Chris Dow's Completed Games of 2021 Part 3 (#41-68)
And there we have it.
A final, jumbo hurrah to ring in the new year.
Not a patch on my overall efforts in 2020 when I managed to finish over 100 games, but another tick mark on the 2021 Resetera challenge, and a handful of game’s scythed off the backlog to make room for triple the amount to be added to the infinite pile.
Read up on the first 40 games I beat on my list here and here.
41. Rugrats in Paris (N64) - 16/08/21 - ~7 hours (Credits)
You basically take part in a variety of mini-games across Reptarland to win tickets which allow you to buy items to complete fetch quests, and in turn unlock more areas, games, whatever.
It’d be a solid 5-out-of-10 if it weren’t for the controls. All movement is on the left stick - fine. But the way it’s implemented means that left and right turn the characters as opposed to moving in that direction directly as we expect in a 3rd person action game in 2021. Essentially you run forwards, stop, turn Phil or Lil or whoever you’re controlling with left and right, and then get going again. It makes many of the minigames.. not very fun.
After 4 hours or so, the last boss is unlocked, facing you as Reptar, against a big snail thing. A decent spectacle for a licensed game of the era, but oh boy, does the camera and movement controls make it nearly impossible to actually beat.
42. Little Nightmares (+ Secrets of the Maw DLC) (Switch) - 16/10/21 - ~10 hours (Credits)
Started this once before, and although I loved the atmosphere, and the aesthetic, and the cinematic platformer gameplay, the load times on the Switch were so poor, I had to put it down.
Seriously, for a game constructed around a certain level of trial and error, having to wait between 60 and 90 seconds after every death is unacceptable.
The Switch port looks amazing, and at a glance is basically like for like against the PS4 / Xbox One versions, but the loading really, really lets the experience down.
A year on, my partner and I sat down looking for something to play, and decided to give it another go. Having someone to chat to whilst the game loaded endlessly softened the blow a little, and the fact the game itself, outside of this technical failing is so good obviously helps too.
It's not as good as Limbo / Inside, its most obvious influences, but it's about as close an almost-ran as I've seen in any of this genre. The story is fantastic, with excellent world building, environmental storytelling, implied lore, the lot, and if anything it's these elements that really kept us invested even when the game was taking the piss with our time.
As soon as the credits wrapped on the Secrets of the Maw expansion, we moved right on to Little Nightmares 2. Load times are about 5 seconds a pop.
..makes the optimization problems of the first all the more maddening.
43. Moto Rush GT (Switch) - 23/10/21 - ~10 hours (100%)
Another one of those 'feels-like-a-mobile-game-even-though-it's-not'.
It's got endless runner modes, unlockables that you can purchase using gained currency, but also a 100 stage career mode that gets surprisingly tough.
The game's mechanics never get much more interesting than 'drive bike fast and don't hit other cars', but as a title that you can drop into for 20 minutes here and there, it's certainly kept me entertained enough to have merited the 79 pence sale cost I originally pumped into the eShop for it.
44. Habroxia (Vita) - 25/10/21 - ~3 hours (All Trophies [PSN])
A 16-bit looking, 8 bit sounding euro shmup.
It’s decent! Pretty easy, as even if certain stages prove challenging you can always grind for cash to upgrade your ship. There’s a sequel which I’m keen to check out.
I’m frustrated that both titles got physical releases via PlayAsia, and I somehow missed both. Oh well!
45. Super Destronaut DX: Intruders Edition (Vita) - 26/10/21 - ~1 hour (All Trophies [PSN])
A perfectly fine Space Invaders clone. Serviceable but soulless.
46. Perils of Baking: Refrosted (Vita) - 27/10/21 - ~3 hours (All Trophies [PSN])
A not-very-good platformer.
