Shadowgrounds Survivor

Shadowgrounds Survivor

Shadowgrounds Survivor is the unmistakable sequel to previous years top down horde mode shooter Shadowgrounds. Unmistakable because if you didn’t see the title you’d be hard pressed to tell them apart.

That’s not to say Survivor doesn’t introduce a few new features, multiple playable characters and a more detailed level progression makes the game a good deal more engaging as you go along. The storyline is as was in the original utterly forgettable and can be easily ignored.

The greatest strength of Shadowgrounds Survivor is once again it’s use of atmospheric lightning which does a good job at turning otherwise bland encounters with the alien horde into something a little more suspenseful, lending somewhat from the horror genre.

Real player with 22.5 hrs in game


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Like its immediate predecessor, Survivor is a top-down shooter that hearkens back to the days of Smash TV and Total Carnage, except that there is a much more detailed plot and a heavy nod to role-playing games. As opposed to the blanket machine-part upgrade system of Shadowgrounds, Survivor has implemented a more refined approach, with unique class abilities, general class abilities and weapon abilities tailored to each of the three characters.

Basic gameplay is still kill or be killed, run and gun, etc. Every kill nets you some experience, which is banked toward increased levels, and each level brings with it some upgrade points. Weapon upgrade parts are still found on the battlefield, dropped by enemies, but now you also get class-specific abilities and character tweaks. These are what increase with each level. Using the marine as an example, you’ll be able to buy quick weapon reloads, tough skin and fragmentation grenades. This is in addition to the basic set of character improvements that all three avatars have: radar display, increased health, critical hits, and an “auto-doctor” that will dose you with a health kit (if you have one stockpiled) if you fall below 50% health at any time.

Real player with 9.0 hrs in game

Shadowgrounds Survivor on Steam

The Adventures of Fatman: Intergalactic Indigestion

The Adventures of Fatman: Intergalactic Indigestion

Sorry, but no.

I enjoyed the first Fatman game, but this is nothing like it:

  • It is smaller. Much smaller than the first.

  • It has no speech. (The first one had)

  • It is NOT point & click. It is purely drag & drop, which is, well… a drag.

  • It is not a complete story. At some point you return to the fatcave to get some paperwork for a new member and… game over.

Yes, the cost is minimal, but at the same price the first Fatman offers much, much more. It should be given as a free prologue to a series of episodes that will never come.

Real player with 1.5 hrs in game


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Compared to the firstgame…this sux

Real player with 1.4 hrs in game

The Adventures of Fatman: Intergalactic Indigestion on Steam

Darius Cozmic Collection Arcade

Darius Cozmic Collection Arcade

Great port with one glaring omission: the lack of 4:3 resolution support. Running the game in full screen on my 4:3 monitor results in letterboxed 16:9, which causes two significant issues:

  1. Darius Gaiden cannot be played in true fullscreen at its native aspect ratio. You can either play in stretched letterboxed 16:9, or in letterboxed-and-pillarboxed 4:3. No matter what, it won’t fill the screen.

  2. Multi-monitor mode for the games that support it cannot be correctly lined up and scaled, because the “seams” of the screens don’t correspond with the monitor resolutions. Stretching the game past the internal boundaries of the game resolution just results in the image being cropped, even though there is screen space there; said screen space is just black. I presume this is also an issue on multi-monitor 16:9 displays.

Real player with 6.4 hrs in game


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EDIT: It’s been almost a week and nothing regarding possible issues is coming, kinda scared they aren’t saying anything about it, not recommending until they at least give words for the issues on the port (That is, if M2 stops reposting Senjin Aleste Fanart in their goddamn Twitter…)

The price is quite excessive if they don’t fix these issues (It’s 2021, these issues shouldn’t be there in the first place, no, “M2 is not experienced with PC, that’s why BASIC stuff happened” is not an excuse).

Not a perfect port, but it’s been less than 2 days since it was released.

Real player with 5.8 hrs in game

Darius Cozmic Collection Arcade on Steam