Seneste anmeldelser af Minzoku Bokumetsu

I mean, it's ok, pretty standard for HER Interactive. As far as I can tell it's a perfect port of the "regular" version (haven't played a physical copy, but it runs the same as others I've played), although I have issues with the interface, particularly with how Nancy's phone uses the center of the arrow instead of the arrow point as the interactive hotspot, so I was often clicking an entry I didn't want. Also, it gets tedious having to saddle/unsaddle the horse every time I need to do one single thing at the ranch before going back out, since Tex yells at Nancy if she doesn't, even if the horse is perfectly fine staying saddled for however long Nancy is off doing her own thing anywhere else off-ranch.

Also it is SO HARD to tell what vegetables are ripe other than the tomatoes. Extremely annoying puzzle.

Small nitpick is I adjusted the speaking volume to be quieter, but this doesn't affect the cutscene volume. Probably an oversight but nothing game-breaking. Bigger nitpick is inventory management, how you have to pick the item you want to use, then click the TINY "X" box to exit the inventory, and if you miss, it drops the item back into your inventory, at the BOTTOM of your inventory. Irritating.

The main reason I wanted to play Shadow Ranch was to see how it compared to the book, but I've forgotten most of it by now, so while most of the major points are similar (to the rewrite, not the original from like 1931), all I can really comment on is that some parts were streamlined for execution in a game (such as the location of the green bottle and the fact the game has only one villain), and some of the game additions are completely silly (an Old West outlaw building a wooden magnet maze puzzle??). Standard for the ND series, though!

Tl;dr: Decent, but not my favourite ND game.

Short but interesting mystery/horror point and click adventure. Not terribly challenging except for a few places where it's not necessarily clear what to do next (biggest hint, click EVERYTHING, a LOT). The story is engrossing despite the linearity, although there are five "decision" points that determine what happens in the epilogue to the main plot resolution. Definitely worth a try!

Caveat that I have ever only played Senior Detective to get the maximum challenge out of Nancy Drew (so some of these issues may not appear in Junior Detective), Trail of the Twister may be my favourite of the ones I've played so far (despite my lengthy list below—this is actually a better balance of elements I like to things I don't compared to other games).

Good things:
+ the circuit board minigame is an interesting, challenging logic puzzle
+ Land Rush is pretty fun, and I would love a standalone game of it
+ actually really like the mousetrap puzzle and would also love a standalone game of it
+ game can be completed in two or three sittings (depending on if you milk for the Easter Eggs)

Downsides:
- I dislike "completely bizarre and unrealistic map as minigame" and the GPS feature in the car is not evident unless you pay attention to the icons changing (it's mentioned in Debbie's introductory letter, which is how I realised way late that there's a GPS, although it only even acts like a GPS should when it malfunctions)
- many of the instructions are given once and never again, so if you missed it, tough luck (Junior Detective has a checklist, though)
- a couple of the puzzles require rotating pieces, which is not really explained in Senior Detective (right-click to rotate)
- the cable minigame is REALLY not colourblind friendly—would have been nice if they had textures

Weird things:
- some of the conversations seem to lag a bit (Chase in particular), even though there's no option to auto-advance the dialogue
- humanely relocating prairie dogs... to the other side of the farm? would not work, they'd just go back
- and using a "prairie dog vacuum" to do it, no less
- not a fan of the transmission puzzle, which—considering the ND series is supposed to be fairly STEM-positive—doesn't remotely resemble how a transmission works and is an engineer's nightmare in terms of gears having to be installed in a specific, non-sequential order (and one gear doesn't even connect to anything, what's up with that)
- kind of strange the culprit would leave a deliberate (if incredibly obtuse) clue where to find them
- also kind of strange that Nancy would be able to fix almost anything by doing a Numbrix or w/e, but I know that's just how the games work

tl;dr: Standard ND fare, but I like this one more than other ND games, warts and all.

Exactly the browser game but will rack up your Steam acheevo count! WARNING: My ancient computer baked TOO MANY COOKIES and spontaneously DIED

At least it's not from mining Buttcoin hahahahaha

ha

So, I hate this less than the other MacVenture games so far, but I still hate it. The interface is fiddly, and the puzzles are so obtuse (Open a PHONE?) that even when I follow a walkthrough TO THE LETTER, I still CANNOT CLEAR THE GAME. Also the game started glitching where sometimes the cursor will not be aligned correctly, so I have to select just underneath an object vs. the expected active area, and sometimes this means I cannot do the action I intended.

