Happy Saturday, Geekly Gang! Kyra Kyle here. We made it to the weekend. Woo hoo! Today, I’ll share my reaction to the latest Fallout Season Two episode. “The Other Player” confirms who pulled the strings behind the scenes before the bombs fell.
“The Other Player” doesn’t harbor too many spoilers besides our first glimpse at a super mutant, portrayed by none other than Ron Perlman. It’s about time Perlman got screen time in Fallout. He’s been the narrator for most of the Fallout games. Nope. He doesn’t deliver his iconic line of “War, war never changes,” but it was great seeing him as a super mutant, and the small screen time Perlman received carried a ton of world-building.
I wondered why we hadn’t seen a super mutant before the seventh episode of Fallout season two. You can’t sneeze in a Fallout game without encountering at least one super mutant. According to Perlman’s character, humans have hunted them to near extinction. And no, we don’t know who Perlman is supposed to be. Is he The Master from Fallout: New Vegas? Marcus? Or someone else entirely. One thing’s for certain, Perlman’s super mutant isn’t a nightkin.
Too bad. Perlman could pull off Lily Bowen. “Oh, pumpkin, Grandma’s sorry about that. Sometimes she gets mad and listens to Leo when she really shouldn’t.”
We get even more of The Ghoul’s backstory in “The Other Player.” Fallout season two tiptoes toward too many flashbacks, especially in the past two episodes, but I liked Barb’s scenes. And the idea that The Enclave could predate the bombs dropping is a nice touch. The impression I got from the games made it look like The Enclave became active after the bombs dropped. Michael Emerson’s Dr. Wilzig also shares a good scene with Barb. And I like how Season 2 calls back to how Cold Fusion was transported. All of this is good, but a second flashback-heavy episode made “The Other Player” feel like it marked time in moments.
And what was up with The Ghoul waiting until sundown before trying to pull himself off the pole? He may have made it to the top if he didn’t wait for at least four hours. The Ghoul spending time on the pole gave Fallout an excuse for more flashbacks. That’s the only reason he wouldn’t try and free himself.
“The Other Player” made me care about what happens in Vaults 32 and 33. That’s no small feat. Honestly, Norm’s storyline–we need more Norm–set up potential stakes in the Vaults. According to the records we saw last week, Vault-Tec still intends to use the Forced Evolutionary Virus on the Vaults. That’s the same virus that created super mutants. What happens when Vault 33 runs out of water? Will they consume unfiltered water that could transform them? We’ll have to wait and see.
And I’m loving Hank MacLean’s villain arc. His worldview suggests that order without autonomy is preferable to conflict. Interesting. Hank and Lucy’s dynamic is great. I can’t wait to see where Fallout takes their relationship.
Overall, “The Other Player” is a good episode. It just misses the great label because it spends too much time in the past. Granted, everything we discover in the past intrigues me. But I didn’t care for two consecutive episodes, spending half their runtime in flashbacks. It’s excessive.
What are your thoughts on Fallout “The Other Player?” Let us know in the comments. Thank you for reading, and wherever you are, I hope you’re having a great day.
Hey, hey, Geekly Gang! I haven’t done a free-to-play video game review in a handful of months and figured I’d give the treatment to a game I played a lot of this past summer, Clicker Heroes. Yes. Clicker Heroes has been out for over a decade, but it’s still available on multiple platforms: PC, mobile, PlayStation 4, and Xbox One. Clicker Heroes started as a Flash game, so this free-to-play video game has been around for some time. But just because a game is “free-to-play,” does that mean that it’s free-to-play friendly? Let’s subject Clicker Heroes to our review criteria.
Mechanisms: 2/10
Clicker Heroes doesn’t cover new ground, so its mechanisms score suffers as a result. Don’t get me wrong, I like idle games. I played the heck out of AdVenture Capitalist. I did the same with Clicker Heroes. I sunk hundreds of hours into this game, but it doesn’t do anything more than click on heroes, like the game’s name suggests, allow you to upgrade the heroes, and then face the next goofy-looking boss monster.
I do like how you can choose to upgrade your heroes by factors of 1, 10, 25, and 100 levels each time. This makes leveling up lesser heroes like Cid, the Helpful Adventurer (your first Hero), a breeze. Goldfish and Bees will flash on the screen with button prompts, but this does little to shake up the stale gameplay.
Above Image from GameDesigning.Org
Gameplay Loop: 2/10
I know I just said I sunk hundreds of hours into Clicker Heroes, but most of that time I spent AFK (away from keyboard), and that’s by design. Clicker Heroes is one of those games you log in once, maybe twice, a day, check on your heroes, and put the game back to sleep.
You’re encouraged to “ascend” your world, which erases much of your progress, and then you must climb back to where you just were. This is what keeps Clicker Heroes’ gameplay loop score from reaching even lower, because Clicker Heroes’ most engaging gameplay is at the beginning. Waiting for your power-ups to recharge or your characters to defeat enough monsters to upgrade your heroes becomes tedious.
After some time, you can use hero souls (from ascending) and purchase Ancients that can help you progress faster in the game, but once you reach Level 300, you’re given the choice to “transcend” your world. This is another layer of ascending that erases your gilded heroes (upgraded heroes through relics) and your Ancients. So, after “ascending,” you go all the way back to the game’s tedious beginnings.
But you do obtain “Outsiders,” which are supposed to be stronger Ancients, but it takes a long time to accrue enough ancient souls, what you get for “transcending,” before you begin to see a tangible difference. Plenty of websites offer ideas on how to speed this process, but I don’t imagine too many players will sink enough time into learning Clicker Heroes’ math to take full advantage. Clicker Heroes becomes a slog.
Respecting Time: 1/10
Clicker Heroes is an idle game, so it’s supposed to be more of a time waster, and it does indeed do that. I can forget Clicker Heroes exists for several days and return to my heroes. But Clicker Heroes makes upgrading your world so difficult that it goads gamers into either spending hours of research to get the perfect set-up or spending money to make the hurting stop. Is the drop of juice you get worth the tens of billions of squeezes? I don’t think so.
