"Sharks and Minnows" and "Lies of P: Overture"

Publisher: Collin's Game Company

Developer: Collin

Platforms: Microsoft Windows (Reviewed)

There's really not a lot to write about with this one, so I'm just going to dive right in (pun very much intended). Sharks and Minnows is an $8 survival horror romp that has been making the Youtuber rounds lately, and I decided I'd give it a shot. Why? Because I'm a predictable creature and this game is all about marine life. So, read on to see if this bite-sized (again, pun very much intended) experience is right for you!

The premise is simple: you're in a swim complex, and your goal is to complete 10 laps in the pool and go home. Only, when you get ready to start your first lap, you realize there's a hammerhead shark in the water...and things only get worse from there. After leaving the water at the end of each lap, the depth of the pool and the denizens dwelling therein get progressively more hazardous, but no matter the obstacle, you must persevere. 

There is, of course, more to this game than just swimming and avoiding dangerous marine life. There's also a light resource management aspect. Swimming drains your stamina bar, which doesn't naturally refill. So, you need to find resources like energy bars or water bottles in order to keep handling laps with any kind of speed. These resources can be found during the occasional mid-lap detour or purchased at a vending machine.

As for how you make these purchases, you use an unlikely currency: dive toys. Each lap in the pool comes with 5 dive toys scattered across the bottom, and if you can take time out of your lap to grab some of these without getting eaten, you can spend them once you emerge. There's stamina resources, but there are also some cunning tools like glow sticks or a flashlight to avoid dangers in deeper, darker waters. 

It's also worth noting that in spite of what I've said so far, this isn't a roguelike. I know that the specific way I've described resource management sounds right out of the roguelike playbook, but thankfully, it isn't!

Technically speaking, Sharks and Minnows is a decent enough package. The graphics aren't anything to write home about, but they establish exactly the right kind of atmosphere, and the sound design also helps. Textures were always solid and I never experienced any animation or audio glitches. Pretty solid stuff, but there are two problems I have with this game on the technical front. Firstly, I had exactly one crash early on, but that was the only one. Secondly, the interact button isn't as responsive as it needed to be. I'd swim above a dive toy, press the button right when it showed up, and about half the time I wouldn't pick it up. The same can be said for resources. It's like the second you enter water, the interact key just doesn't quite work as expected.

Before I move on to the scoring, I have one final qualm: the last lap. It's basically just dependent on luck. The game gives you a hint as to how to survive, but the exact meaning is vague. You're told to use light in order to get through this lap's hazards...but you have more than one light type available, and neither of them seem to work how one might expect. I, for one, interpreted the hint as a sign that I needed to flicker the flashlight to scare something off. This was not the case. Then I thought I maybe just had to keep the light on and turn around to face threats as they came. Again, not the case. Maybe holding a glow stick? Nope. This lap seriously felt impossible for quite a while. In the end, throwing the glow stick is what worked for me, but I've watched people beat that lap without doing that. So, the game stumbles at the last second in the coolest level because of how "90's adventure game" the logic is.

So, there you have it. Sharks and Minnows isn't going to set the world on fire, but it's a fun little survival horror experience that'll give thalassophiles like myself their money's worth. This being an incredibly small game, I'll be using my 2X scoring scale, where my usual maximum of 1 point off for any negative is increased to a maximum of 2.

Let us review:

Technical problems - 1.0

Impossible-feeling final lap - 2.0

The final score for Sharks and Minnows is...

7.0/10 - Good

Well done, Collin, well done!

Publisher: Neowiz

Developer: Neowiz, Round8 Studio

Platforms: Xbox One, Xbox Series X/S, Playstation 4, Playstation 5 (Reviewed), Microsoft Windows, MacOS

For this review, I'm going to be operating under the assumption that you've played Lies of P. So, there'll be some spoilers, but that's usually not a large concern in soulslikes anyway.

Lies of P is one of my favorite games of all time, having handily taken home my GOTY award for 2023 above landmark titles such as Baldur's Gate 3. So, I was excited for the Overture DLC since its announcement. Then, as we all saw, the DLC was shadow-dropped less than a week ago during Summer Games Fest, and I suddenly knew what I was going to be doing that night and many nights after. Now that I've finished it, I'm ready to share some thoughts.

