Gaming Report Q2 2026
Man, this was a weird couple of months.
Taria & Como
I finished this, and overall, I liked it! That said, I got a lot of my compliments out in last quarter’s report, so it’s time to talk about a flaw I noticed on multiple occasions: the game likes to set up ideas that it doesn’t actually use.
For example, there is a character who tells Taria that his wheelchair was taken from him. Although he asks her not to risk doing so, Taria says she will retrieve it. Later, you find the wheelchair, but you can’t do anything with it. I think the implication is that you’ll come back and pick it up later (which is odd in and of itself); but the next time you talk to this character, Taria tells him she found it and she’ll go get it this time, only for him to again urge her not to, because the main story is off in a different direction now.
This kind of thing actually impacts gameplay, too; Taria has a prosthetic leg, and a lot of emphasis is placed on the fact that the one she prefers gets replaced with an inferior model early in the story. For the first half of the game, she can jump, but at such a low height that it’s entirely useless in 100% of situations. So when she is later reunited with her good prosthetic and thus regains the ability to jump, this should feel empowering. Except it doesn’t, because this isn’t an action platformer where jumping is an essential tool in your kit; it’s a puzzle platformer where the movement is centered on grappling and planning your swings. This “upgrade” doesn’t actually amount to any significant gameplay changes; an occasional convenience to shave a few seconds off of traversal time, but nothing more. Which then makes me ask: why are we dedicating the B button to jumping then, which does so little, and making our most important action button the Up direction on the D-Pad? I think this is what made the controls feel so clunky, and playing actually would have felt smoother if they’d just dropped the ability to jump entirely.
Still, these are nitpicks. This was overall a good game for the Playdate and I wouldn’t say no to a series.
UNBEATABLE
Not even four months into the year this won the recipient of my 2026 “Biggest Disappointment” award. Except to call this game disappointing is underselling it.
Okay. I hate ragging on passion projects from small studios. Usually I don’t have to, because often it’s more that the end result isn’t to my taste, or the recipe just didn’t turn out. But like… this game seems intentionally antagonistic at times, or completely tone-deaf at others (sorry for the pun) (I didn’t actually specify, but this is a rhythm game, that’s why “tone-deaf” is a pun).
Before the game starts, it takes some time to ask for your input on your familiarity with rhythm games and how you like to play them. I don’t know if this actually has any effect, but it gives the impression that the game wants you to have a comfortable experience. “We’re just here to have a good time,” it implies.
And then it spends upwards of an hour not being a rhythm game. You start off playing a band member, running around backstage, talking to people, getting a sense for your character. You finally take the stage, ready for some sick-ass rhythm-based gameplay to perform for the cheering crowd… except the game instead flashes forward, and you do more walking around and talking for a while. The voice acting is really good, but conversations are handled poorly. The introduction teaches you that you can interact with a character multiple times to get new dialogue until the game doesn’t let you interact anymore; but later on when you’ve come to expect this behavior, the game instead repeats the same line over and over. Or there’s times where one character interrupts another, but the character who was originally talking still keeps performing their whole line, so both lines overlap and you can’t understand either of them? Recording the entire voice line means this was an intentional decision! Not one person thought this was a bad idea???
When you do hit the first rhythm setpiece, it’s, uh. It’s very good. I mean it, it’s a heck of a lot of fun; you’re fighting shit and swatting bullets away during a high-speed chase and it’s great.
Then it’s over, and it’s back to running around, talking, story stuff. This should be fine! It should be very hard to make me not care about the story stuff, that’s what I live for! But the problem is those big, fun action setpieces are exceptions to the standard gameplay. The standard gameplay involves lengthy fight sequences which barely feel like rhythm gameplay because the music for these encounters is just so lacking. There’s no punch! The beat of the music should emphasize the hits I dish out, but it’s so flat! Meanwhile, the on-screen indicators are poorly designed; your notes can come oppositely from the top and the bottom of the screen at the same time, making it’s difficult to intuit the timing. Sometimes the noteboard jumps from one side of the screen to the other, too; there were multiple occasions where I missed a string of notes just because I was so focused on one area of the screen that I didn’t notice they were now coming from somewhere else.
There was one of these fights I wasn’t mentally prepared for—I think I’d just started the game up for the night—and I failed it. Instead of letting me try again, the encounter just ended. My companions told me “well, you suck” (not a joke), and the story carried on. I’m sorry, you’re just going to rip me out of the game so you can insult me for being a little sloppy? Fuck off.
Agents of Groove
Holy shit, I swear to god I can actually play rhythm games. I used to play Guitar Hero on expert; I loved Hi-Fi Rush. But I couldn’t even clear the goddamn tutorial of this game. No wonder I got so thrown off this quarter.
Wanderstop
I remember Wanderstop being billed as a sort of “cozy game that’s a commentary on cozy games, by the guy who made The Stanley Parable”. I’m not sure where I got this impression, but I don’t think that’s ultimately what it was (I mean, it was directed by the guy who did The Stanley Parable, that’s not the part I’m taking issue with).