True Cost: 3/10
While Clicker Heroes offers skins for auto-clickers (Why would anyone want that?, but okay), it gains most of its money through the purchase of rubies. Fortunately, players can earn rubies by sending mercenaries on missions, opening relics, and clicking on goldfish. But I still struggled with how to grade Clicker Heroes’ “True Cost” or its “free-to-play friendliness,” because I can see players getting caught in a trap. Heck, I got baited into that same trap: reviving mercenaries.
Every once in a while, one of your mercenaries may perish while on a mission. You can spend rubies to revive a mercenary, but there’s some math (I haven’t done the research) where the mercenary’s level and/or the amount of time they have remaining for a mission dictates the number of rubies you’ll need to revive them. In my experience, reviving mercenaries takes a mountain of rubies. Players have little chance of having enough rubies to revive advanced mercenaries, like the “Demigod +13 level” mercenary pictured above with the low, low revival price of almost 5000 rubies. Looks like time to open another credit card and buy 5000 rubies for about $400.
With one exception, outside of reviving mercenaries, I see little use for spending rubies. That one exception is a one-time damage boost for your Heroes. This costs somewhere between 50-100 rubies, and once you buy it, you’ll have it for the duration of the game. 100 rubies or less is a steal.
But the remaining ruby purchases involve buying gilded Heroes, which will reset after you ascend, some version of speeding up Clicker Heroes’ glacial pace, or buying an auto-clicker. Eh. I almost gave Clicker Heroes an average score for “True Cost.” Reviving mercenaries aside, few of the other ruby purchases can be avoided.
User Interface: 2/10
Clicker Heroes doesn’t have that many menus and submenus, but what is there is confusing and difficult to navigate. I’ve played the game for months and still get turned around, not knowing where I can find certain information. I can’t imagine a noob looking at the screen above and being able to tell what does what. And several buttons have multiple functions, so it’s easy to misclick.
Graphics: 3/10
While simplistic, Clicker Heroes’ graphics are pleasant. I’m grading this one on a little bit of a curve, because Clicker Heroes is over ten years old. But the game hasn’t received too many graphic updates through the years, so I can’t get too crazy with this score.
Audio: 6/10
I had to average Clicker Heroes’ audio score. Clicker Heroes has epic music. It often gets stuck in my head. But the sound effects are as annoying and repetitive as clicking a button thirty-five times a second. Ow! My ears. Those moments when I don’t use an ability and listen to Clicker Heroes’ soundtrack make all the difference for this score.
Aggregated Score: 2.72
Clicker Heroes is an idle game, so don’t expect much. While it has charm, the graphics haven’t been upgraded too much to keep up with modern devices. Clicker Heroes can be a slog if you don’t research how to maximize your Heroes or spend money, and I worry about gamers who fall into the ruby pit of reviving their “good” mercenaries.
Hey, hey, Geekly Gang! Kyra Kyle here with another board game review. Full disclosure: Today’s game is one of my go-to 2-player board games, Robin of Locksley by Uwe Rosenberg. I’ll try to stay as neutral as possible, but it’ll be difficult. I love this game that functions as a race between two players. You control two pawns, Robin and a Bard. While Robin steals Loot from the rich, that Loot is used to move the Bard on a Race Track. The first player to finish the race wins. We’ll get to the daring do soon, but first, let’s discuss some of the less swashbuckling aspects of Robin of Locksley.
The Fiddly Bits
Designer: Uwe Rosenberg Publisher: Funforge, Rio Grande Games, Wyrmgold GmbH Date Released: 2019 Number of Players: 2 Age Range: 8 and up Setup Time: 5-10 minutes Play Time: 20-30 minutes
We’ll use Robin of Locksley’s rulebook for this section. I don’t know if words can express how to set up the game. We’ll include the picture the rulebook provides. I always use it when building the board.
* Shuffle all Loot tiles (gold coin side up) and build a 5×5 grid.
* Choose a player to go first. The first player takes one loot tile from any corner of the board. The second player takes the tile from the opposite corner. Each player flips the tile they chose back over to the side showing the gold coin and forms their personal supply.
* The players put their Robins in the now empty corners.
* Place the remaining loot tiles with the gold coin side up in a draw pile.
* Find the corner pieces labelled “The Beginning” (start) and “Long Live the King” (end). Put them together in one of the corners. Place “The Beginning” piece (as shown above) in the inner corner.
* Shuffle the remaining corner pieces, draw three, and put them in the remaining corners.
* The players put their Bards in their color next to the start tile.
* Shuffle the small fame tiles and put three of them between the corners.
* When complete, the game layout should look similar to the picture above.
Game Flow
Moving Robin
* Players alternate turns. The start player begins the game. * Players move their Robin in the shape of an “L” composed of three tiles (just like the knight’s move in Chess).
* The player takes the tile they landed on into their personal supply.
* At the end of their turn, the player fills the now empty space (the space their Robin left) with a Loot tile from the general supply. Do not fill the square occupied by a Robin.
The Racing Track
Players win the game by moving their Bard along the Racing track (the one surrounding the loot tiles). There are two ways to move with your Bard.
1) Every Fame tile (the ones that compose the Racing Track) shows one task. If the player is able to fulfill the task indicated on the Fame tile, they may move their Bard 1 tile forward on the Race Track. These tasks range from possessing a specific color of Loot or having your Robin in the corner of the 5×5 Loot tile grid.
2) The player may spend 1 Gold coin (and discard it to the open discard pile with the Loot side up) to move their Bard 1 tile forward (clockwise) on the Race Track. The player may continue to move their Bard forward as long as they can meet the requirement or pay the bribe for each tile they encounter.
Loot Collection
A Loot collection is a set of 1 or more Loot tiles of the same color. Loot collections may never be split into smaller collections.
