Retrospective
From May 1, 2018, to December 17, 2018, the OHR community was once again given the opportunity to relive the days when world exploration, random battle engagement, and chitchatting with townies could become anticipated moments in gaming. Once again, game design was about top-down travel through middling towns, sprawling dungeons, bits of underground places, and all of the fields in-between (except for where fast travel is implemented). Once again, designers were rewarded for implementing all types of throwback design into their games while innovating new mechanics that emulate a classic texture but for the smartphone era. The contest, called Heart of the OHR, had a simple rule: make, add to, or finish a traditional OHRRPG or any game that modeled the titles we played back in 1999. We’ve done it before. We’ve done it again. We’ve even done it a third time. Heck, we’ve done it a fourth time. But could we milk the community stone enough to get into history a successful fifth outing?
This year’s contest window started at the beginning of May, halfway between the March opening of 2016 and the July opening of 2010, but ended during the traditional bugfix window of seasons’ past (mid-December), making for the longest window in Heart of the OHR history. (It was supposed to run until the end of December, but the host had forgotten his own plan and set it to end two weeks earlier than previously scheduled.) The end result led us to having our most voluminous submission period ever with 23 possible contestants and 21 qualified contestants. Games like Restoration of the K’ab and Hanu in Hell were supposed to enter this year’s contest but were either dropped or disqualified due to insufficient content. Other games like Asphodelus, Px, and Zalag: Glustu were not originally designed for Heart of the OHR but seemed to qualify through the extended rules adopted in 2014, so they became contestants. Birdcaged, a title made for the 2018 One-Room Contest, was not originally a contestant but entered the Heart of the OHR by rite of being exactly the kind of RPG we would play in the engine’s early days. In total, we’ve had so many entries this year that to keep opinions fair, voting had to last until mid-February 2019, two months after the contest window ended. But, even with such a large voting period, we still had just 13 unique voters offer their voices. Maybe three months would’ve been better.
In Heart of the OHR seasons past, we’ve had three distinct categories for each game to help voters know how to vote: original release, rerelease, and OHR Legend. This system made it possible for older games to enter with new content and experience new life on the OHR and, perhaps, to give the author some incentive to finish. Now, while the community always looks forward to a new IP, there’s something to be said for a great game that gets more greatness added to it over time, and we all hope to see a great game finished in time. However, because games on the OHR have a history of slow or stalled development, getting new or finished content on any old game is rare. Therefore, it’s a treat when an author sticks to a property long enough to get us to its ending. In this spirit, along with 17 fresh properties debuting in 2018, we’ve had four returns from previous years, with three of those games, Bale, Dark Planet, and You Need a Hero having been original contestants in the previous Heart of the OHR Contest (2016). But, here’s where the story gets interesting. Traditionally, a rereleased game will contain new content beginning where the previous release left off, but this year’s contestants have done something that very few games ever do: they’ve actually rewritten their opening sequences with new and improved content, so the 2018 entries can be played from the start while promising a new experience from their 2016 versions. This hasn’t been done before to the host’s knowledge. The fourth rerelease, Drydocks: A Merchant RPG, is a bit more of a sandbox than a linear adventure and can be started from scratch regardless how the previous release played. This, too, is unique to the contest.
Another interesting phenomenon that occurred in 2018 that has hardly happened in the past was the inclusion of the multi-game author. In 2012, Spoonweaver had entered two games into Heart of the OHR, Legendary Heroes (rereleased version) and Kinvesard: Epilogue of the Princess, marking the first occurrence of the multi-game author in this contest. In 2014, RedMaverickZero had also entered two games, Mr. Triangle’s Adventure and Batman and Robin. These were the only two times in Heart of the OHR history that one author had released two different titles in the same contest year. It seemed as though this phenomenon would never become a trend. But, today, we can see that this isn’t so. In 2018, the multi-game author has returned, this time with a vengeance. For starters, author MorpheusKitami released Arc Wars (aka Arc War / aka Skotos Dorchatus) at the end of the contest window, but his other game, Zalag: Glustu (episode five of The Complicated Gallery), which was released much earlier in the year, appeared to meet Heart of the OHR’s obscurest guidelines, so it was also officially entered. Then, in reviewing every game released during the window, the host saw that ChalkFlower’s Asphodelus and Px both fit the “in the spirit of 1999” rule, so he invited the author to enter them both, to which he or she did. And while the Heart of the OHR saw its first year where more than one author released two eligible games during the contest window, this wasn’t the moment when it would experience its earth-shattering multi-game author debut. No, the Heart of the OHR broke an all-time contest record this year (to be clear, an all-OHR-contest record, not just a Heart of the OHR record) when author TheCrimsonDM released not one, not two, not three, not four, but five games for Heart of the OHR (with one, Masks: 15 Pages, exclusively for Heart of the OHR; the others were released to escape from eight years of dormancy, but because they fit the guidelines, they were entered, too). It’s unlikely we’ll see anything like this year’s multi-game author phenomenon happen again. It was quite the scene.
