Mister Jack

Was there ever any doubt?

I've been playing a lot of Witchfire recently. It's kind of an interesting hybrid of genres and people seem to have differing opinions on just what it is. It's definitely at least partly a souslike FPS game. You collect witchfire from enemies to level up and you drop it when you die and have to go back to try and collect it. I've also heard it called an extraction shooter by some in that you go into the maps to collect resources and if you die before you can find an exit portal then you drop everything, though you can go back and pick it up on your next life along with your dropped witchfire. I don't know a lot about extraction shooters and this is strictly a single player game but I guess it could technically count? I hesitate to call it a roguelike because the maps aren't procedurally generated and the bosses spawn in the same place every time, but I guess there are still random events during a mission. What I really like about this game is the gunplay and the feeling of progression. The story takes place in an alternate history where witches are real and the church has witch hunters to wipe them out. The time period is kind of hard to pin down but based on the guns you get I'd guess it's equivalent to maybe the WWII era? Your guns are all magically enhanced so it's a little hard to tell but you won't be finding any modern military weapons here. The most advanced gun I've gotten so far looks like an old Browning rifle that spawns angel wings while aiming down the sights to block incoming fire. I like the old-timey designs of the arsenal, though. Feels weighty and bulky in a good way. It feels powerful. Speaking of which, these guns are great and get better as you go. Every gun has four levels, starting at 0. At level 0 they just shoot normal bullets like ordinary guns but once you get 25 kills and hit level 1 every gun unlocks a special ability. Use that ability enough times and you get a level 2 ability. Use that enough times to unlock the final and fully upgraded level 3 ability. These aren't just passive buffs either. These are very unique and useful abilities. I already mentioned the angel wing shield but you also have things like a sniper rifle that ignites enemies while you look through the scope, a revolver that lodges bullets in enemies and detonates them when you reload, a crossbow with bolts that zip in between targets like Yondu's arrow, and lots more. I honestly haven't seen an arsenal this unique since Resistance on the PS3. It doesn't hurt that you also get a loadout of magic spells to choose from on top of that. The game is still in early access and there are some balance issues that need to be ironed out in my opinion but I think when this hits 1.0 it's going to become a sleeper hit.

I freaking love Dynamite Headdy. Used to play that all the time.

Cultic: Chapter 2 I feel bad about this. I can tell that Jason Smith worked his ass off on this game and he lovingly crafted these huge, sprawling maps with tons of attention to detail. This game is his baby and I respect the hell out of what he accomplished mostly by himself. However, I gotta say that chapter 2 feels like a step down from chapter 1. There's a massive difficulty spike with the new enemies and level design. Whether that's an issue for you is up to personal preference, I suppose, but even if I'm okay with the game being harder it has one other major issue that really started to affect my enjoyment: these levels are too big. I almost feel guilty complaining about it. Like I said, this game was made by one guy and I can't imagine the amount of time it took for him to make these gigantic areas to explore. One level in this game can be nearly as big as the entire mansion in Resident Evil. You could fit three or four Doom levels in one Cultic Chapter 2 level. It's extremely impressive on a technical level and they're laid out in a way that make them feel like real places instead of mere video game levels. Unfortunately, when actually playing it's also extremely easy to get very lost looking for your next objective. There is an auto-map that fills out while you explore but it only helps so much. There are times when the path forward is practically a secret area. I spent over an hour on a single level at one point and didn't run into a single enemy for half of that time because I was so confused about where to go. I know people like to be snobs about objective markers and compasses but this game really needed it. I had to consult Youtube more than once just to know where the hell I was supposed to go. Maybe that's partly my fault for wanting to do a whole level in one sitting but come on. It's a boomer shooter. That's how they're meant to be played. There's also several atmospheric setpiece moments where you'll be trapped in the dark somewhere, just waiting for something to come at you out of nowhere while you're stumbling around with your lighter. This can be effective in theory, but since I got lost several times this also meant long stretches where I didn't run into any enemies at all because I didn't know where I was supposed to go to trigger the next encounter. I'm willing to accept partial responsibility for it since this is hardly the first time I've gotten lost while playing a game and struggled to figure out what I was supposed to do, but it happened to me enough times while playing this that I started to feel like I couldn't possibly be this inept. Most boomer shooters will have you looking for, at most, 3 keys or key items per level. This one can have you hunting for up to 8 or more depending on the level. It's rough. Maybe I'll have a change of heart on a replay since I know what to do in the levels now but I'm not ready for that yet. I need a break from this one. Shame really because the gunplay feels great as always.

