LogFAQs > #978054180

Game #24 Complete! SKEW

Throw This Quote On The Back Of The Box: "Slightly aSKEW"

Final Thoughts:
Alright, I promise no more Jason Isaacs facts. For that, you'll have to subscribe to my podcast "I Yaks About Isaacs". Yes I know that doesn't rhyme but it does if you mispronounce it.

SKEW is a hard one for me to rank because it is an endless runner and I don't particularly like endless runners. It just is a genre I don't really care for so apologize to the endless runner fanclubs across the world. This, however, was almost a pretty good one. It uses the crank, which at least makes it feel like its own thing. I've played a handful of other endless runners before and they're all the same. Well, almost the same. This at least doesn't feel like "endless runner clone #974" which is nice. I was considering playing it a bit more even after feeling like I had a good grasp of things, which is a good sign for stuff like this.

Couple of issues here. The first is that the "fun" controls aren't the best way to control. I was having more fun using the crank and the gyroscope controls, but it was much easier with the dpad and buttons. When I was actually trying to get better scores, I was being boring and hated myself for it. But there was no denying it was easier that way, so I dealt with the self loathing to get them points.

The other thing is the point system is bonkers broken. Ok, so there are technically two segments dring your runs. The first is a sort of standard tunnel. Obstacles come out, you avoid them, and you try to collect orbs. The faster you go the more the points are worth, but also the harder it is to get them because you starting moving fast and they love hiding them right around other obstacles. Then you get to a "free falling" segment. You rotate counterclockwise or clockwise, avoiding boxes and getting orbs. Now, the orbs in the free falling segment and ONLY the free falling segment can be chained. Grab one? Five points. Two in a row? Ten. Three? Twenty. Four? Forty. You have to get them all in a row and there is a ton of luck involved in patterns, but you can get literally hundreds or thousands of points in a single tunnel segment if you're lucky. I figured this out by accident because I went into a tunnel with like seventy points and left with over seven hundred.

This by itself isn't terrible. But here's the thing. It makes the rest of the game feel utterly pointless. The normal segments are like 95% of the gameplay but you get a single point for like five seconds of flight. So either you get a good tunnel segment or you play for an hour. The top place on the leaderboards right now has 351,000 points. I promise you, they did not play this game for the two days it would've taken to get that score otherwise. This game becomes all about the tunnel segments and the stuff you get from the other bits is a pittance. You're throwing pennies on top of Scrooge McDuck's money pile. You're bringing a handful of sand to the beach. Who cares about the ten points I get for playing between falling segments when I can get hundreds upon hundreds during the only bit that matters.

And on top of that you can also make the normal segments trivial. You die if you crash into an obstacle, but if you stop flying and let yourself drag on the floor (or ceiling or walls) you slow down. Now, theoretically the fast you go the more points you get because you eventually go fast enough to get a speed bonus. And then...you get three points for every several seconds you fly instead of one! So...you're throwing three handfuls of sand onto a beach. And also you're going a lot faster so it is much easier to crash into something and lose a life. Oh, and you're going so fast you're going to be missing half of the orbs in the tunnel segments which don't chain but are still worth between 10-25 points.

So you have no incentive to go fast. In fact, you have NEGATIVE incentive to go fast. Here was my strategy: drag myself on the ground to slow down. Get through the tunnel segments with almost zero chance of dying because you are going so slow. Repeat when you gain speed to slow back down. Go through the tunnels and do everything you can to chain orbs. Rinse and repeat. 95% of the game is pointless and you're literally just killing time until the falling segments pop up again. You're literally just twiddling your thumbs going slow and waiting for the big point chance to pop up again.

I got close to 4k and then died during the falling segment and I just didn't have the desire to go back in. OH! And I forgot to mention: the orbs that are worth points and the boxes that kill you in those falling segments look very close to each other because the Playdate is in black and white and they're both the same general size and shape. So my success felt like 5% due to my skill at maneuvering my character, 45% on the luck of the layout of the boxes and orbs, and 50% on passing this eye exam I forgot to study for. I got a decent score and just couldn't motivate myself to go back in. Not that it wasn't mildly enjoyable, because it was. But that scoring system makes so much of the game feel pointless that I didn't feel like wasting my time to hope I got a good layout of boxes.

Fine endless runner. Uses the crank. Some dumb design ideas. BUT it isn't HANA so good going, SKEW!

Should You Play It? Maybe? It isn't bad but it isn't great. You might like it more than I did if you like endless runners and can overlook the rough edges. It is only $4 so it feels like it is worth that asking price.

Final Score: 5. As mid as mid gets.

Games Completed: 25/142.

Game Rankings:
25) HANA Spacetime Fantasy
24) Boogie Loops
23) Hidey Spot
22) The Lushes Land
21) Nightingale
20) A Joke That's Worth 0.99 Cents
19) Whitewater Wipeout
18) Snak
17) DYG
16) Lost Your Marbles
15) Grand Tour Legends
14) Demon Quest '85
13) The Fall of Elena Temple
12) Flipper Lifter
11) Questy Chess
10) The Keyper
9) Echoic Memory
8) SKEW: a The Last Worker Spin-Off Featuring Jason Isaacs as SKEW (voiced by Jason Isaacs known for his work in The Last Worker)
7) Omaze
6) Sasquatchers
5) Castle Tintagel
4) Casual Birder
3) Zipper
2) Pick Pack Pup
1) Crankin's Time Travel Adventure