Alienware isn’t really known for amazing gaming peripherals, in fact, due to their own ecosystem, some people put them dead last, but they aren’t low quality or anything. They are just aimed toward Alienware owners because their design and aesthetic matches the current generation of PCs and laptops that are out. This is only the second Alienware keyboard I’ve ever used as the last one was released almost a decade ago. I have to say, this keyboard definitely caters to this generation of computers, and especially my Area-51m R2 in white. I have the matching mouse and headset, so why not try the keyboard right?
Well, I’ve always been against using full-size keyboards with laptops, so what’s the point? There’s a keyboard built into the thing! However, with the emergence of 60% mini keyboards, I decided to try this first at a lower cost, and while I don’t mind it, a full-size keyboard does not pair well with a laptop, especially with a chunky braided cable. Even wrapped up and held with a cable tie, the thing was always in the way, and the cable was so stiff I couldn’t really get it to sit where I wanted it. I constantly pushed the keyboard back and hit my mousepad and whatnot. While this isn’t an issue on a desktop, I’m not going to knock points for this as it’s obviously a full-size keyboard meant for desktop PCs.
When it comes to looks Alienware nailed their current design blueprint. It matches my laptop perfectly and looks minimalistic. This isn’t a flashy keyboard with lots of macros and gimmicky spinning things and whoopdy-doo-dads. There’s a volume wheel and that’s pretty much it outside of standard FN media keys. The low profile is nice and thanks to this the keys are raised up away from the base plate. I did notice some deck flex in this thing, probably due to the low profile design, but it wasn’t noticeable while typing. The keys themselves are Cherry MX Reds so there is some clicky noise when typing. There are multiple RGB lighting zones, but for those who don’t want to install the Alienware Command Center for RGB control the keyboard has built-in lighting effects to cycle through which look nice. I didn’t have to install any drivers on my Area-51m R2 and Command Center just recognized it. There was no firmware update needed either.
Typing on the keyboard feels nice. The response of the Cherry Reds is great, but I did hear a little pinging when typing, but it was only with particularly hard presses. There is a USB 3.0 passthrough on the keyboard, but it requires a separate cable to be plugged in, so what’s the point of the passthrough then? I guess it could bring a USB slot closer to you as an advantage, but if you don’t need a USB slot closer to you right at your keyboard, then don’t bother plugging it in. Overall, the keyboard is mostly recommended for current Alienware owners who want to keep their aesthetics matching, but for anyone else, I wouldn’t really bother, as there’s nothing remarkable about this keyboard that the competition hasn’t already done or done better. But if you want a minimalistic RGB keyboard with nothing fancy going on, then this is a great choice, as most gaming keyboards can be pretty gimmicky and flashy.
Beautiful indie games are something that comes only once in a while. When you think about games like Journey, Limbo, Inside, Braid, Monument Valley, and Flower, These are memorable games that most core gamers know of and look up to when it comes to quality indie games and what defines an indie game. Omno tries this but doesn’t quite reach that height for several reasons.
So, when it comes to these minimalistic indie games, they usually try to tell a story with no voice acting through the music and action of the protagonist. Games like Journey and Inside pulled this off amazingly well, and I even remember tearing up a bit with Journey despite no written or spoken dialog being present. Omno has some great music and tries to pull off the adventurous fast-paced snowboarding/gliding on linear pathways with epic music and opening up to a beautiful vista kind of like how Journey did, but it doesn’t quite work here. Once you land, you get the camera ripped from you, and your little guy walks up to the vista, and the camera pans around. That detracts from the user’s perspective and takes away that epic experience. Diving into the open area without any cuts adds to the sense of exploration and discovery because now I don’t quite know where I landed, but if I get a camera cut, it kind of ruins the surprise.
Most of what Omno consists of is repetitive puzzle-solving in open areas that all play out exactly the same. There are white orbs you must collect to unlock the final puzzle to move on, but there are optional things you can do to get 100% in the area, which isn’t hard. I was able to play 100% of the game on my first try without a walkthrough. You get an area map once you get to the waypoint, and this shows where the orbs are. Each area has about five orbs that require gathering white cubes from animals and plants around the area. Once you have enough, this unlocks one of the five orbs. You then have a few books to find that have a dialog about another creature going on their pilgrimage. Some orbs require platforming puzzles, moving blocks, or shuffling things around. It’s very easy, and I found almost no challenge in these puzzles. You do unlock new abilities as time goes on, such as teleporting to certain waypoints, surfing on your staff, and dashing.
There is a small sense of progression, and each new area is beautiful and looks great. However, I felt like it was a chore by the tenth one because I knew exactly what was coming up. Find five orbs, gather the cubes for that one orb, find the books, solve at least three puzzles, etc. It became predictable, and there is really no story or character development between them, so the game relies on pretty graphics and whimsical music to keep you going. The platforming and controls work okay most of the time, but I felt dashing was a bit hard to control, and landing was a bit slippery. Many times, I slid off a cliff or block just to start over again.
If the game were just a linear adventure traveling through these valleys, I feel it would be a better and more memorable experience. Having a dozen levels that play out exactly the same for literally no reason is boring and a chore, despite how pretty the game looks. Maybe four or five pieces spread out between more eye candy would have been better for this type of game, but what’s here turns into a slog towards the end. I still recommend the game as it can be finished in less than four hours and it is charming to look at and explore, but just be prepared for repetitive level design and unchallenging puzzles. The story is pretty much nonexistent, and there’s no type of character development even through actions. Omno (I think that’s his name?) has a flying axolotl-type creature flying around with him, and the creature is sick, maybe? At the beginning of some levels, he picks him up, and the thing looks like it’s dying. I honestly don’t even know.
