The Bad
Fobia: St. Dinfna Hotel
***click here for our review***
COGconnected has created a new, imaginary award for achievement in atrocious game titling, of which Fobia: St. Dinfna Hotel is the inaugural recipient. This title should have been a trigger warning that Fobia: St. Dinfna Hotel would struggle in the imagination department. It’s a first-person survival horror game. The narrative is forgettable, the acting is bad, the puzzles are bland, and the enemies are bullet sponges. The graphics are good, and the game has a budget price, but those aspects aren’t enough to recommend it. Our reviewer “kept waiting for something to truly surprise [them] or show [them] a twist [they] hadn’t seen before”. Those moments never came.
Good Company
***click here for our review***
Good Company is a management sim, with a focus on product production increase. Once production gets automated, the gameplay gets tedious, and unenjoyable. The game’s narrative and lore actually started to depress our reviewer, who hated having to create a cutesy dystopia. They concluded that “the balance is off, and the game isn’t fun for long. What you are left with is yawning”. For those of us who think playing a management sim sounds dreary, Good Company will only reinforce those thoughts.
Of Bird and Cage
***click here for our review***
The premise for Of Bird and Cage is incredibly intriguing. It’s a symphonic metal album that takes the form of an interactive story game. The narrative is about an abused and kidnapped woman. The writers were going for something similar to Beauty and the Beast, but they created a bleak tale of Stockholm Syndrome instead. The gameplay is very uninspired, with only the soundtrack being any kind of highlight. Our reviewer really wanted to love Of Bird and Cage, but suggested that readers “listen to [their] favorite metal band, and make up a story in [their] head” instead.
Do you agree with our The Three Best (and Worst) Video Games from July 2022? What were your favorite games that didn’t make our top 3? Let us know in the comments.
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