Recent reviews by Lunanella

Editing my review to POSITIVE after Sony removed the mandatory account linking! But the original is below, for posterity.

Helldivers II can bring players together.

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Sigh. Sony ruined this.

I live in the UK and I am NOT creating a PSN account to play a game that allowed me to skip it as a requirement in the first place, especially since UK PSN account creation demands either a scan of my face or of my ID. Not happening.

The last big security issue PSN encountered happened in SEPTEMBER 2023. The last minor one happened YESTERDAY.

The community manager’s responses to people and outright lies about how SteamIDs work is also an appalling behaviour. We’re being treated as morons!

Seriously lacking on some Liber-Tea right now.

I haven't been this OBSESSED with a game since Dragon Age: Origins came out 14 years ago. Everything about it is just outstanding and rekindled my love for gaming (which had admittedly been burnt out for some years - I couldn't spend over 2h ingame, whereas time doesn't seem to pass when I play Baldur's Gate 3).

There were several moments during my playthroughs (two, so far) where my jaw dropped or I cried or laughed out loud or had to stop and just stare at the screen in utter disbelief at what my actions had wrought. How dare you, Larian Studios, make me face CONSEQUENCES?!

Divinity Original Sin II is one of my favourite RPGs and I knew that Larian would deliver an outstanding feat with Baldur's Gate 3, but didn't expect it to be nearly as good as it is. I'm glad to see the attention it's brought back to the cRPG genre and to story-heavy games that greatly emphasize quality and player experience rather than profits. It's a work of art done by passionate people and it shows.

Also, Raphael's Final Act is the best villain soundtrack ever.
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Edited on Nov 28 2024.

This is beyond cute! I love playing hidden object games, especially point and click ones, and this was fun without being too difficult.

I enjoyed finding the little easter eggs spread throughout the levels and found the devcats to be nothing short of adorable. Also, I didn't realise that buying the game also helped IRL strays - it made me feel all warm and fuzzy inside!

10/10 Would rescue Fofiño again.

Absolutely adorable. Didn't think it would make me sob by the end but it did. Kudos to the devs for being able to properly convey feline body language ingame! :)

Eh. Unlike SIMULACRA, SIMULACRA 2 just made me cringe at all times.

It somehow managed to create characters that are so obnoxious to the point where I stopped caring about them and the story altogether. They're not likeable at all - in fact, quite the opposite - and don't even intrigue me at the very least. I could not relate to the entire social media influencer thing going on (I believe that's because it sounded so superficial and shallow, even more so than it is in reality, as if that was the only "depth" the characters had) and the dialogue (both written and spoken) could simply not make me give a damn. Playing this game felt like a chore and, frankly, made me question why was I even doing it instead of spending time with my actual friends. After little over 2 hours of something akin to torture, I uninstalled it with a sigh of relief. I do understand that the creators most likely wanted us to feel uncomfortable with these said influencers, I just wish they'd work more on their writing just to make it so the game doesn't feel, well... annoying to play.

Don't get me wrong, I'm a lover of horror literature, movies, documentaries and, more recently, games. The first game was quite scary and made me uncomfortable as well, albeit in a good way. SIMULACRA 2 didn't, though. To me, the interactions and story are forced, uncreative, shallow and bland. The acting is also slightly worse than the first game, with the exception of the main Detective (I really like this dude!).

Another thing that bothered me were the dialogue responses I, as a player, had. I decided to play as a junior detective at first; some - if not nearly all - of the dialogue choices available to me were just plain moronic. At times I simply had no better or more logical option to choose from and the cringe moments I mentioned at the start of the review would happen, such as the main detective asking me if I didn't even bother reading the case file (which I had).

Ah, man. I really wish this would have worked out because these kinds of Orwellian games are right up my alley. SIMULACRA 2 just couldn't make the cut for me, though.

We got drunk and ate raw chicken full of salmonella, then proceeded to vomit *all over the ship*, each other included. Voted for my own SO to go to the brig then played the accordion and danced around it til the sunrise. Almost got one of us eaten by sharks. That's the pirate life.

I'm currently dealing with the loss of a most beloved pet, whom I saw as my family and my companion. That said, I did not expect to be so deeply touched by a puzzle game, one that doesn't even have a written story such as Timelie. It brought back good memories, but also the sadness I felt (and still feel) from time to time. It's safe to say I identified a lot with what I experienced in these 8 hours of playtime. :)

The relationship between the girl and the cat she befriends whilst trying to escape whatever facility/place/realm she's held in is, to me, purely sublime. One could say that what the game doesn't deliver in written words, it does so in every one of its others aspects - Timelie doesn't *need* to have a written story. It perfectly conveys its meaning without it.

As for the gameplay, the puzzles are diverse and complex, making use of mechanics that are easy to understand and play with, allowing people like me (who overthink the most simple of puzzles and end up doing everything wrong :P) to decipher and get past each level. Basically, you can control time by forwarding and rewiding the scenes, planning your route carefully after studying the enemies. The game allows you to try over and over again, essentially making it a trial and error gameplay. Don't be fooled, however, because it doesn't get boring or too easy to conquer - sometimes, what seems to be the simplest solution can have consequences later on in the story and actively affect how you solve other puzzles. Plan your steps with care!

Visually speaking, what a stunner! The HUD is really clean and minimalistic, focusing on what's important: your timeline. The graphics are beautiful and the animations are adorable! The soundtrack is also good for the ears, quite atmospheric indeed.

I'm glad I got to experience one of the best puzzle games of the last couple of years! Recommended both for the visual story the game tells as well as for the challenges presented in each level.

You can own blue chickens. Or a dinosaur. Maybe even both. You can be homies with a dark spirit that lives in a sewer and sells some of the rarest items you can find. You can gift people with precious stones and they'll ask you "How did you know I was hungry?". You might, in fact, gift people something they don't like and they will ensure to let you know just how much they dislike it but will keep the gift anyway. 10/10 keeps my farmer on her toes!

Manifold Garden has made me question my sanity several - and I do mean SEVERAL - times. Still, it's an undeniably beautiful, tough, mesmerising and innovative game.

I'm not ashamed to say I needed help more than a couple times, but there were also times when I felt incredibly proud of myself for finishing the puzzles, which play with the laws of physics to trick the mind. Some of them were tougher for me and easier for others... and that's okay. ^_^

I'm very happy to have bought this when I did. It fried my brain a wee bit but it's aaall good.

Edit: Enchantment? Enchantment!

Just lovely.

I wish I were immune to games that have animals as protagonists (especially those as cute as wombats), because empathy just makes me feel for them during their journey. This story is quite short, yet during more than just one moment I ended up getting emotional and hoping that everything I did would make things ok for the little marsupial.

The game is also a strong message, specially so when we take into account how our actions as species affects Nature and what Nature does to keep its balance. It also perfectly portrays how humans and other animals share the same world and that the latter can find safety and comfort within the structures we built to protect ourselves. That's in my own understanding, of course. I'd wager most people can just enjoy it for what it is, though: an absolutely cute short story about a wombat roaming the Australian wild.

As for the gameplay itself, the animations are adorable, the sounds and sountrack are lovely and relaxing, the artwork is absolutely GORGEOUS (watercolour-like)... All in all, it was a heartwarming experience.