Month: October 2025

Next Fest: Umigari – The Fish Might be People, The People Might Be Fish

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I downloaded a few demos for this quarter’s Next Fest but played very few. Rather than trawling through categories to find interesting demos, I let Steam pick for me via the “Recommended for You” section. Having recently playing the likes of Hell is Us, Yuppie Psycho, along with a smattering of Devour and Outlast Trials, it is understandable that Steam suggested mostly horror titles.

One was a typing battle royale. Like playing Russian Roulette with Mavis Beacon. Sadly, I didn’t find it all that fun. Umigari caught my eye because there’s a big ole’ unsettling fish on the thumbnail. Horror and fishing? Sign me up!

Hmm what’s that? Have I heard of Dredge?

Yes! It’s even in my library, I really should play it some day…..Anyways, back to Umigari.

I started the demo awakens on a tiny island in the middle of the ocean. The only other inhabitant? A fish merchant who tells me to go catch some puffer fish so I can buy upgrades from him. Seems like he’s the enterprising type then.

Armed with a harpoon, off I went to spear some fish dutifully placing them in my ship so I could sell them to the Fish Merchant. Who, by the way, looks vaguely like a fish himself. I think it’s the eyes, those bulging, spaced out eyes.

I gathered enough fish to upgrade the reel speed of my harpoon and increased the boat’s speed. The rest of the money I used to gas up the boat and set off for a nearby island.

This too was a small island. It’s only inhabitant a school girl. She asked for a ride back to the island I just came from and got in the boat.

On the way, I catch some tuna, and right before we reach the island, the girl disappears! Maybe she didn’t like all the dead fish touching her feet. At least she left a map with a treasure chest and what looks like another gas station location.

The tuna sold for more than the pufferfish so I was able to upgrade my boats fuel capacity. I ventured off towards the treasure chest on the map which lead me to a sunken wind farm. I used my harpoon to hit the targets on the windmill blades to get them spinning. One of them dropped the treasure, a sonar system for the boat.

Much easier to catch those fish now that they can’t hide.

I purchased the final upgrades for the boat and harpoon. I’m assuming it’s the final ones for the demo.

I set off towards the next gas station. I didn’t take the most direct route which resulted in my boat running out of fuel and sending me back to the original island mere feet away from my destination.

Once againI set out, this time on a straight course. Along the way I spotted a massive fish the shape and size of a freight train breaching the surface. It didn’t seem to take notice of the small vessel right next to it. Lucky me.

As I once again approached my destination, I saw the burning husk of my previous vessel. What does this mean? Am I doomed to return to the Fish Merchant until I unravel the mysteries of this ocean? Wandering the oceans and facing it’s horrors until the end of time? I do not have time to ponder these questions. The boat needs gas, the Fish Merchant needs fish.

My fish were still aboard unharmed. I picked those up and sold them to the fish seller (the same one from before!) on the new island.

Across the way was a high school, half submerged. There were new fish to catch here. They looked strange from my boat, bigger, and wrapped in something. They were also very fast. I managed to land one and as pulled it out of the ocean, it was indeed wrapped in something, a jacket by the looks of it.

I ventured off the boat into the high school and that’s where I found even more of these clothed fish. I…I…I think these fish may have been people at one point. Now I’m harpooning them to sell for boat upgrades. Such is life in Umigari.

There wasn’t an option to save that I could find and I had to step away from the demo. It didn’t kick me out and I think there was at least a little more there to do. I didn’t feel like repeating the hour I’d already done and an hour is plenty of time with a demo for me.

Umigari is going on the wishlist. I’m intrigued to see where this one ends up. Are the fish actually people? What’s the deal with the Fish Merchant? Can I harpoon that giant, train sized, fish with my human sized harpoon? I kinda have to know.

The Scariest Part of Yuppie Psycho is the Save System

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Lately, I’ve been playing through Yuppie Psycho. A pixely, horror, adventure game released in 2019. It being October and all I thought I should play at least one horror game. This has been on my radar since the No Sleep Podcast was hawking it, so probably 6 years now. Having just completed Hell is Us, I was still in the mood for the puzzling/adventure style game and Yuppie Psycho fit the bill.

I’ve been enjoying it so far. It’s a little more action-stealthy than I thought it would be but there’s still puzzles and a good bit of exploration to do. I like the juxtaposition of it’s bright pixel graphics with it’s horrific scenes filled with blood and monsters. There’s a printer that crawls around on four human giant hands for crying out loud! But it’s pixel art so it’s all kind of cozy. Even so, I have been tempted to call it a day and shelve the game due to it’s save system.

See, you can’t save whenever you want and there are hardly any auto saves. You might be asking, “well what’s so bad about save points, have you never played a game with save points?”. And I would say “Of course I have! This is different.” While there are save points, photocopiers to be exact, you need to find witch paper to be able to be able to photocopy your soul to save. Spooky! And witch paper is a consumable item found in various drawers and filing cabinets throughout the building.

Consumable saves, that’s a new one for me, I saw this and the question “What happens if I run out?” immediately came to mind.

