The Gardens Between was neither an adventure game nor a visual novel, so I’m not entirely sure how this got into my recommendations after buying Tangled Tower. It’s a puzzle game, albeit a simple one. After playing a few levels, I was ready to give up for being boring, but something made me stick with it to the end. After reaching the ending cut scene, I am so glad I did.

It’s About Time

No literally, it is about time. The only controls the player really has is to move this pair of friends forward and backward through time as they walk through the level to the end. However, each character has their own unique abilities. The girl character is able to pick up, hold, and place down a lantern. The only way to clear the level is for the girl to have a lit lantern for the two of them to place on a pedestal. The boy character can flip switches, which sometimes open flower blossoms of light or darkness (takes away the light from the lantern) and sometimes alters where the environment is in time without the characters moving.

Like any good puzzle game, the first levels are simple to show how the time elements work. Gradually, the puzzles become more and more complex, which, with how few controls you actually have, is rather impressive.

On the flip side, since there are so few controls, solving the puzzles never feels impossible. They’re akin to same “ah ha!” moments I had when playing The Turing Test or even Portal. The Witness this is not. I probably really would have quit if it was.

Is There a Story, Though?

If you know me or are familiar with my work in gaming over the last 16 years, then you know I’m a story gamer. The apparent lack of a story is why I nearly called it quits early on. The game begins with these two characters in a tree house in the rain. Suddenly lightning strikes, and they’re both in this strange world of islands that appear to be made up of their memories. In the level, you don’t play through the memory itself, but when you place the lantern on the pedestal, a piece of the memory forms in the sky. The memory then forms and plays out after all of its pieces are collected. Each memory typically has two or three pieces aka levels to solve.

The memories are cute, the visuals are stunning, and the sound design is superb, but is there a point to all of this? All I can say is sort of, but the ending resolves in a way that I can guarantee you will not see coming. As such, I’m on a little crusade to tout this game to puzzle-loving friends and family.

It’s not expensive, it doesn’t take long to play, and hey, it’s a great way to pass the time (ha! I’m funny) while we’re in this quarantine. It’s not Portal mind-blowing levels, but it’s still something short and sweet that puzzle fans should check out.

The Gardens Between review copy was purchased by me.

The post The Gardens Between Review – Not All Is as it Seems (Switch) appeared first on CrunchyChocobo.

With the coronoavirus putting us all on lock-down, I figured it was a good time to play some of the Switch games I randomly bought and never tried. I love using the Switch for puzzle games, visual novels, point-and-click adventures, etc. This is where most of my collection now resides. One such game I never heard of until a random store search was The Turing Test, and the brief description hinted it was right up my alley. As I searched for a game to kick off the coronacation, The Turing Test caught my eye. It was the perfect start to cleaning out my Switch digital backlog.

I love puzzle games, but I’m picky about them. I loved Portal, but I will not try The Witness. If you center the puzzle around a mystery, then I’m all in. That’s the only reason why I suffered through so many bad Professor Layton games. The last game I played that comes to my mind that was both a puzzle game and a mystery was The Station, which I loved. The Turing Test appeared to run in the same vein and check all the same boxes.

If you take The Station…

With The Station, the player character is sent to a space station to learn why the crew has gone silent. It’s mostly a “walking simulator” where you uncover clues about where the crew might be and solve puzzles to unlock audio and video logs. It’s a thrilling mystery that stunned me at the very end. Similarly, The Turing Test also features the player character trying to figure out why the ground crew on a space exploration mission has gone silent.

The difference here is that it’s not a true walking simulator. There are puzzles to solve, but the puzzles aren’t there for the player to solve to uncover more of the mystery. With The Station, the entire space station was open to the player. The player solved puzzles to get into locked areas and to find more clues as to what happened to the crew. The Turing Test requires puzzles to leave the room you enter. This is where the other half of the mashup comes in.

…and mix it up with Portal…

The player controls Ava Turing, an engineer that that the onboard AI, TOM, woke up to find the ground crew. They’re all on a base on Europa, one of Jupiter’s moons, which happens to also be the moon that developed life in Space Odyssey 2010. I don’t want to believe that’s a coincidence. I’m not sure why Ava was still in cryostasis, but without her, there would be no mystery to solve. TOM appears to be panicked about the welfare of the crew, especially since he can’t locate them anywhere. He isn’t sure if they’re alive or dead, which feeds into the panic of Ava to find them as soon as possible.

