Monthly in a Month #9: The Watchmaker edition

Reply here once done.

I'll try this month.

• Hellblade: Senua's Sacrifice
• GRIS - [Beaten]
• Orwell - [Beaten]
• The Shapeshifting Detective - [Beaten]
• Case of Distrust - [Completed]
• Aegis Defenders
• Smile for Me - [Completed]
• TSIOQUE - [Completed]

Ugh I'd love to enter but I've got a busy month ahead ><

I'll see what I can find that I may be able to complete.

For now... bump ^.^

thanks again for offering another awesome game this month, i always look forward to seeing which game will be given away next. though i technically don't own control, i'm gonna sit out this month anyway because i do have it via steam family share, and already 100%'d it. i hope whoever ends up winning it enjoys it as much as i did. awesome story, graphics, gameplay.. this game has it all.
also, yeah, fuck daylights saving time.

Thanks for the offer mate! I will definitely try to complete the games I've got :)

btw do i have to list the games i'll play? if yes then i'll edit that in later! BUMP!!

I'll try my best. Thanks for doing this.
List of games I'm considering:

Getting Over It with Bennett Foddy
Tiny Echo
Overgrowth
Finding Paradise
Silence
Call of Cthulu

What I actually ended up playing:

Control is gorgeous. And any game with photo mode is a goty from me :3
35 hours to 100%

Yay Control, I shall try this month!

The Stillness of the Wind - Abandoned

We Were Here Together was sadly the biggest disappointment. I loved the first one & despite some complaints with the second it was still a fun experience. This one the puzzles were either confusing/difficult (as in required a bunch of steps) or only one person had to do most of the work, idk felt like a more frustrating & tedious game. Still had it's moments, but overall bummed we didn't love it :( Hoping the next one in the series is more up our alley.

Little Misfortune some of the humour missed the mark for me, but as the game went on it definitely grew on me & got a couple big laughs and even made me emotional. Considering I wasn't loving it initially it left quite the impact.

Smile For Me was a fetch quest simulator but pretty interesting, definitely had a neat distinct style to it. The characters weren't super fleshed out or anything but it was a fun, chill P&C style game. Gave me a bit of Jazzpunk vibes.

NEOVERSE was fun for a night, but don't see myself replaying it compared to Slay the Spire etc. Still will probably play a couple more playthroughs and see if it sinks it's teeth into me.

The Shapeshifting Detective had nice acting & atmosphere, an interesting single-sitting adventure game. Really put me in the mood to play more FMVs/choose-your-own-adventure style games.

A Case of Distrust had some incredible style with the graphic design, super clean and fit the tone well. The music too! Got a bit bored with the story/mystery side of it by the end, but it wasn't bad.

We'll see how I go this month. A few slightly longer games I want to play, so I'll see if I can get them done. I have a few smaller ones to change to if I run out of time..

Started to run out of time at the end there.. A Short Hike is beaten for the last game. Might go back and 100% it and Rover Mechanic eventually :P

Definitely have to do this month too. Thank you cj.

Complete games list:

Fran Bow - achievements

Well, this was more macabre than I expected, but it was interesting. Suffers from some common issues with adventure games like "I pick up these items of interest, but ignore others, for seemingly arbitrary reasons." Some of the dialogue feels stilted as well, with not much reason to have dialogue options. Puzzles stumped me multiple times and motivated me to use a guide; maybe I'm a bit dense for the genre.

Still tells an interesting story, and the overall concept of "a horror world through a child's eyes" is a novel one in gaming. I would like to see how Little Misfortune turned out.

She Remembered Caterpillars - achievements

I enjoyed that sort of dramatic depressed poetry through which She Remembered Caterpillars tells its brief "story." For the puzzles themselves, they were definitely harder than expected and I needed a guide for several of them.

Purrfect Date - achievements

Definitely didn't enjoy this at first, especially with (minor spoilers) the first four protagonists going through the same song and dance with research orientation and unwittingly starting the cat transformation process. By the end, I wanted to preserve my save before starting a new game, which probably means it won me over. Incredibly catchy music and the little "relationship status" completionist screen helped.

Passpartout: The Starving Artist - achievements (minor spoiler: "The Ladies Swoon" achievement is one of several possible "good" endings)

The first two hours of Passpartout flew by as I drew whatever I could think of and my art flew off the shelves to the less discerning customers. Unfortunately, I eventually ran out of creative ideas to draw (plus my bad art was no longer up to snuff) and I resorted to cheesing my way to the finish line with spammy paintings. I understand for obvious reasons the ability for a single-player game to assess art would be extremely limited, and the concept is an intriguing sort the industry could really expand upon with the right budget.

Paratopic - achievements (note on achievement timestamps: As the achievement guide on Steam explains, achievements are only tabulated at the end of the playthrough)

I saw this on a friend's Twitch stream and decided to eventually play through myself. Made me feel a little better about staying locked in to the June 2019 Humble Monthly (the one with the Black Ops 4 headliner; never really enjoyed any flavor of Call of Duty multiplayer).

