Recent reviews by Paikia

Even though I was a little skeptical about this game, I just *knew* I had to get it, especially considering its attractive price tag. Soon enough I found myself addicted, playing for hours and hours, burning most of my free time. Although Game Dev Tycoon isn't the deepest of games, it was enough to keep me playing for nearly 30 hours at the time of editing this review, and I do feel like coming back to it. Anyway, this game is definitely a must try for any simulation games fan, especially when the topic is something so natural for us gamers. Don't pass on this game without trying!

EDIT June 29th, 2014: Coming up on 10 months since I got this game, I can tell you I still enjoy playing it. The only realy issue I have with it is the fact that it starts stuttering real bad on the late stages of the game (when you have the biggest office and both labs). It's not like it needs any more of the major resources it has (CPU time, GPU time or memory), as my computer has plenty of those to spare, and the game barely registers on my performance monitors. I read somewhere the game has a major memory leak, which could explain this weird phenomenon. Other than that, the game is a real gem!

I wasn't sure about this game when I bought it. I figured there was a good chance it would end up on my "wasted money Steam purchases" basket. Only a few days later, when I bothered to check it out, this game became one hell of a pleasant surprise.

Recettear is a weird mix of simulation, hack & slash and role-playing, with the cute japanese kind of graphics and animations that I really love. You play Recette, the cute and naive item-shop seller girl, who's teamed up with Tear, the fairy, who at first seems like the tough business...fairy(?) personality, but already a few hours into the game, I'm getting the feeling she has a totally different agenda than the one she's letting out.

As Recette, you need to manage your items shop and make money, so you can pay a debt to Tear's agency (whatever it is), so they wouldn't take your house. In addition to buying and selling routine, you can also hire adventurers and go to dungeons. In return for your payment to the adventurer, you get to keep the items you find in the dungeon, and sell them with nearly 100% profit.

All in all, this game is a lot of fun, definitely worth its price, in my humble opinion.

That's one of the best games I've encountered during the last couple of years. Despite starting to play a buggy and unstable release, I really enjoyed it. The gameplay is amazing, in my opinion, and by now all the bugs are gone (as far as I can tell, at least).
The main idea in the game is to either be a pirate and build your own naval empire, or be a trader (my personal preferred choice) and build a huge merchant fleet, and later on gain control over cities.

The game takes place in the Caribbeans, during the European colonization in America. Therefore, you can choose to be either Spanish, English, French or Dutch, but you're not limited to trading just with your country's own colonies. Also, even for people like me, who aren't die-hard fans of "Pirates Of The Caribbeans", it's impossible to miss the connection. :)

The trading mechanism is quite realistic, and is a lot of fun, as you need to start small, trading stuff yourself, until you get rich and famous enough to buy more ships and more goods, so you can buy more ships and build businesses in cities, so you can manufacture goods yourself, which is obviously cheaper than buying them from someone else.

If you're into trading simulation, get this game. You won't be sorry.

Expeditions: Conquistador is a tactical RPG, set, as implied by the name, during the historical Spanish invasion of parts of the American continent. You play a Spanish nobleman, in command of your military unit, set on a ship from Spain to America.

Your first duty is to choose the members of your unit. I really like the idea that you don't only have to consider their tactical roles (Soldier / Scout / Hunter / Doctor / Scholar) and how many of which class you're going to need, but also their personal views and agendas. Some of those people are either racists or extremely religious, while others are more tolerant and open-minded. Some are adventurous and like taking risks, while others are more cautious and calculated. As squad-leader, you must consider how well those people are going to be able to interact and get along with each other, and how easy it is going it be for them to accept your leadership, considering the differences between them. Having half your squad be adventurous risk-takers and the other half very cautious, for example, is probably not a very good idea, as any decision you make during the game which will have anything to do with taking risks, would end up making half your squad lose morale.

Next up, as soon as you set foot on "The New World", you're challenged with tough decisions to make, one after the other. Some issues can be solved either peacefully or by force, while others will require unavoidable violence to deal with. One of the things I really like about the game, is that it lets you face some of the obvious moral dillemas of the period and the context from a refreshing and flexible perspective. You can be the barbaric warlord who uses violence to solve every problem, you can be something more alike an enlightened diplomat, or anything in between, according to the options the game presents to you. While you're obviously led by the general way history was set in reality and are expected to bring money and treasures back to the King of Spain, the game gives you quite a variety of ways to do that. Some of those ways are filled with violence and bloodshed, and others are much less so, although fighting is an integral part of the game, whatever path you end up choosing.

The battle system is complex and interesting, yet not too difficult to learn. The ingame tutorial is effective, short and to the point, so I won't get into it in too much detail. The main principle is choosing which members of the squad to send on each battle, based on their skills, experience and character. Also, some of your people will trigger all sorts of plot events during the game, which gives the game a higher replayability value. I've found it interesting to start another playthrough, this time with different people, just out of curiosity regarding their personal plot events.

As the game is very story-driven and there's (almost) no voice acting, there's a lot of reading to do, which you shouldn't skip if you want to stay in the game. Your choices and decisions have a significant effect on the plot, and in order to make an informed decision, you should know what's going on. Skipping text will only put you in a position of having to choose an arbitrary action, which in my humble opinion, takes most of the fun out of the game. If you generally don't have what it takes to be patient and take the time to read, maybe this is not the type of game for you.

The graphics are not bad at all, and the soundtrack is one of the best I've heard (composed by Leonardo Badinella, a musician from Chilli), which really helps keeping the game alive, even along the slower parts.

All in all, this is one of the best games I've encountered during the last few years, and I recommend it to anyone who likes Tactical RPGs.