A Wolf Among Us (01/03/15)
Pac-Man Championship Edition DX+ (All courses S ranked on 01/08/15)
Distance (beta 3315, 01/11/15)
Shantae: Risky's Revenge- Director's Cut (01/16/15)
Sega Bass Fishing (01/17/15)
Fairy Bloom Freesia (01/17/15)
BasketBelle (01/18/15)
Tiny & Big: in Grandpa's Leftovers (01/20/15)
Sideway: New York (01/22/15)
Doom 64 EX (01/23/15)
Shadow of the Ninja (NES, 01/29/15)
Shatterhand (NES, 01/30/15)
S.C.A.T. (NES, 01/31/15)
Abadox (NES, 02/01/15)
Never Alone: Kisima Ingitchuna (02/05/15)My review of this game can be summarized simply: good view into another culture, poor gameplay mechanics.
Never Alone is a game about the Iñupiat people, a traditional hunter-gatherer group of Alaska Natives. You are playing out a folklore legend traditionally passed down from Iñupiat storytellers, with graphics inspired by the artwork of Alaska Native people, where the rewards for finding hidden objects in the game are documentary film clips about the Iñupiat people. This game is part interactive legend and part cultural documentary. The tale is lovingly told in its native language with English subtitles, and the artwork is gorgeous. In its goal to educate people about the Iñupiat in an entertaining way, this game succeeds.
The downside is that this game suffers from poorly implemented controls and glitches. You will fall through floors for no reason, your character will fail to grab ledges you clearly were in position to grab, you will get slowed down by extra animations that interfere with completing timed tasks, your AI controlled companion will get itself killed, jumps won't land as expected, and the bola weapon will not work a good majority of the time that it is supposed to (especially when using a controller instead of mouse). Much of the challenge of this game stems from a poor control system. The level design is not bad, however, and I enjoyed the puzzles. Unfortunately, I would see the solution to the puzzle and it would then take me 5 to 6 tries to actually get my character through it because of frustrating mechanical issues.
Nevertheless, it's a lovely look into another culture and it's nice to see a game that really isn't based on the same tired gaming narrative tropes. I wish this had gone through a bit more play testing and refinement, because it really is something special, it's just hampered by infuriating mechanical problems.
*click for images*