Kaiosama TLJ

Beyond Good & Evil I want to see Ross cover this one for two reasons. The first reason is because he said in one of the Videochats (and also a old thread) that he thinks this game is overrated, aaaaaaaaand it's a sentiment I can agree with. However, I think that Ross could elaborate more on that, especially because I'm curious if his points mirrors mine, and I think a Game Dungeon episode would be perfect for that. (plus, it would be another to earn the "Minority Report" award me thinks) The second reason is because, overrated or not, I still think it's a good game with a unique premise. And again, I think a Game Dungeon episode would be perfect for this game. Machine Hunter Another one that I remember from my shareware/demo days. It's a top-down shooter where you need to rescue hostages to proceed to next level. Don't remember much, but the unique part about it is that your character is not that strong, but when you kill a robotic enemy, you can take it's carcass and play as it until it's destroyed or you find another one. The Raven: Legacy of a Master Thief I know that Ross loves point and click adventure games (except Sierra ones of course ?), and I know one that might be right up his alley. It's a detective story set in the sixties, and you play as Zellner, a middle-aged swiss constable, and he wants to take part on the investigation against the Raven's Heir, a thief that entitles itself the succesor of another thief know as the Raven (obviously), and he stole one of two valuable jewels and it's now aiming for the second one. I don't want to say more because I'm afraid to go into spoiler territory. The best description I can give to the story is that it's a flawed masterpiece. Zellner is not the kind of protagonist you would expect in a detective story (he would be part of the supporting cast at minimum), and the game know how to build a mystery. The only downside is the second half of the game. Trying not to give much spoilers here, but after Zellner finally get to the botton of things and finds the criminal, the story takes a different turn, and by that I mean it re-winds to the begining, where you experience it from the point of view of another character. The second half is about giving answers about some key plot points and wrapping everything up. And to me it's a weak part of the game because despite the writing being not bad, it felt rushed in some areas. Again, I don't want to say more because I want Ross to play the game, even if he doesn't feature it on Game Dungeon. Z Probably I'm not the first to suggest this one (to lazy right now to check the previous pages), but I think it deserves to be in the show. It's a RTS that really know how to distinguish itself from the rest. How? Well, for starters, you don't mine/collect resources to create units, they only take time to make, and the better the unit, more time it takes. And you don't build buildings either, instead, they are spread all across the map, and the map is divided in territories that you need to conquer not only to have access to the buildings, but also because the more territories you own, the less time it takes to make new units. So, to sumarise, it's a RTS that cuts away (mostly) resource management and base building in favor of going straight to unit training and combat, but still, you can't be too agressive either since you start with few units and the CPU has a slight advantage. That's not the only unique factor though, this game has some good atentions to detail. Sometimes when you engage tanks with infantry squads, you have a chance of killing the driver instead and leaving the vehicle ready to be taken by any footsoldier. Also, be careful when blowing up tanks, the turret fly from them and if it hits the ground, it explode, dealing damage to anything caugh in the area. Although this game is avaliable on both GOG and Steam, I advise not going for these versions. They are not the DOS (or even Z 95) original, which wouldn't be a problem except that I've heard it's a shoddy port. Apparently a completely different dev team ported Z on IOS/Android, and THEN re-ported this version to Steam and GOG, which caused many issues and I've heard even bugs that were not present in the original. They promised to fix it, but it was 4 years ago, so... Ohhhhhhhhhh booooooy... THIS game. You aren't suggesting this one because of Projared's most recent aborted Let's Play aren't you? If yes, then I will second that because I was thinking on the same thing.

I remember seeing this one a long time ago in a Jimpressions episode from Jim Sterling, and a big "NOPE" passed through my head when I saw it. And this Game Dungeon ended up reinforcing that feeling. Not just the mean traps like those holes in the side-walls, but the "humor" of this game also made me cringe a bit. I can take crude humor, but this game writing makes Duke Nukem 3D look like Monty Pyton in comparison. I laughed not from the attempts of humor from the game itself, but from Ross's delivery of the lines and his own jokes and references, that were spot on unlike the game. This game also reminds me of Wizorb, which is another indie Breakout clone. And since I've discovered that Death's Hangover came YEARS after Wizorb, I would not be surprised if the latter served as a inspiration for it, especially since it also tosses other elements over the "Breakout" formula like abilities and bosses. I think Ross should cover Wizorb in a future Game Dungeon, it's not perfect, but I think it's a really solid game.

That's odd... Cause I clicked on it and it worked just fine, as you can see it right now. Maybe it's a glitch.