The twilight years of the Vita have been a real mixed bag. Perils of Baking tries really hard to present itself as a sort of NES-era style platformer, but it just doesn't quite cut the mustard. It feels much closer to the more arcadey output of the Master System in an odd way. Back in the late 80s, there was a definite split in the type of games that gravitated towards Nintendo's or Sega's 8-bit machines, and the speed of Perils of Baking definitely gives it a vibe that I'd associate more with the Alex Kidd or 8-bit Sonic games, rather than the more methodical and considered Mario titles.
I didn't hate the game at all, and I still enjoyed my time with it, but it's very unlikely I'll remember anything about it in 3 months.
47. Lady in a Leotard with a Gun (PS4) - 28/10/21 - ~2 hours (All Trophies [PSN])
I bought a handful of games by a developer called 'The Voices Games' from PSN, as they were all: a) cheap (we're talking sub £0.50 here); and b) touted as being easy games for platinum trophies.
Let me tell you that whilst it's impossible to argue that the game wasn't cheap, it was much tougher than it ought to have been to beat.
2 hours is nothing for a Platinum trophy when other players are grinding Dark Souls for 100 hours, but when the game itself is probably 15 minutes all in, and one single stage becomes a sticking point for the best part of 2 hours as you need to beat it without taking damage, it feels like its own unreasonably mountain to climb.
It's a 3rd person shooter, ostensibly, but with broken, wonky physics, and enemy AI that pivots from gormless to 360 no scope legend in the space of a stage. The level that almost broke me was a simple moving platform stage, akin to the classic Streets of Rage elevator stage but in 3D, that asked you to take out enemies using headshots from ludicrous range, whilst avoiding damage from their homing rockets. Not fun at all.
48. Newtonian Inversion (PS4) - 28/10/21 - ~2 hours (All Trophies [PSN])
Another '..Voices Games' special. Use a magic gravity altering gun to make your way to the exit.
Seems easy, and is easy... if you're using a guide.
After the first 5 or 6 levels, solutions suddenly become incredibly esoteric, and frustratingly, often bound to getting very, very lucky. The gravity mechanic is not quite as taught as it should be, and as such, sometimes what should be a very simple leap becomes a test of blind faith as you cross your fingers and hope that Newton's law actually kicks in when it should to save you disappearing out into space, forcing a stage reset.
I liked that the final level has you plain jumping into the sun though.
49. Violetti Goottii (PS4) - 28/10/21 - ~4 hours (All Trophies [PSN])
The last in my personal 'Voices' trilogy. The best of the bunch I guess?
A 2D puzzle platformer. Strong GBC vibes to the weirdly digitised sprites that bitcrush characters down to limited colour palettes and give the whole thing a similar feeling to Rare's Donkey Kong Country remake that hit the diminutive handheld back in the day.
Every stage has two goals which need to be met to complete the game 100%. One is always to beat the level. The other may be tied to time taken, enemies killed, or some other slightly more oblique objective. Similar to aspects of both Newtonian Inversion and Lady in a Leotard.. there are stages that work perfectly well, perhaps needing a few attempts to complete their additional objective, and there are stages that just flat out don't.
Sometimes your progress will be undone by wonky platform physics. Or global cycles of movement that become desynched, thus making a time goal impossible. Or hitboxes being wonky enough that you do / don't take damage when you shouldn't / should.
If you want to grab one of this illustrious software house's output - Violetti is my personal pick, even with its foibles. Prepare to be frustrated though.
50. Tetraminos (PS4) - 28/10/21 - ~3 hours (All Trophies [PSN])
A Tetris knock-off that I covered in passing in an old Hard Drop episode. Very much an example of 'Can we have Tetris?' / 'We have Tetris at home.' made flesh.
51. Actual Sunlight (Vita) - 28/10/21 - ~1 hour (All Trophies [PSN])
This is a pretty hard one to respond to and quantify. A narrative game (almost like a micro visual novel?) about depression and suicidal thoughts.
