Shadows Behind the Throne 2
Remember “That Which Sleeps” the kickstarter game that promised that you could play as Cthulhu and corrupt the world and a million other things, but then the dev took the money and ran and never delivered.
Implausibly Shadows is not only the game that was promised, but it delivers. The graphics are a little off and the interface is a little confusing, but goddamn is it fun to corrupt and dismantle several civilizations until eternal winter falls upon the land. There is a lot of room to grow, and here is hoping it keeps growing.
– Real player with 119.6 hrs in game
Read More: Best Conspiracy Grand Strategy Games.
Great game. It’s a bit like Ruinarch, if you’ve ever played that, except on a strategic level. Lots of variety in the ways you can take down a kingdom. Very replayable and it’s right up my alley.
That said, it’s EXTREMELY rough. As EA as you can get while still being playable.
- Kind of a crap, poorly thought out UI. For example, saves are placed in alphabetical order instead of chronological order where your most recent one is at the top. You might have 7 autosaves, and the one you’re looking to load is save number 3, halfway down the screen and you have to look at the time to know that’s the one you want. I called my manual save aaa, so it will be at the top of the list. That’s a small thing, but there are a lot of poorly designed UI functions like that and it impacts the level of information you get from the game.
– Real player with 39.5 hrs in game
The Song Out of Space
In 1962, during the height of the Cold War, twelve astronomers at a deep-space observatory were found dead. Because of the proximity of an important military base, two federal agents were sent to investigate any Russian involvement…
And what they found was from beyond this world.
Find out what really happened that night by exploring a town full of suspects with something to hide, and stop it from ever happening again.
Choose to play as federal agent Catherine Armstrong, a young recruit with excellent scientific skills, or as Stuart Ross, a street-smart veteran. Their unique skills and personality will change how the story unfolds.
And whatever you do, try to keep your sanity!
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Two playable characters, each with its own story routes, dialogs, and personality.
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3 investigation routes, 4 endings, and dozens of secrets to reveal.
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Unique retro visual style that mixes pixel art with photography
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Original 80’s creepy synth soundtrack.
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Click-and-point mechanics.
https://store.steampowered.com/app/1765600/The_Song_Out_of_Space/
Read More: Best Conspiracy Female Protagonist Games.
Secret World Legends
I have really enjoyed the Borderlands series and story - The characters made the difference. I wanted to try out my first MMO however I’m extremely picky about “Fantasy” - I usual don’t like it. With TSW, it takes place in the Present. It has a “grown-up” story full of characters, etc. not found in most games. Plus, this game has as much playtime as the entire Borderlands series combined.
There were some Sci Fi MMO’s I considered, but I didn’t want to level grind - TSW has linear growth and I can “spend” my Skill Points where ever to determine my Quality Level (1 - 10).
– Real player with 3423.5 hrs in game
Read More: Best Conspiracy RPG Games.
ADDENDUM: We are now approaching the 2 year anniversary of the relaunch. In this time, they have added about two hours worth of new story content. Much of the old story and PVP modes are still missing from Secret World Legends, and they are trickle releasing the holiday event content one year at a time. Anyone still questioning if this was just a cash grab?
Make no mistake about it, the real reason this game died the first time is because Funcom only expanded the game by about 25% over the course of five years. Even after that new content was added, the game really only has about a month worth of content to experience, even for a casual player. Don’t get me wrong, it’s great content… the story is fantastic, with great missions that go far beyond the menial tasks that pass for quests in most MMOs. How will the game die this time around? Read on and find out.
– Real player with 1842.5 hrs in game
At Eve’s Wake
High-quality visual novel with multiple endings, fantastic graphic and sound component, and intriguing premise.
The Good Parts:
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Fascinating set-up of family ties based on cult-like faith, bloody competition, and something outright paranormal with overall dysfunction taken to the next level.
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Great writing throughout. It manages to introduce a complex fictional idea in a manner that captures attention and makes you ponder.
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Atmospheric world-building. There’s sinister feeling intertwined with some outright shocking moments. “At Eve’s Wake” isn’t horror in the pure sense of the word, but more in a psychological one, so it has a very well-done horror element burning its way through the game, sometimes on slow simmer, sometimes as a wildfire.
– Real player with 11.3 hrs in game
Ahhhhh I was so excited for this to come out and it’s finally here! I’ve just finished my first playthrough and it lived up to my hype, if you’re having any doubts about picking up the full game then please try out the demo and you’ll see what I mean.
-Gorgeous art and music, just a delightful atmosphere throughout
-A well developed and intriguing story of mystery, murder and mishaps
-An incredible amount of dialogue choices with a variety of endings seemingly possible depending on them.
