Month: August 2025

Review: Catacomb 3-D

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Developer: iD Software
Publisher: Softdisk
Year: 1991
Genre: FPS

box art for catacomb 3d showing a guy holding a gun and a monster
I am a fan of the incredibly inaccurate box art for the game

Catacomb 3-D is the third game in the Catacomb series and the first in the series to be a first person shooter. I feel like people sometimes claim it’s the first FPS, but that’s incorrect and it’s not even the first FPS by iD Software. In this game you play as a wizard named Petton Everhail and must explore a series of catacombs to defeat the evil lich Nemesis and rescue your friend Grelminar. Different releases of the game switch the names around but that makes no sense to me and the later games refer to the lich as Nemesis so that’s what I’m sticking with.

Today the game is pretty simplistic compared to even FPS that would come out a few years later. You wander around maze-like levels and shoot fireballs at a variety of monsters that you would expect to see in a fantasy setting. The fireball is the only weapon you have, but you can pick up two different powerup types that shoot multiple fireballs at the same time but in different patterns. It still has a little bit of a rpg influence since you pick up healing potions that you choose to use when you think you need them.

two demons and a lich

Even though it’s dated, I still had fun. It’s very interesting from a games history perspective and I liked seeing what id software dropped and what they carried to their later FPS. Walls can be destroyed by shooting at them, adding more of an exploration element to this game compared to Doom. There’s also some puzzles that you need to figure out from reading scrolls. I think the enemies are charming too. I really enjoyed the pixel art for them and their animations.

I would recommend the CatacombGL source port if you want to check it out. It adds a lot of nice features like widescreen and smoother movement.

Catacomb 3-D is available on GOG.

Blog Roundup (August 10, 2025)

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It’s still Blaugust which means my RSS feed reader is still packed with stuff to read all the time. I think that’s pretty nice. To continue my trend of Library Posting, I picked up more prizes from the Ann Arbor Summer Game yesterday, so now I finally have an AADL shirt with another one or two on the way. If you like any of these blogs, add them to your RSS feed reader. I use Inoreader but there’s plenty of other good ones too.

Video Games

I think the brief description of RetroAchivements in here made me want to give it a try.

Folks, you need to boycott Microsoft. Stop buying their games, stop covering them on your games outlets, etc. It’s 2025 Year of the Linux Desktop (unironically).

I share Rob’s feelings on why the Ludocene app is kinda goofy.

I love to see blogs highlighting cool stuff made in Decker.

Syl highlights some nice small games.

I think this was a nice tribute to Roberta Vaughan, a beloved member of the adventure game community.

I really enjoyed this review of Ultimate’s game Underwurlde. Unfortunately, every time I hear about the company Ultimate I just think about how their full name is Ultimate Play the Game and wonder how it’s supposed to be said. Is it “Ultimate (pause) Play the Game” or do you say it all without the pause?

I should also probably play Starcross sometime, Infocom’s 1982 sci-fi text adventure.

The Video Game History Foundation acquired Computer Entertainer magazine, which ran from 1982-1990, and put it into the Creative Commons.

Technology

I’ve gotten into more self hosting and media server stuff over the last couple years and I’m always excited to see more recommendations for Homelab software

Music

Garrett Schumann wrote about local Ann Arbor music legend Fred Thomas

Vinzenz did a song-by-song breakdown of their great new album A Clearing. Also consider checking out their games.

Dev Logs

I’m just happy to see progress being made on Death Ray Manta 2.

TTRPG writers can do dev logs too and I just like hearing about what Dinoberry Press is working on.

Other Stuff

Another link to local stuff, I enjoyed this history of the oldest active train station in the United States, located in Jackson, Michigan.

My Favorite Radio Stations

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Even though this Strong Bad email is very accurate, I love public and college radio. I think the curation it offers beats streaming and it’s how I discover new music these days.

Anyway, here are my favorite radio stations. All of these can be streamed and it is probably not a huge surprise that I own t-shirts for all of them. If you have a community radio station you like, consider supporting them if you can fit it in your budget. Funding is being cut for everything good right now and they need support.

WDET – Detroit’s NPR station. I think it has a lot of good music shows that play at night and as a local, the news programming is relevant to me as well.

WCBN-FM – The University of Michigan’s radio station. It’s pretty chaotic and they play a wide range of stuff and a lot of obscure things too.

WPRB – A community radio station in Princeton, New Jersey. I really like Jon Solomon’s show on Wednesdays and he hosts a 25 hour long Christmas music marathon every year where he stays up those entire 25 hours and plays really weird christmas music including a 40 minute version of Little Drummer Boy

KEXP – A legend in Seattle. They have helped so many bands from the area, including the whole grunge scene, and I like all the alternative rock they play

Indie Game Roundup (August 8, 2025)

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I don’t know what happened but it feels like there were a million games this weekend, so apologies for the massive and kinda messy list. I hope you all are doing well. Blaugust has been pretty fun so far and it’s been nice seeing so many posts from other people I follow. If you’ve got a blog, consider joining in and posting a bunch!

