“Whatcha Playin’, Pixels?” – November 2022
13 min read
A monthly roundup of games enjoyed by the writers of The Pixels
Why hello there! It’s been a bit, hasn’t it? The world has changed and so have you. It’s good to take a break now and then, don’t you agree? Especially during this busy season. Reflect back with us on November 2022 and a month of games played and laid to rest. Ideally. The backlog lives on… Here’s what we’ve been playing in November at The Pixels!
Behold! Coffee returns!
My first entry since becoming a Dad of Boy and Girl, this last month has been… fairly quiet actually? Most of my time was spent relearning how to take care of a newborn, but I did fit in some gaming!
First up, Sonic Frontiers, naturally. In my three-ish or so weeks with the game, I have nothing but good things to say about this title. Is it GOTY worthy? Not in the slightest. Is it perfect and deserving of 10s across the board? Nope. But is it fun, is it engaging and does it compel me to play more? You darn well better believe it! The Open Zone concept is just that – a concept. However, it’s a well-done concept and one that I think deserves further refinement for the next Sonic title. Each day I play, I find more routes to explore, more challenges to complete and more heights to climb. It’s been so much fun to play and I can’t wait to start tearing this apart for a critique here on The Pixels.
Kid Espresso got sick in the middle of the month (surprise, surprise). I managed to convince him to watch me play Super Mario Bros. 3. I don’t play it too often (mainly because I get a bit bored of it after World 2), but I stuck with it and it helped me remember why I adored this game as a kid. Honestly, it’s the best Mario title. Super Mario World may be pretty and may have flying cape powers, but it can’t stand up to the variety available in Super Mario Bros. 3.
A day afterward and while watching Twitter meltdown, I fired up the Genesis and played my all-time favourite game ever: Sonic the Hedgehog 2. I can say now that I’ve beaten that game about 30-ish times. Does every playthrough get boring? Oh, heck no! It’s my comfort game. When everything in the world is going crazy, I know I can depend on Sonic 2 to make things right within the world once more. It’s a game I’m thankful for.
Prior to starting Sonic Frontiers, I finished the rest of CrossCode, including the DLC content, A New Home. I LOVED how all of the loose ends from the game’s first ending wrapped up, including some crucial character development brought about from Lea’s and C’tron’s shared past. I’m set to complete the rest of my CrossCode review for the site by mid-December or so.
Lastly, I picked up a copy of God of War: Ragnarok. I’m stoked to play this one, considering the first game was the inspiration for my first tattoo. I’ll have to wait a bit before I can sink into this one, but I know I’ll find the time to play and enjoy it. From what I’ve heard, it’s a masterpiece. Let’s hope I think the same of it when I finally return to the Nine Realms.
November has been a pretty fantastic month in terms of my gaming activity (and a more active month compared to the past 2 months or so). There are a few giant elephants in the room but I’ve only picked up Sonic Frontiers this month (I published a ‘First Impressions’ on it here at The Pixels). Needless to say, I’ve been having a great time with it, and it has been a while since I could say that about a Sonic game. Looking forward to getting back into it.
Most of my time this month has been spent replaying Omori (for real this time). The first time I played through it I accidentally played the wrong route. I decided to replay it this month (I promised a friend I would) and I’m so glad I did. It’s hard for me to replay games multiple times but this was worth it. Omori offers something very unique in its storytelling and overall it’s a really impactful and valuable message. It’s an RPG that focuses on characters and internal conflicts rather than a worldly crisis unlike most. I would love to break down this game sometime in the future. I might be playing some post-game content here shortly.
It’s been a while since I shared what I’ve been up to! I’ll start with God of War (2018) which I originally started playing last year but dropped it for various reasons early on. Around mid-October, I got really hyped for the sequel that would drop soon so I decided to try to rush through the game as soon as I could. I skipped some of the side quests along the way in order to save time but I finally reached the end and did all I wanted to do, literally the night before the release of God of War: Ragnarok! Thanks to YemmytheFerret, I was able to acquire it on release day and I began the journey the day after. So far I’ve played about 13 hours of God of War: Ragnarok and I’m really enjoying my time with it. I’ve been playing much slower and deliberately so that I don’t miss anything this time around, since I regretted rushing through the previous title.