I love visual novels and narrative-driven games, so I feel that I know what I’m talking about to some degree, and I say this- At Eve’s Wake is a beautiful and eerie story that deserves your attention if you’re at all interested in Lovecraft, mysteries, visual novels, or graverobbing. Trust me on that last one.
– Real player with 7.2 hrs in game
Evil Cult
Evil Cult gives the player control over a Cult which tries to take over key figures in society to spread its influence and complete the Final Ritual, before any of the competing cults.
Generators generate resources, making them an obvious prime target for expansion, yet the easier (cheaper) to influence Adepts increase the probability of gathering Virgins, which serve as resource wildcards and are of course necessary for rituals as a sacrifice.
Sects within the cult allow for some optional micro-management. However, the player’s attention is mainly directed at the expansion on the map, resource balance, and awareness of the Investigator.
– Real player with 15.9 hrs in game
This game represents a very niche and rare computer game genre: the cult simulator. There are only two games I know of in this genre: 1. Evil Cult, and 2. Cults and Daggers, which is also available on Steam. This game has great potential, and is being improved with expansion sets. I highly recommend this game, which also has an excellent soundtrack.
– Real player with 13.1 hrs in game
The Black Watchmen
ALRIGHT, TIME TO CLEAR A FEW THINGS UP
[olist]
- This game is NOT subscription-based! Think of it more like The Walking Dead series, where you pay for a season whenever it comes out. You can play any seasons you own indefinitely.* This game WILL take over your life. Like the slogan in the old ARG Majestic from EA: “It plays YOU” Will clarify later.* The game on Steam is only 25% of the actual game. It takes place in real-life, on websites created specifically for the game, and on social media.
– Real player with 165.2 hrs in game
**** Full Disclosure: I’m a volunteer Moderator on the official forums; however I’m not paid in any way, shape or form. ****
EDIT: Since I posted this review, I have been hired by Alice & Smith as PR/Community Manager. Therefore, I will no longer update this review as long as I hold that position.
Also; to make room for this update, I removed the “Updated” list at the end of this review.
Content:
While the amount of content seems limited, it is worth making a huge note that the Content of any ARG is not found primarily in what you are presented with - in this case, what you see when you start the EXE file - it is the secrets you can find based on that initial presentation.
– Real player with 164.5 hrs in game
![[Neolithic]To the End](https://cdn.cloudflare.steamstatic.com/steam/apps/1519140/header.jpg)
[Neolithic]To the End
TL:DR
This may be the weirdest fever dream you’ve ever had.
Life is full of absurdity
Some Features:
Everything in a classical RPG plus…
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Bizarre adventures.
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First-person gunfight during battle.
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Convert supernatural (or not so supernatural) enemies to be your pets.
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Deployable traps, barricades, and furniture to decorate your home.
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Your very own home with a map editor. ALL MAPS in the game can be edited during the gameplay. Support import/export map to RMXP.
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Magical items and anomalies with their own mechanisms.
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Crafting items from 3D printers.
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Plant and harvest food and…something else.
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Endless procedurally generated quests from mission boards.
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A powerful cheat console that can run Ruby script.
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Minigames! The awesome part of an open-world RPG is, you can get all those minigames for free!
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Frequent updates. Who knows what you can find in the future.
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DRM-Free!
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Highly customizable playing experience.
Risks: (I will be totally honest with you. Thus, I put it here)
1, The game is made with a very old game engine. (For memories' sake)
2, There is only one developer.
3, I am terrible at 2D art.
4, I am not a native speaker of English.
Thus, I provide an honest demo for you. The demo version will update all the way till the game release.
It reflects the current stage of game development in almost real-time.
As the game is one of the first and last RMXP games that’s ever being developed, I’m not exactly aiming to make it something great. (or even sane.)
Instead, it needs to be unique and fun in a way that people can rarely see nowadays, to make people laugh maniacally even in a grimdark world where both the in-game world and the life circle of RMXP are coming to an end.
Story
Welcome to our secret society of [redacted]. We are among the most ancient ones in our line of work.
For a long time, we have witnessed the rise and fall of many others.
The situation is grim, the world almost ended in 2008, 2012, 2015, and 2020.
Some people predict it will keep ending this year, next year, and the year after.
But, well, even if that’s true, even if the ending is inevitable, it is tragic, we are still alive.
So, cheer up! We shall carry on.
As long as we stand, the world shall never fall!
To the end…
Features:
Unbalanced and Unfair
Beneath the facet of the beautiful life people called “normal”, lurks the truth that this secret struggle is never fair.