I can't think of anything meaningful to say about the first 3 games, but I can comment something on the last one. Death Road to Canada is a game that I've heard a lot about, especially since I'm subscribed to Projared and PBG on Youtube. And in all honesty, from all the footage I saw, it's not a game that I fell I would like, and I think that's because I've played Organ Trail first, and that game spoiled it a bit for me. This makes it sound that the reason why is that I've played OT and hated it, and I don't want to play another similar game again, but it's quite the opposite: I think Organ Trail is a really good game, but I think it's WAY better than Death Road to Canada for various reasons. The main reason being that DR2C for me falls into a trap that grabbed many "rogue-lites": Too much dice-rolls. OT also has a lot of random occurences that can screw you over, but also some that can help you. And some of the nasty ones, like a bandit making a member of your party hostage, can be averted by simply aiming your gun at the right place (but one chance only or your friend dies, OR you end up shotting him/her by accident), while in DR2C that would be just a choice that has a high chance to fail. The point where I'm coming at is that DR2C is a game of mostly luck, and that's bad for a survival game in my opinion, while OT has a balance between luck, skill, and managment of resources. Can't blame Ross for cheating if luck is the only factor you have to scale "difficulty". And the soundtrack, ohh boy... It's like comparing day & night. DR2C has nice tracks, but I don't think they fit the game theme much, to me it sounds like "hey! I have this ost because I'm a indie game", it could be on any game except this one. OT soundtrack on the other hand... You guys better hear it for themselves: https://bencrossbones.bandcamp.com/album/organ-trail-directors-cut-original-soundtrack Death Road to Canada is not without ideas though, I really like the concept behind special survivors and party customization, while Organ Trail is bare-bones on that, and OT is not without it's nuances, like the leader/player character only being able to recover health with medkits (but still he/she's immune to diseases so I can't complain much I guess), and aiming is awkward at first. But overall, I think OT is a better experience for me to recommend to anyone, but then again, I didn't played DR2C so it can be just bias.

Liking the new site so far. Only problem is that I can't edit my older posts. And I want to do that because I noticed some of them are extremely broken, thanks to how the new layout changed how it handles Youtube videos.

Eh? I don't find the Xbox controller to be that awful, it's just the D-pad that sucks balls and it's on an awkward position. The N64 controller on the other hand... Yeah, I will not argue that.

Good to see you're back Ross. By the way, I think you should do more episodes like this, where you quickly review more than one game. Because I feel that there's a lot of games that deserve to be in the show, but at the same time don't present much material for a full Game Dungeon episode. Anyway, here's my thoughts on the games you covered: Camp Sunshine - Somewhat reminds me of Ao Oni, maybe due to the fact that you can hide to avoid the monster/killer, big difference is that in Ao Oni that CAN backfire if the monster is right behind you. Anyway, this doesn't look like a bad game overall, but not one I'm interested at the moment. Lakeview Cabin - I think the main problem with the Xbox controller is that I think they designed it more with analog sticks in mind, especially because not only the D-pad is in a awkward position, it's not as good as far as D-pads go. I've tried to run Fusion (a Genesis/Mega Drive emulator) using one, and I find it awful to imput directional commands. As for the game itself... Well, looking on the bright side, it doesn't look cryptic like a Sierra adventure game. (or the Pumpkinhead game) Halloween Harry (a.k.a. Alien Carnage) - Good to see a game that I suggested, even if it is for a short time. Despite me not considering it a bad game, I have to agree that it didn't aged well. One problem is the "fake" secrets that Ross mentioned, but I also would add that this game suffers from "Duke Nukem Syndrome", just like MANY PC platformers, in which the levels are maze-like but the game gives you very little to help you navigate and don't get lost. Still Not Dead - Since you liked this game, I think you should try Ziggurat. It's a Rogue-like/FPS hybrid, and everytime you level up you choose skills randomly. It has a different approach, since it's more about exploring randomly-generated level to find the Boss and proceed to the next one (like a regular Rogue-like), but that's the game that came to my mind when I saw this video. My only complaint about it is that EXP is dropped as a item that CAN disappear, instead of being instantly earned. On the plus side, this game has evil carrots.

