I’m going to be completely frank here, I wouldn’t be surprised if this game is completely buried by releases and deemed as shovelware. But honestly judging this game at face value would be a disservice to this game which, believe or or not, packs in quite a punch (or should I say spike?) into an otherwise minimalist presentation. The game shaves nearly all the fat, and while it has its quirks like Mario tennis style extra modes and what I almost would call a parody of the Smash bros/Soul Calibur character creation mode, the game is ultimately about its simple, yet refined controls/core gameplay.
Super Volley Blast is a 4 player couch multiplayer (no online as of this publish) party volleyball game that has an extremely low skill floor, yet shockingly high skill ceiling for how few options the game actually presents (think games like Divekick). The game only has 3 buttons: a jump, a hit, and a set/intercept light attack. As per mostly accurate volleyball rules, each game is played 2v2 (you have to autofill cpus to play). In the basic gameplay, each team has 3 hits to clear the ball from their side of the field, and each player must alternate hits. It is advised to set the ball up for one another until the final third strike, whereas the player presses the jump key, presses the hit key at JUUUUUUST the right moment, and WHAM! Gets the strike – yeah by the way, the game has a spike move but it’s a combination of button presses. Wow is this like a fighting game??? Kinda actually. It’s a sports game at heart, but the unique aspect of Super Volley Blast is the ability to aim shots with the left stick. By using numpad notation, the field is broken up into a 3×3 grid of sorts.
In this case, I held my control stick down and left to target where the reticle is pointing. Not pointing the control stick would aim for the center, etc. This mechanic is what makes the game feel the most like a fighting game: THE MINDGAMES.
While at first, it may feel nigh impossible to react, the game has a dashing hit similar to the Mario tennis games, and you feel quite masterful as you manage last second maneuvers. You can even save shots from going out so long as it never hits the ground. The quick nature of the gameplay, coupled with the tight controls really serve as a solid foundation for a sports title. I believe this game was budgeted for its price: $10 gets you just enough: I would equate it a cheaper NBA Jam or Mario tennis.
LIGHTNING ROUND: game modes- GO! Quick match: as basic as it gets: start a match with up to 4 players and play the standard game. Tournament: basically the average arcade mode from an anime fighting game: wouldn’t fault you for skipping, but the writing is quirky and the gameplay is still solid. Super blast: modifiers for the match. Your special match from smash bros if you will. Only modifiers I enjoyed were max 2 hits and chicken/bomb ball (both of which are VERY chaotic). Avatar editor: deceptively robust and unexpected: I had a good time with it in that Mii maker way, and there aren’t any crazy cosmetic microtransactions, so yay. Phew that’s the last of them: sounds sparse, but decent considering what you put in.
I think you’ll know if you’re the type of player to buy this game. The game reminds me of a cross of Windjammers and Mario Tennis in a good way. Those games have stuck with me for a while, so another new developer throwing their hat into the “kinda sports games but not really” genre is always welcome. I think solid online could really make this no question, but your enjoyment of the game may vary. As for me, this is my most reluctant gamer seal of approval, if only because I feel like opinions on this game will invariably be polarized. If you want my opinion: I left pretty happy.
Super Volley Blast – $9.99 steam version.
Publisher: Unfinished Pixel.
Release Date: Nov 1, 2018.
I was provided a review copy from the developers for the purposes of this writing. My opinions are still my own.
My Memory of Us is a puzzle game. It focuses on a shared story between a young girl and an old man who is telling her a story about his childhood, and the girl he was friends with back then. Turns out the old man was once a young thief. And he met the girl after getting chased by soldiers for his thieving ways. It’s an exaggerated and fairy-tale like story about Poland’s invasion by the Nazi war machine.
Most of the game is fairly lighthearted in things you see and do it’s a good game for children in that sense. However, as adults you can see the darkness of the game because you know what the embellished things actually are, you know the monstrous things that actually happened. As such the story doesn’t have a lot to ruin since most of us know what the Nazis did. Many embellishments to the story are now that Nazis are a machine army and instead of the Star of David the people are just forced to wear red, whereas everyone else is just shades. Real or robot, Hitler is a cunt; you know just in case you were wondering.
The only voice acting is the old man narrating at the start of every level, everyone else talks via voice bubbles that have pictures in them while making gibberish noises. There’s not a lot of active music in the game, instead it’s mostly ambient sounds, from people mulling about doing their work, soldiers looking for your characters, and vehicles moving around. Oh yeah did I mention that Patrick Stewart voices the old man, yeah that’s right, Patrick Stewart. If you don’t know who that is then… I just pity your entire existence.
In the game there is something rather unique that I really liked, in almost every level there is a ‘memory’ to collect which in game is just a picture. After you obtain it though it unlocks in the memory main menu area. Each memory tells you about a real person and a basic explanation of their exploits during the war. Each one of these people even shows up in the game to varying extents. After I beat the game I read them all and I’ll admit it was rather touching.
My Memory of Us was developed by: 
A review copy was provided by (the publisher maybe? IMGN PRO or the dev Juggler Games, not sure waiting for Cathy).
Chasm is a metroidvania type game which is quasi-procedural generated. In so much that there are rooms on the map that are in the same place no matter what but the paths to get to those rooms are changed with each game. Great thing is you can always play the same map as your friend if you want. The game gives you a ‘Seed” which is a code for that specific world’s map setup. When you start it gives you something random but you can always change the seed at the start to something else if you’d like including changing it to be the same map as your friend, or their map as yours. Now before I continue this let me dictate, I don’t like metriodvania games, I don’t like procedural generation, I don’t like platformers. As such this game is an entire bag of stuff I don’t really care for personally. As such I don’t play games like this often so some concepts that you might be familiar with or are common in these games, I… well I don’t know anything about them, so bare with me. Or don’t… it’s up to you.
Chasm was developed by: 
A review copy was provided by the developer Bit Kid, Inc.