Selling a Loot Collection
Anytime during their turn, players may sell a Loot collection which consists of 3 or more Loot tiles of the same type.
Discard two of the Loot tiles on the open discard pile and collect the remaining ones as Gold coins by turning them over.
Game End and Winning
There are two ways the game can end, and a player can win.
1) The game ends immediately if one player’s Bard “laps” the other player’s Bard on the race track. To “lap” the other player, one player’s Bard must have made a full extra lap around the track thus passing the other player’s Bard a second time. The player whose Bard has passed the other is the winner. If both Bards are on the same spot on the Race Track, the game does not end.
2) The player who first completes two full laps of the Race Track and fulfils the challenge on the goal tile is the winner.
Review
I love the way the Robins move. Robin of Locksley’s new players will have an easier time picking up the move mechanisms, but the way knights in Chess move isn’t straightforward. The Robins have familiarity, and each move functions as a spatial puzzle. One of the Fame tiles (the spaces on the Race Track) requires a player’s Robin to be one move away from their opponent. I don’t know how many times I’ve spent a Coin to skip this requirement, but I get a rush every time I can meet that requirement naturally. Then, it becomes a race, so my opponent can’t finish that Fame tile during their next turn.
The Fame tiles have varied requirements. Robin of Locksley’s modular board ensures no two games will ever be the same. And planning spaces ahead is fun, making each turn meaningful, even if your move this turn won’t help you progress right away. Robin of Locksley also has that volta, a turn where the game shifts, and it’s usually during the mid-point. Players bide their time, collecting Loot, meeting easier requirements, and accruing enough Coins to skip five or six spaces on the Race Track during a single turn. I love this volta (turn). As soon as this happens, the race is on. The other player will pop off a five or six spaces of their own, and Robin of Locksley begins in earnest. Typically, this momentum continues until the game ends.
And games of Robin of Locksley don’t take too long. BoardGameGeek and the rules list games as lasting up to 40 minutes. This hasn’t been my experience. My first game of Robin of Locksley may have taken close to 40 minutes (with the teach), but as soon as you have two players who know what they’re doing, turns take no time at all. Sometimes, I must call time and raise my hand if I want to move those five or six spaces in a turn, because it’s easy to get into a rhythm. The game’s rhythm getting interrupted raises the stakes during the volta. It’s so good.
Looking up a Fame tile’s requirement is one of the few ways a game of Robin of Locksley slows. None of the Fame tiles has any text; they’re all conveyed through icons. The Robin of Locksley rulebook contains a glossary of what each icon means, but it will slow down the game to look up that information during your first lap around the Race Track. Despite this occasional slowdown, I like how both game elements work with each other in Robin of Locksley. It’s a healthy balance of figuring out how best to maximize your Loot with your Robin piece and looking ahead on the Race Track to see what you may need.
Robin of Locksley is my go-to 2-player only game. My spouse and I have played a ton of 2-player games lately, but Robin of Locksley is one of the few competitive 2-player-only games that consistently make our rotation.
Too Long; Didn’t Read
Robin of Locksley has short, punchy turns that lead to a satisfying race to meet Loot (or spatial) requirements. With its modular board, each game is unique, but one thing stays constant: the volta (turn). Each game will have an exciting turn where one player moves multiple spaces, and then the race is on.
Before we begin, it’s impossible not to compare Persona 5: The Phantom X with Persona 5 and Persona 5: Royal.
Mechanisms: 6/10
Maybe I should have rated this lower since the mechanisms are similar to Persona 5 and Persona 5 Royal. Since the mechanisms in Persona 5: The Phantom X stay true to the original Persona 5, they’re baseline good. Enemies maintain their weaknesses, and the game is more upfront about what enemies are weak to, instead of players having to guess. The main character (Wonder) can alternate between up to three different personas for different enemies. This cuts the score a bit since the main character from Persona 5 (Joker) can alternate between up to ten different personas.
The baton pass in Persona 5: The Phantom X is a step up from Persona 5. When prompted to perform a baton pass (baton touch in this case), any character who has an element that any of the enemies they’re facing is weak to will have “Weak!” pop up next to their picture. The downside is that players still have to remember which enemies are weak to which elements, because a character possessing an enemy weakness may target one that’s already been incapacitated.
Gameplay Loop: 5/10
I’ll start with the positives. Players can go back to cleared Palaces. Unlike the original Persona 5, there’s no pressure to collect everything before the Palace collapses. Due to small map sections, the overworld is easy to navigate. Event-wise, story-related events (the Palaces from Persona 5) remain as permanent events. Smaller events with limited rewards get phased out after a certain period of time. This makes events easier to navigate for new players, and for players who’ve never played Persona 5.
Mementos differs slightly between Persona 5: The Phantom X and Persona 5 Royal (Persona 5 doesn’t include this). In Persona 5 Royal players collect stamps and flowers in Mementos to collect rewards. In Persona 5: The Phantom X, players collect train tickets to exchange for items and unlock different areas of Mementos.
I’m going to level with you, Geekly Gang. This is my biggest gripe with Persona 5: The Phantom X’s gameplay loop, and it’s not something I’ve ever complained about in a game this much. Persona 5: The Phantom X has fifteen different currencies. Fifteen. Why? I don’t even pay attention to most of them because many of them are zone-specific. The two important currencies are the Yen and Meta Jewels. Yen allows you to purchase anything in the overworld, and Meta Jewels lets you pull for characters and weapons. If you’re short on anything required for a specific task/character level, the game will prompt you to go collect it.
Respecting Time: 8/10
Persona 5: The Phantom X allows me to complete my dailies in under ten minutes. There’s no auto-clear for farming, but after a player completes a farming-related battle, they can spin a dodecahedron (a 12-sided die) up to six times and gain that much in resources. Seriously. I can complete my farming after two auto-battles.
