My Week Unwrapped: May 12, 2023 – Lost Words, Peridot, Mia and the Dragon Princess, Family Bash and More

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’m still not fully back to my normal workload, but I’m still trying to find as much time for games as I can. The highlight of the week was Lost Words, as it’s exactly the kind of game I needed right now. Aside from that, I mostly continued games I’d already started. So let’s get to the games.

Lost Words: Beyond the Page

Lost Words has been out for a few years already on other platforms, but we were lucky enough to get a mobile port this week and it’s everything I needed in a game at the moment. It follows a young girl as she deals with loss and grief for the first time. She’s also a writer, and we get her story told through her journal, as well the fantastical story she’s writing about a young girl trying to save her village. The entire game is beautifully voice acted and features a stunning soundtrack, together with unique word-based mechanics. In the journal sections, you control Izzy as she runs and jumps across the words on the page. In the other sections, you have a book of words that you can use to help you through obstacles. For instance, REPAIR will fix a bridge, while RISE will make specific platforms lift you up. Each of the eight chapters has a different theme, so the game never gets stale or outstays its welcome. The puzzles aren’t particularly difficult, and neither is finding all the fireflies — though I did miss two. But they’re still enjoyable to solve and everything comes together very cohesively. The gameplay, story, writing, voice acting music, art style, it all just works so well to capture the feeling the game was aiming for. I know it’s a story about a young girl, but it still moved me as an adult and helped me while I’m going through a similar struggle. I highly recommend playing Lost Words, especially since the first two chapters are free and should easily suck you in. It’s even a contender for Game of the Year, as I’m sure it will stick with me for some time. This isn’t some wishy-washy feel-good game that downplays grief, but one that acknowledges it’s part of life and something you have to live with. Lost Words is so well-made that I played through the whole thing during a week where I wasn’t all that eager to play games. I also realized when the credits rolled that it was written by Rhianna Pratchett — which explains why the writing is so good. Seriously, just play it. Especially if you’ve struggled with any sort of grief recently. And if you want to see more of the game in action, I posted all my videos here.

Peridot

Niantic’s augmented reality pet game, Peridot, released this week but I only just started playing it today. I hatched a little baby creature that I named Periwinkle and took him to a park to play with him. It was cute playing fetch with him, but I felt very silly bending down with my phone in public to try and get close to him, as requested. I’m not a big fan of AR, so I’m not sure how much I’ll stick with it, but I might check in on him every once in a while. He is pretty cute, after all. Unfortunately, using the camera in-game stopped my recording, so I don’t have any gameplay video. It’s free-to-play, though, so just give it a try on your own.

Mia and the Dragon Princess

I played through Mia and the Dragon Princess a second time and got what I think is probably the best ending. It also filled in some gaps in the story, but I still feel like there’s stuff I’m missing. It’s enjoyable enough, but I think it could have been better if the story was more fleshed out and we got to know the characters more. I’m not sure yet whether I’ll try to see all endings, but maybe I’ll play once more to try to get a path I missed. This one is a bit hard to recommend. If you like cheesy FMV games and don’t mind being a little lost at times, you might enjoy it despite its issues.

Family Bash

I finished my first playthrough of Family Bash and enjoyed it quite a bit. I’m not sure how worth it is to replay, though I would like to figure out who my secret admirer was. Like I said last week, the game is very stylish and has a really nice presentation overall. The writing is compelling, too, and it’s free to try. So just give it a chance.

LEGO Bricktales

I finally had more time to give to LEGO Bricktales, but the more I play it, the more frustrated I get with the building controls. I really want to like it. The story is charming and it’s always great to have a LEGO world to explore. But the building feels so fiddly that I end up spending a lot more time than expected to move pieces into the intended spots. It’s not a big deal when it’s only a few pieces. But as the puzzles get bigger, I’m finding my patience wearing thin. If the controls don’t bother you, though, there seems to be a good quality game here.

Genshin Impact

And last, I’ve been trying to catch up on the latest world quest in Genshin Impact. It was needed for an event and then I just kept going because I was enjoying exploring the new area. I like using Sorush to solve puzzles and also there’s far more interesting things going on than in the previous area, which I barely explored at all. So I’ll keep chipping away at it. I’m still pacing myself because I’m a bit burnt out on Genshin after almost three years with it.

And that’s everything I’ve been up to this week. I also caught up on the latest season of Mrs. Maisel and finished watching Shrinking. Anyway, 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!

This Post Has 2 Comments

  1. Deb

    THank you, love your work. I especially enjoyed the Da Vinci series, what would you recommend I try next that might be somewhat similar?

  2. jipos

    nice

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