Fun Fact: Feenicks, author of this year’s False Skies, released another game, WitchX, just five days after the contest window closed. If the host had remembered that the 2018 contest was supposed to last until the end of the year, not the 17th, then WitchX would’ve given us four sets of multi-game authors, not three. To correct this oversight, the host gave Feenicks the opportunity to enter his second game, but Feenicks honored the window as it was decided and kept his second game out of the contest.
Between shattering previous entry records and multi-game author records, it would seem that Heart of the OHR 2018 has had enough “firsts” to set its standout season of highlights in stone. But, no. This year’s contest also saw, for the first time, its debut non-English title with author Bird’s entry, Rolling, Radical Revolution, or Rollende, Radikale Revolte, as it is called in its native German. As of this writing, there was still no English translation, but the author says he’s working on it. Voters were instructed to vote on the game’s content, not its language. Adhering to this standard, the voters rewarded the game well, thanks to its graphics, design, and music; though, voters still couldn’t wait to see what the game might play like in English, as they would very much like to know what it’s about.
This year also saw the beginning of a new trend in OHR gaming and design: the inclusion of the commercial game, with the Wobbler’s Kaiju Big Battel: Fighto Fantasy entering the ring (full version purchasable on Steam, Itch.io, and Android). To make it easier on voters, two versions of the game were eligible for vote, the commercial version for those who had it and the demo version for those who didn’t. Votes from both versions were consolidated into a single score, so the end result accounted for both versions. The host expects to see more commercial games debuting in 2020, with RedMaverickZero’s Axe Cop being the likeliest candidate so far.
Thanks to this year’s sheer contrast between numbers of entries and voters, Heart of the OHR 2018 has debuted the contest’s first true sets of ties. While previous years required tie-breakers between at least two games, a combination of pure votes and precision scoring had provided enough variance to break ties by mere decimals, making clear, if not extremely close distinctions between game placements. However, in 2018, voter scores were much less bendable, and tied scores were no longer unavoidable. In this case, we had two sets of ties, with a first-ever three-way tie vying for 3rd place.
For the sake of placement on the chart, 3rd, 4th, and 5th place would be listed according to quantity of highest single votes, but the average scores were still even with 3rd place, so all three games in these spots were technically tied for 3rd. But, perhaps, even more stunning was the tie for 15th place, which involved two games from the same series by the same author, receiving the same average score and number of votes. When all was said and done, there was really no way to separate these games by rank, so 15th and 16th place were determined by highest single vote.
Much of the trends that began with the 2010 season has persisted into 2018. Authors shared their progress regularly in the Heart of the OHR announcement thread, stoking hype and confidence in their entries. TMC took up the mantle of offering the bug bounty prize that James Paige had first introduced in our debut season (James had decided in 2016 to cancel the bug bounty as it was too taxing on his time, and therefore would have no means to fulfill them all). The host had once again offered his e-books as entry prizes, and to his surprise, some contestants had actually gotten them this time (as was evidenced in his sales reports). Most of the contestants who said they would make a game for the contest followed through. The ones who couldn’t make the deadline apologized for it.
