Reus - 13/20 hours

Having played through the two-hour mode two and a half more times, I'm left with the feeling that this last tier of unlocks is going to be beyond my powers. At least for the time being, anyway. I once wondered whether the simplicity of the map would mean that I'd quickly reach mastery or if the complexity of the upgrade system meant that I would fumble around for whatever meager achievements seem easiest at the time, without any particular plan, or even a vague understanding of what I'm doing.

The answer to that dilemma seems, for the moment, to be leaning towards the latter. I mean, it's not super difficult or anything, but there's a tension between buffing up your villages with extra resources and having them grow so rapidly that they go mad with greed. If you don't get the balance right, you can wind up having to fend off attacks from the villagers, either against your giants or against a village you were grooming for a specific achievement. I've yet to fail to get at least one by the end of a game, but I can't say for sure how long my streak will last.

I'm enjoying this game quite a bit, but I suspect that its barely restrained violence will keep it from being one of my all-time favorites. Basically, the problem I have with it is that I am the one who creates the evil in this world. So I never really approve of the targets of these various crusades. Yet punishing the aggressors with earthquakes and muck bombs feels unpleasant to me as well. As awful as these humans are, I'm the one who made them what they are, and it feels like a failure whenever I have to put them down.

Then again, you do get used to it. Having resolved to never again allow my giants to suffer under the arrows of an ungrateful humanity, I've preemptively wiped out several armies and turned my divine wrath against multiple towns, and it's starting to feel just like a thing I occasionally have to do. I don't think I'll ever enjoy it, but those are the rules of the game.

Anyway, I look forward to going after the next few, moderately difficult achievements, and I kind of dread going after the last few, presumably very difficult ones. In any case, Reus is proving to be a very entertaining game that has no trouble holding on to my attention, and that's really the only thing I ever wanted.