Battle Pass: 4/10
The battle pass is nothing special. It’s similar to Genshin Impact, Honkai: Star Rail, and Wuthering Waves, but with an extra ten levels tacked onto it. I’m not sure why, since these ten levels offer the same rewards with every level.
True Cost: 7/10
Unfortunately, Persona 5: The Phantom X falls into the same weapon banner pattern as Genshin Impact. Players select two five star weapons they want to include on the banner in addition to the featured one, and there’s a 1/3 chance they’ll get that weapon after eighty pulls. However, pulling (opening packs to gain new units or weapons) is cheaper in Persona 5: The Phantom X than the other gachas we’ve covered. Weapons cost one-hundred Meta Jewels per pull, and characters cost 150 per pull.
Narrative: 2/10
The only upside to Persona 5: The Phantom X’s narrative is it’s easy-to-follow—especially if you’ve played Persona 5. It doesn’t build on Persona 5 or Persona 5 Royal, but reskins it with characters and Palaces that mirror the original. The group of teenagers fights to get their desire back, which doesn’t make much sense for rag-tag teenagers. They haven’t survived high school and have minimal life experience. This would hit harder if the characters were much older, by, like, thirty years.
The “time” in the game doesn’t flow well, either. In Persona 5, there were days of the week, holidays, and deadlines. Players had to plan their time well to get the most out of their time. In Persona 5: The Phantom X, “time” is only relevant for overworld tasks and when confidants are available to hang out. Instead of using specific dates, day progression is denoted by today, tomorrow, and yesterday.
Storytelling: 3/10
Since the story flows in Persona 5: The Phantom X, it gets a slightly higher rating than the narrative. However, it still gets a lower score than other gachas because it’s mimicking Persona 5 in every way. Come on, guys.
Also, how long are Wonder’s parents going to be on vacation? They’ve been on vacation since the game began. I think they went out to buy milk and cigarettes.
Credit: GameRant
Presentation; User Interface: 5/10
The UI has a similar setup to Honkai: Star Rail, which isn’t too difficult to navigate. There are too many subcategories. Why are there two different categories for shopping? Combining them would eliminate one of the subcategories.
Credit: Game8
Presentation; Graphics and Audio: 4/10
The audio quality is fine. It’s average. The graphics, on the other hand, are slightly better than the original Persona 5, which is almost a decade old at the time of writing. There shouldn’t be minuscule graphics differences between two games that are ten years apart.
Aggregated Score: 4.89
I tried to raise the score for Persona 5: The Phantom X as much as I could, but this is the best score I could give it. There are definitely some sections that could’ve earned harsher scores. If you’re looking for Persona 5,Persona 5: The Phantom X has that to a degree. I recommend playing Persona 5 (or any other Persona game, for that matter) over Persona 5: The Phantom X. Since it’s around the holidays at the time of writing, Persona 5 and Persona 5 Royal are likely on sale somewhere. If not, they’ll probably be on sale at the end of the year. Steam normally has a huge end-of-year sale. I’ve also seen PlayStation have sales on Persona 5 and Persona 5 Royal in the past.
What do you think, Geekly Gang? Was our final score too low, too high, or just right? Let us know in the comments. Thank you for reading and have an amazing rest of your day.
Happy Holidays, Geekly Gang! Season here. This month’s plushie review is special to me. I got a Playskool Glo Worm (1996) as a present on my first Christmas, and I still have it. My Glo Worm’s name is “Baga,” so I’ll be using that title throughout this review.
Before we begin, let’s review the categories. I’ll be looking at size, softness, kid-friendliness, and cuddliness. There won’t be an aggregated score.
Size
Baga is on the smaller side and fits perfectly in your lap if you’re sitting cross-legged as an adult. Baga rivals newborns in size.
Softness Versus Firmness
Baga has— or, in my case, had — a music box inside that plays “Twinkle, Twinkle, Little Star,” and when activated, his face lights up. This, plus his hard head, puts him toward the middle of the soft versus firm scale. In my biased opinion, he’s super soft, but I’ve worn him down over the years.
Kid Friendly Versus Adult Only
Since he’s designed for infants, Baga is kid-friendly. He gets docked a few points for small pieces like the zipper on his back, which could be ripped off by a rambunctious child. I used him to fight my other toys when I was two. It was war, I tell you.
Cuddle Buddy Versus Desk Buddy
Baga is definitely a cuddle buddy. That’s part of his design. Since Playskool doesn’t make him anymore, I could see him as a collector’s item. Playskool intended for Baga to be a cuddle buddy, so he’s a cuddle buddy.
Final Thoughts
I tried to be as unbiased. Let me know your opinions of Playskool’s Glo Worm in the comments. I have a baby picture of me with Baga when I got him. Would you like to see that picture, Geekly Gang? Let me know. Thank you for reading, and have an amazing holiday season.
Hey, hey, Geekly Gang! Kyra Kyle here with another board game review. Today’s game is Michael Feldkötter’sLittle Devils, a quick trick-taking game with a twist. Little Devils has no suits. Instead, players must follow the first card (in a series of 54 numbered cards) that’s played per round. The second card dictates which direction every other player must follow (up or down from the original number). The player who either plays in the wrong direction (up instead of down) or plays the furthest number from the original card wins the trick; you’re trying to win as few tricks as possible. Little Devils takes a simple concept and bakes in some interesting choices.
Before we get any further, we’ll get devilish with Little Devils’ details.
The Fiddly Bits
Designer: Michael Feldkötter Publisher: Arclight Games, Stronghold Games, White Goblin Games Date Released: 2012 Number of Players: 3-6 Age Range: 8 and up Setup Time: Less than a minute Play Time: About 15 minutes
Little Devils consists of a 54-card deck. Depending on the number of players, remove a number of cards numbered between 28-54 from the game. The rulebook will state which specific cards need to be removed at each player count. Ultimately, players will be dealt 9 cards each, which should be the entire deck.
