Next Fest 24|3 Day 5
Micro-reviews for Day 5 of Autumn Next Fest 2024, exploring Chicken with Robot Legs, Keep Driving, Completely Stretchy, KKCKC, Delta Physics, Lost But Found, and Rooster
This post was originally on Discord, and as such does not contain additional information 2025+ posts have
Unintentionally, today was full of very unique games, so if you're itching for something different most are worth checking out. All have their pros and cons, so no single one stands out above the rest (i.e. no highlights today, but if you desire something go play Chicken with Robot Legs)
KKCKC
Keyboard Key Character Key Cap provides a very unique roguelike experience, where you duke it out on top of a keyboard, and your only means of targeting is by pressing different keys on your keyboard, which then determine where your attack lands on the screen. It's a really unique and interesting way to play, though not without flaws. Since you need one hand for movement (arrow keys) you will have to control entirety of the keyboard from ~ to / with one hand - though with the low attack speed, one finger is enough. The other issue is if, like me, you have a quite large keyboard, then there is a lot of movement of the arm to make it from Q to ], which gets a bit in the way of the flow of the whole thing. Still, the demo is short but sweet, so I recommend trying it out
Playtime: ??h
Lost But Found
A neat tittle about sorting through heaps of different items to try and find the ones people lost. Given how each day is more or less the same, I worry it might not be as replayable as it should be, but the core gameplay loop holds up. Throughout the demo I kept getting new items, and even though I started to fail some requests towards the end, I never really got any sense of urgency - save for maybe when a black market dealer showed up, at which point I threw anything I could at him. Have fun offloading the 3-day-old lost diapers. Overall as good as the gameplay is, it has minor annoyances (long cooldowns on usable items while they use themselves automatically when held) and some things missing from the demo (I don't get how either black market or the normal market works), but I'd lie if I said I didn't enjoy my time with it
Playtime: ??h
Completely Stretchy
Completely Stretchy (and Uncomfortably Sticky) has something bizarre around every corner, building a world where you never know what you'll come across next. You explore said world with your grapple arm, climbing buildings and completing quests. Simple stuff, but it needs not be more. I will say that the way the grapple-arm works felt a bit weird, giving me more/less speed than I expect, while making strafing oddly difficult. Part of that is probably me being used to Valley Peaks, of which this is the strange and slightly uncomfortable cousin, but I do think there is some finnicky momentum stuff going on with the game itself
Playtime: ??h
Keep Driving
This game is unlike anything I've played before. I could make comparisons for portions of the gameplay, but that would not do justice to just how much the whole of it commits to setting the atmosphere of a turn-of-the-millennium road trip: the art, the menus, and the long stretches of silence between "combat" encounters, interrupted only by the music on the radio and chatter from any hitchhikers you pick up. I think a big part of this game will be replaying and learning a bit about how to drive well, cause my time with it was a constant struggle at keeping my ride (and rider) in good enough condition. I hope the demo stays after Next Fest, as it's something that one should really try before purchasing
Playtime: ??h
Chicken with Robot Legs
As absurd as the game sounds, it might be the first of its kind when it comes to gameplay. It aims to be something akin to a metroidvania, but your character never stops running, and will die if it hits any hard wall. It can be annoying to die because you splatted against a step instead of jumping on top of it, but a checkpoint is never far behind, so hardly any progress is lost. It's simply fascinating seeing these genres get combined, and I'm curious what comes of it in the full game
Playtime: ??h
DeltaPhysics
A game that is a lot like playing in a developer sandbox, where you have what feels like randomly strewn about objects and some simple tools to interact with them. In reality, it's more like an immersive sim x metroidvania, with a physics simulation being your main way of interacting with the world. I think the main issue is that it can be very easy to stumble into a solution that works, which doesn't feel great with the seemingly random layout of objects. But when you deliberately execute a strategy - say, spinning yourself right to produce an air current that would push you left before lifting you up a bit onto the cliff you need to get to - it gets really enjoyable. I just hope it can handle a whole game worth of problem-solving, cause nuance enjoyment only lasts a short while
Playtime: ??h
Rooster
A simple game celebrating Chinese culture, revolving around the zodiac and meanings behind each of the animals. The gameplay itself will vary between different levels, but is essentially very simple point'n'click 'puzzles'. Nothing revolutionary, and not super smooth, but it's pretty and to a degree educational.