Recent reviews by Dekameter

It's like Alien: Isolation except the monster is even more relentless and there's hardly any time for rest. It doesn't really "top" Amnesia: The Dark Descent, but it's like comparing apples to oranges since this game does its own thing.

Somehow both painfully easy and annoyingly hard at the same time. Despite owning it for years, I finally picked it up for Spooktober with their recent remastering of the games' visuals. It took 10 hours to get every achievement, but that Kate segment with the generators on Hardcore is such ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ luck that you have to conquer. Surprisingly not as scary as you might think, or maybe I've seen too many Youtubers play it years ago.

To the developers, please make it obvious somewhere how many pumpkins and pages you've collected (out of how many) per level so you know where you're missing some.

November 13, 2023: I wish Overwatch had this relaxed and casual of a community back when I played it. I moved on from Overwatch to TF2 back in 2020 and I've never looked back since, even though I still prefer the way Overwatch plays.

June 3, 2024: Team Fortress 2 used to be my save haven from Overwatch, and I used to have the utmost respect for Valve for over a decade now. Now they just abuse the community's wholesome love for the game by sitting idly by doing nothing to solve the core problem of the bot crisis.

Most official servers are unable, particularly in the evening, where bots fundamentally ruin the enjoyment of the game or outright prohibit you from playing. The only way around this is through community servers, but there are only so many of those to get around. Be prepared to sit in queue for half-an-hour to an hour just to get in. At this point Valve is begging me to give my time and money to any other hero shooter, MOBA, etc. company than them.

#FixTF2 #SaveTF2[save.tf]

Equal parts captivating, equal parts frustrating. I've been waiting to play this game since I first saw it showcased on Sony's Future of Gaming event in 2020. My initial impressions back then was how "Pixar-like" it looked.

After playing it, it's not as superficial as that. It does not at all come off as commercial and the developers' passion is clear. What I was hoping with this game was a relaxing experience for once from my usual shooters, but the combat ended up being one of the most frustrating experiences of my life. I know people over use the "harder than Dark Souls" or "Souls-like" terms for games, but it's very much like a Souls game, and one of the optional challenges (Trials) was very reminiscent of Nameless King.

You're at the mercy of what healing flowers the developers feel is appropriate for a fight. The hit detection and enemy behavior can be frustrating and feel unfair at times. This was all at the middle / "Normal" difficulty. The hardest difficulty, Mastery, has such a difficulty spike that that's the only achievement I can't accomplish. Even New Game+ is an unforgiving, unfun playthrough, because you'll late game minibosses in ordinary enemy encounters 20 minutes into the game.

However, I'd still recommend this game. Besides the combat, the rest of the game is that puzzle-solving, platformer adventure game I was hoping it would be. The Rot are crafted to be as cute as possible as you collect hats for them, but it works regardless. I really enjoyed all the non-combat time trial challenges, or using various skills you learn to solve platforming puzzles.

The themes, soundtrack, and environments are the strongest highlights. I get such a pleasant sense of accomplishment restoring the environment from the corruption; seeing everything going from red or brown to pleasant, summery greens really helps with this. The story can be a bit straightforward without much depth, but it still had me invested all the way through. The music was composed with the assistance of Balinesian gamelan musicians to ensure they were using it culturally appropriately, which says a lot to me about how much the developers cared about the culture itself. It's a soundtrack that I immediately added to my Tidal collection.

Overall, I recommend people pick up Kena, with the caveat of playing on one of the first two easiest difficulties unless you really want a rough challenge. To people saying that the value isn't there and that the game is too short, I have no idea what they're on about. It took me somewhere between 16 to 20 hours to beat the game (albeit with a completionist playstyle in mind), and 30 hours to beat every single trial, find every Rot hat, etc. As someone who couldn't do Mastery difficulty, all I can say is "Good luck."

To the developer, please don't do time exclusive hats! It'd be great to collect the hats of seasons past regardless of the current date somehow.

I can see why this game got all the praise it has over the years. I played it for the first time in 2020, and for the most part it still holds up. The expressions and animations of the character models must have been so mind-blowing back in 2004. The world building is its greatest strength and makes me want a Half-Life 3 just to see where the story goes after Half-Life 2: Episode 2.

It never feels repetitive, and at each level there's always something new to change it up. In this day and age of 18+ years of first-person shooters, I can see why Valve has a hard act to follow that doesn't feel derivative. But please Valve, I just want to know what happens next!

Effectively a Slender: The Eight Pages clone, but without that sense of dread. I really wish there was more replayability, since so few games actually feature kaijus as a mechanic. Only Youtubers looking for their next video to make should get this in its current state.

I have even more hours from my days of playing MIrror's Edge on the 360. A game that I'll come back to every once in a while. While it's a really simple game at its core, it's just so satisfying to challenge yourself, run through the levels as fast as possible, and to purposely avoid using guns!

A timeless classic, unlike its sequel that just retcons everything.

One of the hardest games I've ever played, but one I'll always go back to. To this day I still haven't completed it! Get this over DiRT Rally 2.0, the sequel loses the immersion that this game gives me. Playing it feels like you're constantly on a tightrope where at any moment you can fall off.

The party level really needs sound retweaking, because the current balancing makes it feel the solution's pathing feels like you're doing what the developers didn't intend. Probably one of the better Backrooms games currently out. With how little there is to this game, it's more like a $5 game

This game makes Doom look chill.