Nightmare Reaper What a pleasant, addictive surprise this turned out to be. I thought it was a roguelike because of procedurally generated levels but it really isn't despite what the store page claims. You don't lose progress when you die other than dropping your currently carried guns and having to start the current level over, so you'll never drop your hard earned coins for the upgrade shop or get sent all the way to the beginning. Good thing too because this game has roughly 90 levels. They all take maybe 5 to 10 minutes to beat, not counting the battle arenas that you do on the side for arena coins. My final playtime when I finally put it down clocked in at 33 hours. The real star of the show here is the guns. Yes, the game uses sprite and voxel graphics so the guns aren't super detailed but the sound design on them is immaculate and enemies explode into showers of blood and gore so pretty much all of them feel great to shoot and there's a ton of variety to boot. I actually lost count of how many weapon types there are, though they all fall into the melee, light, heavy, or magic category. It's not just your typical pistol, shotgun, sniper, smg rotation either. Those are all in there, sure, but then you get things like spell books, a scepter that summons meteors, pirate cannons, a scrap cannon, a howitzer, a black hole gun, a railroad spike launcher, a mini nuke, a god damn orbital laser, and much much more than I can possibly list here. The store page on steam claims there's 80 weapons and I have no reason to doubt that. On top of already having 80 weapons, each one you pick up comes with modifiers so they'll function differently. It's kind of like Borderlands in that sense, but the modifiers aren't just passive stat increases and they can wildly change how two versions of the same gun feel to use. I found all kinds of crazy combos. My go-to starter gun in the second half of the game was a magnum that fired electric stun bullets and had 675% knockback, but the most memorable gun I found was probably the smg that fired flaming, explosive piles of poo with every shot. You just never know what you'll get. As if that wasn't enough, your character gets a lot of upgrades too. You'll start off fairly weak and squishy but by the end I was double jumping, grappling, air dashing, and even kicking back enemy projectiles. It's a ton of fun. My only real criticisms are the ending (at least the one I got) is pretty anticlimactic and sometimes I got lost in a level for several minutes trying to find the key I needed to progress. These levels can be full of big, open spaces sometimes and keys aren't marked on the map so you have to hunt down their little glowing sprites which can sometimes feel like looking for a needle in a haystack. Other than that, this was fantastic. I'm already starting NG+.

I almost put Dispatch but if I'm being honest with myself this is the game I obsessed over the most in 2025. I loved the tactical combat and with 100 endings to find among wildly different routes, I ended up playing this for a stupid amount of time in my obsession with getting the golden ending. There aren't really any lazy fade to black text over a blank screen endings in here that I could find either. They all have their own art and scenes and were interesting enough to motivate me to keep going to find the next one. I still haven't found all 100 of them, though I imagine someday I'll go back to get the rest.

I've been on a huge boomer shooter kick recently. Played through all of Blood: Refreshed Supply and Duke Nukem 3D. I picked up Selaco and Rise of the Triad and Dark Forces Remastered on the steam sale. The most interesting one I got, however, turned out to be Nightmare Reaper. You play as a mental patient going through procedurally generated levels in her dreams (so I assume since you go to bed in her cell in between levels). The randomized layouts do mean the levels aren't super complex but it makes up for it with the guns. There's an enormous variety to pick up and they all have modifiers kind of like Borderlands. After each floor you also have to sell every gun you're carrying except for one level 1 gun you're allowed to take with you, which sounds annoying but it keeps you from clinging to the same weapon for the whole game and you get new guns pretty quickly on the next floor anyway and most of them feel pretty good to shoot. You can only equip four guns at a time but you can carry dozens of them in your inventory on each floor and can swap them out anytime you want to try new loadouts. I've been looking for that endlessly replayable old school shooter that never runs out of stuff to do and I may have found it with this one.