Ugh... Bad news about the PC version of Pax Corpus. I had to download this game from 2 different sites (that apparently are the ONLY ONES that have the cd image of this game), and BOTH come with their set of problems. The first I downloaded from a russian site, and when I mounted it in a virtual drive it opened the instalation menu just fine, BUT the game refused to install saying that there wasn't enough space on the hard drive despite having (obviously) more than enough. Then I downloaded from another site (I think it's german, but I'm not sure), and this one installed. BUUUUUUUT the game had NO music (and worse, the tracks are on the image, but I'll get to that), and it crashed after the battle with Dr. Ellys (that one you can see in video I posted) and didn't played the cutscene that supposed to play after that. Then, I decided to check the game files and I think I noticed why that happened: THERE ARE CUTSCENES MISSING IN THE FILES! And before you guys ask, the first image that I downloaded also has the same problem. The cutscenes are simple .avi files that can even play outside the game, and I noticed that only some .avis are present: The Cryo logo when you launch the game, the intro cutscene (3 times because this game is in 3 different languages), and the 2 endings. But nothing that happens in between. Addimitely, I wasn't running the game in the ideal operational system (I was running on Windows 7, this game was released for Windows 95-98), so I could've faced other problems in the long run, but that would be a matter of me learning how to emulate a older system. But when the cutscenes are missing it means that the game crashed because it couldn't play them, meaning that this game is unplayable due to missing files. I'm afraid to say that we have another Bip Bop I & III here, and I have a theory of why this happened. This game came at 1997, a time where many people didn't had a at least decent internet connection. So, to facilitate downloads, pirates would chop files to reduce the size of the game. I'm sure of that because I've played Day of the Tentacle and The Dig through pirate copies back in the day, and some things I still remember from them: DotT had only voice acting at the begining of the game, but after they split into the different time periods, the rest of the audio after that was only sound effects and music. And The Dig had ZERO voice acting and ZERO animated cutscenes, but everything else worked fine. What I think happened here with Pax Corpus is that the pirates removed the cutscene files, but did a sloopy job on that (The Dig worked even without it's cutscenes), but because this game was received poorly back them (and because it faded in obscurity), nobody cared, and as a result the only digital "copies" we have now where those botched ones. If someone here knows a digital pirate from that time (or WAS one, who knows?), please confirm if my theory is true. Either way, this is a true tragedy to gaming preservation. There are some good news however. The first one is that I salvaged the soundtrack. Yeah, for some odd reason the game have no music but I managed to extract the soundtrack files with the help of PowerISO, which shows that this game has music but it can't play because... My head hurts... Anyway, it's not special, but I think it has some neat tracks in it. If Ross is interested, I can send to him via e-mail. I wanted to actually put the tracks on Youtube, and then post on the soundtrack session of the forum, but I don't know any decent free video editor for that. I downloaded the free trial of Filmora, and while it's good, it leaves a ugly watermark. I know that I just want to share the OST, but I will not pay an video editor just for that. The other good news is that there still are some physical copies of the PC version around: (it's illegal to post amazon/ebay links? Just asking because I didn't saw anything regarding that in the forum rules, but if that's the case you guys can delete these) https://www.amazon.co.uk/Cryo-Pax-Corpus/dp/B00006YYBN https://www.ebay.com/itm/PAX-CORPUS-HOPKINS-FBI-DOUBLE-PACK-BIG-BOX-VERSION-for-PC-RARE-COMPLETE-/271027230460?_ul=US Dunno if these are legit regarding the good condition of the games, but unfortunately, I'm not buying these. Don't get me wrong, but I'm not a retro game collector, even if I had the money for that I would even do it. But maybe Ross can tell Clint from Lazy Games Reviews about these, especially since the second link is also packed with another obscure game. Sorry everyone.

I've tried to search for a iso, but I couldn't find it. I found plenty of sites with info but no links. However, I did found a site with a download of the PC version. Can't post the link here because I think that would go against the forum regulations.

I wasn't aware of that. It really depends on the writing I think. If a videogame is only focused on the spy / combat element, I wouldn't be too interested. There's this whole weird world in Aeon Flux and the ideas they're meddling with that's the fascinating part. Well... I can't promise you anything, maybe only a headache. As I said, I only knew about of it's existence thanks to Guru Larry's Fact Hunt, and I've never played it. I brought up this fact because I felt it could be an interesting topic to bring up in a follow-up episode. But, even if I didn't told you that, I think you would assume Aeon Flux had a hand on it just by looking at the cover: And yes, this game has a PC version. I thought it was a PS1 exclusive before I found this image to show to you. But again, don't expect this to be a good game. From what I know, this game bombed when it came out. The little footage that I saw from it made me a bit unconfortable because the UI is ugly, the camera is awful, and I got the impression the game has horrible controls. And I think that the fact that this game was advertised as "Tomb Raider in space" didn't help either. As for writing... I'm not sure. Footage of this game on Youtube is extremely rare (just to show how obscure it is), and it doesn't seen that anyone had beaten it (don't blame them), so I don't know the whole story. But I know that is set in a matriarcal cyberpunk city where a scientist invented a mind-controling device called Pax Corpus, with the intention of using it as a remedy to help people that suffer from depression, however the main villain (the woman in dominatrix suit at the cover) wants to weaponise it. Not sure how much "out there" the plot is, but the fact that I've played Megarace 1 and 2, and I know about the existence of Commander Blood, I can say that Cryo Interactive Entertainment are experienced in being weird. Well, it's better you see a footage of the game to judge for yourself:

Once again, Ross didn't disappoint me. I've expected him to dig up a licensed game that I didn't had any idea it even existed, and he delivered. And the voice acting... Damn! It makes The Chosen: Well of Souls look competent in comparison. Funny you mentioning that you kind of wanted to see a Aeon Flux game, because I know about a game that was supposed to be like this at one point. It's a Playstation game called Pax Corpus, and it was made by Cryo Interactive Entertainment, the same guys responsible for the Megarace series. Never played the game (only watched a Guru Larry's video where he mentions it), but I know it was going to be a Aeon Flux game at some point but the license was canned, so they had to change a lot of stuff to sell as a original IP.

