UFO 50

UFO 50 embodies the good and the bad of (this time fictional) 80's console era. I would be lying if i say every game is great - but every game serves as a piece of much bigger ensemble of experience that is: *FUN*.

Highlights: - Soundtrack is consistently incredible and novel - Games you don't end up liking usually will still impart some endearment, even if they don't stick - The games that do stick, really stick and have tons of replay value - The overall atmosphere of the game (and the meta console) is warm and delightful - Obvious spiritual parallels to previous games from Derek Yu (primarily just Spelunky for me)

There's Velgress, and then there are 49 other games you can play once Velgress pisses you off so much that you need to take a break to get your heart rate down. UFO 50 is a marvel and a celebration of retro video games. I guarantee that everyone will find at least one game that they fall in love with, and it might even be in a genre they don't expect. It's nuts just how many ideas are crammed into this affordable package, and I could spend many more hours delving into UFO 50s depths if I desired. But as of right now, having sampled all the package has to offer, about 50 hours logged, and 9 cherries under my belt, I feel I've reached a satisfying stopping point. Now, humor me as I gush about some of my favorites, with medals awarded to my top three. Magic Garden is the favorite game that I absolutely suck at! I tried so many times to get the gold cartridge on this one, but just couldn't hack it. Magic Garden and Valbrace are the two I wish I could've spent more time on, but maybe someday. I don't normally go for puzzle games, but Camouflage is a clever little one with, in my opinion, perfectly tuned difficulty. I loved just staring at each new level, mentally running through different possibilities on how to solve it, for it to eventually click into place, and for it to work exactly how I expected it to. They definitely could have explored some of its ideas further, but it's satisfying enough for what it is. Night Manor is a pretty short point-and-click adventure game, which somehow managed to actually elicit a bit of fear in me, until I figured out how it ticked. The decision to add jump scares and timed elements to a genre that typically encourages taking your time is simultaneously ingenious and so evil. I want to play Bushido Ball with a real person so bad. Fast gameplay, tight controls, unique characters, and a high skill ceiling are ingredients for a killer party game with friends. I swear some of those AI opponents can cheat though... Rock On! Island is cool not just because it's a tower defense game with cavemen, but also as a showcase of what this genre could've looked like on the NES. The decision to have a character that you physically move around the map during rounds adds an extra layer of tension and strategy that I've never seen in a game of this genre. I just wish the cherry requirements were a bit less restrictive. I don’t even understand how anyone came up with a concept like Avianos. It’s sort of a bird strategy game with dinosaur gods, I guess, but that description doesn’t even come close to cutting it. It’s just so weird, but oozing with depth and complexity. This is a prime example of a genre that I typically don’t go for, but because it was in this package, I ended up sinking quite a bit of time into it. What if Final Fantasy... but cowboys? It's like the devs peered into my mind while making Grimstone, perfectly engineering an experience to my tastes. Grimstone feels like the most faithful game in the package, almost to a fault. There isn't much in the way of modern-day game design here, unlike most of UFO 50, but I actually appreciate it for that. There's something so special in the simplicity and restrictions of classic JRPGs, so Grimstone gets a lot of kudos from me in its ability to recapture that feeling in a tragically underexplored setting for the genre. I do concede, though, that the game probably won't do much to win over any JRPG skeptics, which is a strength of many other UFO 50 titles that would have been welcome here. Bronze medal! Velgress is sort of like a toxic relationship. Your cortisol levels are going haywire the whole time you’re together, you swear you’ll never come back, and then you can’t stop thinking about just giving it one more try. I felt the whole gamut of emotions while chipping away at this one, with the highest of highs and lowest of lows. Getting the cherry made me feel like I had finally self-actualized, only to immediately find myself yearning again for a game that had nothing left to give me. Silver medal! I'm not exaggerating even a little bit when I say this, but there were a few days when all I could think about was Party House. It commandeered my brain in a way that scarce few games ever have, to the point where I even had a dream about it. I've never smoked cigarettes before, but I imagine it's a similar experience to playing Party House. They need to put a warning or something on it, because there are addictive qualities here that the FDA should probably regulate. Easily worth the price of admission alone, but play at your own risk. Gold medal! I knew UFO 50 was going to be up my alley before purchasing it, but it worked for me even more than I expected it to. There are some stinkers in there, and some titles that just didn't click with me, but I adored the adventure of getting to sample 50 different games and not knowing which ones I was going to fall in love with. Truly a one-of-a-kind experience.

