Zootopia (1 and 2)

Disney doing something right!

These animated flicks where everyone is an anthropomorphic animal takes place in Zootopia, where predators and prey live in peace and "anyone can be anything". That doesn't mean it will be easy though as learned by protagonist bunny cop Judy Hopps who takes in on herself to take on a missing persons case and discover why some predators are going feral. 

Zootopia 2 continues the story of our heroes and does more world building with another case, and while its still a good watch it isn't as strong as the first one.

Regardless, both have good CGI, a well written plot, cute and likeable characters, and many funny moments to boot! Disney is doing very well with these. Highly recommended!

Styx: Master of Shadows and Styx: Shards of Darkness

Being a sneaky rakash is fun!

It's been awhile since I've played a great stealth game and both these Styx games definitely fall into this category. In it you play the titular goblin who is agile, quiet, and has an assortment of skills to deal with the many foes. The main one being that you can barf out a clone of yourself!? Yeah. That's actually a main one in the first game - Master of Shadows - that ties closely to the really cool story.

Having a good story and a funny, sarcastic protagonist ticks a lot of boxes actually. But having maps that you can approach in a multitude of ways is even better. If you want to play non-lethal, you can. If you want to play complete non-detection, you can. If you want to murder everyone, you can... almost. That last one might be tricky as there are people harder to kill than others, but patience, luring and handy environmental stuff can defeat even the most armored enemies. It's a little easier in Shards of Darkness that lets you craft some nasty things and unlock skill trees that can bypass some defenses.

"I see you..."

Usually though you want to remain hidden as many enemies can insta-kill you (and on the hardest "goblin" mode, all of them can insta-kill you), and even those that don't slay you out right have a decent chance of taking you out if your parry timing isn't good and/or there's more than two of them. Sure melee combat might feel a bit rough but I think that's intentional. All up these two are super fun for those who enjoy the sneaky thief type games. Highly recommended!

Helldivers 2: Ten Super Credit Farming Tips

If you're like me and just want to unlock all those warbonds in Helldivers 2 without opening your wallet then here are some quick tips to farm super credits! Note: While the tips are quick, the farming is going to be a bit of a grind... :P

1 - Desert planets yield more opportunities. More land space = more chance for points of interest on the map. My regular ones are Choohe and Vernen Wells against the automatons and Grand Errant against the terminids. 

Stars in the red circles give an approximate location of these three worlds.

2 - For the same reason above - illegal broadcast and drop pod data missions are the best ones to do as space isn't "wasted" with enemy bases or other facilities. If those aren't available, do one of the others types on the same planet to let them show up again - ideally an eliminate [single target] one as those are faster than flag raising, activating fuel pumps and sabotaging supply bases.

3 - Difficulty wise level 1 trivial missions are the best for super credits as you don't get "samples" in the pool of RNG treasures when you open up a POI. 

4 - If you have friends or allies, try do some farming with them as the locked bunkers that need two people to open have lots of chances for super credits. Anyone picks up super credits or medals, everyone (regardless of where they are on the map) gets the full amount.

5 - Regardless if you have friends the first warbond you unlock should be the "Control Group" to get the warp pack. Having this lets you teleport into those two button bunkers by yourself, improving your solo grinding immensely! If you find its "bouncing" you out instead of teleporting you in, stand back a little and/or crouch before warping. When warping out, always aim angled left to avoid exploding the potential fork lift outside which might kill you.

6 - Pick a load out for speed: Light armor, sprinting bonuses, the warp pack when you have it. Explosive grenade or weapon to open containers. You might even find such a weapon on planet. Treat it as your "lockpick" with a preference on fast fire / open rate.

7 - Even if my "green" common samples are full, I still pick them up at each POI so that the map marker changes from a white diamond to a regular gray pointer. It takes a little more time, but it lets me not worry about remembering where I've been. The sample count also gives me an idea of how many more spots there might be.

8 - I still do the mission and extraction because I'm interested in leveling up my weapons for customization, but if you have no interest in that and don't care about your win record feel free to just quit the mission as soon as you've hit all the POI's as any super credits and medals picked up are immediately "safe". 

9 - In every warbond, except the premium HALO one currently, there are 300 super credits to unlock which is great. 

