Holocure is a Hololive-inspired fan game in the shape of Vampire Survivors. If you haven’t heard of Vampire Survivors, it’s a 2D roguelite where you try to survive as long as possible. If you’ve never heard of Hololive/Vtubers, I’d suggest this video by Gigguk. While some of the specifics are bit out of date, the general coverage and explanation of virtual idols is handled really well.
If you’re already into Hololive, Holocure is a fantastic sort of love letter to the talents, and the fandom around them. All the enemies are mascots of the HoloEN branch, and all the items are in-jokes, or reference to various moments from Hololive history. The level of care put into everything is fantastic. I watch a lot of Hololive content, and so perhaps unsurprisingly, I also enjoy Holocure quite a lot.
That said, even if you have no idea what Hololive is, or don’t care to learn, Holocure is still worth checking out for its core gameplay. So let’s talk about that!
You start by picking a character to play as. There are 11 characters, 5 of which are unlocked from the start, and 6 of which can be unlocked with an in-game lottery system (don’t worry, it doesn’t use real money). After this, you’ll pick a game mode. Currently there are two modes, Stage and Endless. In Stage, your goal is to defeat the boss that spawns at 20 minutes, and in Endless, your goal is to just survive as long as possible.
Regardless of which mode you pick, you’ll get dropped into a large field, and the game actually starts. Enemies will spawn in, and move toward you. If they touch you, you lose health. Lose all your health, and it’s game over. When you defeat an enemy, they drop exp. Pick up enough experience, and you’ll level up and get presented a choice of several items and weapons.
This is as good a time as any to cover the aforementioned systems. Each character starts with the first level of their unique weapon, but can hold up to six more. Weapons fire automatically. Some fire in a direction determined by the player, and others fire in a completely random direction. This is actually a good thing, because you don’t have to spend as much time aiming, and can just focus on dodging everything being thrown your way.
In addition to weapons, there are also items and passives. Each character has 3 unique passives they can level without taking up a slot, and 6 items slots. Items have various passive abilities, for example, one gives regenerating shielding, and another buffs your damage if you go an amount of time without being hit.
The end result is that each run of Holocure feels different, while still giving a fair amount of agency in choosing between the various items and weapons that show up to pick from.
As a fangame, Hololive doesn’t cost anything, and you can download it on itch.io here! The game also has an official twitter here, and a larger content patch is expected later this year, sometime around September.
The bar for franchised game tie-ins is a moving target, but it’s rarely above sea level. Often, it spends time in the Mariana Trench. I’m lucky in that the franchises I love started as games, so the games are usually pretty good (or in the case of Pokémon, “Yes, it’s the same thing, but I bought it and it was okay the last 5 times so I guess I’ll do it again.”)
There are exceptions, of course, coughMagic:Legendscough but on the whole, I don’t actually play many games based on “Things I liked when they weren’t games.” I’m much more likely to buy a shirt because you wrote Undertale on it in comic sans, than I am to buy a game because it has LeBron James, or Rick and Morty in it.
All of this is a lead up to say that my expectations for Garfield Kart – Furious Racing were low. Very low. And while the game does exceed my expectations, the fact that it doesn’t crash constantly and runs on my Ultrawide monitor at all is already miles above what I expecting. My expectations were right next to the funny looking fish with the glowing bulb attached to its head.
Garfield Kart – Furious Racing is a a cart racer based off the Garfield comic strip: the fat orange cat who hates Mondays, loves lasagna, and made its creator Jim Davis a fortune. As a child, I actually liked Garfield if only because a cartoon where the cat actually wins made me happy. A a teenager I thought it was incredibly stupid, and not actually funny. But a stronger understanding of how syndication works, and how easy it is for a comic strip to get kicked from a paper at least makes me respect the effort it must take to tell 20+ years of mildly inoffensive “jokes” and not upset anyone.
Anyway, the theming is skin deep. Garfield Kart is fairly straightforward cart racer. If you’ve ever played any Mario Kart, you’ll pick it up quickly. If you haven’t played any Mario Kart, well, it’s a cart racer, so you’ll pick it up in like 5 minutes tops anyway.
