The Hub of Reid Harris Cooper

I have a huge affinity for all things freak shows and circus. From Tod Browning’s Freaks to Alex Winter’s FREAKED, the 1947 and 2021 adaptations of Nightmare Alley, The Greatest Showman, the third season of American Horror Story and so much more. Not to mention my own personal experience of shows in Coney Island, falling in love with a bearded lady and being trained in pinhead and fire breathing. I’m not even bringing up books, comics, etc. Although one comic I will mention is 99 Girls by Terry Laban which has an amazing circus/sideshow scene for an erotic comic.

Taking that all into mind I absolutely loved the story and characters in the survival horror logic puzzle game Vlad Circus: Descend Into Madness. What writer Durgan A. Nallar has created in an original tale based on many legends and truths of the world genetic mutations, the world’s treatment, trauma, pain, psychiatric development and failure is intensely heart breaking, soul crushing and intriguingly mysterious as you meander through multiple tales of people’s lives. People just like me and you and yet nothing like me and you, unless you are like me and have been a circus person in a way.

I also love pixel art and this is not just pixel art, but crazy weird complicated and at times scarily horrific art. Yet also charming and giving these characters not just the words that built their personality but an image to how they could be perceived.

In gameplay your character moves as smoothly as pixel art can hacking and slashing and having stamina so low that you can’t run for half a screen without being out of breath. How this mechanic plays into the challenge version of the game I will never know, but in the story mode it was definitely excellent for immersion of being Ollie even in third person 2-D point and click fashion. Which any game should be capable of doing, make you feel outside while in as much as it can.

Not that one would really want to ever be immersed fully into a world full of hallucinogenic or are they? headless “zombies”, possibly insane barkers, alcoholic magicians with no legs, one armed snake charmers who caught off their own arm, ventriloquists whose puppet is more in control and more story spoiling extremeness. No, just on the crux of immersion, guiding Ollie through at some points really wracking the brain solutions that when you solve them are actually fully logical and in place that you’ll be kicking yourself.

Recently discussion of story and plot progression has been a hotbed discussion. And then, and then, and then only works for improv and as a silly joke in a stoner movie, but as a usage to tell a story it truly needs to be “this happened, therefore that happened but then” till conclusion and resolution and Vlad definitely follows this rule even if as a player you get lost, the game itself knows it is making sense even in insanity.

If I had to criticize one part of the game and a proper review really should always find something cause the perfect book, movie, game does not exist it’d be the game’s next to final section. Like many video games when you reach the final boss it takes a sudden switch and lots of what you’ve learned is now thrown out the window and you’re practically playing a different game. Where you were once using your brain, logic, management, reading comprehension and strategy, you are now relying fully on hand/eye coordination and while forgiving I could see some players getting frustrated… the pay off is worth it though especially when you’ve been on this “dark ride”.

Dark ride allows me to mention one more carnival scene that I adore despite it’s sickening portrayal but which also speaks to Vlad Circus and what it attempts and achieves fully and that’s from Alan Moore and Brian Bolland’s Batman story The Killing Joke. Twisted, mind bending, leaving you feeling broken and yet wanting to return again and again. That fits Vlad Circus to a tee.

Vlad Circus is available NOW on Steam, GOG, Epic, Xbox, Nintendo Switch and PS4 and PS5.

There are demos I will have played but will not be mentioning on my site. Mostly if I quit a demo it’s one of two reasons, it is not optomized well and can barely run or… the game even if amazingly beautiful has extreme control issues and needs to be reconfigured completely. Pop-Culture Spectrum makes efforts to only promote, discuss or speak of the positive unless recieving a key and putting in enough effort to mention the game and find the merit even if disliking it. That won’t happen here, but there have been at five demos I have played and chosen to not speak of because of gameplay design issues by the dev and I’m not a pro gamer, but a DEMO should NEVER cause you frustration and anger, so “buyer beware”. Now here’s demos I loved.

SIMPLER TIMES:
What I could explore of the one room offered was excellent. Music was fun, the art is beautiful and exquisite. I love how simple it truly is. You can draw, take photos, play guitar, even bird watch… but I also can’t get a feel for what the rest would be. A dorm room? An apartment? Would it be like Unpacking but more elborate with more to do then unpack, but actually play with items and a paintered digital art look? I’m curiously interested for more.
https://store.steampowered.com/app/1812210/Simpler_Times/

BELONGING:
This feels like it’s still very much in development, but it is part of the Steam Next Fest and a first person point and click exploration it’s interesting. Discovering story elements through memories, videos, digital devices, etc. via a VR recreation of a crime scene (I think) feels wonderful. I don’t fully have the gist of what our mission is other than we are in the future, we’re cops of a sort and we’re exploring a cult that suddenly disappeared. I’ll be keeping my eye on this and so should you.
https://store.steampowered.com/app/2081580/Belonging/

PROMENADE:
Absolutely adorable platform puzzler. Not easy in the least. I have NO idea what the story is or what my motivation is from the demo, but the visuals are wonderful. I would watch the hell out of this as a cartoon although it is reminscent of Adventure Time meets a Boy and his Blob from both stylistically and gameplay. An alien like backpack that helps you grab enemies to jump higher cause your jump sucks while hunting down disc pieces for… I don’t know why. Again though, it’s adorable looking and super fun, even though I didn’t beat all the levels and I’m not even sure how to, I enjoyed my time and it is worth looking into.
https://store.steampowered.com/app/1781260/Promenade/

