Steam Library A-Z Challenge

The challenge: To play through each of the games on my Steam library. The rules: I have to play at least 1 hour of each game, in alphabetical order. The Banner Saga came out in 2014, and I remember being so hyped for it. I love the aesthetic, and I love tactics games so this one seemed right up my alley. The Banner Saga is set in a Viking-inspired world where, weeks before the beginning of the game, the sun stopped moving in the sky. I love this - normally darkness is the herald of evil but this is just way more ominous to me. You play as a group of Varl (giants with horns) travelling around the human lands getting tithes for the Varl King. Later in the game you also play as humans fleeing the creatures known as the Dredge, and the story just gets more exciting (and depressing) from there. Such a beautiful caravan...shame if something were to happen to it (it will :( ) The game is split into two main phases - travelling and combat. The combat is fairly easy to learn but ...

The challenge: To play through each of the games on my Steam library. The rules: I have to play at least 1 hour of each game, in alphabetical order. Arsenal of Democracy is another one of those dry looking games we got in a Paradox mega-bundle, bought many years ago. The background art on Steam shows a flow chart, which I'm guessing is some kind of skill tree. Looking at Google, I'm guessing the game is a Risk clone. Judging by reviews, it's a well received wargame, with enough complexity and depth to keep you entertained for hours. All of these are guesses, however, as I could not get this damned game to load. Arsenal of Democracy is a hilarious name if you think about it though I tried troubleshooting this thing for nearly half an hour, using all of the power Google could muster. I failed. Sorry, everyone! Arsenal of Democracy: In my 'Doesn't Work' folder.

The challenge: To play through each of the games on my Steam library. The rules: I have to play at least 1 hour of each game, in alphabetical order. I picked up Armello from a recent Humble Bundle, and I'll admit I bought it because it was described as a 'board / card / dice rolling game' which are words that are always exciting to me. The plot of the game is simple, and told in some very pretty animated cutscenes. The King of Armello (a lion) has become infected with Rot, which is causing him to both act all evilly and slowly die. Your job is to deal with this situation, and you can do so in a few different ways - these are the win conditions of the game. First of all the tutorials are really cute, and hand-hold you through the basic mechanics of the game. You move your character around a hex grid, where you can fight rivals and monsters, explore dungeons, and complete quests. I'll admit these mostly sound more interesting than they are - the dungeoneering i...

The challenge: To play through each of the games on my Steam library. The rules: I have to play at least 1 hour of each game, in alphabetical order. Age of Wonders: Shadow Magic is the third AoW game. Strangely it doesn't have any number attached to it, so I had to look up where it came in the series chronologically. Steam has listed it after AoW3, and I'm not sure why AoW3 wasn't called AoW4, but there we go. The intro of the game tells me that the wizard wars of the first two games have sucked the life force out of the world, and because of this wizardry is outlawed. Because you play as a mage in this game you have to take the side of the arcane, which is a bit sad. We (or at least, sensible, forward-thinking people) take steps to minimize the damage we do to our environment, so it makes sense that in a setting where magic is killing the world it should be at least limited. I suspect that later on in the game it'll be revealed that wizardry is fine and it...

The challenge: To play through each of the games on my Steam library. The rules: I have to play at least 1 hour of each game, in alphabetical order. The newest of the Age of Wonders games (by a good ten years or so), AoW3 is subtitled 'Eternal Lords'. I think maybe it should be called 'Age of Wonders 3: Eternal Loads'. My computer trying to load this game I was starting to get a bit nervous that the game wouldn't start at all when it finally booted up, and after skipping past all of the developer intros I found myself at the title screen. This is the first place AoW3 pleasantly surprised me. Right at the very bottom middle of the screen is a button labelled 'Get Started!' It was almost as if the game was super enthusiastic to have me here, like it was saying 'Yeah, you didn't like the last place I lived but look, my new house is way nicer!' The plot of the game is that the Light Elves and the Dark Elves have finally made amends after ...

The challenge: To play through each of the games on my Steam library. The rules: I have to play at least 1 hour of each game, in alphabetical order. Age of Wonders 2 seemed to crash less than Age of Wonders 1, but that's the only reason I preferred it. Whilst I could forgive AoW1 for being a bit ugly and rough, AoW2 seemed to embrace it's early 2000's aesthetic. I'm convinced the entire budget of AoW2 was spent on particle effects, as there's one for basically every situation. Spells? Particles. A unit dies? It turns into particles. Found a new point of interest? It's highlighted by, yes, particles. The plot for this one seems worse too - the intro shows white male protag (tm) sailing on an airship, which gets attacked by some pretty rad looking dragons (who breathe red particles). The guy (called Merlin) falls into the sea and then is told by a wizard (who really should have been called Merlin) that he needs to reclaim all of the different elements of ...

The challenge: To play through each of the games on my Steam library. The rules: I have to play at least 1 hour of each game, in alphabetical order. Apparently in the past we bought all of the Age of Wonders games, which means that you are now entering the Age of Wonders Bloc. Steam largely lists these in chronological order, with the exception of Age of Wonders: Shadow Magic, which will be the last one of the series I'll try. So, Age of Wonders. This game was released in 1999, and I think it was fairly popular. The tiny pixelated graphics remind me of the countless hours I burned playing Command & Conquer, so it instantly endeared itself to me. Everything is clear enough to be very playable, and I actually cheered out loud when I saw this game had some useful elements such as tutorials! Tooltips, even! As far as I can tell humans are the baddies in this game - they invade Elven lands and decide to kill them all. The Elves are living in castles and rainbows whereas...

The challenge: To play through each of the games on my Steam library. The rules: I have to play at least 1 hour of each game, in alphabetical order. So, originally I was going to play one game for at least an evening, rather than for an hour, but smarter people than me advised me this might be a terrible idea. They were right, and I found this out after trying the first game on my list: Achtung Panzer - Kharkov 1943. In Achtung Panzer you play as a military commander in charge of German troops, fighting the USSR. The game is in two parts; a simplistic map overview where you control units square by square, and then a real-time strategy section where you control tanks, men, and some kind of incredibly squeaky wheeled jeep. Of course all of this could be made up because this game gives you no help whatsoever. There are no tutorials or even tooltips. My best guess at how to shoot at the bad guys was 'this looks a bit like a little guy with a gun'. The map overview. I...