Recent reviews by Cipher

It's pretty much just as fun as the original Subnautica. Works out of the box on Linux.

EDIT: Regarding people spreading panic about EULA, wait until they find out and figure out how to read Microsoft's or Discord's EULA >⩊<

Cute goat-bunny-cat lady.

The most fun ps1/n64 stylized 3d platformer for a very low price. Almost feels like a steal.

Pseudoregalia is a great 3d platformer which focuses on extremely satisfying, responsive and fancy movement, in a metroidvania setting, and a simple goal collecting missing keys to reach the end for the grand finale.

Collect power ups, unlock more advanced move sets that will help you reach places previously unreachable, beat time trials for new outfits, and feel like a jumping god, all while admiring the goat lady's 3d polygons that 1996 Lara Croft would be jealous of.

The only negative is how short the game is (as long as you aren't lost running in circles like I did), but that also makes it great for speedrunning.

Works out of the box on Linux, although some of the text is blurry on Steam Deck.

Made in Abyss but with a sad, scared, fluffy friend, and way more brutal.

I absolutely love this game and the entire STALKER series, but making a negative review to make feedback:

Adding new a new quest, locking out old endgame saves and expecting people to replay 50 hours worth of story just to play through it, for absolutely no apparent reason is awful, don't do that.

If you want to experience Sealed Truth quest without having to make a new save, subscribe to the "EarlyX18Lab" mod in the workshop, load any of your pre April 14th saves and go to the Sidorovich's bunker. This should trigger the quest:

https://v1.steam.hlxgame.cc/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3707217306

There is nothing that should stop people from enjoying this, where a simple mod can trigger the quest just fine.

A game that revived my love for metroidvania games and at the same time became one of my favorites. I'm surprised it's not as popular as I would've imagined.

Nine Sols is pretty much a perfect metroidvania that does everything well. From very satisfying, parry based combat, tight and responsive controls which are perfect for platforming, skills and unlock based progression, amazing story and a big world.

All of the sprite and world art is very detailed and well animated. The sound and music fits perfectly with the eastern themes, and the overall world gives a perfect sense of isolation and creepiness with what is happening in the story.

There is a nice balance between backtracking and satisfaction with unlocking new abilities.

All of the characters are very memorable and well written, with a good balance of seriousness and silliness that doesn't break immersion. There are some side activities which give more context to some of the character's individual stories.

There were few places where I felt a bit lost somewhat early in the game, but that very much could've been just a skill issue

If you are looking for a good metroidvania game, then this one is a must.

Works out of the box on Steam Deck and Linux.

Normally I would recommend this game as I generally like survival games, got it on a recent sale but only after I've bought it I was made aware of couple of things.

For the positives first, it's a fairly nice survival game with nice stylized graphics and I'm sure I'll have fun with it. works pretty well on linux too, which is nice.

The reason I cannot recommend it is due to how how obnoxious the game is with telling you at every step how "ethical" and "good" the developers are, how much they stand against AI and how pro environment they are, how protecting the wildlife is important etc. etc, while just recently laying off 10 of their employees due to delays.

What is more ironic is that the game also had a disclaimer that the game was made without crunch, which seemingly is now removed.

The game apparently has been unfinished and in development hell for years and it seems that any feedback or criticism is faced with censorship.

If you are willing to look past that, and you like good immersive survival games, then I'm sure you will like it, otherwise I'd recommend to avoid it.

Just your average genshinslop.

Yet another game that looks really pretty, with interesting premise, but is designed to target certain audience that needs a constant dopamine hit with endless notifications spam, 4 characters instant swap, button mashing combat that gives an illusion that you're playing the game, auto walk, and extremely boring and predictable gameplay. You can't even go to options until you pass certain point in tutorial.

I feel sorry for the fans of the franchise, you guys probably deserve better than this.

This is one of those games you should go in blind.

Plenty of adorable, funny and creepy moments in a well written story. If you've played DDLC, you'll love it.

Peak Kojima writing, but definitely not for everyone.

Death Stranding is one of those games that is just hard to recommend due to Kojima's unique writing, that's not everyone's cup of tea, but also because of the walking sim nature of the gameplay.

If you are familiar with Kojima's nonsensical, comical and metaphorical writing, it's definitely a must. You will find gameplay similar to MGSV (for better or worse), great graphics in a really well optimized game engine.

You'll be hauling boxes, while babysitting you BB, dealing with ghosts, tar monsters, terrorists and delivery addicts. You'll be traversing using hiking equipment, ladders and constructions built by other players. Basically glorified Amazon delivery with story attached to it.

Voice acting, mocap and writing is really great, not much to be said without spoiling the plot.
Stealth, sneaking, combat, although not common in general, feels very smooth and enjoyable.
Music and sound design pretty much perfect.

Controls at times don't feel very responsive and sometimes it feels like you're fighting the character movement itself.
Some parts of the world are a bit more annoying rather than being challenging (high snowy mountains)

Works perfectly out of the box on Linux.

I really tried to enjoy this game but it's just not fun.

Kitsune Tails has some of the worst level design for a game of this style. The early levels started pretty nice but as early as world 2, it quickly became a mix of Kaizo Mario rom hacks difficulty and Syobon Action comically unfair hazards and pitfalls. Some levels feature big foreground elements completely obstructing your view which is just awful. Levels length spans from a very short straight line level with few jumps to multiple endless rooms full of lava and spike pits as if made to be as frustrating as possible,

The movement feels floaty and imprecise, which mixed with very tight platforming makes it quite unenjoyable.

The voice acting is a mixed bag, with Kiri's (the orange kitsume) and Yuzu's (the purple kitsune) acting being decent while the rest of the cast and random characters is pretty bad, but not because of the subpar acting but due to pretty awful writing...

The gameplay design choice is very strange considering you have to replay the entire game again as Kiri after finishing the game as Yuzu, with Kiri's move set and abilities being way more fun with dashes and wall jumps. it almost feels like the game was designed around Kiri's playstyle but you are forced to play the entire game as the more inferior and less fun to play character first.

Music and art are both pretty great which is appreciated.
Modding support is also nice.

Works perfectly fine on Steam Deck.