The Adventures of Sir Kicksalot

The slapstick energy in this game found a perfect resonant frequency in my brain, the likes of which I haven't felt since my Factorio addiction. While playing, I was simultaneously frantic and cathartic, in a flow state of grabbing anything nearby that could hinder enemies, throwing furniture and spells in every direction, and experiencing the joy of setup and payoff multiple times per minute. This game makes you feel like a grinning, mad, brilliant bastard. Everything can be used as a blunt weapon, and most of them can also inflict status conditions in the right circumstances. Whatever doesn't feel awesome is still hilarious, especially since both you and the NPCs are equally as likely to screw yourselves over. Of course, your most reliable tool is always gravity. The streamlined nature of the game is another mark of its quality. Steam reports my playtime as only seven hours to complete 100% achievements, and to me, that feels like the perfect length. The dual nature of most spells also makes them easier to use. One spell acts as both teleportation and telekinesis, and another acts as both the noisy distraction and the way to trick guards in to fighting each other. Because these pairings are thematically significant, you don't have to overthink which one you need to reach for when the game starts moving quickly, or spend too many upgrade points trying to get a well-rounded build. I have two minor gripes which began to sour the experience near the end: Swordplay was unsatisfying, because as the enemies get harder, they develop perfect reaction times and decision making, so the relationship between striking, blocking, and kicking becomes entirely outdated in favor of finding some other way to inflict a status condition. The game is more fun when you're doing traditional combat as little as possible, so this is pretty minor. More serious was the lack of frequent checkpoints and high lethality, resulting in a lot of repetitive re-clearing of rooms you've already visited. The tedium of retrying the same sections repeatedly was the only thing that made me consider putting the game down. This is it. The shorter game, with worse graphics, made by people who are paid more to work less. It's simply everything we've been asking the game industry to be.