GameFAQs has a entry, and it's waiting for submissions: https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/pc/221372-the-adventures-of-down-under-dan

Baron Baldric: A Grave Adventure I still think we need more detoxing from the Armed and Delirious episode, and what's a better way to do it than a game also protagonised by an old person that's not screwed up in the head? (or at least, not like granny) And for the most observant here, yes, this is the Baron Baldric from the game Mystic Towers published by Apogee. In fact, this game is the first game, Mystic Towers is a sequel. But this game was not published by Apogee and was only distributed in Australia, it's native territory. This alone makes this game perfect material for the show. (I think) But a warning, this game is frustrating, I've only played a few seconds of it and ragequitted, that's how frustrating it is. I had no clue of what to do, the controls were horrible... To be honest, I think the sequel... Mystic Towers ...Is a vast improvement, and despite not being as obscure as it's predecesor, it's a very unique game. In fact, I think this is the most unique game Apogee/3D Realms has under it's wing. This game is hard and have tight controls, but it's not on the same level of frustation as the first one, I find this game a enjoyable challenge instead. Your objective is navigate the towers and kill all the monsters in every floor and destroy the Monster Generator that respawns them, and grab the key to exit the tower that only spawns when all the monters are dead. Sounds easy? Well, it gets tricky. You can only destroy the Generator with a bomb that you can find in the tower (and there's more than one, but you only need to use one), you regenerate Health slowly but you need to keep an eye on a Thirst and Hunger meters (food is found scattered on the tower's floors and dropped by killed monsters, water is available infinitely on fountains in certain rooms and bottles found on the ground, but the latter has a random chance of getting you drunk), there's lethal traps in some rooms (and you can use some of them to damage/kill the monsters), monsters from the higher floors are tougher/stronger, and other things... Other unique factors I can say about this is that (obviously enough), Baron Baldric isn't the kind of protagonist you would find in a mainstream game, and this game may have some of the weirdest mosters I've seen. Also, just like Hinterland, this game is anemic on the soundtrack department, but the (VERY) few tunes it has are great. Just listen to this one as a example: (Oh, and in some rooms in some towers there's the same level of nudity from Nyet III, just a warning)

Well... I don't have much to comment on the graphics and filters like everyone else here did, but I can make a commentary on the "story" portion of this game. I didn't played The Crew, so all I know about it's plot is what Ross said in the video. But I've played Tom Clancy's The Division, also published by Ubisoft, and that game's plot invoked on me the same mixed feelings Ross had. On the plus side, The Division's protagonist is the kind of "cardboard" I can get behind: It's a customised character with zero backstory and zero dialogue. As much as some people love to mock the "silent protagonist" trope, I think some games benefit by sticking with it. If the objective of the game is to immerse the player and want him/her to explore this world they have created and meet it's people, it's better to have a blank sheet where it's up to your imagination than a guy that's trying to fake a personality and a motivation. But just like in The Crew, everything and everyone else feels like cardboard. There are no memorable characters, no memorable antagonists, the last mission is just a excuse to enter the Dead Zone, the PvP-centric portion of the game, and it ends with a cliffhanger. I see both games as two sides of a coin. The Crew is the game that didn't need a complex plot, but they decided to shoehorn one because they are "artsy" like that, while The Division story could be interesting, but it's undercooked thanks to it's open-world nature and Ubisoft's wanting to play "safe". And I bring up "open-world" here because that's the trend Ubisoft wants to follow: Games with massive "worlds" to explore, and not much ambition on everything else. Oh, and also adopting the "games as a service" model and shoving up that horrible Uplay DRM. (EDIT: Did I forgot something else? Oh, right! Also "realism")

Since I watched this review there was something about Fay that was bothering me. Then I decided to watch the review again and I noticed two things: 1 - Apparently Fay has a bad case of Lordosis; 2 - Fay looks like Miss Frizzle from Magic School Bus. Interesting bit of trivia here, and it sums up my feelings towards this game message. It smells a lot like anti-nuclear propaganda, which is not surprising considering this game is German, and according to some comments I saw on Youtube about this review, this negativity towards nuclear power seems to be common in Europe. Oh yeah, here's another problem that I have with this game, they offer a FICTIONAL solution to a "REAL" problem. If this was some kind of fantasy/sci-fi alternate universe where BOTH elements were ficticional to create a metaphor, I could get that behind. There's still general execution, but that's another story... I could go on about many things wrong in enviromentalistic plots of any kind, but this video put it in sarcastically better words: _rRTHhGVUHg

"Captain Planet Midlife Crisis" may be my new favourite award you gave in a Game Dungeon so far. Enviromentalism is a theme that's very easy to screw up the execution, and to makes matters worse this game is also about time travel, which is ANOTHER theme that can be screwed up easily by inexperienced writers. A movie-based game is next? Hmmmm... Don't know any other obscure PC game that's based on a movie besides Pumpkinhead, but knowing Ross it will obviously surprise me... ...unless he's going to do a episode on The Dig. It tecnically counts since it WAS supposed to be a movie at one point, but they decided to make it a game instead because the budget wasn't favorable. But The Dig isn't that obscure, so I have no clue.