One trend that has changed drastically since 2016, however, was the inclusion of a #hotohr2018 channel on Discord, which has steadily replaced IRC as the go-to for real-time chat, expanding Heart of the OHR’s social media reach to places that not even the host had anticipated (or created). That channel remained quite active throughout the contest window, and many of the discussions and pep talks that went unnoticed on Slime Salad were instead being held on Discord. This, in the host’s opinion, kept creativity and encouragement alive in this exceptionally long season, and hardly anyone burned out as a result. Thanks to this successful transference of discussion forums, Heart of the OHR plans to expand to the moon and maybe to Mars for 2020, but it still won’t deal with Facebook, as Facebook buries conversations that the poster didn’t pay for. For now, Discord would seem like a great place for Heart of the OHR to continue its realm of interaction, and the host looks forward to participating in the discussion much sooner next time.
On a sadder note, it seemed that Castle Paradox was no longer relevant enough to carry any of the 21 games in this year’s Heart of the OHR, even though one veteran user had at least posted progress on a game he was making early in the contest window. That author and that game hasn’t been seen since.
In short, the battle for the Heart of the OHR raged on in 2018, this time with an impressive average game score of 5.63, up more than two points over the 2016 average (but still half a point below the all-time highest average set in 2012), with five games scoring higher than the 2014 winner. Unlike in previous years, however, voter turnout had been largely consistent, with every game satisfying the two-thirds rule, which is the rule that states that every game must receive at least two-thirds the maximum vote given to a single game to avoid receiving “robot scores” of 5 for each vote “below par.” This year, two games, Bale and False Skies, received 12 votes, setting the par for the other games at 8. Five games received eight votes. No game received votes from every voter. Thanks to each game dodging the robot score, all scores recorded this year were purely by community vote, which helped keep the contest average above 5.0.
Most impressive, though, was the Heart of the OHR 2018 winner, which scored the second highest average in Heart of the OHR history, just ahead of the 2012 winner, DUNGEONMEN: Men of Dungeons. However, no game in Heart of the OHR history has ever topped the original winner, Motrya, which still stands at a record 9.5 voter average, and while the 2018 winner came close, it still fell short by half a point. Perhaps in 2020, we’ll see a new King of the Heart of the OHR. It’s a longshot, but we shall see.
That said, Heart of the OHR 2018 is now over, and with its ending comes the final march for its competitive entries.
Here again is the story of that battle for the Heart of the OHR:
Please note that rankings are listed from worst to best, and based on average votes, not rosters or quantities of total players. For this reason, abstained votes did not count against games, but in many ways helped their averages. Also, the two-thirds rule was implemented, but no game fell below par, so the rule was ultimately thrown out this year. For the games that were tied, their ranking was determined by numbers of high-score votes (the game with the most high-score votes receiving the higher rank). Games that shared values in all categories (score, average score, precision score, and total votes), and could not otherwise break the tie under any global circumstance, were ranked according to highest single score votes. Games that received scores before they were disqualified had their scores thrown out. This applied only to Hanu in Hell, which was disqualified due to insufficient content.
Also note that footage from each game can be viewed at the host’s YouTube channel in the special Heart of the OHR 2018 playlist (locate via “Playlists” section), beginning at 10 a.m. EST, Monday, March 10, 2019, with new episodes airing every three hours (until 7 p.m. each night) until Friday, March 15, 2019, at 10 p.m. Each video includes a special Heart of the OHR 2018 introduction complete with theme song (composed by Kylekrack) and lasts an average 40-50 minutes (the low end at about 18 minutes, Px, and the high end at just over 90 minutes, Masks: 15 Pages). The “season finale” video contains a Heart of the OHR 2018 retrospective in the host’s own words beginning at time marker 20:09.
THE RANKINGS
Fuzzy Description: Part 5 of The Complicated Gallery series, where lost souls visit a gallery to reclaim something valuable of some sort. In this fifth part, a fifth lost soul must enter the gallery to accomplish a goal. Yes, this description is vague. That’s why it’s called “fuzzy.”
Audience Consensus: Tries to make a point about something, but whatever that point is seems unclear to most players. Relies on the previous parts to provide some understanding on what’s going on. Fortunately, those parts are accessible within the main game.
