Nextfest (Feb 2025): Solasta II, Twilight Monk, Nautical Survival
1#solsta2 #twilightmonk #nauticalsurvival #nextfest #streaming #letsplay #twitch
Intro: 00:00:15
Solasta II: 00:03:53
Twilight Monk: 01:14:15
Nautical Survival: 02:15:59
Solasta II: I have zero experience with the IP, so coming into this blind I have a few notes: It's using the Systems Reference Document as it's core (which makes this a D&D-style game) and feels like it's working in Baldur's Gate's realm. The demo is a little rough with the animations and UI, but if you want a game that feels extremely like D&D with shiny graphics, Solasta is worth checking out. I enjoyed my time with the demo. I'll be keeping an eye out for the full release.
Twilight Monk: a stylish metroidvania with some ... interesting character writing choices. It has all the hallmarks of a metroidvania: unlockable skills, badges that augment your abilities, shops, etc. I really dig some of the art direction as well as breaking things up with a world map, but I really got stuck on 3 points: 1) the writing needs some work across the board. 2) enemies respawn on every screen which feels punishing. 3) hopping into the overworld map doesn't trigger any sort of autosave, and dying can cause you to lose a LOT of progress. It feels bad. It's not a bad game, but some decisions have been made that'll for sure turn some people off.
Nautical Survival: a bullet-heaven game where you pilot a boat and shoot the horrors of the deep. You post up on islands to upgrade different things (guns, healing, etc) as well as gain experience from the gold you collect. The game does an interesting thing by allowing you to pick and choose your boat makeup: do you get more weapons or more deackhands? Each come with their own bonuses and allows for a lot of interesting build opportunities. My only real hang up is that you navigate using cardinal directions, and not relative to the nose of the ship. It takes some getting used to, and I'm not sure if it's the right choice or not.
Game info:
Solasta II: https://store.steampowered.com/app/2975950/Solasta_II/
Twilight Monk: https://store.steampowered.com/app/1911940/Twilight_Monk/
Nautical Survival: https://store.steampowered.com/app/2860990/Nautical_Survival/
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