Tag: 100% | A Banana Peeled

Birdigo after 100%ing it, part three

Posted on July 7, 2026 by Minna Hong • 0 Comments

I have a bit more to say about Birdigo (John August, Corey Martin) and indie games in general. At the end of the last post (which you can read here), I mentioned that I was surprised when I got the ‘win each round with one word’ achievement. It was anticlimactic because I did not realize I had won it until after it was over. I had been going at it for so long, I didn’t know quite what I was supposed to do when I actually won or how I was supposed to feel.

It reminds me of when the boys fought

*SPOILER*

Malenia for three days in their Elden Ring (FromSoft) playthrough. And, yes, it’s amusing to me to spoiler tag a boss from another game in this post. Part of the series evolved into Rory soloing every boss as long as there were no NPC summons to summon (and even sometimes then). In Elden Ring, they decided through trial and error that he would not use the spirit ashes for bosses. Krupa said to Gav that he (Gav) would one day rue that decree, but to Rory’s credit, he adamantly refused to use the spirit ash during the Malenia fight.

They edited down the footage, obviously, but they revealed that it was fifteen hours in total over four days. They did not even show any of the footage for one of the days. I think? They split it into three episodes, and each was over two hours. The last was almost two-and-a-half hours. It was epic, and the struggle was so real. The reason I mention it is because when he fginally beat her, the celebration was muted. I mean, the initial celebration was pretty hyped, but it subsided quickly. It became much more an expression of relief than excitement. Rory said something about not knowing what to do because he should be running back to fight Malenia again (massive paraphrase). He died 265 times to her, and you could see it wearing on all three of them in the last episode.

Anyway, this is me whenever I go for a plat. I go blank on the inside and something deep inside of me almost gets angry. Like, “You’re not the boss of me, and I’m going to do this!” Who it’s saying it to, I have no idea. Also me, probably. This is why I don’t do competitive sports–I’m way too hard on myself when I do.

It’s funny. It’s not so much that I care about winning and losing–though I do to a certain extent. It’s just me feeling like I’m not doing enough. It’s all about me winning and losing against myself–not me winning and losing against anyone else.

I just now realized that Birdigo sounds like vertigo. D’oh! Huh. The video I’m including is an interview with the two devs. I didn’t realize that the game was a card game first (called AlphaBird). Huh. Made by the same two guys. Thats’ pretty cool!

Birdigo–those last three achievements, part two

Posted on July 6, 2026 by Minna Hong • 0 Comments

I’m back to write more about Birdigo (John August, Corey Martin), 100%ing it, and my gripes with indie games in general. Before I get into it, here’s my post from yesterday. I started talking about the three achievements I needed to 100% this game, and then I justt migrated (heh) all over the place.

I am so bad when it comes to sticking to a subject because everything is connected in my brain. So, I may start out by mentioning that I 100%ed the game, and that makes me think about the game, of course. Then, I think about what I didn’t like about the game and/or what frustrated me. That got me to thinking about what I didn’t like about indie games in general, which then led to me broadening that out to games in general.

Then, I give in to my to rant about how much I hate certain things in tutorials–and then I forget what I wanted to talk about in the first place. Or I run out of time/desire/will to talk about it. This is how my brain works, much to my dismay.

Speaking of, I just tried the demo for a typing game that has absolutely no tutorial; it was frustrating as hell. Also, here is one of my pet peeves in games: limited inventory. In the demo I tried, it’s a farming/cooking sim with something like 10 slots of inventory. 10!!! It encourages you to go out and explore so you can pick up ingredients for your recipes. Except I can go about two steps and pick up ten things (I can pick up several of each item, but 10 different items total). I can barely go to the next area before I have to return to put tihngs in my box.

By the way, I had to find that on my own. They don’t tell you there’s a box. Also, I got into the restaurant biz because my grandfather died and deeded it to me (of course).

I don’t mind a nonsensical or unbelievable premise, but I do mind not being able to figure out what to do. I will give a shout-out that they allowed me to type in Dvorak without switching up the keyboard.

Anyway. Back to Birdigo.

I used the Lean Deck to tackle the win a route by using one word per round. I didn’t think I could do it with the Feral Deck because I did not have the confidence that I could consistently–wait. I think at some point I changed to the Feral Deck because I realized that if I could only use one word per round, then I might as well use this deck and have six wild cards.