Average Score: 2.88
Total Voters: 8
Highest Rating: 6
Lowest Rating: 1
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Fuzzy Description: Pick a hero, any hero. Then send that hero into the fields to fight animals because heroes fight animals. A lot. That’s how it works. Use the frog as your guide.
Audience Consensus: Terrible graphics, sketchy wallmaps, endless battles, blob-like attacks, good (probably ripped) music, and an incomprehensible storyline. Yep, all the best newbie conventions are here. It even starts in the upper left corner of the screen. And the dialogue? Oh, the amateur, poorly spelled dialogue. Classic. This game has it all.
Average Score: 3.25
Total Voters: 8
Highest Rating: 5
Lowest Rating: 2
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Fuzzy Description: In the year 2201, three female mech pilots go on a mission to destroy a three-legged destroyer in a wasteland vision of Earth, but then they are destroyed and torturous stuff soon follows.
Audience Consensus: The writing is competent, but nearly every other design choice is poor. The graphics are hardly more than solid colored blocks. Navigating the tight, long, winding halls of the underworld is a chore. Battles are terribly slow and offer no incentive to fight. The dialogue, while clear, is often vulgar and at times disturbing. Given the environment, this makes sense, but it doesn’t make the game the least bit fun to play (maybe that’s the point?). Even the game’s page description is off, as it fails to mention what the game is really about. Seems more like a commentary than a game.
Average Score: 3.3
Total Voters: 10
Highest Rating: 6
Lowest Rating: 1
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Fuzzy Description: A young, vain pony is sent on a mission to collect a sapphire for the rock farm’s stable elder (stable instead of a town because the characters are horses—get it?). But, as it turns out, her adventure to collect rocks is not so straightforward, and her journey will take her well beyond the cave where the sapphire is contained (but not that well beyond—just two more maps beyond) to locate the missing Marble (another pony) and bring order back to the farm. Based on an episode from My Little Pony, the cartoon.
Audience Consensus: More of the same from TheCrimsonDM, but with more competent writing than previous entries and has the possibility for a second ending. Graphics are also better than the other games, but still ultimately harmless. Neither good nor bad, it’s basically just fine.
Average Score: 3.63
Total Voters: 8
Highest Rating: 5
Lowest Rating: 2
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Fuzzy Description: In a fan-game based on Yume Nikki, a young woman who can’t seem to leave her apartment no matter how many times she interacts with the front door goes on a journey through dreams to solve abstract puzzles and explore strange paintings. Fortunately, there’s loot along the way. And birds. In the daytime. Trippy!
Audience Consensus: It looks and sounds nice, but it’s pretty weird and confusing. It’s hard to tell what the player is supposed to do and when. Having an unusual control scheme adds to the confusion. Understanding Yume Nikki may help, or maybe it won’t. It’s hard to say. At least it’s short, but how does the player know when the game is over? With an abstract goal, it’s hard to know what to aim for.
Average Score: 3.88
Total Voters: 8
Highest Rating: 5
Lowest Rating: 2
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Fuzzy Description: After getting into a serious battle that’s left him injured and his little brother unconscious, a pirate sails through a storm, only to shipwreck on a mysterious island. Fortunately, a young woman rescues him, then immediately forces him to do her chores for her. Based on a true story.
Audience Consensus: An uglier, less whimsical version of Crystal Cave, One Pirate: Adventure in Summer Island still keeps to the One Pirate tradition of featuring funny banter, catchy music (when not also inappropriate), and messy visuals, and fans of the series may find something to enjoy in this sequel, even if it means digging in the dirt a little to get to it.
Average Score: 3.89
Total Voters: 9
Highest Rating: 6
Lowest Rating: 1
Actually tied for 15th place.
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Fuzzy Description: A pirate and his mate hear tales of a vast treasure that lies on a green island, deep inside a crystal cave. They come to the island to retrieve the treasure, but their adventure leads them into a storied battle against bigger, rougher pirates and a secret that none of them expects uncover.
Audience Consensus: Sloppy but charming, One Pirate: Adventure in the Crystal Cave clearly doesn’t take itself seriously as it attempts to turn an otherwise poor presentation into a fun, silly game. The graphics are bad and the spelling is downright atrocious, but the characters and story fill in the gaps, and the music, while too high quality for such a messy game, is a toe-tapper.
