I cannot decide between AI War and Starward Rogue. I think I like them both equally. Or let me say it in another way.
I think they are my favourites but for different reasons. AI War because it keeps my brain busy, i like to think my way around, I prefer games that challange me mentally, not my reflexes. That's why I avoid shooters mostly, they simply suck when it comes to thinking.
Starward rogue on the other hand... I don't even know why. It fits into a grenre that I really avoided as much as possible. As somoneone who really HATES Isaac, I didn't except it to be my kind of thing. It disappointed my exceptions and showed to be a very good game. Maybe it's the flashy graphics. Maybe it's the awesome techno soundtrack. Maybe it's the different mechs with their individual attributes. or maybe it's just the fact that game does not consist of shit, blood and more shit. seriously, what teh hell is wrong with the designer of Isaac?
Just out of curiosity: Have you tried other games in the same genre as Isaac/Starward? There's quite a lot of them now, most of them don't do giant poo monsters and whatever. Only Isaac really does that. It rather sounds like the biggest issue with Isaac was the themes and Edmund's general gross-out sort of artstyle. Or were there other things you didn't like about Isaac?
As it is, many bits of Starward were very, very inspired by Isaac. So the contrast here is interesting.
I think Teleglitch would be the closes thing to these games that I have. I played it some time and it was actually better than Isaac but it did some stuff very differently. However, I lost interest in that as well.
The theme in itself is a great turn off for me. But also the gameplay or maybe it's simply the RNG that is too big in this game. Isaac has trillion of items but a lot of them share actually their benefits with other items. They are simply there to say "There are so many items in this game with so many possibilites". However, that many items also can screw you over with the RNG and I get screwed over many times. Also the lack information.
Now that I think about it, the last point might be the most important: The game simply does not tell you what any item does except some very vague information. You have to search the wiki yourself for any item you find because the creator thought it would be a good idea not to show waht items do in game. Not even when you pick them up. Probably the worst design decision I've ever seen (actually, not the worst, but very close to it). This kills the game for me. I don't want to spend my time searching the wiki on every run, wasting a lot of game time.
Starward Rogue however tells you what you get (except the mystery circuits which are basically the equivalent of potions in traditional rogue-likes so this is tolerable). Plus, you can simply test and switch out stuff like weapon systems. If it does not suit you, you can pick your old stuff up again. This is not possible in Isaac and you are stuck with your decision, ruining your run (which makes the design decision of not adding information even worse).
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