Birdigo after 100%ing it

Posted on July 5, 2026 by Minna Hong • 0 Comments

I have finally 100%ed Birdigo (John August, Corey Martin). Here was what I had to say in my A Quick Review about it. As usual, the one achievement I thought would be the hard one was the easiest (and the first of the three that I got). Let’s review. The three achievements I had left were–

Before I get into how I did each of the three achievements, I want to talk a bit about the different decks. The first is the classic deck. It’s the most well-rounded of the decks and it has no penalties. It has two or three of each consonant and four of each vowel. And one wildcard. It’s what I used for most of my gameplay until I realized the usefulness of using the more thinned out decks.

You have to unlock the other decks under certain cirumstances. Some of them are joke decks like the Pirate Deck, which you unlock by playing one word with 3 Rs in it (I had to look it up, obviously). There are three decks that I consider joke decks (Gadsby Deck, Pirate Deck, and Alphabet Deck. Well, the last one is not a joke, exactly, but it’s a deck that only has one of each letter. And you get one extra word at the start. You unlock it by playing each letter at least once in the same run.

The Pirate Deck has 9 Rs in it and one wildcard. The Gadsby Deck is unlocked by winning a run without using an E. The deck has no E, but you start with 10 seeds. (Seeds are used to buy feathers and songs, both of which will help with the run). And it has one wildcard. I have never won a run with any of these three decks because the wackiness of them did not appeal to me.

Oh! The two decks that I consider more serious. One is the Lean Deck. It has one of every consonant (well, two of a few like S and T) and three of every vowel (except U. Only one of that) And one wildcard. But you also get one less discard.

Finally, there’s the Feral Deck. This has the same letters as the Lean Deck, but it gives you six wildcards instead of just one. And you get one less word. Normally, you start with three words, which means you start with two (there are ways to add words). This is the deck that is often said to be the best overall–if you’re comfortable only making two wourds per round (for the first few rounds at least). This is the deck that most people seem to recommend for–well, just about everything.

As a reminder, these were the three achievements I had left:

1. Win a run by passing each round using only one word.

2. Win seven daily migrations (daily run. I don’t know how they were seeded, but you had to finish them in the same day. Or rather, the same run. I’ll get more to that later).

3. Finish the final route (Short-tailed Shearwater). It’s not the longest or shortest of the routes, but–I’ll get to that in a minute, too.

The Spirit Lift (prettysmart games): A quick (?) look and review, part two

Posted on February 16, 2026 by Minna Hong • 0 Comments

I 100%ed The Spriit Lift (prettysmart games) today. The immediate feeling I had was relief. Relief that I could quit playing the game and move on with my life. This is something I hate about trying to 100% a game, by the way. How much I hate the grind and tedium by the end of the game. Dark Souls III (FromSoft) was my favorite game until Elden Ring (FromSoft again) dropped. When I went for the plat/hundo chievo, I was naive as to how much it would take out of me. By the end, I was hating the game with all my heart. And this was a game I played every day as my comfort game. When I got the plat*, I exhaled slowly, put down my controller, and did not touch the game for several months.

I did eventually pick it up again, but it was a journey. That plat was brutal and trash, by the way. I have a completely unsubstantiated theory as to why the From plats are so terrible. It’s because Miyazaki did not want to do them, but he was pushed to do so. So he made them awful as his way of retaliating. Again, I have nothing to base this on, but it’s a theory that makes sense.

And the reason that Elden Ring‘s is a dream in comparison is because it was meant to be a mainstream hit/breakthrough. That’s not a diss on the game, by the way. It’s my favorite FromSoft game by a hair over Dark Souls III. Something can be a massive hit and still be unique to the vision of the director. I really hate people who act as if something that has mass appeal is automatically a sellout.

Ahem.

Back to this game. Here is part one to my review from yesterday. When I realized that I was close to the plat, I should have just shut down the game and walked away. Why? Because I knew what it was going to do to me. I knew that I get obsessed and my brain turns weird. I knew that I would keep on grinding until I got the two or three meaningless items I needed to get the plat.

I did not want to do it, but I knew I would.

Did I walk away? Of course I did not. I got into that flow state that I hit when I’m focused on an objective. Here’s the thing, though. With the Dark Souls III plat, I knew what I needed to do. I did not like what I needed to do, but I knew each grueling step. The worst was ten hours grinding to get a certain covenant item. Anyone who went for the plat and didn’t want to do the online PvP knows what I’m talking about.

Tag Archives: 100%