When I think of casual games, I usually think of games that are relaxing, stress-free, usually offer a good story and characters, and have a great world to explore. With mobile games, this is true as well, but I feel that despite how great Assemble with Care is, it’s held back by the casual game constraints too much. The mechanics and idea of taking apart devices and fixing them is an itch that games like House Flipper and PC Building Simulator scratch, and when I saw Assemble with Care, I thought it was going to be the same. The fact that a voiced narrative is included was just a bonus.
You play as a female hobbyist repair woman who travels to Belariva for a vacation and relaxation when she ends up getting involved in the town’s squabbles. She runs into a mayor and his daughter, and a cafe owner and her sister. She is the key to getting each party to resolve their family issues, and of course, her tinkering helps that. The story itself is well voiced, and UsTwo games are well known for gorgeous visuals and unique gameplay, but the game falls short here. Every chapter, out of thirteen, has a device you need to disassemble and fix and it’s really neat. I couldn’t wait to get the next device, as they did get slightly more intricate as you went on, but the game handicaps itself by allowing snapping of parts that are allowed only in one spot, so it’s not really a puzzle anymore. The biggest challenge came in disassembly, as there’s not much to tell you about how to do this.
Various devices range from a GameBoy Advance SP to a watch, a music box, a record player, a portable cassette player, and others. You get everything you need laid out in front of you, such as a screwdriver, cables, or various parts to repair the item. Long pressing allows you to take things apart, and there is a swiping motion for screwing things in and out. You can rotate the device, as every side needs to be inspected. Most of these puzzles can be completed in just a few minutes, and each chapter has voice dialogue at the beginning and end.
The art is great in both the story stills and the 3D graphics of the objects. Bright watercolor drawings and flat pastel textures just pop on the screen. I didn’t want the game to end, however. I felt like more chapters could be added, as the story isn’t memorable but entertaining and a bit touching. I still wanted to know the fate of each party’s families, and for less than an hour of gameplay, UsTwo did a great job with the storytelling. Sadly, once the game is over, there’s no reason to go back at all. The puzzles will never change, and they’re way too easy to be replayed. I wish the puzzles weren’t as easy and had more intricate and smaller parts, or just something more complicated.
When it comes to “vise”-type” controllers for phones, there’s been an increasing demand for quality now that mobile games are pretty much console quality. We still get nice, simple games, but sometimes we want our console experience to be super portable. It used to be that Apple took quite a while to catch on to official controller support. It wasn’t until iOS 13 that Bluetooth controllers were officially supported. They have been available on Android for nearly a decade, but the cheap Chinese devices never quite held up. So there are two animals you can tame. The traditional controller with a phone clip or the vise-style controller I personally prefer the console, as it feels more like the Switch or a traditional handheld console. I always felt the controller and clip were super heavy, and view angles got weird.
Within the last couple of years, major gaming companies have been making official controllers for phones. With games like Call of Duty: Mobile, PUBG, and GRID: Autosport, there’s a reason why. These games play phenomenally better with controllers. The Kishi isn’t perfect, but it does a great job of giving us quality where we need it. The vise actually folds into itself, which is something I can’t say for cheap Chinese devices that I have used. They have this weird sliding mechanism that’s spring-loaded and just feels too rigid and universal. This controller is hand-tailored for iPhones, and using my iPhone 12 Pro Max was a dream with this controller.
The first issue I ran into is that unfolding the device is a pain. There are two pull tabs that are oriented awkwardly and don’t have a nice snap or click when they unlatch. You have to pull the controller simultaneously and just let the controller kind of fall apart, and some wiggling is required. The controller is basically two halves of a controller that are connected with a soft rubber band that is anchored with plastic pieces at the end that have a peg that allows for stretching. There’s a rectangle backpiece in the middle that has support pegs that rest on the back of the phone. It feels tight, and I never felt like the device didn’t stretch enough or too far. There are spacers for smaller iPhones, so the band still gets tight. You insert your phone into the lightning port side and slide the other half on and it just pulls tight and it works. The right side is solid, but the left side has a bit of giving and wiggle, but this is because there’s no port to keep it in place. I never noticed this while gaming.
The controller feels solid in the hands and like a handheld system. Of course, ergonomics are only half the battle, and the other half is how the buttons feel. The alternate analog placement (Xbox style) feels amazing. These are some damn fine analog sticks, and I felt they weren’t too loose or tight. They click nice and are just full-size analog sticks that feel similar to an Xbox One controller. The D-Pad is weird, but at least it rolls and rocks and isn’t separated like the Switch or PS4. You can easily use this with fighting games, which is my point. The face buttons are similar to the Switch but feel a tad stiff. They aren’t loud and clicky like Moga controllers are, but you eventually get used to them. I noticed that after a week, they loosened up a tad. The Kishi has triggers similar to those on the Xbox and two shoulder buttons. The shoulder buttons are stiff as well, and the analog triggers are a little loose for my taste, but you get used to them, and they aren’t a deal-breaker.
