Recent reviews by dorkflame

Below Nowhere is a short, but incredibly intense horror game. It extracts the scariest aspects of games like Amnesia/Penumbra into levels consisting of short build-up and very tense maneuvering around an enemy, with various puzzles and gimmicks added for nice variety. The soundtrack is really good, especially at heightening the claustrophobia of the situations you're in. The story consists mostly of semi-related episodes told through notes, but the game has a few fun twists in its story and the way it's told in the last few levels.

Overall it's a great small horror game. Some may complain that it's short, but padding it out would not benefit it whatsoever. In my opinion Below Nowhere could sit comfortably next to Iron Lung as an example of an "indie horror gem".

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A note on pricing: I probably wouldn't have picked this game on my own at full price, but this entirely the fault of Steam's outlandish price multipliers for Poland. The current price of $16 sits right with me, but in PLN I pay 20% more. I have no idea why PLN is among Francs, Euro and Pounds when it comes to Steam pricing because it's nowhere as strong of a currency.

A game which encapsulates Gen Z's metairony the best when it comes to anything outside of social media and memes. Both a ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ and a genuine discussion of the many dystopian trends of the modern world, Cruelty Squad can be as abrasive as suggested by its intentionally jarring art style, but it doesn't stop it from being really fun.

The game's branching level design and varied gameplay options make a strong case for calling it an immersive sim. At the same time, it has quite a few moments where that design is quite inconsequential, because its frequently crushing difficulty will force you to really stick to the shortest and safest paths. A few of the secret final levels can even devolve into trial and error. My last complaint is that there are mixed signals about exploration; some levels contain unlockable secrets and hidden areas, but some have next to none of that. This unfortunately pushes you to look up online guides.

Other than that, great game. Go buy it and acquire the CEO mindset.

It's good, go check it out if the premise interests you. Not much replayability in my opinion, but definitely worth playing

I tentatively recommend this game, but play it on easy difficulty on your first run. It's atmospheric and really damn scary. Fantastic sound design and a very tactile gameplay feel, despite some jank. I found the story fitting and engaging enough, with a subtle emotional punch that actually got to me.

Why easy mode? Game was often frustrating on the normal difficulty. The monster has one-hit me out of nowhere several times and I had to replay large chunks of the game by no fault of my own. Easy mode has additional save points to counteract this. I also got stuck doing trial and error several times because I happened to run out of tools to scare the monster off with.

Ultimately though this game is pretty damn cool (especially the ending parts!) and I believe that you will have a great experience on Easy difficulty. It is also very worth to replay the game on a higher difficulty once you know your way around as you will likely discover several new strategies of dealing with obstacles and the RNG makes it fairly fresh too.

Vastly overrated. Half-life is a frequently unfair and a very frustrating game. It is full of unpredictable traps and other gotcha moments. Absurdly long stretches without health pickups during heavy combat mean that any semblance of fun is lost redoing the same segments over and over again. Save scumming is a core feature more than the shooting in this game.

At its best, Half-life mildly impresses with some quite clever platforming puzzles, but they get very rare after the first few chapters. At its worst, the game is a complete chore and frequently made we wish I could still refund it (final boss being one of the most egregious examples of this). Despite loving other classics from the same era (Deus Ex, Thief), I would advise to skip this game.

Fun and imaginative game with a decently realistic mental health angle. The exploration and puzzle design is fantastic and refreshing in the times of obvious level design and self-solving puzzles being the status quo. Worth playing for those elements alone.

Asides from that, the game manages to be scary every now and then, sometimes endearing and often hilarious (intentionally) without those moods being at odds. My only complaints would be the slightly floaty combat and some frustrations with boss presence stopping me from exploring the maps.

I can't recommend this mod enough; it is a more true sequel to Gothic 2 than the actual Gothic 3.

Every new thing in the mod is painstakingly true to the original - the visuals, animations, enemies, voice acting, crafting systems, character names, the writing and so on. Quest design is stellar. Many of the new locations are fantastic, and the rest are still great. Many subtle references to the previous games.

On top of that, the mod is equally long if not longer than Gothic 2 with its expansion, the quality is top notch the entire time and the story keeps finding new ways to keep you engaged. Hats off to all of the creators, this mod is pretty much a miracle.

Darkwood is a big, juicy thumbs up from me.

The world-building is stellar and this game is worth playing for this reason alone. The atmosphere and aesthetics are amazing. The gameplay is a unique mix of survival horror and the actual survival genre, as well as base defense, making a very fun gameplay loop. The horror is subtle and often uses the neatly-crafted soundscapes to make you paranoid, making for a very tense experience.

If you're worried about top-down 2D graphics not being your thing - so did I, but it quickly grew on me. The game features a lot of detailed item close-ups and character portraits that really spark your imagination, and the 2D environments are not to be sneezed at either.

Idk how to end this, if you're whatsoever intrigued by Darkwood just play it.

I mostly enjoyed this game, but would I recommend it? No.
"Scarlet" is not really worth 4 hours of your time unless you're a big fan of the series or you are starved for erotic horror. It doesn't go that far in any of its core themes. I know it's a free teaser game, but still.

It's honestly not a bad game! I can certainly see a lot of improvement since the first entry in the "Lust" series. The presented story was quite alright. I really enjoyed the puzzles and the exploration for the most part, but the clunkiness of the character controls was a considerable detriment to the experience.

EDIT:
After getting back to the game, I discovered it can actually be very fun. I guess my first playthrough had bad RNG and I ended up with a very uneventful campaign.
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For a low price, this was a fun game to play for a short time.
Long-term-wise, I couldn't get too much into it - after playing a campaign for around 12 hours, the game started feeling less like "satisfying management tasks" and more like a chore.

Maybe I am missing something, but I don't feel like playing it more than I have, and the game seems to have a dozen times more to offer. It just doesn't seem like what I haven't seen is any more fun than what I have seen.