After you’ve prepared the deck, deal out all the cards.
Game Flow
For the first round, the player to the left of the dealer begins the trick; for every round after the first, whoever “won” the previous trick, begins the next trick. The first player starts the trick by playing any card from their hand that doesn’t have five little devils beneath the number. Quick note: most cards in Little Devils will have at least one little devil underneath its number. Players cannot lead a trick with a card with five little devils, unless they have no other card in their hand.
The player to the left of the starting player will play a card from their hand. If the second player plays a higher card, all other players must play cards valued higher than the first card if possible. Whoever played the highest card gets the trick, unless a player is unable to play a higher card. This player will get the trick unless more players are unable to play higher cards. If a player (or players) plays a card in the opposite direction of the second player, the player with the furthest valued card from the original card wins the trick.
After all cards have been played, a round ends. Players score the number of little devils from their tricks. As soon as someone scores 200 points, play ends, and whoever has the fewest points wins.
Review
Little Devils has a built-in catch-up mechanism: the player who wins a trick can’t possibly win the next one; they begin the next trick. I love that. It’s simple and offers plenty of strategic choices. I could play a card closer to the low or high end, thinking the players in front of me (on the scoreboard) might get stuck with a trick or two. There are even cards that have no little devils on them. Often, when I know I’m going to get stuck with a trick, I’ll play one of the one devil or no devils cards to net the fewest little devils I can.
While you could card count during Little Devils, it doesn’t matter that much. Little Devils plays quickly. It’s more fun to play a second game. Even when I’ve finished last (triggered the end game), I feel like I did something if I stiffed someone else with a bunch of points during one round. Little Devils is a great filler game. It may get overshadowed by Cat in the Box (we still need to review that game), but it requires less setup, is an easier teach, and I’ve found more gamers catch on to Little Devils a lot faster.
Too Long; Didn’t Read
Quick to pick up and easy to teach, Little Devils is an excellent trick-taking game that offers plenty of strategic choices, a brilliant built-in catch-up mechanism, and fun gotcha moments.
Inspired by tile-laying board games, Dorfromantik offers the relaxing gameplay of creating a pastoral landscape of trees, villages, water, railroads, and fields. Designed by four German and Swiss students (Timo Falcke, Sandro Heuberger, Luca Langenberg, and Zwi Zausch) in a game design master’s program at HTW Berlin, Dorfromantik is a peaceful, minimalist game that lives up to the title, cozy. Hey, hey! Kyra Kyle here. We’re back with another cozy video game review. Even though Dorfromantik has crossed over into an award-winning board game, we’ll be discussing the equally stellar indie video game by Toukana Interactive. Get ready to build a gorgeous landscape with Dorfromantik.
Game Mechanisms: 7/10
Dorfromantik takes a simple concept of tile laying and does it exceptionally well. I’d wager the idea of Dorfromantik stemmed from playing board games like Carcassonne. Dorfromantik’s game mechanisms lend themselves well to board games, so there is an excellent, cooperative board game by the same name. Sometimes, you don’t need an elaborate set of mechanisms to make a game sing. Sometimes, you just need to do a simple concept well, and Dorfromantik does just that.
Chain similar land types with each other to gain points and finish goals (that the game presents) to score even more points and to increase the number of tiles you have to draw from. Dorfromantik can be played competitively–there is a leaderboard–or you could watch the countryside bloom as you place tiles. Dorfromantik‘s ability to make me invested in a landscape reminds me of another cozy video game we covered, Terra Nil.
Gameplay Loop: 9/10
Whether you play Dorfromantik to get the highest score possible or casually place tiles and find your Zen, you can’t deny Dorfromantik’s gameplay loop. Once you get started, you won’t build just one pastoral scene. You’ll want to go farther with your next run, reveal new tiles like the windmill (pictured above), or watch your boats and trains traverse the landscape. And yes, the scene above is animated. It’s so neat watching your creation come to life.
Because the tiles can come out in different orders, no two scenes in Dorfromantik are exactly the same. This adds spice to the simplistic gameplay. Dorfromantik is an easy game to get into, but a difficult one to master if you want to climb that leaderboard. Or you could be like me. I just want to discover new tiles and watch my landscape get bigger and more diverse. I’m so glad Dorfromantik has been ported over to the Switch. It’s the perfect game to play on the go.
Narrative/Storytelling: 1/10
I should’ve excluded this element, but I didn’t with other video games that had little to no story, so narrative/storytelling is staying in the lineup. Let us know what you’d replace this element with for games that have little to no story. Dorfromantik has no story to speak of, so it receives a low mark in this category.
User Interface: 10/10
Dorfromantik has a stripped-down but effective user interface. The tiles feel great to manipulate. They almost feel like placing a board game’s tiles. The picture above shows how Dorfromantik will highlight the spaces where a tile can be placed. Gamers can only place the tile on top of the draw pile. Dorfromantik does an excellent job of not only showing where a tile can be placed, the callouts show where you can gain extra points, and whenever you hover a tile over a space and begin rotating it, Dorfromantik will make the matching tiles shimmer.
Dorfromantik’s elegant and minimalistic user interface makes it accessible. Like I said, Dorfromantik may use a familiar board game mechanism in tile placement, but every element Dorfromantik adds is handled with care and purpose. I had to give Dorfromantik top marks for user interface.
Graphics: 8/10
Dorfromantik has excellent graphics for a top-down isometric video game. The art style works well, and I appreciate the small details. Look at the clock towers, cottages, and windmills in the image above. Like I mentioned before, Dorfromantik uses small animations to denote movement. The boats (if you’ve unlocked the boats) move along the waterways. Smoke puffs from chimneys. While all of this is great, Dorfromantik does venture into cartoony graphics.
These cartoony graphics work well when one zooms out and sees more of the landscape, so I understand why Dorfromantik chose a minimalistic, cartoon-like art style. Players are meant to take a macro view of their village. But I dock Dorfromantik a point or two for graphics because the game doesn’t quite hold up on closer inspection.