Mechanically, Garfield Kart isn’t hugely technical. Press a button to go forward, toggle your drifts on curves to get a mini-turbo, and hit item boxes for consumables. The consumables range from a lasagna (a single use speed boost), to two variety of pies you can throw at your enemy (one type homes, the other type you have to aim). And it wouldn’t be Mario Kart without an item to royally screw the first place player. In Garfield Kart, that’s the UFO: a trio of three alien spaceships that fly ahead on the course, lay down tractor beams, and grab the first person to pass through.
Strangely enough, the UFO is fairly good for illustrating perhaps my biggest gameplay gripe with the game. Once a player ends up in first place, it’s incredibly difficult to catch them. A lot of the speed loss in Garfield Kart comes from crashing into other carts, and once you get ahead, it’s incredibly easy to just chain mini-turbos. And because of how item rolls work, it’s unlikely that the second place player will get the red shells homing pies they need to close the gap.
Outside of that, we have the actual racing tracks. Garfield Kart has 16 tracks, all of which are fine. There’s a fair amount of asset reuse between them, but that’s not really a big deal to me.
What is a slightly bigger deal to me are the bugs. Garfield Kart is mostly stable, but has a fair number of bugs. In the 10 hours I’ve played, here’s a sampling of what I’ve seen: 1. Item display from item boxes not updating, and showing you as having an item after you’ve used it. 2. Cart collisions acting inconsistently. 3. Netcode resulting in other carts clipping into you, and launching you through the ground. 4. Hitting geometry at weird angles can easily result in carts getting stuck tilted up at 90 degrees, and unable to move. 5. AI getting permanently lodged on rocks.
Garfield Kart isn’t a bad game. It’s effectively just a low budget Mario Kart clone with a more boring theme, fewer tracks, and less polish. And while I would normally say “Just go play Mario Kart,” what sets Garfield Kart apart is its price point and system.
See, Garfield Kart regularly goes on sale for about a $1.50, a price at which you can buy 10 copies, send them to all your friends, and have an amusing cart racer to play with everyone for under $20. Compare to Mario Kart 8, which is $60 for the game alone, and another $50+ for each controller, and all of a sudden Garfield Kart is an absolute bargain.
So yes, while I do recommend Garfield Kart, it’s a conditional recommendation based on having 3-4 other folks to play it with, and spending about as much as a Snickers bar per person on the game itself.
This writeup is about the demo for an indie game called h8machine, a card game based around the idea of internet arguments. The name is presumably a reference to everything modern social media has become. Before I talk more about h8machine though, I want to talk about a very different game: Binding of Issac.
Even the game’s splash art has that uncomfortable poorly-trained-neural network feel to it.
Binding of Issac, if you haven’t played it, is a roguelite themed around the idea that you’re an abused child who has escaped into the basement. You’re trying to avoid being murdered by your mother, who is hearing a voice telling her to kill her son. There’s a lot more to it than that, and it drags a lot of mechanics and ideas from the OG Legend of Zelda games. But it’s not the mechanics I want to talk about here, it’s the theming and aesthetics of both of these two games.
As you might gather from my description above, or from looking at the Steam page for 30 seconds, Binding of Issac could likely be described as gross or crass. Many enemies and mechanics are poop or urine themed, and the whole thing is deliberately repulsive. I’m not writing this to argue that you shouldn’t be offended by these things, but more to note that the theming of Binding of Issac likely turns off a variety of players who would otherwise be very interested in it. Binding of Isaac is carefully crafted and well made, but it’s a multilayered chocolate cake, carefully frosted to look like a massive turd.
So why am I talking about this in relation to h8machine? Well, h8machine gives off a very similar to vibe to me based on what I’ve played, and seen of the demo. That vibe being “Something very careful and clever, with the theming and flavor of bathroom stall graffiti.”
Instead of child abuse and fecal matter, though, h8machine themes itself around internet discourse. Your resources are emoji. Every enemy has a procedurally generated anime avatar, and all the cards are questionable internet arguments. Even the Steam page and description of the game have the tone of a cringe worthy copypasta.
