I’m sorry that I have not really updated in a while. I’m too busy feeling fucked up by life. having my hands turn to shit from blood circulation problems, and working on my own thing to set time aside for games lately. Pretty cool that the major I spent four years of my life in is pretty much useless without connections, given that the money men behind most publications are fucking them over to make investors a little more money and AI will actively make things harder. Hahaha.

Anyway.

I was originally just going to write about a demo I played. However! It is, of course, a demo and too short to carry a post on its own. An early version of this demo actually debuted in last year’s iteration of itch io’s Queer Games Bundle, so I thought, hey, let’s get into the spirit of things and look at some other games from the current bundle!

Which. Uh. Ends in a little over 24 hours. Consider checking that out, I guess. (Disclosure: I am also a participant in the bundle.)

Death of a Wish is the upcoming sequel to melessthanthree’s Lucah: Born of a Dream. Or perhaps a retelling of the game from a different perspective? Regardless of the true nature of things, you’re playing as Christian, a major character from that game that’s now on his own quest for peace of mind. And that quest mainly comes in the form of toppling the theocratic order that raised him. Whomst amongst us wouldn’t?

Death of a Wish is largely similar to its predecessor, being an action RPG of rough drawings striking at each other with colorful streaks. Corruption gradually ticks up, presumably dooming Christian to a bad ending in the full game, though doing good at battles will fight it back. You fight with mantras that change the nature of your strikes, building up charge for your little familiar buddy to draw on for its own attacks.

From what I can tell, the game’s more accommodating of action from the gate. You get way more rewinds at the start, allowing you more chances to retry battle rounds. While full heals are a truly consumable item now, it now grows on trees over time, so you can now presumably horde those. Like the original game, you can equip virtue modifiers to support different playstyles, and way more of them are available within the first hour for the player to experiment with. Maybe this is just for the sake of the demo, but for returning players it feels like an invitation to go nuts with what they’re familiar with.

The story seems more concrete from the get-go, with Christian going out to fight his dad – only to see him get put down by a higher ranking official. Sure, this religious order suddenly became way more fash, but that’s not gonna deter Christian from his goal of tearing everything apart with other outsiders.

I will say though, it’s kinda hard to judge what’s new from the original Lucah since it’s been like, 3 years since I’ve played it. I know that there’s more visual flair with conversations having little visual novel portraits and some combats ending with a little animation of Christian striking a pose. Honestly, seems like a good excuse to check out Lucah again.

Texting the Awkward Ace Guy You’ve Had a Crush on Since High School by Carrot is a short and simple visual novel whose premise is already spelled out by the light novel title. Now, the main reason why I wanted to check this out is that Carrot is also the developer of Our Wonderland, a much, much longer visual novel that I’ve been interested in so I wanted to get a taste for their writing.

Though! It wasn’t exactly a good example, because the game is meant to completely capture the experience of having a conversation over text. Besides the general informal writing style between friends (?), the game incorporates a lot of pauses between messages often to reflect people taking in messages and working through their responses.

At the very least, the game is a good showcase for the character voices. You’re texting as Genzou Ichihara, striking up a conversation with Iggy Maxwell, Our Wonderland’s primary character. Gezou is an outwardly friendly dude, while Iggy is anxious and overly focused on his job. Part of those anxieties is his fear of getting too close to others, due to a fear of feeling committed to having sex (and having not realized his own asexuality).Genzou, in his own awkward flirting, is a nice guy and gives Iggy the space he needs.

This was also made for a game jam where you’re only allowed to use one of each presentation aspect, and the whole texting setup really works within those limitations. And when those assets finally show up, it lends a climactic feel to Genzou taking Iggy out for a Christmas date.

It’s short and sweet. Can’t wait to finally play Our Wonderland, which is explicitly about a deteriorating friend group where people can die horribly.

WAS/WERE by RodFireProductions is a game that’s brave enough to ask: murdering a person that hurt you is hot, right?

Set along a demonic being named Powers, you set out to murder the effigy of someone you hate that’s hurt you. Maybe you can imagine the person as someone you personally know. Personally, I imagined it as a stand-in for the worst of society as a whole.

Regardless, it’s an interactive fiction game about fucking tearing them apart. The writing is violent in a horny way, painting a very evocative mood. If you’ve played my personal works, you’d know I’m all for it. Personally? I wish it wasn’t a piece of interactive fiction because I want to vividly tear someone apart through hot action gameplay, but then again, I suppose that’s what stuff like Death of a Wish is for.

And now, we end things off with something more personal: He Fucked the Girl Out of Me, by Taylor McCue. It’s an interactive semi-autobiographical account of the main character dealing with trauma that came from an experience pursuing sex work for the sake of transition.

The game isn’t necessarily a parable on sex work. In fact, the game acknowledges that it’s a valid avenue of making money that’s unfairly prosecuted against. However, it’s very much a game about the creator communicating her own personal experiences, with the sex work itself and the surrounding stigma of her gender identity being treated as a fetish.

I honestly don’t have a lot to say due to the game’s personal nature. So instead, let me talk about the advantage of making something like this interactive. It’s one thing to just write about experiences, but people can read things fast. In making it interactive, players have to really engage with the experience, and by being put in the shoes of the writer, they get a better understanding of the writer’s perspective. Sure, it’s not much of a traditional game, but as a medium to communicate experiences, He Fucked the Girl Out of Me is an effective example of how games can be used as a medium.

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That’s just a small selection of things to check out from the bundle. There’s a general lean toward interactive fiction, so if you’re into visual novels and the like, I recommend picking it up if you haven’t already. Once again, sorry for being too fucked up to do Content(TM), but surely, things will become better (copium).