Well, I haven’t run out yet. Nor have I found myself in a situation where I wanted to save and couldn’t. I have been close and it does add a lot of tension to the game. Will I find that next piece of paper before I meet my untimely demise? There isn’t a whole lot that will straight up kill you in the building but when there is they tend to come out of nowhere and lock you in a room together.

I’m not the most up to date on my video game history but I had a feeling that this save system was nod to an older game. It just has that feel of old game design. A few quick searches later, and it turns out I was right! The original Resident Evil, which I haven’t played, uses a similar system with ink ribbons and typewriters.

This kind of item based system does make me think differently about how and when to save. I have been caught plenty of times saving right before a big piece of dialogue and then having to go through it again if I die before the next save point. So I’ve been pressing my luck sometimes to see if I can make it until the next story beat to save. Other times, I don’t want to save while my health is low so I’ll look around for healing items before coming back to save. But if I die during that, I’ll have to find all those items again.

It also dictates how I have to interact with the game. It can’t just be a quick pick up play and save. I need to have the time to complete the section before I shutdown the game. This can be frustrating, but typically, the time between saves have been at most 20 minutes. Still, losing 20 minutes because I died still feels bad.

With this type of save system, the game feels less like an open ended exploration game and more like a level based game. Except, I determine how long the levels are by when I choose to save. Fail the level and die, you have to do it all over again.

I’m torn on this system as a whole. On the one hand, it does a great job of building tension when exploring new areas. Will I be able to find the next save point? If I do, will I have enough paper to save? I’m low on paper should I really save now, or risk another area? It works for a game like this where it’s harder to build a sense of unease with visuals. On the other hand, it’s no fun to have to run through sections again, redo dialogue with multiple NPCs, or find all the items again when you die. Not being able to save when I need to close the game is also inconvenient.

It’s certainly a novel system, but I still prefer being able to save when I want not when the game says I can.

Hell Is Us

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I just finished up Hell is Us this week. I hadn’t heard of this game until I read this RPS article a few weeks back. Admittedly, the article doesn’t give the game much praise but I was intrigued by the prospect of a “souls-like” in a more modern setting.

Hell is Us takes place in an alternate 1993 in a country called Hadea where civil war has broken out. The Palomists and the Sabinians are engaged in a viscous war full of all sorts of horrible atrocities. Talking to the various NPCs, they don’t even know why they hate each other so much, they just always have. There are also these creatures that have appeared and seem to be linked to strong human emotions.

The story itself is a mix of government conspiracy in Hadea and story line of ancient orders and fanatic cults of Hadea’s past. So there’s still some gothic fantasy going on here. There’s also the story of the main character, Remi, looking for his parents and unraveling his own past which ties everything together. I’m loving the mix of “modern” Hadea filled with computers, office buildings, and secret labs and also unraveling the story of “historic” Hadea through the various books, artifacts, and monuments throughout the game. It’s a slow burn but it never lost my interest.

Hell is Us executes well on the “souls-like” style of exploration and storytelling through environments and objects in the world. I spent time combing each zone for secret passages, shortcuts, and new items that revealed a bit more information about Hadea. I was often more excited to find an item with something to read on it than any new piece of gear.

There are so many different things to find. There are research items which explain Hadea’s troubled history, there are miscellaneous items like diaries and newspaper clippings that give contexts to present day events. There are also items that lead to puzzles or “Good Deeds” where you have to give the correct item to the right NPC which help connect the player to the world.

Combat is not the main focus of Hell is Us. It’s there, and it can be challenging at first, but once I got the rhythm down and found a weapon I liked, it was almost trivial. Combat ends up being just one more puzzle to solve to get to where you want to go, rather than a main focus of the game. There aren’t difficult bosses, there’s no leveling or character builds, there’s hardly any combat customization save a few weapon choices and skills.

Death doesn’t punish you either. Enemies killed before you die stay dead, no health is lost, and, typically, there isn’t a long run back to where you died. There’s no “souls” to collect and sometimes dying is the better outcome because all your health is restored.

For me, this is more of a welcome relief than a deal breaker. My favorite part of Souls games has always been exploration. The combat tends to leave me frustrated, especially if I have to do the same section and kill the same enemies over and over again. The only time enemies respawn in Hadea is if you leave an area without closing the Timeloop. Something I always made sure I did so I didn’t need to repeat fights.

As a result, there are some mechanics I engaged very little with during my playthrough. You’re able to swap between two weapons but I never found the need to. If there are resistances and weaknesses of the enemies based on weapon type, I didn’t notice. I powered through everything with my Rage Pole-arm. I also had a Grief Pole-arm equipped but hardly ever used it. Defensive equipment can also be upgraded, something I forgot about and still found the final fights manageable. There are consumables littered throughout the world but I hardly ever needed them either. I did play on normal so this might be different on a higher difficulty.

I found Hell is Us to be the perfect length. It took me 27 hours to finish the story and I never once felt like it was dragging on. I did a lot of exploring and I read everything I came across, made sure to do the optional Good Deeds as I found them, and went out of my way to solve optional puzzles. There’s still plenty of things out there that I could have done or found but by story completion, I felt like I had a firm grasp on how everything connected together. I don’t feel a need to go back through and find everything I missed.