Cleo - a pirate’s tale
„Cleo - a pirate’s tale“ is a Solo Developed Retro Pixel Art Pirate Adventure with a lot of nostalgic flair, humor and a linear story, inspired by the old Zelda games and the classic LucasArts adventure games.
THE STORY:
„What is the most important part of a story?“
Cleo is a 14 year old cynical girl, living a repetitive life with her father in a bar. She knows everything about the epic adventures of pirate legend Captain Cabeca, but in her everyday life, she is just surrounded by boring fishermen and unsuccessful pirates, hanging around at the counter.
But when Cleo finds a strange pirate-logbook and sees a ghost, who gives her a mysterious hint, her boring life is about to get turned upside down. She is thrown into a dangerous adventure and finds herself in a world of lies, deceit, greed and bad breath - the world of pirates - and most of them are looking for the same thing:
THE TREASURE OF ETERNAL MEMORY.
KRAKEN FODDER:
“Kraken Fodder” is a mini game inside the game.
It is a card and dice game, which is taken pretty seriously among fishermen and pirates. One round takes about 5 minutes and the game is about destroying your opponents card deck with canon balls. HAHAHAR!
Throughout the game, Cleo has to play this card game against a few NPCs.
The game was successfully funded on Kickstarter in 2020. The release is planned for late 2021 with full voice acting in English and German.
ARRRGH!
Read More: Best Pirates Top-Down Games.
Nelly Cootalot: The Fowl Fleet
I’ve LP’d the previous installment , Kickstarted the sequel, and was rather looking forward to this. Let’s break down my impressions, from least important to the most:
Graphics: I kinda miss the original hand-drawn look. It had a unique charm to it that the smoother and less unique 3d models lack.
Voicework: Quite good all around. Except from some British TV guy – apparently everyone were so excited to have him on that they forgot to check whether his voice fits the character.
– Real player with 13.0 hrs in game
Read More: Best Pirates Third Person Games.
As I have been following the game’s author’s main work for a while, (which I would highly recommend to most people on the planet) I finally brought myself to buying the game during a sale. The drawing style is simple, but atmospheric, the voice-acting is mostly superb and the few birds one gets to see up close are truly adorable. The highlight of the game definitely are the song-bits, which are completely insane and oddly catchy. Bought it during a sale and thought it was quite sweet. Especially for a game both written and animated by someone who, as far as I understand, only dabbles in game-development.
– Real player with 10.3 hrs in game
Crowalt: Traces of the Lost Colony
Crowalt: Traces of the Lost Colony is an adventure game that is merging the traditional storytelling with modern-day pixel art graphics.
CHASING A MYSTERY THAT IS UNEXPLAINED FOR 150 YEARS
A group of people who set out to establish the first settled colony in America in 1587, mysteriously disappears a short time after arriving. They leave only an island name carved on a tree: “Crowalt”.
Now, the year is 1737.
A young and ambitious adventurer Hugh Radcliff pursues the Lost Colony to make his first great discovery. Now, different people live in Crowalt, where he came to solve this mystery. He will hover around the island and definitely will get in a series of troubles to find what happened to the Lost Colony.
CLASSIC POINT AND CLICK MECHANICS
Collect, combine, and use items to solve puzzles.
PIRATES ARE HERE TOO!
Try to deal with routine pirate visitors of Crowalt and of course, enjoy funny dialogues.
FOLLOW YOUR JOURNAL
Hugh draws important things and takes notes regarding them in his journal. It will be updated after important events and findings during the game.
MAKE CHOICES
Lie or speak only the truth.
COLLECT ARTIFACTS
There are lots of historical items around the island, collecting them will take you to another level of… achievements!
EARN THE TRUST OF NATIVES
Natives are discreet residents of the island. Taking information from them will require earning their trust.
Read More: Best Pirates Story Rich Games.
Beans or Bones
Beans or Bones is a fun 2-player online co-op pirate game for having a good time with your best buddy. Stranded on a cannibal island you are lucky: Improved seamanship has led to fewer and fewer shipping accidents in recent years - a major food source for the cannibals. So you are offered a deal: find Brownie George on a remote island, and get his relish recipe to make beans more tasty than your bones. So you go on a quest with your fellow pirate buddy, fly with birds, paddle in barrels, and use your bubble shooter to fight sharks.
Key Features:
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For fans of fun pirate games
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Focus on fun little game mechanics like flying a bird, or making sharks fly with your bubble shooter
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No-one is seriously harmed or killed - no blood, just blood orange juice
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A short game that lasts about an hour.
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A family project made by a non-vegetarian solo developer and his 3 non-vegetarian sons.
Penny’s Path
This was a great game, a well-written story. Immersive and creative characters with wonderful spins on late 1600s theology and the power of women. The voice acting is top notch. I really enjoyed it. Sister Benedetta is the best!
– Real player with 4.0 hrs in game
A modern day woman gets infected with COVID-19, then … gets sent back in time to the late 1600s of “New England” … or rather has a fever dream?
Praises
• Some animations are pretty.
• The hand-drawn art is a little rough, but it’s a refreshing change from how most visual novels are illustrated.
• Good attempts at old English (I think).
• Criticisms of religion, especially of Puritanism.
Complaints
• No Steam overlay, so no screenshots. (I’m too damn tired for ShareX.)
– Real player with 1.5 hrs in game
inAntrum
inAntrum is an atmospheric 3D action-adventure RPG developed as game series and released in five parts. It combines action RPG elements from The Witcher III, like the combat and quest system, as well as adventure puzzle elements and a 3D-stylised graphic from the Zelda series in an entirely new fantasy setting. The game is being developed in Unreal engine 4 for the PC first.
inAntrum - Part I is set in the mysterious world of Antrum, a gigantic cave biotope where human-like animal creatures, wild creatures and elemental monsters live in five large different regions ranging from the desert to a flying island.
A Winding Path
A Winding Path is a charming and original experience, offering chilled out gameplay that provides just enough of a challenge. It’ll take 2-3 hours to complete but there is plenty of scope to spend longer in the game for those who want to explore in detail or become a master at the Artemis Archery Club! The beautiful combination of gameplay and styling give this title a unique and wholesome feel, it has the potential to appeal to a range of player preferences and I highly recommend it!
WANT TO KNOW MORE?
– Real player with 7.0 hrs in game
Admittedly I did not like the first hour of the game, I was afraid it would turn into another stick guy game with generic puzzles, but it got a lot better toward the second half, mainly because the quests just became a lot more creative, and in general, the experience gave me a strong sense of escapism, granted it happened much later in the story. Also, I am questioning the use of WASD and 1234 in a game like this, I really feel like mouse UI would be a more relaxing option, I even got a finger cramp because there is a mechanic you need to constantly spam, if you are curious about hidden interactions anyway. Hunting for hidden achievements and optional trinkets is probably the strongest part of the experience, I think the side tasks for the collection were very enjoyable - and you can unlock some cosmetics hats too. As for the story, I was invested more in the second half of the narrative, for whatever reason I didn’t fully grasp the intended theme of the world, it’s not a familiar setting to me, but I will say that I loved the ending, it gave me a satisfying closure.
– Real player with 4.7 hrs in game