Things I’ve been playing recently (Part 1 – Wii U demos)

Things I’ve been playing recently (Part 1 – Wii U demos)

Time for a roundup. Seeing as I’ve played a lot but not posted about anything. In several parts too, as there’s so much. Firstly, some demos:

Over E3, Nintendo put nine new Wii U game demos on the eShop under the horrifically named “Nindies@Home” banner. So I played them.

Runbow

Not as good as I was hoping for. It plays a bit like Guacamelee only rubbish. Sort of. Platformer with an annoying colour changing mechanic where platforms disappear when the colour changes to match. Didn’t play it multiplayer, which is the main draw, so it’s probably better there.

Mutant Mudds Super Challenge

More Mutant Mudds. Which is great, as the original was great, but on the Wii U you lose the 3D and it makes the jumping in and out of the screen seem pointless, somehow. And it’s hard. And I never finished the original 100% so not sure how I feel about more hardness.

Forma.8

Pleasant floating around game. It’s a bit like Knytt Underground and Abyss in style, has a fun drop a bomb and “kick” it attack, and some simple puzzles. Seems OK, might be interested in the full game.

Extreme Exorcism

Platformer where you kill ghosts. It’s a bit like Super Crate Box, only when you kill the ghost, the next level has a new ghost who duplicates all your moves from the previous level. And then the next level has all the previous yous and ghosts. Or that’s what it seemed. Fun, if a bit confusing.

Rive

Lovely twin stick shooter with really, really meaty bangs and explosions. Sections split between gravityless side scrolling and gravity based platforming, with the odd swimming section (where you can’t shoot). Very nice.

Soul Axiom

It’s Not Portal(TM). It’s also really shonky, with stuttering and framerate issues all over the place. It also looks a bit like it’s been made with some Unity level designer or something. And terrible, terrible voice acting. Oh god.

Freedom Planet

What looks like Sonic and sounds like Sonic but is terrible (like Sonic is now, I suppose)? Freedom Planet! Awful animation, screen juddering everywhere and all hopes and dreams of a possibly good Sonic game (even though it isn’t Sonic) up in smoke. Boo.

Lovely Planet

If Noby Noby Boy was a first person shooter, it would look like this. Is the style intentional, or the result of not being able to draw? Who knows. Hiding behind the cute sparseness, is a brutal one-hit-death FPS, which is sort of OK, but I’m not sure I like it enough to play it again.

Typoman

The best of the bunch. Limbo-esque platforming with puzzles solved by creating words with letters that litter the area. So RAIN is a rain cloud filling a pit, but add a D and it DRAINs out. Clever, lovely, and definitely on my want list.

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