It goes really hard and heavy, features unique, if not always great (or consistent) writing, and presents its sobering narrative using a mixture of 16-bit style sprites and painfully beautiful stills.
What I do appreciate about a title like this however, is its existence. This is an hour long, deeply personal and challenging game created by, in essence, a single developer. And it had a proper paid release on a digital store front curated by Sony, one of the biggest players in videogames. It almost doesn't matter what I or any other reviewer says about a title like this. The availability of a work of this stature through mainstream channels shows that games are growing up, and I'm excited to see how this young medium continues to progress.
If you can stomach the themes the game tackles, absolutely give it a shot. It won't necessarily make you feel good, but it will certainly make you feel something.
52. Tachyon Project (Vita) - 30/10/21 - ~3 hours (All Trophies [PSN])
A game I beat a few years back in 2018 and then returned to in 2021 for some reason.
A Geometry Wars knock off that runs terribly on the Vita. A real shame, as Geometry Wars 3's fantastic port showed how capable the handheld was at running this sort of game when shown a bit of love.
The game has a hackneyed 'hacking' storyline, customisable loadouts, and a few nice additions like a challenge mode, etc. I also beat the game on the PS4 even further back when I fancied something bitesize and arcadey and really enjoyed it for what it was, so the game is much less of an issue than the port itself.
I'd recommend everyone to play the game on a home platform if possible. Worth noting that it's also available on the Switch now, in a much better state. At its core is a decent twinstick shooter, I just can't really recommend the Vita port unless you're desperate for trophies.
53. SEGA Mega Drive Ultimate Collection (PS3) - 7/10/21 - ~5 hours (All Trophies [PSN])
When this collection first launched for the 360 / PS3, I was ALL OVER IT.
This many games from my childhood, from a formative machine? SIGN ME UP.
Playing it now when I'm much more experienced with emulation, boy do you see the cracks.
AND YET, it's still leagues better than the more recent Mega Drive collection that hit PS4 / Switch etc. Input lag is better (if one more person tries to say the Switch port is acceptable I will commit an act of violence), unlockable extras are better (Phantasy Star 1? Some ancient Sega Arcade hits?), pixel scaling is better (even if you're forced into using a bilinear filter which gives everything a softness it shouldn't have).
There's a mix of games in here, so naturally some are more fun than others, but I enjoyed gunning for Xbox Achievements years back, completing little tasks in each of the games present, and I enjoyed doing the same for PlayStation Trophies in 2021.
54. Speed 3 Grand Prix (PS4) - 7/11/21 - ~12 hours (All Trophies [PSN])
I already beat this on Switch this year. I called it 'one of the worst games I'd ever played' on the podcast.
If anyone is able to explain why I felt complained to beat it again - answers on a postcard, please.
55. Astro’s Playroom (PS5) - 17/11/21 - ~5 hours (All Trophies [PSN])
From the ridiculous to the sublime, Astro's Playroom is a very, very good platformer, and a very, very good launch title, and a very, very good pack in for the PS5.
I played a chunk of this game when I first got the console back in Spring, but it's only now that I've finished Astro’s Playroom 100%.
Revisiting it now, without being blinded by its newness, and its 4Kness, and its dualsense controllerness - it’s basically a perfect platformer. As good as most 3D Mario titles, and with a reverence to the PlayStation brand, which, lets be honest, Sony have absolutely earnt these days.
It’s just a great game. The final boss encounter, which I won’t spoil, is such a treat for anyone with a bit of PS1 knowledge, and revisiting stages to find collectibles, those beautifully modelled pieces of PlayStation hardware, I had absolutely zero frustration, because even on third or fourth run throughs, the stages themselves are just such lovely places to be.
Post launch, a few things have been added including a little speedrun section across bespoke challenge maps, and if anything, I wish there was more of these. They really reminded me of the time trials in Mario Odyssey that I got absolutely hooked on. Although there’s not the same room for manoeuvre in Astrobot as in Odyssey, so it's actually not that hard to basically max out a run even as a filthy casual, they're still an absolute riot to get good at.
