Nothing particularly outstanding in this batch. Some I might come back to, some I definitely won't. Some I like in theory and some that are just not for me.
Blade Symphony
This game seems really cool and I am never going to play it. Not least because it's multiplayer only and at this point it's almost entirely dead. The Steam forums have posts from this year claiming that, at times, there may be as many as 26 other players online, but there was literally no one when I tried it out.
Aside from that though, I'm pretty sure it's one of those games where you need to play against someone of roughly the same skill level as yourself to have any fun, and anyone still playing it at this point is not going to be a beginner. And there aren't exactly a steady stream of new players to match against each other. Nor can you play it against the AI. There is an AI opponent, but I easily beat it by button-mashing, so it's not exactly going to provide a sustained challenge.
Which is all a real shame as it's a pretty neat concept. I could be into a decent sword-duelling game, as long as the learning curve wasn't too bad. But I guess not this one. It does seem to be free now though, so there's that.
Brink
Some kind of team-based online FPS like. You can play it single-player, but it's still shit.
Well, that may be overly harsh. I have the same issues with similar games like Payday and Left 4 Dead, which I'm aware are very popular. I've never heard of this one so I'm guessing it's not as good as those, but for me that's not the issue. I'm just really bad at these kinds of games. I end up following my teammates around doing basically nothing because I don't know where to go or what to do, and I find the whole experience too frustrating to ever stick with it long enough to learn.
This one also seems to be free.
Burn Zombie Burn
Arcadey action game. Kill endless hordes of zombies to score points. Keyboard to move, mouse to aim. And I hate that control scheme. I almost immediately lose track of where my mouse pointer is and end up shooting in the wrong direction. Probably plays better with a controller, but since it didn't show up in the list of controller-supported games I never tried it that way. I don't feel I'm likely to be missing out on much anyway since I reckon it's probably entertaining for about ten minutes tops.
Call of Cthulhu: Dark Corners of the Earth
Sort of an FPS adventure game, I think? Obviously dated, and I expect it gets stupidly difficult once the shooting starts, but I played 20 minutes and would have played more if it hadn't crashed. Might give it another shot some time. I don't have high hopes for it, but it could surprise me.
Capsized
Platformer. Shoot monsters, get past obstacles. You've got a grappling hook and a thing that blasts you and whatever you're next to away from each other. It seems ok, but I'm not instantly hooked. And I feel like the game mechanics are introduced too quickly. I didn't have time to get used to the controls I already knew before I was being told about another thing, and it was hard to keep them straight. Particularly jump and jetpack, which seem like they probably should be condensed into a single action. Also, not sure what the main gun's secondary fire mode does, other than glow.
The Cat Lady
I remembered trying this out once before and giving up on it very quickly. And the first chapter is obnoxious as fuck and I almost quit again, but just as I was about to I got a hint that maybe it was actually going to get better, so I stuck it out and chapter two is an immediate improvement. It's still kind of annoying, but at least it seems to be going somewhere now and isn't just random bullshit happening for no reason.
That first chapter though. Oof. Walk one way, interact with a thing, walk back the other way and now something's changed for no reason. Repeat until you meet an incredibly annoying NPC who I wanted to tell to fuck off but couldn't. Oh, and then she tricks you into murdering someone, except it doesn't need to be a trick because you have no choice bu to do what she says anyway.
It does look like it gets better after that, but that's a really bad introduction.
Cave Story+
Old-fashioned platformer. I'm reminded of Crystal Caves, for some reason. It does feel very DOS-y. The controls are awkward, like an old game. And the jumps are very floaty and sort of hard to control. I'd probably have a lot more time for it if it had come out in 1990, but it doesn't seem to have much to recommend it in 2004, let alone 2021.
Chroma Squad
Tactical RPG where you're running a TV studio that makes a Power Rangers knock-off? Very weird. I didn't get very far into it, but the story seems extremely bad. The gameplay might be cool though? Hard to tell so far. The audio and visuals aren't great either. I do like this kind of gameplay, but it's doing its best to put me off.
Colt Express
This seems like a really fun tabletop game. But I've absolutely no interest in playing it as a video game. If it had local co-op I might keep it to play in person, and if it had Remote Play Together there'd definitely be some possibilities, but I'm just not interested in playing against strangers or AIs.
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