There are three other buttons: one for recording and taking screenshots, a home button, and a menu button. They are located below each analog stick and are out of the way. Other than that, my next favorite feature is the passthrough charging, but it’s oriented at the bottom and out of the way of your hands. This allows for longer tethered gaming sessions. You can use a power bank in your pocket or sit near an outlet; it’s great. When you’re done the controller easily snaps back together, but only after you figure out how. You have to orient the tabs inside just right or it won’t go together. It took me too much time trying to figure this out, but essentially the small gray tabs on the inside need to touch and you know it’s oriented correctly. Then the back plastic piece just snaps on to keep the halves together. It’s a rather compact thing when it’s all said and done and easily fits into small pockets.
With that said, there’s not much left to say. There is an app that upgrades the firmware, but mine didn’t need it. Other than that, if the game supports controllers, it will recognize this device. I have yet to play a game that supports controllers that won’t see the Kishi. The only issue was Real Racing 3, but there’s been a long-time glitch that requires you to put the game in airplane mode to use controllers, so that’s not Kishi’s fault. For the price point, you’re paying for quality, and this is well worth $100. I know console controllers are $40 cheaper, but this thing is a bit more complicated to make and has more moving parts. I think it’s well worth the money, and it turns your iPhone into a portable handheld gaming device.
UsTwo’s next game is a small adventure game where you play as a girl named Alba, who is trying to save the local wildlife reserve from corporate hotel moguls. You run around the island trying to gain 50 signatures on a petition to give to the mayor in hopes it will stop the construction. The main gameplay loop of the game is taking photos of 62 different animals on the island via your phone and scanning them with an app. Other objectives include picking up trash, restoring birdhouses and feeders, and rescuing animals from toxic chemicals.
The island is broken up into small areas, so it’s easier to navigate and find where you need to go. Side quests have a green arrow, and the main objectives have gold ones on the map. The entire game is broken up into three days, and you will complete most of the game within two hours fairly easily. Sadly, most of the game is running back and forth between areas with very little to actually do. Picking up trash and fixing items is about all there is to do here. You can also replace photos on info boards, but most everything is done during the main story, as you will come across every area at some point. You can talk to most of the townsfolk, but they have nothing important to say except to waste your time as per NPC regulations. They don’t even offer side quests, which feel odd.
I did enjoy taking photos of the animals, as tracking them was a lot of fun, but sometimes there is just one bird you can’t find somewhere to complete a side objective, and it’s quite irritating and frustrating. While the idea of respecting nature and animals is a great message to get across in a game, I felt nothing for the characters as there wasn’t enough time to do any world-building. For most of the game, you’re just trying to get the 50 signatures, and nothing really happens until the last 20 minutes of the game. For such a large island, I felt there could have been more to do with maybe some mini-games or more side objectives. Even adding more animals that aren’t 90% birds would have been nice as well. Animals are categorized as rarities, but I don’t see how this has any bearing as there’s no point or rating system for finding these animals. Hell, there isn’t even an achievement for finding all the animals in the game!
The game at least looks really pretty, and the low-poly art style with bright, vivid colors is great. The game has good lighting effects, and the sound effects of animals everywhere are a nice touch. Alba controls well as she runs around the island, and I didn’t run into any bugs or crashes of any kind. However, on my iPhone 12 Pro Max, I still ran into frequent slowdowns, especially when zooming in on the phone. This phone is more than capable of running this game at 60FPS, but it needs better optimization. You will end up seeing what the entire game offers in the first 30 minutes of the game, but that’s not to say this game is boring. Two hours is probably just the right length, to be honest, as any more would overstay its welcome due to the lack of things to do. I highly recommend this game to young players for the message it delivers and to any gamer for just a relaxing and chill game.
Well, this is an awkward position I thought I would never be in. A lifelong Android user is switching to an iPhone. Both sides would ask why, and I have many reasons for the switch. For one, Samsung hasn’t impressed me outside of their ungodly-priced fold phones since the Note 5 was released. Every phone since has been almost the same, with just newer parts inside. While technically Apple is guilty of this as well, I feel their ecosystem evolves, changes, and improves within itself, while it almost seems every phone manufacturer is held back by Android itself.
I switched over mostly for the games, as Apple always gets the better games, whether they are console ports or not. Apple Arcade is a huge step up over Google Play Pass any day. I also haven’t done a phone review in a few years, because what’s the point? Every Android phone is basically the same these days, minus any gimmicks. I feel I’m well qualified to do this review as a contrast and comparison, as I have had nothing but Android phones for the last decade. My first phone was a Motorola Droid back in 2010, and that review is on this site now. The last iOS device I had that wasn’t an iPad was an iPod Touch 4, which is also on this site. So, this is my first ever iPhone, and it has been a very interesting transition.
The Unboxing and Setup
Well, I was shocked that I walked out of a T-Mobile store in Portland while I was on vacation with a brand new, sealed iPhone 12 Pro Max, and it was blue, by the way. A gorgeous color for the phone. My wife also made the switch about 3 weeks ago, but she’s gone back and forth between the two companies since the iPhone 4S came out. As I opened the box, did the usual SIM swap, and started the phone up, I felt I was in for a rough transition. I had so many paid games and apps on Android; how was I ever going to switch over? Sure, I had some paid games on iOS from my iPad I had a couple of years ago, but a phone?
Well, the unboxing was pretty underwhelming even for an Apple device, and I checked my first box for things I don’t like about the iPhone and Apple in general: No charging adapter is included. The second checkmark was a lightning cable to USB-C. You can’t use just regular USB-C cables, but only these cables. Apple’s stupid proprietary crap strikes again, and I hate it. I had to order a set of cables and chargers on Amazon as my Samsung Galaxy Note20 Ultra cable won’t work and it doesn’t even recognize charging on the adapter.
