Hi everyone, and welcome back to My Week Unwrapped, where I discuss all the games I’ve been playing over the last seven days. This has been another busy week, with mostly new games but also a few older ones. There’s also a variety of genres, from puzzle games to interactive novels, match-three, and more. There’s a lot to discuss, so let’s not waste any more time.

FAR: Lone Sails

I mentioned FAR: Lone Sails last week and how I was blown away by it. Since then, I finished the game and wrote a review. I tried to keep it spoiler-free, but the gist of it is that it’s a short but memorable game similar to INSIDE but with a vehicle that you need to maintain. I loved everything about it but thought the touch controls could use some work. Don’t let that deter you from playing, though. It’s worth the slightly clunky controls to be able to play it. If you want to know more, make sure to read my review. I also have my full playthrough recorded here.

The White Bird Carnival

Coming right off the back of unmemory, COTTONGAMES just released their own version of an interactive novel that blends text and puzzles. It’s called The White Bird Carnival and is considerably shorter than unmemory, since most of its chapter only take a few minutes to solve. The puzzles themselves are also mostly easy, though they do sometimes require going back to other chapters to find clues. The story involves a young boy’s death and the mystery surrounding it. It took place at the carnival, hence the name of the game. It didn’t take me long to finish the game itself, though I’m still trying to find the last two hidden objects so I can unlock the bonus content. Overall, it was an enjoyable game, but I wish there had been some trickier puzzles. Perhaps the best part of the game is its pause menu, which is a fish dangling on a hook. Anyway, I think it’s worth checking out at its cheap price, but I wasn’t completely blown away by it. You can also use my walkthrough guide if you get stuck.

Dungeon Falan

As many of you might know, I’m a big fan of match-three games, at least the kind that’s free of consumable IAPs. I also miss Dungeon Raid, which died in the terrible 32-bit app-ocalypse that removed all 32-bit apps from the App Store. Several developers have been using Dungeon Raid as inspiration for their own games, and Dungeon Falan is the latest. I was enjoying it quite a bit at first, and especially appreciated that there are four different characters to play as, along with two separate modes, to offer some variety and keep things fresh. But due to the lack of some features, along with some irritating issues, I think I’m done with the game for the time being. One problem is that it heats up my iPad Pro and drains the battery. It’s better on the power saving mode, but it’s still an issue. I’m also tired of having to keep shutting the music which turns itself back on between runs. But the biggest issue for me is that I don’t see any way to tell what my score is while I’m playing or even a run history so I can compare my past scores. The result is that I can play a game for an hour and think I’m doing well but then end up with a score that’s either lower than my current high or only a bit higher. If I were able to see my current score at all times, I’d be able to tell if I’m doing better or worse than previous games and cut loose if it looks like I’m wasting my time. Without this feature, the game just feels like a time sink. I’m willing to revisit it if this is added, but until then I’m going to have to call it quits. If you’re still curious, though, I have gameplay videos below for all four characters.

Meteorfall: Krumit’s Tale

I reviewed Meteorfall: Krumit’s Tale back when it released on mobile, but a new character was just added as a DLC to the PC version of the game. I was able to get access to it on iOS ahead of its release on there and gave it a try. I’m a big fan of Varfa in Meteorfall: Journeys, so I was excited to see how her skillset translates to Krumit’s Tale. The way it works is that her gorilla friend, Orhu, takes up one inventory slot as a minion. You can then unlock each one of his skills at a time using coins. Once the skill is unlocked, it’s free to use. But there is a cooldown period. You have to do a few melee battles in order to be able to use the skill again. So it’s a little tricky, since he only has one attack point without skills. I ended up losing the Elmer the tree boss, but I still managed to get my highest non-win score ever, so that’s not bad. Varfa plays very differently from all the other characters, so once again it’s like a whole new game. The DLC will cost $1.99, but the developer also added a free Halloween mutation called Reaper’s Curse, so you still get new content even if you don’t want to spend more money. I think that’s pretty fair. You can see some gameplay video I made of Varfa below if you want a better idea of how she plays.

Wark & Wimble

Wark & Wimble is a new puzzle game that has you playing as two dinosaurs who need to save all their friends from what seems to be alien invaders. There are different types of puzzles, but they’re all Sokoban style. You swipe to move your character and then push boxes and other objects around. In one type of puzzle, the goal is to get a dinosaur egg to its nest, then grab all the fruits on the level and feed them to it. Another kind has you pushing a key around to get it into the keyhole. And last, you have a puzzle type where you have to blow up an enemy base. Already from the first few levels, I can see the game is going to be pretty challenging, so don’t let the cute cartoony graphics deceive you. I’ve so far encountered laser-shooting robots that kill you if they see you, and frogs that use their tongue to pull you — or other objects — close to them. Each level requires quite a bit of work to solve, so I’m glad there’s an unlimited undo button and also no move counter. So you don’t have to worry about whether you wasted any moves while working out the solution. I haven’t gotten that far yet, but I did enjoy what I’ve played so far. I only wish it had iCloud sync so I could share my progress on both devices. The game is also free and supported by ads, meaning you don’t have to spend a penny if you’re ok watching ads instead. I recommend at least giving it a try to see whether it’s something you might enjoy.