The base extends deep underground with various rooms and levels. The crew has locked up the rooms so that the only way to get through them is to solve puzzles that build upon difficulty. Basically, Ava has to find a way to power the exit doors. To do so, she has to move energy balls to power different doors, contraptions, etc. And naturally, the only way to do so is with a device that looks like a gun, but totally is NOT a portal gun.

At least there aren’t any turrets or really anything to kill you. Your only fear in getting through it is frustration at finding the solution and the occasional timed run. Those levels nearly broke me, but there was really only one that gave me great difficulty in getting the timing down pat.

A Mystery Worth Uncovering

As Ava tests with TOM by her side, she gets the feeling that not everything is how TOM portrays it to be. If the player solves the optional room puzzles—which I highly recommend—you will learn a little more as to what is going on with the crew and why they are hiding from TOM.

I have to say that I had so many guesses as to what happened to the crew, and none of them were correct. The game doesn’t reveal all at the very end; instead the big truth comes out during the final level below Europa’s surface. While you’d think there wouldn’t be many reasons to play after you learn the truth, The Turing Test keeps one last shocking surprise at the very end. I’m still haunted by the final choice I had to make. I think I made the right choice, but it doesn’t mean that I’m cool with the result.

In addition to the story being so great, the puzzles were incredibly addictive. I stayed up way too late most nights swearing that I could not sleep without solving this one last puzzle. I think we all know how these puzzle games go. There’s never one last puzzle.

Most likely by now, you’ve heard of The Turing Test, as it released on Steam in 2016 and PS4 and Xbox One in 2017. I didn’t hear about it until it released on Switch in February 2020. If you’re like me and you haven’t heard about this game and how great it is, I cannot recommend it enough.

The Turing Test review code for Switch was purchased, not provided by developer or publisher.

The post The Turing Test Review – If Portal and The Station Had a Baby… (Switch) appeared first on CrunchyChocobo.

I’ve been out of the PC-indie scene for a long time now, so I miss hearing of some sleeper hits on Steam, such as Pig Eat Ball. The press release I received about it mentioned arcade action and getting fat from eating balls. It sounded too wacky and Pac-Man-esque for me not to give this one a try. Oh it’s crazy wacky, which is amazing, but it’s crazy fun too. Even when I get overly frustrated with a level, I never feel like a level is impossible. I just haven’t figured out its secrets yet.

There Is a Point With the Puzzles But…

Have you seen Disney’s Brave? If you have, then the “story” won’t be too surprising or original for you. If you haven’t, well, players play as a princess flying pig thing who wants to leave the space station to go exploring and see the world. Her father, King Cake, has decreed that it’s time for her to marry. He has no idea who could be a potential suitor, so why not weed out the chaff with a contest? Each sub-realm of King Cake’s space station has a bevy of challenges for a suitor to complete. If the suitor completes all of the challenges in a sector, then he gets a pearl. The one who collects all of the pearls will win Princess Bow’s hand in marriage.

Unsurprisingly, the princess does not want to get married, so she vows to entire the competition herself to win her own freedom. But how do the Cake Guards and her father not recognize her? She puts on glasses, of course! It worked for Clark Kent, it can work for a princess pig thing trying to avoid marriage.

In reality, the story doesn’t mean much. Not even the sub-plot you uncover after clearing stations matters in the end. It’s there as a reason for players to pilot a piggie through these puzzles to meet the challenges. While each substation has its own quirks and tricks, all of the puzzles boil down to one simple thing: Princess Bow has to suck up objects to win. And I mean literally suck up.

Ninety percent of the time, Princess Bow has to suck up a number of tennis balls. As she sucks up the balls, she gets fatter. If she can’t squeeze through a doorway, she has to barf up the balls to lose the weight. That’s right kids, this is one time when bulimia is acceptable: when you’re solving weird puzzles to get out of marriage.

Naturally, it’s not that straight forward or simple. Spiky balls float around too, and if she sucks one of them up, it will make her sick and barf. Whenever she gets hurt at all, from enemies or spikes or a dozen other random obstacles, she will get sick and barf. If you suck up the barf balls before they bounce themselves clean, she will get sick and barf. When you’re under a time limit to collect all of the balls, you DO NOT want to get hurt at all.

In addition, if you need to get enemies to stop doing their thing, barfing on them does the trick. I would think that would work on anyone, even in reality.

Barfing Good Fun

As is typical with these puzzle games, the puzzles start off relatively simple and then progressively compound the difficulty as you continue. The puzzles sometimes seem impossible, but there’s always a trick to getting through it. Sometimes that trick is particular path or order to follow, and other times it all comes down to the disguise Princess Bow wears.