Another game I’ve started playing this month is Vampire Survivors, a top-down rogue-lite horde survival game with cool pixel art. Everything about this game reminds me of Castlevania— the art style, monster designs, and music all seem to be heavily influenced by the series, and I love it! The one thing I didn’t realize about this game is the fact that you only control movement. The attacks happen automatically, and depending on the particular weapon or projectile, you sometimes don’t even have control of the direction. However, my worries quickly faded away as I gained more weapons and abilities. There will be hundreds of enemies on screen and so many screen-filling abilities coming from your character that you’ll be glad you don’t have to worry about aiming. The game is very addicting and I find myself being in the ‘just one more’ mentality to see if I can make it just a bit further the next time.
I love playing games this time of year. The weather cools down. Fire in the fireplace. Hot chocolate. Pumpkin spice (if you’re basic). Everything’s cozier and snugglier. I feel less guilty being a 37-year-old alpha male dressed in a black hoodie and jammies loafing on the couch playing video games that’re almost as old as me!
Over the past month, I knocked out a few old favorites: Mega Man X2 and Aladdin come to mind. I’ve spent time with my kids playing Minecraft and it’s an actual delight being taught something about a video game rather than teaching it, particularly where a 7-year-old and a 5-year-old are involved. Playing on PS4, we’re building our own Olympus using the Greek Mythology pack.
Early in the month, I defeated Advanced Dungeons & Dragons: Eye of the Beholder on Super NES. Yes, it uses the SNES Mouse. No, I didn’t use the SNES Mouse. The tracking on that thing is slower than a system without blast processing… Anyway, I didn’t anticipate enjoying AD&D: Eye of the Beholder. In fact, when I initially played it, I didn’t think I’d even have the patience to stream the entire thing! What I discovered was an oddly addicting experience that satisfied my basic cravings for exploration. I inquisitively stalked the depths below Waterdeep with an appetite for discovery that I didn’t know I’d possess for a point-and-click first-person dungeon crawler action RPG home console port.
Shoving Xanathar’s stupid ugly face (which is also his body) into his stupid ugly spike trap left me wide open for a new adventure: I started Lufia & the Fortress of Doom! So far, it’s been a fairly average 16-bit JRPG experience but something that’s stood out is how natural the dialogue reads now and then. Different than some of the wilted, stilted stuff in other games from the time. I’ll be playing the game weekdaily at 1pm Central if you’d like to join us!
It’s November, so most of my time for the month has gone to NaNoWriMo. Still, I’ve had time for a few games here and there, generally as rewards for finishing goals. First off, I went back to Dead Cells which I hadn’t played really since around 2018. I had put about 20 hours into it and couldn’t get very far. After watching some friends play, though, I decided to give it another go. I’m not much better, but at least I managed to beat the game a few times now.
I also picked up a few small, cheap indies over the Steam Autumn sale that I’ve been trying out one by one. Lots of cat-themed games. Hidden Cats in Paris is a single-screen hidden image game of a sort I’ve been enjoying lately. They can usually be completed in around half an hour or less, but they scratch an old itch that I haven’t seen since Highlights magazines. There are a LOT of cat-themed ones out and about. Just have to be picky about the price since they’re so small.
The other cat game I got was Sudocats, which you can probably guess from the name is Sudoku but with cats. Complete a few games, get a profile on the game devs’ kitties. Not a whole lot of content to it, but… cats. I also scratched my love-of-fishing-games with one called Pengu Never Left. It’s a very chill game about a bird, an island, and a fishing rod. You learn bits of the story as you fish up music, messages in bottles, and, well, fish. It’s surprisingly touching for as small and simple as the game is. Hits on emotions like fear and loneliness in a calm and peaceful way. It was more than I expected, and I found myself struggling to put it down.
When I’ve not been working or watching as many World Cup matches as humanly possible, I’ve been really enjoying Ys VIII: Lacrimosa of Dana. I’m a huge huge fan of the Ys series but for some reason never reached the end of this particular iteration. It’s an incredible game, though – definitely scratches that action-RPG itch that I’ve had since I decided the Trials Of Mana remake was my Game Of The Year for 2020. Now that Ys VIII is on PS5, it gave me an ideal opportunity to revisit it, and I am so glad that I have.
Also over on the Xbox, I downloaded McPixel 3. Honestly, I haven’t even thought about McPixel since back in the early 2010s when Pewdiepie used to play it on Youtube, so to download and play this utter madness has been a nostalgic joy! It doesn’t make any sense at all, as a point-n-click or as a comedy game, and I just love it all the more for it! Just to click at random on various things to see what madness ensues is exactly the kind of silliness I needed on these dark November nights. And, just like old Pewdie, I’m finding myself shouting “McPIXEL!” at the end of each level.
