Recent reviews by Kranst

An immersively relaxing and wholesome creature-collecting and underwater pollution cleaning title. Loddlenaut is relatively simplistic in execution, but brilliant in how it makes you feel. The concept of tidying ecosystems on an alien ocean planet is straightforward, yet charmingly accessible. Free-roaming stress-free biomes, while enveloped by soothing scores and pleasant sounds, already promote atmospherically cozy vibes. But caretaking varied and cute animal-like critters? This is a sure-fire formula for unwinding. Environments actively function when left alone, you are encouraged to explore, progression can be personalized, and full completion is satisfyingly obtainable. Anyone can pick up and enjoy this wonderful game. An outstanding and comforting experience.

The earliest moments of Disc Room are brilliantly executed through a clever design philosophy, but this creatively puzzling experience slowly devolves into frustration when artificial difficulty overtakes strategy. Those initial good impressions were a byproduct of the open-ended progression paired with uniquely thoughtful unlock conditions, rooms, challenges, and secrets. Seemingly simple abilities contained depth that allowed various approaches, uses, and interactions. These aspects excelled. Unfortunately, hardmode, the second half of the game and some other punishing trials opted for uninspired obstacles. These later levels relied on random patterns, spawn luck, obscured vision, and spammed hazards. Nevertheless, despite endgame failings, it is worth it on sale.

Rocket Rats initially succeeds as a short, imitative title through charming visuals, reasonable variation for the scope, and unique upgrades, skills, and builds. Unfortunately, this game greatly overstays its welcome, which leads to a soft recommendation. The experience quickly transitions from a bullet hell to an idler. With a basic understanding, runs require no input from the player except on selection screens. This is compounded by a single, restrictive map and large hitboxes. Achievements beyond the first win artificially prolong playtime, working towards evolutions often depends on luck, and there is no reason to swap characters. This is fun to start, but not to complete.

A pleasantly relaxing entry in the “chore-like” genre that has you rounding up, collecting, and depositing leaves in a homely setting. While advertised as such, it is important to note that the core experience is a roughly two-hour-long session with one explorable map. Further content comes from challenge runs or leaderboard scores. Regardless, for the price point, ones interested in the concept will enjoy themselves. The objectives, interactions, and mechanics are all extremely satisfying to engage with. The music is calming. And the atmosphere is warmly familiar. The core gameplay loop might be linear, but the chill and mundane autumn vibes are worth staying for.

In a landscape oversaturated with idlers excessively prolonging content to pad game length, the developer of Space Rock Breaker has intentionally done the opposite, prioritizing player time by delivering a short experience filled with new ideas, instead of artificially stretching concepts thin. There is a continuous stream of interesting mechanics, weapons, and variations for nearly the entire duration. Both the progression and pacing remain engaging throughout. Moreover, the aesthetic presentation and quality of life additions contribute to this design philosophy. These decisions are a feature. Those who desire a condensed, well-crafted incremental title that does not waste your time will thoroughly enjoy these few hours.

Sonic Adventure DX is a nostalgic three-dimensional step in the series. It is quite flawed and consistently janky, but it remains narratively charming with quickly-paced gameplay. There is plenty of variation between action stages, each character plays uniquely, and the story lines and additional dialogue have varied takes. And the Chao Garden is phenomenal in its first iteration! However, the lows in this title are rock bottom. Missions involving precision, the Sky Deck segments, and the entirety of the fishing minigames with Big the Cat are atrocious. Moreover, playing in anything but the original resolution and framerate without modding has unintended effects. Seriously, download BetterSADX.

“For those who come after.” Clair Obscur: Expedition 33 is a magnificently handcrafted title brought from passion. The presentation here is paramount, with narrative relevance, deliberate world-building, exhilarating battle starts and finishes, dynamic animations, rich atmospheres, painterly themes, and small flourishes, supported by one of the most remarkable soundtracks in the medium. Encounters are simplistically complex, and strategy is executed through brilliant customization systems like luminas, pictos, and skills. These aspects are firmly tied together by a sincerely written and emotionally impactful story depicting a stark contrast between hope and grief, responsibility and escapism, legacy and mortality, life and death, and familial importance. “Tomorrow comes.”

An incremental dice game with a fundamental understanding of pacing that is hindered by its lack of individuality. Incredicer might be an enjoyable experience for those looking for a bog-standard, unimaginative title about linearly increasing numbers. However, there are few meaningful choices and not much room for optimization aside from the obvious. Moreover, the skill tree, while large, is repetitive, featuring the same reused upgrades for each tier of pip. The visual clarity is poor, making it challenging to track numbers, multipliers, and animations of the few unique effects provided. And there is only one music track on a relatively short loop. Skip this one.

Kabuto Park is a delightfully cute, visually cozy, and approachably casual experience about creature collecting and card battling featuring bugs. You are immediately able to start playing, and the mechanics are very understandable despite minimal tutorials. Critter gathering is definitely the highlight, with a large variety of insects to discover paired with an encyclopedia, terrarium, leveling, sizes, statistical ratios, and even shiny hunting. There is some fun to be had with the tournament mode, though the pushing and deck builder are rather simplistic comparatively. However, you can continue engaging with the entire game even after completion. Despite being rather short, this is worth the price.

An immersively rich atmosphere can greatly enhance an experience, and Slots & Daggers takes full advantage of its weighty mechanics, enveloping audio, and thoughtful visual design in these several high-quality hours. Interacting with the slot machine cleverly influences the surrounding table, with coins or objects shuffling around, rousing cheers from the observing crowd, or dice rolling and granting meaningful combination bonuses. The roguelite elements themselves are solid, and the various decisions, synergies, and skill checks are experimentally interesting. There is also a high-score arena mode. Though the base game progression does have a few minor pacing and balancing issues. Nonetheless, the presentation and interactivity are praiseworthy.