Audio: 7/10
Dorfromantik’s music exudes the concept of a cozy game. I’ve listened to Dorfromantik’s soundtrack to fall asleep. It’s that soothing. Unfortunately, the game’s sound effects detract from this calm. The clacking and clicking of the tiles often takes me out of the game’s vibe. I would’ve preferred more pastoral sound effects accompanying the mechanical sounds of turning and placing tiles on the board. Yes, I could reduce the sound effects’ volume or turn them off altogether, but that would eliminate half of Dorfromantik’s audio. We’re grading the game’s entire audio. If we were only grading Dorfromantik’s soundtrack, its audio would score much higher.
Replay Factor: 10/10
Dorfromantik has an addictive gameplay loop, so the replay factor is through the roof. I can see myself playing Dorfromantik on my Switch while waiting in line. Heck, I’m surprised Dorfromantik hasn’t yet made it to the mobile game space. I could see plenty of people playing Dorfromantik on their phones. It may be an even better game for smartphones. The Switch tends to be a game’s first foray into mobile gaming. Fingers crossed that this cozy game classic makes it onto more mobile devices.
Aggregated Score: 8.6
Sure, I gave Dorfromantik a story/narrative score, but I’m not including that score with its aggregated score. Sometimes you need a cozy video game to find your Zen. Dorfromantik is a great game for that. I’m hoping more gamers will have the opportunity to play Dorfromantik on other platforms soon.
Team 17 produced The Survivalists as a cooperative adventure game set in the Escapists universe. The player wakes up marooned on a mysterious island. You must adapt to your new surroundings. Prepare your defenses against island threats. Explore, hunt, build, craft, and train monkeys with up to three friends as you do your best to survive.
Hey, hey! Kyra Kyle here. Today’s post is a follow-up of sorts. Months ago, I mentioned during one of our Whatcha Playing segments that I’ve been playing The Survivalists. I finished the game and figured I’d share my thoughts. I played The Survivalists on PlayStation (so most of my comments will reflect that), but The Survivalists is also available for Xbox, Nintendo Switch, and Steam. Typically, it retails for about $25, but The Survivalists tends to go on sale for as low as $5. I snagged a copy when it was this cheap. Let’s see how The Survivalists measures up in our review criteria.
Mechanisms: 8/10
Full disclosure: I’m not the biggest survival game fan; that’s more Skye’s video game genre. Survival games often frustrate me. It takes a while to make progress (I’m impatient), and your progress can be foiled with a single false move, which causes the game to devolve into a frustration simulator. I usually like to chill whenever I play video games. Most survival games have no chill. That’s where The Survivalists is different.
The Survivalists takes a laid-back approach to the survival game genre. Sure. You can–and most likely will–die in the game, and after respawning, you’ll have to travel back to where you lost your belongings, but The Survivalists is more forgiving. Upgrades don’t take as long, eliminating one of the barriers for me. If you train monkeys, these upgrades take a fraction of the time. Monkeys are The Survivalists’ single best addition. It took me a while to figure out how to train a monkey (the controls are a little wonky), but once you get the knack, you’re no longer alone on this island. Even if you play The Survivalists solo, you have allies.
The Survivalists’ monkeys element is enough to give it an above-average score in mechanisms, but the game doesn’t add too much to the survival video game genre, so I couldn’t give it higher than an eight out of ten. Still, I enjoyed my time with The Survivalists, and the game’s mechanisms kept me engaged.
Above Image from GameDesigning.Org
Gameplay Loop: 8/10
The Survivalists has the same addictive gameplay loop as most survival games. While I love the addition of monkeys, you can get stuck waiting for your monkeys to finish constructing key materials. That holds back this score a bit. The missions can also get too specific; one also doesn’t receive credit for a task unless they have the mission in their questline. The Beast Master is notorious for this. Kill 10 Bats. I already have; I guess I must hunt for 10 more. And the Beast Master’s questlines (in particular) don’t appear to have a linear progression. You can go from slaying a mid-level boss to hunting wolves, and then to taming animals, which transitions to killing warthogs (an equivalent animal to wolves). These mission progressions tend to be head-scratching.
Still, The Survivalists has a satisfying gameplay loop. The world resets after every few days (after a blood moon). So, if you must hunt wolves for their pelts (or to finish a quest), you may need to wait for them to respawn after a blood moon. The morning after a blood moon, you’ll be attacked by natives. Perishing during one of these raids isn’t too big of a deal, provided you’re at or near one of your camps. You’ll lose the items in your inventory, but your attackers will vanish, and you’ll respawn at your nearest camp. Easy.
Sailing can be tricky to master. I was fifteen hours into the game before I could navigate the waters well. Once you get the hang of sailing, exploring becomes a blast. I couldn’t wait to discover a new island or the materials I could find on the island. This is a hallmark of survival games. Perhaps I should give more of them a try.
At first, obtaining a new monkey can be exciting, but you’ll end up with well over 15 monkeys. That’s a lot of monkeys. The number of monkey companions will become unruly, and monkeys have a range limit. The Survivalists doesn’t do a good job of marking this range. I lost count of the times I’d task a monkey to do something like chop down trees, only to see the monkey skip a tree to knock one farther away. Make the monkey’s range make sense. I’ll also get a monkey falling me a little too long, and then they’ll randomly swim on the beach on a foreign island. It’s a good thing monkeys can’t die.
Narrative: 6/10
The Survivalists has a basic premise with little story beyond that, but it doesn’t need a lot of story beyond a person marooned on a distant island. I do enjoy the ending. It’s not a true ending, because you can continue playing after this moment, and the credits roll. I won’t spoil what happens here, but The Survivalists has an adorable cutscene after the player rebuilds the Galleon and sets off for home.