About the best things are
+ you don't need to play Deja Vu I to "enjoy" Deja Vu II
+ some of the graphics are nice for the era it was created
+ the "timed death" is much more fair

Some lesser nitpicks include
- all the bills look identical, so you have to Examine each one individually, wasting a turn (sometimes the conductor will kick you off the train just for being ONE SECOND late paying him)
- the woman who goes around randomly beating on you is purely a nuisance and feels like a waste of resources
- confusing directions in the hotel, where going back and forth between the lobby and the casino are up-and-right to go one way and down to go back the same way
- just not really enjoyable

Instead, play something like Lamplight City, or any game by Wadjet Eye Games. Much more fun for your time spent.

Actively DO NOT WANT

Let me be clear: I've played this style of game in the past, so I figured I knew what I was getting into again with another of the same, but I sat with a WALKTHROUGH and STILL found myself being arbitrarily killed for ABSOLUTELY NO REASON, well before I was even near the game end and with no apparent way to ever hope to finish the game.

In other titles, this was from random encounters, so that was an easy enough workaround of reloading until the encounter doesn't spawn. In THIS one, there is an unpassable obstacle that from that point sets a time limit (or, rather, a move limit) before you just die. Unavoidable, and as far as I can find, unwinnable.

Let's say it takes absolute minimum 100 moves to finish the game. 90 moves in, there's a riddle that requires an object. If you don't have the object, it's 20 moves to get it, and with death at 100 moves, OH WELL TOO BAD. Now, it's possible to reload to get a new riddle, where the object might be in your inventory, and I might consider that fair *enough* to give it a pass.

HOWEVER

it actually feels closer to 1000 moves (I'm not counting EXACTLY but basically more moves than I have the patience to perform perfectly optimally), plus moving things around in the inventory seems to count as a "move" even if it's not actually taken out of the inventory or used on anything else.

Furthermore, there's an inventory size limit -- which makes sense from a realistic standpoint, but the walkthrough I followed operated under no such limit, nor did it seem concerned by the slow arbitrary death trigger, which means either this port is needlessly harder or broken, or this was adjusted in the NES version.

I admit it's possible there's something I overlooked, but the short of it is this game is irritating and a joyless frustration to solve under the constraints given. If the trigger were closer to the end, so to allow a bit more exploration time, it would be more enjoyable -- or, at least, less frustrating -- but trying to squeeze what feels like 700 steps into 500 moves is more than enough to make me throw in the towel and say save your money and watch a Let's Play, or at least get the NES version maybe. Even on sale, this port feels like a rip-off.

Edit: Okay to be fair, the graphics are pretty good for the era it was made. Otherwise, there's not a lot of draw to play this as is. Like, there's basically no story other than "don't die" and no humour like with the Monkey Island series or similar. Puzzles are fine enough (although parsing some of them is iffy: "OPEN" a bucket??), but it's easy to have a torch suddenly burn out with no warning if you aren't paying attention. Would have been more realistic if the burning out torch gave some sort of warning if you weren't in a room with another light source, such as the light gets dimmer (it does exactly this if there is another light in the room you are in but your own torch goes out).

Cute! and FREE! How can you go wrong?? =o

IMPORTANT EDIT: Photosensitivity warning, this game has a LOT of flashing sequences

Usual caveat that the binary nature of the Steam review system means I tend to grade on a curve and only give a thumbs-down to a game I absolutely HATE.

Let me be honest, Neofeud is ugly and rough. Like, REALLY hard to look at, ugly. That said, I feel the crudeness of the art style actually fits the dystopian theme of the game, while having a style like, say, Deponia would make the game silly vs. gritty and actually work against the overall mood. As it is, the style makes me really connect with the classism (and sometimes speciesism and cyborg...ism?) depicted in the story.

My main complaints have to do with the odd glitches that appear here and there, usually from AGS (I assume, by the error messages familiar with other AGS games). For instance, rapidly clicking through to try to speedrun the game often causes a crash. I got an odd soft lock when messing around with the phone that unlocks with a blood sample (which is irritating when going for one of the "die/don't die" achievements since that requires a single playthrough with no loading). Other than that, there are character-specific descriptions that don't change after switching between characters. A few oddities that got missed in QA. Also not really fond of Proto-J constantly dropping N-bombs, but I see how it fits the character.

I can overlook all of that, though, since this is basically a one-person show. Frankly, that makes me forgive a lot of things, because doing literally EVERYTHING (except some voices) and finishing a whole game of this scope is nothing short of impressive. The music is fantastic, the lore is deep. If the glitches were fixed (a neverending battle from the sound of it for other AGS games), I would give Neofeud top scores. Really all that's keeping this out of a DEFINITE recommend rating is the glitching making the last couple of achievements nigh impossible to get, or at least increasingly frustrating to do it.

Once again, caveat that the binary nature of the Steam review system means I tend to grade on a curve if I don't flat out DESPISE a game.