With that out of the way, I tried doing the Android to iPhone transfer app, and it’s complete garbage, of course. The iPhone said it would take over an hour to transfer 8GB of mostly just photos over, and that’s unacceptable with a good wifi connection and fast speeds. There is also no way to stop the process, as you must shut the phone down and reboot. I then ran across the app just freezing and locking up, and even after I selected just texts and smaller files to transfer, it never transferred anything in the end. Wonderful. The rest of the setup was easy enough, but I found another thing I hate about Apple. Their security is good but too strict for the user. I realized I had a passcode on my iPad, and I was trying to figure it out but just couldn’t after signing in. I wanted to reset the password, and I was told it could take days or weeks as my request has to be manually processed to make sure it’s me. Excuse me, what? I just spent over $1,000 on your device, and you can’t let me reset my password like everyone else automatically? Even worse, if I didn’t remember my iPad passcode, I was boned for good, as Apple can’t reset these. Why? Thankfully, I remembered my iPad pin lock passcode, and I had the Apple account password saved in Google Passwords, so I was safe there, but I just really hate their security on the user’s end. It’s just too blasé.
After the initial setup, I took a good look at the phone itself. It’s sleek, sexy, and well-designed, like always. The iPhones started to look ugly around the 5th generation era up until it was redesigned again with the iPhone X. I’m glad the aluminum back is back as well as the sides. I hate the glass backs, as they make the phone more fragile. Samsung loves this for some reason, and I’ve always hated it. The phone feels like an iPhone again. Round edges and no curves around the sides. It’s sleek and uniform, and I really do like it. The blue color is subtle yet fits the design well, but these big-ass camera bumps will always be ugly.
Hello iOS, My Old Friend
Once I was plunked onto the home screen, I sighed. It’s the same! Nothing has changed in 13 years. While that’s true on the surface, I know iOS has evolved a lot in other ways since the 4th generation. Even then, I could make folders. Apple thought to finally give us something similar to the Android app drawer with the App Library that is accessed by swiping all the way left. It auto-organizes into categories, and you can search, which is nice but very limited. Apple also finally allowed widgets, which have always been a big selling point for Android phones. They work well, but since this is a newer implementation, not a lot of apps support it. It’s nice to finally have my email, weather, news, and calendar all on one screen rather than switching through apps or that horrible swipe-down window thing they did a while back.
However, there are still no themes, alternate third-party home screens, or anything like that you can get on Android. I can’t truly make the phone look unique without jailbreaking it. Not even colors! I can only change the wallpaper, and that is it. I understand Apple has their own thing going, and it’s their OS and their own phones, but let us do what we want! At least create an official theme store on the App Store. I could change the always-on image, theme, and many other things on my Note 20, and that will be greatly missed, probably the biggest thing that will be missed. While some people feel it’s a hassle and too much, it’s a staple of the Android ecosystem.
Let’s talk about ringtones as well. What’s with this Garage Band nonsense? I either have to buy ringtones on the iTunes Store or import them with a third-party app. Zedge is the go-to app for ringtones on Android, but it still stinks on iOS. It’s such a hassle. I just wound up buying some ringtones, and I’m upset that you can’t change ringtones for each app like you can on Android, only system apps. Unless the developer creates special ringtones for you to pick, you have to hear the same sound as everyone else. Get with the program in terms of customization already, Apple; it’s not that hard.
As I dove into the settings, I felt simply lost. Even five days later, I’m still trying to find things and noticing stuff that needs to be adjusted. Part of this is Apple’s incredible security, as I am now able to choose whether apps can track me or use GPS, and I have complete control and am told what each app wants to do. That’s amazing! Android is still lacking in this matter, and it’s still too much of an afterthought over there, but Apple has nailed it, and they keep all of these app developers in check with it. I feel the system settings need a serious overhaul, as these haven’t ever changed, not even once. They keep the same categories and just add more stuff inside. While most of it seems security-related, at least there are a lot of options, and you do have control over what every app does. Screen time was a recent thing a few years ago, and even this is something not available on Android phones. Everything is well categorized, but there’s just so much here that it can feel overwhelming.
Apple took out the fingerprint scanner and now relies on Face ID, and I have to say it just works really well. Compared to Samsung, it’s a joke how bad Samsung’s facial recognition is. Even their in-screen fingerprint scanner is finicky and doesn’t always unlock when you want it to. Face ID just works fast, and I haven’t had any issues with it in any lighting conditions. However, I do hate that I have to still swipe my phone after unlocking it. This is a dumb thing that needs to change already.
There’s an App for That
While Android phones still sell ten to one over iPhones, everyone caters to Apple. Anything and everything is on the App Store, and it all runs and feels better on iOS than Android. While most apps work fine on Android, you still get compatibility issues across devices. The upside to the App Store is that it’s all made for one device, and most apps just feel better. I ran apps on this phone that have been on Android for years, and I noticed features that didn’t exist on Android or that just ran better or looked better. You also don’t get as much garbage on the App Store, and it’s at least filtered out better. The App Store is just better-looking and sleeker than the Google Play Store. You get front-page feeds, articles, and lists that make it feel like a store. While Google Play is sleeker and better designed, it’s still essentially a mess of apps all over the place. Apple does a good job siphoning apps into your interests and keeping the good stuff away from the garbage. Not to mention Apple Arcade is a much better value than Google Play Pass. There are so many console ports that are top-notch quality because it’s just one phone you have to develop for. Android gaming is so hit or miss because if you run a lower-end phone, you’re not going to be able to play much, and Apple gets all the timed exclusives. While there are quality games on Android and pretty much every mainstream game, there are so many on iOS, and they just run and feel better.