Average Score: 3.89
Total Voters: 9
Highest Rating: 8
Lowest Rating: 1
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Fuzzy Description: An Internet chatroom actually has a good idea when it tells a young man to invite his friends into his dreams to help him defeat terrible shadow monsters. Somehow, that works. For reasons.
Audience Consensus: Looks great, sounds great, probably could’ve been great. But, there isn’t much here yet. And, it’s unnecessarily difficult at the start. And, how does this gimmick work again? It’s a good attempt, but nowhere near ready for game time. NPCs should talk more. Battles should be a bit more winnable. So empty.
Average Score: 5
Total Voters: 9
Highest Rating: 7
Lowest Rating: 4
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Fuzzy Description: Orphans Pain, Hope, Bipolar, and Tranquility embark on a quest to retrieve the missing pages of therapy they need to confirm that their lives suck. But, can they overcome liars, betrayers, and even the darkness along the way?
Audience Consensus: Definitely the best entry from the Crimson Tide; it manages to keep the story pointed, the puzzles sensible, and the themes consistent. While it’s questionable whether it has a point to make, it does adhere to its message that sadness sucks pretty tightly. Characters are true to who they are, even though that makes for some sluggish and uneven battles. The game, however, is far from happy, and those who get depressed easily probably shouldn’t play it.
Average Score: 5.22
Total Voters: 9
Highest Rating: 8
Lowest Rating: 3
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Fuzzy Description: Future cop is back to stop future crime and defeat future thugs to protect the future. He also upsets his captain and takes on a sidekick who can’t stand him. Welcome to a future 80’s buddy cop movie, OHR version.
Audience Consensus: Much improved over the 2016 version, as this version has a complete intro and opening act, but it still ends too soon. Battles are frequent and not that exciting, but the post-fight analysis is pretty cool. Graphics are inconsistent, especially outside of HQ. Menu depth is interesting, if not a bit much for such little content. Music is great for the genre. Definitely moving in the right direction now, but still not indicative of two years’ worth of additional development. Keep going.
Average Score: 5.45
Total Voters: 11
Highest Rating: 7
Lowest Rating: 4
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Fuzzy Description: Number Riddles, an RPG Adventure. That’s basically it. And, it’s “in the style of Yume Nikki.” So, there’s that also. Okay, and maybe choices matter, too. And then there’s the dot character. All right, what is this game exactly?
Audience Consensus: Fitting graphics and sound and a strong sense of genius guiding its very being, Px is in an OHR class all by itself. Unfortunately, its lack of clarity and direction severely hamper its fun factor, and those who are bad at brain teasers, especially with numbers, may find little reason to play it.
Average Score: 6.11
Total Voters: 9
Highest Rating: 9
Lowest Rating: 2
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Furry Description: A young wolf-boy goes on a rescue mission to find the missing wolf-girl he likes. But, when he discovers she’s been brainwashed by someone he once trusted, sort of, his rescue mission turns into a revenge mission, and his adventure teaches him what it’s like to go from wolf-boy to wolf-man. Or something like that. Something heroic obviously happens, according to the title. It also gets serious after all the dirty jokes have been exhausted.
Audience Consensus: Still as messy, buggy, and inconsistent as it was in 2016, but the inclusion of a prologue, more story, and some general updates make the game better than before. The humor keeps it from getting too serious, at least at the beginning, but the tonal shift halfway through kicks the story into a different gear, at times for the better, at other times for the worst. Overall, it needs rebalancing, in more ways than just in gameplay.
Average Score: 6.22
Total Voters: 9
Highest Rating: 7
Lowest Rating: 4
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Fuzzy Description: A bird-girl with a smoking problem tries to leave her studio apartment through the front door, but the door is locked, and all of the creatures in her ventilation system—the only path out of the apartment—want to harass her with psychological warfare, and perhaps some physical warfare, too. Can she suppress the bullies and get some fresh air before they knock her unconscious?
