It's always bittersweet to see a more recent game on deck to be reviewed. On the one hand, as technology has improved and game theory has become more understood, the games have tended to get better. On the other hand, they've also tended to get bigger. Don't get me wrong, I love a gargantuan epic of a game every now again...I mean hell, I'm one of those people who's crazy enough to consider replaying Mass Effect...as in all of it. That's going to have to wait till after the blog is finished, of course, but still...
Anyways, what I'm getting at is that neither of today's games were particularly long, but neither of them were anything short of a good time, either. Essentially, today was the perfect blogging day, so I'd be in a fantastic mood if I weren't so tired.
Voxel Smash is apparently a callback to one of those eras of gaming that I'm too young to have experienced, because I don't know what the hell a voxel is. Apparently, Blogger doesn't either, because it's giving me that ever irksome red squiggly line...then again, Blogger also doesn't understand the word "gameplay." Fortunately for us, Voxel Smash does.
I'll describe the gameplay as "Minecraft meets Dark Souls," if that makes any sense...which of course it doesn't, so let me clarify. Voxel Smash has the blocky, simplistic aesthetic of Minecraft and the gameplay of Dark Souls...just with the dial turned back down to "baby's first beat em up."
The game is designed with the sole intention of letting the player have fun, and it pulls it off very nicely. This is one of the rare games that I stopped playing because of time constraints rather than because I stopped wanting to play. You can roll, slash, shoot hadokens, and even do this really cool spear move that takes a bit of skill to implement, but is very satisfying when you do. All of the mechanics are explained intuitively, and, without being too esoteric, they reward the player for figuring them out.
This is one lesson that Voyage could have learned from Voxel Smash. The instructions are conveyed very hamhandedly in the form of a text-guided tutorial that locks off mechanics before the game deems you ready to use them. I understand that Voyage is a much different game with more complex controls and rules that are more imperative to know, but still. The first few levels are such walks through the park that I could have beaten them without breaking a sweat without the tutorial, and it would have made me feel better as a player, too. I guess you could make the argument that they give you the option to skip the tutorial at any time, but before the game begins, I have no idea how nightmarish the first few levels are going to be. I've played many a game wherein I blazed right through the tutorial without paying attention and have proceeded to have my rear handed to me on a silver platter within five minutes. Obviously, this is not one of those games, but my point is that I didn't know that before the game began, so skipping the tutorial was way too scary.
Other than that, though, Voyager does everything it means too and does it well. It's an RTS, which I've never been too big a fan of, but it's a good RTS; my saying that is like a vegan complimenting your steak tartar, so take that as you will, but the game looks good, sounds amazing, and feels fine. It's competently put together and it doesn't fall into any of the traps that most RTS games fall into. I hate its kind, but I had fun with it, so I'll give this one a recommendation, but I'll save my seal of approval for Voxel Smash.
That's all I got for today. Until next time, stay volumetric.
Links
What does the Voxel Say: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=26912
play long and prosper: https://www.digipen.edu/?id=1170&proj=26709