Some of the downtime is mildly annoying, but there is never really an overbearing unskippable pause in the action. Moreover, I understand the intent to encourage the player to take in the atmosphere. And that atmosphere is bewildering and compelling, combining a David Lynch or Nicolas Winding Refn film with the look of a warped PS1/N64 game.

The Suicide of Rachel Foster - achievements

Throughout the game, I felt like the developers wanted to combine the best elements of the adventure genre's recent heavy hitters like Telltale's Walking Dead, Firewatch, Gone Home and Life is Strange. Overall, it didn't really succeed in that respect, because the pacing feels off and the game doesn't quite execute its concepts quite as cleanly as its progenitors. (Moderate spoiler) The big reveal(s) feels like there's something off about it, like it's unearned and doesn't properly align with what the rest of the game built. I also got lost or stuck several times, but I am a bit careless. Despite all of that, I did enjoy the journey, and although it is not a horror game in the traditional sense, the game can build tension well at a few points.

Tsioque beaten Cute little P&C. Short, simple, and sweet.
Smile for Me beaten. Weird First-person... P&C game.
Little Misfortune beaten. Cute, slightly crude and disturbing (given the protagonist) with a couple of funny parts.
The Shapeshifting Detective beaten. Didn't enjoy it as much as Late Shift; it was still very interesting, but played out more like Her Story.
Supraland is great! XD puzzle-platformer-collectathon, with some metroidvania elements. The PAID DLC has achievements. grr.
EDIT: Dropped Wuppo as I wasn't enjoying it. Gonna give The Magic Circle a spin instead.
The Magic Circle beaten. Ugh, glad that's over, there were some great parts to the game, but overall it was just really lame. The game mechanics ("hacking" objects and creatures to accomplish objectives) was cool, but the story (megalomaniac and a failed game)... ugh.

Welp, time to revisit Half-Life! Hopefully my nostalgia-coloured glasses don't disappoint me :)
EDIT: Friggin' game breaking bug in Black Mesa. Seems they keep updating it, and it's normal for the save files to stop working; but in this case, it looks like they screwed a chapter over, and I can't progress. I guess this is why most mods are free...
EDIT: Dropped Black Mesa. It got incredibly hard when I hit the end of Questionable Ethics chapter in the lobby. From then on, all of the enemies became bullet sponges, literally almost full clips of ammo to kill each enemy. Utter tripe.
I guess I have to decide what my new bonus game will be for the third time this month. dang.

EDIT: Shadow of the Tomb Raider will do. Got a week to play it, so that should suffice.
EDIT: Hmm, I don't think I'm gonna finish this bonus game in time :-/ A lot bigger than I thought.

1. A Case of Distrust
2. Figment
3. Late Shift
4. Tacoma
5. Vampire: The Masquerade - Coteries of New York
6. Vampyr

This month had a few games I really wanted, so I will try mostly these

Kimmy
Little Misfortune
Smile For Me
TSIOQUE
Vampire: The Masquerade - Coteries of New York
Yakuza Kiwami 2

Thank you so much for the giveaway

This month, I will try:

• aegis defender (completed) acievements
• call of cthulhu (dropped due to motion sickness)
• yakuza kiwami (completed) achievements
• catherine classic (finished) achievements
• do not feed the monkey (completed) acievemenrs
• gris (finished) achievements
• evoland 1 (completed)proof, ss only no achievement due to game played offline
• smile for me achievements
• tsioque achievements

I have never done a challenge like this, so I'm gonna start with some short games to try it out:

Question: Can I switch one or more of these games later, if I find out that the game isn't fun or if I get stuck?

Aww yes, I'm so in. Games to be decided as the month passes by. Thank you, Cj!

Yay, Control! Not sure if I can make it this month, but I'm gonna try :)

I was going to find 6 games to play anyway. It's a monthly ritual now ;)

I probably will be playing

Let's give it a shot

Excited to Participate again

1) Call of Cthullu-- Played-- fight destiny
2) Horace-- Played-- game over
3) Red Faction Guerilla Re-Mars-tered- played-- Red Dawn
4) Night Call--Played-- L'Ange de la Mort, Le Marchand de Sable, Le Juge
5) Grim Fandango Remastered-- Played-- Year 4
6) Dropsy?-- Played-- the longest hug

I'll be playing at least 6 of these to completion! Hope everyone is staying safe and healthy out there :3
Automachef
Dead Island Definitive Edition
Vampire: The Masquerade - Coteries of New York
The Stillness of the Wind - Completed Screenshot/Final Scene Before Credits
The Hex
Okami HD
Night Call

Ok third's time a charm, last time I was really close this time I'll finish them on time!

Cheers for still doing this. I participated once for Persona 4 Golden, this is my second time :P