Hi everyone, and welcome back to My Week Unwrapped, where I discuss all the games I’ve been playing over the last seven days. I’ve mostly been focused on games I’m deep into, such as Sky, Genshin Impact and Titan Quest, but there are still a few notable new games to cover. I didn’t enjoy every new release I tried, but see why before deciding for yourself whether or not to check them out.

Mitoza

Gal Mamalya’s Mitoza is more of a toy than a game, and it’s actually been playable through browsers for a decade now. But thanks to Second Maze, the publisher leg of Rusty Lake, it’s now available on iOS, Android and Steam for free. Since the entire game is simply making binary choices and then watching it play out, it’s a great fit for touchscreen devices. I wrote a bit about it here and also made a video that shows off all the endings. But I recommend just downloading it for yourself and experiencing it first-hand. It’s free, so there’s nothing to lose. I also learned that “mitoza” is Polish for “mitosis,” which is when one cell divides into two. Everything makes much more sense now and you should see for yourself.

Kill It With Fire

I really wanted to like tinyBuild’s spider-squashing game, Kill It With Fire. But already we were off to a bad start with no tutorial whatsoever. I managed to figure out the controls on my own, but the gigantic attack button covers most of my clipboard, which cleverly doubles as a list of objectives and a very basic weapon. I only played through the first level, but you have a checklist of goals. Some are hidden at first, but you’re told to kill your first spider and also get into the bathroom and find the hairspray. But it’s somewhat broken, as I opened the closet and got credit for the hairspray objective. That confused me for a while and made me wonder if somehow the closet was the bathroom. When I finally figured out that I needed to kill four spiders to open a specific door (none of this is explained), I got into the bathroom and found the hairspray. But then it didn’t get added to my inventory — even after finding multiple bottles. Again, very confusing. I managed to find the weapons list, but it allowed me to choose any weapon in the game, not just the hairspray. The catch was that once I ran out of ammo, they were useless. I wasn’t sure how to refill ammo normally, but there was a big INSTANT AMMO REFILL button. It seemed suspect, so I avoided pressing it for a while until I got desperate. And it launched an ad, which killed the game’s sound. I should mention here that the developer gave me a code for the Ultimate Spider Hunter IAP, which is supposed to remove ads. So I was quite surprised to be hit with an ad, even if it was a poorly-marked opt-in. At this point, I lost all interest in the game and didn’t even feel like trying to complete the hidden objectives in the first level. By all means, try it out for free, but I wouldn’t go spending money trying to make it a premium game at this point. Wait and see if they iron out all these problems, especially the opt-in ads.

Slashy Camp

Slashy Camp is an endless high score chaser from Blue Wizard Digital, the makers of the bloody puzzlers, Slayaway Camp and Friday the 13th: Killer Puzzle. It’s basically their take on the Crossy Road formula. You play as Jason — or a number of other unlockable monsters — and have to keep moving up the screen, killing any potential victims you come across. You get extra points for scaring them into a hazard, such as water, fire, potholes. If you pick up a weapon, you can use it to play a little mini game when attacking your next victim, also giving you bonus points. There are also hunters and police that could kill you, as can the same hazards that kill the campers. It’s also game over if you harm a forest animal, as only a truly evil monster would do such a thing. You also have a meter at the top, and once it fills up, you enter a sort of frenzy mode where each kill counts for a lot more points. But if you let any victims escape, that meter resets, making it harder to build up a high score. I like how much strategy here there is for getting more points from each kill, but the game feels a bit slow considering one deadly mistake ends your run. I would love to see a way to either start from a checkpoint or maybe speed up the game for a score multiplier. It just doesn’t move quickly enough for a game that’s meant to play over and over. I still might spend more time with it to improve my score, but I don’t think it has long-term appeal for me in its current state. Still, it’s free with just a $0.99 IAP to remove all ads, so try it and judge for yourself.

Queen: Rock Tour

I’m not a fan of rhythm games, so it’s no surprise that I didn’t really enjoy Queen: Rock Tour. It’s made well and I like that they let you try it out before paying to unlock the full game. But even the first song started to get too fast for me closer to the end. I’m just not good at these games and don’t really have any interest in getting better at them. But if you do like rhythm games, definitely give it a try.

WASTELAND!

