Planet TD (Steam Deck): COMPLETED!

Planet TD is a pretty simple, no frills Tower Defen[c|s]e game. I don’t remember how I ended up with it on Steam, or why I started playing it, but it’s… fine? I mean, it’s straightforward. You have loads of levels, and on each you put different types of gun towers down on set locations before a load of baddies march along a set path and you have to make sure your guns kill them before they reach the end of …

Superhot (Steam Deck): COMPLETED!

Yes, yes. I’m late to the party. I know. And no, I have no excuse because I’ve owned it on Steam for ages, and it’s been on PS+ seemingly forever. But I’m here now, and that’s all that counts, right? And, as it turns out, Superhot is bloody excellent. The “things only move when you do” mechanic is so obvious now that you wonder why it wasn’t really done before, and here it turns a first person shooter into a …

The Murder of Sonic the Hedgehog (Steam Deck): COMPLETED!

What was obviously an April Fool, not least because of the release date, it turned out that The Murder of Sonic the Hedgehog was, in fact, a real actual game that genuinely exists. And was free on Steam. Who wouldn’t want to play a game where Sonic the Hedgehog is murdered? Minor spoiler (because obviously, c’mon): Sonic wasn’t murdered. In this mostly visual novel game, it’s Amy’s birthday and, as you do for such events, a murder-mystery-onna-train party has been …

Figment (Steam Deck): COMPLETED!

From the outside, Figment looks like the sort of game I’d really want to play (and, of course, is why I did). Interesting graphics style, the promise of puzzles, some weird story about being in a person’s subconscious, great voice acting. All of those are true. But, it’s just so, so dull and tedious. The main issue is the puzzles are often of a disguised Sokoban nature. You have to flip a switch to activate a thing, but you have …

Cave Buster (Steam Deck): COMPLETED!

Cave Buster is a short retro-style platformer which perhaps could be classed as a Metroidvania if it was a bit longer. You get a few upgrades that let you reach other areas, but there aren’t many areas (or many upgrades) so it doesn’t feel like you get to use them enough to consider it as that sort of game. It is fun while it lasts, however. I’m assuming it was the result of a Game Jam or something, with the …

Milk inside a bag of milk inside a bag of milk (Steam Deck): COMPLETED!

I’ve played some baffling games in my time but this may be one of the oddest in years. It’s sort of a visual novel, where you play as seemingly the subconscious of a very anxious girl who is sent out to buy some milk. Except, you also play as you, the player. And the girl knows it’s not real. Or is it? Or is it not real but her medication makes it seems like it is? Or is the subconscious …

Vampire Survivors (Steam Deck): COMPLETED!

Let it be known: I actually spent actual money (rather than money gained from selling farmed trading cards) on this Steam game. I don’t think I’ve ever done that before. The things a Steam Deck make you do. I’ve wanted it for some time. Yes, it looks a bit pants and yes it’s cheap and yes, yes it rips off the Castlevania aesthetic to the point of why-hasn’t-Konami-stepped-in, but there was something interesting about how you just get ridiculously overpowered …

Little Inferno (Steam Deck): COMPLETED!

Is this the third platform I’ve played and 100%ed this on now? Probably. It’s still great. I suppose I’d not realised before but Little Inferno is really “just” a simple clicker game. You buy things to make money (by, er, burning them), with which to buy more things. Which you then also burn. There’s a checklist of combinations of two or three things to burn together for extra kudos, and a story about the world getting colder all the time, …

Scream Collector (Steam Deck): COMPLETED!

With a thousand PC games to choose from in my Steam/Epic/GOG/Itch libraries, mostly unplayed, you’d think I would never need to even look in the Steam store for something else to pass the time, right? And, if I did, you’d expect I might be picking out some high profile or highly lauded title that I don’t already own, yeah? Well, no. For I stumbled across this shambolic looking free-to-play clicker game instead, and then spent THIRTY HOURS completing it. No, …

World of Goo (Steam Deck): COMPLETED!

It’s been a long time since I last played this on the Wii. I blame not having another machine with a suitable input device, as it only really works with touch screens and pointers, not control sticks. Yes, I know I could have managed on the Switch or even on the Mac, but anyway. Trackpad on the Steam Deck it is. I’d totally forgotten about most of the “story”, and have no recollection of the Information Superhighway “world” at all. …

The Norwood Suite (Steam Deck): COMPLETED!

Another PC-locked, Steam Deck-freed game! Who knows, one day my huge Steam backlog may finally be dented. (Narrator: it never was) The Norwood Suite is one of a series of first person narrative discovery games set in the same universe. I don’t know the order they’re in (if indeed they are), but I think this is the first one? It doesn’t really matter though, as it’s utterly mental so even if I did get some references, the rest is nuts …

Wargroove (Steam Deck): COMPLETED!

One of those games from ages ago that I was really looking forward to, but it took forever to come out and when it did, I’d sort of stopped caring. At least, enough to pay for it anyway. But for free, on my Steam Deck? Ah, gwan then. Yes, it’s Advance Wars. Graphically and mechanically, anyway. In fact, in those respects, it’s so close to Advance Wars that I’m amazed the normally trigger-happy Nintendo Fun Lawyers didn’t set upon it …

Pony Island (Steam Deck): COMPLETED!

I aborted an attempt to play Pony Island on my Mac a few years ago, as you have to press the left and right mouse buttons at the same time at some point, and with a Mac mouse you can’t do that. I had a PC mouse I could have plugged in instead, but I also had eleventybillion other games that didn’t require that sort of effort, so it got shelved. Until now! Sure, the Steam Deck actually has no …

Aperture Desk Job (Steam Deck): COMPLETED!

Yes, I have a Steam Deck. And you know what? It’s actually great. I was sure it’d be horrible and clunky and just a bit wrong, but actually, it isn’t. Well, OK, it is still a bit clunky. To show off the ten trillion different sticks, buttons, pads, flaps, twiddles, surfaces and touchybits that the Steam Deck packs to ensure there’s a workable control method for just about every game you can throw at it, Valve created a free game …