Exploring The itch.io Collection #2

I've already got three articles' worth of stuff from itch.io, so you know what, I think I'll get through them right away. Still very short games here, all requiring under 10 minutes to finish.

Experiences

One of my biggest issues with these itch.io articles, right
now, is how I keep having the reflex to say these games
are short. They still take under 10 minutes to finish
at the moment!

Good Morning Hon: A game that I believe was made on RPG Maker. The story of Ash, who lives in her apartment with her fiancée Eve. That morning, she cannot shake the feeling after getting up that something’s not quite right. Sweet, yet with a devastating twist. “Why do I feel like I’m forgetting something?”

Homing: A 3D game about how carrier pigeons always find their destination. The letter being sent is recited as we follow a pigeon on its journey towards the letter’s recipient. You can control the pigeon to fly left and right, but once you let go it will always course correct towards the goal. You can get new bits of text based on which blue buildings you fly over. Clever!

It may be low-poly, but it's still looking nice.

HubWorld: In first-person view, you travel around four hub “worlds” (hence the title) while accompanied by vaporwave-ish music. The worlds are dubbed Island, Forest, World and Sky, and moving around is all you can do. Want to see the next level? Just left-click, and you’re there. The game ends after the fourth level. This one kind of hurt my eyes after a moment, and the lack of interactivity with anything meant I didn’t feel a need to spend much time playing it.

This one is a classic, for a good reason!

The Majesty of Colors: I loved this one! You play as someone’s dream, in which they were one giant underwater creature with three eyes. You control its lone tentacle, and it becomes aware of the human world after grabbing a balloon. From there, you can choose to befriend humans, rescue people or toss fish into fishermen’s boats. Or you can be hostile, kill people by dragging them underwater, and see the armed response with bombs and torpedoes. I’m told this is a remake of a classic web game? This one has five possible endings depending on your choices, so although it can be finished in five minutes, there’s enough to discover by replaying and trying different avenues to make it worth coming back to.

I spot a light in the distance. Must be relevant.

What Happened To Survey Team 4?: A walking simulator in which your character is investigating the disappearance of a team in the wilderness. All you can do is follow the path. Occasionally, you can find data cards with text from those you’re looking for, or glowing balls that you (ironically) can’t use to light the way as the night falls. This game has a horror vibe to it and offers good ambiance. For a game allegedly made in less than a day’s worth of time, it’s not bad, but it is a little empty.

Equaboreal 12.21: Set at the Winter Solstice in a world of sentient plants (that somehow wear clothes… don’t ask), the village is worried as a coming shipment of light, their main source of nutrients, has gotten lost in the woods. Basic controls moving around, not a ton of gameplay to be had. Putting aside the slightly absurd tone, the story didn’t feel all that interesting. Still, its creator likes the project enough to have made additional chapters.

Self-care

Yeah, just a "look out the window while listening to
vaporwave" simulator.

…might just ditch this category if I fail to find enough games for it, and add it to Social reach instead.

VIRTUA BLINDS: Blinds simulator. Not blindness; blinds. Watch the skies change as the day comes and goes outside, turn on the lamp, get rid of the clutter of post-it notes on the desk, turn on the TV and its vaporwave music, and relax. That’s all. Not much else to it. It can be soothing, but chances are that unless you’re big on vaporwave you won’t give this one much of a chance beyond 5, maybe 10 minutes.

Social reach

Well, Mrs. Goldman, I didn't expect to meet you
at this point in time!

Conversations with Emma: Your character encounters in Toronto the ghost of Emma Goldman, a famous anarchist who conducted leftist activities in the U.S. The conversation veers into the issues of modern hyper-capitalism and how bad things have gotten. Despite having parts with apparent choices, none lead to different results, so I think that was a bit of a missed opportunity. Hey, at least it spreads awareness of a historical figure that’s seldom mentioned otherwise.

falling is not the same as dying: A story told through text about the struggles of being a Chinese teenaged girl who's into girls, presented from the point of view of that character, a student playing tennis at PE class. Particularly brutal is the commentary on the preference for parents to have boys rather than girls in Chinese culture, and the impacts of growing up as a girl with that baggage – even if said girl isn’t even growing up in China. That's before even factoring in the LGBTQ aspect.

In My Friend Carrie’s Car: A text-based game in which the protagonist is reflecting on her life dealing with eating disorders, OCD and depression, and how they affected her life through school and until now. You make choices by pressing the key of the first letter of the choice you want; you can “stay in the car”, or you can divert towards other thoughts to learn the full story. This one does hit, it shows the impacts of those issues, and some of the ways in which they impact life.

Shut up, anxiety!

1365: Made at the end of its creator’s time through high school, with the title reflecting the number of days spent in high school. And how a struggle with mental illnesses – mainly overbearing anxiety, which ends up working as a vessel for other issues such as dysmorphia, depression and suicidal ideation – made it a particularly tough couple years for them. It’s a tough subject, but the integration of mechanics into the story, such as being able to keep going even after what only looks like a Game Over, is especially clever.

Okay, Nic... try to think of a funny joke... no... not that...
fuck, that one's too dark... oh Hell no... neither... ...Nope,
every joke I wanna make will reference real-life events
and I'll hate myself for making it.