Storytelling: 7/10
Even though The Survivalists has little story, the story it has is done well. Flavor snippets from the labyrinths and vaults sprinkled through the various islands do a lot to build The Survivalists’ world. My favorite parts of The Survivalists’ story are piecing together a story from the random objects I encountered. This game allows players to fill in certain blanks in its story. As of writing this post, I have yet to play The Escapists. I’ve heard that there are references from the previous games set in this universe. If so, that’s fun.
User Interface: 9/10
The Survivalists’ user interface works well. With few exceptions (I mentioned a lack of showing the player their monkey’s range), the game provides ample information in a digestible manner. The volume of information a survival game needs to convey is staggering. Players can get lost in menus and submenus. While that can happen occasionally with The Survivalists, it doesn’t happen as often as other survival video games. This contributes to The Survivalists‘ ease of play.
The well-laid-out GUI gives players the information they need. Yes. I could locate my missing monkeys if I wanted; I just didn’t want to retrieve them. The map allows for customized markers, which makes remembering where things are easy enough. Furthermore, you don’t really need too many personalized markers because the taskmasters have unique markers, and they spawn on the game’s five islands: Mysterious Strange at the player’s island, Beast Master at the Badlands, Survival Gourmand in the Swamp, The Collector at the Volcano, and The Salesman at the final island shaped like a skull and is a combination of all the biomes. The Survivalists also labels all the labyrinths and vaults, so the randomized map is clearly marked.
One can also mark a recipe and know when they’ve collected the necessary materials. I only have a few gripes, like the lack of a monkey range display. The Survivalists did their homework and included enough features from other survival video games to make playing this game enjoyable.
Graphics: 9/10
In keeping with The Escapists’ universe, The Survivalists uses a cute pixel art style. I don’t tend to like pixel art because the art style sacrifices detail for the sake of the designer not wanting to include detail (it tends to be cheaper), and it taps into nostalgia. A stripped-down look is a key feature of pixel art; it makes the art more abstract, which can allow players to see themselves in the graphics. Somehow, The Survivalists’ graphics maintain a level of detail despite using pixel art. That’s impressive.
As you can see in the image above, The Survivalists uses a mock 16-bit art style, but the shadows from the trees have detail, the water ripples, and the grass shifts. The Survivalists has enough detail to make its world breathe, but it has enough abstraction for players to see themselves in their protagonist. This is pixel art done right.
Audio: 8/10
Truth time. I predominantly played The Survivalists muted. The times when I had the sound on, the effects sounded natural. The music is solid and suitable, except for the sailing tune. That song alone raises the audio score a full two or three points. I would sail from island to island just to hear this tune. The Survivalists’ sailing music feels like an adventure, and that’s what I wanted from this game. Don’t believe me? Check out the audio on YouTube. The track is titled “Adventure Awaits.” That’s so fitting. I can almost smell the salt from the ocean.
Replay Factor: 8/10
The Survivalists’ ability to be played cooperatively raises this score a lot. I don’t know how often I’d play it as a solo experience. If you have no desire to play The Survivalists in co-op mode, I could see you dropping this score a point or two, but I do like playing this game as a co-op experience. Since the game randomly generates the islands each time, The Survivalists becomes a different puzzle. During my solo play, I had plenty of rocks for masonry but not enough trees for lumber at the game’s start. The inverse was true during my co-op playthrough. Plenty of other game elements, like the labyrinths and vaults, change too, so each play of The Survivalists is different.
I enjoyed my time on the island and wouldn’t mind returning after several months. If you need me, I’ll be listening to “Adventure Awaits” while heading out on a road trip.
Happy Turkey Day, Geekly Gang! Season here. Are you worried the food comas in your family will get too intense next week? Never fear! I’ve got the perfect solution to get you and your family active after next week’s feast. Or, at least, annoy the crud out of them. Let’s get smacking with this month’s plushie review: Sugar Daddy.
Before we begin, let’s review the categories. I’ll be looking at size, softness, kid-friendliness, and cuddliness. There won’t be an aggregated score.
Size
The Sugar Daddy plushie is more on the medium side. It’s slightly smaller than Chibithulhu and is perfect for whacking unsuspecting victims on the backside.
Softness Versus Firmness
Sugar Daddy has a bit of softness, but it isn’t a plush I’d recommend substituting for a pillow. It’s definitely a plushie I’d recommend hitting a wall with for stress relief. Also, definitely keep it out of arm’s reach from mischievous house guests.
Kid Friendly Versus Adult Only
I’m leaving this one in the middle. It’s really open to interpretation and how you use it. Kids and adults alike can have a lot of fun with the Sugar Daddy plushie. I recommend a scavenger hunt. Whoever finds the Sugar Daddy plushie gets to smack the person they want to hide it next. How would you use it, Geekly Gang?
Cuddle Buddy Versus Desk Buddy
Sugar Daddy is easy to cuddle with, but I wouldn’t recommend it due to its firmness. It’d make a great couch decoration, but I can also see someone keeping it locked away in a safe to avoid mischief. Honestly, I think Sugar Daddy makes for goofy decor anywhere in the house. It’s one of those things that makes people question why you have it. Keep them guessing.
Final Thoughts
Sugar Daddy is a fun plushie to have around. We’ve had many a giggle fit in my family whenever we chase each other around the house with it. I’m not sure if they’re in circulation anymore, but you can purchase a Sugar Daddy plush between $7 and $30 on eBay. I highly recommend getting one for fun, or if you’re a candy lover looking to add a Sugar Daddy plushie to your collection.
Do you agree with my assessment of the Sugar Daddy plushie? Would you like me to cover more candy/food-related plushies in the future? Let us know in the comments. Thank you for reading and have a relaxing time with your families.
P.S. This year, I’m thankful for all of you, Geekly Gang. I appreciate you taking time out of your busy schedules to read our posts and leaving us likes and comments. I hope we can continue to bring you content you enjoy reading.
