First established in 2020, Joystick Ventures is one of those indie game publishers that I admit I hadn’t paid much attention to before, if only because being relatively new, their current lineup is a bit slim. That said, they’ve already published notable titles such asDo Not Feed the Monkeys 2099andLost in Play,the latter being one of my favorite games of 2022, so they clearly have an eye for quality. And they certainly wanted to show off this level of quality at PAX East, bringing a whopping eight games to the show floor. Did any of them end up being worth checking out? Well, let’s go through them and find out…
We may as well kick things off withwhat I’ve already stated as being the best game of the show,Enter the Chronosphere, from developers Effort Star. It might be tough to explain exactly why it deserved top honors, but the most basic reasons are that it was one of the most innovative games at the show and one of the most fun. You play as one of multiple characters tasked with exploring and disbaling chronspheres, colossal structures capable of messing with time and reality. And to showcase how they can mess with time, the top-down roguelike action operates bySuperhotrules, that being everything else only moves when you move, be it walking, dodging, shooting, reloading, etc. All while the inhabitants of these chronospheres are trying to kill you with many, many bullets.
Twisted Time Tactics
There have been more than a few attempts over the years to try and merge turn-based strategic gameplay with full-on action, typically seen during RPGs.Enter the Chronosphere,however, is the first to figure out how to do it in such a fun, unique and easy-to-understand way. Just point in a direction, click and move to/shoot at your desired spot. You can take the time to plan things out, move in rapid shifts, one after the other, or anywhere in between. There’s a particular thrill in successfully dealing with a bullet hell scenario as you perfectly maneuver around projectiles, emerging from them into an area that provides the room needed to get off a successful shotgun blast at the attacker, and this is a game that never stops with those kinds of thrills, thanks to perfectly-executed and creative action.
There are a lot of other subtle touches to enjoy here, from the designs of each circular, mazelike floor to the psychedelic visuals and the bits of surreal humor, such as a mini-boss who fights you by summoning exploding cows. And this extends to the fun part of any such roguelike games, where you try and earn the perfect blend of upgrades, buffs and builds that makes for a combination which can wreck anything in your path. Would you like to play as a giant bear who flings knives out from their body in all directions after a certain amount of moves? Who wouldn’t? There’s just a ton inEnter the Chronosphereso far that’s just plain fun and unique.
Had it not been forEnter the Chronosphere,though, our pick for the best game in Joystick Ventures' showing would have gone to 43 Studios’Hell of an Office.It’s a first-person parkour platformer currently available in Early Access for all to try out, and I even have a copy in my own backlog, which I admit I haven’t gotten around to yet. And after finally getting some time with the game at its exhibit, I am now kicking myself quite a bit. You play as an employee of HellO, Hell’s main producer of infernal office supplies, and to escape your infernal job contract, you’ll have to navigate a series of deadly obstacle courses as quickly as possible, what with a large pool of lava that’s slowly rising beneath you.
Just Another Day at the Office
Comparisons toNeon Whitefeel inevitable, but there’s a lot here to still setHell of an Officeapart, such as its greater focus on verticality, with a trusty explosive stapler allowing you to rocket jump and achieve new heights, making sure you locate the nicely-placed markings guiding you along the way. Said stapler also burns its way through walls of documents blocking your path, and combined with an air dash, gives you a lot of fun tools to start out with. As expected, the challenge is in trying to figure out what skill is needed on the fly while leaping from platform to platform as quickly as possible, which is always tricky yet fair, and rewards your expertly stringing together the right combo of dashes and stapler blasts.
The Top Ten Games of PAX East 2024
PAX East 2024 has come and gone, having delivered four days of gaming goodness, which included these ten particular highlights from the show floor.
The visuals are also nice and charming, leaning into the office setting as various supplies surround you in a sort of surreal, twisted fashion, as there are even first-person segments in between major levels where you can interact with NPCs and get more world-building, which also leads to a lot of nice humor. But once again, the thrill is in finding ways to shave off those extra seconds in order to get those sweet, end-of-level gold medals. Fast-paced and full of zaniness in several gleeful ways (and I haven’t even gotten to even greater obstacles and gameplay mechanics yet),Hell of an Officeis worth grabbing right now, and we can’t wait to see what additions arrive as the game develops over time, leading up to its Version 1.0 release.
