Framed - (iOS / ~2 hours / Status: Completed) - So, the fabled creator of Metal Gear, Hideo Kojima, called this his Game of 2014. That was one of the reasons I decided to pick it up. Also, I think I got it for free on some sort of one day giveaway deal. For the most part, I liked the puzzle mechanics - you move comic panels around in order to help spies elude police; very unique. It's like an interactive comic, but without any dialog. However, it could have used a bit more instruction as the game progressed. To up the difficulty, you get to levels where it's necessary to move the panels after you've started the action, but it does a very bad job of letting you know when you can move the panels. There were a couple of puzzles that I solved just by luck and shoving things around - probably not what the developers had in mind. I'd like to see a Framed 2 someday that actually had characters and told a story.
Hitman Go (iOS / ~30 mins / Status: Aborted) - I really seems a shame to use the Hitman license to market a chess-like puzzle game, but I will say the graphics were outstanding for a tablet title. Definitely not what I was expecting though in the way of gameplay.
Ori and The Blind Forest (PC / ~3 hours / Status: Abandoned?) - There should be a rule, nah, a law, that game developers shall be forbidden to create beautiful, whimsical games with cute characters that are hard as balls to play!! I bought this off Steam after hearing just glowing reviews for it's charm and graphical quality. And yes, it looks awesome, like an old fashioned hand-drawn Disney cartoon. And yes, I was moved to tears by the opening sequence. Then...it all came apart for me. Truth be told, I've always sucked at games like Super Metroid and Castlevania. I'm just not a really good side-scrolling platformer gamer. I've played a fair number over the years (mostly in the SNES days), but I guess I stayed toward the easier ones. This game gives no quarter. After about 3 hours of enemies that took half my hit-points at once, getting hurt by water, and having to use up power-ups to save, I gave up. A real loss as I'm sure the ending of this game would have been wonderful to see.*** Update: Well, maybe I was a little too hasty on my verdict here. I was watching a stream yesterday of someone playing Ori and was somewhat heartened to see that they got stuck in exactly the same place I did! With some help from the other watchers, he got through it and I saw what I had missed. So, that evening I reinstalled it and decided to try some more. Mind you, it's still harder than I think it should be, but if I take it in small chunks I might be able to get through more of it.
I have over 900 games in my Steam catalog and last night decided to hit up a couple, just to see if I could find a diamond in the rough. No such luck this time.
Wrack (PC / ~ 1/2 hour / Status: Aborted) - It would be rude of me to say too much negative about this game because it's apparently supposed to be an "old school" FPS - like Doom, but cel-shaded. So, saying things like "the writing is juvenile", "the controls are primitive", and "it's not worth my time" would just be a slap in the face of the developers who slaved over this game. Moving on...
Super Toy Cars (PC / ~ 1/2 hour / Status: Aborted) - I'm always up for a racing game, no matter how cheesy, but I still wonder what the big draw is for toy cars driving around a kid's bedroom floor. Seems like I've seen it too many times before. Anyway, the controls on this one were not as tight as they needed to be and I found myself hitting the track walls much too often. Fortunately, I probably got it in a bundle deal. No major loss.
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