THE THAUMATURGE:
Traditionally I don’t enjoy isometric games or games with with rounded strategy combat yet those are two things this game are built heavily upon and I enjoyed them immensely. Mystical horror magic in the “olden times” (scarily not so LONG ago) of Rasputin (a character in this game) is definitely a good approach to make something feel different and original. Lovecraftian and/or Baba Yaga seems to be the go to a lot and instead Thaumaturge goes another approach. The investigation, keeping track of your skill management, discovering what is missing and solving the mystery on way to battle. I must admit at press time I did NOT finish this demo… I’m missing, something… but it is a marvel of an experience.
https://store.steampowered.com/app/1684350/The_Thaumaturge/

AN ARCADE FULL OF CATS and A TOWER FULL OF CATS:
Hidden cats are great. Super fun. Zen and yet also challenging. The story part of these both makes it even cooler and more fun. The demos only offer two hidden pictures, in the arcade the year 1995 with involves finding cats, but the other involved beating an arcade game to get cats an item so they can unlock other levels in the game if it was the final product. In Tower there were three levels and more objects to find as well, it’s a tower of time so it was prehistoric and egyptian These games were so fun it makes me wants to experience what Dev Cats did with Castle full of. 15/10 score.
https://store.steampowered.com/developer/devcats

LOGIC PUZZLE:
At first this escape room weirdness is something I can wrap my head around. Then it just gets way too much for me. It’s really well done though. If I had the patience to rteally think about the logic or not logic I think I would have a blast. The exploration is very well done, the puzzles are sound, but they just take a lot of mental power at a certain point. The kind of mental power where you’re like “Okay, that opens this, so that opens that, but… I can’t open that cause I need this and to get that I need to decode the morse code, but the morse code of what cause it’s a word but where’s the morse code itself? Oh I need to figure out this graph to figure out the code? Can I call a friend?”. That might be exactly what you’re looking for and if it… this is the game for you!
https://store.steampowered.com/app/2513380/Logic_Escape/

The fest truly is big. Some demos are larger than others. Some make you want to explore as much as you can because who knows when you’ll play the whole game? Some take 30 minutes, some take 2-3 hours withstanding. Here are 5 more demos I played to completion and truly enjoyed to discuss and tell you (the universal) to go check out yourself.

AMERICAN ARCADIA:
Imagine if everyone on The Truman Show didn’t know they were on it. Now imagine if someone who worked in production found out someone would be eliminated and they for reasons to be told wanted to save this person. Now take that but turn it into a video game that is half puzzle platformer and half first person narrative puzzle exploration. You get America Arcadia. The demo gives a perfect taste of this for me personally highly anticipated game, which trailers only gave a glimpse of. Now that I know how it’ll actually play? I really am all in.
https://store.steampowered.com/app/1249040/American_Arcadia/

ANOMALY, AGENT:
A very basic and also in ways simple low pixel side scrolling brawler/shooter, yet through the mechanics of “powers” becomes very interesting. You jump, you punch, you kick, you shoot, you dodge, you parry, you melee but the world around you and some of the weapons you get, that’s what changes things up here. Very easy to pick up and play as well. The little in jokes, the writing, this is something. No puzzles, just hand/eye and a tale.
https://store.steampowered.com/app/2378620/Anomaly_Agent/

VLAD CIRCUS:
Also a pixel art game, but a horror survival puzzle this time. The demo I don’t believe ever gets to the combat part of things, but the other vibes are there. Solving where to go, what to do next to trigger events, and what a dark sad event. These circus characters are full of life in their dialogue and backstory, and the main with being a clown who now suffers delusions in a horror game where there may or may not be dead bodies or all his friends from the circus reunion for 8 years ago might not exist is… a lot. It also is NOT what I expected. From trailers I thought this would be a point and click, but the gameplay surprised me pleasantly by being different.
https://store.steampowered.com/app/1702430/Vlad_Circus_Descend_Into_Madness/

DOGGY DON’T CARE:
I have played and beaten this before but I still really had fun. If you have not been a dog who doesn’t care yet, then go be one and be as expectant as I am for Rotub’s game/toy. I loved the graphical improvements and the ability to interact with way more than I could before, destruction is fun. How much trouble will Doggy get into when the parrot sends him into the city? There’s not much more to say here, it’s just adorable and zen while also making you think a bit and well, doggy don’t care.
https://store.steampowered.com/app/2438180/Doggy_Dont_Care/

BUY ME SOME SOUP:
I don’t know how to describe this, but here goes. Among many other emails, you get a friend asking you to buy them soup. Using hints from other emails, you go to other websites, you find info, you input info, you play games on an old computer, you listen to music, you watch videos, you send emails, you read emails, eventually, you get soup and then? Well… then the demo ends. It’s a trippy experience inside a computer… but is it all in the computer?
https://store.steampowered.com/app/1606990/Buy_Me_Some_Soup/