Dr. Drago's Madcap Chase Think about Monopoly, but instead of running around in circles in a board to occasionally buy hotels in the hopes that someone occasionally lands in the same spot, you have a huge board with many spaces to go freely and many finishing lines. And that's just the start. The game is about a race all around Europe (well, almost, the eastern side of Europe is blocked until many in-game years pass) with many randomized finishing lines (you can set how many), and (just like Monopoly) the objective is to be the richiest player at the end. The main way to earn money is to reach a finishing line to earn a cash prize, but there are other means. Rules are different though, properties serve to generate small incomes per turn instead of forcing other players to pay you for example. What you need to watch out is Dr. Drago, he will appear after a player reaches the first finishing line, and will follow a player like a tick, causing all sorts of misfortunes, almost all of them related to lose money. This is a game that you seriously need the manual to understand some crucial details, like the chance cards effects. And it's also extremely temperamental on modern systems, but I can guess Ross can figure this one out. Giants: Citizen Kabuto A hybrid between third person action and real time strategy, a unique concept on itself, but it also one of the few that tries to create a "assimetrical balance" between the factions. And it's made by ex-Shiny devs, so it has their sense of humor. Personally I don't have any experience with this one, I only watched TotalBuscuit's video on it, and I think it defitively fits Game Dungeon. Mutant Penguins If you guys watched the AVGN Atari Jaguar video, then you might recognise this, it's Attack of the Mutant Penguins. But what I've discovered later is that this game was going to the a Jaguar exclusive, but it got a PC port years later despite that, simply named Mutant Penguins. So I could say this is on Ross territory now. And I think the AVGN words are enough to justify why I'm suggesting this. Outlaws Another game that I remember from my shareware/demo days. This was Lucas Arts attempt at the FPS genre. Not much to say about it because it was a long time ago that I played the demo, and I don't remember anything particulary unique gameplay-wise. But I remember this is one of the few old FPS that tries to tell a story that's not "demons out of nowhere, kill them". War for the Overworld Yeah, I know... You guys might say "wouldn't be better if Ross review Dungeon Keeper instead?", but I have my reasons for suggesting this one instead. Before it was being disgraced by EA by being turned into a Clash of Clans ripoff, the Dungeon Keeper games where quite influential, it even inspired Evil Genius (another game that Ross could cover) to be created. But most of games that are inspired by DK also try to branch out to something completely different (like Dwelvers, which also tries to mix DK and The Settlers in a blender), or only just are inspired by the fact you can play a evil character with high dose of dark humor (like Overlord, which is inspired on Pikmin gameplay-wise). War for the Overworld is the only game that feels like a true sequel to Dungeon Keeper 2, and this is one of the reasons I'm suggesting this one. Also, another reason for me to suggest it is that this game had a rough start, a really rough start. This game had numerous bugs, glitches, and framerate issues on release, the main canpaing was a bit lackluster, and it didn't deliver some features they promised on Kickstarter. However, things are going more smootly now, since many issues are fixed, and they where delivering good stuff from either expansions and free updates. Truly a game that didn't gave up despite the odds. And in this month (April 20), they are going to deliver more free updates (and a new expansion), including a script editor for the map editor that the fans were asking for a long time. (according to Nutter, one of the devs, the script language they created for the game is very powerful, but was not user friendly, and that hold them back to release it for public until now)

I remember that game! I think I still have the CD for it somewhere, but perhaps not. That was the first game I encountered that incentivized sticking with the starting weapon, since it wasn't completely terrible and had infinite ammunition. I mean, sure, its low power and low rate of fire meant you'd be trading health for (other weapons') ammo if you defaulted to it later, but spamming the fire button would see you through a lot of the game and not risk running dry on mooks. I will admit, Blake Stone initial weapon is waaaay more reliable than the knife from Wolfenstein, especially since it doesn't generate noise to alert enemies. But if we're going to talk about sticking to the initial weapon, I think the Mage from Hexen wins. His initial weapon is weak, but can continously fire and penetrate enemies. ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ Will take this opportunity to suggest a few more games: Birthright: The Gorgon's Alliance A D&D licensed strategy game in the same vein of Romance of Three Kingdoms. Not one that I have personal experience with, but it's one that is obscure nonetheless. In fact, I only know about this game because Kikoskia played it on his channel. Just like in Romance of Three Kingdoms, you choose one of the kingdoms with set territories, and must win through war and diplomacy. Some big diferentials however, is that this game also have dungeon crawling side-quests you can do with your heroes, and the Gorgon, who is a non-playable ruler that's the main nemesis of the game, and either defeating him or conquering most of his (and his equally monstruous allies) territories is some of the ways you can beat the game. It has a lot of drawbacks though, and I can asociate that with the game trying to be to many things at once. Still, it's ambition makes me consider it a worthy candidate for Game Dungeon. Creeper World series It's not that old, it has a following, and a fourth game is being developed. But it's not that spoken compared to other indie titles, and it is a extremely unique concept, so I think Ross should give this series a go. I only played the third game (and it's spin-off Particle Fleet: Emergence), but the main theme of the series is simple: It's a single player RTS where you need to build a infrastructure to repel not a horde of enemies, but a "liquid" refered as the Creeper. It has a good variety of weapons to deal with the different hazards the game presents, and the difficulty of each level is usualy associated with it's level design and the enemies present. (sometimes it's not just Emmiters that continuously spew Creeper that are the problem, there's also aerial spores that can bombard your base with Creeper if you don't have the necessary counter) Mystery of the Druids I know that Retsupurae already took a shot on it, but I still think Ross should review this one because the memetastic boxart is just the tip of the iceberg. For those who don't know it, it's a old point-and-click adventure game where you are a british detective trying to solve a series of murders where there's nothing left from the victims besides the bones, and he later discovers a old conspiracy involving evil druids. A really cool concept, but moon logic is the least of this game's problems. This game features one of the most unlikeable protagonist in gaming, and it's even worse since the game tries to force simpathy by making everyone else an asshole towards him. The plot has more holes than a swiss cheese, it has cringeworthy puzzles (one of the puzzles involves poisoning a hobo with alchohol stolen from the forensic department to steal his change to use a phone boot), AND it has (in my opinion) a WORSE love story than Twilight. The only reedemeable quality of this game is that the story and dialogue is so bad that it can go into "so bad, it's good" territory.

