I’ve decided to retroactively make this an entry in the Short Sessions series. I like the title a lot and it keeps things simpler. The series is no longer just about abandoned games, but also shorter games in general.
This is a series about the shorter PC games I’ve completed or abandoned recently.
Shardlight
Developer: Wadjet Eye Games | Released: 2016 | Genre: Adventure, Point & Click
Another classic retro-style point-and-click adventure game, set in an post-apocalyptic world where a young woman with a deadly plague is searching for a cure. Conventional and very pixelated.
This game was too pixelated for my liking. Since I have a 32″ monitor, it felt like playing on a color sibling to the old ZX81 home computer. That was a little disappointing coming from Whispers of a Machine. Of course, that game was not from the same producer – so perhaps it’s not a fair comparison.
I admit this one never really did it for me. Even exploring the market after solving the reactor in the sewer felt stale. The dialog and the screens were uninspired and I revisited the same locations over and over. The puzzle in the alley was the last straw. After learning what to do on the internet, I facepalmed hard. I even thought about that solution before looking it up, then rejected it as being too far out.
The Unfinished Swan
Developer: Giant Sparrow | Released: 2020 | Genre: Adventure, First Person
A fascinating first person exploration game with minimalistic and stylish graphics. In the beginning I was just splatting paint to reveal the world around me and I was afraid that would pretty much be it. But later, buildings would be visible at first and I had to shoot water at vines for making them grow, thereby creating paths for me to climb and shimmy along. And then there was that dark chapter too.
Some excellent ideas. Some of them were overused, like growing those vines to get around, others were thankfully sparsely used before they became annoying. The splatting of paint and later water made for a lot of clicking on the left mouse button. I’m quite sure my index finger wasn’t happy when the credits arrived, which by the way they did as part of the gameplay. Developers should do that more often.
Growing those vines for climbing often felt like busywork and for that reason I really think it was overused. Just as I arrived at a secluded area away from the vines I had grown for miles, new vines were visible for even more growing. Groan. I wish they introduced its replacement a little bit earlier than they did.
I could shoot balloons for a collection quest, and to buy “toys” on the title screen.
A swan was running ahead of me, sometimes helping me with yellow footprints or a honk somewhere. I could never catch up to it. It was just there to show me the way whenever there could be any doubt.
I liked having to shooting at small badminton bats on wheels to do things such as e.g. raise gates or lower a bridge. And that fire hose! It felt like having the water splatting equivalent of a mini gun.
I didn’t like the way the kid (which was the protagonist) kind of fell down the stairs instead of walking on them properly. That felt like the developer couldn’t be bothered fine tuning it, to feel right.
After reaching the top of a tower in the city at the center of the enormous maze, I entered a chapter with blackness. I had to walk to light bulbs and shoot them to scatter the light a bit. Later one fell down and I had to shoot it ahead of me, into a river, then follow it closely to avoid getting slashed by spiders.
You had to put dangerous animals in this game? Really!? They felt like they didn’t belong.
Another novel idea came in that black chapter – entering a polygon creation world through a window, then creating polygon blocks for jumping on. It felt like a very simple level editor for a 3D game. This could easily have become annoying, but it actually worked well for me. But I imagine it will have its haters.
I found the king in the end and now he told his story in a few levels of his own. At one point, credits started appearing on the walls of the buildings he crawled past. Someone asked, “Your dream has credits?”
Psychonauts 2
Developer: Double Fine Productions | Released: 2021 | Genre: 3PS, Adventure
The much praised sequel to the original game, released no less than 16 years later. A third person platform and combat game with psychic powers such as telekinesis, PSI blasts, pyrokinesis, levitation, and so much more. The game had a heavy focus on story and sometimes felt like playing a Pixar movie.
I both loved and hated the first game when I completed it in 2012. The Milkman Conspiracy was a fantastic level, but it also had the hateful Meat Circus level that probably subtracted a year or two of my lifespan.
This second game felt like the gameplay was dialed up to 11. If a video game could suffer from ADHD, this could be a contender for the top spot. It had too many cutscenes, too much story, too much of everything. Sometimes I couldn’t walk two meters until a new cutscene triggered. It constantly wanted my attention in one way or another, and I was bombarded with new gameplay features.
I also didn’t like the combat much. The thing with my psychic powers being suitable for different kinds of enemies had me toggling around a lot of hotkeys on my keyboard. Sometimes I accidentally brought up the File Explorer. It made me feel old. I don’t like to feel old when it comes to video games. At least not yet.
Exo One
Developer: Exbleative | Released: 2021 | Genre: Adventure, Sci-Fi
Sort of a dream-like game flying or rolling a small sphere across the surface of a planet, trying to reach a slanted transport tower for traveling to the next planet.
The sphere could roll on the ground of a planet, controlling gravity downhill then releasing to gain speed uphill, followed by changing shape for gliding through the air. This used up energy and I had to either recharge by rolling again or by gliding through clouds.
There were probably about a dozen planets to get through. Most were relaxing to glide and roll through until the transport tower warped me to the next planet while showcasing effects from movies such as 2001: A Space Odyssey. The planets looked awesome – they reminded me of when I was driving the Mako around on planets in the first Mass Effect. Same kind of epic visuals.
Unfortunately, not all levels were fun to traverse. Some were actually quite frustrating. In the beginning, I didn’t like the water planets either, but I soon learned to surf the waves while gliding, and then they were okay. However, the asteroids around the sun were a nightmare to navigate. The sphere easily left the screen which was disorienting, and it was difficult to escape the gravity of an asteroid.
The planet that zapped most of my powers wasn’t all that much fun either. I could only jump and control gravity, which was like playing tennis with both hands tied on my back and hitting the ball with the racket held between my teeth. Sometimes lightning temporarily switched on all my powers for a short while.
The Norwood Suite
Developer: Cosmo D | Released: 2017 | Genre: Adventure, First Person
This was in the same style as the free game Off-Peak. It took place in and around a hotel, getting items from people for other items in return. Lots of colorful art and local loudspeaker music everywhere.
Unfortunately, I didn’t get to see even an hour of this two hour game. First I had to dial it back to 32-bit mode just to get it started, and then it kept crashing after less than half an hour. At one point the road even disappeared and I fell into the void, then respawned at the hotel entrance. Unfortunately, I needed a voucher and it was inside a box on the other side of a gate that was now impossible to open.
After restarting twice and experiencing a third mid-game crash, I gave up. A shame, since it had amusing dialog (people kind of “sang” their words with samples or piano keys) and relaxed fetch puzzles.
See also: Short Sessions, Part 18