She starts off with glasses, but by exploring the substation and fulfilling random sidequests, the princess can acquire new disguises. All of the disguises have a benefit and a detriment. One disguise will pump up the speed, but it greatly reduces the suction distance. Another strengthens and lengthens the suction, but Princess Bow will get sick more easily. Most of the time, if a puzzle is too challenging and frustrating, all it takes is picking the right disguise.

Sometimes kicking off the level with a power-up helps as well. Some levels have power-ups within, briefly granting abilities of slowing down time, attracting all of the balls, or health shields. Some power-ups can be found exploring the substations and storing them for later. When you start a challenge, that is an opportunity to change Bow’s disguise as well as starting with a power-up. Some of these power-ups have really gotten me out of a tight pinch, especially for the timed challenges. You all know how much I love timed challenges.

It’s because all of the challenges never feel impossible that I easily fell under the sway of, “Going to try one more time,” for hours on end. Once I did try and succeed, then it became “Just one more level,” hence the hours on end.

It’s not the deepest game as far as story goes, but you’ll be having so much fun solving the puzzles, it won’t matter. It’s a great pick-up-and-play game for the Switch that has gotten me to put down my iPhone for gaming. The portability of the Switch just makes it even easier.

Pig Eat Ball review code for Switch received via developer.

The post Pig Eat Ball Review – Acceptable Bulimia (Switch) appeared first on CrunchyChocobo.

I wrote a professional Chaosbane review for PlayStation Lifestyle, but it doesn’t mean I can’t write something here. I think the way plagiarism works is that I can’t copy and paste directly (please detect sarcasm here), and I don’t need to copy and paste directly. Warhammer: Chaosbane is pretty fresh in my mind, and that’s because I’m busy warning all of my friends to wait for a massive price drop.

On paper, Chaosbane appeared to have everything we’d want from a Diablo-esque WH game. I will be comparing this game to Diablo a lot for two reasons:

• it is a Diablo-lite, and
• it’s impossible not to.

So buckle in and prepare for the Diablo wannabe comparisons. It’s not pretty.

When a Game Makes Diablo‘s Gameplay Seem Complex…

Look, I absolutely adore Diablo and Diablo-like games. However, for a Diablo-like game to work and stand out on its own, it needs its own hook. Its own gimmick. Something that makes it unique. Unfortunately, Chaosbane has none of these things.

It does have a deeper skill system than Diablo, I will give it that. Players have a wheel of skills for both active and passive skills that unlock once the character reaches particular levels. However, your character needs a certain number of skill points to activate the skills in his skillset. You don’t always earn new skill points each time you level up, so the skill wheel becomes a land of bargaining. You may really need the fully upgraded version of this one skill, but then you may have to give up another high-level skill in return.

On top of this, there’s a completely additional skill tree for God skills. These need favour points (1 per level gained), gold crowns, and stone fragments to purchase. Once you purchase a God skill, you have another set of skill points to juggle with your skill wheel.

And that’s all the complexity you’re going to get in this game.

Chaosbane only offers four character classes, and no, you can’t change the gender of any of them. You want to play as a girl, you’re stuck with the Scout class. It’s fitting, actually, because I think the whole game has only four maps as well. If you thought Diablo III was tedious with its maps, at least you didn’t go back to the same exact map four or five times in one Act. No, I’m not exaggerating. Each area your character visits has up to two different maps they can visit to complete the main story. Be prepared to do one map 75% of the time you’re there. By the third Act, I was just going through the motions, wondering when it would be over. I can only do so many fetch quests through the same damn map to pad out this story.

At least in Diablo III, the maps were procedurally generated with the varieties of enemies (Who doesn’t love plague jailer arcane demons? The answer is everyone.), not to mention various events or caves would open up for exploration at different times. Chaosbane has NONE of that. If you want side quests, just wait until you finish the area, because then the Expeditions and Boss Rush modes unlock. Boss Rush is what it sounds, and the Expeditions are, get this, opportunities to explore that same damn map you’ve already done ten times before! This time, it will have various event challenges, like kill all the daemons before time runs out. Yes, my excitement went straight through the roof, too.

Zero Reason to Replay

I’ve replayed Diablo III so many times, I have that incredibly tedious Platinum Trophy for the version on the PlayStation 3. So yes, I am not opposed to replaying games. This style of game demands a high replayability factor, and Chaosbane just doesn’t have it. Sure, the trophies may be a reason in of themselves, but the overall game isn’t entertaining enough for multiple playthroughs, even when using different characters.

