63
76
FREE GAMES REVIEWS
EXPECT TO PAY
Free
DEVELOPER
David Lindsey PittmanLINK
bit.ly/3ArhxbfNEED TO KNOW
T
he original Neon Struct was
a cyberpunk Thief, filled
with structures to explore,
mainly by crouch-running from
shadow to shadow. Now, Minor Key
Games has returned to its neon
world for a smaller roguelite made
for the 7-Day FPS competition.The mission here calls for shooting,
and intimidation, rather than very
careful sneaking around, as you
infiltrate a megacorp to take it down.
Over several randomly assembled
floors, you have to gather eight
keycards, and also make it to the top
floor, while contending with a bunch
of pesky, patrolling robots.
Ammunition is strictly limited, but
you can find enough to make do by
raiding filing cabinets and plundering
the robot corpses. Keycards,
meanwhile, can be found on the
human staff, who need to be chaseddown and intimidated with the
action button. They’re given titles like
Chief Cowardice Officer and Chief
Harassment Officer. Desperation
Column is a cyberpunk game that
embraces the ‘punk’ bit more
authentically than most other
videogames in the genre.
It’s a cathartic game, if not a
satisfying roguelite – it’s just too basic
to be worth much replaying. The
layouts might change, but they’re still
samey corridors housing a couple of
different robot types, and with little
to do other than shoot and scavenge
ammo. You can’t even restore your
health, which I guess adds tension in
a crude way, but that also causes runs
to become basically unrecoverable.
But that’s the nature of jam games:
they’re prototypes, usually
with a couple of cool ideas.
This is certainly worth a
look on that basis.HOSTILE TAKEOVER
TCB in NEON STRUCT: DESPERATION COLUMN
BELOW: (^) Robotic guards patrol the premises.
EXPECT TO PAY
Free
DEVELOPER
Quite Good
LINK
bit.ly/3u6ww9z
NEED TO KNOW
BELOW: (^) Match your potions to the colours in the speech bubbles.
B
e a witch, they said. It’ll be
fun, they said. Then how
come I’m spending every
moment frantically brewing
potions for demanding customers?
Crazy Cauldron gives you the keys
to the hottest potion shop in the
realm, but keeping up with demand
is an increasingly stressful process.
As they appear at your window, with
little speech bubbles telling you what
they want, you have to gather
ingredients, then plonk the right ones
in your bubbling cauldron. You’re
trying to match your potion’s hue
with that in the bubble above each
customer’s head. If successful, they’ll
disappear in a flurry of points.
It’s not explained what these
brews actually do; you’re only playing
with colours here, for instance by
mixing a red bug and a yellow plant
to make an orange potion.
Sound easy enough? Well, sure,
for your basic colours, or to make a
lighter shade of black, by adding
something white. But suddenly three
customers appear at once, requesting
colours that seem quite indistinct. Is
that a very, very light blue, or a very,
very light purple? I’ll just consult my
colour chart – oh crap, game over.
Did I mention you’re against the
clock? Oh right: you’re against the
clock, with each mistake adding a
hefty penalty to a meter o’doom. The
only way to reverse the tide is to
complete customers’ orders, which
(blessedly) restores a chunk of time.
Crazy Cauldron is a charming
score-chaser, whose only real
drawback is its vague palette, and it
would be possible to memorise that
over time. Can you beat
my high score? Yes, but
then I don’t think the
witchy life is for me.
TOIL AND TROUBLE
Run a hectic potion shop in CRAZY CAULDRON