There are things that can hardly be killed. They may come in great numbers to overwhelm us.
Even when not facing such a supernatural entity, a well-trained Kung-Fu master can still be killed by just a bullet.
But, We Fight on With All We Have!
We have guns and our own magics. We even learned to bind supernatural entities to our wills.
We have tools and artifacts, we have skills ranging from combat to conversation.
If there is a lock that can hardly be picked, try blowing it.
There are always solutions.
You Are Different.
Your arrival was not expected. You were not on any lists. We know little about you.
Show us, who you are and who you will become with all the perks/skills/proficiency you may develop.
We may still stand a chance against all odds with your help.
Lead us…
In This Vast World
Your loyal companions will follow you from ancient ruins to modern metropolis, from east to west.
You will meet common folks we swear to protect, watching them live their “normal” life.
You will discover mysteries, solve them when combat evil forces lurking in the dark.
The Secret History
The story behind this game:
https://store.steampowered.com/news/app/1519140/view/2986431641632413538
It’s the first Neolithic game with English localization that comes to Steam since 2004 when the first game of Neolithic was published in a dark corner of China.
_Comparing to a commercial game, this is more like a memento to the old golden age of RPG Maker XP (when indie games are really indie; when updates are free instead of being paid DLCs; when developers update games for years, even decades instead of abandon projects as soon as it’s no longer profitable; when games are made with passion instead of money-hunger; And, when RPG Maker was not used to just make those cheap adult-only games.)
This is NEOLITHIC!
There are many games out there, made with modern tools and more than 1 developer. They are supposed to be better than mine.
But, they are not. Why?_
Unauthorized Edit Detected!
We also have cats! They are cute. :3
The Last Yandere: Cursed Dark
This one is a gem and underrated. I loved everything in this game. Thank you For everything.
– Real player with 8.6 hrs in game
Very cool game. As a fan of visual novels I can definitely recommend.
9/10
– Real player with 1.9 hrs in game
SIT DOWN, PLEASE
Game is a 1 out of 10 for the sheer fact it’s broken Video here (once it uploads) w/ time stamps to dialogue outside of the ending you can’t reach and the crashes: https://youtu.be/R_UDuAQKmQE
Disclaimer Unlike the other reviewers so far I actually played the full game (that you can play BEFORE making my review)
The first part of the game has the most redundant mechanic and takes sooooooooo long literally like 5-6 minutes a person to max the juice and you’re literally just managing 2 things. The story is really hard to follow the grammar is a bit off and you’re thrust into the world told A B and C and the story doesn’t really give you enough information about the world to draw you in and feel involved in the plot to be honest. I did enjoy the flashback with the grandpa that was probably the highlight of the game and story. (the story is probably the best part of the game by far). THE WORST PART IS you get all the way to the end and the heart crashes your game. I literally tried so many different ways to beat it the mechanic for even playing the ending is terribly hard because your chain move and your single light up move are on the same key and with the BACK TO BACK TO BACK COMBOS it’s almost impossible to get them without erasing your moves plus the heart heals when you make a mistake, so imagine my surprise when the game crashes after I FINALLY brought him to probably his last phase. Hopefully the crash situation will get fixed for future players. The game would have been a 6 out of 10 if it worked the story was interesting even though it’s not told particularly well told and it tries to do some neat things but the first part of the game drags because of redundancy.
– Real player with 8.5 hrs in game
I wasn’t expecting a game like this at first, but it drew me in pretty much immediately. The story is really intriguing and well done, so are the characters and the ending was a nice twist. But the spearhead of this game is the atmosphere, the mood that transmits is really powerful, giving me different emotions, from distress to sadness. In a word: dark.
The only flaw, if you’re looking for a game with fast-paced gameplay, fun and dynamic, this game is not for you. In fact, it’s a bit repetitive, but once you understand that the gameplay is functional to the narrative, a simple device to tell a story, it’s something you can live with easily. In addition, there is also a fast game mode that shortens the timing and does not make you lose anything in terms of plot, a mode that I sincerely recommend to anyone who wants to approach the story giving up a little immersiveness. Basically, a game that you do not see every day and that I fully recommend.
– Real player with 3.8 hrs in game
3x3 the immersive fiction
IVE been playing this game all day. Its very cool and addicting i wish more games was like this one. Definitley 10/10
– Real player with 11.4 hrs in game
Loved it!! It’s been a while since i last played a game like this, quick good and oldschool. Deffinitely a good game can’t wait for its part 2!
– Real player with 4.0 hrs in game