Plus, after you finish the game, there is nothing for your character to do other than Expeditions, Boss Rushes, and the Relic Hunts that unlock upon game completion. It feels like an absolute waste. Perhaps the DLC will add more incentives to replay it, but that just makes Chaosbane an incomplete game.

How this game sits now, Chaosbane is nowhere near worth the $59.99 price tag. If you’re wanting a Diablo-esque Warhammer Fantasy game to possibly play with friends, wait until this title goes on sale. I’d wait until the price drops to $25-$30.

I really wanted to like this game, but it’s too boring and tedious for even me.

The post A Candid Chaosbane Review – More Like Varietybane (PS4) appeared first on CrunchyChocobo.

Three years ago, I reviewed Valley on PS4 for PlayStation Lifestyle. It was a small indie game, it looked pretty, and I sometimes enjoy exploration games. I figured, why not? Well, I fell in love with it. I trumpeted constantly that it needed to be a GOTY contender, even if that meant it was only in the indie category. I didn’t care; it HAD to be there. It didn’t win with our site, but it was certainly my personal best indie title of the year. When I heard it was going to Switch, I practically danced with joy. I have another place I can play Valley? And this time I can take it on the go? SHUT UP AND TAKE MY MONEY!

If you’ve never played the amazing game known as Valley, then step into my office and let me tell you why you should.

The Valley Runs Deep

As I played through Valley a second time on the Switch, I was once again captivated by how deep the story really is. One major problem exploration games suffer from is dancing along the fine line of interesting gameplay and interesting story. Sure, you can argue most games dance upon that line, but the exploration genre has a far bigger struggle than most other genres. For example, Firewatch had really unique exploration gameplay, but the story was fairly lackluster overall. On the other side, Dear Esther had an interesting tale, but the gameplay was literally just walking around. Valley, however, exhibits the finest balance between gameplay and story that I have ever experienced in the exploration genre. It was true in 2016, and I haven’t come across a better exploration game yet today.

The story stars an archaeologist on the hunt for the legendary “Life Seed,” a seed that reportedly has extraordinary power. On her search, she accidentally finds a hidden valley in the middle of the Rocky Mountains. The valley itself is a dichotomy of beautiful, vibrant life and patches of death—dead trees, dead animals, you get the picture. There are also ancient ruins from an unknown  civilization, not to mention signs that World War II scientists were there years before, researching the Life Seed as well. Not only did these scientists find it, but they were also using it to create a bomb that would rival the Manhattan Project. As the archaeologist explores the intricate valley, she realizes that they started a horrific chain of events that all leads back to the Life Seed. She knows she can’t leave the valley without rectifying the sins of the past.

UnbeLEAFable Walking Simulator

Early on in the archaeologist’s adventure, she finds a LEAF (Leap Effortlessly through Air Functionality) suit that the WWII scientists created for exploring the terrain. At first, the LEAF suit can only jump high and run quickly, but through suit upgrades found, players will soon be able to jump mid-air, run across water, grapple to crane hooks, and that’s just a small sample. Some upgrades cannot be reached until you find other upgrades further into the valley. Fortunately, you can easily fast travel to any area you’ve already explored at any time.

The LEAF also has a God Hand, which allows the suit to either grant life or take it away. Those dead patches I mentioned earlier? You can bring them back to life. The only catch is that the God Hand is powered by an energy source called Amrita, and the God Hand abilities take a portion of the LEAF’s Amrita energy cells. Replenishing the Amrita is easy enough, as the valley is literally littered with Amrita orbs to collect. The orbs will even respawn after awhile. If you’re really in a bind, though, you can take life away from plants and animals to refill the cells.

However, the more life you take away, the more you risk killing the valley. Even when you die, you take life from trees and animals around you to respawn. It wasn’t long before I revived every tree and animal around me after respawning. I felt too guilty to carry on without giving back to the ecosystem that brought me back.

There is some combat, but I’m not going to explain it because it spoils too much of the story. Just know that it exists.

I loved my romp in the Valley three years ago, and I loved it just as much today. I worried that knowing the full story would dampen my enjoyment the second time around, but instead, it pulled at the heartstrings a little bit more. It all seems more [redacted] when you know what’s really going on under the beautiful facade. If you never ventured into the Valley before, it’s never too late to visit now. It’s already available for PC, PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and now finally the Switch.

I also have to add here that the soundtrack is still one of the best video game soundtracks out there. Even after three years, it’s still in my writing music rotation at work.

Received Valley Switch review code from publisher.