A lot of the time, with games on Android, I would be locked out of higher graphics settings because my phone is too new and it takes months for the developers to fix it. Another issue would be that higher-quality assets won’t download because the phone is too new as well. I would also have crashes, or the game just simply wouldn’t be available for my phone for some strange reason despite being the most popular and newest device on the market. Android users get locked out of a lot of stuff if a developer doesn’t enable the app to be compatible with certain devices.
That’s the joy of iOS—everything just works. There are always crashing issues on Android with something or something on the phone that is somehow broken, in beta, or needs to be fixed and is ignored. Google leaves everything up to the phone manufacturers to add or fix anything they didn’t do in the latest Android build. That also leads to phone updates. With iOS, you get them the day Apple makes them available. I can’t tell you how sick and tired I was of waiting months or sometimes a year after Google released the latest Android build. There is so much waiting and even then there are things always wrong with the latest build with Android. I used to have to reformat my phones after each major Android update. Then there’s the blockade of the mobile provider, as Samsung might have the build ready, but it might take 3 months for T-Mobile or Verizon to approve the OTA update. While it’s gotten better over time, I still have to wait months for the next update, and Samsung only supports their phones for 2 years, and then they stop updating. With iOS, you get support until that architecture just can’t be supported anymore.
So with that said, if you have the latest iPhone, you know every game will have the best graphics settings and run the best. It’s that simple. With Android, there are low-end devices, mid-tier devices, and high-end devices, all with different results. Android phones also use off-the-shelf parts, and literally, up until the last 2-3 years, the Android OS has finally stopped getting laggy and constantly freezing over time. iOS is snappy, always feels fast, and rarely ever freezes or crashes. A lot of times, apps would just freeze and crash or completely stop working on my Note 20 Ultra. It was rare, but it shouldn’t happen at all. Sometimes a new phone would cause my emails to not come through, I’d have mobile data connectivity problems, wifi calling wouldn’t work properly, or something along those lines every single time. With iOS, you have a worry-free experience all around.
Please Die iTunes
My #1 complaint about the iPhone still stands to this day, and it hasn’t gotten easier. You still can’t transfer files and photos over with any ease unless it’s already on an iOS device. I spent an entire afternoon trying to figure out how to transfer photos over from my old phone. I know there’s the iTunes method, but you have to keep everything in a single folder, and there’s no sub-folder option. I’d essentially have to reorganize everything. I can’t drag and drop, and third-party transfer software is still limited. It’s all complete nonsense, and it shouldn’t be this hard for just photos. I wound up just storing them all in the cloud in the end, because unless you transfer everything to iCloud, you’re pretty much screwed if you want it on your phone. With Android, you can copy anything over to the phone or SD card with ease, like any removable storage. I thought by now that at least regular media would be easy to transfer over. iTunes still stinks; it hasn’t changed one iota in the last decade, and it’s still limiting.
To Stay or Not to Stay
After less than a week with my iPhone, I have to say I’m really impressed. Very little needed transferring, as any of my old accounts on apps still support Google, even on iOS. I will say that Apple Maps is awful, and I still prefer Google Maps, and the same goes for Chrome. While it’s not as feature-rich on iOS as on Android, it’s still miles better than Safari. There are some built-in apps that are great, like iMovie, Clips, the AR measuring app, and Pages. Apple has always been the best at productivity software, and there’s nothing like this on Android at all. Google itself has barebones offerings like Google Docs and Notes, and every other manufacturer is laughable in comparison. These built-in apps are top-quality and incredibly useful.
The thing is, iOS feels polished and stable, while Android still feels like an ever-evolving OS because it is. It started out very rough, and because of the open-endedness and hundreds of different phones, it took much longer for Google to get where it is than Apple. Even 10 years later, Google still isn’t where Apple is in terms of controlling and keeping a lockdown on their ecosystem. I have to learn every new Android phone because each manufacturer has its own version of the OS, and this can get tiresome after so long. Each major Android update seems to offer and do less and less, while Apple still has major features implemented into each major update. While I love the customization and overall openness of Android, I am not such a die-hard fan that I refuse to see its issues. Android has a long way to go still before it becomes as well-established and polished as iOS. On the gaming front, iOS feels like its own platform, like Nintendo. Android has always felt like a third-rate generic video game system platform, and that has never changed. Sure, you can run emulators easier, which is a huge selling point for mobile gamers, but iOS is just a better-polished platform. It feels like the phone version of Nintendo. Complete control, top-notch quality, and they don’t play games with developers. It’s Apple’s way or the highway, and sometimes that’s for the best.
