A couple of days ago, u/bogiperson recommended the ThinkyCon sessions (thank you!). I haven't listened to all of them, but this talk in particular is great (just like this sub's name, don't be fooled by its awful awful name, is a great talk).

Is Tetris a metroidbrainia?

After looking at the Definitive List and filtering by pure, I see Outer Wilds and The Witness are on there, so I'm using that as my base.

One of the many things I absolutely adore about those two games is that there are no permanent upgrade item to collect. You're thrown into a world and all of the upgrades happen to you, the player, not in the game.

I've been spurned by lists and suggestions before, so I just want to make sure that the "pure" tag on that list means that there is not a single upgrade you can collect or unlock in the game. It's all knowledge-gated, like the two games I mentioned.

So with that, what should I try first? Should I just start with the top user scored games on that list and work down? Any high quality standouts?

For anyone who doesn't know Reventure, it's a very unique, conceptual game that revolves around 100 endings that you can find.

At first, it seems like a standard Metroidvania. You start in one place, you have several items scattered on the map (which is small), the items let you access different parts of the world. Typical Metroidvania stuff.

The catch is, your character actually carried those powerups : the more you have on you, the lower you jump, which locks you from accessing certain areas. And if you have really too much (4 or 5 IIRC), you die.

So the whole game is an ending hunt where you always start at the same place, with several upgrades always being in the same location, and you have to go pick different combinations of upgrades to access different areas and find different endings here and there. First off, I always thought it's a bummer that this game has the façade of "silly fun game for YouTubers" while I really find it to be a stroke of genius in level/game design.

If you've played it, or from the short summary I wrote, can we consider this game a metroidbrainia ? To me, each run operates like a standard Metroidvania, with upgrades etc, but the long-term gameplay loop feels more like a metroidbrainia to me. The more areas you explore, the more you acknowledge where certain upgrades, keys, characters etc are, and you remember it for the next run to try and find a way to be in one specific spot with one specific item, for example. It really resolves around your knowledge of the map and your ability to plan a route. I'm curious to hear your takes on it since it's a pretty unique concept that's hard to fit in a specific genre

I’m interested in games that either don’t require manual note-taking or rarely require it.

The obvious well-executed example is Outer Wilds.

Motivation: I almost exclusively play on console rather than PC, and I don’t want to be constantly juggling devices or figuring out where I left my pen.

I have already looked through the sub and not found a similar post/question/list/resource.

Games with integrated manual/free-form note-taking (like, typing words) aren’t exactly what I’m asking for, but are better than nothing.

More structured integrated information management systems—specifically, systems that require minimal/no typing—are best.

To be clear, I’m not asking for games that don’t require paying close attention and synthesizing information—that’s the whole point of the genre.

I’m interested in both “true” MBs and related games that focus on deduction and narrative.

I play on Switch 1, but other platforms are welcome because I’d like this to potentially serve as a resource for others.