One thing that makes Freeman's Mind what it is, in my opinion, is that it's a parody of the "right man in the wrong place" theme the Half Life series is famous for. I don't think Ross choose a self-centered and paranoid personality for Gordom Freeman just for comedic purposes. Think about it for a second, if you, a "regular joe" with a "regular job", and NEITHER a soldier or security guard, ended up in the same situation as Gordon Freeman did, how would you fair? I would say badly, unless you already had a sociopathic tendency. The same logic could be applied to a zombie apocalypse. Zombies are not human anymore, but they still resemble one, and who's better to kill then that a guy/gal that didn't have much regards to others even before the whole thing began? (aside from someone with military training/discipline of course) Bonus points if the zombie was someone he/she hated before. The only thing that you can hope is that said sociopath has it's own stardards (which is not uncommon, believe it or not), and that you are one of "rare" types of people he doesn't like to kill.

Speaking about confusing title changes, the only game that comes in my mind is Puzzle Bobble. For some unknown reason, they changed the name to Bust-a-Move in the western market, even though I think the former name was more appropriate. And to make matters even more confusing, a game series called Bust a Move came later in Japan, but had to change the name to Bust a Groove in the west because Puzzle Bobble was using the name Bust-a-Move for the western release. My brain hurts...

My biggest concern is what is considered as a illegal download in Poland? I'm not familiar with their laws, but considering this crap is happening I can only imagine it has several loopholes. The point were I'm getting at is that most games that Ross covered in Game Dungeon are abandonware, and while it's not illegal to download them they're still considered downloads from "non-official" sites, which may fall into "piracy" territory even if it technically isn't. But even if it's not the case, Ross reviewed Strife when it was abandonware, but now it's a commercial game again thanks to Strife: Veteran Edition, which, like Ross said in the follow-up episode, puts this game in a weird territory since it's technically not abandoware anymore, so... And there's also the CarnEvil review. As far as I'm aware of, emulators are considered piracy in a lot of places, but only if don't own the original game, and Ross doesn't seem to own a original cabinet for this game. Although, I do hear that it's a bit more lax for arcade games of past generations, so Ross may be safe here. I do hope that I'm exaggerating, but considering the situation it's only natural for me to expect the worst.