Audience Consensus: Short and straightforward, this game puts most of its focus on the theme, and it works well. Battles are dull and repetitive, and getting sent back to the beginning after every failure may feel grind-y in time, but the simplistic design keeps the story and theme at the forefront, and for a game that doesn’t try to get too fancy, keeping an eye on the goal pays off. It’s also nice that the goal is clear and easy to spot, and that battle difficulty can be charted by the color-coding of the ventilation system. All-in-all, very tightly and effectively designed.
Average Score: 6.27
Total Voters: 11
Highest Rating: 9
Lowest Rating: 3
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Fuzzy Description: In a time when the demons return to terrorize really hard land (no caps), one real wizard and three fake ones are called into adventure to slay them. But can they survive the dangers of tutorial forest, the glen, and even *gasp* the highway in their pursuit of justice? In really hard land, surviving even the searching of a bookshelf can be really hard.
Audience Consensus: The difficulty is real, the art style is odd, and the humor is sardonic, but these are the very things that make really hard game stand out among the rest. There’s just enough ambiguity to force the player to brave his choices but not so much that he can’t figure out the best path for advancement (and not defeat). The unique class choices at the start of the game also make it replayable. It’s called “The Dark Souls of the OHR” for a reason.
Average Score: 6.33
Total Voters: 9
Highest Rating: 8
Lowest Rating: 5
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Fuzzy Description: A ragtag group of the usual adventurers travels throughout the land, talking to townies and taking orders from authorities as they work for the right to visit Skull Island and beat up a new evil overlord who has taken up residence there.
Audience Consensus: A satirical and somewhat wacky adventure that uses FnrrfYgmSchnish’s 8-bit graphics set, and somehow makes it work in its favor. Sometimes it borders on the absurd, with characters talking nonsense and battles either taking too long in certain cases, or going very quickly in others, or even proving unnecessary when the player discovers a path around it. But the game still has a vivid personality, and it’s hard not to like how it handles itself.
Average Score: 6.4
Total Voters: 10
Highest Rating: 7
Lowest Rating: 5
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Fuzzy Description: In this Uncharted Waters-inspired trading game, the son of a traveling merchant gets into the family business and roams the bustling countryside as he searches for deals and trades that can help the people flourish and his bottom line grow. It’s medieval capitalism. With horses, resources, guilds, and boats.
Audience Consensus: A great idea that’s executed well on paper, this game does occasionally suffer from awkward bugs, like stepping on a flashing town tile that offers no response or paying for an item when there’s no more room in the player’s inventory. For every two positives, a bug creeps in from behind, but the game is still a lot of fun with plenty of room for exploring, trading, and getting to know each town’s specialty. Even with the bugs at play, it’s a game worth investing time in. Unless you hate commerce games or capitalism, of course.
Average Score: 6.73
Total Voters: 11
Highest Rating: 9
Lowest Rating: 4
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Fuzzy Description: In a busy town filled with culture and religion, a young hero enters his coming-of-age moment when the elder asks him to help an old lady solve her rat problem. The elder’s command leads the hero into a series of give and takes, where this person needs this thing, and that person needs that thing, and getting that thing means the hero can get this thing, and before we know it, we’re stopping evil in its tracks (more than likely).
Audience Consensus: Graphics are average and the sound is decent, but the game has enough personality and strong writing to more than make up for its shortcomings. The town is chockfull of unique shops and townies to keep the adventure interesting, even when not much has happened yet. The pacing, while a little slow, especially when the fighting starts, is mostly solid. Fetch quests abound, but they still make sense. In spite of its flaws, the pieces seem to work well together, and it’s hard not to like the game. Undoubtedly the sleeper hit of Heart of the OHR 2018.
Average Score: 7
Total Voters: 10
Highest Rating: 8 (three votes)
Lowest Rating: 6 (three votes)
Actually tied for 3rd place.
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unscharfe Beschreibung: An evil tyrant has gone crazy, and it’s up to an interplanetary traveler of peace, a creature that resembles a McDonaldland Fry Guy, to rise up, help his people, and fight back against the forces of tyranny and insanity, one goose at a time. Written in German but contains an English walkthrough in a text file.
