Jeremy Swinnen

Blog

December 31, 2025 Wk 1

    Progressing through Oceanus

    Beat Scylla in my latest run. Once I knew how to avoid her attacks, she wasn’t too difficult to deal with.

    Was lucky to meet Narcissus on my path who was kind enough to replenish my Death Defiance. That, together with a decently filled health bar got me through the fight.

    Oceanus, apart from the Pinhead enemies, is very nice to look at though. I love all the little water effects and it’s a nice touch that the water flows into the portals that let you advance to the next room.

December 23, 2025 Wk 52

    Game of the Day: Cast n Chill

    While browsing Nintendo's Winter Sale in the eShop the other day, I came across Cast n Chill. Made by Australian dev Wombat Brawler, it's a cozy fishing game with a simple premise: you pilot a small boat across lakes, rivers, and oceans, catching fish at your own pace.

    But what caught my eye is the art style. I mean, look at it:

    A few others, including Ged Maheux, seemed to agree:

    Leave it to a beautiful, understated game like this to be the first one to actually tempt me to want to buy a . Just gorgeous.

    youtu.be/M7aPS8pGYfQ

    Ged Maheux -

    It also struck me how far games have come since I first started playing back in 1997 (Pokémon Blue on the Game Boy Color). Back then, if you weren’t Square Enix, Nintendo, or another big developer, you barely stood a chance of getting noticed. There was no real internet ecosystem for small teams, no social media, no storefronts surfacing niche gems.

    Now, if you have a vision and the skills to build something that works, you can make something truly beautiful and actually get it in front of people. This game is proof of that.

    Then there’s the price. It’s €15, currently on sale for €11. For a small, handcrafted game, that feels more than fair, especially when many big releases are pushing close to €80. Granted, those games are made by much larger teams with huge budgets. But still, these two people spent probably years building this game. Years of late nights and early mornings creating something they truly believe in.

    That's something worth supporting, in my opinion. You can grab it on the Nintendo eShop or Steam.

December 21, 2025 Wk 51

    Meeting Mineru

    Really enjoyed exploring the Construct Factory. Given Mineru’s theme, it felt really fitting that you are tasked with assembling her “body” by collection five pieces in mini puzzle rooms.

    After a really fun boss battle with the Seized Construct, I finally was able to retrieve Mineru’s stone. Getting these stones is always accompanied by a cutscene with some of my favorites themes as the soundtrack. The developers made a slightly different variation for each sage, and Mineru was no different.

    Link standing in front of Mineru's Construct

    Mineru also grants Link with the ability to control his own “construct”. You can Ultrahand items to its arms and back, giving the gameplay yet another turn. It’s actually pretty fun, albeit a bit slow, to control this. Link sits on top and you still have the ability to use your bow to shoot arrows.

December 17, 2025 Wk 51

    The quest to find Mineru continues. Exploring Thunderhead Isles is a blast and I like the new puzzle elements the game introduces you to.

    I noticed the soundtrack changing from the generic Sky theme, to a more unique track. I haven’t heard it before so it must be specific to this area/quest/character.

December 13, 2025 Wk 50

    Completed the fourth temple with Riju at my side. Especially liked this one. The fight with the Queen Gibdo was a bit annoying due to the sand but, after I got the strategy down, it went pretty smooth.

    The part where Riju gives your her powers was especially touching, with the music in the background.