Underneath all of that, though, I found the demo fairly engaging and interesting. The game bills itself as a sort of real time card game, with the maplike progression structure used in Slay the Spire and Inscryption. Instead of collecting individual cards, you collect “personalities:” sets of cards that you can run up to 3 of at a time, combined with offcolor/filler cards to make up your deck. You burn cards to generate resources of the same color, and try to construct your engine to wipe out your opponent before they complete construction of their own engines.
It’s not the greatest thing I’ve ever played, but it did convince me to keep an eye on it.
If any of this sounds interesting, I suggest you try to the demo, which you can find here on Steam. I honestly don’t know if h8machine will end up being good, but it feels created with the intention of being a good game, and not just being shock material.
One of the stupidest things I’ve ever read about games was written by David Sirlin, a very smart game designer. He wrote it in a book that I picked up out of curiosity, and early on I encountered this quote.
I believe there is a great deal more of this “fun” to be had while playing to win than while only playing casually, but there is no use in entering that debate now.
David Sirlin
This was the quote where I put his book down, because it speaks to me of a fundamental misunderstanding about human beings. I’m going go through a fair number of anecdotes here, but I think every single one of them demonstrates that his point is wrong. They illustrate a variety of examples where Sirlin has completely ignored human behavior.
If you had board games or video games as a child, and had younger siblings, you likely had to play games with them. And if you did, you likely chose to throw games to keep them happy. Perhaps David Sirlin likes making his siblings cry. I didn’t. There’s no fun in crushing, or being crushed. This brings me to my second example.
In college, the dorm I lived in had Wii-U in the communal space, and it was used primarily for two things: Smash Bros and Just Dance. There was a set of two players who were simply much, much better at the game then everyone else present, and would often play against each other. At one point, one of them moved out, after which a funny thing happened: virtually no one wanted to play against that second player. The gap was simply too wide.
We often played Magic, AKA M:TG, in the dorm. Quite a few people played, and many had a variety of decks. One of the more popular formats was commander. I remember one particular game with 8 players, in which I got the following combo out.
For anyone keeping score at home: this combo destroys every single other card each player had in play, and would continue doing it every turn until someone stopped it.
Unsurprisingly, everyone scooped, and started a new game. I would not describe it as very “Fun”.
A few more quick ones: games like Diablo Immortal, where “Winning” is temporary, and based on spending cash. Playing games against newer players who you’re trying to introduce to the game.
There’s a reason that the Magic: The Gathering personas are Timmy, Jimmy, and Spike. Not every player is going to derive satisfaction from winning all the time. Sirlin’s thesis seems to be that “Every player should strive to be a Spike” which is one of the stupidest fucking things I’ve ever heard.
So why am ranting about this now? Sirlin’s book is 20 years old, there’s a zero percent chance anyone ever reads this post, and it’s not like any of this is relevant.
Well, I’m mostly ranting about this because of something someone said to me recently. I’ve been making Historic Brawl decks while trying to use every possible legal commander as a commander, and I got some feedback that I should make fewer decks, and more “good” decks. To this I have two responses.
First off, yes. Part of the reason I’m doing this is that it makes “easy” content. It’s much less effort to sit down, build a deck over a day or two, and then live stream myself playing it to YouTube 5 times a week than it is to spend a month tweaking and tuning a single good deck. Because guess what? I’ve spent two years writing things for this blog, doing interesting interviews, and here’s the sad truth: no one reads it.
I can play an entire fascinating indie game, spend a week doing a writeup, post it, tweet it, and it makes not GOD DAMN iota of difference. Nobody fucking wants good content. Everyone wants easy consistent content. We’d all rather have grey sludge every day than chocolate chip cookies once a week.
So yeah, if making shitty Magic decks every day and posting about them is what it takes to get an audience, I’ll do it. I started this blog so that I could avoid being shafted at conventions because I’m not an “influencer.” Don’t think for a second I’m not super passionate about games. If I wasn’t, I wouldn’t still be writing this.
