Review Games you may not have tried 1 - LV edition!

I dig through the game libraries so you don't have to! Hidden gems and underdog picks have always been something I seek in all media and games are no exception. I figured I would share my love of oddball games with LV! One of my favorite Youtube series is Games you might not have tried by Extra Credits so this has a bit of a similar format and may touch on some games found there.

In this first edition of GYMNHT I give you guys a spoiler free review of two games, one on PC and one on Mobile. Let me know what you think of them if you have tried them out or if you are now interested in trying them.

Here we go!

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Stray Cat Crossing

Developers: Jurlo and Jetpackgnome
Publisher: Fridge
Platforms: PC (steam)
Price: 3.39$ (CDN)

Do you like surreal monster stories? Bored with normal, everyday video games? This might be the thing for you. Stray Cat Crossing is a small indie horror gem that I encountered a few years back. I have a soft spot for both pixel graphics and monsters so it seemed pretty perfect.

My journey with this game was quite short (took about 5 hours to get through everything) but it was definitely interesting. The story is bizarre and heart-wrenching at times, the art style is pretty flooring for a single artist to do.
It is marked as horror and it is but I would not consider it that scary of a game. It leaves you uneasy and does occasionally make you jump but all in all it's mostly about the atmosphere and the wicked story.

The Good: The soundtrack and atmosphere are great. The graphics are stellar.
The Bad: Some of the puzzles can be pretty frustrating and there can be some trial and error tedium for some sections.
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Look, Your Loot!

Developers: Dragosha
Publisher: Dragosha
Platforms: Android and iOS
Price: Free (Some ads)​

Any fans of Mouse Guard here? That is the link that got me interested in this little mobile gem almost a year ago now. It has been one of the longest lived games on my phone which is no small feat, I go through a lot of mobile games a year.

This a Card Crawler game, sometimes known as card brawlers as well. The gameplay is simple at first but has nice layers to it when you have been playing a while. You play one of a multitude of little mousy heroes with classic RPG flavors from the likes of a knight to a plague doctor. Each comes with its own dungeon delving perks: Opening chests with ease (thief), making great use of shields (knight), etc. Dungeons are a board of cards (you select how big you want to go from a tiny 2x2 to a large 4x4 board) which is randomly generated with monster, traps, items and sometimes NPCs. Your little rodent has an HP number on the to right of his card. It can kill any monster it comes across by you tapping on it and removing your HP equal to the damage the monster deals.

For example:

In this screenshot from their shop page you can see the adorable Thief Hero on the middle right. They have 7 HP left and the spider to their left has 7 attack (see on the top right), the mouse would die if it tried to attack that right now so it will have to go around.

Each time a card is moved onto and the effects resolve, like killing a monster, another random card takes it's place. Could be good, could be bad, try not to get cornered!

The biggest aspect of this game that I really admire is that free updates are added to it constantly. New items, new heroes, new enemies and game modes pop up every few months to no additional cost. This is a rarity in the mobile market especially for a free game. Every time I come back to it there is something new to see which I really appreciate.

Lastly, speaking of money the game is a very fair free game. The only real money store items are the following:
- Remove ads and have one booster(item) for free each game - 2.39$ CDN (one time purchase)
- Start kit. 100000 gold +60 gems - 2.39$ (one time purchase)
- Reduce boosters(item) prices by half forever - 2.39$ CDN

All of these are not set up as pay walls to progress and just make things quicker/easier. I appreciate that they are one time purchases and don't encourage any kind of gambling on characters or addictive payment plans. Speaking of ads, they are quite minimal, you will get one after a few games (as far as I can tell only if you retry the same board and settings, if you go back to character select and back in the ads don't appear) and if you choose to view an ad to start with a free item before your run. That's it. Both in-game currencies (gold and crystals) are available in game as you naturally play. You can use those to buy new passive buffs for characters, the characters themselves and little items to give your next run a boost.

The Good:
- Design is pleasing and themed.
- Artwork looks great and has nice little animation touches like the mice twitching their noses or ears.
- Games are short which is perfect for a mobile game.
- Honest pay system with no abuses.

The Bad:
- Some of the UI can be a bit confusing/hidden away.
- Some broken english can still be found in the game since the developers are not native english speakers.​

Whew that last one took a while, sorry if it was long winded!
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So what did you think of this first little review article of mine? Any advise on making it better? I would love to hear it.

 

Hah I am familiar with it but indeed my family did not eat Chex cereal. I have seen it on a few lists of surprising kids games.