Sproggiwood

Hello!

 This game has been on my Steam wishlist for some time now and last week it was finally on proper sale. I bought it immediately and all I have to say is that I am not disappointed.

So Sproggiwood is a turn-based, rogue-like game. You go from dungeon to dungeon with your cute Cloghead companion and do quests for the Sproggi who has made you his minion. I like the humor in the game and overall the dialogue makes me smile. After finishing the tutorial you may enter your first dungeon or you could decorate your town as well. The decoration option doesn't let you be that creative but it does have its share of features from adding trees and rocks to adding buildings. So far I haven't found out if having your town decorated has an effect on anything, but I hardly think so.

 The game obviously has some Finnish spirit in it and one hint of it is the main setting. The game is supposedly based on Finnish mythology but let me say that so far I haven't had any hints of it... Perhaps I'm poorly educated on the matter but I don't see it. There are other hints of the Finnish subtlety as well which can be seen in item and location names. The first dungeon named Ickykolo, icky hole. The second location, Goaturku, basically combining two real life cities - one from India and *hehehe* my hometown in Finland. I also found an accessory in the dungeons names Tuuri - Luck. If I remember correctly the accessory allows you to reroll an item once each. Didn't try it out but could be useful. Anyways, to my surprise the game company isn't even Finnish but has a Finnish artist in the three-member team.

 Every dungeon has its own objectives which involve clearing the dungeon with different classes and harder difficulties. The first class you have is the farmer. To be honest this class is quite hopeless. By leveling up you get better skills but the only useful one (I think) is only unlocked once you reach level 3 of the Pitchfork skill, which takes around six times of leveling up. It allows you to poke enemies in every direction which is quite useful when you're all surrounded. I haven't been able to see the other skills yet, but hopefully they're a bit better. When you start playing the warrior class, you get a similar skill which allows you to attack in every direction the first time you level up which gives the class a clear advantage over the farmer class. The third class I recently unlocked is the archer and this class is sweet as hell. Your base attack is using the dagger but once you level up which is quite quickly, you get access to the crossbow. Now you can attack enemies without even letting them touch you. The other classes include the thief, vampire and wizard. It'll take some time before I unlock those since I feel like I'm shit at this game. I'm playing on normal but the game is quite challenging nevertheless.

Even though your level and skills restore after every dungeon you may use the store to enhance your gaming experience, for instance by speeding up the leveling process or increasing the hit points of your characters. On top of that all the loot you find in dungeons next appear in the store, so you may buy equipment and consumables for your character to have a better chance at survival. This is especially important considering your farmer since in the beginning of every dungeon the class is quite useless like I mentioned earlier.

 The game is turn-based so an important feature in the dungeons includes skipping turns. Your character stays put while everything else in your vision moves. I play on keyboard and I must say that I get a bit hasty at times and instead of moving or attacking an enemy I accidentally skip a turn, and that may put me in a tough situation at times. That's my problem in this game really - I'm too careless and end up dead because of a stupid mistake. At times I should clearly take the time to make a strategy but noooo, let's kill everything without stopping and checking our own hit points and poof, we're dead. I need to change my play style soon since the dungeons are getting more and more difficult.

If you like rogue-like games I strongly recommend this game. Even if you're new to the genre this might well be the game to get you hooked on rogue-like. On top of that, you simply can't ignore the cuteness that overflows from Sproggiwood!

Seduce Me 2: The Demon War

Hi all!

So this game I've been playing (or reading) is a bit different from the games I've introduced here earlier. I must say that I'm a huge fan of visual novels, especially the otome-genre. To those of you who aren't familiar with it, visual novels are interactive, story-driven games, where you get to make choices that will eventually affect the outcome of the entire game. Most visual novels are so called harem games, where the main character (in most cases male) is surrounded by pretty girls and gets to pursue one of them. To be honest I'm not too excited about playing a male character in the hopes of getting to date/screw an anime girl, but this is where otome comes in. Otome is basically reverse-harem, mostly a genre enjoyed by us girls. The game I'm about to introduce you to was just released on Steam and it's sequel to an otome game I really enjoyed reading last year.

The story goes as follows. In the first game, the main character Mika inherits the grand mansion of his recently deceased grand father. On her first visit to the mansion, she faces the view of five young men scrambled on the floor, obviously hurt. Out of the pureness of your heart you let the men stay with you at the mansion and eventually it is revealed that they are royal incubi of the Demon World, running away from their duties. This and that happens, and you get to date one of the brothers in the end (PG-16 style!)... (plus various other people, like your best friend Suzu and a succubus lady called Diana!)

