alias_sqbr

Masterlist

pauraque prompted me to react to the ABC Murders or The Dig. I picked the ABC Murders since I am feeling the kind of sore and stupid today where a puzzle game would be a fun distraction. Also, the reason I bought the ABC murders in the first place was as research for a vague idea I had to turn some out of copyright murder mystery into a computer game myself (this story isn't out of copyright yet but some of her other works are), so it'll be fun to analyse it from that perspective as well.

So! Agatha Christie: The ABC Murders is a 2016 Unity puzzle game based on the 1936 murder mystery novel by Agatha Christie. From Wikipedia: The initial premise is that a serial killer is murdering people with alliterative names. The murders follow an alphabetical order, starting with a victim whose initials were A. A, and appear to lack a motive.

It was updated a little in 2020 and if often on deep sale for like $2.

I'll put major spoilers under an internal cut, so the mystery can stay fun for anyone who's unfamiliar with it.

I've played through investigating the first crime scene, and it's moderately fun so far! I had to suspend my disbelief slightly for some of the inserted puzzles but overall it's a pretty enjoyable and not too difficult mystery game, in terms of both gameplay and story.

CW: Domestic violence, more in the game itself than my post.
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The Devil's Calculator is a little algebra puzzle game about figuring out what various functions do and then using them to create the number 666. I've been having a lot of fun with it, but if you don't already think algebra is fun this game will probably not convince you otherwise.

The first 20 levels are free, and I feel like the early levels would be pretty doable for anyone with an ok grasp of basic algebra.

I'm at level 39 now and some of the later levels have been moderately challenging(*), and I'm not sure how anyone could have solved some of them without knowing (or knowing to look up) equations like the sum of all integers between 1 and x, the number of combinations of k objects chosen from a set of size n, etc. Which is still highschool level, but the sort of thing most adults will have forgotten unless they studied maths further.

(*)I have a Phd in abstract algebra, but that was a long time ago, and I'm not always great at puzzles, so it's hard to calibrate exactly how hard they are objectively. But definitely not easy for anyone who doesn't have a strong background in algebra.

Ukrainian Bundle: Metamorphabet, Windosill, Resynth, Changeling, Landlord of the Woods

Other: Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic, Doreamon: Story of Seasons, Deltarune Chapter 2, Magical Otoge Iris

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Games:
Lost in Secular Love
One Shot

Manga:
Love Me For Who I Am

Live Action Movie:
Jungle Cruise

Animated TV:
Arcane
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Another highly rated game from the to-play pile, this time one I hadn't tried before!

Later Alligator is an incredibly cute, funny, and understatedly queer little puzzle/adventure game which I would have liked a lot more if it wasn't unnecessarily inaccessible, but I did mostly enjoy.

You play an unseen character helping a guy who thinks his family is trying to kill him. You wander around Alligator New York (everyone is adorably animated alligators) talking to his various family members, who ask you to solve various puzzles and other mini-games. The mini-games vary in difficulty and type: some are impossible to lose, some I found very easy, and others were beyond my capabilities because they required quick reflexes. The writing and plot is very silly but a lot of fun, and there's a nice number of queer characters in the mix.

You can always get to a happy ending no matter how few mini-games you complete. But you have to click through quite a lot of dialogue, especially if you retry a failed mini-game, and there's no autoplay or skip so now my hands are sore >:( This is the second time I've gotten frustrated by the lack of dialogue autoplay in a Pillowfort game, I'm thinking of emailing them because otherwise their games are great.

Spoilers for the ending structure below the cut, but no plot spoilers, and it's something I'd have wanted to know going in! (And think I did, but then forgot, oops)
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Live action TV: We Are Ladyparts, Ted Lasso

TV Cartoons: Owl House season 2, Amphibia, Master of the Universe

Games: The World of Art, Spiritfarer

Books: The Raven Tower

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I liked some of these! Afaict they're all available for Windows too. Some are free, and I've marked the ones which run in a browser.
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A point and click puzzle game about being an archaeologist deciphering and learning an ancient language to understand the history of her fantasy-ish scifi world. A mix of uniquely fantastic and irritatingly flawed, but overall very much worth playing.

It's a branching narrative game that rewards replay but doesn't allow for multiple save files, so I strongly recommend buying it on Windows or Linux so you can manually create your own save files at major choices.

Here's some advice I wrote for new players

( Non-spoilery opinions, accessibility notes etc )

Raya and the Last Dragon, Wandavision, Disco Elysium, My Brother Rabbit, Stay
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Looking at the list of stuff I want to review, there's a bunch I didn't super enjoy, so I'm going to silo them off into their own post, and people who only want recs can scroll by.

I'm feeling depressed right now which makes me pickier/more negative, and many of these seem plenty enjoyable to other people. So maybe you'll find a rec in here anyway ;)

Below: Misc little puzzle games, Obey Me, Blue Flag, Mage & Demon Queen, Rainbow Days
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