Reptilian Rising is like Bill & Ted’s Excellent Adventure, but instead of gathering historical figures for a school presentation, you’re gathering them to fight an evil reptilian invasion throughout time. Sure, they might have generic names like “Bert,” who is obviously Einstein. However, naming conventions matter little when you can have a T-2000, a talking Ankylosaurus with a southern accent, and Winston Churchill on the same team.
Marathon’s a fascinating experience for me. I have enough to criticize about it that I likely would have dropped a lesser game altogether. However, Bungie is good at shooters, and you can really feel that long running pedigree in Marathon, it simply feels good to play. So much so, that I’m continuing to play it despite the fact that I think it has a real identity issue. Not aesthetically, of course. The brightly colored visuals, unique setting and AI Corpo lore are another high point for the game.
Mewgenics is a game that completely exceeded my expectations, and that’s saying something because the pre-release hype had me pretty pumped. By that I mean I consumed every single video that the game’s creators, Edmund McMillan and Tyler Gael put out as I impatiently waited for the game to release.
I play a lot of deck builder games, and I’ve also played a ton of Slay the Spire clones. Slay the Spire is certainly a great a game that led to the genre being as popular as it is today. I, however, prefer to play games that put a unique spin on the formula, rather than copy it wholesale. I’ve thrown together a list of 10 deck building games that aren’t Slay the Spire, literally and metaphorically.