Incredibly, still one of the best exclusives for the machine, a year or so in to its life.
56. Ultimate Runner (PS4) - 27/11/21 - ~6 hours (All Trophies [PSN])
A horrible endless runner. Thought I'd do my bit for the community by writing a trophy guide for the fantastic PSN Profiles that explained how to exploit some of its glitches to reduce overall completion time, but it was rejected for using first person language and not following their in-house style guide.
Fuck 'em.
The worst game I've played this year.
57. Zuma’s Revenge (PS3) - 28/11/21 - ~30 hours (All Trophies [PSN])
I love Zuma.
Painfully, it's one of the games I totally forgot existed when putting together our initial top 100 lists for the podcast, reminded of it only when a uni friend messaged to say he was enjoying the show, but was excited to hear my thoughts on Zuma when it popped up.
Oops.
I played a lot of Zuma and Zuma's Revenge back on the 360. Yet I had never beaten either of the Popcap's puzzlers. The OG Zuma is so brutally difficult in its later stages, a challenge made worse by control issues that would sometimes see the analogue stick become unresponsive during a particularly heated combo. Zuma's Revenge was a lot more refined, but included one mode, the fearfully tough 'Iron Frog' gauntlet, that asks you to beat 10 specific levels in a row without any room for error, which I was never able to conquer.
I watched an ex-girlfriend complete this challenge years ago despite never being able to complete it myself. Whilst emasculating may be the wrong word to use here, the spectre of the Iron Frog has hung over me for the best part of a decade.
Until now.
The game's main campaign / story / whatever you want to call it, took me 3 or 4 hours to beat. Iron Frog took me the remaining 25 hours of play time. Grind, die, grind, die, grind, die, grind, die.
I have a perfectly amicable relationship with my ex, and dropped her an image of the unlocked trophy as soon as I had beaten the mode.
When I finally beat level 10 I genuinely screamed out loud.
58. Inferno 2 (PS4) - 28/11/21 - ~1 hour (All Trophies [PSN])
A game not too dissimilar to Tachyon Project in setup and execution, but it just feels so much better.
It's a shame more of Radiangames output has never been ported to modern platforms. Their library of twin stick shooters on Xbox Live Indie Games and iOS was so, so strong, and whilst Inferno 2 is decent, I didn't enjoy it as much as JoyJoy, Ballistic, or even the original Inferno if I'm being honest.
As an aside, I’d also like to pour one out for the incredible mobile puzzle games by the same developer, Crush and Slydris. I put so many hours into both of these on my old iPhone 5. No idea if they're still available for purchase on mobile storefronts, but both were damn good titles back in that golden age of premium mobile gaming.
59. Ultra Mission (Vita) - 02/12/21 - ~1 hour (All Trophies [PSN])
One of the last batch of digital Vita games.
It's a really simple maze based shooter. Absolutely nothing to write home about at all.
BUT, I absolutely had to beat it, to unlock the final trophy in the game whose description reads:
It has been an awesome decade with our beloved handheld. We are so grateful to have been a part of its history. Thank you, PS Vita! And thank you as well, player!”
Ten years! Sleep well, wee man.
60. Statik (PSVR) - 03/12/21 - ~3 hours (All Trophies [PSN])
The best PSVR exclusive for my money.
Played this when I first got the headset back in 2018 and was a little worried the experience would have dulled a little. Not a jot.
Whilst the puzzles were naturally easier (meaning I beat the game in 3 rather than 5 or 6 hours), my time with Statik was still an absolute joy.
Every scene involves you manipulating a puzzle box that encompasses your hands entirely by experimenting with all the buttons on the Dualshock controller. This 1:1 projection works so, so well. Every puzzle is fun to work out and the sense of atmosphere and 'being' was incredible throughout. It's the closest I've come to finding a game on par with The Witness for organic discovery.
