Full Steam Week 8: Monkeys & Mutants
With a side of volleyball?
Welcome back to my recaps of FULL STEAM, where I’m trying to play through my entire 300-game Steam library to clear out my backlog – one randomly-selected game at a time.
You can follow along with my progress, such as it is, here on Headcanon and on this YouTube channel.
Previous Full Steam recaps:
Hyper Gunsport
In which I shoot first and ask about the score later.
After a week with some pretty heavy narrative and strategy games, it’s nice to dip into a pure arcade experience like Hyper Gunsport. This kinetic, loud, fast-paced game answers the immortal question: what if volleyball, but guns? The graphics and responsiveness are modern as hell, but the gameplay is pure SNES (in a really good way): a couple of button inputs, some variety to the levels and character, and rules that are easy to understand but hard to master. And the competing teams just want to share their cultures’ foods with each other! Good times.
Uurnog Uurnlimited
In which I take a walk around the block(s).
Uurnog Uurnlimited is hard to describe. You’re dropped in a world with some fun responsive physics, day-glo colors and lots of little cubes with eyeballs, and sent on your way without so much as a quest marker. When I was trying to come up with games to compare it to, nothing stuck out in my brain more than A Boy and His Blob for the NES, a game where you similarly set off underground with very little explanation and have to figure out how to use the tools in front of you to advance. What would I call this game - a cube-’em-up? An immersive sim? A puzzle game? I dunno - whatever it is, it’s adorable, easy to grasp, and fun.
Do Not Feed the Monkeys 2099
In which I observe and report.
Last year I fell pretty hard for deduction games like Return of the Obra Dinn and The Case of the Golden Idol, and I feel like Do Not Feed The Monkeys 2099 wanted to scratch that same itch but couldn’t quite reach it. The twist here is that, rather than collecting clues from a scene after the fact, you’re conducting surveillance and gathering clues as something is happening - or a lot of somethings, to be more accurate. You’re switching between surveillance screens, so whenever you’re looking at one, there’s a chance you’re missing something on the others. It’s an interesting idea, but it didn’t really pay off for me.
Super Indie Karts
In which I fail to live up to my past potential.
Super Mario Kart and Mario Kart 64 were staples of our childhood video game collection that always stayed in pretty heavy rotation. While I’m sad to say my years of skill accumulation didn’t exactly transfer to Super Indie Karts, the game absolutely nails just about everything about the feeling of those games from earlier video game generations. Track design, sound effects, drifting mechanics, item boxes – it’s all there. Whoever made this clearly did their homework (or avoided doing their homework in order to play more Mario Kart 64, as was the case with me).
Curious Expedition
In which I quickly run out of chocolate and into trouble.
With the pixel graphics, dice combat and hex map, there’s a lot of board game DNA in The Curious Expedition – I just didn’t realize it at the time I first played it, before I had become more of a board game nerd. It’s a tough resource management game without a whole lot of crunchy, complicated resource mechanics; the only bars you really have to track are your sanity and your health, and the latter only really comes into play in combat. Mostly it’s an exploration game, and you have to decide where to explore with the resources you have, and what risks you want to take on the way. I’m so glad this game came up again for me, because I’ve put a lot of hours into it already, and now I’ll probably put in a lot more.
FTL
In which I almost run out of space gas.
Speaking of games I’ve put a lot of hours into, FTL was a blast from my past that felt like slipping back into an old comfortable set of PJs (if the PJs were constantly trying to kill me). Even on easy mode, I have never once beat the rebel fleet at the end of a run of FTL, but that has not frustrated me or turned me off at all. Every run is so varied, and the gameplay loop so satisfying, that I’ll always come back for more. For one studio to release both FTL and Into the Breach is absolutely ridiculous. Save some genius for the rest of us, folks.
Mutazione
In which I'm on island time.
There was some nice art design and sound design in this week’s games, but nothing that compared to the beautiful construction-paper-cutouts of Mutazione. Once you arrive on the titular island and are set loose on the town there, the layers and layers of intricate designs really pop out to leave you gobsmacked. The music and sound effects, from the song under the opening credits to the sounds on the island, are also impeccable - clearly a game that a lot of people put a lot of care and thought into.
*****
Reading: She Is in Love With ChatGPT | Kashmir Hill | The New York Times
Listening: The Complete Live at the Plugged Nickel 1965 | Miles Davis