• fae/faer or they/them

fae otherkin in the streets, anthro red chocobo in the sheets


This list doesn't count UzeMaze and its RetroAchievements version, since Backloggd doesn't have Uzebox games included. Those are fine enough lil' puzzle games. (Counting those and three other things not in the site's database I'm presently at 70 beaten games in 2024.)

Junkoid (NES romhack): play Junkoid.

If you take nothing else from anything I post about ever, play Junkoid. Probably play Super Junkoid, too, I hear nothing but good things and I just haven't gotten there yet, probably in the very near future.

Junkoid is a fantastic hack on NES Metroid with some brilliant map design, but I think more than anything part of why I recommend it is that it actually made me kinda uncomfortable in ways I wasn't expecting from a romhack of NES Metroid. Nothing but nice things to say about it, but also I don't wanna say a whole lot either: if you've played the original game you'll know the basics, it doesn't do much to your equipment, you can get in there. It's not a super big hack, but if you like Metroidvanias at all it's incredibly worth playing over an afternoon.

Content warning for some child nudity. Not detailed, not sexual, but there to add to the unnerving vibe of one area.

Nottolot (PC): cute enough for a lil' freebie game. Like, it's a three-stage platformer with some light puzzlin', I don't have a lot to weigh in on here, but I certainly enjoyed it.

I hope that lil' sphere is living its best life out there.

9 Years of Shadows (PC): Got outta a Metroidvania bundle. It wasn't on my radar before this, actually, but I did like it a bunch.

There's a kinda-minor thing Metroidvanias do that I honestly think is really important, and that's momentum in the basic movement sprites. SotN and Super Metroid are massive genre definers for a lot of things but they also do this really well-Samus has a wide sprite run with fast animation, Alucard leans into his regular movement in a really lovely way. (For the opposite, look at Nathan and Juste in the first two GBA 'vanias, who are very stiff and upright in their every movement besides crouching-they're not even really that much slower in the grand scheme of things, but it sure as shit feels like it.) This is a tangent, but it is a very specific thing that 9YoS' Europa does well, and I appreciate it.

Since you can normally heal more or less for free, and there's a timing bar for rapid partial heals if you get put into the danger zone, AND if your main bar drains you still have a few life gems as a last-ditch resort that you can't heal outside of save points, the game is very happy to sling some big damage your way and make that health bar also be a resource for one class of attacks, including your main ranged option and the things you'll use for a lot of interactions. It's not a hard game-I only died twice near the end-but it felt like it kept me on my toes a bunch.

Lovely spritework all over, too, brilliant music. I honestly think my biggest critique is that there's not really a ton of variety in the bestiary: several things just have different highlights to indicate elemental weaknesses being different (but in turn also have different attacks).

Secret Agent HD (PC): GOG had another sale and after doing the Crystal Caves update earlier this year this felt obligatory.

These two games were among the first things I found and delved into when, as a young adult, I hit DOSbox to catch up on a few things. They're pretty straightforward, 2x2 screen platformer rooms with some minor puzzles, but I have a soft spot for 'em. Secret Agent HD's new episode adds quite a few new things, jetpacks and swimming gear and some new enemies, that actually probably make the user-created stuff go wild. I haven't delved yet.

Anyway hopefully someone hits Dark Ages or Realms of Chaos next, let's go wild with it.

Wooloop Halloween (PC): I'm done all the content I have in the casual games by this dev is done, I'm free. My hands no longer need busying during streams or whatever in the name of achievement hunting.

Cookie Cutter (PC): Mixed thoughts here.

On the one hand: Worldbuilding is neat, it's got a compelling setup and lore. Characters're mostly pretty likeable, even the weirdo scumbag who can't stop speaking in innuendo. Absolutely beautiful art and animation all around. World's interesting, and things like "there was a whalefall from space and it's doing bad things to the people who thought this giant meat source from heaven was going to fix their scarcity issues" are dope. Combat's a mixed bag: your stuff feels mostly solid and useful, but big crowds get difficult to visually read fast. Certain enemies shooting from offscreen or through the environment get annoying very quickly-the flies in particular are monstrously aggravating.

Two things kinda left a rough taste in my mouth: one, while I do not mind the cliffhanger all that much usually, the ending of the game's basically just four of 'em in a row, a string of plot hooks for a presumed sequel. Two, parrying is a big part of fighting-timing a parry lets you do a brutal kill animation to immediately dispose of someone AND get some health/energy pickups. Since things in this game hurt a lot that's important. However-the parry windows are weird and do not feel consistent. It's rough, and after the second boss (where it genuinely does feel mandatory) I started bypassing it in the boss fights entirely, favoring just whittling them down over a couple minutes to trying to time 6-8 blocks.

Mix that with a bit of technical jank (icons not removing themselves from the map, a reload launching me to a save point I hadn't been to yet-thankfully not too far ahead of where I was) and a lot of areas just kinda feeling big and lengthy to move through, and I honestly don't know how big a recommendation I can offer here. It's good, but there's a lot of rough edges that keep it from being something I'd recommend as quickly and eagerly as I should want to recommend a game about a lesbian robot in a trucker cap doing big violence.

Frogun Encore (PC): it's Frogun! It's more Frogun! Renata is back! our national nightmare is over

Frogun also has a little jank, I think-there are times when you autolock onto the wrong thing or just don't turn correctly in a jump, and these can result in deaths, and it's kinda annoying. Checkpoints are frequent enough that it's not a huge deal if you're not after the no-death emblem, sure, but it's still led to some frustrating moments here and there. But also whatever the occasional falling into a hole doesn't break these games for me too bad. It's Frogun, it's fun, it's charming, I love 'em, play Frogun.

House of the Dead: Remake (PC): Again, mixed thoughts-they didn't do an awful job, but there's some weird technical stuff going on-why does the gallery take a million years to install? why is there orange bloom behind transparent orange things I need to shoot? I've heard there's some added boss invuln, which kinda sucks, but I have played the original so little I can't compare for myself.

On the other side, though, I'm a massive slut for lightgun games and oh boy are we lacking in those lately. Ain't awful, was cheap. Music's kinda a shame, though, but that's not really something the devs could do a ton about.


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