Audience Consensus: A good-looking game with minor mechanical bugs, it certainly seems to have a lot going for it. The German dialogue does make understanding the story difficult for most players, but the map design and scripted events make it easier to figure out how to progress. Once it’s translated, it will probably be a lot of fun for English speakers. The game’s author expects to have a translation ready as early as April 2019. In OHR language, that means it may be ready sometime before 2022, if we’re lucky.
Average Score: 7
Total Voters: 8
Highest Rating: 8 (four votes)
Lowest Rating: 4 (one vote)
Actually tied for 3rd place.
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Fuzzy Description: The stars disappeared from the skies 2000 years ago. But now they’re back for reasons unknown. Meanwhile, a group of explorers train for expedition leadership as the funny feeling that something bad is coming looms in the back of superstitious minds. Could it have something to do with the sky? Spoiler Alert: Probably, since the title suggests it as so. Until they figure it out, however, they’ll engage in a bunch of fetch quests in order to bring a partnership back to rival townships.
Audience Consensus: Another solid entry from Feenicks, False Skies promises much of the same visual charm as his previous games, like soft palette, customizable heroes, and a classic-style adventure. Even though the story is currently vague, there is still plenty to do and much to see. And for those who enjoy the a la carte method to making battle parties, this one’s got it all. Just make sure to customize sensibly, or the game could punish your choices (or make them seem too forgiving). Definitely one worth checking out.
Average Score: 7
Total Voters: 12
Highest Rating: 9
Lowest Rating: 1
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Fuzzy Description: A sword-wielding hero rises in a time of great need to protect his people from the dangers of the outside world so that they may venture out into it without the risk of harm. Generic, sure, but he looks really good doing it, and that’s what matters here! There’s also lore upon lore galore to explore, and that, too, is what really matters.
Audience Consensus: A beautiful game with much attention to detail. Perhaps the most stunning revelation is not in how good it still is after two years out of the public eye, but in how much it has improved over the original release. In a world where new content is piled onto old and broken material, Bale attempts to fix its past mistakes and build on new and sound choices. Improving on an already great game is a masterstroke indeed, and the future for this gloomy game is bright.
Average Score: 7.33
Total Voters: 12
Highest Rating: 10
Lowest Rating: 2
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Funky Description: On the night of the big Kaiju Big Battel championship bout, American Beetle is about to clobber the evil Dr. Cube and claim his victory, when Dr. Cube pulls out the chair and turns the tables on American Beetle. But Dr. Cube doesn’t stop with this cheap shot. Oh, no, bro. His follow-up move is even more dastardly, as it involves a giant slug, time travel, and a plot to leave Cube propaganda all over human history. Thankfully, American Beetle is not yet down for the count, and he embarks on a mission with his fellow Kaiju bros to counterpunch the uncool Dr. Cube, pin him to the present, and restore history back to its normal, funky self. Based on and licensed by the Kaiju Big Battel intellectual property. Has demo and full versions available for play.
Audience Consensus: Essentially perfect, Kaiju Big Battel: Fighto Fantasy steps forward with a high, glossy polish, streamlined game design, multiple on-the-fly difficulty levels, funny characters with sensible skills, and a professional presentation all around. And, with its fun personality, good looks, and catchy sound, it’s hard to deny its place at the top of the Heart of the OHR food chain. The demo is already expertly crafted, but the complete version seals the deal. This is a game that no OHR player should miss, especially if he or she has the ten dollars required to buy it on Steam, Google, or Itch.io. Excellent game.
Average Score: 9
Total Voters: 10
Highest Rating: 10
Lowest Rating: 7
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FINAL THOUGHTS
And there you have it, your lineup for the 2018 Heart of the OHR Contest.
