Happy to share these games with you!
I had been looking forward to playing them for a while now.
My wishlist is… sigh.
For every game I play, a handful of new ones get added to my wishlist.
But every once in a while, one of those games on my wishlist actually get released, and I get to finally play them. Cheers and celebrations!
I present to you… five games I’m finally able to happily share with you!
Ova Magica
Ova Magica is a game I’ve been looking forward since it was but a proverbial freshly laid idea egg. I supported the Kickstarter and had the privilege of watching Claudia hatch and grow it into the 1.0 release I am now happily sharing with you!
Okay, let’s start with why I was instantly sold: it’s blobs, it’s eggs, it’s a farming sim, it has cute graphics and the game just oozes with passion that was palpable from the beginning. The game is heavily inspired by classics like Stardew Valley, Slime Rancher, Harvest Moon and Pokémon, and while the elements are definitely there, it is far from a clone or rip-off. It flawlessly combines all the best bits of those games with Claudia’s unique vision on the genre, and a good chunk of humour into a cosy, lovely and addictive game.
I don’t have to tell you it’s a “you get a farm, sleep in a tent, buy a house, get a blob, raise it, battle with it, breed it, make money, upgrade tools” kind of game - that’s very obvious from everything you see.
What isn’t obvious at first sight, is the replayability in the “dungeon”. The ruins take you to Blob Worlds, which are basically a series of procedurally generated dungeons you go through, battling wild blobs, solving puzzles, and gathering the resources you find. It is super addictive to go through that motion over and over and over again… so much that I tend to forget there’s more to the game! Like Blobs to feed, farms to tend to, villagers to befriend, a battling championship to win, festivals to attend…
If all that isn’t enough, there is one more thing to convince you:
I designed one of the blobs in the game!
The baby blob with a shell on its head is mine - but if you do your best, you can get one too, and breed it so that ALL your blobs have adorable little shells on their head, ALL OF THEM muahaha~
It doesn’t come as a surprise that I’m rating Ova Magica a masterpiece.
One Coin Museum
One Coin Museum is another masterpiece-to-be.
Toadzillart, the dev that also gave us the gorgeous Whimside, is working on a new game. This time, it’s a “go find treasure in your boat and put it in your museum” type game that I couldn’t be more excited about!
And the kicker… you catch the treasure with a claw. A CLAW.
I’m honoured to have played the early playtest and being involved in discussing the features that would eventually make it into the demo and later on the final game.
This dev is someone who works really hard and pushes out updates and fixes faster than you can request them, so while there isn’t that much in the demo yet, I promise you this is one of those demos you want to stay on top of, as you’ll be along for the ride and see this grow from a prototype to a full-fledged masterpiece in virtually no time!
Long Live My Lady! 🍻 Tavern Simulator
Long Live My Lady! 🍻 Tavern Simulator is, aside from the only game I know that has an emoji in its name, a tavern simulator with an interesting twist. ‘My Lady’ is a sleeping princess in a crypt thingy in the basement of the tavern, which is located in a dungeon because apparently, the surface is dangerous?
When your tavern is open, you do all those typical tavern things: brew beer, serve beer, clean tables, wash mugs, sweep floors - the whole business. Outside of opening hours, though, you get to explore the world looking for more ingredients to cook and serve in your tavern.
The “business by day, exploring by night” loop puts this game in the same ranks as Moonlighter and Dave The Diver, the kind of good company I feel it holds its own against pretty well.
It’s cosy with gorgeous graphics and I’m invested in learning more about the Princess. You too? Go check out the demo, or better yet, buy the game.
Chocolate Factory Simulator
Playing Chocolate Factory Simulator is the gaming equivalent to finding a golden ticket inside your Wonka bar. You get to run a chocolate factory in a steampunk world, crafting chocolate bars using your clockwork machinery, and automate it with your very own robot, Nougat!
My favourite part of the game is the customisation. You can unlock moulds for your chocolate press, allowing you to make chocolate in a variety of shapes and sizes.
Similarly, you can unlock packing materials, allowing you to customise the package your chocolate goes in.
This is the kind of simulator you lose yourself in for hours on end, making bar after bar, completing order after order, until your irl chocolate craving becomes too strong to continue playing.
Wax Heads
I’d been following Wax Heads since I first saw a post about it on Reddit. I immediately found it innovative, fascinating and just utterly cool.
The premise is: you work in a record store, customers will come in asking for this or that album by one or the other artist, they might describe the cover or ask you to pick something out for them, and your goal, of course, is to sell them the album they want or need.
But it’s so much more than that. There’s a storyline that was already extremely compelling in the demo, so much so that I actually rage quit when it told me I couldn’t play any further. Not that I had any other option but to quit, but you know, it was the principle of the thing. It’s a story I need to know the ending to, and I’ll gladly wade through the boxes full of puzzles, the hilarious dialogues and the banger music to get there.
Did I say banger music? Oh yes, I did. The game has an original soundtrack complete with hand drawn covers for their records in game. The music is amazing, and the entire atmosphere just makes me want to dye my hair, get some ink done, pierce a couple of body parts, clad myself in leather and steal a motorcycle. Or something. I don’t know what the cool kids do, I’m just a nerd playing this game at home.
My wishlist is already massive, and I always add to it after your posts. Thanks for all the reviews, I really enjoy reading them!