James - The oldest of the brothers, heir to the Demon throne, a bit serious by nature

Sam - A total brute, hot-headed and has a dirty mouth

 Eric - A bit of a flirt, keeps calling you princess (uggh)

Matthew - Baby face, a total turn-off imo

Damien - Can read minds, a bit shy, but my absolute favourite in the first game!

Diana -  Passionate by nature, will do anything to achieve her goals (drag the brothers back to the Demon World)

So in the second game you pick a route and it continues from where the first game ended (won't reveal any specifics, I don't want to spoil the story). You are about to get married to one of the incubi brothers, when all of a sudden you are dragged into the Demon World.

 There you are greeted by Diana and her "friends" and it is revealed that if you want to leave the place, the Demon Lord has to go down. Your fiance, plus his brothers and their wives follow you and together you prepare for the ultimate Demon War.

I must say that I've enjoyed the sequel immensely. I still haven't gone through Erik's or Diana's routes but the rest have all been very unique and entertaining. I've read the forums at Steam and many people are struggling to get "happy endings". That's all I've gotten so far, so actually I'm struggling to get the bad endings.

I can't help but think of a 14-year-old when I was playing Matthew's route. The story was interesting but since the sequel is PG-18 instead of 16, I felt so awkward in the sex scenes. Of course, it is clearly stated in the intro that you can always say NO and it doesn't affect the outcome of the game, but obviously I was curious since you do get CG art from some of the scenes. So if you want to collect all the art, you must have sex.

Obviously the sex scenes aren't anything graphic since otherwise the game wouldn't be allowed on Steam. Nevertheless the scenes are still written quite intimately. Well written soft-porn or so to speak. 

The first game was free which really shocked me. Full-scripted voice acting, plus beautifully drawn CG art. I was willing to pay for the game, so it was no surprise that the sequel had a small price. For a measly 10 euros I've been having an absolute blast. I've played for 11 hours and I still have two routes left, plus finishing the bad endings for each route. The game also has a bonus story that is only revealed if you know the correct password. You get a letter from each ending and I'm such a dimwit that I've forgotten to mark them down... I've read on the forums that people are still struggling to find the correct password but when they do, I'm just going to cheat a little bit. Anyways, I feel proud playing this game since it clearly shows that the Japanese aren't the only ones who can create a proper VN!

 There are a few bugs I've found so far. Sometimes the voice acting differs from the script that is shown on screen, but that hasn't bothered me that much. Also, while playing Matthew's route, I got a happy ending with Diana dying. In the aftermath, Diana was still alive and kicking despite dying earlier... Oh well, not a big deal. When the game is text-based there are bound to be some typos, but those don't bother me at all. Try playing a Japanese VN with translator software... then you will understand.

 Example: I played Sweet Pool years ago with a translator, didn't understand much but enjoyed it nevertheless. Later on my friend laughed at me and told me about the actual story. Go google it, it's too disturbing to write here.

Overall I'm really glad Seduce Me got a sequel. I didn't hear about it until later but the game collected over $23,000 on Kick Starter. The creator, Michaela Laws included a letter in the game that indicates she has "a million stories to tell". I hope that's true and she keeps on making these amazing stories!

Alrighty, I think I'm going to read Eric's route next. I hope it's good!

Echo of Soul vol. 2

More EOS!

By now I've gotten more accustomed to the game, Echo of Soul. I'm now a level 38 archer (last time lvl 17 ;-) ) and I'm starting to enjoy the game more and more. Here are some of my thoughts about the game so far.

 Some of the prettiest places in the game so far.

I've been leveling up pretty fast and one of the reasons is PvP battles. First I wasn't too sure if I'd even like PvP but after playing a few battles I'm absolutely hooked. I don't have any screenshots of my own but an explanation should be enough. The battle ground where the 30 players fight against one another in teams is selected in random. I don't know if there are other versions but so far I've played in two different battle grounds, where the maps are a bit different. In the first area the map is circular with 5 pillars surrounding it. Your goal is to activate these pillars and of course, kill as many enemies as possible. The other battle area is more oval-like, with five different paths crossing it. Every path has a crystal where you can collect resources. Again, try to collect as many resources for your team as possible. While in the first area the pillars are there the whole time, but the crystals in the second area disappear once someone has obtained them. Whichever team wins will get better prices but so far I've been plenty happy while losing as well - I get a ton of experience points compared to random quests in the main game. (Around 10,000 exp from a quest, ~60,000 from a PvP battle)

