Weekly Update 2025-09-21
A Week in the Homunculus and Pechorsk Villages
Game Releases and Updates
Into the Radius 2 beta fix - I got pretty frustrated earlier in the week when I tried to test out the new modular gun update, because the beta was very unstable and constantly crashed out. Not unusual for a beta, that's why it's a beta, but thankfully the issue [which turned out to be the starting shotgun] was hotfixed pretty quickly and I was able to play around for a few hours. I have to say, it's a very nice change, and works incredibly well with the customizability of your gear in general.
I wound up finding the firing mechanism of a PP-19 Bizon early on, which I could clean up, buy the rest of the parts for, and use as my primary, then strip down my sawn-off to use as a light secondary in my pistol holster. Being able to stack the shelves of my safehouse with components for guns and alternate kits really plays into what makes these games so engrossing.
They also improved the smoking a bit by giving your guy a more natural two-finger grip rather than the old pinch-grip that made it look like he was ripping a joint before. These kinds of details matter for immersion. Now they just need to add proper chain-smoking by letting you light a cig with another cig and I’ll be happy.
Approaching Infinity outer hull and more - this guy just can't stop adding even more content to what is already one of the best and biggest roguelikes around. Not only does this patch add new quests, new items, more quality of life features, and a whole new type of sector, its main feature is expanding the structure and rewards for going on a space walk while raiding a derelict ship. At this point the only thing he could add that I've wanted is direct boarding of a non-destroyed vessel, to live out my Buck Rogers nostalgia. And at this point, I really can't rule it out.
Mid Night Yammy - an NES homebrew project that's been released on Steam. I really like high-effort homebrew stuff, especially for the NES. There's something about developing a game under extremely tight limitations but with multiple decades' worth of tools and refinements that can yield really impressive results, and the exemplar of that was Retrotainment's Full Quiet. Now, Yammy ain't Full Quiet, but as a pretty straightforward and well-polished puzzle game somewhere in the vein of Lode Runner and Solomon's Key, it's still plenty worthwhile. There is a stage select, but no saves, so I might try to clear it in one sitting one of these days.
The State of Games Played
I've made it… probably halfway through Silksong at this point, and while I haven't hit any real brick walls, it has been steadily increasing in difficulty. Some of the bosses recall the best bosses in the original Hollow Knight, but I've yet to see anything that really stands out as being unique. I thought it was a bit funny that, of everything to steal from Bloodborne, they took the 'abduction to a bottle episode' mechanic. Haven't seen many people complain about how unfair that is [I thought it was great] but I suppose it's still a bit too far past the end of Act 1 for people to have gotten to it.
I finished Caput Mortum this week… or at least, I got the normal ending. It's a good thing, in a way, that the game makes you replay to find the secret ending, because the game itself is incredibly short, which itself is a good thing. This might be the first 'horror' game that is actually snappy enough for me to enjoy the occasional replay, and I'm looking forward to beating it again and writing it up.
An impressive speedrun by RJsmangit, who still [already?] has a Christmas tree up.
Most of my time this week was spent in Abiotic Factor, which I started and almost immediately became obsessed with. It's essentially a survival/crafting game that looks and feels like a Half Life 1 mod, is more than slightly tongue-in-cheek, and has a surprising amount of depth. I was prepared for sphincter-relaxing minigames and jokes about smashing crates, but I was caught off guard by a genuinely compelling story, satisfying and significant equipment upgrades, and the best setting and exploration in a game of this genre I've ever played. I'm still kind of puttering around building out my base of operations rather than plowing through the main objectives, but if my playtime stays where it is for another week or so I shouldn't have any trouble finishing this soon.
The demo for Alabaster Dawn, a new game by the developers of CrossCode, came out this week, and I jumped on it immediately. CrossCode was one of my favorite games of the past decade, and I've been anxiously waiting for any news about Radical Fish's follow-up since 2018. The good news is that Alabaster Dawn is very similar to CrossCode in terms of style, gameplay, and tone. The great news is that it's even better looking, might have even more combat diversity, and looks to have dungeons that are just as expansive. The demo has about an hour's worth of the very start of the game, including the prologue, then jumps ahead for a short amount of the first dungeon. The game is likely to release in Early Access, just like CrossCode did, which is a mixed bag - I don't know if I really want to play it half finished and then picked back up in spurts as the later areas are added like I did with that first game. Either way, I've apparently got until sometime in the first half of 2026 to decide.
Writing
With Siralim Ultimate finally written up, I no longer have any particular obligation to plow through its endgame content to reach the Guilds and other late-stage goals… but I might still chip away at it from time to time, especially on my Deck. Maybe more importantly, with it out of the way, I now feel ready to tackle my essay on JRPGs in earnest, and have already made good progress on the first draft. While working on it, I've actually decided to use it as a format for an entire series, with an essay for each 'genre' I think needs addressed in a similar way.
Such a series shouldn't interfere with my other essay plans, but a similar side goal has set back my one on Nature significantly - I wanted to reference Thoreau's Walden but it's been years since I last read it, and when I went to pick up an eBook copy for a 'quick' re-read, I ended up buying a compilation of multiple books, and now I'm instead reading A Week on the Concord and Merrimack Rivers, a book he apparently wrote while living at Walden Pond. It's plenty amusing in its own way, but also kind of long.
I expect to complete the secret ending of Caput Mortum shortly, and will likely have its write-up done not long after that. It's a game I enjoyed, and have plenty of praise for, but is also very short, which means a short write-up.
Other
Mystery of the Malign and Bloodthief, two games I played the demos of during the most recent Next Fest, are due out tomorrow, and I'm probably going to get Mystery of the Malign right away. Then, just two weeks later, Daimon Blades [from the developers of E.Y.E Divine Cybermancy] and House of Necrosis, another demo I played during the same event, are launching together. It's a bountiful season for games only I have much interest in.
The next Age of Empires 2 DLC has been formally announced - the Alexander the Great campaign, by the CaptureAge team that made the Battle for Greece expansion last year. Just like that last 'Chronicles' DLC, this will be single-player only, feature three new unique civilizations with mechanics and progression that is more experimental than what would be included in a civ for the base game, and a campaign that probably has at least a few decisions that impact later missions. And it's coming out in just under a month, which means I should probably go ahead and finish the last few missions of Battle for Greece already, huh?