Brothers - A Tale of Two Sons
Simple Review Portion:
===[ ❤ Audience: ]===
☐ Kids
☑ Everyone
☐ Casual players
☐ Pro players
===[ ☼ Graphics: ]===
☐ Potato
☐ Really bad
☐ Bad
☐ OK
☐ Good
☑ Beautiful
☐ Masterpiece
===[ $ Price/quality: ]===
☐ It’s free
☑ Full price
☐ Wait for sale
☐ Average
☐ Refund it if you can
☐ Don’t do it
===[ ☣ Requirments: ]===
☐ 90' PC
☐ Minimum
☑ Medium
☐ Fast
☐ High end
☐ NASA computer
===[ ☼ Difficulty: ]===
☐ You just need 2 arms
☑ Ez
☐ Easy to learn / Hard to master
☐ Hard (first few hours)
– Real player with 562.6 hrs in game
Read More: Best Atmospheric Indie Games.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SOCOkvdY1ws&feature=youtu.be
While Starbreeze has enjoyed acclaim from it’s previous releases, the studio hasn’t exactly built it’s reputation on creating whimsical worlds with moving narratives. Both Chronicles of Riddick and The Darkness gave their players dark and gritty worlds to explore and some unique gameplay twists to hook players. With such a pedigree Brothers: A Tale of Two Sons stands out as being wholly against type. It’s the video game equivalent of Martin Scorsese’s Hugo, stepping away from subject matter reserved for mature audiences to deliver a memorable experience that can be enjoyed by audiences both young and old. While seemingly stepping out of the comfort zone established by their track record, Brothers stands out as one of 2013’s best, and most surprising, releases.
– Real player with 9.8 hrs in game
PANORAMICAL
SUMMARY: A musical/visual game where you manipulate various settings to create your own visual/musical combinations. Worth purchasing if you enjoy experiential games, and like unusual musical and video experiences.
Panoramical is best summed up as an audio/visual toy. It’s a kind of spiritual lovechild of screensavers, Proteus, and the Atari C-240.
As you play (with minimal instruction) you enter various settings. In those you have nine factors you can maniuplate - there’s no directions, you have to find what they do. Each factor alters both the musical and the visual landscape - what could be a mysterious black and white swamp, with a few tweaks, becomes a strange mirrored plain with shooting stars flying about. Music could be dissonant, orchestral, whimsical, or something else.
– Real player with 41.1 hrs in game
Read More: Best Atmospheric Indie Games.
A Stendhal Syndrome inducing piece of art, that becomes David Kanaga’s most ambitious work to date
I should start this review by saying that after the first 20 minutes I spent with Fernando Ramallo and David Kanaga’s new creation, I feel forced to stop in a state of anxiety while tears of emotion blurred my eyes.
Panoramical puts me in the same state of euphoria that Stendhal felt visiting the Basilica of Santa Croce in Florence for the first time, as he became overwhelmed by the dazzling beauty found in Giotto’s frescoes.
– Real player with 5.9 hrs in game
Expand
Disclaimer: A review key was provided by the studio.
ESPRESSO REVIEW
Not a meditative, relaxing game as I assumed, but more a good reflex dodge em up with great rotational labyrinths to escape from. The remaining impression of rotating, expanding and collapsing levels will stick with you after you are done.
PROS
Intricate mazes to figure out
Monochromatic layout is a gorgeous modern art experience
Not as easy as you would expect
Music is a very nice low key electronic soundtrack that is well composed
– Real player with 11.8 hrs in game
Read More: Best Atmospheric Minimalist Games.
Follow me, says the game with a chime.
A week ago, I received an email from Expand developer Chris Johnson inviting me to play the game ahead of release. Since it was a game I was already interested in, I jumped at the opportunity.
Chris describes the game as a “meditative exploration through shifting circular labyrinths”. It is a game that I find hard to frame my thoughts on - Chris' words are certainly accurate, but the game has another quality to it that’s a little more difficult to define.
– Real player with 9.3 hrs in game
Seedlings
Immerse yourself in nature as a sentient seed in this relaxing award-winning 2D puzzle platformer. Set in the tranquil backdrop of New Zealand’s native forest using real photos and videos.
Traverse through earthy greens, rocky plains and crystal-clear waters filled with interesting puzzles and secrets to uncover.
Features
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Take control of several unique creatures, each with their own abilities.
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Solve intriguing puzzles through beautifully hand crafted levels.
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Collect hidden secrets strewn across the photo-realistic environment.
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Relax with the beautiful ambient soundtracks and nature sounds.
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Learn more about the origins of the Seedlings through a narrative driven story.