Video Games

A new Indiepocalypse (Itch.io) has been released this month, featuring a nice set of video games and ttrpgs.

people crowding around something called a "drink-up contest"

Wildwood Down (Steam) is an adventure game where you must solve a murder mystery at a boardwalk in New Jersey. The game features a protagonist with Down Syndrome modeled after and voiced by the designer’s childhood friend and has been receiving positive reviews from what I can see, which I think is really neat. There’s a demo available too.

I haven’t played anything submitted to the GMTK jam but it has almost 10,000 games so I’m sure there’s a few good ones in there.

Strange Jigsaws (Steam) is what you expect it to be, a collection of strange jigsaw puzzles. But I was a big fan of their previous game, the very good and free 20 Small Mazes.

This Downpour game touring the games exhibit at a local library is great! More games folks should do events at their library.

looking down a very tall tree

FALLSTRUKTUR (Steam/Itch.io) is a free game where you must descend down a giant structure in a first person view without falling too far. Sometimes you’re just awful at a game but can appreciate that it’s well made.

Valerie Paris has a very nice asset pack and tutorial on Itch for doing your own Myst-style adventure game.

Zentera (Itch.io) was already out but the assets and engine were just released for people to use on their own games.

Wholesome Games is doing a whole thing on Steam, don’t @ me about discourse, and it seems like some games releases have happened during it too? Is This Seat Taken? is a puzzle game about seating people at tables and booths. And Tall Trails is a chill exploration game.

people hanging out at a tiny bookshop on a wagon

I don’t think? Tiny Bookshop (Steam) is connected to that one, but I am a book nerd so this has been one I’ve been watching for a while. It has a demo!

isometric view of a robot walking on a bridge between two buildings

I don’t think Sands of Home (Steam) is either but it’s heavily marketed to the chill, cozy games crowd as well. It is an isometric puzzle game and features a demo.

1000 Deaths (Steam) looks like a very trippy 3D platformer and there’s a demo available to try. Something about it reminds me of early 00s console games.

1 bit art of an open door and a spiral staircase

I don’t know anything about PAGER (Steam) but it’s an adventure game with a nice 1-bit aesthetic so it’s going in the post. Someone let me know how it is!

I haven’t heard anything about Prometheum (Itch.io) either but it’s published by Thalamus so it’s probably a good arcade game where you blow things up. I was also excited to see that Ste Pickford did some art for the game.

art of a forest on a desktop

Desktop Forest (Steam) is just a really chill time on your desktop and it’s $1. There’s a bunch of options so you can adjust it to the scenery you like and then you just let it run and listen to the nature sounds.

top down view of someone in a dungeon with 3 spider monsters

Azaran: The Demon Bottle (Steam) is a short game inspired by the first Zelda game.

TTRPGs

Dragon Reactor (Backerkit) is described as a “mythopoetic mech tragedy game about conflict on a grand scale.” It’s for 2+ players, with one as a GM, has a demo, and I think it’s worth a look. I’m a huge fan of Dinoberry Press and it’s always nice to see them working on another game.

Black Mirror: Bandersnatch

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Developer: House of Tomorrow
Publisher: Netflix
Year: 2018
Genre: Interactive Movie

bandersnatch box art pixel art cover of a guy and a spiral laid over his head

Bandersnatch is an interactive episode of Black Mirror where viewers make decisions at key points to determine the outcome of the story. The episode is about a young man who is developing an adaptation of a novel but feels he is starting to lose his grip on reality as he develops the game. Through various points in the story you are offered a choice between two options and each one will lead you down a different branch. I wasn’t very impressed with the options offered and felt very railroaded during the whole thing. That’s probably part of the point of this thing and the story it’s telling, but it also just kinda meant I became bored with the idea of it all pretty quickly. Often when people criticize Black Mirror, it’s for making really basic statements like “what if technology was bad?” I don’t think this is always the case but it certainly felt like it with this episode, while feeling very smug at the same time. I’m not a fan of Black Mirror in general though so this may have been something I was never going to enjoy. There are many other games that do a much better job having meta commentary about choice in games that you can play instead. However, it does get some points for the Jeff Minter cameo.

I guess it doesn’t really matter that much about how I felt about this game. It was delisted earlier this year and as of this writing, I don’t believe any of Netflix’s interactive movies are available anymore. It’s a big shame because I’m not opposed to the idea of them and I heard some of them were good, but Netflix will dip its toes into games and then get distracted and decide it’s not really worth the focus. It feels like they’re going through something similar with their mobile games offering and dropping a bunch of games from their service on there as well. I can’t imagine it helps that no one knows Netflix even offers their games.

It’s not all doom though. People have figured out how to preserve these interactive movies and with some searching online, you can find the preservation efforts pretty easily. Even though I didn’t enjoy Bandersnatch very much, I’m glad it was preserved and will be available for people to check out for years to come.

