, I picked up some random floppy disks at a garage sale, one of which had a star map program on it. Not only did it show the locations of stars currently, but...The manual also hinted that real-world lunar cycles affect the game. That blew my mind, and I couldn't help but look it up. Apparently, the game boosts your "lunacy" level based on the current moon phase. Since I played right on a new moon, I had higher defenses but lower spell damage. Very weird!
That is very cool.
When I was a kid, I picked up some random floppy disks at a garage sale, one of which had a star map program on it. Not only did it show the locations of stars currently, but you could rewind or advance time to show the positions of the stars and planets years in the past or, even more cool: the future.
Kid me was utterly enthralled with the idea that we could know that. It gave me this profound sense of mysticism about the cosmos -- knowing that we could predict the position of the stars twenty years out felt like fortune telling.
I love the idea that a game has incorporated that to affect its mechanics. Such a neat idea. In addition to the star map, I've been a sucker for that sort of thing ever since Metropolis Street Racer on the Dreamcast would read the time on your system and adjust its time of day to the local time for wherever you were racing. I thought that was like, unbelievably advanced at the time. So modern. So futuristic. So realistic.
It worked great for me on the Steam Deck. I added it as a non-Steam game and ran it through Proton.
You have to manually rebind the controls, but other than that it’s flawless (because Proton is Magic).