Recent reviews by shammack

This is one of those demanding platforms kind of in the vein of Super Meat Boy or VVVVVV, but in this one, you play a chubby rabbit named Chubbit, and there's no jump button -- instead, you mostly move just left and right and touch tiles that bounce you in different directions and speeds depending on the type of tile. You use this to move through the levels and avoid enemies and spikes, collect leaves, and rescue your animal friends who were captured by an evil poison carrot or something. Each level has three different types of medal you can get based on your performance (though I'm not entirely certain what each one represents). There's also an overworld map with branching paths and areas that are locked off until you get enough medals, as well as boss fights and minigames.

I've only played about an hour and a half of this so far, and got a few levels into world 2. To be honest, I'm not really the intended target audience for this type of game. I don't have the dexterity to be good at it or the patience to bang my head against it over and over until I get better. (I had to look up a video on YouTube to find out how to get past the tutorial.) That being said, I'm still enjoying it pretty well. There are some concessions made for people like me, such as an optional bat character who can support you by allowing you to take several hits instead of dying instantly, and the ability to unlock checkpoints part of the way through the levels. They're still challenging, but possible. And you can choose to use these helpers or not on a per-level basis. If you want the full challenge you can just ignore them.

The controls are tight and the graphics are cute, and the music is great. There are also built-in timers for speedrunning and the game keeps track of a lot of different stats for you. There are unlockable alternate characters and color palettes, and probably other stuff that I haven't seen because I haven't gotten that far.

Overall, it's a well-made game and I'm enjoying it. I think people who are more into this genre would probably get more out of it than me, so if you're one of those I'd definitely recommend it, and if not, I still think it's worth checking out.

Nina Aquila: Legal Eagle is a fun adventure game with memorable characters and clever writing. It obviously takes some inspiration from the Ace Attorney series, but it has its own personality and goes in some interesting directions.

This game includes three chapters, but the first one is basically the tutorial/demo and the other two are much more substantial (so if you've played the demo and are on the fence, there is more to the game than what was shown there). Similar to Ace Attorney, part of the game is spent investigating crime scenes and gathering evidence, and the other part is in court, cross-examining witnesses and using the evidence you've gathered to point out contradictions to their testimony. Unlike Ace Attorney, the investigation phase is a bit more elaborate here -- you actually control an avatar and can roam around the city freely (more or less) and there are lots of NPCs to talk to, who usually have something amusing to say.

At certain points during the investigation, you need to play minigames in order to progress. The minigames are well made, but they do tend to kind of grind the story to a halt. I enjoyed the one in chapter 2 well enough that it didn't bother me, but I wasn't a fan of the one in chapter 3 at all, and you have to do it many times. Fortunately, the game gives you options for making the minigames easier (or even un-failable) if you just want to enjoy the story, but you still have to sit through them, and toward the end of the game it got to be a bit much for me and felt a little like padding. But I have to give them credit for trying some interesting ideas.

The story and characters are the main draw here. Nina is a likable protagonist and I enjoyed spending time with her and a cast of quirky (but not in an annoying way) side characters. The cases are engaging, if not terribly challenging, and there are some twists that I certainly didn't expect. I will say that there are quite a few story elements that get brought up but are left unresolved, presumably to be addressed in a sequel, so I hope that that actually happens. Even so, the conclusions of these episodes are satisfying enough, and the game left me wanting more.

This is obviously a low-budget game, but they've spent the money well, with some very nice art for the main character portraits and other accents. The sprites and maps look good; I don't know how much of it uses stock RPG Maker assets, if any, but whatever the case, the art style feels cohesive and polished, and there are some nice lighting and effects. The music is catchy and the sound design is fun.

Also, it plays great on Steam Deck (although by default, it only accepts the left stick for movement; I modified my configuration to use the D-pad as an analog stick so I could use that instead, which felt more natural to me given that you can only move in the four cardinal directions).

Overall, this game feels like a labor of love; you can tell that the author was passionate about what they were making and about the other games/anime/etc. that are referenced. It's not perfect, but I highly recommend it and I hope we get a season two.