10 - To retain your skills and sanity, after every unlocked warbond or two go into a few random super helldive missions (at least one against each faction) and spread democracy!

KPop Demon Hunters

What a good excuse to get musical numbers in!

Demons have always been trying to invade the world but since the beginning of time there have always been a trio of battle bardic women who destroy them with magic weapons but also trap them in hell with their songs. The most modern trio is on the verge of locking them in for good, but hell sends through their last hope: a demon boy band!?

It is easy to see why this movie is so popular, and not just from the songs which are also quite enjoyable. The super powered starlet heroines are frequently shown in a comical and very humanizing light and despite the whole demons eating everyone's souls bit the tone is light enough for everyone to enjoy. Excellent and highly recommended! 

Ogu and the Secret Forest and Sable

A pair of exploration games!

Ogu and the Secret Forest 

In this silly and happy cartoonish game you play as the baby platypus Ogu who armed with a hat and butterfly net sets out on an adventure on a strange island which has lots of puzzles to solve, friends to make (who you can call to help pass obstacles) and enemies to beat up...? Yeah this turned out to be a much bigger game than I first thought with plenty of places to go and things to do. There's a bit of a clash between the cutesy animal art style and activities such as dancing, fishing and drawing versus beating up the dangerous enemies (you can turn on god mode as an option because they can get pretty mean) but its all rather fun with very simple controls. Will especially be of interest to explorers, collectors and those that enjoy RPG Maker type games. 

Sable

The visuals are so different, its great!

This is an amazingly drawn exploration and puzzle jumping game with a very simple story that actually has no bad guy. Indeed I don't think you can even die in it which makes it quite relaxing. Good controls and the ability to climb, glide and ride your customizable hover bike across the large map make it fun to explore, with very hard to find collectable stuff for those who seek to do so. The many optional side missions are quite cute and are the actual "meat" of the game. Apart from the optional fishing mini-game (which as usual I don't have the patience for) I really enjoyed this one. 

This War of Mine

Fighting despair... 

This is a super cool survival game where you attempt to guide your group of civilians to have enough resources and survive a modern civil war. At night you can send one person to try scavenge or trade stuff but getting killed is pretty easy to do if you aren't careful. More dangerous than bullets and raiders is the winter though, and simply getting sick due to the cold and not having enough medicines to stave of death is a tough one. Your people also have moral compasses so while you can go steal and kill others it almost always ends up breaking your morale towards uselessness and or suicide.  

It's a grim and bleak game but one done so very well. The lack of a tutorial works here, and the difficulty levels come from the groups of people you unlock per play through. My starting trio was pretty good as they all could contribute some special thing (though I think 2 out of 3 were suicidal towards the end) while I had a much harder time when I only had an elderly couple or a group with a pregnant lady (who can't run or leave the base). This might be the only survival type game I've played multiple times. Highly recommended.

Ranking of Kings

An anime with excellent characters.

This currently two season anime adventure series follows the little prince Bojji who dreams to become a great king like his heroic father, but has some huge obstacles in his way the least of which being that he is small, weak and deaf. The art style is a simple one which lends itself to the child's tale but there are a number of great action sequences and even more great emotional moments in this fantastic story which gives even the side characters little arcs and goes to great lengths to show that no one is one hundred percent bad... or good. Absolutely fantastic series and one I highly, highly recommend!

Alas the second season, titled "The Treasure Chest of Courage" is a collection of short stories that take place in between various episodes of the first season. While it is very fun to have more screen time with these characters, it's structure alone makes it difficult for it to compete with the excellence of season one. Still worth a try if you get into it. 

Adolesence and Twilight of the Gods

Two Netflix series about killing!

Adolesence

This four episode British series starts off with the arrest of a 13 year old boy for murder and goes from there. It's a pretty heavy story in terms of content but also features excellent cinematography and acting, the primary reason for which is that each of the one hour episodes is all shot in a single take with no cuts. This is excellent TV and is high on my recommended list.

Twilight of the Gods (Season 1)

This Norse themed animated series has a high content of violence, gore, nudity and sex - definitely not for younger audiences! It follows a vengeful bride to be who goes after Thor with the help of Loki and more than a few other Norse mythological beings. I like the art style and the flowing animation but it suffers from characters passing the idiot ball which makes the tale far less epic than it's trying to be. I'll watch season 2 if they make it but am not so fussed if it never happens either.