Happy Spooky Season, Geekly Gang! Kyra Kyle here, and while Ratropolis doesn’t exactly fit the horror aesthetic for this month’s theme, it is an interesting blend of deck building, tower defense, and real-time strategy. That’s right, it’s time for another quirky video game review. Relatively new, Korean video game design group, Cassel Games, combines so many disparate themes and mechanisms that they couldn’t possibly work together. Could they? Let’s put Ratropolis against our video game review criteria.
Game Mechanisms: 9/10
Ratropolis does manage to merge its separate parts into a cohesive whole, but I don’t imagine players unfamiliar with deck building to fare well. Sure, Ratropolis begins with slow waves of enemies. The deck-building is somewhat pared down, but this game retains most of a deck-building game’s complexity, and the time constraint can be intimidating. The real-time strategy meets tower defense work well together. They’re almost seamless.
The deck-building does get streamlined to a point. Ratropolis splits cards into specific leader types: Builder, General, Merchant, Navigator, Scientist, and Shaman. Each leader type has a male and female variant with their own special powers, so this specializes each potential deck even further. You begin the game with the Builder, which allows for upgraded buildings and extra building cards that provide sustained benefits, even resources over time. Ratropolis has addictive gameplay and since it offers so many avenues to customize your deck, once you get hooked, you’ll lose several hours and not even notice.
I can’t believe how well Ratropolis blends its various game mechanisms. Each leader takes advantage of different design spaces, and I love that. Different avenues for victory make a great deck-builder, and Ratropolis is a great deck-building game without the added wrinkles of an RTS and tower defense.
Speaking of tower defense, Ratropolis does an excellent job of ramping up its difficulty from one wave to the next. Gameplay balance like that is difficult to find. Each city run lasts up to 30 waves of enemies. The furthest I’ve ever gone has been level 25 or 27. Each new enemy type adds a new threat for the player to manage, and while these new challenges can feel unfair when first introduced, runs don’t take too long (players can even send in a new wave early to earn extra in-game money), and a quick look at Ratropolis’s card library should reveal a strategy to deal with each one. The only reason Ratropolis doesn’t get top marks in game mechanisms is that the deck-building can–at first–be overwhelming.
Gameplay Loop: 10/10
I spoiled this entry in the last one. Yes! Ratropolis has an addictive gameplay loop. I spent hours playing the game, not knowing I had spent hours playing the game. Not only does Ratropolis start players with one leader type, but you can unlock other leaders and extra cards for each deck by gaining experience. Ratropolis manages to add a little bit of Pokémon to its gameplay. Gotta catch ’em all! These new cards tend to be more complex, but they also break the game in fun ways. Ratropolis is one of those video games where you’ll be arguing to play one more game.
Narrative/Storytelling: 6/10
One wouldn’t think a deck-builder, real-time strategy, tower defense video game would have much of a story, but that’s not the case with Ratropolis. The game has a loose story that adapts to the events of your game. Did you recently have a lot of rat citizens die during an enemy raid? You may get approached by grieving parents who want burials for their children. You decide how your rat leader reacts. Do you give them a proper burial? Do you ask the parents for a death tax? Yikes! That got dark, but so does Ratropolis’s story. This game paints its story in its liminal spaces, but there isn’t much in the way of an overarching narrative.
User Interface: 7/10
Ratropolis’s user interface is well designed, but a lot is going on in this game. Too much. I don’t know how Ratropolis could fix this issue, but it is an issue and drags down the game’s user interface score a hair. Currently (I’m writing this review in June 2025), Ratropolis is only available on Windows (and by extension, Steam). I can’t imagine Ratropolis on a console or mobile device, despite deck-building games running well on smartphones. Information pockets form in all four corners. The screen is cut into two sections: the top is the city (which players can scroll from side to side, making this space even larger and unwieldy), and the bottom center shows the player’s hand. Many cards have extensive text, so that adds even more cognitive load (how much information one’s brain must compute at one time).
Throw in the random story elements, and Ratropolis can get overwhelming. Still, Ratropolis has a space for everything. It offers a clean interface for players to find most information. I don’t know how the game could improve on its UI design, but it’s missing something.
Graphics: 8/10
Ratropolis’s graphical details are fantastic. The images on the cards are cartoonish but have a well-defined style. Ratropolis is a pretty game. I may have lowered it to average if it wasn’t for the city, slowly building in the space above the cards. Look at the reflection effects in the water. You can see your entire ratropolis reflected in the river. Depending on the location you build your city (Ratropolis offers a handful of places, which can vary gameplay), you’ll be given flourishes that make every rat city unique.
Audio: 7/10
Typically, I play most video games with the sound off. That makes grading a game’s audio difficult. But I have heard plenty of Ratropolis’s audio, and it’s well above average. While the soundtrack does its job (it doesn’t stand out, but it serves the game well), the sound effects, especially the jingling of merchants entering your city or the growls and grumbles of various enemies invading your rat city raise this score. In fact, it’s these unique sounds–that I grew accustomed to–that made managing my city a lot easier. I won’t go as far as to say that you need to play Ratropolis with the sound on, but the sound mixing immerses me in the game’s world. And that’s what you want from a game’s audio.
Replay Factor: 10/10
Unlocking all the leader types, the cards, and the random city generator that makes each playthrough different gives Ratropolis an infinite replay factor. Not since Civilization have I felt this strong of an urge for “just one more turn” or game or unlock one card in my journey of mastering the Merchant leadership style. Ratropolis combines several game mechanisms that lend themselves to replay (deck-building, tower defense, and a varied enemy and environment for a real-time strategy). These mechanisms work together to form a game you won’t put down for hours.
Aggregated Score: 8.14
Ratropolis does the unthinkable and combines deck-building, tower defense, and real-time strategy into one addictive indie game package. This game may not appeal to everyone, but if you’re interested in two or more of the game’s three main mechanisms, you should try Ratropolis.
jkgeekly.com 