 I've also found a guild! Or actually I think they found me and invited me to join, so I did. Once I joined, the guild was probably pretty new and they had a peaceful status. The next day I logged in they were already hostile! I did some reading and it seems that guilds can fight each other, so that's where the hostility comes from. Only today I understood what it meant in practice. I came to an area and I wanted to purify souls with an other player. (You collect so called chaos souls from monsters and purify them into different buffs. Purifying them with friends is more effective (takes only one soul per buff) than by yourself (takes two). So I went next to this other player, about to request purification with them, when my character attacked them! I was so shocked that I could barely do anything next so obviously I was killed by this other person. What I realized is that the character was probably from a rival/hostile guild and I automatically attacked them when attacking. I've played for over 30 hours now but I felt like an absolute noob when I didn't know about the fact that other players in RED are also your enemies. Stupid me.

 I had to take this screenshot because I was cracking up so badly while fighting this miniboss! (Juha is also my father's name)

 I still haven't used any real world money in the game but every once in a while I'm tempted. But what I do like about the game is that you get these magic eggs from here and there, and you may use them to get certain credit items. So far I've used them all to purchase magic lamps. Magic lamps give you a variety of items which are supposedly of higher value. Also, every lamp (I think?) gives you this little silver coin. When I received the first one I noticed that the coin had a description talking about summoning a ghost tiger. I thought instantly: "HELL YEAH!!! Lucky me!". It wasn't that simple since summoning this godly mount requires 2,500 coins of the same type. And I know no other way of getting them than purchasing magic lamps. One lamp costs 86 magic eggs, in other words you need *takes out calculator* 215,000 eggs in order to get this fuc**** tiger. The most I've had is around 300 at a time. If magic lamps are the only way to get this tiger, I'm out!

 This is my character visiting the first town after some time and look, I have a party member! One of my friends was kind enough to try the game so that I'd have someone to play with. Unfortunately it wasn't to his liking so I'll be going solo for now. I wish the community was more open and my apologies if it is and I just haven't noticed it but, there isn't much integrity within the players I think. I don't know about the guilds, but the one I'm playing in isn't putting much effort in playing together. I do have one experience which required me to play together with someone and hey, it made me feel all fuzzy inside. This level 14 character wanted to go against this level 15 co-op quest bear and my level 19 character was just randomly passing by. This person kindly asked me to help and I did. Once the bear was dead they thanked me and we parted ways but it made me soooo happy! This is what the game should be like. I still have co-op quests I haven't done because there haven't been anyone helping me (even though I've asked!). Players unite, now!

 I'm really looking forward to leveling up to 40. In the screenshot you can see my pet Anto who kindly collects all my loot. To be honest I couldn't live without him anymore. He will unfortunately expire in 3 days (I've used an hourglass to lengthen his lifespan). So I think, if I'm correct, I'll receive a new pet on level 40!  It's too bad that otherwise you need to use store credits to buy new pets but I hope that you'll get them by random every once in a while. I'm a bit sad to go separate ways with Anto, though. He is such a sweet heart.

  There are also different events in the game every now and then. I took this screenshot today before logging out. There was a fashion competition in the main town. Even though I didn't participate I kept getting these event gifts like they were raining on me! So, that bunch right there is gathered around a mailbox, opening their gifts (I think). It's fun because when I was playing Dragon Nest every main town was filled with people like that! I'm afraid the game is dying out slowly since all the servers are uncrowded all the time and that is actually the most people I've seen in one place during this week.

Today will be my 7th day of logging in and it'll also be my 7th day playing this game. 38 levels, 32 hours and 7 days. I think I'll receive a new mount tomorrow! A horse, which is must faster than my current llama (even though I received a new riding permit on level 35, which makes my llama faster.)

All in all I'm really enjoying this game! I keep looking forward to meeting new people, leveling up and discovering new things about the game. It's not the best MMORPG, but the best I'm currently playing. I was looking forward to the Tree of Savior which will probably be out on the 10th, but I think I'm too busy playing EOS that I'll skip it. Thanks for reading and if you're at all interested in trying out the game, I'm here to help the best I can. I'd love to get new friends to play with!