PixlBit

Seems like a lot of stuff I played this week but between retro games with low gameplay time and various rage-quits it's not as much time spent as it seems. Here's everything, 'cause I need to write.  

PS4

Rive 

Really great graphics, excellent controls, but it beat me up pretty badly at first which made me rage. I had this experience quite a bit in my first dive into TSS's, so maybe I'm just in a mood and will have to restart all these games again in a week or so when I'm not so stressed. 

OG Xbox

Atari Anniversary Collection: Black Widow - I love this game but it's difficult. I wonder how the full cabinet plays. I'd like to take a trip to Funspot sometime to find out. 
Project Gotham Racing 2: Geometry Wars - This was set in an arcade cabinet in your garage and very easy to find. This is the first iteration of Geometry Wars and it's very good. I even played a few races in PGR2 but I'm not a big fan of racing games that penalize you for hitting things. That's why I like the Burnout series so much. 

Wii

Geometry Wars Galaxies - This is a load of new levels set into a galaxy map. You have pickups that earn you points to spend on opening new levels and unlocking a robot buddy that helps you in different ways. There's also the first Geometry Wars Retro Evolved included, which on first play seemed not that much different than the first GW game. 

I then did some cleanup of my Wii's hard drive and memory stick. I still have quite a few WiiWare and Virutal Console games there. 
Orbient 

Not a twin-stick shooter but kind of similar. It was a very early WiiWare game I got way back because it was about astronomical gravity. You pilot a space rock by adding or subtracting gravitational attraction. You grow in size by hitting bodies (orbs) of a certain size, smaller ones just get captured and orbit around you. When you get to a certain size you can capture a sun and end the level. Later levels have super strong gravitational bodies like black holes or very large objects that have a lot of pull. It's really cool but probably not available anymore unless you got it back then and saved it on a memory card like I did. 

XSX

Black Widow on Atari 50 and Atari Flashback Classics Vol. 1. - Yeah, I play this again where ever I have a copy, just for fun. 
Midway Arcade Origins: Robotron 2084, Smash TV and Total Carnage - Robotron 2084 and Smash TV are a lot of fun and Total Carnage is like a sequel to Smash that's mashed up with a game like Commando. I enjoy them all, but I play on Score Attack mode for achievements, and it's without continues. Needless to say, I don't last very long on a single virtual quarter. 
Geometry Wars Evolved - I played this on Xbox again because it's still available and I own it. Fun. I need to get its two sequels at some point. 
Halo: Spartan Assault - I guess not technically a twin-stick shooter because you use the trigger to shoot, but its isometric view just feels a bit like a twin-stick shooter. I thought I'd get into this again but it just wasn't exciting me as much as I thought it would. Maybe if it was a little more bullet-hell crazy like a lot of twin-stick games, I would've stayed with it. 
The Ascent 

This is set in a dark dystopian cyber punk world and plays great. I love the graphics and setting. It really looks good. I feel like the story and dialog is good too. Gameplay is excellent but it got very difficult after the first few missions. Maybe I didn't upgrade properly or something. I'm not sure, but I will return to it because I love the look of the game so much. 

Other Stuff

My book and music theme this month is the 17th century, and so I tried to find some games set in that time. 
Port Royal 3 - Actually less complicated than I expected. It was fun sailing around the Caribbean during the time of pirates trading for goods. I found it eventually burdensome to try and remember prices in so many different ports however. Maybe there was a universal data menu somewhere?
Crash Bandicoot 4: It's About Time - At least some of the levels are based in pirate times. This is a very good platformer. I managed a few more levels in this from last time before I got frustrated. I got this a while back mainly because Toys For Bob made it, makers of Skylanders. 

Then I just went through some current release lists and played the following.
AimLabs 

The basic game is free. It's an interesting trainer for games like Fortnight and Call of Duty. I don't play multiplayer shooters, but I do single player or co-op. It was interesting for a little while. 
Wizardry: PGotMO - This remake is pretty darn good with various modes to make it a little more modern and less unforgiving. Even so, it's still pretty brutal. I got to level three this time before being totally screwed by a pack of spitting frogs. I really dislike the high prices in the town for items and resurrections. It takes a long while to get the spell to cure poison and potions are just too pricey. Honestly, if I could change just a few stats in this game I would enjoy it so much more. 
Warhammer 40K: Space Marine 2 - This was gifted to me by my gaming buddy over Xmas. I restarted and found I wasn't in the mood for the tricky timing required to block attacks in boss fights. This is more of a melee game than a shooter. I get back to it sometime though. 
Grim Idle (also called Grim Clicker) - 

Here is where I finally hit my sweet spot. I must be stressed out because I really got hooked on this. It's a free game by Desert Water Games. I played their DPS Idle game before this. Grim Idle is a 2D game where your character auto runs and attacks enemies one at a time. While this is going on you gain XP and currency to upgrade weapons and add abilities to your auto-battler. When your DPS (damage per second) gets a bit stagnant, and enemies are harder and harder to beat, you just kill yourself (ritually - hence grim dark theme) and restart. You earn a special currency for this that boosts permanent base stats. There are a lot of abilities you can add, weapon types, and crafting and upgrading of equipment that make it a very interesting game. And you can just cruise and not even do anything for a while if you want. The perfect type of game for me right now. I'll be playing this after any new twin-stick shooters for a while. 

Onward to next week. I just picked up Project Gotham Racing 4 to get at Geometry Wars Waves within it, so I'll be breaking out the Xbox 360. Ciao!