I know that people (Jonathan in particular!) loved The Outer Wilds, but so much of that game required a level of skill and dexterity when all I wanted to do was be immersed in working out the games puzzles and secrets. Statik goes at your pace and is all the better for it.
Worth getting a PSVR for, honestly.
61. Submerged (PS4) - 08/12/21 - ~5 hours (All Trophies [PSN])
I beat this game on the PS4 near its release. Then again on the Switch when that port arrived. Then again on Steam when it was cheap in a sale. Now for a fourth time after reinstalling it on the PS5. The sequel cannot arrive for non-Stadia platforms quick enough.
Submerged is such a unique, plaintive and reflective experience. Almost nothing else like it.
A combat and threat free game set in a post-'event' city almost completely submerged by water outside of climbable structures that seem to represent failed capitalist expansion. It's a gorgeous game that fits perfectly between other more action heavy games as a real palette cleanser.
I love the non-linear approach the game takes to 'levels', with each story checkpoint being triggered whenever a building is beaten regardless of the order you tackle them in. I love the pictorial approach to storytelling. I love the foregrounding of wildlife on the world as the element that outlasts humanity.
Highly recommended. Hardly anyone seems to know or play this game and it's a crying shame.
62. Pixel Gear (PSVR) - 11/12/21 - ~2 hours (All Trophies [PSN])
One of my favourite 'shooting gallery' style titles for the PSVR. It's all pretty generic, and yet manages to make the shitty PlayStation Move controller feel like the most accurate pointing device in the world. Having the controls feel this good honestly excuses its short length, or blurry visuals, or lack of depth.
I can pull off a headshot from about a mile, consistently. I can look down the scope of the sniper rifle, the Move controller basically pressed to my headsetted face, and snipe a little lad from a billion feet.
A great showcase for how the combo of VR and accurate motion controls can transport you to another place.
63. One Night Stand (PS4) - 11/12/21 - ~3 hours (All Trophies [PSN])
A visual novel / choose your own adventure with multiple paths. You awake next to a woman you have no recollection of and have to negotiate the awkward conversations that take place on the morning after a one night stand.
Some decent writing, lovely art, and surprisingly varied outcomes for completion. This was put out physically by Red Art Games, a French publisher who have grown massively over the last year to become one of the best teams working with limited run media. Very happy to own a copy.
64. Kitten Squad (PS4) - 16/12/21 - ~3 hours (All Trophies [PSN])
Luc Bernard and Arcade Distillery have produced a ridiculous amount of games over the last few years. They supported the Vita to its death, were strong proponents of limited run publishing, and yet, for my money, have never produced a decent game.
Kitten Squad is a few years old now, and was developed in co-operation with Peta. It riffs on the format of something like Smash TV but with infinitely less finesse, asking the player to navigate through single room combat challenges to free orcas and dolphins from Sea World, and sheep from intensive farming.
The message of the game (as with almost all of Peta’s campaigns in my opinion) managed to rub me up the wrong way, despite being an ethical vegetarian myself who is generally very sensitive to animal rights issues, but even ignoring the premise, the game just isn't very good or fun or polished.
I played their title Mecho Tales a few years back, and found that it suffered from Turrican style Euro design - that is to give the player lots of health as the majority of enemies and projectiles are unavoidable, rather than giving you less health, but refining the AI to provide a readable and learnable threat as opposed to a constant, unscripted barrage. Kitten Squad suffers from many of the exact same design issues despite being a slightly different genre.
None of the design choices are helped by the dual stick control system feeling incredibly imprecise for what should be an analogue, granular input method, and its frustratingly easy to get your character jammed amongst enemies which often leads to unavoidable damage and death. All enemy pathing is assigned as 'head straight for the player character', and collision detection is wonky. Player shots often get absorbed by a wall immediately if you're backed into a corner, as the 'hot spot' from which your shots and projectiles fire from just doesn't seemed to have been considered at all.