The Night Fisherman: This could be just a narrative, but considering all that’s going on right now, it feels so much more fitting here. The only controls are the mouse to go through dialogue, and the left/right arrows to change the camera angle. On English waters, you play the eponymous character, who is accosted by a shadowy boat led by someone in search of migrants passing the frontier in hiding. Unfortunately, your boat hides one such migrant under the tarp, a young child. And your choice inevitably boils down to handing the kid over to that racist monster, or keep protecting the child and get murdered for it. nICE. Very nICE. It’s tense, it’s scary, and… well, right now, it will hit really damn close to home for many people.

Plain games

And the end result is pretty, too!

Central Limit Theorem: A shmup in which you control the circle at the center of the screen. Enemies come from the edges, in three different patterns. Learn the pattern and shoot fast to beat them? Oh, it’s not so simple. Each enemy leaves a color trail behind them. If an enemy weaves through that trail, it learns that other enemy’s pattern. The challenge turns into fighting enemies that constantly evolve the longer you play. I got all the way to 55 kills, not bad for my first time. Very clever idea, though I don’t know if it could ever be expanded into something larger.

Looks cool, and I don't say that just because of the field
of ice we seem to be driving on.

Derpy Deep Drive: Drive your bus as far as possible into an endless(?) field of ice with obstacles. Everything is done with the mouse – both driving the bus and controlling the camera. When you hit an obstacle, you lose health, which is regained by driving without hitting anything. The further you go, the more common obstacles become. How far can you get? I got to 2,200m. This could make a fun minigame in a larger product.

Falling Skies: Feels like somebody’s first shmup. You control your ship, destroy enemy vessels gather power-ups, get better, go through an asteroid field, then beat up the boss. All over five levels, the total of which can be beaten in under 10 minutes. It’s not reinventing anything or being super creative, but it’s just fine for a quick shmup pick-me-up.

LAZA KNITEZ!!: A game that’s more interesting for its context than for its content. Play alone or with up to three friends, and control a knight in space that shoots lasers from its spear. Kill the other knights by shooting at or ramming into them. Solo Mode calculates your number of kills, while multiplayer is more about depleting every other knight’s health bar until only the winner stands. It’s fine as far as minigames go. Just don’t buy it at its current 100$ price tag (see link as to WHY it’s now at that price).

Dunno how to describe the look of that game/animation,
but I do know I like it.

Out The Window: a car trip sim: A game about a child watching the world through the window of a car. You have an “imaginary friend” which you make jump over obstacles. If you get a good score by keeping a streak going, you earn tokens, which can be spent on snacks in gas stations. It looks cute, and dips into that odd, shared experience we’ve all had as kids imagining stuff in the world outside during long trips. This one’s sweet.

No doggo shall escape my petting hand!!

Pet The Pup At The Party: Your social batteries are running dry so you fall back on your old tricks of seeking the nearest dog and petting it instead of doing small talk. You explore the procedurally generated houses, looking for the good boi or good girl. You can look for little “Arf”s on the screen or listen to guess where those sounds are coming from. You start with a 2-minute timer that replenishes by 30 seconds at each puppy petted. There are more than 52 dogs to meet! I liked that one, it’s got a very funny tone and it’s quite challenging if you get lost easily!

Guppy: Play as a little guppy looking for flies to eat. You don’t have a ton of control in your motions, alternating between the Left and Right keys (or A and D) to move around. Find flies and eat them, then hide from predators. Repeat, go for a high score. This game looks relaxing but gets quite tense at moments. I think there may also be a few secrets and scenes to look for.

Making a moon was easier than I thought. Just a click.
Also, wow, that'Ms a funky planet.

Petty Puny Planet: Play God! Here’s a brand-new planet, now add something new to it. After every decision, you rest for 100 years. How does the world change on each cycle? Do you lead them its inhabitants to wealth? Do you advance them to the point of leaving? Do you lose them all to natural disasters? Or do you take a fantastic twist to things, ending into a Lord of the Rings-style world at best, a zombie apocalypse at worst? So many possible endings. This one was fun!

The crowd is growing, better not disappoint all these
folks. Just focus! ...if the game lets you.

Stage Fright: An odd mix of rhythm and horror, you play the piano in front of an audience, using the S/D/F and J/K/L keys. However, your character is dealing with intense performance panic, and so your playthrough of each song (there’s only 4) will change depending on how well you perform. Doing badly? The screen will blur or flip upside-down. At its worst, you can expect a jump scare. But if you do well, you may see your audience in the room grow. Decent idea on paper, but the screen effects make it harder to learn a song you may already be struggling with, not to mention you need great coordination and an eye on both sides of the screen. No way to tell which notes are to be hit at the same time, either.

Stealth Fishing: You’re fishing in a marine theme park tank to rescue fish. The owners, obviously, don’t want you there. Steer the boat left and right with Z/X, control your hook with the arrows. A hooked fish will fight as you pull it up; you can let go of a fish by pressing Space. You can’t let your boat or hook be spotted by the searchlights – instant game over! You get points for staying alive, 10 for fishing out coins, and 25 or 50 for a fish. Can you survive all the way to 1000 points? It’s gonna be tough.

Stay tuned, there's one more of these coming up next Friday as buffer while I work on actual, larger reviews.