Alien Rampage Did you guys know that this game was going to be Duke Nukem Forever at some point? It's doesn't look like it at first glance, even if you consider Duke's origin as a platformer. Or maybe it's because it has a Predator look-a-like instead of a blond macho guy that steals quotes from movies, but this game is ultra-violent also. Bio Menace Not that obscure, but weird nonetheless. (at least I find it weird) It's a old platformer published by Apogee where you play as a C.I.A. agent trying to stop a evil scientist to rule the world with a army of mutants... That look extremely cartoony and could belong to a kid's show... Aaaaand you still reduce them to small chunks of meat and eyeballs... Aaaaaaaaaand there's also bloodied corpses in some levels... Did I mention that I find this game weird? I've finished this one also, and I can say it's not bad, despite having some flaws commonly found in old PC platformers. Although I can say, from the bottom of my heart, that the first level in Episode 3 CAN GO FUCK ITSELF! It was not uncommon for shareware games to make the first level of the last episode have a gimmick that makes it ultra-hard for newcomers to force them to play the content prior to become more experienced in the game (for example, Hocus Pocus first level in the last episode has no healing items AT ALL), but this game drops the ball. The level has mines hidden in the grass that can only be identified by A TINY CYAN PIXEL, AND THE GRASS IS LIGHT GREEN. And after that you need to pass through many suicidal enemies to get the only non-hidden healing item in the level. But the real bullshit is that there's a TIGHT corridor you need to pass through that have shooting lasers THAT HAVE A RANDOM PATTERN, with is almost impossible because there's A LOT of lasers. The solution: There's a invincibility potion HIDDEN ABOVE THE CHECKPOINT. How do you suppose to figure this shit by yourself? I HAD TO check a video on Youtube in frustration to figure that one out. The other levels after that are brutally hard, but manageable and less frustrating compared to that dick move. Blood & Magic This one I have lot of experience with. It's a Dungeons & Dragons licensed RTS game where the basic concept is that you create a unit called Basal Golem. This Basal Golem, when idle, can become a obelisk that generates Mana, that's in turn used to create MORE Basal Golems, AND to convert them into combat units like Fighters, Clerics, and even Gargoyles. And you convert them in buildings that you can build in specific points of the map, using 4 Basal Golems as a foundation. Yeah, Basal Golems are everything... It's a unique concept for a RTS, and there's also some maps that have their own gimmics like one where the walkings paths are tight, and you need to activate/decativate bridges by pressing pressure plates (and you can even kill ground enemies with that). The big problem this game have is that since there's no unit cap, you can produce as much Basals Golems as you want, breaking the Mana "economy" eventually. There's a Mana cap, but it doesn't stop you to practically have nigh-infinite Mana due to the amount of Basal Golems generating it (they generate up to 10 Mana, and it become stored in them for you to manually collect, and it also auto-collects after a while). Good thing the AI doesn't know about this exploit. One thing that's also unique is that this game plot is divided in mini-campaings with no relation with each other, and you can choose which side of the conflict you want to play. This (for me at least) is good and bad at the same time bacause while the writing is okay for most of them, they are short and some of them are generic at best. Nuts and Bolts is my least favorite because while it is intentionally cantoonish and silly, it feels completely out-of-place in tone compared to the other campaings. Howl of Vengeance is my favorite because despite being about a king defending his kingdom against a necromancer (which can be kind of cliche sometimes), it's more gray-on-gray morality. (the king in question actually was some sort of barbarian leader before that took the kingdom they reside now to save his starving clan, even if the previous king did nothing wrong against them. The necromancer just wants to help the daughter of the previous king to reclaim her throne) After you play all the campaings, you play a mega-campaing where you create a custom character and the objective is to simply conquer the land, playing all the maps all over again. While it is a cool concept, it's practically more of the same at that point. Cyberdogs And old freeware top-down shooter. Every level is procedurally generated like a rogue-like and objectives to open the next level varies between killing all enemies or destroying certain designated objects. And you buy weapons and ammo (and even lives) between levels. I've played this game a lot, but never got too much far since this game start to get really hard later on. Daikatana Yeah... You guys may be thinking that the only reason I'm recomending this is because I'm a sadist and want to see Ross suffer. And you guys are wrong. (but also right ) The main reason that I'm recomending this notorious bad game is for gaming history purposes, thanks to Mighty No. 9. What Mighty No. 9 have to do with this? Well, after the colossal failure that was that game, I did a quick look at it's troubled development and I felt as if history repeated itself, and NO ONE that trashed the game made a comparison with Daikatana besides me. Besides having different problems, both games developments have some crucial similarities that, at least for me, it's uncanny. For starters, both games were seen as apparently passionate projects from veterans of the industry that left their respective companies and were on their own, one big difference being that Kickstarter didn't existed at the time of Daikatana, but Romero had a lot of cash that he earned from his days at Id. While both games generated hype in the beggining, it started to drop due to controversies, constant delays, and horrible mismanagement. And some of the mismanagement in both cases I can point to both Keiji Inafune and John Romero being used to work under the wing of a big company, but forgetting that they were practically on their own and even though they had a good budged, they needed to concentrate on their respective projects due to being small studios. (Inafune tried to push a animated series spin-off despite not having finished the game, and may the true gods of existence knows where the rest of the money went, and Romero irresponsibly spent part of it on Ferraris) Mighty No. 9 had a controversy among the community related to a female moderator. Daikatana had a controversy related to Romero adding his girlfriend as a game designer to the team. (Yeah, maybe this connection is a bit forced, you can ignore that one) Also, both have cringeworthy market slogans that became memes. And when they came out, they were mediocre at best, but with a good chunk of technical problems, and outdated graphics (especially in the case of Daikatana). Both also had promoted gimmicks that hindered the game more than making it fresh: Mighty No 9 has the dash/absorve mechanic; Daikatana has the Save Gems and the AI companions (and since this is the first FPS that did it, and poorly, they were buggy and unreliable as hell). Both games also have terrible writing. For me, Daikatana is the original Mighty No. 9. But I could also be a crackpot theorist and you guys can ignore this if you wish. Hard Reset Not a very old game compared to many games that Ross covered so far on Game Dungeon, but I think it could be worthy for the show. This game is made by Flying Wild Hog studios before they rebooted Shadow Warrior, and if you guys played Hard Reset, you can agree that a lot of it got carried to that game, but this game is still different. While Shadow Warrior focus on trying to create a interesting melee combat while being on roots with old FPS, Hard Reset main gimmick is that you have two guns: One is bullet based, and the other is energy based. And you unlock alternate fire modes to them, that could count as different weapons. (for example: one of the modes for the bullet gun is a shotgun mode) The game also have a Blade Runner-esque plot. I find the story experimental at best, because while it seems to create a interesting setting, not much is explained and it ends in a cliffhanger. I will let Ross take his own conclusions on this one.

