When the seas boil into the red giantess of our sun, one grand monument will escape the ravages of solar apocalypse. Secure in the Humanity Memorial on Titan, future civilisations will find an ancient leatherbound tome with a thousand pages. It is the Crashbook.
A new page beckons, containing ten more games I have not played.
324/ Slay the Princess
You’re here to slay the princess. Don’t believe her lies.
Crash notes: With voice acting from Jonathan Sims of The Magnus Archives, the trailer for this visual novel yanked me into its dark embrace without warning.
Windows, Mac, Linux | Steam Link | Just Released
325/ APICO
APICO is a laid-back beekeeping sim game about breeding, collecting, & conserving bees! Set in a series of lush environments, APICO uniquely combines resource gathering, biology, and beekeeping minigames, taking ideas from a mix of real-life and fantasy apiculture & floriculture.
Crash notes: Big update in September – lots of stuff added such as coral restoration, butterfly upgrades and deep-sea diving – in this game about *checks notes* beekeeping.
Windows, Mac, Linux | Steam Link | Released May 2022
326/ Abtos Covert
You are in a remote military outpost at Mount Abtos and you’re tasked to guard it. The only things visible from there are an old shrine and the forest. Many are afraid of this infamous outpost because of the local folklore stories. Actually, too many stories… Will you be safe, all alone?
Crash notes: Horror game. Willing to wait and see, but so far unconvinced this isn’t just another FNAF-like.
Windows | Steam Link | Unreleased
327/ Jusant
Enjoy meditative vibes in Jusant, an action-puzzle climbing game. Scale an immeasurably tall tower and ascend to new heights alongside your watery companion. Master your climbing tools, find your way up through diverse biomes, and piece together the tower’s past.
Crash notes: Looks ace, although I have displeased furrowed brows at “cutesy animal companion”.
Windows | Steam Link | Releasing Soon
328/ The Waking Knot
A unique, fast, musical tactics game. Watch yourself stay afloat as you hone your instincts. Use versatile tools to resolve emergent situations creatively. Find your rhythm in the chaos of The Waking Knot. “…Do you feel that? Everything entangled in one beautiful mess!”
Crash notes: Musical tactics? And just look at this. It’s so Crashbook.
Windows | Steam Link | Unreleased
329/ Worldless
Worldless is a stylised 2D platformer with a unique, active, turn-based combat system, and a mind-bending interpretative narrative. Players embark on a journey of self-growth and understanding, pushing the limits of their nature in a newly born and abstract universe.
Crash notes: Whoa there, back up. Did you say a turn-based platformer?
Windows | Steam Link | Unreleased
330/ Station to Station
‘Station to Station’ is a minimalist & relaxing game about building railway connections. Grab your conductor’s hat and bring the voxel-art world to life through the magic of trains!
Crash notes: It looks charming but I’m reminded of Shut Up and Sit Down’s joke about the millionth Ticket to Ride spinoff being called Ticket to Ticket.
Windows | Steam Link | Just Released
331/ Islands of the Caliph
Islands of the Caliph is an old-school inspired action RPG based on Middle Eastern folklore and Islamic spiritual tradition. A KEYBOARD ONLY 1980s style Dungeon Crawler with an open world.
Crash notes: This is really impressive work.
Windows | Steam Link | Released Sep 2023
332/ Core Decay
Travel across a dying Earth and uncover a sinister plot to preserve humanity no matter the cost – even if it means redefining what makes us alive – in an old-school atmospheric immersive sim that explores the nature of consciousness and individuality.
Crash notes: Okay, someone is really into making a Deus Ex homage.
Windows, Linux | Steam Link | Unreleased
333/ Sektori
Sektori is an intense, fast paced twin-stick shooter where every run is unique. Choose your upgrades carefully and create powerful builds to take on numerous enemies and epic bosses on a constantly evolving battlefield.
Crash notes: Been a while since I had a bedazzling twin-stick shooter to share.
Windows | Steam Link | Unreleased
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Another great list. I can say I played a demo of Slay the Princess about a year ago while on the jury for an event, and it is –existentially horrifying.– It’s also pretty funny, and as you remark in your entry, the voice acting is worth the price of admission on its own. This game is from the Scarlet Hollow people, another game I enjoyed. Find the time for this one if you can, I’d love to read your words about it!
Slay the Princess is amazing. A great thing about is that you can complete it in under 4 hours and if you don’t want to see all the nooks and crannies you end up with a really fulfilling experience.
Also it’s a game which makes you feel like your choices really matter.
Island of Caliph looks really interesting from the screenshot
I am absolutely going to buy the shit out of Slay the Princess. I had to get this Crashbook out before I broke, so I could keep it safe and untouched on the list.
It was difficult choosing a screenshot for Islands of the Caliph because they all looked good. Even better in motion!
It looks like Worldless does a thing where it makes explicit the thing in boss battles where you have to defend and “wait your turn” to attack in the space between the boss attacks. So it’s real-time, but you have a meter that shows you “This is when you should be attacking” or “This is when you should be defending.” Maybe? Maybe I misunderstood? Haven’t tried the demo.
Urthman, yes, I think you might be right. Turn-based is quite misleading as you’re under time pressure to react during “your turn” and the “enemy’s turn”. It was a bit confusing considering how ZOW! POW! ZAP! ZAP! the trailer was, not showing off the front-of-box featured turn-based combat at all.
I’m really intrigued by Slay The Princess and can see myself picking that up soon! That trailer…
Ooo and cor, The Waking Knot looks ace! That typeface I recall being used for the Troika RPG book, which is also suitably psychedelic. Love those painterly tiles.
Islands of the Caliph looks beautiful doesn’t it? I want to walk around that place.
https://www.rockpapershotgun.com/endure-the-swarm-pits-your-sokoban-skills-against-endless-horrible-insects
I think I found a Sokoban that even you guys won’t want to play
Yikes, CA. The mechanics remind me a little of Hiding Spot & the Puzzlescript game Secure.
There’s a couple of Baba Is You levels themed around the word “More” that are like this mechanically too. Also some DROD levels with expanding tar though I guess the lack of a sword is a big difference. Anyway I won’t play it for the usual reasons (no Maaaaac port).
I was about to say “I should go back to that game with the free-form pushing, that was on the Mac” and then “That Isles of Sea and Sky game that got linked in the RPS blurb you just linked sure looks like a ripoff of that game” and then RPS revealed that it is that game! fka Akurra. It is mildly disheartening that they said that the demo is apparently two or three hours long when I know I spent longer than that without finishing the demo. (Which is what I need to return to, the full game isn’t out yet.)
Oh good catch, Matt. Yes, I remember some of those More levels. That reminds me, I probably should Play+Baba+More at some point as I never finished it.
Yes there was an announcement that Akurra was changing name (largely due to the dev being uncomfortable with appropriating the name) a little while back. I’m not sure the new name clicks for me but it’s probably because I’ve been living with Akurra in my head for awhile.