I'm a little later than I'd hoped with getting my February update together, but better late than never! Nine games in February takes me to 21 so far.
Master post here
13.
Final Fantasy Adventure: Mystic Quest (Switch) | 2 February 2020
Complete playthrough. Despite the name,
Final Fantasy Adventure is actually the predecessor to
Secret of Mana rather than the
Final Fantasy series. While clearly primitive nowadays given its original Gameboy origins, for its time this is an incredibly impressive game, with a large world to explore, enjoyable combat and a story with a few interesting twists, alongside a thoroughly excellent soundtrack. I'd have liked there to little more guidance to the world exploration - at times it feels like it's relying on trial-and-error, especially given the very limited information on the in-game map - but we do at least have a good number of guides and walkthroughs about the remedy that. I now really ought to find some time to play Secret of Mana properly at some point, especially given that this was from the excellently put together
Collection of Mana compilation - which for this game, sees the inclusion of the European, US and Japanese versions, as well as the Super Gameboy recolouring.
14.
Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney (Switch) | 5 February 2020
Complete playthrough. Although of course I knew about this visual novel adventure series, up until now I've never actually played any of the game; with the remastered release on Switch of the first three games came a perfect opportunity to fix that. I had a good time with this first game, which great writing and dialogue throughout, impressively expressive characters and enjoyable, often humourous stories behind each of the five cases. At times I felt that the investigative portions of the game went on for a little too long, but the trial scenarios - which are very much the highlight - more than made up for that. The remastered presentation of the game is excellent, making this an excellent way to experience the start to this long-running series.
15.
Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney - Justice For All (Switch) | 9 February 2020
Complete playthrough. Moving swiftly on to the second
Phoenix Wright game,
Justice For All picks up nicely from its predecessor, as we start to see that characters recur not just within individual games but across the series as a whole, allowing us to get to know them really rather well, whether allies or adversaries of Phoenix.
Justice For All sees the introduction of a few new mechanics to spice up the game's investigative portions of, notably including "psyche locks", bite-sized puzzles where, similar to the trials, you have to present appropriate evidence to open up certain dialogue paths with the character in question. There are some nice additions to the regular case and the writing remains excellent, though to my mind the stories are a little weaker than those of the first game.
16.
Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney - Trials and Tribulations (Switch) | 16 February 2020
Complete playthrough. A return to form after a slight drop with
Justice For All, in
Trials and Tribulations the series feels like it's really finding its feet, though it's sadly also the end of this core trilogy. The game nicely mixes up the scenarios with the use of characters other than Phoenix as protagonist, allowing us to see things from a different point of view, allowing us to get to know some of the supporting cast better than the series has previously allowed. With everything wrapped around some impressively well-devised scenarios and the writing and humour remaining as strong as ever,
Trials and Tribulations is an excellent climax to this trilogy package.
17.
Forager (Switch) | 18 February 2020
100% of in-game 'feats' completed, aside from one blocked by a bug. In
Forager, your character starts off on a small island, surrounded by rocks and trees, and equipped only with a pickaxe - and from these humble beginnings, you'll gradually build a thriving industry across an expansive series of islands. Viewed from a traditional overhead perspective, the game puts all of the core resource-gathering, building and other core abilities within easy reach, while a well-developed skill grid ensures that there's always another progression objective just a short distance away.
Ultimately,
Forager is in large part a game about progression for its own sake - there's no storyline to speak of - but it's undoubtedly a compelling experience, as you see the resources roll in with an increasingly self-sufficient and even automated industry. A handful of NPCs, landmarks and even dungeons scattered across the various islands that you buy to expand your play area bring some enjoyable variety to the experience, though once you reach the endgame and max out the skill tree, eventually there's not that much reason to keep playing. I know that the PC version has seen significant expansion since release, but while it still showcases a development roadmap on the title screen, the Switch game remains at v1.0.0 - here's hoping that we'll see the expansion content coming to consoles before too long!
18.
The Turing Test (Xbox One) | 22 February 2020
100% of achievements unlocked.
The Turing Test is a first-person puzzle game with a sci-fi setting. While similar to
Portal and
The Talos Principle in gameplay, the puzzles generally tend towards being more straightforward, though there's still enough challenge to make solving them satisfying. The core puzzle mechanic is built around moving energy from one place to another, opening doors and activating switches and other devices, ultimately to unlock and reach the exit of each of the 70 core 'chambers' (to borrow language from
Portal). This starts off with the use of energy-providing blocks, but quickly expands with the use of an energy-absorbing 'gun', pulsing energy sources and other variations. The gameplay is nicely complemented by a plot based around the definition and limitations of AI (hence the title), which while in some ways a little cliched, still manages to build interest and draw you through the game.
19.
Enigmatis: The Mists of Ravenwood (Steam) | 24 February 2020
100% of achievements unlocked. My first foray into Hidden Object Games,
Enigmatis represents its genre well despite its age. The premise here sees a amnesiac detective exploring a village on the track of a serial killer and a missing girl - not the most original, but it does its job. The core gameplay comprises two elements - exploring the town through a number of fixed scenes, collecting evidence and solving simple puzzles, then solving the 'hidden object' scenes that give the genre its name. I was surprised quite how compelling this gameplay can be, as objects gradually get removed from the scene as you locate them from the list that you're tasked with; the repeat usage of most scenes (two or three times each in total), rather than feeling too repetitive, actually works well as you recall where certain items are from previous encounters and further 'tidy up' the scene. The artwork for each scene is consistently impressive and there's a fittingly relaxed soundtrack Away from these scenes, the puzzle-solving element of the game also works well; I was particularly pleased with the well-implemented map and objective system, which directs you to locations where there's something for you to do, avoiding the need for any aimless and unproductive trial-and-error exploration.
20.
Rusty Lake Hotel (Steam) | 25 February 2020
Three stars for all recipes. Having heard the
Rusty Lake series name several times, I knew that the games are well-regarded, but I hadn't realised that the themes would be quite so dark! This first game in the series, the goal of
Rusty Lake Hotel is essentially to murder each of five anthropomorphised animal 'guests' at the titular hotel, to be served as dinner the following day to the remaining guests. This is achieved through solving point-and-click puzzles taking place in the room of each guest, each of which is a well-designed, self-contained 'puzzle box', with a series of tasks that rarely get overly obtuse, a nice contrast from many other games in the genre. As a game build in Flash, technically it's not particularly impressive, but the graphics and audio do there job in setting the tone, with a distinctive art style throughout. With a short run time - around 1-2 hours unguided - I had a good time here, and look forward to exploring other games in the series.
21.
Rusty Lake: Roots (Steam) | 29 February 2020
100% of achievements unlocked. The immediate follow-up to
Rusty Lake Hotel and, having now played all three of the 'premium' games in the series, probably my favourite,
Rusty Lake: Roots builds nicely on the foundations of the first game. The core puzzle gameplay remains just as enjoyable, while also expanding the range of mechanics employed - my only significant criticism in this regard is that the occasional memorisation puzzle is something that I could do without. While the narrative links to
Rusty Lake Hotel and its dark themes aren't immediately evident, as the game progresses, we see a more expansive storyline play out, with clear callbacks to imagery and characters from the prequel. The game makes good use of an impressively non-linear approach, structuring itself as a series of independent scenarios within a family tree structure, progressing through time across a number of branches that can be tackled in an order of the player's choice. Common across the series, the game is still built on Flash, but within that constraint, this is an impressive and enjoyable achievement for the developer.
