deKay's Lofi Gaming

Detective Pikachu Returns (Switch): COMPLETED!

It’s been a long time coming, what with the original game coming in at the end of the Nintendo 3DS’ viable life, and it now being the twilight hours of the Nintendo Switch, but finally it was released and, having given it to my daughter to play first, the time eventually came for me to finish the story that cliffhangered on the previous game. Now, I may be misremembering the first game, but I’m pretty sure this one is somewhat …

Stikir (Steam Deck): COMPLETED!

Well this is a bloody weird game. It is, sort of, a game about making a game. Only you play the game and the game keeps changing as you do. One minute it’s a platform game, then it’s a sideways scrolling shooter, then you’re in the dark, then you have to dodge stuff while not falling in holes. Weird, as I said. In some ways it feels a bit like a Wario Ware game, only with the microgames somewhat longer …

Pikmin 4 (Switch): COMPLETED!

Pikmin is, essentially, Nintendo’s take on the real-time strategy format, only you direct little carrot creatures to fetch and carry and multiply and stuff, rather than build tanks and so on. There are different colours of Pikmin which have different strengths and skills, and there are baddies to fight who all want to eat them. Pikmin 4 doesn’t deviate too much from this, but it is just so much more relaxing than the other games in the series. In the …

Doctor Who: An Unlikely Heist (iPad): COMPLETED!

This is a bad game. Do not play. You want more? Sigh. Fine. Doctor Who: An Unlikely Heist, which was renamed in an update to “Doctor Who: Hidden Mysteries” presumably because there was no unlikely heist in the game, is a hidden object game. I’ve no beef with hidden object games. They can be fun but they are very shallow, and usually, that’s fine. However, it’s not just a hidden object game because there’s a tenuous Doctor Who story here …

Azure Striker Gunvolt 3 (Switch): COMPLETED!

I found out recently that there are no plans to create any more Gunvolt games. Or Blaster Master Zero games. This is a Bad Occurrence, because I very much like them both. What exactly are Inti Creates going to do instead? Anyway, this game. It’s a bit different to the previous Gunvolt game, in that you don’t play as Gunvolt. Well, not really. Instead, you play as Kirin, a sort of ninja monk who makes use of some of Gunvolt’s …

Pikachu Murders Ash

(An OpenAI story) Pikachu sat on the edge of the forest, watching as Ash trained his other Pokémon. Pikachu had been Ash’s loyal companion for many years, but lately, it had been feeling unappreciated and neglected. As Ash shouted orders and commands at his other Pokémon, Pikachu grew angrier and angrier. It had had enough of being treated like a second-class Pokémon, and it was determined to make Ash pay. When Ash’s back was turned, Pikachu crept up behind him …

Robotnik’s Mean Bean Machine (Switch): COMPLETED!

Just in case I didn’t have enough games to play already, and I have a copy of this already on my Switch in the Sega Mega Drive Collection thing, I decided to play the one in the new Sega Nintendo Online collection. No, I don’t know either. I’ve played it before. And completed it before. But not for a while. Mean Bean Machine is just a reskin of Puyo Puyo, and I have to say, I prefer Puyo Puyo. This …

A Short Hike (PC): COMPLETED!

Another PC game? Why yes! Because it’s not on anything else and I’ve a Steam Link set up and it was free on the Epic store and I wanted to play it and life finds a way. It’s a gentle little game, where you play as a bird who needs to hike up a mountain. Doing this is made easier by finding golden feathers, some of which are scattered about and others from completing tasks, which allow you to climb …

Action Biker (Spectrum): COMPLETED!

Another game I really enjoyed, but rarely completed, back in the day. Some people suggest that the C64 version of Action Biker is superior, but they’re wrong. It’s a totally different sort of game, for a start! This version involves you riding around a town, searching houses for parts for you bike to enable you to travel underwater and in an area which is pitch black for some reason. You need to find your friend Marty (for some reason you …

Big Ben Strikes Again (Spectrum): COMPLETED!

Way back when, this was one of my favourite games. The main reason being that it had a built in level editor, but the catchy music has remained in my head for decades. My copy was one of four games in a compilation, the other four being Panzerdrome (which was impossible), Tidy Tony (which was a bit like Atic Atac only rubbish), and Steelyard Blues (which I liked until many years later when I found out it was a hacked …

Azure Striker Gunvolt 2 (Switch): COMPLETED!

And that’s the pair of them. I’d never played this sequel before, but it turned out to be just as good as the first game. There have been a few quality of life tweaks, such as not needing to choose which challenges to do before you do them – now they act more like normal achievements – and some of the upgrades upgrade themselves as you use them, rather than need improved versions synthesising. The gameplay is the same as …

Azure Striker Gunvolt (Switch): COMPLETED!

Not that long ago (FIVE YEARS?! WHAT) I played, enjoyed and beat the 3DS version of this. I purposefully didn’t look back at what I wrote back then until just before writing this, and a few things surprised me. Firstly, I never did get the good ending last time. This time, I did! Secondly, I had difficulties in all different places this time. For example, the “fire boss” was a walkover before, but he was one of the difficult ones …

One Strike (Switch): COMPLETED!

It’ll probably take longer to read this post than it took me to complete the game. One Strike is a one-on-one fighting game with the sort of graphics early Game Boy Advance games had, with colour palettes to suit the very dark GBA screen. Games like Castlevania: Circle of the Moon looked hideous when blown up on a big TV via an emulator, and so does One Strike. As the name suggests, you need to strike your opponent just once …

Pikuniku (Switch): COMPLETED!

Pikuniku is a… game best discovered for yourself. Partly because that’s genuinely true, but also because it’s a little hard to describe. Sure, I can tell you it’s a sort of platformer with puzzles and bosses, and there’s a lot of kicking things, but that’s not really describing the game. No, the game is unusual. Both in style and content. There’s a plot about a guy who gives out free money, there’s a leaf-based underground resistance, and there’s a section …