My Week Unwrapped: August 27, 2021 – Behind the Frame, MARVEL Future Revolution, Hanski’s Burlap of Chaos, Baldo, The Magnificent Trufflepigs and More

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Hi everyone, and welcome back to My Week Unwrapped, where I discuss all the games I’ve been playing over the last seven days. It was another busy week with some games I adored and others I wanted to love but couldn’t. I also played a pre-release game and a Switch game I’d been looking forward to, and I previewed some upcoming Sky content. There’s a lot to cover here, so pull up a chair and relax!

Behind the Frame: The Finest Scenery

I’d been looking forward to Behind the Frame ever since I first saw screenshots of its gorgeous Ghibli inspired artwork. I was lucky enough to get a copy ahead of release so I could review it in time. Once I started playing, I couldn’t put it down until I finished. It only took me an hour, so it’s a short game. But it’s quality stuff here. Again, I’ll let you read my full review to get a better sense of what it’s like. But I purposely didn’t say much about the story because I didn’t want to spoil it. If you’re open to a short movie-like experience, I highly recommend playing Behind the Frame.

Hanski’s Burlap of Chaos

Hanski’s Burlap of Chaos is about as chaotic as one might expect. It reminds me of No Paint, because you’re using odd brushes to paint around the screen and then can snap a photo of it as a keepsake or delete it forever. But there is a game here — albeit a short one. Hanski, an artist I hadn’t heard of until now, created a sort of monster out of a burlap sack. It’s called the Burlap of Chaos and it gets bigger and stronger as it creates more chaos. It does so by getting paintbrushes to try and attack you while you’re painting. It’s a little hard to explain. But basically, you need to choose a paintbrush and then try to fill in the screen 100% with it while other paintbrushes are getting in your way. It got tricky at times and I had to replay a chapter, but it was doable in the end. Once you finish the story mode, you unlock all the brushes and can just paint to your heart’s content. I’m not sure I’ll do much of that, but I had fun with the game and don’t regret playing it. The paintbrushes are all weird and unique and it’s all just some zany fun. If you want a better idea of what it’s like, you can watch some of my gameplay video below.

MARVEL Future Revolution

I told myself I really don’t have room in my life for another service game, but MARVEL Future Revolution looked too good to not even try it. I spent about an hour with it, much of which was the opening sequence that’s sort of like an interactive cutscene. You watch different avengers fighting bad guys and then join in at times to get a small sampling of how each of them plays. So you get to try out Star-Lord, Iron Man, Spider-Man, Storm and more. Then you get to choose up to four characters to add to your team permanently. I was afraid to choose all four, so I picked Spidey and Storm. I then started playing with Spidey and the story followed him taking on the Green Goblin. I was surprised to fight an enemy so specific to him, as that made me wonder if it would have been different if I chose a different character. I’m not sure, but I was still really impressed with the graphics all through this. The battles themselves are a little underwhelming, as I mostly just mashed whichever buttons ended their cooldown without really knowing what they were. I never had any trouble progressing even with all my button mashing. And it turns out, you can actually have the game play itself on auto. That’s a bit of a turn-off for me because it makes me feel like a fool for playing when I don’t have to. And, like I said, even when I’m playing it feels like there’s no way for me to lose. I also wish I didn’t have to see other players back at the hub, since it seems to be a single player story campaign. Overall, it’s probably a fine game if you don’t mind it basically being played for you. It looks nice and it’s sort of like watching a Marvel movie. I’m just not sure I’ll continue with it, as I much rather be playing Genshin Impact if im going to give my time to a service game.

Pets No More

The idea of air hockey with zombie pets sounded interesting enough for me to drop a buck to buy Pets No More. I figured the controls would be a good fit for a touchscreen, since you mostly just need to move your character around to block the ball. Oh how wrong I was. You do indeed move your character around, but it’s with a joystick and you move horribly slow. There’s a sprint button you can use to try to go faster, but I’d always end up sprinting in the wrong direction. There’s also a button to punch, which didn’t help me much either. It’s a small miracle that I nearly tied with my opponent, because it felt so hard to control that I didn’t even expect to get a single goal. I had had enough of the game after just a few minutes and wouldn’t recommend it unless the completely redesign the controls.

Ponpu

Ponpu is an older game from the same developer as Pets No More and I grabbed it on sale for a buck before trying the other one. I love the art style of Ponpu, but I didn’t really enjoy playing it. It’s similar to Bomb Chicken in that you lay eggs that explode. It’s more laid back — at least from what I played so far — than Bomb Chicken, but also far less interesting. I appreciated the slower pace, but felt like I was mostly just blowing up rocks in my way and looking for the next thing to do. It also wasn’t clear why I was collecting colored feathers and whether there were a specific number I should have been looking for. I stuck with it until the first boss, where I died. I was going to try to battle him again, but the game put me all the way back at the start of the level, which was just a long walk combined with bombing bricks in your way. I really didn’t want to make that trek again for another attempt at the boss so I quit. It might get better later, but I really can’t stand games they have such horrible checkpoint systems. If the boss killed me, just let me go right back in and battle him again. Anyway, you can watch some of my gameplay below if you want to see what it’s like.

