Here are some games I played during the Sonic Amateur Games Expo 2023 and why I liked em!
Susan Taxpayer
She's Susan, and she pays taxes. Punkitt and Beatrix have a hit on their hands for sure with this one. It's Pizza Tower for trans femmes (Pizza Tower is for trans mascs, obviously, we all know this). This game has an unhealthy obsession with schmovement in the best way possible and while the demo absolutely has some kinks to work out this shit shows so much promise and I cannot wait to go sicko looking for all the shinies in the full game. This is going to have an iron grip on my dumb ass once it drops.
CODE Bunny
Bro holy shit this came out of nowhere for me. It's been at SAGE multiple times before and I guess I just fucking slept on it for some reason? This game is incredible. It's very much in the Inti Creates style of lightning-fast retro action platformer, and Axel's gameplay in particular is some Beyblade-but-as-a-furry-sci-fi-platformer shit that hits every single button for me in every single way.
The gameplay is great, the level design so far is great, the story is really compelling and I can't wait to learn more, the character design and spritework are adorable, the music absolutely slaps, like. This shit is the complete package. The Gunvolt/Mega Man Zero/Sonic Rush love child I never knew I needed.
As it turns out this game drops on itch in like 20 days and I am going to be all over it when it does. Play CODE Bunny, this shit slaps, really hope this gets a Switch release at some point.
B.U.D.D.
A fantastic action platformer with clear inspiration drawn from Metroid and Monster World IV. The sprites are adorable, I really like the vibe, the combat feels really fun, and it's really quite polished. Fantastic package, if you like the sound of a retro MW-inspired action-adventure game with some fast-paced combos give it a shot. Also seriously, the art is great.
Cosmogelica
YO @CyanSorcery YOUR GAME KICKS ASS. THIS IS FUN AS HELL!!! Love the art, love the music, great SHMUP, if you like the idea of a furry pastel interstellar shoot em up with phenomenal 2A03+VRC6 music give this a shot, absolutely grabbing the early access release so I can play endless, this is good as hell. Also, cohost user spotted.
Gonna play more games throughout the week and I'll write about the ones I think are great. Go play some free video games!
y'all this all looks fantastic