About 1/3 of the games are very good and most are difficult. According to the game classification, there are 30 reflex games, 22 thinky games, 29 quick games and 20 epic games. My favorites are Mini & Max, Night Manor, Rail Heist, Vainger and Warptank.

Why have I not written a review for this yet? It's great! I've finished like half of them, and several I've even replayed many times because I can't get enough of the gameplay. The aesthetics may be 80's but the devs have taken design inspiration and lessons from 90's and 2000's games as well, all the while putting their own spin on these ideas. So many fantastic games. Mortol, Mooncat, Kick Club, Warp Tank, Waldorf, PARTY HOUSE, Avianos, Rail Heist, Divers, Porgy, Vaingers, Valbrace, Night Manor, Lords of Diskonia, Pingolf, Rock On Island, Cyber Owls, even freakin Barbuta. GET IN THE UFO, WE'RE GOING TO SPACE!!!

I'm not kidding when I say this has become my favorite game of all times. It's endlessly replayable, it's a masterclass in game design, and you can and will learn to beat each game if you spend enough time with each of them no matter how difficult they appear at first glance. It's a game that respects your time (mostly because you can always skip a game that bothers you) and it made me discover pleasure for genres that I always skipped before, particularly the puzzle and bullet hell/shoot-em-ups. I now only play it on my Nintendo Switch, but the Steam version is great. Everything about this game is amazing, I cannot recommend it enough.

Don't take this the wrong way. This would be a side thumb, if Steam offered that instead. I understand it, I respect it, I also feel it worthwhile to say why I'm not really enjoying it. [h1]Mossmouth has done it again:[/h1] They've made a precisely overtuned game that beats you to death with both charm and sheer hardness. If I was directing the overall curve of this fictional console, I'd have told them to aim for the curve of a game like Kirby's Adventure or Super Mario Bros 3. Yes, they have hard segments, but you at least stand a good chance of whomping the final boss, even if it does have a nasty surprise or two. Yes, there are 50 games, and nearly all 50 of them are exactly the wrong kind of hard. It was indeed frustrating to see the Blaster Master evaporate because he fell a tile. Mossmouth did not need to replicate this feeling so exactly. (This is, the same issue that so many games, movies, and TV shows have in referencing something that sucks/is bad by doing it verbatim.) In so few words, [b]exactly[/b] the problem I have with the Mossmouth Ethos. ...Of course, most games back then, deigned to give you [i]a continue.[/i] Why the developers felt the need to have this extra special dickpunch route of not having them, I do not know; that is more in the direction of the ZX Spectrum, and a frankly tall bridge to sell. Why so few of the games are designed around Fail Forward is frankly asinine seeing as one of them very clearly is. What's frustrating is that there are signs that the potential for actual fun play was in mind, given some of the hidden things one can "discover" via their missives of an ARG. But I prefer my games to be rather self-contained. Sure, you can probably find the magical "one" game that you'll like from UFO 50, but from the idea of a library perspective, if you only find "one" in 50, that's very bad statistics. I could easily name 50 NES games I'd enjoy playing, and at least 25 that I've personally beat. And I'd probably be able to name a few semi-precious gems, too. Sorry. I'm not hardcore enough for most of these games. Intuiting basic IFF is not something that should be part of a required skillset.

I definitely had fun playing the many games of UFO 50, but it's one of those games I clearly should have watched reviews before buying. Out of the 50 games, there were maybe only 5 that I liked, and only 2 that I liked enough to complete. The reason is simple; I just suck ass at most of them. Those games truly reflect that era of video games, including the really high difficulty (and no way to lower it), to a point that often feels really unfair. So, before buying this, ask yourself, I am good enough to play an old arcade game and not die in the first 2min? Cause I'm not. 6/10