Blon

Blon is an upcoming auto-running platformer in which you control a little blob of slime. I like the pixel art and the fact that it’s designed with a touchscreen in mind. The left side of the screen is for jumping and the right side of the screen is for shooting. Since your blob moves automatically, you just need to time the jumps and attacks. The controls are responsive and I never felt like they caused me to mess up. Failure was my own fault. But the levels feel too long for me and relaying them to try to get to the end is far too repetitive. You can upgrade things like your armor or bow long a power-up lasts by using the leaves you collect. But I wasted about 800 leaves between my first two runs because I couldn’t figure out how to spend them. Each new run makes you trash all remaining leaves, so I just wanted all of them. Once I figured out how to use them, I made sure to do so before starting a new run. But I still got tired of the game before I ever got through the first level. There were two bosses and then a new type of gameplay mode right after them. When o finally made it to that point, I was low on health and also confused about how the new mode worked and I died. I just didn’t have it in me to go back in for another try at that point. I think I could have enjoyed the game if the levels were shorter or there were at least some checkpoints. But starting a long level like that from scratch every time I died was just too much. I’m sure there’s an audience out there for this game, those who like a challenge and wouldn’t mind the length. But it’s just not for me.

Genshin Impact

I’m still pretty obsessed with Genshin Impact, especially since a new character is coming in a few days that I saved up for. I’m also trying to prepare for her by getting upgrade materials she needs and artifacts so I won’t have to start worrying about them when I already have her. Aside from that, there was another event this week that finished today, called Phantom Flow. It was pretty straightforward, but I was glad to earn the rewards quickly without too much trouble. I also spent the week looking around for challenges and chests I missed, but I’m getting to the point where I’ll probably just wait until I can get the compass to help me look for chests.

Sky: Children of the Light

The Season of the Little Prince is almost over in Sky, with just one more Rose quest left. So the next season has start in beta, called the Season of Flight. It adds a new area to the Hidden Forest that’s made up of several floating islands among the clouds. There are also interconnecting cloud tunnels, but I haven’t tried those yet. I was far more interested in the new Halloween area and cosmetics added for the upcoming Days of Mischief. There’s so much going on that I think you should just watch my video if you’re curious and don’t mind spoilers.

Baldo: The Guardian Owls

Baldo was the first Apple Arcade game I was looking forward to in a while, as it looked like a pretty decent Zelda-like. It’s not all bad, but there are so many little issues that it made it hard for me to enjoy it. First off, the game hasn’t been designed very well for touchscreens. The joystick is thankfully floating, but everything else is managed through the buttons near your right hand. Even accessing your quests and settings are all found inside this same menu near your hand. It feels awkward, because you then spend a lot of time going through the menus to find the right tab. If I already have to tap that area to go through the menu, just let me tap that area to open the different tabs in the first place. The menu interface is also very odd, as the tabs have faded icons and the whole menu is transparent. The mini map inside it is also just splayed in the middle and hard to see. It also takes three taps to play a song on your horn. I don’t know why I can’t just select the horn and then the song. Why do I also have to tap the “use” button between them? It makes for a very clunky experience. Aside from that, the camera is fixed and there’s no way to zoom out. So your view at any point is very limited. This led to me wasting a lot of time at certain points because I just didn’t notice something off to the side. Or walking off cliffs because the angle made me think it led to the stairs. And that’s brings me to my biggest complaint. It is way too easy to die in this game. It’s like a death simulator. You can die if you accidentally walk off a cliff that’s too high. Or if you walk into even the smallest amount of water. Then there are the actual enemies. I gave up when I was forced to fight tentacles without a real weapon. I’d walk through the door and get attacked before I could even pick up the jar, much less throw it. Death also feels pretty meaningless here, since you don’t lose any progress and just revive back in the same room with full health. So it just feels like I’m dying for no reason. Then there are the bugs I encountered, like getting stuck hiding behind a bush. I saw no way out other then to quit to the menu. I do think there’s some potential here for a decent game, but all these little problems add up and make it hard for me to enjoy it. I’ll keep an eye on it, and I recommend waiting for an update or two to at least fix some of the issues.

The Magnificent Trufflepigs

I had been looking forward to The Magnificent Trufflepigs ever since it was first announced. I skipped it on PC because I don’t really have a good gaming setup. But it released on Nintendo Switch this week so I was eager to play through it. I loved the idea of chilling out on a scenic farm, using a metal detector to find treasure. Unfortunately, I had a hard time pushing myself to continue. I completed it in the end because I knew it was short and wanted to see where it would go. But the actual gameplay is excruciatingly slow. You pick up your metal detector and slowly walk with it until it starts beeping. Then you use your shovel and trowel to dig it up and send a photo to your friend. She then starts talking and you have a whole conversation before you can start searching for treasure again. The conversations are also pretty mundane. The pace might have been more bearable if you could multitask instead of standing still while chatting. The story also didn’t make a whole lot of sense while playing it — especially the fact that the two friends never work on the same field together. They try to make it make sense at the end, but it really didn’t for me and just felt like some cheap twist it didn’t earn. Sadly, I don’t recommend the game, but I wouldn’t mind another metal detecting game done better.

And that’s everything I’ve been up to this week! I also finished the first season of Ted Lasso somehow got through the movie Raw. I also started the third season of Manifest now that it’s on Netflix, because apparently I like pain. Anyway, let me know in the comments section which games you’re playing and I’ll see you back here next time for more of My Week Unwrapped!

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