SnowWulF
Hello and welcome to the digest series October edition!
Happy Halloween everyone! It is the month of spooks and horror. That means we continue our monthly bounty hunt from last month and this month I did actually manage to beat some of the games. :)
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Monthly Bounty
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The second month of the horror bounty monthly is here. One of the good points of horror games is that they are oftentimes pretty short, which is perfect to get the good feeling of beating games flowing.
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Babbdi
PC/Windows - Steam
Finished
Time: 45m
Rating: 8 out of 10
From my thoughts at the time:
"Babbdi is a really interesting game. I read somewhere that the game wants to depict the feeling of being stuck in one place, which it certainly does . The city of Babbdi feels like a slum and is mostly abandoned. Your goal is to leave via train, but that turns out to be more difficult than it sounds.
It is eery and strange. Perfect for October spooks. The atmosphere is amazing. Platforming with various items feels good and exploring is intriguing.
So, it gets a recommendation from me. :)"
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Dagon: by H. P. Lovecraft
PC/Windows - Steam
Finished
Time: 1h 1m
Rating: 2 out of 10
"Well, it's a graphical adventure where you click on simple buttons to move the story forward. How can I say this... it´s just boring.
There is more text in the optional trivia regarding Lovecrafts life than is used in the actual story. It feels like some real big fan really wanted to tell you something about his god and savior H.P. Lovecraft and built a "game" to stop normal people from running away. To be honest, the trivia is interesting, maybe build a game around that instead of half assing the gamebits. I mean even the graphics are borderline okay for a 2021 game.
The only good thing is that the story is fully voiced."
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The Evil Within
PC/Windows - Epic
Unfinished
Time at writing: 1h 26m
(temporarily) Rating: 4 out of 10
Near the end of the month, I tried to play The Evil Within. Even though I knew that I would probably run out of time.
Well, I don´t know if the game/level design is bad or if I am getting old. For some reason, I needed like 20 minutes to leave the first room. I just couldn´t find the door and tried to kill the monster. After that, the game really didn´t feel right to me. The combat feels completely unbalanced, like melee attacking enemies 10 times but you are killed in 2 - 3 hits. Sometimes head-shots kill in one shot, sometimes they tank multiple hits. Why is that? I don´t know.
Unfortunately, I could only play for something over an hour, but it didn´t impress me. I heard a lot of good things about this game and guess that I just haven´t reached the good parts yet. But for now it gets a 4/10 from me.
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Generic Bountys
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As you may recall from last month digest, I was really hyped for one game in particular:
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Forza Motorsport (2023)
PC/Windows - Steam
Unfinished
Time at writing: 67h 52m
(temporarily) Rating: 6 out of 10
Did the game live up to my hype? Yes, but no.
First off, the game has what it takes to become a great racing game. Driving physics are excellent, as well as the tuning options. But for the love of good, the game is barely playable. Performance is really bad, always online just kicks you out of singleplayer. Online matchmaking is broken in that it ignores your skill and safety-rating. Don´t mention the bugs, the list of problems is seemingly endless.
Despite that, I have a lot of fun. Driving feels great, even though the AI in singleplayer behaves like rambo, the multiplayer is amazing and the newly introduced leveling system for all the cars intrigues me. (At least for now)
Would I recommend this game to my friends? If they are into racing games, yes, but get the game via gamepass. For everyone else, no. Not in the state the game is currently in.
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Misc Games
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Time for one more Xbox Pass game.
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Railway Empire 2
PC/Windows - Xbox GamePass
Unfinished
Time at writing: 9h 6m
Rating: 8 out of 10
I like games which depict the logistics of different commerce. Railway Empire is one of my favorite economy tycoon games. Railway Empire 2 does something most sequels don´t. It expands the features of the predecessor and elevates the gameplay in meaningful ways. For example, it introduces the ability to experience the campaign with your friend in coop. Also, lots of quality of life improvements plus more elements to expand your rail and goods network.
Simply said, the game is like its predecessor but better. :)
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Community Content
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My favorites this month:
AllTheTrophies
The GameCube Gauntlet #008 - Resident Evil Zero
-Love the to read about the struggles of completionists. Keep up the good work. :)
moho_00
Backlog Journey 2023 #21 - Barney's Hide & Seek Game
-I don´t know why moho_00 keeps playing these children games, but they are always an interesting read for sure.
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End Word
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Another month, another digest. Super Mario is the theme for the next months bounty, which should be a blast. The end of the year is approaching fast, I am not sure if I want to do a normal digest or going for a end of the year special. What do you guys think? :)