No new game today, and nothing of importance with the games I’m currently playing.

Anomaly: Warzone Earth

I gave a shot with one of the extra game modes I unlocked during the campaign. Bagdad Mayhem is the actual reverse tower defense I was talking about when I started this game a few days ago. You get some starting cash and need to destroy wave after wave of spawning towers, surrounding a generator. Once the generator is destroyed, new towers spawn, tougher than before. I managed to get to wave 13, out of 18 in total, before I was destroyed.

Toki Tori

The story repeats itself. I tired the level I was stuck on again, and I solved it again. I can’t believe it wasn’t obvious the last time. I managed to solve a few more, but I haven’t completed the world this time, like I did yesterday. Still, I’m getting there.

Titan Attacks

Bah, I hate it. Five or six fresh attempts, but I got nowhere. There’s nothing to write about, really. The last zone is hard.

As per usual, I wasted some time on these two games today.

With Toki Tori, the same thing happened again. The level I was stuck on was suddenly easy to solve, after a good night’s rest. I solved the two remaining levels of the castle world and unlocked the next one, called Stinky Swamp, if I remember correctly. I got a new item, which I can use to suck in slugs, or just change the direction of their movement, if I only use it for a moment. I solved the first couple of easy levels and then promptly got stuck on one of the next few.

Toki Tori Swamp Zone Transition Screenshot

The way to the Swamp Zone.

As for Titan Attacks, I got pretty much nowhere. The difficulty of the last zone is a nightmare. I’m slowly getting used to it, but I have yet to see the final boss.

Today was somewhat of a slow day, with no lengthy sessions. On the few occasions that I had some spare time to waste, I’ve returned to some of the “older” games.

Saint’s Row: The Third

First I had to validate the game files and download 80 megabytes of data in order to make the game playable again. It seems something get’s lost when you reinstall Windows, so the game starts crashing on startup. I decided to try and get some of the achievements, but this failed. There was still progress, though. I finished a couple of the assassination tasks and completed a few of the challenges, including the Powerslide, Streaking, Helicopter Destruction and Boat Destruction challenges. None of them are directly tied to an achievement, but they eventually add up, so progress was made. Other than that, I bought some upgrades and that’s about it.

Titan Attacks

After about 10 attempts that failed quickly, I managed to get one past the boss of the Saturn zone. As a reward for this, I got access to what seems to be the final, Titan zone. Saturn was a breeze compared to it. All the enemies can take plenty of hits, a rain of bullets is constantly covering the screen, and there’s so many parachuting aliens I either have to kill them, or i die trying to collect them all. Most of my attempts failed at the second level of the zone, but I did manage to squeeze a few through, all the way up to level 91. At 90, there was what looked like a boss, but I guess they just add bosses as regular enemies now, because he was easy to beat and I got nothing for it.

Titan Attacks - Game Over

I’ve been seeing this phrase a lot lately.

Toki Tori

This morning, the game was crashing, for some reason. I wasn’t even able to start a level. Verifying and reinstalling did nothing, so I gave up and tried Titan Attacks. This evening, though, the game ran fine. After some rest, the solution to the level I got stuck on came to me easily. All I needed to do was to stop the brick that was blocking the ladder from falling below by building a bridge over the gap. Once that was done, everything else was easy. The next few levels held me back for a few moments but were eventually dealt with. I got to somewhere around level 10 of this second world, I believe, and that’s where I got stuck again. Maybe tomorrow I’ll be smart again.

Other than a single, but lengthy Diablo III session, I also managed to squeeze in some time for two more games today.

Titan Attacks

The first one was Titan Attacks. As I said last time, I managed to get to the Saturn world. Today, I tried to get past it, but I couldn’t even get close after several attempts. In fact, I have yet to reach the boss. The enemies that get to me are those big guys that drop down and leave a few of those mines behind. I find it nearly impossible to get in front of them to even be able to shoot them. The window of opportunity is extremely small, and if you get unlucky enough to get a few of them behind each other, it get’s pretty much impossible. After several failed attempts, the rage got to me, so I’ll try again some other time, perhaps in a few days.

Toki Tori Screenshot

Toki Tori is an extremely colorful game.

Toki Tori

The second game was a new one I decided to give a try. Toki Tori is a puzzle in which you use a limited inventory of items to avoid enemies and collect all the eggs on a level. It looks simple, but pretty, the music gives it a happy atmosphere, and overall, it feels fun to play. I’m not sure where or how I got the game, but I’m guessing it was part of a bundle I bought in the past. I have this problem now where I need to get almost every bundle released, so I suffer from a clogged backlog of games. To think I used to almost exclusively pirate…

I managed to complete the first world and got a few levels into the second one. There were some hiccups along the way, but overall, the puzzles were relatively simple up to now. When it gets down to it, it’s about navigating the level in the correct order by using the items you have available. Right now, I’m stuck on a level where there’s only one egg to collect, but I’m not sure how to use the combination of Bridges and Brick Switches to get to it.

Puppy Games gave this game (or any other one from their library) for free a few months ago. I tried it back then, but I never played it extensively, since that’s probably not the way this game is meant to be played.

Basically, it’s a Space Invaders clone with blocky, but flashy graphics, which allows you to earn cash and upgrade your tank between levels. It’s a simple formula, but one that’s highly engaging. There are plenty of levels and upgrades to go through, as well as a lot of achievements to unlock.

I’ve been playing it sporadically since the day I got it, but I’ve been stuck on the moon “world” for a while now, because I kept getting killed by the boss. This morning, I finally managed to get past it, and then I went past the next world, Mars, on my first attempt.

Titan Attack Screenshot

The difficulty curve basically goes flat during the Mars levels.

Saturn followed after Mars and I managed to reach the end boss there on the very same attempt, but I didn’t manage to beat it. Still, I got a new high score (which is pathetic, compared to online scores) and I managed to upgrade all of my add-ons, which got me an achievement.

All in all, it’s a very fun game, so don’t be surprised if you see more of these posts.