Unoriginal and Uncreative【Game-Log: Mid-November 2025】
IDK, it's November I guess.
Major Timesinks and Finished Games
Rue Valley is a narrative driven timeloop game with the RPG mechanics of Disco Elysium... for about 5 minutes. Having explained and tutorialised it's many mechanics in the first 3 or 4 loops, the game just drops 75% of them. For much of the rest of the game it becomes an extremely broken, but compelling narrative adventure with a good mystery and multiple interesting storylines. Then it decides it wants to be bad again and makes you sit through an arduous one hour sequence ending in a fake ending. Then there's a narrative driven epilogue that is less compelling than the earlier game. I can't recommend it to anyone.
Necesse is still a lot of fun. It's flattened out a bit, but I still enjoy both town-building and adventuring, and I have things to work toward.
Likewise Worldbox really has added a lot in recent versions. I've had a lot of fun building different sandbox worlds and watching them implode themselves in many different ways. It's also still a shame that the unlocking process gates so many features, and is so at odds with the rest of the game.
I started an adventurer character in South East Asia in the latest Crusader Kings III and have had a great time guiding their dynasty through assorted misadventures and fuck-ups (including writing a fake legend that resulted in my character becoming the heir to the King of England, despite being based in Bali). At some point I decided to conquer a local realm and thus the game reverted to the usual CK3 fair of managing a ruler. For better (assorted intrigue and lewd plots) and worse (losing a war based on the games fictional numbers unrelated to the actual state of the world.)
Demonschool is a game I've been waiting literal years for. It's an rpg set in a school on a demon-infested island, but with puzzle-ish combat encounters in the style of Into the Breach, rather than turn based combat + grinding levels. I've really enjoyed it so far (about 8 hours in), the story and writing are great with a ton of well-written incidental moments. The aesthetic is perfect, and there is an incredible soundtrack to go with it.
I finished Q-Up (as one character), which ended in the perfect manner for such a game. There's a cool cameo at the end too. There are a few minor gaps that are a bit annoying, where your "gameplay" has to catch up with plot requirements, but otherwise it's perfect satire.
A Case of Fraud is a small scale mystery game where you have to fill out a corporate org chart similar identically to the Roottrees game earlier this year. Instead of having a fake internet, it dumps a whole lot of evidence on you in one go, which can be more or less frustrating depending on context. I enjoy it, but I'm afraid I'll have lost the thought train necessary to continue it.
All Games Played
Automobilista 2: GREAT
Necesse: GREAT (Notable)
Q-Up: GREAT (Notable)
Worldbox: Good
Rue Valley: Mediocre
Crusader Kings III: Good
Demonschool: GREAT (Notable)
A Case of Fraud: Good
IDK, it's November I guess.
Major Timesinks and Finished Games
Rue Valley is a narrative driven timeloop game with the RPG mechanics of Disco Elysium... for about 5 minutes. Having explained and tutorialised it's many mechanics in the first 3 or 4 loops, the game just drops 75% of them. For much of the rest of the game it becomes an extremely broken, but compelling narrative adventure with a good mystery and multiple interesting storylines. Then it decides it wants to be bad again and makes you sit through an arduous one hour sequence ending in a fake ending. Then there's a narrative driven epilogue that is less compelling than the earlier game. I can't recommend it to anyone.
Necesse is still a lot of fun. It's flattened out a bit, but I still enjoy both town-building and adventuring, and I have things to work toward.
Likewise Worldbox really has added a lot in recent versions. I've had a lot of fun building different sandbox worlds and watching them implode themselves in many different ways. It's also still a shame that the unlocking process gates so many features, and is so at odds with the rest of the game.
I started an adventurer character in South East Asia in the latest Crusader Kings III and have had a great time guiding their dynasty through assorted misadventures and fuck-ups (including writing a fake legend that resulted in my character becoming the heir to the King of England, despite being based in Bali). At some point I decided to conquer a local realm and thus the game reverted to the usual CK3 fair of managing a ruler. For better (assorted intrigue and lewd plots) and worse (losing a war based on the games fictional numbers unrelated to the actual state of the world.)
Demonschool is a game I've been waiting literal years for. It's an rpg set in a school on a demon-infested island, but with puzzle-ish combat encounters in the style of Into the Breach, rather than turn based combat + grinding levels. I've really enjoyed it so far (about 8 hours in), the story and writing are great with a ton of well-written incidental moments. The aesthetic is perfect, and there is an incredible soundtrack to go with it.
I finished Q-Up (as one character), which ended in the perfect manner for such a game. There's a cool cameo at the end too. There are a few minor gaps that are a bit annoying, where your "gameplay" has to catch up with plot requirements, but otherwise it's perfect satire.
A Case of Fraud is a small scale mystery game where you have to fill out a corporate org chart similar identically to the Roottrees game earlier this year. Instead of having a fake internet, it dumps a whole lot of evidence on you in one go, which can be more or less frustrating depending on context. I enjoy it, but I'm afraid I'll have lost the thought train necessary to continue it.
All Games Played
Automobilista 2: GREAT
Necesse: GREAT (Notable)
Q-Up: GREAT (Notable)
Worldbox: Good
Rue Valley: Mediocre
Crusader Kings III: Good
Demonschool: GREAT (Notable)
A Case of Fraud: Good
Mael Duin