I haven’t been able to sit or even stand and play too many games–I’ve been in and out of hospitals and had several surgeries lately—so I’ve been playing more mobile games.
Onirim
One mobile game that I return to often is Onirim. Replace Solitaire on your phone with Onirim. It’s free to download with some cheap expansions. If you like Solitaire, you’ll love this game.
Onirim is a solitaire game, but it has a theme. As the name suggests, it’s about dreams. You’re trapped in a dreamland and must escape. To do so, you collect doors of four suits/colors (blue, green, white, and red). You can do this by playing three cards of the same suit without repeating the card’s type. In the base game, there are three card types: suns, moons, and keys.
Suns and moons are just symbols you can play (sun-moon-sun or moon-sun-moon) to find a door and open it. Suns are the most common card and moons are the second most common. Keys, which are rare, can be used like suns and moons, but they also have special abilities. If you have a key in your hand and draw into a matching door (yes, the doors are also in the deck), you can clear the door right away without playing three cards. And keys can also keep you safe. You see, the deck also has nightmares.
When you draw into a nightmare (ten in the deck), you have four options:
1) Return a door you’ve already cleared
2) Discard your hand
3) Discard the top five cards of your deck
4) Discard a key
Discard a key is the best option if you have a key.
You can also play a key from your hand and not to the stack. If you do this, you can look at the top five cards of the deck and discard one (except doors). If you’re lucky, you can discard a nightmare just before drawing into one. This is a good option if you want to see upcoming cards.
Oh, and if you ever run out of cards, you lose. So, discard the top five cards of your deck nightmare option unless you know there are a lot of upcoming nightmares. Ah, strategy.
Onirim is quick and easy to learn. If you didn’t get the gist of the game from this description, no problem. The game has an excellent tutorial. I highly recommend Onirim.
Onitama
Wow, two games that begin with “O.” Onitama is another free game with some cheap add-ons too, but these two games couldn’t be more different.
Onitama is a chess-like game, so you’ll have to play against the AI, pass n’ play with an opponent, or play online. There are plenty of AI options and they scale well. I’ve played a lot against the AI
Anyway, Onitama is played on a 5×5 grid. Each player begins with four pawns and a king (which begins on your throne). You win by either capturing the other player’s king or ending a turn on your opponent’s throne.
But the units don’t move like normal Chess. Onitama adds cards that tell you how you can move your pieces. There are only five cards in any game (there are more options in the deck). The first player gets three cards and the second player two. Whenever you play a card, you don’t discard it. You hand it to your opponent.
This creates a likely scenario that you could give your opponent the card they need to win. This produces so much tension. It’s amazing. I don’t know how many times I’ve held onto a powerful card because I didn’t want my opponent to have it. I’ll give you the boar (which is a version of a pawn’s movement). But I’m keeping the rabbit (a cross between a bishop and a knight) for the winning move.
Onitama is another game that’s easy to learn. And it has a good tutorial. You should try both.
So help me, I have restarted Persona 5 as it is now on Gamepass… and this time it’s the Royal version which I’ve not played yet! Already I’m completely sucked back into this amazing adventure, loving the anime visuals, the music, the story… I’m doomed!
I’m also playing Far Cry 5 again, that game had an amazing difficulty curve that makes it an absolute power fantasy after a while, just what I need after some grueling Persona 5 Palace runs!
Right now, it is God of War: Ragnarok all day every day. This is a game I simply cannot get out of my head. It is as pristine as every reviewer says and boasts a narrative that few games can rival. Even while I’m at work, I’m distracted, thinking of all the ways it riffs on Norse mythology and subverts my expectations at every turn. At 41 hours (and counting), I have completed every available side quest and optional boss. And, to be honest, I don’t want to return to the main story because that means I’ll be one step closer to the end, which seems like it could be soon. Even so, I can’t wait to find out what happens. While I’ve enjoyed all the entries in the GoW series, Ragnarok seals Kratos as one of the greatest video game protagonists of all time.
What have you been playing recently? Finish any games in November? See you next month, space cowboy…
Red formerly ran The Well-Red Mage and now serves The Pixels as founder, writer, editor, and podcaster. He has undertaken a seemingly endless crusade to talk about the games themselves in the midst of a culture obsessed with the latest controversy, scandal, and news cycle about harassment, toxicity, and negativity. Pick out his feathered cap on Twitter @thewellredmage or Mage Cast.