Viticulture World: Cooperative Expansion

An amazing game about making wines!

Prelude: The base game of Viticulture is a competitive one which we didn't play but is required to play this cooperative expansion. Made by the same people who created Wingspan, Viticulture World is a worker placement game with differing actions per season, across a time limit of 6 years (and differing "world" event cards change the flow drastically). By then each player must be at 25 victory points (or more) and the influence token must also have reached the "full" end of its track.

I won't lie, this was a bit complicated to get started with and the rule book could have used a full cheat sheet of symbols somewhere so expect your first game to be a really long one (especially if like us, you haven't played the base game) but once you've got it it's actually pretty simple! Simplified per season its just:

Spring: As a team you place your rooster on the "time" clock which determines what bonus you get right now (might be a card, money, extra worker or 1 VP) and what order you will be placing workers down for this year.

Summer: Place workers to get seeds, plant them, give tours, construct buildings, develop new tech (important if you want to win), and use summer visitors.

Fall: Move your roosters to the inner part of the time clock and either gain a card, money or age a grape.

Winter: Harvest grapes, turn grapes into wine (very cool), use winter visitors and fill wine orders to gain VP!

In addition to the main board each player gets their own player mat to keep track of their buildings, fields and most importantly grapes and wines, both of which get older each year to a max of 9, and turning grapes into wine makes retains their age (eg 3 year old grapes make 3 year old wine, unless you don't have a "3" slot which makes it reduce to a "2" slot etc).

Orders usually ask for a combo of wines at around 4 or just one of the 7-9 rank ones and having a discard down to 5 cards rule at the end of each year makes it important for you to trade with your friends to make the most of each turn. There's way more to it than what I've written but that's the gist of it.

Now buying the base game AND this expansion is a bit pricey, but if your cooperative group likes tough games with not necessarily a lot of combat (like the cooperative mode of Wingspan) then this is a good investment for you. If your group isn't cooperative then just the base Viticulture should do, but I can't comment on how good or not good that is. :P

Arcade Paradise

The ultimate mini game chill out collection.

In first person business simulation game, you are put in charge of a laundromat that happens to have a small backroom with a few arcade games. I was quite worried about this game with the whole "business simulation" bit and grungy animation intro but when that last drawing fades into the crisp 3D view - I was quickly hooked. Especially since almost everything you do is income. Do the laundry mini-game? Get money. Pick up trash? Get money. Yank gum off furniture? Get money.

The game loop is very cool and quite relaxing and I for one enjoyed the laundry, but the whole point of the game is to expand the arcade space and number of arcade games (your only real expenses) on site which just generates passive income. And you can play ALL of them. Sure, a lot are re-skins of old classics but that doesn't make them any less fun. The carrot there is by completing goals on them they start making even more passive money. To do all this AND have a simple story arc mixed in there? Awesome. I ended up playing this A LOT. Highly recommended!

Helldivers 2

The battle to spread managed democracy continues in this four player co-op that has stayed true to the old original while making the game better! You still have grenade-like stratagems to call down to deal with aliens, still have to find resources planet side and still have your super destroyer double as a game lobby to spend research and unlock gear. And there is also still some really epic music backing everything up!

The biggest improvement is the change of view in mission. Where previously it was a top-down affair where you were limited by the screen where your squad was and couldn't wander off on your own, now it is an over the shoulder camera with optional first person view when you aim down the sights of some weapons. This means you can definitely split up to tackle more objectives but death still comes as hard, fast, and usually with a mix of hilarity and annoyance. It's easily taken over our Friday game night sessions and is a real blast to play especially if you have a dedicated squad to play with. You can join other random Helldivers but your milage may vary - that's not something I've tried. Highly, highly recommended, even if Sony is doing BS things to try ruin it for everyone. Greed much?

Whatever Sony ass-hat tried to get that decision through needs to be fired, captured, and fed to aliens. FOR LIBERTY!

Frieren: Beyond Journey's End (Season 1) and Strong Girl Nam-soon (Season 1)

Featuring female protagonists that make you laugh and cry. In a good way.