Thanks again to everyone who participated this year, and special thanks to the Wobbler for giving the community an excellent (and complete) game in Kaiju Big Battel: Fighto Fantasy. Thanks also to everyone who helped make this contest run smoothly, keeping the controversies down and the votes up. I do think this turned out to be one of our best seasons, and I thank everyone who participated, regardless of the capacity in how you participated. Every year I wonder if I should keep going, as community participation in the OHR seems to dwindle. But then Heart of the OHR comes around again, and I’m reminded that the heart of the OHR still beats, even after 20 years since James Paige had first uploaded the engine to the public. This year was especially surprising as it shattered all participation records, including the previous record-holding 2012 season (at 17 entries). It’s exciting to see new releases hit the Slime Salad gamelist, and this year has given us plenty of quality titles and throwbacks to our yesteryears. So, thanks again to everyone who came out of hiding to produce a night’s worth of free entertainment, and thanks to those who still have something coming up the line for our next contest. Great job to all of you. I hope you continue to work on your projects and bring this crop of games to completion. And to those who didn’t upload anything during the Heart of the OHR window, I hope you’ll still upload something soon. As always, the year needs more hits, especially in the off-seasons.
Thanks also to James Paige, TMC, Kylekrack, FnrrfYgmSchnish, MorpheusKitami, Wobbler, Spoonweaver, Gaplan, and Foxley for helping with the prizes. I hope you all remembered what you offered (Hint: It’s on the contest’s front page). Also thanks to James Paige for hosting the first public upload of this retrospective.
Heart of the OHR 6 begins on May 1st, 2020, and runs until December 20th, 2020, so get your entries started now if you want to make it even better than this year’s crop.
—Pepsi Ranger
And now for fun, here is a list of statistics for the Heart of the OHR’s various achievements so far:
Highest Participation Turnout: 21 (2018) (17 originals, 4 rereleased)
Lowest Participation Turnout: 11 (2016) (10 official originals, 1 unofficial)
Highest Voter Turnout: 16 (2012)
Lowest Voter Turnout: 12 (2010)
Highest Average Contest Rating: 6.14 (2012)
Lowest Average Contest Rating: 3.55 (2016)
Highest Rated Game: Motrya (2010, 9.5)
Lowest Rated Game: James Doppler's Epic Sci-Fi Fantasy… (2014, 2.25)
Most Voted On Game: DUNGEONMEN: Men of Dungeons (2012, 15 votes)
Least Voted On Game: Vikings of Midgard (2010, 5 votes)*
Most Perfect 10’s Given to a Single Game: 8 (Motrya, 2010)
Most Imperfect 1’s Given to a Single Game: 5 (Hero, 2010)
Most Perfect 10’s Given in a Contest: 12 (2010)
Fewest Perfect 10’s Given in a Contest: 1 (tie, 2014; 2016)
Most Imperfect 1’s Given in a Contest: 13 (2010)
Fewest Imperfect 1’s Given in a Contest: 1 (2012)
Widest Voter Spread for a Game: 1 — 10 (Surfasaurus, 2016)
Narrowest Voter Spread for a Game: 6 — 8 (Final Dragon Legacy, 2012); 3 — 5 (Universal Wars, 2012); 1 — 3 (Dark Planet, 2016); 2 — 4 (Grapnes 2: Kepnalcide, 2016); 6 — 8 (Hinterlands: Pilgrimage, 2018); 5 — 7 (Trytuges, 2018)**
Highest Low Score for a Game: 7 (tie, DUNGEONMEN: Men of Dungeons, 2012; Kaiju Big Battel: Fighto Fantasy, 2018)
Lowest High Score for a Game: 3 (Dark Planet, 2016)***
Number of Games to Receive Votes from Every Voter: 1 (Eternity Fragment Prelude, 2010)
*Fruity Quest (2016) received only 3 votes total, but because it wasn’t officially released for the contest, and because I didn’t encourage votes for it, voters largely ignored it, and I decided not to cast it in the official running. Likewise, Hanu in Hell (2018) started receiving votes before I officially disqualified it, but only two people actually got their votes in.
**Universal Wars actually received a low vote of 2.5, but decimal votes were not accepted and were thus rounded to the nearest whole number, in this case 3.
***Hanu in Hell (2018) received a 2 as both its highest score and average voter score, leading also to the narrowest voter spread in the contest, but because it was disqualified for being too short and incomplete, all of its official records were thrown out with it. This was also in part due to only two people voting on it, which wasn’t a fair representation of the community vote, especially since the robot scores would’ve changed the average to 4.25 if I had kept it in (and if no one else had voted on it, which would’ve been unlikely).