Good to finally have a definitive modern port built from the original source code

Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: Shredder's Revenge Streets of Rage 2 and 4 (Probably my top recommendation) Scott Pilgrim vs. The World Absolum TMNT: The Arcade Game The Simpsons Dungeons & Dragons: Shadow over Mystara River City Ransom Castle Crashers Comix Zone Splatterhouse 3

I got my eye on that controller. I use my steam deck docked to my tv most of the time, and while the DS5 works well enough for the most part there are always those few games in the backlog that don't gel super well with it. I really like how the deck feels in portable mode so if this controller is basically just the steam deck with the screen chopped off then it would be perfect.

Dispatch Season finale dropped today. All in all, this game is fantastic, maybe the best that the Telltale guys have ever made. I know that their previous works were constrained by the budget and technology of the time but this is the first episodic game I can think of that actually looks good enough to pass for a tv show. Hell, it looks better than plenty of actual animated shows. I would love to see this universe expanded as a series. I know that R-rated superheroes have become a bit of a cliche with Invincible and The Boys and too many other examples to list, but Dispatch sets itself apart with its more comedic and optimistic tone. These heroes are perverts and jerks and fuckups but they're trying their best out there. It also helps that they're really funny. I laughed out loud at several moments in this season, but when the drama hits it hits hard. I like these characters and I got emotionally invested in them. That's good writing. Unlike previous games by Totally-Not-Telltale, this one has more actual gameplay with the dispatch shifts. Your job is to sit in front of a computer and pick the right hero to send to the right distress call. It sounds overly simple on paper but every episode throws in new workplace complications to shake up your shifts. You can't just solely depend on number crunching stats for your heroes. You also have to take their powers, their mercurial personalities, and their relationships into account when deciding who to send where. A perfect shift with no mistakes is trickier than you think. The story veers onto pretty different paths depending on your choices too. This isn't just a situation where someone might die and then the story plays out the same except they're absent and occasionally people mention it. Depending on what you choose and how well you do on your shifts you could be seeing two completely different scenes in an episode. You will have to play through the season at least twice to appreciate all the content. That's not a bad problem to have when it's so enjoyable. This game really took me by surprise. I bought it because of positive word of mouth and I can see why people like it so much. This would be a game of the year contender if there weren't already so many strong choices this year. It at least deserves best narrative.

I don't know what happened at Valve to make them suddenly start making so much great hardware but I'm here for it. I did not like the old steam controller or steam machine or even the Index hardware but all of this honestly looks good and I have been absolutely loving my steam deck since I got it. I don't need another VR headset anytime soon but I am liking the look of that controller.

The Hundred Line: Last Defense Academy So this is kind of an odd case. I don't feel like I've truly beaten this one yet, but I got far enough for the credits to roll. Thing is, this game is meant to be played multiple times and you won't get the whole story in just one playthrough, but that's all I'll say about that. This is like a blend of visual novel, tower defense, puzzle, and tactical RPG all in one. Sounds bloated, and yet it somehow works. In fact, I expected the tactics side to be an afterthought but this is the best tactics game I've played in several years. Each story battle requires you to defend the shield generators for your school. They are the most important thing, more than the lives of your units. In fact, you're actually encouraged to sacrifice your units in big flashy desperation attacks to both do big damage and boost your score at the end. You get them back after each wave so you don't want to waste their potential by keeping them alive at all costs. Each character in this game is totally unique and has their own role on the battlefield. None of them feel superfluous. You level them up by crafting weapon upgrades, which is where the visual novel side comes in. Instead of building up affection levels, spending time with each teammate will increase a certain skill that you need to access certain upgrades. Spending time with the jock will upgrade your gym class stats, for example. The battle system itself is quite interesting. Instead of each unit getting a turn, you're given action points at the beginning of each round and can spend them how you wish. If you want one unit to go several times in a row, you can. Each attack leaves a unit exhausted for one round though so if you want them to go multiple times you either have to spend another AP to refresh them or stick to moving one space per extra turn. Each enemy you kill (except the 1 HP kamikaze units) also gets you 1 AP back. That means that there are times where if you plan out your AP use strategically, you can wipe out the entire enemy force without them ever even getting a chance to attack. It's incredibly satisfying when you can pull it off. Each attack also builds up a meter that you can spend to either buff units, let them use their desperation attack without dying, or even give back spent AP. That's why I say this can feel like a puzzle game at times. Some enemy waves can feel utterly overwhelming at first but if you manage your units and AP use smartly you can turn the tables and decimate the other side in a single round. I won't speak on the story, since I haven't fully completed it yet, but I will say that I ended up enjoying the entire cast of this game, unlike Danganronpa. In each Danganronpa game there was always one or two characters who I hated from beginning to end, but in this I managed to come around to all of them eventually. Don't get me wrong, some of them are really obnoxious, but they get better for the most part. Even the ones who stay obnoxious are at least really useful in combat. I honestly can't recommend this game highly enough. It has a free demo on steam if you're on the fence so you have nothing to lose.