Black Mirror: Bandersnatch is no longer available on Netflix but is easy to find through your favorite search engine.

Proposals A and B Passed in Ann Arbor!

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Local library posting again but it’s wonderful to wake up and see that proposals A and B passed in Ann Arbor. This means that a parking lot that has been sitting next to the library for over a decade will be transferred to the library where they can build a new, larger library that will also include affordable housing. My limited understanding is that it had a vote in 2017 to make it a park, which it was never suitable for nor did the city or the citizens group that pushed for that vote ever do anything with it. As relatable as I can find “no really, I’ll get right to doing this task any minute,” I’m glad that it will belong to the library. The amount of misinformation being spent and put out by this group saying that the vote was to destroy parks was intense and I was worried it wouldn’t pass. It turns out it wasn’t even close though.

“We’ve replaced a parking lot with a library and affordable housing” is my dream scenario for any city and a great thing to wake up to.

I was hoping the proposal for Livonia to build a lot of new buildings for the city would pass but didn’t expect it to and it didn’t. It’s Livonia, which is a lot more conservative, and I knew that a monthly increase of $10-15 per month in taxes would be a tough sell.

But I’ll take the new downtown library in Ann Arbor. Congrats to the city!

THIRST/HUNGER Reviews

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Developer: Christina Stone-Bush
Year: 2019
Genre: Solo TTRPG

pixel art for Thirst, showing a black and white woman looking down
pixel art cover for Hunger, showing a black and white photo of a woman's mouth

THIRST and HUNGER are two tabletop rpgs created back in 2019 for a game jam where the rules must fit on a business card. Both games are erotic solo ttrpgs about a vampire biting a human, but each game is played from a different perspective. The games are played with a deck of cards and something to write your notes with. You answer some prompts at the beginning, and each card that is drawn is another prompt to describe what is happening or how you are feeling. The game ends in a way similar to blackjack, you must keep drawing cards if your total is under 14, if it is over that then you may stop. If it over 21 then the game automatically ends. The two ranges where the game ends also have different prompts. Both games are very short and should only take a few minutes to play, but can be replayed many times. The layout of the games is great, with everything cleanly organized to fit on a business card without feeling cramped. The rules are very concise due to the business card limitation, which makes it very easy to pick up. As everyone knows, vampires are hot and this game succeeds in its goal. In addition to the games being effective at being erotic, I just think it’s mechanically interesting to use the Blackjack limitation of 21 for a ttrpg. It inspired me for my game Navigator, so it’s also very important to my own creativity as well.

While they have been delisted on Itch, THIRST and HUNGER are still available for download on Itch.io

The Ann Arbor District Library Archives

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Shoutout to the Ann Arbor District Library archives for no reason other than they’re just a lot of fun to search. I’ve posted before about The Cybertub, but it’s fun to just browse the tags and search to find old computer history. The World Wide Web tag is a lot of fun and I can search for local businesses like Borders Books and Music (who started in Ann Arbor) and find tons of old ads and stuff like that. If anyone has any libraries that have easily searchable archives like this, please link them to me!

Apparently the original website for the AADL is still up and preserved too!

Blog Roundup (August 3, 2025)

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My first blog roundup of Blaugust, the month long event where folks try to make a little blog post every day (not it’s not required for participation in blaugust). It’s been fun seeing folks I already follow jumping in, even unofficially. I recommend these blogs!

If I forgot your blog, please excuse my screwup and let me know so I can follow it too!

The Obscuritory did its first post about a game in years and I’m so excited! I never even heard of The Tone Rebellion.

Indie Tsushin is back!

I haven’t even heard of many of the Games Aura’s Playing and that’s awesome.

I also love to hear about marketing adventure games and just stuff along those lines, so here’s exodrifter talking about No Signal.

I think if you’ve been following my blog then you are used to me telling you to see a RSS feed reader, but here’s a very good intro guide to them for you to share with friends.

It looks like Myst Online has a bunch of events organized by the community coming up this week! Just a reminder that Myst Online is absolutely free to play.

Do tumblr posts count as blog posts? Maybe? Anyway, here’s a good post on Ultima Underworld.

It’s not a blog post about I liked this video on The Hidden Origin of Artillery Games.

Also not a blog post but I like this website on why you should leave Substack and alternatives you can move to.

Gemini

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I’ve joked sometimes on social media about how there needs to be an Internet 2 because of how crappy the modern internet has become, but I just learned about the Gemini protocol, which is maybe not The Internet 2 but a fun thing to noodle with, thanks to this blog post. I’ve downloaded Lagrange, which seems like the recommended application for looking at these pages and started poking around. I think it’s pretty neat so far, even if I have no idea what I’m doing. If you have a page, I guess let me know? I’ve found a few pages from people I know but I’m always looking for more to bookmark since I’m still learning how to navigate this. I would also appreciate any tutorials on how to make your own page so I can do my own.