No One Lives Under the Lighthouse XSX Review 8/10 "More Bite-Sized Horror Gold" 🗼 @marevocollectiv #IndieGames #GameDev

I am a big fan of bite-sized titles that can be enjoyed in a single evening – horror titles especially, as Boomfire’s recent The Creepy Syndrome reminded me.

No One Lives Under the Lighthouse is a game with some serious character in its presentation that drew me in on multiple levels from the visual style through to the subtle gameplay mechanics, narrative, and incredible sound design – with the only slight hiccup for me being the final sequence of events.

The game – a first-person adventure - opens with your character being dropped off at a remote island, with the titular lighthouse looming large. The boatman makes cryptic comments about the previous lighthouse keeper before rowing back off into the darkness, leaving you alone on the island….or are you?

Video Game Lo-fi: Sonic Curaga Records Vinyl Review 💿 🌴💨 #VideoGameVinyl #Vinyl

There’s something about the lo-fi genre that completely resonates with me. Over the years I’ve covered several lo-fi versions of various video game soundtracks, and I appear to always be in the mood for a lo-fi record, there’s something about the low, beat-driven mellow vibes that gets me hips deep into the music, and in cases where I have a personal history with the game in question, I can genuinely find myself getting totally caught up in it, as was very much the case with a specific track on this particular record.

Kill It With Fire VR Review 7/10 "Lots and Lots Of SPIDERS!!!" 🕷️🔥 @KIWF_Game #IndieGames #GameDev

SPIDERS!

Still here? Well, they make some people run a mile so now they've all gone, let's talk about Kill It With Fire. Because this game features spiders. Lots and lots of spiders. 

Waaay back in the beforetime (1990), there was a movie called Arachnophobia, which also featured lots of spiders. If you haven't seen it, watch it, it's great. Anyway, the reason that comes to mind is one particular scene in which Jeff Daniels makes a flamethrower from a lighter and an aerosol can. This prompted a spate of arson-lite events at my school which resulted in a lot of kids nearly blowing their hands off with cans of Lynx Africa (which, by the way, smells even worse when it's lit), and general flame-based mayhem. 

Some 30-odd years later and Kill It With Fire comes to VR, giving you the opportunity to relive the excitement of the homemade flamethrower, but with none of the danger. 

But that isn't all.