Oh it's definitely not easier, but at least where steamOS is concerned I like how free of bloat it is. I'm kind of hoping valve puts out an official version for PCs down the line. The steam deck is already getting a big surge of popularity thanks to the price gouging Microsoft and Nintendo are up to lately so I feel like it isn't out of the realm of possibility valve would do something like that if Windows ever goes a bridge too far.

I'm thoroughly enjoying it so far. The tactical RPG side doesn't feel tacked on either. It's unlike any other tactics game I've played. I'll post my full thoughts when I finish it.

Played the demo for this on the deck and really liked it. I was going to wait for the next steam sale but I had a really shitty day (fell through the attic) and was too pissed off to care about paying full price when I already have to pay to repair a giant hole in the ceiling so fuck it, I need to de-stress.

1) Beat em up 2) Roguelike 3) Great on steam deck 4) Online co-op Yeah this was made for me. It also does a very good job scratching that Dragon's Crown itch since that never got a steam port

I'm mostly keeping it in my back pocket in preparation for the day when Microsoft decides Windows computers can only install apps from the Windows store

Man, the steam deck is cool. In fact, it's so cool that it's actually got me considering Linux now.

Those devs really seem to know how to take those old Genesis franchises and make them feel new again. They did great with Streets of Rage 4.

Fuck it we ball. Getting the 1 TB edition.

I've been keeping an eye on this and Neverness to Everness. Probably gonna end up sticking with whichever one comes out first unless there's a major quality difference between them.

Wuthering Waves This one is really frustrating to me. I caught up on my other free to play stuff so I figured I'd give this one a try. It came to steam and its community glazes it constantly, talking about how it puts Genshin Impact to shame in every way. Well, the truth is they're not entirely wrong. In terms of gameplay and quality of life it does improve a lot of things. Exploration is a lot swifter with free sprinting outside of combat and lots of field gadgets. They even added a free glider that gives you the ability to straight up fly across the map. That's great. The combat is also more active and skill based. That's also great. The cutscenes have better animation than other gacha games. There are also some good puzzles and the devs even seem to listen to player feedback when they do their patches, which I commend. So what's the problem here? The story. Freaking. SUCKS. This is maybe the worst RPG story I've ever seen, or at least it has the worst presentation. As soon as you begin you're overwhelmed with lore terms like resonator and tacet discord and etheric sea and given almost no chance to process what any of it means. I played for weeks and I still have no idea how the hell this universe works. I heard while looking for info that at some point in the past the developers announced they had taken player feedback into account by rewriting NINETY PERCENT OF THE STORY. If this is the after then I'd really hate to see the before. The player base claims it gets better once you reach the second continent but man I just don't know that I have that kind of patience. Even if it does, there's no way it could get THAT much better. If that's not bad enough, these characters are boring and bland. All they do is infodump on you in the cutscenes and almost none of them feel like they have a personality or agency outside of supporting the protagonist. I don't like their designs either with the exception of Lumi, who has a cute design with a light bulb tail and hair curls that make her look like a mouse, but apparently she's the weakest fighter in the game so it's pointless to even use her. I'm the kind of guy who prioritizes gameplay over story but this is an open world RPG. Your story and characters have to grab me at least a little bit to keep me invested. Genshin Impact definitely has a lot of faults that put me off when I went back to it but the Fontaine characters and story arc ended up being extremely well-written and they kept me invested until I finished that region. There's just nothing like that going on here and I hate it because I can tell this game has a lot going for it in other respects. I want to like it. I really do. But I just don't care.