I miss not being able to charge apps to my phone bill; customization is still very limited; and overall, the majority of the OS hasn’t changed at all, while Android feels like night and day compared to 10 years ago. But is that a good thing? Apple hit its stride and was happy with it, while Android 2.0 felt like some beta OS that you sign up for for fun. If I don’t complain about Google themselves, I can point my finger at phone manufacturers. Samsung’s software has gotten much better over the years, but there are still problems. OnePlus is less bloated than Samsung, but their phones are always all over the place. LG relies on gimmicks, and Google themselves can’t even make a solid, stable phone with their own OS. Google’s phones always feel like Kickstarters. This type of varied quality control is literally the bane of Android’s existence and what’s stopping it from completely taking over iOS for good despite having a majority of the market. I feel if Google made a bold decision and kept Android for themselves, they could seriously compete and fine-tune Android just for their own phones, but instead, they’re using off-the-shelf parts like everyone else with lesser results. The fact that Samsung is the flagship for Android is indeed strange.
So, the question remains. Will I stay with the iPhone? It’s too early to tell, but so far, unless Samsung or Google does something truly impressive with Android, I don’t have a real reason to go back. When you think about it all, we are really at a plateau in terms of the raw power of smartphones and the features they can have. In the end, most people won’t notice a speed difference between the two systems, and I don’t see the point of even benchmarking my iPhone here. It plays games well, and most at 60FPS. We’re getting to the point where video game consoles are. They’re all the same, with different OSs and controllers. The lines are blurring as barriers are being broken down every year.
Quality of Life Differences
This is what both OSs come down to. What quality of life things have I noticed over the week of having the iPhone? For starters, I can’t say it enough: organization on the iPhone is bare bones. Why can’t’ we at least alphabetize the apps in folders? On Android, you can even rename the apps and change the icons! On the plus side, controllers work better with iOS, and Apple really pushes and advertises games that have controller support. I used a Razer Kishi with my iPhone, and every game that supports controllers had zero lag with it. I do like how the contacts can have more details within them, such as how each person is related to you, and you can even create an emergency medical ID that gets sent to emergency responders if it’s supported in your area. I like the swipe-down shortcut drawer, as this is usually only a feature on Samsung devices, but it’s customizable here with large buttons and works well. Dark Mode also works much better on iOS than Android. Every app just works with it, while it has to be implemented into each app on Android. I got so tired of half my apps not supporting dark mode or glitching.
I also prefer how Apple Pay works over Google Pay. Double-clicking the power button brings up the wallet, and most shopping apps support it. I never used Google Pay because it was such a hassle, and it fought with Samsung Pay. Samsung Pay was a permanent, weird swipe-up tab at the bottom of the phone, and most of the time I’d accidentally bring it up. You also have to manually keep NFC on, which sucks battery life; there’s no shortcut for Google Pay, and it doesn’t work within apps.
With that said, hate it or love it, and despite some limitations, what’s here, limited or not, just simply works. You can’t say that with Android, even after 10 years of being a user. Something’s always broken on Android no matter what phone manufacturer you go with, and while I’ve used everything from OnePlus, Samsung, LG, and Motorola, I have to say it’s nice to not have to worry about that anymore.
When I first saw Builder’s Journey, the first thing that popped into my mind was Monument Valley. It looks similar with a bright and colorful art style, no voice acting, and a story told through actions. It features small, spinnable tower-like levels that only take a couple of minutes to solve. The game is imaginative and a nice departure from the typical movie license LEGO games we get from Traveler’s Tales. It’s relaxing, fun, and feels like you’re using Legos to get around these levels to reach your destination.
You play as a boy and his father, who are essentially trying to take down some evil company the dad works for. The game is so short that there isn’t time for a feel-good story or emotions to set in, but the game at least tries. You pick up Lego pieces and set them down on the round pegs like you would in real life. You hold the pick-up button to let go, and that’s about it. You can spin the level a little bit, but the great thing about this game is that there’s no preset design you need to follow. You get a few pieces, and the puzzle is to figure out how to put them together with the limited pegs in the level to get your characters across. Each character has two orange platform pieces that you use for them to hop around on. Sometimes you need to build something, but the game gets tough towards the end.
Puzzles towards the end involve two screens in which you need to either place blocks a certain way or get blocks to the other screen in a certain way. Each area has maybe five puzzles before the next idea is brought in. One idea is using race track-type pieces with curves and straights to get across on a roller skate. Another idea is using blocks to grow more if you put them down. It’s all very imaginative, and it never gets boring or old. The game has a “just one more puzzle” feel to it. You get breaks in between with a scripted puzzle that just requires putting a few pieces together, but it’s a nice break. I did have issues placing and dropping blocks as the camera would be at a weird angle. The blocks do snap over the pegs they need to go in, but sometimes I just couldn’t get them positioned right, which required fiddly placement.
There were a few occasions in which where to go in the level wasn’t obvious or my character wouldn’t start hopping across the level because a certain block was too high or too far away, and I couldn’t figure out which one. The levels that take this kind of trial and error are frustrating and ruin the pacing, but thankfully there were only a few. I also feel that this game could have been made without the Lego branding. While it feels and looks charming, generic blocks would have worked just as well too. There’s nothing that the Lego branding brings to this game to make it feel unique.
That’s basically it for the entire game. It ends in 90 minutes, as it was originally designed for iOS devices with 5–10 minute pick-up-and-play sessions. There is an RTX option for PC, which is super weird for this kind of game, and it looks okay, but why cut your frames in half for a game like this? There are only a few levels that use light that uses RTX, so it feels kind of pointless. Other than that, the game looks great, and the physics are also good. I highly recommend this game if you want a zen-like, relaxing puzzle game to kill a couple of hours. It’s not memorable, but it sure is fun.
