“Whoa. Right, I need to go easy on this one, don’t I. This is clearly an early-stage alpha-ish game that the dev probably put online just for their friends or something. I’m sure it’s downloadable for free–“
…
…
…
“Oh, FUCK you, dude.”
Page 55, Game 27: Hooks And Shotguns by FifthEdgeStudios
Right. So. This is a side-scrolling shoot-em-up, reminiscent of Contra. In fact, in the Bad Place, all copies of Contra have been replaced by this game.
You can use the titular shotgun, which blasts a three-bullet spread, or you can use the titular hook, which does nothing. Your sprite changes to indicate you’re now holding a hook gun, but no amount of button-mashing caused it to do a single goddamn thing (and this game has nothing resembling a tutorial mode). So even though the dev considered it important enough to put in the title, the hook is not in the $5 release of the game.
The first time I tried playing this game, I found movement to be weirdly floaty and unsatisfying. There was one early mini-boss battle that I could simply rush past and ignore. In fact, when I went back to fight the mini-boss, I found it very difficult to FIGHT the fucker at all, as I kept drifting off the side of the screen and triggering loads of adjacent areas. But I stuck it out, because I wanted to see what would happen when I finally whittled down his health.
Answer: the game crashed, and rendered itself unplayable. Permanently unplayable, as far as I can tell. When I went back in to do a screenshot run, I found an unbreakable wall of indeterminate height standing between me and the rest of the game.
Can’t jump over it, can’t climb it, shooting it is pointless. Everything about this is pointless.
Perhaps if I delete and re-expand the game, it will return to a state where it’s playable. I think I’ll do the first half of that.
I find it hard to imagine this doing brisk sales. But anybody who somehow actually purchased this game deserves a refund and and apology.
Will this next game not fill me with hostility towards whoever shared it with me?
Page 11, Game 9: Blue Rose by WhiteCat
“Fantasy romance visual novel”
Oh, dear. Is this an interactive “novel”? I’ve had really dreadful luck with those. But good news, WhiteCat: after Shotguns & Hooks, there is literally nowhere to go but up. And who knows, maybe it’ll be just a straightforward piece of fiction. The ones I’ve encountered in this trawl have, to my pleasant surprise, consistently not sucked. Here’s hoping.