Overture begins with our long-nosed puppet protagonist touching an unusual stargazer and waking up on the outskirts of Krat zoo. Problem is, the zoo was burned down during the puppet frenzy, but it appears to be intact. As Pinocchio and Gemini make their way through this area, they hear that the so-called "legendary stalker" from Krat legend is in the area too, tracking her kidnapped apprentice, Romeo. The stalker, like the zoo, met her end during the puppet frenzy, and anyone who played the base game will know what happens to Romeo all too well. 

With all this in mind, our heroes realize that this unusual stargazer sent them back in time. With this newfound ability to potentially change the course of Krat's history, the team follow in the stalker's footsteps, learning more about who she was and about her relationship not just with Romeo, but with Carlo as well...another character whose fate will be familiar to players. 

But sitting two steps ahead of the legendary stalker and three steps ahead of our heroes is a monster so feared by the alchemists that they tried and failed to contain him at sea. A monster reduced to almost nothing in the base game, but who is in his prime in this piece of history. The true villain of this universe: the self-proclaimed "King of Riddles," Arlecchino. 

As you may be able to gather from the fact that I've actually been saying something about the story in this DLC, the storytelling is actually pretty good. Cutscenes are directed professionally, with unusually good acting. Surprising emotional weight is given to established characters and existing plot points. And I found that I left the DLC with an even greater appreciation for this world's lore than I already did. Lies of P already had the best moment-to-moment story of any soulslike, and it continues that trend with Overture.

In terms of gameplay, you aren't going to find many changes to the formula here...but if you're playing a Lies of P DLC in the first place, I would think you're hoping for the existing formula! Really, the only additions are around 10 new weapons and 2 legion arms. Among the weapons are things like a bow, a Bloodborne-style hook claw, and something called the "silent evangelist's mace"...which seems like a contradictory name, but it's a cool one. For the legion arms, you have one that throws sharp discs and a shotgun one that I like to call "the win button" for how much damage it does.

And on the subject of damage, it must be said that Overture is as difficult as one expects a soulslike DLC to be. On the standard difficulty, enemies hit like a truck, and a lot of them can take a major beating too. But the developers seemingly thought through this, as most of these enemies have low poise. So, if you can mitigate damage for long enough to land a hit, you're more than likely good to go. But like with anything else in a soulslike, you will have to learn patterns well enough to start mitigating in the first place.

The same can be said of the bosses, which are as great as all Lies of P bosses are. I wouldn't say any boss in Overture is better than the best ones from the base game, but I'd call that praising with faint damnation. DLC bosses move faster and hit harder, but their attack patterns are easy to learn. The final boss in particular moves at a frankly dizzying speed, but his patterns are rigid enough to learn quickly. If Lies of P's bosses were tough but fair, these DLC bosses are "tougher" but fair, in other words.

I do, however, have to levy one criticism against this DLC on the difficulty front, and that's in regards to the very first boss you fight. In that fight, it's not a matter of "if" the camera wonks out, it's a matter of "when." The size of the boss paired with the specific way the arena is enclosed means you're going to have the camera up way too close to see anything several times. And you know what? As a result, this was the boss that killed me the most. No other boss in this DLC killed me as many times as this one did, and it's more than a little bit the camera's fault. I tend to give soulslikes a bit of a pass when it comes to camera wonkiness since they all have problems with that, but this time I do think I have to put my foot down a bit. Other than that, though, another solid boss roster!

There's nothing to say on the technical front that can't be said of the base game, other than to say that the new additions to the soundtrack are just as great as one would expect from the base game's quality. So, with that in mind, I suppose it's time to wrap up! As a Lies of P mega-fan, my word might not mean much when I say that Overture is worth every penny, so consider the following instead. Overture takes everything great about the base game (bosses, story, interesting tools) and provides something of equal or greater value. A DLC is a much easier sale to make than a base game, so if you're a fan of the base game, what are you waiting for?

Let us review:

First boss camera woes - 0.5

The final score for Lies of P: Overture is...

9.5/10 - Near Masterpiece

Excellent as always, Neowiz, excellent as always!