Are you ready to be one of the Seedlings?
The Power Latch Kid
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Play as the Power Latch Kid in this classic arcade style twin-stick shump! Enjoy the complex gameplay experience of physics melding with shooting anarchy! How long can you stand to dwell within the crushing madness of the Amalgotron before you succumb to its mighty insanity? Play for highscores, honor, and for your own personal reasons! Or don’t! I’m a game description, not a cop.
Kernmantle
A rather demanding, but surprisingly fair physics based platformer.
Gameplay: You walk (or awkwardly run if you can manage) and climb (mostly climb) through a series of vertical challenges by controlling individual limbs with your thumb-sticks and try to survive various hazards and get to the top. The level design is very good and no gimmick felt overused. I’d even say some elements were a bit underused, like swinging balls and rotating wheels - I wouldn’t have minded to see them used again, because they were so much fun!
– Real player with 18.2 hrs in game
I wouldn’t recommend this to anyone but the most hardcore fans of physics-based climbing games. It looks great and the movement system is slick and works well. I’d say it plays better than similar climbing games like City Climber and Heave Ho. But the game is also just too damn punishing! The checkpoints are really far apart and every time you die you loose so much progress it’s a real struggle to work up the will to keep going.
– Real player with 5.6 hrs in game
stardust
it’s like.. ASMR for the eyes o_o
I played it with the game music on and then I played it with my own music
Both ways are great! if you need to relax and play something that isn’t overwhelming, get this =)
– Real player with 1.0 hrs in game
It is an absolutely beautiful game! I highly recommend.
The game is beautiful. Downright stunning. Every color, everything in it! It captivated my attention just from looking at the title screen.
Atmospherically, it also took my heart. The music and sound effects never assaulted my ears, and actually made me calm and focused.
For replaying it, you can do that as many times as you want! There’s no story, only a calming place where you travel around collecting star-dust and becoming the prettiest astro-body.
– Real player with 0.5 hrs in game
Weakless
Weakless – Finding Strength in Collaboration
Weakless is a short and relaxing puzzle-adventure game set in a beautiful organic environment. The player adopts the role of two carefree, wooden creatures called Weavelings, one of which is deaf, the other blind. However, the characters find strengths in their weaknesses and collaboration is the key to solving unique puzzles and saving their world.
Overall, it is a serene and relaxing experience with a disappointingly vague narrative and fairly minimal mechanics. Its visuals and soundtrack are the game’s best features with the style of gameplay allowing the player to enjoy these at a leisurely pace. The cute characters and simple puzzles give the game a very casual feel, making it easy to play but unfortunately, much harder to get immersed in. Weakless was an enjoyable experience overall but the short playtime of around 3-5 hours and technical issues mean that the price tag is a bit too steep. With that in mind, I’d only recommend it cautiously, and definitely on sale.
– Real player with 6.5 hrs in game
Weakless
First Impressions🤔
The game looks impressive and feels original from the start. Hand drawn graphics play a significant part in telling the story and there is an unusual soundtrack playing throughout which gives the game an earthy and natural feel. Instruments such as the marimba, rav drums and udu are used to create the weird but spiritual acoustics.
– Real player with 5.3 hrs in game
Hourglass
Backed the Project on Kickstarter 3 years ago an have been waiting for its release ever since. I got to play it early because of the Kickstarter rewards and I must say, its as amazing as I expected it to be! Since its Kickstarter, I was prepared for everything, but the game is worth every penny. If you are looking for a fun, immersive puzzle adventure, go for it.
– Real player with 13.6 hrs in game
I have a predisposition for first-person puzzle games like this and have played many. I can honestly say it has some fun, well thought out puzzles. It’s not very long and the story isn’t all too interesting in my opinion, but there are a good amount of puzzles to break your head over. The time mechanic is used in different ways to keep you changing up your thought process on how to solve them. I do wish there were more of them as only one or two puzzles use the same mechanic, but I suppose less is more in this case. Sometimes the simplest puzzle is hardest to figure out, but leads to a new perspective necessary to beat bigger puzzles later on. If you like these type of puzzle games, I definitely recommend it.
– Real player with 9.5 hrs in game
Mantle
Loving the game! I Beat it a couple days ago and now i’m thinking of speedrunning it! The game has so much potential and I look forward to more content like this from the developers!
– Real player with 4.7 hrs in game
Great game. It takes me back to the side scrolling games I loved as a kid, though it has more depth and explores the concepts of mental health through beautiful visuals and complex stage design. I cannot recommend this enough, I love it.
– Real player with 4.6 hrs in game