Dark Cards

I’m a big fan of Pixel Cattle Games’ Dark Mist, so when I saw they had a new game out called Dark Cards, I grabbed it right away. Unfortunately, I find the game confusing and not very satisfying to play, at least in the time I spent with it. The way it works is that there’s a board full of face-down cards in blue and pink. You can turn over any blue ones and your opponent can turn over and pink ones. Then you use those cards to attack each other or heal or other actions. Since you’re not sure what card you’re going to flip over, it seems like the strategy comes more from the deck-building than the battles themselves. But I could be wrong, since I didn’t play for that long. The story is also ridiculous and confusing and slows down the whole game. You can skip the dialogue, so at least you’re not forced to sit through it. But I think half my time playing was reading the silly dialogue. Anyway, you can watch my video to see what it’s like, but I can’t personally recommend it based on my experience so far.

Spooky Squashers

Spooky Squashers is a free Halloween-themed game from Raviv Elon where you play squash and try to hit monsters with the ball. You lose balls if they take too many bounces without hitting anything, and once you’re out of balls it’s game over. The idea is to get as far as you can before running out of balls. My main obstacle with the game is that I lose track of my character while I’m watching the ball and monsters. There’s just so much happening on the screen. Still, it’s a cute little game and it’s free, so give it a try.

The Simplest RPG Game – Text Story

The Simplest RPG Game is basically what it says on the cover. You have some buttons that allow you to go on a quest or fight monsters, but the battles are all automated. Everything also uses up energy, so you can’t do too much before having to stop and wait for your energy to replenish. I played for about half an hour but the whole thing just felt way too repetitive to me and I have no plans to return to it. But feel free to give it a try for yourself. You can play for free, but there are IAPs that give you some extra perks like faster energy replenishing. I didn’t buy it, but if you like the game and just wish you had more energy, that seems like a good trade-off.

Laser Quest!

I’m a big fan of laser-reflecting puzzles, so I figured I’d try out Laser Quest!, due to its appealing graphics. Unfortunately, from what I played so far, it doesn’t offer much of a challenge. I felt like I was just going through the motions. Even when it added a new mechanic, it didn’t increase the difficulty. I also don’t understand why there are new weapons to unlock. It seems like something tacked on just to give people something to grind for. You also need to either watch video ads to unlock new areas — and weapons — or pay $3.99 to remove ads. I didn’t feel like doing either, so I’m just moving on to more interesting games. There are also other IAPS, including a subscription, but I’m not really sure what they do.

unmemory

I already reviewed unmemory last week, but this week I completed my walkthrough for all eight chapters. I’m still working on the extras so I can unlock the epilogue, and you can watch my progress here.

Genshin Impact

I didn’t have that much time to play Genshin Impact this week, but I did finally ascend two of my characters so I could level them up more. Unfortunately, I made a mistake and leveled one character to level 40 and ran out of materials before I could level the others up. I wish I balanced it out more, because now I’m left with three weaker characters. And for the first time, I gave up mid-dungeon because I was struggling to complete a challenge. Lisa’s attacks did the most damage to the group of frozen slimes, but she just wasn’t hitting hard enough for me to kill them all within the time limit. So I’ll likely go off and complete other quests, then come back to this one later. I’m still enjoying the game, though, and haven’t hit any paywalls yet. Again, you can see more of my videos here.

Among Us

I spent more time playing Among Us this week and got some of it on video, including a few games where I was the imposter. I’m finding it much more enjoyable when I have a full group of friends, because random people who join often end up leaving a few seconds into the game or do all sorts of other nonsense. So I’m going to try to stick to playing only friends or friends of friends. I recommend getting a group together if you plan to play a lot.

Sky: Children of the Light

And last, I finally attempted the Trial of Air in the beta version of Sky and ragequit right near the end. I spent 40 minutes yelling and scaring my cat because I kept dying. You see, this trial is made up of frozen platforms floating in space. There are also wind gusts that blow you around and make it hard to navigate sometimes. You even have to use some wind gusts to throw you to platforms. Oh and there are moving platforms and no shadows anywhere, so it’s hard to gauge distance and tell whether you’ll land in the right spot or not. Combined with Sky‘s slippery controls, it meant that I was falling to my death constantly. Even when I landed smoothly, I would try to inch over a bit and then slip right off the edge. I finally gave up after doing one jump probably 100 times, finally making it to the next platform, only to die again and have to do that whole part again. Perhaps if there was a checkpoint there I might have made it, but I just couldn’t see doing it anymore. So I had some friends take me a second time and lead me so I wouldn’t have to be traumatized a second time. If you, too, find this kind of platforming challenge too difficult, you can always go with a friend and warp to them, at least. But this was definitely not my idea of fun.

And that’s everything I’ve been up to this week! I also binged the first season of Upload and then was sad that it ended on a cliffhanger. I do recommend the show, though. It plays with the idea of IAPs and ads in the afterlife. As a mobile gamer, I could really appreciate how hellish that would be. Anyway, let me know in the comments section what games you’ve been playing and I’ll see you back here next time with more of My Week Unwrapped.