The post Valley Review – Just as Great the Second Time Around (Switch) appeared first on CrunchyChocobo.

Eighties nostalgia is so hot right now. Thankfully, the hair isn’t coming back (yet), but the 80s have tapped into video games like few other time periods have. I suppose it’s because all of us GenXers who had fond memories of movies, music, games, etc. from that era are now the ones making video games. Which brings us to Beat Cop, another 80s-nostalgic game from the pixelated graphics to the 80s cop-genre it emulates. As soon as you start a new game, the devs rush to inform you that this is 100% based upon these really bad cop movies. In other words, please don’t judge us for the bad writing and racist commentary because this is how cop movies were in the 80s.

Well, I know I always like beginning a game with an apology and a warning. Don’t you?

I Can Drum to This Story’s Beat

You are disgraced detective Jack Kelly, forced to be a beat cop while Internal Affairs investigates the last homicide case you were part of. Simply put, things didn’t go so well. Someone was murdered in a Senator’s house and diamonds were stolen from his safe. Jack Kelly has been blamed for all of it. Before they can straight up fire him, however, IA has to do their investigation to see how much of the allegations are true. Until then, he gets to pound pavement for three weeks while his Captain looks into it.

Kelly has to patrol his beat, make arrests when needed, respond to residents’ complaints (no matter how ridiculous they are), write up tickets, and try to stay out of the cross-hairs of two rival gangs residing in the area. While he’s at it, he needs to try to solve his own mystery. Who really stole those diamonds, and are they the same person who committed the murder? Fortunately, the answers to both can be found on his beat. Coincidence? I think not!

One of the most charming features of Beat Cop is the ability to completely miss clues about Kelly’s diamond case. All it takes is one missed phone call, one forgotten meeting, or not finding one address and it’s impossible to solve the case. It’s also possible to have Kelly’s beat end early, either due to firing or crossfire. If he pisses off either the Mob or the Crew, they will put his name on a bullet. It’s up to the players and their choices to write Jack Kelly’s story.

Unfortunately, though, solving Jack’s murder/theft mystery is less than satisfying. Once the player has all of the information, they can make four choices to end their story. When I got to that point, before I made a single choice, I couldn’t help but ask, “Is that it?” I expected the truth to be a bit more in depth, despite the fact this is a bad 80s cop movie.

Instead, the more interesting stories are the side stories found while performing daily duties. I was far happier with the ending when I didn’t solve the case compared to when I did.

We Got the Beat

Beat Cop‘s gameplay is one of those that starts off simple, and then as you progress through the weeks, you see that its simplicity was grossly deceiving. Each morning, Kelly starts off his day in briefings where the Chief hands out assignments for the day. Sometimes you have to write up 5 tickets of any kind. Other times, you’ll have to write up 5 tickets for tires, 5 for lights, order 5 cars to be towed, fully patrol the beat twice a day, and be on the lookout for a wanted person/car. And of course, that’s all on top of responding to the residents’ needs and solving your own case.

The game is kind at first though. You’ll start off only writing a few tickets a day. Gradually, the tasks will compound each day. The last day on the beat, you will run around like a chicken with its head cut off.

As you’ve probably gathered, time management is crucial in Beat Cop. The beat lasts from 8 a.m. to 6 p.m. each day. Some tasks have to be completed during a specific time window. I normally hate games with timers like these, but in this case, it fit the game perfectly. Also, if you mess up on a timed task, you can easily restart that day (if you haven’t been fired for not guarding the autoshop during an illegal porn movie filming).

The game choices aren’t just limited to the diamond mystery either. As already mentioned, you can choose to help either the Mob or the Crew or piss them off or even ignore them entirely. You can choose to buy drugs from the crew, solicit sex from the neighborhood prostitutes, or accept bribes from people trying to get out of tickets. However, if you’re caught doing any of these things by undercover IA cops, you can have your pay cut for that day or lose your job entirely.

And yes, there is a bit of money management in the game as well. You will never be bored a single day on the beat.

Hard to Beat the Price

I’d speak more highly of Beat Cop if it had a better main story conclusion. The ending choices really did stick to their 80s movie guns, but no one has really said those movies had the best endings. Authentic? Yes. Good? No. That said, though, the journey to get there is more than entertaining, just like a bad 80s cop movie. For $14.99 digital-download from the eShop, the entertainment value can’t be beat.

Received Beat Cop Switch review code from publisher.

The post Beat Cop Review – Beats Being a Real Cop (Switch) appeared first on CrunchyChocobo.