Recent reviews by omzh

Cloudpunk is a beautiful game that, given it's voxel-style graphics, evokes the feeling of playing in some mastermind Minecraft builder's cybepunk world, and being given a story and collectibles to give me a reason to explore the detail and beauty of this cyberpunk world.

The game loop is straightforward; fly-drive your cybercar called a HOVA to different overworlds, walk around contained zones within them, and in each zone collect objects and interact with NPCs - all while the main plot and side stories guide the player through the world. That means no combat, no twitch reflexes beyond piloting your car, and no life-sim survival mechanics (which their next game might have). That means minimal stress while playing, outside of having to pay repairs for playing bumper HOVAs and being confronted with a few moral dilemmas. It does also means that you may only find this title enjoyable if, like me, you desire a simple and concise gaming experience with a sometimes intriguing story and a visually interesting world to enjoy from your couch with a controller.

In Cloudpunk, the player is represented by Rania, who has newly arrived to the city and started work as a delivery driver for the eponymous Cloudpunk organization that delivers packages to anyone who pays, no questions asked. While I still haven't completed the main narrative at 10 hours, there have been moments where I tuned out the story to experience the cyberpunk vibe and aesthetic, but then paying attention for the moments I found interesting. I do enjoy playing as Rania, who is a very likable protagonist if maybe sometimes "too good" - for which something could be said for how it is a meta-commentary of how different Rania is, as she grew up outside of the megalopolis experiencing the sky while the majority in Nivalis do not. As my playtime has gone on, I have found the main plot become interesting enough once it gets past the opening to the actual plot about a AI named CORA who runs all the city's systems and is now malfunctioning, even if I found it's points is sometimes a bit too on the nose.

There are also side stories that can be found by interacting with named NPCs in each zone. These stories are sometimes worth listening to, and some of them lead to moral questions that have to be answered by the player. When I didn't want to focus on the story or really get lost in the world, I would turn down or mute the voices so I could look around while listening to an amazing soundtrack. Cloudpunk is fully voice-acted, but at times I found it a bit grating, and some characters lacked emotion in the voices, which while understandable for androids is less so for other human characters. I do appreciate that it's in there, as it was well done at times. The music on the other hand is great, and I found it enjoyable throughout. Alternatively, it's not hard to mute the music for your own soundtrack.

I do think I'll eventually complete the game, but I have the OCD gamer problem where I need to collect all the items, especially with it's map icons with which the game tells you to visit and explore every nook and cranny for the weirdest knick knack. The main map also lacks basic open world functions like placing way points and showing the route, but I assumed this was a conscious choice based on wanting to maintain immersion in the world. However, it ended up with me switching back the map often, even with the minimap. Outside of maybe one resource that is needed at a few points (electronics) and quest items, I have not seen a use for many of the items besides selling them. Cash is also abundant however because it is rewarded upon visiting new areas and completing missions, and the only reoccurring costs are repairs and gas which are not a burden at all. There are car upgrades that somewhat help and are not too expensive, as well as clothing for Rania.

Overall I think Cloudpunk is a fun and cool experience, and the DLC adds more story and some racing which appears to be well received and I will likely get next sale. While I am interested enough right now to continue with the story, I may burn out since there's not much else to distract from the collecting and the flipping back and forth on the main map to find everything. However, I am glad that I experienced the world as much has I have so far and I look forward to what this team does next,

nice

I can't recommend this one right now. Unskippable cutscenes, overly long "tutorial" that's essentially just your avatar telling you how to control it, lack of options to adjust mouse sensitivity among other things, and boring combat. I'll come back on full release to see if anything has been addressed.

Spreading managed democracy has never been more fun. Now back to sipping my liber-tea while I drop napalm on bugs and nuke commie robots.

This game will kick your butt, but in it's current state Quasimorph is a really fun, tactical game where you are strongly balancing risk vs. reward in a rogue-like experience. The metagame setting of a PMC company is also great, as taking jobs for different factions increases their power. Highly recommend this game if you want a challenging, fun, and explosive rogue-like experience.

Very cute and seemingly simple city builder, until you get into larger production chains and managing the efficiency of your production chains. The game lacks deeper population mechanics, but it's aesthetically pleasing and it's landmark feature of creating organic cities is well accomplished. Looking forward to future development after 1.0 as well and hope they add more mechanics, but as it is it's a great game.

SpellForce: Conquest of Eo is fundamentally an RPG game played on a 4x-style map with tactical battles. It changes the way 4x games are played by tweaking the expansion and exploration aspect of the game, where expansion isn't the be-all-end-all, since you're limited in how far your domain can expand, and exploration carries throughout the game as you explore the map and find new quests. This isn't a Master of Magic or Civ-style game, so if it's what you're looking for I'd refer to those series, especially because the map is NOT procedurally generated, while quests, events, and some locations are.

If you want to try a fun and engaging game with a variety of interesting mechanics and fun, quick tactical battles, this game is a steal at this price point.

This is a hidden gem of a game, that has been out for a while and did not quite grab my attention at first. After hearing about it from friends and following the latest major update to conquest mode, I felt it was time to jump in.

The combat and the ship design are where Airships shines. It's much easier to grab the basics of making a vehicle in Airships, while still posing interesting challenges when it comes to ship layouts that makes it it's own fun minigame. Watching your ships duke it out is always a treat, especially as you start bringing bigger guns to bear.

In my short time with the game so far I'm really enjoying it. The diplomacy aspect still needs some work however. I would like diplo requests to come less frequently. In addition, the notifications in the corner are a bit small and make some of the treaties difficult to read. The bones are here however, and I'm sure I'll have more comments as I play.

This is one of those rare, special games where a small team (or in this case, one person) has tried something very experimental that really clicks and is fun once you get into it. The game still has some jank and lacks optimization, but it's quite frankly one of the most enjoyable combat systems in a rogue-lite game that I have played.

It could certainly use more content, variety, and meta progression (and maybe a name change that's less of a mouthful!) but the bones on this game are great and I'm happy to play it as it is.

Edit: this game has steadily been getting better with updates, if you haven't already come check this game out. And it works great on controller.

More detailed review incoming, but Against the Storm in it's current state is a very solid game. If I was told this was a full release and not EA I wouldn't question it. I'm about 20 hours in and feel like I've barely scratched the surface. Highly recommend if you want a bite-sized city builder game where you can get a session in for 1-2 hours and feel accomplished.