I would have to say this is the first “adult” game I’ve ever played that’s actually good and can be considered a game. Most are shameless excuses for games just to throw nudity up on the screen, but Lust From Beyond does it with a purpose as it’s part of the story. You pay as Victor, who ends up having dreams that teleport him to the world of Luust’ghaa. This is a land of lust that is ruled by strange gods who want to bring everyone to the Land of Ecstasy. You end up going back and forth between these two worlds. Luust’ghaa is a puzzle-solving world with little combat, and then the current world is mostly sneaking around and opening new paths. This is a Lovecraftian game all the way through, and it’s what lured me in. The art design is also inspired by H.R. Giger’s work, Aliens.
I won’t beat around the bush or hide it. The main selling point for Lust is the hardcore sex scenes throughout the game, but when I say throughout, I mean spread out across the entire game. It’s done tastefully, and it’s actually part of the story. With this occult worship of a god of lust, they partake in orgies, torture, maiming, dismemberment, and all sorts of horrible acts. The game is incredibly violent and disturbing. You have sex with mutilated bodies and strange monsters, and it’s also pretty entertaining and fascinating to see this used in a halfway decent game. There are only a handful of sex scenes in the game, and they are key points in the story. To get to Luust’ghaa, you have to feel the extreme pleasure of being transported there.
However, this is an adventure game with light combat, so there is some light puzzle solving, but most of the game is running around labyrinthine levels, collecting baubles and keys to open doors. Sneaking around is mostly done early in the game when you learn of a rival cult that split and tried to use the opening of Luust’ghaa to their advantage. This is the most disturbing part of the game, where there’s lots of gore and strange sexual encounters. Sneaking in this game is pretty easy but still tense. If you stay crouched, no one can hear you, no matter how close you are. There are a few chase scenes, some bosses in fact, and you do get a gun towards the end of the game to use in small parts. Overall, the game never got boring as the gameplay was always tossed up, but I didn’t care for the Luust’ghaa levels. It looks gross and creepy, with shiny flesh everywhere, but after a while, it was just the same boring corridors to find ways to open doors. Sometimes I use a lever to move a block, but mostly they get boring. Nothing really happens on these levels, as there really isn’t much storytelling here. It feels like an excuse to fill the game out.
I also felt that having the power of Essence felt like a waste of time, as you only use it towards the end of the game. You can find Essense pools and use them to raise bridges and lure gross monsters near tumors that they can absorb to open a pathway. It just felt like silly filler content and a pointless gameplay mechanic. However, I did like the creature and enemy designs. Overall, the entire game looked pretty good, and the art direction was great. The atmosphere was very memorable, and I feel like I will remember this game for a long time. The characters, however, are something to be desired. The voice acting is spotty, and I could tell they tried to make these characters stand out, but you don’t spend a lot of time with them, and their backgrounds aren’t explored enough. Victor is a cookie-cutter protagonist who is trying to find his girlfriend and save her and then disregards everything just for her. That whole story is cliche and gets old and tiring. I also wish the lore was explored more. What’s here is solid, and you get an overall sense of what these gods of lust can do and the cult’s basic history, but instead, we get filler levels of boring key findings.
But can Lust stand out without the hardcore, uncensored sex scenes? Yes, it actually can. Even the censored mode works because the game isn’t built around sex and gore. While it helps and adds to the atmosphere, you can still enjoy the story and game without all of it. There are a few plot twists in the game that surprised me, and I played the game straight through to the end; it was entertaining enough. However, the only time I wanted to quit was when another Luust’ghaa level came up because I knew I was in for more boring corridors, key finding, and lever pulling. At least it’s not too easy to get lost or not know what to do. Occasionally I missed a ladder or had to quickly learn the layout of a level because of the number of enemies around, but somehow it just all works.
Overall, Lust From Beyond is a surprisingly decent adventure game with tons of atmosphere, dark horror, and excellent enemy design. The shock value of sex, gore, and dismemberment is second-hand to the entertaining story and levels, and that’s okay. There is a bonus called the Chamber of Pleasure that is just rooms with two sex scenes each, a few not in the game, and that’s just there, I guess. It doesn’t really add to the value of the game as a whole. I just want to say don’t go into this game thinking it’s sex every 10 seconds. It’s spread out and used to advance the story or be part of it.
Sumire is a beautifully made game with charming visuals and well-written dialog. While you can finish the game in about 3 hours, it’s quality content, and I was moved and touched by the story. You play a young girl named Sumire, who has recently lost her grandmother. The death split your parents up and made them distant, and you feel like your life is falling apart. One night, a magical seed flies through your bedroom windows, and you befriend a magical talking flower who only has one day to let you see your grandmother again.
The game is in a 2D sidescrolling style, but there’s no platforming here. This is a typical adventure game, but there really aren’t many objectives, and there’s no obscurity or cryptic puzzles here. In fact, there are no puzzles and very few characters to interact with. There is a map with a few areas you can fast travel around to, but there is a good and bad deed system set in place that can change the ending of the story. The game really focuses on being good to people, being the mature one in a situation, and realizing that life is finite. It’s pretty heavy stuff.
Early in the game, you come across creatures you can do good things for that aren’t complicated. Give a scarecrow a hat; give a frog a bug to eat; but what bug you choose will determine a good or bad deed. Other larger objectives have you delivering things to people from other people, and these are pretty much done as the story progresses. The first half of the game is spent wandering around collecting a few coins to spend and spending them wisely, on yourself or other people. There are a couple of mini-games thrown in for good measure, but the second half of the game picks up the pace quite a bit as the story concludes.