Frieren: Beyond Journey's End (Season 1)

 
This anime is a strange masterpiece. It takes place in a Dungeons and Dragons like fantasy world focusing on Frieren the long lived elf mage, and the story begins with her and the party of heroes having saved the world from a demon king - usually the end of a campaign but that's ok, because this is a mostly a melancholic drama about characters growing as people. As a bonus there just happens to be a good portion of awesome action sequences on top of the excellent art, music and story. I'm sorry Blue Lock, this is now my favorite anime as it regularly hits me in the feels. Highly recommended!

Strong Girl Nam-soon (Season 1)

This continuation in the world of Strong Girl Bong-soon gives us a new cute protagonist but unlike Bong-soon, Nam-soon (and her family) has no problems making use of her superhuman strength in public. While yes, there are bad guys who just happen to be idiots despite their good looks, this is mainly a love story with a heavy focus on humor. This works for the most part but in the few episodes where Nam-soon is taking a back seat in the plot it can get quite taxing... Ultimately if you enjoyed Bong-soon you'll probably like this too, but just don't expect it to be as good.

Unicornus Knights

Anime stylized box artof a happy princess doesn't do it justice.

This is one of the best designed games I've ever played. I hope that's a strong enough start for you, especially given how many board games I've already reviewed. In this cooperative war game, up to six players must somehow guide the revenge hungry princess to defeat the emperor (before time runs out!?).

The setup can be a tad lengthy especially if you aren't used to how the flower shaped tiles are meant to be joined together, but the summary is that the princess starts at the furthest part away from the Emperor. Most of the tiles in between are ruled by randomly chosen Empire leaders while the farthest edges are where the princesses allies (that's the players) start. Game play from here goes pretty quick!

On a turn each player will either be collecting knights, gathering supplies, sending those to someone else, drawing a bonus card or moving. Now each knight adds another die to your combat roll, but to move you must pay one supply per knight! This means big armies move slowly, especially over difficult terrain. If you end up in a space with an enemy, roll your dice. Some characters are better at attacking, some better at defending, and some are better not fighting at all.

When the bad guys move it's simple: blue ones stay put no matter what, white ones (or leaderless ones) will only move at you if you walk right beside them, and red ones will always move one space closer to the nearest enemy. As soon as they are one step away from a player (or the princess) most of them get a fate card which can really shift the game as some can be made friends and ALL of them have an ally power.

As for the princess, she comes in different flavors too with the easiest being one the players can control (the others just always max move towards emperor like an idiot). She can have the largest army but that also means potentially move the slowest, and in combat she doesn't roll dice. Instead the bad guys do the maximum damage they can on her (and her forces) and if she still lives - even if its just her with 1 HP left, she obliterates anything on her space - making her both the weakest and strongest piece on the board.

That's really the bulk of it, but those fate cards that make each villain different per game are awesome - meaning each telling of this tale is memorable and different from the last. Highly recommended!

Andor and The Foundation

More stories set in space!

Andor

This currently one season prequel Star Wars series decided to break the trend and totally ignore the whole Jedi vs Sith space wizard thing and instead focuses on the regular non-powered folk like the titular Cassian Andor (played by Diego Luna) and the events leading up to the formation of the rebellion in the first place (a second and final season is on its way). Like the Mandalorian there are fantastic visuals here and good costumes but unlike the Mandalorian it is almost devoid of action and instead is all talking in a plot that moves glacially. That will definitely turn some viewers away but I still like it, as the writing is better - which it has to be if that's the main draw. Definitely worth a try - but if you don't like the first episode then you can just tune out for the rest. :P

The Foundation

Humanity is doomed and the only thing they can do is prepare a repository of tools and knowledge to help the future generations rebuild. A sort of "Foundation". Such is the prediction of Hari Seldon (played by Jared Harris) formulated from his expertise in psycho history which is a mathematical way of predicting the future. Of course the ever-ruling and usually evil Emperor Day (Lee Pace is excellent) doesn't like the sound of this and moves to squash this heresy. Does that plot sound crazy to you? It is! And it is also absolutely fantastic!

