Keymailer has received an update of sorts since the last time I put up one of these “finding games” things. Now, the vast majority of games releasing more than a week from whenever you look aren’t available to request. Instead, they display as “this game is not available on Keymailer” with an option to be notified if/when they become available, which is a long shot for the rarer ones that release in a week or sooner and still aren’t available. I don’t understand or have the slightest clue how this system works behind the scenes. Some people are apparently content with showing up to announce that they’ve done something without putting any effort into getting people to engage with it. Out of touch indies make this a weird industry.

First up, we have some new rejections! Ghostrunner didn’t pan out. I’d probably get farther with games like that if I spent time building up a massive Twitter following instead of automating notification tweets for reviews and making clear that I don’t actually use Twitter for anything outside of spam, but engaging with industry personalities doesn’t seem like a good mix for someone who handles editorial content. The more you see developers as human beings and less as faceless automatons, the harder it becomes to ring that shame bell when they make something that sucks. Speaking of things that suck, I also got turned down for Cardpocalyse and Pumpkin Jack, neither of which I had any real interest in beyond poking at antagonistic publishers Versus Evil and Headup. Kalypso is my big bad, but those two are definitely runners-up.

It didn’t take long to find something that looked intriguing. The questionably-named YesterMorrow is a pixel art platformer with a time-travel mechanic. Basically, the monster apocalypse happens and the main character is given the opportunity to travel to the past and prepare for their arrival in advance, which somehow translates to platforming around and fighting large bosses. I can dig it. I have some minor concerns, though, chiefly among which the slightly floaty movement and the fact that there are no visible menu elements displaying your health or that of bosses in any of the screenshots or videos. Dear game developers (in general): the rest of us can’t differentiate between things that are missing for the sake of flashy videos/screenshots and things that are missing because they don’t exist in the game at all. Stahp. Fortunately, YesterMorrow had a demo floating around a while back, and footage from that displays a health bar for the playable character. I’m still not sure if bosses have health bars, though. Probably?

But the idea of visiting a smaller, more comfortable area at different time periods and being able to note the changes is appealing. It’s hard to tell how many times you travel through time, so I’m not expecting a Prince of Persia: Warrior Within degree of time-hoppery (in fact, I’d say that it’s very likely that you only travel back in time the once), but it could go very right depending on how much time is spent establishing a sense of place before getting sent back. A strong enough opening could carry much of the game.

The next game that caught my eye was The Falconeer, a game where you fly around on top of a giant bird with a weapon attached to it. It looks like your traditional arcade flying game, only with a more open world. Looking it up on Google, I saw a lot of “it’s on the new Xbox Series X/S! Launch day! Yay yay yay buy buy buy!” There’s no option to request it on anything but PC. That’s fine, though—after realizing that most of my consoles are secondary platforms at best and I end up playing everything on PC anyway because that’s the easiest platform to obtain keys for, I’m not so sure that I’m going to getting a next-gen console at all. Mostly because I’ve spent all of the money earmarked for the consoles on new camera lenses and lighting equipment. I’m also looking into getting a Black Magic Pocket Cinema Camera 4K, which apparently pairs well with the Sigma 18-35mm f1.8 Art lens I just got. It’s a crop-frame lens, so it won’t work with my trusty Canon 5D Mk II, but I have a 500D from a long time ago that still works, and pairing that camera’s amazing noise pattern with something as sharp as the Sigma is going to be magical.

Basically, games are stupid and I have several even more expensive hobbies. Throwing more money at this site for consoles I’ll barely use is a stupid idea, whereas camera lenses retain their value. The Sigma still costs 500-700 dollars despite releasing back in 2013. For context, that’s the year that Kalypso’s incest simulator The Dark Eye: Demonicon released. Anyway, The Falconeer looks pretty good, like a moody mix between The Legend of Zelda: Wind Waker and Panzer Dragoon. The store page mentions something about joining and supporting factions, which suggests a certain amount of story pliability, but there’s no way of knowing if your choices result in huge differences or merely superficial ones. That’s one of those things that’s difficult (and often impossible) to piece together even if you dig into every trailer, tweet, and screenshot released since a game’s announcement. You have to play to know if it truly walks the walk.

There were some interesting games that I passed up for various reasons, with the one I’m most mixed about being one of those Wales Interactive choose-your-own-adventure games that use live-action footage. It’s called Five Dates and looks intriguing. I just can’t get past live-action footage in my games. I have all of my gaming stuff compartmentalized to the point where I feel like a floating ball of criticism whenever I’m working on this site. In a good way. It’s hard to be a disembodied god of critique when you’re looking at actors looking straight into the camera. It’s worlds colliding and weirds me the hell out.

I came across The Skylia Prophecy shortly afterward. There are some possible red flags here—namely the seemingly casual reference to sexual assault like it’s an ordinary form of world-building—but the game releases on November 20th, and I can’t think of any other games I’m interested in around that time. The Game Boy Advance Castlevania vibe is stylish, the PC requirements are appealingly snarky, and I have faith that this could end up being one of those Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night surprises that win me over.

Haven falls afoul of my “don’t have a generic name that won’t show up on page one of searches” rule, but I also recognized it from a GOG.com announcement post that I happened to catch on one of the days I bothered checking there. Their standards are pretty high—if arbitrary and maddeningly inconsistent—so Haven appearing there is a good sign. Apparently, this is an RPG, though based on some of the trailer, it’s difficult to tell if it has an old-school RPG system where you take turns or something more action-oriented. Not knowing isn’t a problem because I’m down for either. I really like the colors of this one, and floating around alien worlds kind of reminds me of running around Okami‘s world at breakneck speed.

There also appears to be a heavy focus on the relationship between the two characters, which is nice to see; many games feature relationships but only rarely do they factor into the actual story beyond turning one or both partners into MacGuffins once someone is kidnapped, exploded, or betrayed. There’s something about the premise and presentation here that makes me think that there’ll be an LGBT twist, though that may just be my imagination. I kind of want to play Haven to see if my hunch is right.

You may have noticed, but so many games are unavailable at this point that both Haven and Phoenix Point are games that release in December. It’s that hard to find something to request that I just blew through an entire month of games without finding enough games to fill up that month. Then again, I suppose it saves time by reducing the number of games I bother looking at in the first place, so that’s nice, at least. The final game I requested is Phoenix Point: Year One Edition. It released a year ago on the Epic store as an exclusive (though it’s also available on Xbox’s store as a PC download and currently on Game Pass for PC, so… not really exclusive?), but more XCOM is always nice regardless of when it originally released.

I don’t have a lot of faith that this one will come through. Or anything else, actually; the percentage of games that I’ve received a key for after covering them in a “finding games” post is currently at 0%. Oof. Maybe I should transition to covering game news instead of wasting time actually playing things. That way, I can antagonize publishers willy-nilly without a care in the world. And I’d have lots of extra time to call marketing BS out and focus on my other passions without getting frustrated by key acquisition logistics. Or maybe I could stick to impressions, blanket-request everything that can be requested, and spend an hour with anything that comes through. That’d be nice and easy. Fluff articles with hyper-specific titles get more traffic than reviews despite requiring significantly less time, effort, and attention. It’s depressing.

Finding games, requesting games: 11/02/20 first appeared on Killa Penguin