Mr. Skeltal's thoughts deposit

Simulator of various kinds were the bread and butter for the 5th generation of video games on PC, many series started and ended in the span of 6 years. Due to the fall in popularity of this genre, one may think that it's simply too old and complex to care and should be ignored, but I think that there is still fun to be had with this kind of games. Let's take a look at Uprising: join or die and see what it did right and wrong. Aesthetics Patrolling a recently conquered hot zone The 3d graphics have not aged well, the textures look very low resolution and the models are very blocky, unless you have a pair of rose-tinted glasses for this kind of appearances, everything just looks ugly. Not a great start, but it gets better almost immediately. The user interface struck me, it's heterogeneous, meaning that unlike other games where the UI is an abstraction shown to the player, here it's part of the tank you command. It gives a much appreciated boon to immersion. I really enj...

The explosion of procedural generated games is not a phenomenon that needs an introduction. People like to make games with variable levels and many other people like to play them. Fury unleashed is one of these titles and I wanted to see what it offered that others don't. Aesthetics Exploring the hallways of an alien ship The 2d graphics have been drawn with a style reminiscent of a comic book, the sprites have very vibrant colors, the characters have quite exaggerated figures and everything looks cartoony. The effect is nice, but it can be detrimental in some fringe cases. Sometimes it's hard to see the particle details, especially the projectile of the enemies, they tend to blur with scenery, making it a bit frustrating dealing with encounters that use a lot of ranged attacks. Anyway, moving onto the animations, they are made using a kind of puppetry technique, you can almost see which parts of the body are the junctions used to move the other rigid parts, but it didn't...

As I have stated in my faq page, besides indies I review retro-games "that nostalgia forgot", that is retro-games with few reviews still online and not much covering from retro-gamers in general. I like doing it because it give me a unique experience and it also shines a light on a game that may have been ignored at release, but has aged well over the years. Sometimes I find fun experiences , other times I play still disputable titles , in few cases I even played games that still have a following from a dedicated fan base , but didn't really enjoy due to some controversial design decisions. Cold War belongs in the category of games that didn't have a following back then and it sure can't get one today. Aesthetics ...

Lovecraftian myths have exploded in popularity in recent years, definitely thanks to the interesting modern setting and being a relatively recent release still ingrained in the public's mental gestalt, plus the fact that these books may have entered the public domain could be a factor too (but this one is still being disputed , so don't quote me on that). Many have taken inspiration from his works and decided to make their one original creations and one of these is Stirring Abyss. Aesthetics The base of a temple in the depths of the ocean, seems abandoned ... seems The graphics used are mainly 2d drawn images, with 3d models dedicated to divers. The style used is good for the environments, but looks a bit flat for the drawings of the enemies, it doesn't stick out and makes them look a bit bland, but what works really well is the heavy usage of the dark in most of the screen, giving the ambiance a great feeling of confusion and eeriness. The particle details are ...