Amazing visuals help the fantastic writing of this so far two season sci-fi series. While it is actually low on action for the most part, the script and acting are just mesmerizing. My only problem with it is that is spans SOOOO many centuries, so it takes a little while to get your head around who is who one episode to the next especially in season one. If you can survive that brain bending then I can highly recommend this awesome series and I can't wait for the next season. Five out of five!

Blue Lock (Season 1)

An anime about... death match soccer!?

Anime can be just about anything these days, so when it focuses on something mundane (for me at least) like sports I normally opt to skip it. This one is all about soccer, and how the titular experimental Blue Lock facility is trying to generate the best striker out of 300 participants in a series of pseudo death match / knockout trials.

It is fantastic!

Good art, decent story, excellent characters who elicit viewer emotion and almost each episode ends with you wanting to watch the next one. I'm not a sports guy, but I got totally hooked on this and am now waiting for season two! Highly recommended, I even prefer it over Chainsaw Man. You can watch episode 1 here (and probably find the rest too, if you search for it).

Warframe: The Duviri Paradox

When feelings spiral out of control.

This update is so much fun. After playing through the main Duviri story which would only be at most three hours, you are then invited to return to the emotional dreamscape in one of three modes: "The Lone Story" is basically the speed run version of doing 6 tasks to get construction materials from the end boss. "The Duviri Experience" has the 6 main tasks but also has TONS of side activities to do in Duviri's open world and "The Circuit" which is for people that just want to stay in warframes - an endless cycle of standard warframe missions but with the twist that you can pick what rewards you are working towards.

The Duviri Experience is my favorite mode, and I stay in that world for much longer after the six "main" tasks are done to the point that I kinda forget I'm playing Warframe. I think its because every little thing you do lets you power up via "decrees". Maybe you killed a bad guy patrol, or solved a puzzle, went fishing, or played warframe guitar hero - bam! You get a decree which powers you up and these stack till you leave Duviri, at which point you need to start from scratch. For me, that's just fine because you get so overpowered so quickly it is great fun. It's even better in a group because if any individual does any task anywhere on the map, the entire team gets rewarded!

Decrees also help mitigate the fact that you might not have your regular gear on hand. This is because at the start of each Duviri outing you must choose from a limited, randomized pool of warframes and weapons to bring. While some will be what you own, there will be things that you don't thrown in the mix (unless you are legendary rank 3 and own everything I guess). There are always three times in the main quest where you'll need to use a warframe, and if you're stuck with unfamiliar or weak items you might be in trouble... OR NOT, because those decrees carry on into the warframe mode too - so as long as you are overloaded with boons, you should be fine regardless.

Excellent update, and if Soulframe is anything like this I'm definitely going to look into it. If you'd prefer a more visual experience of Duviri without downloading Warframe, DL has put up some videos.

Waiting for Duviri: The Eigth Ebb

This time it's all ship and ocean themed games!

Call of the Sea

How can a Lovecraft inspired game not be horror? This first person puzzler certainly rocks that boat, and is pretty good to boot. Decent voice acting and gorgeous colored art helps usher you along from one puzzle to the next as the story takes you along for the ride. I have to say this has one of the strongest starting quest hooks I've come across in awhile but it lost me once I reached the trial and error puzzles.

Submerged: Hidden Depths

A pair of siblings work to "save" a flooded city being claimed by black tentacles, by making the tentacles ... not black? Despite the premise and the watery wasteland setting this is a very chillaxed exploration game with no chance of failure. Even the Assassin's Creed level of parkouring that takes place is all automatically handled by your regular controls which is a good change of pace. A little annoying that completing the main goal of an area returns you to the main hub though, meaning you might have to repeat it for any missed collectibles.

Maneater

In this game you are a shark out to eat stuff to get bigger and cause chaos in general. Nice graphics, decent controls and a cool mechanism that eating things both heals you and nets you a type of currency to evolve and become a stronger shark are quickly overshadowed by the annoyingly large grind present in this single player game. Since you start out small you need to be careful around the bigger carnivores in the water but gaining mass to challenge said enemies takes a long while. Quests can help, but when the quest is kill x catfish, but specifically catfish in this area and not the other catfish all over the place, that kinda pisses me off. Not recommended.

