1 Hour 1 Decision (1H1D)

It seems bad until you consider the alternative. For this episode, the Xbox Game Pass "Surprise Me" button has selected the side-scrolling platformer with roguelite elements developed by Magic Design Studios! In this title, Death started by outsourcing the reaping of souls, but things got out of control quickly and now he finds himself buried in mountains of monotonous paperwork. Equipping your cl...

Sounds like you better strike... Looking for something different? The Xbox Game Pass "Surprise Me" button has delivered with this crafting game developed by the newly-minted Bontemps Games and published by the prolific Humble Games. While it looks like a side-scrolling adventure game from yester-year, this title is surprisingly free of any combat. Instead, the entire game revolves around exploring...

The fifth in the franchise! Who knew? The Xbox Game Pass "Surprise Me" button has put Tom and Chris behind the wheel once again, this time in Codemaster's 2022 racer. For the first time in franchise history, this model comes loaded with a story-focused career mode! Will suiting up as the curiously named Driver 22 complete the package, or will our hosts discover that those resources could have been...

A fairly fishy mystery is afoot. For this episode, Tom and Chris take on the narrative adventure game developed and published by Slow Bros. The titular protagonist lives aboard a spaceship that fled Earth centuries ago seeking an idyllic new planet, but that dream died when the ship crashed on a decidedly subpar aquatic world. The chief scientist hasn't given up hope, though, and as her slow-witte...

Are they still leading the way? Well, this one is certainly a mouthful! Mattel's little toy cars and their iconic orange tracks are back, but this time in digital form in the arcade racer developed by Milestone. Dating back to the 90's themselves, this Italian game studio has put out countless SBK and MotoGP titles, so they are certainly no stranger to the racing genre. With a Hot Wheels game alre...

What's the 411, home skillet? In this special episode of 1 Hour 1 Decision, Tom and Chris interview Dave Proctor, Game Director and Studio Founder of Mighty Yell. If you are keeping up with the podcast, you should recognize Mighty Yell as the developer that crafted the 90's oozing road trip adventure game The Big Con, recently featured on episode # 169. For this special event, our intrepid...

Legend of the little lizard man? For this episode, our dynamic duo investigate the cutesy platformer developed by MegaWobble and published by Playtonic Games. The developer is a tiny team, but they had big ideas... not unlike the diminutive reptilian protagonist of this colorful title. Will the trio's aspirations of making a zelda-esk experience that's silly and free of any serious "adult stuff" t...

Summer camp ended and then the murders began. Tom and Chris arrived at Hackett's Quarry and were tasked with spending an hour with the interactive drama turned survival horror title developed by Supermassive Games. Dubbed the spiritual successor to Until Dawn, this game enlists the talents of many horror film veterans to portray the cast of counselors and their antagonists. With a reported 186 pos...

Pickpocketing is a crime, even if your motives are pure. In a fortunate appeal to variety, the Xbox Game Pass “Surprise Me” button has selected the pickpocketing adventure game developed by Mighty Yell for this episode. Set back in the 1990s, the protagonist works at her mother’s video rental store until she learns about her mom’s hefty debt to loan sharks. Teaming up with a con artist, the teen m...

Is this guy's name seriously Travis Touchdown? The Xbox Game Pass “Surprise Me” button sure seems to enjoy having our hosts jump into the middle of a franchise. This time the selection is the third numbered, but fourth chronologically in the hack and slash adventure series developed by Grasshopper Manufacture. For those unaware, the franchise began on the Wii in the days of rampant motion controls...

War, what is it good for? Tales, apparently. It feels like the Xbox Game Pass "Surprise Me" button may have confused "random" with "next alphabetically" when it selected this tactical role-playing game developed by Shiro Games as its choice for this episode. In either case, Tom and Chris are honor bound to comply, so they have embarked on a mercenary journey through t...

A retro shooter featuring a space marine, sound familiar? Thanks to the whims of the Xbox Game Pass "Surprise Me" button, Tom and Chris travel back in time to their earliest days of PC gaming and experience something that aims to blend seamlessly with games of that era. The folks over at Auroch Digital set out to create a first-person shooter that was reminiscent of 1993's Doom... and by partnerin...