That said, I see the game this was meant to be, and it's very cute with a neat battle system. The music is fantastic, both feeling nostalgically familiar but also distinctly for DON'T GIVE UP: A Cynical Tale. Certainly there are a few tweaks here and there that could improve the game:
- sometimes it's hard to go through doors, or tell which doors are active
- lots of empty areas that might have been for something but didn't get finished
- would like to be able to adjust text speed uniformly, rather than the first line always autoscrolls, with subsequent lines able to be skipped all at once (and possibly too fast)
- more than the one save slot
I overlook most of these because it's a very indie game (and feels more documentary than not), so I'm inclined to be more impressed that a single person can create this much content, vs. if this had been from a larger, established company. It is on the more difficult side (especially New Game +) if you aren't able to figure out the timing and boss patterns, but I do think it's worth a playthrough!

tl;dr: If you have played The 11th Hour before and/or (like me) have a physical copy you can no longer run, absolutely get this on the cheap during a Steam sale to have a copy that runs on modern computers. Otherwise, HARD PASS.

ts;dr:
Literally the only reason to play this game is for nostalgia, or MAYBE because you're a masochist. I can only recommend getting this because you already know EXACTLY what you're getting into, because even as someone who has played the prior game, The 7th Guest, I have a very difficult time liking The 11th Hour. I have a copy from back in the day that I never got around to playing, and I bought this when I figured it was much faster and cheaper to jump on the serendipitous Steam sale that was going on the exact instant I decided to finally play the game, only to realise I didn't have any way to run the game anymore, and heck if I was going to set up a Win95 machine (or fiddle with emulators or w/e, I'm not THAT interested in playing).

That said, I figured it would be more of the same, but it's... not. The main play mechanic I remember from The 7th Guest, that there were a number of rooms in the mansion that were initially inaccessible until you solve a puzzle in a different section is TECHNICALLY in The 11th Hour, but there is a new gimmick added where it's a sort of scavenger hunt with often incredibly obtuse hints that involve things like anagrams, homophones, or decryption. Because even the physical copy doesn't include anything explaining this, it took me until I had explored the entirety of the available mansion AND looking up a walkthrough to understand what the scavenger hunt clues even meant. That I had solved the first one accidentally and not even realised what I did didn't help matters.

The improvements from the prior game I can appreciate:
+ The hint book in the library is now a PDA thing that you carry around (the blue flashing around your hand indicates a new scavenger hunt hint, which is also not made clear and was rather offputting when starting out, so just letting you know)
+ The animations, especially going in between rooms, are much smoother than the prior game
+ PDA allows replaying the cutscenes
+ It runs, which was really all I was asking from this version especially for less than a dollar, even if I have to give my honest opinion about the actual game

The VERY LONG probably incomplete list of faults:
- Regardless of whether you have a save file, the game ALWAYS starts with the setup screen
- Pre-game setup ONLY includes a resolution setting
- Readme file has absolutely no content
- Setup screen is VERY UGLY while we're at it, and for some reason the "play the actual game" option is much smaller than other stuff
- The next gameplay screen is ALWAYS a brightness adjustment screen (which is you manually adjust your monitor to make the numbers in the skull eyes just barely visible, which may not exactly clear from the poem so I'm pointing that out also)
- Loading screens not skippable, and it is likely the game will crash if you impatiently click the mouse
- NO captions
- NO volume control
- The music feels more like carnival music than something fitting a spooky mansion (I've had it mentioned the music was the same way in the prior game, but I don't remember it being THIS mismatched)
- Often can't hear what the narrator is saying over the music/SFX (not that you'll want to after fumbling around looking for puzzles)
- Aforementioned lack of clarity what to do with the PDA hints
- Where The 7th Guest allowed you to wander around and solve whatever was accessible, The 11th Hour locks off clearly visible items from even being able to be examined until the correct criteria has been met (the Chapel in particular seems completely useless since nothing can be examined until much later in the game, despite walking through it many times to get to the Lab)
- The whole scavenger hunt element is irritatingly linear and frustrating, especially as it seems the same solution is used for two different hints
- Narrator is so irritating I have to point that out twice, it just got old VERY QUICKLY before realising he was belittling me at every turn for failing to solve the scavenger hunt I didn't know I was doing because I was just looking for the puzzles
- Speaking of puzzles, clicking the left or right side of the screen will reset/back out of a puzzle without any "are you SURE you want to reset??" kind of confirmation, which is VERY FRUSTRATING when many of them require a LOT of steps to solve them only to lose all progress so close to finishing
- Frankly, the cutscenes feel like they aren't related to the game at all because they feel like a completely different style, where in the prior game there was a lot of effort put into matching the scenes to the look of the mansion, and they had a ghostly quality that fit the visuals
- idk I just hate it
- oh also the game will likely soft-lock if you tab out, jsyk

In conclusion, again, if you ABSOLUTELY know what you're getting, feel free to get it! Otherwise, consider watching a Let's Play.