My grey slurry is making historic brawl decks with cards that aren’t good historic brawl commanders.
And secondly, some cards are just BAD. I ranted about how much I hate Jaxis as a commander recently. I’m currently trying to make a deck with Korlessa, Scale Singer. Not counting Korlessa, there are 26 TOTAL dragon cards in green/blue/colorless. Of those 26, maybe 6 are actually worth playing as bombs in Historic Brawl. So congrats, you go make a “good” deck based around a commander that offers absolutely nothing except the ability to see the top card of your deck, and do nothing with it.
I’d be in favor of arguing that Korlessa is just a worst version of Falco Spara, in both colors, statline, and abilities. There’s not even any REAL reason outside of flavor for Korelssa to be legendary. What are two copies gonna give you, two 1/4’s?
So when I encounter Korlessa, I have two choices. I can build a deck with those 26 dragons, and Maskwood Nexus/Whir of Invention, and I can try to do something interesting to show people.
Or I can build slurry. I can stuff the deck so full land ramp, return to hand, and counterspells that you could swap out commander to be Gretchen Titchwillow, and there would be literally no difference in playing the deck, except it would be better, because guess what, Gretchen Titchwillow is a better commander!
At which point, why bother? It’s not a Korlessa deck. It’s blue/green good stuff.
In conclusion: Winning is not always fun. Winning is not necessarily good content. David Sirlin is much smarter then me, a very good game designer, and his book reads like the 80 page manifesto at the end of Atlas Shrugged in terms of its relationship to a majority of the population.
This is final part of a series from an interview with Jongwoo Kim, the creative director of Lucifer Within Us, a unique mystery game. To read our writeup on the game, click here. To read part three, click here.
Headcanon, Scalpels, and Lessons Learned
Fritz Wallace: One of the things I mentioned in the writeup was that Lucifer Within Us does feel a bit short. Like, I solved the last case, and the big reveal happens, and I’m ready for the next part… and then credits roll. Was the game intended to be a setup for the next part of the adventure after those first three cases?
Jongwoo Kim: In my headcanon, Ada goes off and it’s a longer adventure in that world to find those acolytes, and exorcise each one. It would be much more episodic. LWU as it is almost functions as an origin story for this world, and Ada, to set up the other “Books” in the series, if we were using Sherlock Holmes as an example. I would love for her to go on more adventures.
Fritz Wallace: Another lore question, if you don’t mind. Is Ada’s ability to use the timeline a supernatural, or a technical ability? Or is it something else?
Jongwoo Kim: I think that’s an excellent question. She’s an exorcist, but what makes her special? When we initially envisioned the project, when the timeline was created, it was meant to be a mind’s-eye sort of thing. It’s someone replaying in their mind. But that was when it was one of multiple tools the player had access to.
Given how dominant it became, I don’t we ever really decided “how” it worked. I think if it was an actual supernatural ability, we would have had some visual of her engaging in the timeline mode, but we didn’t do that. So I think the reality of the game that we actually delivered is that Ada is just visualizing it in her head. It’s not magic, a special technology, or supernatural ability, it’s a skill she has. At the same time, given the setting, I can see why folks might view it as one of the first three.
Let me put it this way. Something I really wanted to avoid doing was… I feel very frustrated with Quantic Dream-style mystery adventure stuff. Occasionally the player gets amazing abilities. In Heavy Rain, the Agent gets Ari, where he can go into his own world, and solve stuff. But you can only do that when the player is allowed to. The game decides when you can do that.
It raises the question “Without this ability, is the Agent a worse detective?” I didn’t want to diminish Ada, and by extension the player, by implying that this is just a trick, or magic. I wanted the player feel like they solved the case through their sheer intellect.
The only concession and supernatural ability is the ability to exorcise demons, and to enter the sanctums of the suspect. So, in that way, she doesn’t have any other supernatural crime solving abilities, because that would be truer to her character, and the spirit of the game.
Fritz Wallace: I feel like the game did that really well. Throughout the whole game, there was only one moment of adventure game logic: that bit in the second case where you have to pick up the scalpel, and then give it to the doctor to have them perform an autopsy.