Not hugely fun.
65. Mappy Kids (Evercade) - 17/12/21 - ~2 hours ('Happy' Ending)
I've got back into the Evercade in a big way since the VS home console was released. Sadly, the Namco Collections are the only cartridges that don't work on the home machine due to some odd licensing deal that separates handheld usage from consolised usage, but the recent arrival of the limited edition purple handheld has meant that I haven't minded playing a few of these games away from the big screen.
Mappy Kids was never localised for the West prior to this collection which is a real shame.
It's a lovely platform game, not too challenging, not too easy, with charming mini-games in between stages, and a sweet overarching story that has you collecting different items to create a lovely party scene. The game revolved heavily around collecting currency which you then use to purchase said items, with deaths and enemy damage all taking away your cash as well as your health. The aforementioned minigames give you a chance to boost your coffers, or, on failure, a nightmare scenario where your wallet is pickpocketed.
The art is lovely, the music has an NES charm, and it's all wrapped in a couple of hours. A perfect retro platformer. A surprising delight.
66. GTI Club + Rally Cote D'Azur (PS3) - 23/12/21 - ~8 hours (All Trophies [PSN])
Late entry for one of my favourite discoveries of the year?
I got a bit excited with a Twitter thread when the game was freshly beaten, but know that I wasn't exaggerating when I said I had played it for 8 solid hours that day.
A wonderful arcade racer, expertly converted by Sumo Digital (who else?!). Take your hatchback of choice on a mazy run around an open world, navigating myriad routes until you find the optimum path for hot lap times. That's it. But fuck me is it enjoyable.
Some of the challenges were super tough, and yet every time I felt I had hit a wall, I had another try and shaved a couple seconds off my lap, or optimised a corner, or mastered a tricky section. This is why Arcade racers can be so fun. Virtua Racing, Sega Rally, Daytona. All greats. But you know what? Stick GTI Club in there as well.
I am now desperate to find a working cabinet of this thing in the wild. Arcade Club perhaps?
67. BreakQuest: Extra Evolution (Vita) - 26/12/21 - ~8 hours (All Trophies [PSN])
When I first got my Vita ten years ago, I enjoyed this game a lot. In 2021? Not so much.
It's a brick breaker. You can influence the path of your ball like the (far superior) Shatter. Each stage is a bit of a puzzle, in that it's not immediately obvious which objects are breakable, which are enemies, etc. It looks a bit like Sound Shapes with a soft, abstract, Orla Kiely sort of look.
But the physics are jank. Seriously unpleasant at times. The ball ricochets at oscillating speeds that you can do very little to influence. Even with the ability to tug the ball's trajectory, certain obstacles can still take literal minutes to take out.
Very unlikely I ever return to this one again.
68. Lumines Supernova (PS3) - 28/12/21 - ~10 hours (All Trophies [PSN])
A very good version of one of my very favourite games.
A kind of halfway house between PSP bangers Lumines and its sequel Lumines 2, Supernova was a great console version of the 2nd best block dropping puzzle game of all time.
I can’t lie and say that I suddenly enjoyed the mission and puzzle modes in this one, any more than I did in any previous entry in the series, but the core game is still such a rush, that everything else is superfluous, acting as little more than stumbling blocks to keep you away from more delicious skins.
No game makes my brain fizz quite like Lumines does. It’s totally different to the zen state of calm that Tetris puts me in, instead its like a constant push like I’m dancing around the edge of a precarious precipice. I love it.
Some skins are actually still exclusive to this particular entry in the series, including an incredibly distracting LittleBigPlanet themed skin that flashes a ridiculous amount of stuff on screen with every quad-clear.
— — —
2022 then. We go again!
Come bother me about all the rubbish I played, recommend new titles, or generally just sigh at my constant frustration at UK politics via Twitter over at @chas_hodges.