Similar toHell of an Office, Toy Tacticsis another game published by Joystick Ventures that’s currently available in Early Access, the creation of developers Kraken Empire. It’s an RTS game where all of the troops are styled to resemble various figurines used in historical reenactments. Aside from that, the game’s other unique hook is its drawing mechanic, where you can use the mouse to draw different formations for your soldiers to fight in. It’s a clever and fun idea, the style makes for some great visuals, and it all plays and controls well. The only downside is that the demo provided only covered the tutorial mission, which didn’t exactly showcase any wider variety the game may have. Still, it’s good enough that it might be worth picking up in its early state.
Speaking of game that ended up being tricky to cover, Summitsphere’s gameAntonblastwas showcased here as well, after appearing onlast year’s list of the best PAX East games.The gameplay didn’t showcase anything too radically different compared to back then, however, though I finally got the opportunity to try out a new character – Anton’s co-worker Annie – as well as a different level. Annie seemed to have a great focus on gambling-themed vices as their motif, but basically controlled the same. The level design is also still nice and huge with plenty of secrets, while the gameplay actually features a nice emphasis on speed in addition to destruction, helping it differ a bit more from itsWario Landinspirations. Overall, it’s still shaping up to be a terrific platformer with a lot of personality and great action.
Speaking of odes to classic Nintendo games,Big Boy Boxingis an ode to thePunch-Outgames courtesy of Soupmasters, but with the added inspiration ofCupheadas well. Where it’s easy to look at the game and simply say that it’s because of the zany cartoon art style, things go a little deeper when you realize that the game merges the colorful character designs ofPunch-Outwith the boss battle structure ofCuphead.E
ach of your opponents has unique gimmicks and different phases that change things up, such as an opponent that turns out to be three kids in a trenchcoat, and as you whittle them down, each kid stands on the side of the area, attacking you in different ways as well. Even as someone who typically never plays sports games, it was easy to get into, fun to work out each pattern and strategy while getting used to the special attacks, and had a nice set of challenges for each boss worth aiming for. Overall, it’s something that was deeper than expected and worth checking out.
Also getting deeper than expected wasStarVaders,a roguelike deckbuilding strategy game from the titular StarVaders Studio. The core gameplay seems similarto last year’sCobalt Core,being another game where you use cards to move across spaces and attack enemies. WhereStarVadersdiffers is that not only does it have grid-based movement and more enemies, but as its name may suggest, it also borrows fromSpace Invadersas well, with the goal being to prevent enemies from reaching the bottom area and filling up the “Doom” meter, triggering a loss.
There’s also a nifty “overheat” mechanic that allows you to go beyond the number of action points provided per turn, at the risk of ruining some of your cards, which can make all the difference. It’s addictive, creative stuff, and it’s easy to see someone getting sucked into this game for hours.
Then there’sChicken Police: Into the Hive,a sequel to 2020’sChicken Police: Paint it Red,which I didn’t have a clever segue into. Full disclosure, I haven’t gotten around to playing the first game yet, that being lost in my backlog as well, but it quickly became clear that you didn’t need to play the debut game in order to appreciate this latest entry featuring a twisted world of anthropomorphic characters. The noir atmosphere is perfectly executed, the dialogue clever and witty as well, and the design and uniqueness of the titular Hive areas that brings more insect-like characters into play was impressive as well.
Also notable were the interrogations and the possible leads into branching paths available, as seen when was given options to try and get a password from a bar’s pianist, and one of them led into a drinking game that was fun. It looks to be more than a worthy sequel with great characters and story elements, so consider this on the radar.
Finally, we havePhantom Fury,the follow-up toIon Furyfrom Slipgate Ironworks, which is a boomer shooter…and that’s all I have to say about it. Well, okay, there’s obviously more, such as how the presentation has shifted to being an ode to later ’90s shooters such asHalf-Lifeinstead of pixelated Build Engine games. As such, it looks good, and there’s also a lot to interact with, which made for a fun sequence in a bar. But as we have plans for a more detailed preview of the game later, and I’m not exactly the biggest expert on the more subtle differences between games in the genre, there’s not much for me to cover right now. I will say that blowing opponents into chunky spaghetti sauce with a shotgun never stopped being fun, though that felt like a given.
Venture? Capital!
Needless to say, Joystick Ventures is clearly gearing up even more to become a major indie publisher, as evidenced by a current lineup that doesn’t feature a single dud in the bunch and has several games that could be some of the best to come later on. It’s a venture that leads to a massive amount of support for a ton of promising games with a lot of variety, and as such, it’s a venture more than worth taking.