The music is also fantastic and really gets the heartstrings plucking as you really feel for these characters and Sumire’s understanding of death and just that in life you have to let things go, things end, and death is permanent. Her constant reliance on the flower is also sad, and it’s just wishful thinking and false hopes. Sumire also sorts out a love relationship and has to solve her bullying issue with three girls who constantly pick on her. It’s stuff every teen goes through in life, and it really brought me back to mine. Thankfully, I never felt lost or wondered what to do next, as you just move left all the time and the story unfolds itself.
Usually, I frown at games that are this short, but if they have a lot to show in such a short time, I’m happy. Sumire has a great story that’s short but really makes you think back to your teen years and early 20s of having to face life alone for the first time and realizing every action you take matters and affects you until the day you die. So many life lessons are tossed in here at rapid-fire but dealt with in a touching manner. However, there still isn’t much of a game here. You walk around, collect coins, talk to animals and creatures, do a few small fetch quests, and then move on with the story. It’s satisfying and fun, but I felt the side quests were a bit pointless. It’s not like you have a heavy dialog with these creatures and come back to them later. It did feel a bit like filler to me.
Overall, Sumire is a beautifully crafted game with great music and heavy dialog that can be really touching and nostalgic, and it just feels like a good, wholesome game in the end. It’s relaxing, doesn’t expect too much out of you, and after a few hours, you get a nostalgic trip back to your teens and early 20s, when life just got started.
I’m not much of a visual novel fan. I love reading books and grew up reading a lot, but visual novels are basically just digital manga, and I prefer traditional manga. I bought the VA-11 Hall-A years ago and never got around to it because there’s so much reading. What got me interested was the bartending aspect. It seemed like a fun time-management mini-game mixed in, and I was completely wrong. However, the strongest point of this game is the fun characters and how invested I became in their stories.
You play Julianne Stingray, a bartender in a cyberpunk world set nearly 100 years in the future. The bar is close to getting shut down, and you’re just living life day-to-day until that time comes. The game is pretty slow-paced and takes quite a while to pick up and get interesting. There’s a lot of character setup, and it takes such a long time, so it feels natural and organic rather than rushed. There isn’t really any gameplay. I spent more time clicking through dialog than anything else, but I did like all the characters. They were fun, unique, and had great personalities that I got attached to. If I were to say there was an ultimate goal, it would be to make amends with your ex-girlfriend who you got into a fight with years ago and need to apologize to, but honestly, this is a slice-of-life type of game. You really only need to read through everything.
You do earn money at the end of every day, and this can be spent on items to keep Jill focused at her job. There will be a hint when you get to your apartment as to what she might want. If you don’t buy this item, she won’t remember what customers ordered, and you have to remember yourself. There are also major bills that have to be paid, so you need to spend wisely. There is also an optional phone where you can view various news apps. Just some insight into the world, really, and nothing that matters towards the main story. There is an option to customize your apartment a bit, but it seemed superfluous in the end and pointless.
As you talk to patrons, you have to make their drinks. This seemed fun at first, but it quickly became dull and stale by day three of the game. There is a recipe book full of 24 different drinks you can make, and you can filter them by flavor and type. Patrons will give hints as to what they want, and you sometimes even have to read the descriptions to get the cryptic ones correct. Drinks are made with artificial chemicals in this world, and you have five. There are squares that fill up with each measurement, and you can mix or blend the drink, age it, or add ice. That’s literally it. I thought you could upgrade the bar and add new flavors and devices, but this is it. You end up cycling through all 24 drinks early on, and maybe 10 repeats constantly. It ends up no longer being fun to make these drinks and just interrupting the story. There are also no instructions on the difference between mixing and blending. You need to count how many times the shaker wiggles, and if it starts going fast, that’s blended. If you mess up a drink, you lose a bonus at the end of the day. However, you can’t serve messed-up drinks, as the game won’t let you. Some drinks allow you to add synthetic alcohol as much or as little as you want, and this is supposed to somehow change the story by making characters spill things when they’re drunk, but I never saw this happen.
The one game mechanic in an otherwise interactive visual novel is boring and somewhat pointless. If there was a much larger selection of drinks, or if I could add some later or upgrade equipment, that would be fun, but what’s here feels half-assed and tacked on. I also don’t like how we never get to know what’s going on in the world. The game hints at things happening politically and with various corporations and even a hacking group, but we get nothing in that regard. It’s mostly just what’s going on inside the bar and the characters you meet; it stays very local and centralized. I also felt the visuals, while artistically beautiful, were boring to look at. There isn’t any change in scenery, and the static anime-style characters just change facial expressions. It’s very hard to stare at the same background for nearly a dozen hours and make dozens upon dozens of repeated drinks just to stay invested in a character’s story. If it weren’t for the great characters, this game would be utterly boring nonsense.
With that said, VA-11 Hall-A is only worth getting into if you love anime, visual novels, or just like reading books. The bartending aspect is a poorly thought-out afterthought that hinders the progress of the story rather than helps it due to the small recipe size and laughable mechanics. I really liked the characters here, and the story ended on a nice note. I expected some sort of twist ending where the bar would close early or the hackers would take over all the androids and something interesting would happen, but we just get a slice-of-life anime-style bartending experience.
thebinarymessiah.com 
Try multiplayer. A lot of fun !