I really like the art style of WASTELAND! and I was curious about the idea of a first-person shooter in portrait mode. Unfortunately, being in portrait doesn’t make it a one-handed game. You still need to use one hand to move and shoot, while controlling the camera with the other. It felt too tight for me to play this way on my iPhone, and I kept shooting my weapon when I meant to move. I don’t know why it’s in portrait mode if it’s not meant to play one-handed, as I don’t see any actual benefit. It would be a lot more comfortable to play in landscape. Aside from that, the environments seem a little empty. Either that, or I missed something. In the first level, I kept seeing locked objects but never came across a key. So I don’t know if they exist or not. Again, the game felt too cramped for me to really want to spend extra time searching for things that may or may not exist. Anyway, you can watch some of my gameplay video below to get a better idea of what it’s like.

Tiler More

Tiler More — a play on the developer’s friend, Tyler Moore –is a word game where you’re give a list of words to make out of tiles. The tiles can be stacked up to three and combined to make longer words. It’s an interesting concept, and I enjoyed the time I spent with it. But there’s no score or move limit or any other real restrictions that add a challenge or incentive to keep playing. It seems like you could just spend as much time as you need on a puzzle and eventually solve it, as long as you have some patience. Again, it’s not a bad game, and it’s completely free so I can’t really complain. But I do hope they do more with it to make it a bit more compelling. I’d still recommend trying it, especially if you’re a fan of word games.

Titan Quest: Legendary Edition

I’m still playing Titan Quest quite a bit and finally made it out of Egypt after killing the second Telkine. I’m now in Babylon and finding my build is not quite holding up. I rely a lot on my pets, as well as poisoning and weakening enemies. But some of the monsters in this area seem resistant to my poison. They’re also poisoning me and my pets, and I don’t like it! Hopefully it’s just the one area and not the whole chapter. I do have a lot of unspent attribute points, so if it doesn’t get easier, I may have to finally figure out where I want spend them. Anyway, I’m still enjoying it quite a bit and have a hard time putting it down. It’s one of my favorite games so far this year and I don’t see that changing anytime soon. Again, you can see more of my gameplay videos here.

Sky: Children of the Light

There’s a lot going on in Sky right now. The Season of Dreams is ending soon, so I finally made new videos of the last two quests for the ice skating girl. The next season has also been announced, called the Season of Assembly, and it started already in the beta version of the game. This time, it takes place in the Hidden Forest and you have to help six young spirits fix up their treehouse by collecting materials for them. It’s been enjoyable so far. The scavenger quests make a lot of sense for the Forest, since there’s so many places to hide things. The cosmetics are still a work in progress, but this season focuses on props, so each spirit has one. We know what some do — like the torch that serves as supplemental light — but not others. The Days of Bloom are also coming soon, which is a celebration of the cherry blossom festival. There will be a cherry blossom tree at Home and a tea set you can purchase through an IAP, as well as a really lovely cape and hair that are available with in-game currency. I have videos of all of these, so feel free to check them out if you’re not afraid of spoilers.

Genshin Impact

I’m still playing Genshin Impact, but I took off a few days this week. I did start some of the story quests now that I ascended to World 5 and played through the new story quest for Hu Tao. I don’t really enjoy playing as her, so I’m saving up my primo gems to hopefully get Venti. The last time he was available, I had just started playing and didn’t even realize what was happening. So hopefully I can get him and not have to wait another year!

SP!NG

SMG Studio went back to their One More Jump roots with their latest Apple Arcade game, SP!NG. It’s a one-handed level-based portrait game in which you tap and hold the screen to make your piece hook onto a node and swing around it. Then you release your finger to let go. The idea is to collect all the jewels in a level before heading to the exit. It seems easy at first, but once spikes are added, it can get pretty challenging, especially if you’re trying to get all three stars in a level. You only have one life, so if you hit any spikes, you have to restart the level from scratch. It is nice to have an Apple Arcade game that’s designed around touchscreens and played in portrait mode, as they’re far and few between. It’s also the kind of game that would often be supported by ads and IAPs these days, so it’s nice not to have to worry about them. I’ll definitely spending more time with this one, though I might have to give up on getting all the stars at some point. Anyway, definitely give this one a try if you’re looking for a challenge that doesn’t come from clumsy controls.

And that’s everything I’ve been up to this week! I also finished the UK version of Utopia and WandaVision. So it’s been a bit of an intense week as far as entertainment goes. Anyway, there’s plenty of more games coming this month, so make sure to keep an eye out on these roundups. Let me know in the comments section which games you’re enjoying and I’ll see you back here next time with more of My Week Unwrapped!