Jongwoo Kim: God, that scalpel. Yeah, that case has a long history, and lot of iterations. I’m not super happy with how the scalpel stuff was implemented in the end. So I sympathize with you there.
I do want to comment on that a little bit. One of our challenges was figuring out if problems in the game were due to UI, or to mechanics. One of the things we ended up doing over time was simplifying down interactions you can take with a character. So instead of asking or presenting, it would be just one action.
Generally we wanted to avoid what you called “Adventure Game Logic”. Shouldn’t Ada be able to perform the autopsy herself? In terms of the scalpel, in terms of trying to ship with the assets we had, we ended up going that direction [having the doctor perform the autopsy]. If I could, I’d have Ada examine or autopsy the body herself.
Fritz Wallace: You’ve mentioned a few games whose mechanics you don’t feel do mystery very well. Were there any other games or stories that did influence Lucifer Within Us? I feel like the default suggestion is something like Sherlock Holmes.
Jongwoo Kim: So, as far as Holmes influence, I don’t think any specific case or book influenced the game. But it was important to me, as far as player experience or the dream of the game. The phrase I kept repeating during development as “The player should not feel like Watson, the player should feel like Holmes.”
I often feel that in a lot of mystery games, the rug is pulled from underneath you. As much as I like Dapangropa, I get frustrated with every debate, because it’s like “Oh my god, you’ve been withholding a critical piece of information the whole time. I could not have known the solution, or I could guess, but given the evidence in my log, I could never have solved this case the way you wanted me to with the given mechanics.”
In that way, Holmes is a big inspiration. While I complain about the Frogwares Holmes games, in some ways, Holmes had a very kinetic style of investigation. He got into scuffles, he was at the scene of the crime. Ada is distinct from that. It’s a very clean investigation, followed by exorcism. But within the space of the investigation, there’s no field work other than the scene of the actual crime.
So, for character and experience, Holmes was a big influence. Beyond that, Phoenix Wright for the contradiction system.
Fritz Wallace: It’s interesting, since it’s such a clean investigation, relative to a lot of other things.
Jongwoo Kim: It is a little ironic that to do that idea, we had to change the idea to be about the supernatural. I’m super happy with it too! But a part of me does wonder if it would have made a stronger mystery game [if it had maintained it’s Cyberpunk theme] even if the project is more interesting and compelling as a result of its unique setting. But I don’t know. I would love to try to make something with the timeline mechanic again to be sure.
Fritz Wallace: One thing that did happen to me was that the game gives you 3 demons, and by the third case, there’s only one demon you haven’t exorcised yet. So it feels like it gives the game away a bit.
Jongwoo Kim: I mean. I see it both ways.
On one hand, I think it’s inevitable that if a game has an overarching arc, the player gets some sense of it. I think rewarding them on that front is good. So at some level, I’m happy if an astute player can see what happens in the third case ahead of time.
At the same time, I was surprised by how many people were caught off guard by the victim of the third case, because they thought the abbot was set up to be the big bad, or what not.
If I learned nothing else, I learned that it’s quite hard to predict how someone else will perceive the intended arc of a mystery. And I think that makes it interesting from a mystery design standpoint. It indicates there’s more to explore, and different levels of challenge one can design, without overwhelming the player.
Fritz Wallace: I will say, I didn’t get the overarching structure of the game, with the spear and whatnot, until the second time I played it, and went “Oh, that’s how it all comes together.”
Jongwoo Kim: Awesome. Well, I’m glad that worked for you on the second playthrough for sure.
Fritz Wallace: I think that’s pretty much everything I had to ask. This is the part where if you want to give a shout out, or mention a current project, this would be the ideal place to do that.
Jongwoo Kim: Well, I definitely have something cooking right now, but it’s not ready to show yet. I’m excited to unveil it to the world, and it’s coming soon.
Fritz Wallace: Well, I’m looking forward to it. Thanks for taking the time to talk with me!
Lucifer Within Us is available for PC on Steam. If this interview has made you interested, you can find it here!
