Regarding playtime, not publication date. Though I suppose the latter applies as well.
Dredge
It's more way fishing than horror. The art style looks killer, but the eerie elements are limited to "someone is trying to raise something eldritch" and "look at these fucked-up fish." And there are some great fucked-up fish in this game!
It's just a bit more pedestrian, and a bit more focused on the tried-and-true, admittedly-addictive fishing game loop, than advertised. Do I regret playing it? Not at all. It's a good game, and it largely deserves the attention it's received. Absolutely dive in if you're so inclined. But I was ready for it to be over a couple acts before it was.
Mothmen 1966
A visual novel (with a few basic puzzles) patterned after old pulp comics, featuring a pixel-art neon green & blue palette that looks absolutely killer. Combined with the off-the-wall events and the noir-ish writing style, you can capture some spectacular screenshots with this game:
The writers went for the fences, or at least a triple, with where the story goes. There's one moment (here) that absolutely would have drived certain audiences wild if this game were more widely-known. A good short experience.
Hello Goodboy
A child wakes up in a limnal space and goes on an adventure with a talking canine spirit guide through two of four season-themed environments, where the duo meets friends, helps them solve their problems, and eats lunch with them. (You even bring your choice of beverage!)
There are a variety of problems with this sweet game with adorable art: loading times on Switch are large; the dog doesn't really act like a dog; there's no real reason you shouldn't be able to see all four seasonal areas in one go instead of requiring a New Game Plus; the game's aimed at kids, but it's too talky and not doey enough (though, not having kids, maybe I'm wrong in that department and they'd enjoy it as a digital storybook).
My real frustration, though, is the translation. It's in clunky, nonfluent English that's not up to modern presentation standards and is not at all suited for a children's game. It's credited to one "proofreader" at the Gameeleon localization studio, and I don't know if this is typical of their output, or they got a bad-apple translator, or the editor, if there were an editor, screwed things up, but whoever let the translation go in this state really ought to be ashamed of themselves. (In fact, since a "proofreader" was credited and not a translator, was the translation AI, with a lone human "tidying up"? If so, that human did a poor job of that, too.) The title comes from a small studio in Southeast Asia that might have not had the contacts to hire translators with a more rock-solid reputation in the Western market, and it seems like someone took advantage of them badly here.
That's awful, because while the game is far from perfect, it deserved far better than the translation it got, and its moral is really good and strong - one I've actually been referencing and remembering in difficult times over the past few months. Plus, the point where that metaphor - the one guiding the entire game - is revealed had me on the floor.
Battle Axe
Look at the screenshots for Battle Axe, and it seems to be one of the most beautiful titles ever made: a top-down fantasy arcade beat-'em-up set in Seiken Densetsu 3 land. It embraces its arcade aspirations with unparalleled relish, too: music with a perfect arcadey sound-font and an ever-present narrator announcing every caption and gameplay event ("FAE HAS FOUND SOME CHICKEN") and a lightning-lashed attract mode of a ravaged landscape and fell beasts building to a crescendo of "YOU THINK YOU REALLY CAN DEFEAT ME?!" and full-screen pixel art of an archvillain with a dramatic chiaroscuro and glowing eyes. It's an extraordinarily confident game with exceptional joie de vivre.
I wish the gameplay were on the same level. The first problem: stuff can come at you from all angles, yet you can attack in only eight directions, which makes managing to attack while evading really tricky at first. (Do not use the D-pad with this game. Go full analog stick. Also, use the elf and make liberal use of her directional spinning attack that makes her invincible for its duration.) Figure out that problem, though, and you're still contending with a thoroughly-unreasonable enemy attack rate and pop-up rate - running into enemies or traps that appear out of nowhere; an utterly constant respawn rate in the second level - and a very low health meter, with no extra lives and no continues. For whatever reason, funding or otherwise, Battle Axe is very short (only four levels), and the devs decided to compensate with cheap hits and unfair deaths. It makes for a frustrating experience, and I frankly wish they'd gone for "unfortunately easy" over "aggravating." (The Curse of the Moon dichotomy!) Also, given the wonders of the first level, you're expecting an escalation of the art that never comes. Everything looks great, mind, but it's the same level of great throughout, with nothing unexpected or inspiring (it's floating meadow-cave-castle-lava cave & dungeon) and no real "wow" ideas or showstoppers. They're clearly capable of more, but it didn't get done here. If you play it, play on Easy instead of the default Hard, expect an adjustment period for the controls, and don't buy it at the full $30 price.
(In fairness: As I discovered in getting additional screenshots for this article, I should point out that the Infinite Mode, though offering no new assets, is good for an occasional dose of mindless dungeon-crawling fun once you've gotten the hang of the gameplay's idiosyncracies.)