For one, I’m having trouble calling this a “cozy game”. It definitely is—it’s calm and slow-paced and full of whimsical vibes and everything—but it almost feels like there’s not enough to do? For a game whose entire messsage is “Hey, maybe it’s okay to take a break and do something relaxing once in a while”, it seems really eager to push you through the story. Like, yeah, I guess I could fill up all these empty plant pots around the house, but the NPCs are going to hover around me until I talk to them, and then when I do their thing the game is going to transition and wipe my plant-potting progress anyway. So, I dunno what to think.
I still really liked it though! As promised, it was a nice way to unwind, and I found it quite fun to role-play the protagonist as somebody who was very reluctant to do so. As expected given the game’s creator, the humor is excellent; there’s even a series of in-game short stories that are basically “Krunch MacKenzie meets Die Hard”, so of course I ate that up. And your companion Boro is just, he’s absolutely the best, I love him, we should all aim to be the Boro in someone else’s life, the world would be a better place.
Mixtape
Holy shit, this might be one of my favorite games of all time. I remember thinking I might make an “urgent report” post, which I’ve never done before, to laud this game for how great it is. And then… I didn’t actually finish it.
I, uh, kinda started playing Civilization VII, thinking I’d play them both at the same time. And then I didn’t. And then I wanted to go back to Mixtape, except now I’ve built it up in my head as this transcendent masterpiece that I can only play under “perfect” conditions, whatever the hell that means. So now I’m still not playing and finishing this game that I have, to this point, absolutely cherished. There might actually be something seriously wrong with me, folks.
Civilization VII
I guess I spoiled this in the previous section, but I played Civ VII. This is notable because, until now, my entire experience with the Civilization series was Civilization Revolution on the Xbox 360, and half a game of Civ V. I’m not exactly sure why I chose to pick it up now; I was aware this entry wasn’t particularly well-received on launch, due in large part to the new mechanic where civilizations are locked to certain ages, so you’re forced to switch during age transitions. However, the developer had just released the “Test of Time” update which allowed a civilization to persist across ages again, and reviewers were starting to say the game was kind of good now, and I guess I thought it would scratch an itch or something, I don’t know, I said the past few months were weird.
Anyway, I’m having fun with it? It probably helps that I don’t have much history with this game, so I’m not comparing it to the other entries in the series like everyone else is. I agree with the general sentiment that the UI isn’t very good—in particular, there’s a lot that isn’t explained very well, or is just confusing—but I’m getting sucked into it regardless. My first attempt, I played as Confucius and started with the Han, which I kept for the entirety of the game; not because I was averse to switching civilizations, but because none of the options ever felt in line with the way I was playing (I saw the tutorial mention at one point that it’s rarely too late to switch your playstyle, but I dunno if I trust that advice). I was shooting for a science victory, but ended up winning a cultural victory by accident, possibly because I was just building wonders every chance I got so the AI couldn’t build them. I think this was how every game of Civilization Revolution went for me, too, come to think of it.
I took a few weeks off, but I just started another game with Amina as my leader; my initial civilization was the Aksumite, and I switched to the Songhai in the Exploration Age. This time, I’ve been focused on the economy and building trade routes, and MAN I am just raking in the gold. I’m tossing gold at all sorts of dumb shit just because I can. Why in the world did I ever think focusing science was a good idea? With enough money, you can BUY science. Hell, you can buy damn near everything. My GDP is twice what everyone else’s is. I might have to play as America after the next age transition, not necessarily because it’ll be a good fit mechanics-wise, but just because I feel so goddamn American right now.
Guild Wars 2
“Oh, dang, they put out a teaser trailer for Guild Wars 3. Maybe now’s the time I get off my ass and finally get caught up with Guild Wars 2.”
I signed in, bought all the expansions I didn’t already own, played a week, and then stopped, just like every other time I told myself I’d get caught up with Guild Wars 2 in the past seven years.
Final Fantasy
So if I had little experience with the Civilization series before jumping into Civ VII, I had even less experience with Final Fantasy. I got through maybe two-thirds of FFX back in the day, and gave up on FFVII Remake after maybe 3 hours, tops. I’ve been sort of interested in trying out other games in the series, but if you’d have asked me a month ago, I would have told you that I’d never in a million years play the first entry. My impression was that is was grindy and annoying and had next to no story, and I have a very low tolerance for turn-based RPGs as it is. How in the hell did I get here?
I blame Miela, who posted about the Pixel Remaster version about a month ago. I don’t recall what my thought process was after that; all I know is that I’m now inexplicably halfway through the first Final Fantasy. Anyway, it is annoying and has next to no story, but for some reason I actually don’t mind it. Maybe I’m just in the mood for something relatively mindless. So far it hasn’t even been all that grindy; the remaster edition has options to boost the amount of experience and/or gold you earn from battles to help avoid the grind, but I haven’t really had to do this at all, nor have I turned off random encounters for convenience aside from maybe once. It hasn’t been as punishing as I expected, either, which I certainly appreciate. Because I’m a madman, I bought the bundle that included the first six titles, as if I honestly think I’m going to go through them all someday. I know myself well enough to say this is a fool’s belief. But on the other hand… I am playing Final Fantasy I, so I guess anything can happen.
“Hey Skep, what about Expedition 33???” Well, I’ll have you know that I played it! For… three hours across two sessions about three weeks apart. Look forward to my review in the year 2107.