Heh, "bare-bones". I see what you did there. Jokes aside, I will agree that Mr. Bones is a very unique concept. I kinda want to see it on Game Dungeon also, but the problem is that Mr. Bones is a Saturn exclusive, and even though Ross is used to change settings on his PC to run extremely temperamental games, I've heard that Saturn emulators are a bitch to run properly. So it's more probable that Three Dirty Dwarves appears on GD. Speaking of which, other game that was on Saturn and also on PC that I can think of is Bug! This one I remember actually playing on the PC as a kid (admitelly, a pirated copy), but didn't got far. But I do remember it being kind of bland. And a fun trivia: This game was designed to replace Sonic as a mascot for the Saturn. And this is not the first time they tried something like that. You guys remeber Dynamite Heady for the Mega Drive/Genesis? That was also pitched as a replacement for Sonic. Heh, guess even them they knew that, eventualy, Sonic would become Sega's death sentence. --------------------------------------------------------------- Alright, some more suggestions: Any of the other Christian Boutin's games Ross, you helped , but aren't you forgotting about something?Yes, I'm talking about the other games by the same guy who created Construction Bob, and you already own them since they came in the same package. Yeah, after the Bob games I don't expect much, but I think you still have some unfinished business. I mean, one is called Xyfud Plasfoc's Earth Invasion, you shouldn't miss the opportunity to cover a game with a name like THAT! Beasts and Bumpkins Ah, this one. This is another of those who I remember from demo disks, but I think this one deserves to be here above all of the ones I remember from demo disks. It's a strategy game where you build a village, and you also need to defend it from monsters like giant bees, undead, and even go against rival lords. It's unique since you don't downright mine resources to "produce" soldiers like other strategy games. You need to breed your population and even herd cows and create a farm to have milk and bread otherwise they will starve. You also need to build "guilds" to convert your male villagers into more useful guys like soldiers, mages, and even better builders. Duke Nukem platformers I know that Duke Nukem is a gaming icon (although I could say it's a fallen one), so you guys may think this is a bad idea for Game Dungeon. Well... He exploded in popularity because of Duke Nukem 3D, so how many Duke fans remember that he started as a character in a platformer game? And that he was more family friendly back then? And that he was (or maybe still is) a big fan of Oprah? A Game Dungeon on the games before Duke Nukem 3D would be a interesting look on how some franchises really change along the way. Also, the first one is a game that I have a big chunk of nostagia value, EXCEPT FOR THOSE FUCKING ROTATING PILLARS. Admittely, the platformers didn't age that well compared to 3D gameplay-wise, but they have their own charm compared to the "edgy" Duke we know today. Sacred series This is not much for me, but I'm making this suggestion thinking more on gaming history purposes. You see, my only contact with this series was Sacred 3, and I feel that game put the series on the map in a bad way... My reactions, from the perspective of a guy that never played any Sacred prior and had no knowledge about them was like this: Boring beat 'en up, made even worse by the fact it tries to have "humor". When I've heard that it was actually a ARPG series that was gutted to please console gamers, I can actually feel the the pain of the old-school fans. I think Ross should cover the previous Sacred games for them.

DROD: Gunthro and the Epic Blunder and Ashes of Malmouth (Grim Dawn expansion).

Ok... This was completely unexpected, even coming from Ross. When he said "back to school special" at the end of the Hinterland video I thought he would do a very obscure edutainment game, or even Sonic's Schoolhouse considering we are close to Halloween (because, honestly, that game is creepypasta material). Was not expecting Life is Strange at all, especially considering that Game Dungeon focus a lot on games that aren't that well known. I have this game downloaded on my Xbox 360, although I was not the one who played it (my sister bought the console second-hand from a friend, and it came with some games in it, and I think this is one of them), I considered picking up this to play on a occasion. And... WOW! From the little you've shown of the game, my expectations for the story really dropped. The way everyone is antagonistic towards Max and the fact that the writing doesn't help that much to feel simpathy for her kinda reminds me of Mystery of the Druids, except that game can reach "so bad it's good" territory for the most part. Well, I admit, at least Max isn't so bad even if she manipulated time and space to make a paint bucket splash over the "queen-bitch" of the school because she was on her way, and maybe have the painter being fired in the process. Because at least she isn't detective Halligan, who downright poisoned a drunk hobo with alcohol taken from the forensic labs so he can STEAL his change to make a phone call, with high chances of said hobo being killed because of that, and also because of OTHER atrocities Halligan commited for the "greater good". Actually, this review kinda gives me motivation to play the game for myself, but with "car crash syndrome" mentality, and I will admit that's kinda bad since I want to form my own opinion.