Climbing is the name of this game, just not literally. The title of this game is actually the French word for a receding tide. We know this because Don't Nod (the game's developer) was kind enough to inform us at the very start of this puzzle platformer. With little more than that nugget of knowledge in hand, the Xbox Game Pass "Surprise Me" button has shoved our hosts off to see just how far up t...

These messes aren't gonna tidy themselves. Kids are messy. One clever strategy employed by parents worldwide to counter this problem is to transform cleaning up into a game and then trick their children into playing it. The developer duo that is Max Inferno have leveraged this time-tested tactic and created a puzzle game in which the objective is simply to tidy up one mess after another. For this...

The protagonist's surname might be Belmont. We put it to a vote and our listeners have spoken. For this episode, Tom and Chris investigate the new-to-gamepass metroidvania developed by ArtPlay and published by 505 Games. Spearheaded by Kogi Igarashi and assisted by a number of other Castlevania alumni, this title sits squarely in the realm of spiritual successor. You won't find Dracula or any Belm...

Tom Hanks is familiar with this scenario. What happens when your plane crashes on an uninhabited island in the Pacific? The Xbox Game Pass “Surprise Me” button must want to know because it chose the survival game developed and published by Beam Team Games as the subject of this episode. Our hosts have just one hour to investigate their randomly generated islands and decide if they will be setting...

Search for family in the wake of an invasion. After getting a break for a couple of episodes, the Xbox Game Pass “Surprise Me” button is back at the helm and has steered us right smack into an alien invasion! As the first title developed by Jumpship (a collaboration between Chris Olsen and Playdead's Dino Patti), this dialogue-free adventure game certainly shares some DNA with the critically-succe...

A world filled with monster pals that skirt copyrights and trademarks. With thanks to a coworker, Pocket Pair’s monster-collecting survival game has been on Tom’s radar for quite some time now. So, when a close friend learned it was coming to Xbox Game Pass and immediately requested that he and Chris cover it in an episode, Tom was ready to give the Surprise Me button another day off. With an unof...

Turn on lights to survive the night. It’s been a minute since the Xbox Game Pass "Surprise Me" button made Chris play a horror game, so Michael from Bits of Time stepped up to course-correct by requesting this Indie Psychological Horror developed by Camel 101. With a narrative told from a first-person perspective and sinister environments shrouded in darkness, this is one that is likely to keep Ch...

Return to greeting an adjacent homeowner. Mr. Peterson has drawn the suspicions of another of his neighbors in this sequel to a game that our hosts have actually played! It’s hard to believe, but over a hundred episodes have transpired since Tom and Chris took a stab at the first game, so when the Xbox Game Pass “Surprise Me” button selected the sequel developed by Netherlands-based Eerie Guest St...

It’s the Spanish word for grey. Created by the Barcelona-based Nomada Studio, this platform adventure title has been described as a combination of other games-as-art staples (namely Journey and Ori). Created by a small team, this randomly chosen game has both a minimalist design and a distinctive visual style that is sure to secure a place for it amongst other artsy indie games. Critical praise as...

Alice takes her trauma back to Wonderland. The Xbox Game Pass “Surprise Me” button has indeed surprised us with its selection of this 2011 third-person adventure game developed by Spicy Horse and published by Electronic Arts. Originally released on the Xbox 360 and Playstation 3, this sequel to American McGee’s Alice is definitely among the oldest games our hosts have been tasked with playing for...

Travel to a land down under. The Xbox Game Pass “Surprise Me” button has selected yet another sequel for our hosts. This time it has chosen the first-person Metroidvania developed and published by Supra Games. Originally conceived as DLC for the original Supraland, this expansion exploded in scope and became a full game all its own. With an advertised focus on exploration and puzzle-solving, this...

Executing exorcisms of evil eastern enemies. Our hosts had no idea what they were going to be playing when the Xbox Game Pass “Surprise Me” button picked this title at the end of the previous episode. A cursory search of the internet revealed that it is a side-scrolling action RPG developed by a Chinese company called Wildfire Game. Screenshots show that the art is 2D and done in a hand-drawn ink...

The spin-off to the series that is itself a spin-off! We move away from a tactical shooter with RPG elements and on to a tactical RPG with shooting elements for this episode of 1H1D. Selected by our special guest Slade from The Game Club Podcast, this episode focuses on the latest spin-off of the beloved series developed by Atlus. With a plot that takes place concurrently with the events of the ma...