World of Warships

This popular multiplayer game is all about collecting and upgrading all manner of ships from around the world's history and then pitting them in missions against others which includes team elimination or area control. Small, fast maneuverable ships have less turrets and less hitpoints while the lumbering battleships bring lots of firepower and HP. There is no respawn when you die. You can either continue to watch as an observer or return to your dock and play another ship out to battle (as your destroyed one is locked for the duration of the match I think). Despite a mode of coop vs AI, the game quickly pushes you into the direction of PvP which is not something I'm interested in. The cash shop messages are also annoying.

Kerbal Space Program

On to ships of the space faring variety - this highly rated game failed immediately for me because as one can imagine, running a space program isn't all fun and games if you want to get anywhere. There's a heavy dose of reading, an unfriendly but functional interface (that might be by design) and my nemesis: math! The steep learning curve is to the moon! Blergh.

The Captain

This is the best old school point and click adventure game I've come across. In it, you must captain your space ship to find special macguffins and make it back to Earth in time to use said macguffins to win a war. Yes there is a timer, and you definitely start in a galaxy FAR FAR away with many potential stops on the way. And that is the beauty of it - everything is optional with each stop even having multiple potential outcomes. I basically sacrificed everything and everyone for the mission, and it let me. Best of all the puzzles are easy, even with the "future tech" terms. The weakest part of the game is the combat, but you don't need to fight a single thing to win the game. Highly recommended!

Mom (TV Series)

An addictive series that deals with addiction.

This eight season uplifting comedy follows the lives of a mother daughter duo (wonderfully portrayed by Anna Faris and Allison Janney) who are both recovering addicts that start out vehemently hating each other. The sharp writing excellently handles the light hearted comedy with sudden, very heavy topics being thrown in the mix and back again which makes almost all the characters endearing with loads of room for growth. 

We could watch this show all day.

This trait makes it easy to overlook the lower budget technical stuff (like green screen) used here, as well as how it becomes quite noticeable how little anyone actually eats despite a good chunk of the show taking place at a bistro. Just very minor points on an overall very entertaining and fun series. Highly recommended, and as a plus, the episodes run for a very short 20 minutes which makes it easy to dip your toe in.

Top Gun: Maverick

Talk to me Goose.

Since Maverick (Tom Cruise) never got over the events from the previous movie, which you don't really need to watch as there are quick flashback sections for it, he remains at a rank where superiors can push him around and create drama. Luckily he is also the pilot with the most dog fighting experience in recent history which is why he is recruited back into "Top Gun" to train some top tier pilots to do one particularly difficult mission.

It's a simple premise when boiled down, but it does everything perfectly - especially the flight segments. There's good tension where there needs to be, good character building, decent humor, and is captivating and entertaining at the same time. Highly, highly recommended. I give this five geese out of five.

Crokinole

Simplicity at its finest.

This big wooden circle is ridiculous both in cost and in the simplicity of rules. In it, two players (or two pairs of players as teams) compete to be the first to score 100 or over. Using your 12 buttons (wooden discs) each (or 6 in the pairs teams version) you simply want to end as close to the center as possible to score the most points and you do this by taking turns flicking your colored buttons from your firing line quadrant.

Yep. It's just a big circle.

The rules are as follows:

1 - You must keep one ass cheek on your chair at all times and cannot move your chair once the game begins.

2 - If there are no enemy pieces on the board, your shot or another of your buttons hit by your shot must end inside or touching the inner circle - otherwise that shot and any other friendly button it touched is removed.

3 - If there ARE enemy pieces on the board, your shot or another of your buttons MUST hit one of the enemy pieces - otherwise that shot and any other friendly button it touched is removed.

Once all the buttons have been used you score (with those touching lines scoring the lower value) and the winner gets the difference in points, meaning you might need to play a few rounds before a true winner is revealed. This is very cool since it allows for comebacks from 85/0 for example (I speak from experience). Or you can just play single rounds which is also fun and requires less mental work.

It is ridiculously fun mainly due to the simplicity and speed of the game. There is almost no barrier to entry as rules explanation is fast. Turns are fast. Setup is fast. Take down is fast. Yet there are often lots of decent decisions to be made.

It's easily become my most played, simplest, most expensive, largest, and favorite game. Highly recommended! Note that this comes in varying sizes, and you'll want a big one. :)