Although the pixel effects animation is excellent, with intelligent use of sprite animation instead of poor dialogues to tell stories, and clearly significant effort was put into universe lore, it suffers from: -=========- Very little sense of progression in terms of powerup that opens new paths. A lot of times it felt like wandering around for a measly weapon upgrade that has little stopping power. Only 1 defense upgrade is available, and is very late into the game. Rest all rely on hp upgrade and dodging.
Fast travel is literally an afterthought, only possible after you've collected all 4 keys, which is the very end. (And not obvious to you either, need rediscovery) Some too spacious areas with nothing but mobs. Inability to take notes on the map. The initial map that limits your view to the immediate surroudings makes it very disorientating.
Very little memorable chip tunes, of all the various area themes, I only remember the one for the wet cave with water currents. -=========- The jumpy alien shooters that asks you engage in chase shooting while it runs around like it's in a circus also did not help, I lost steam midway. Some of the later bosses are so unforgiving, a collision takes out half of the fully upgraded hp bar while spamming the screen with projectiles, at that point, no interest is left, the game became just a chore.
Kudos to the author for allowing cheats right from the start I guess, saves the trouble of doing hacks manually. It even has save states available.
Regardless, it is well made, even offering a randomizer after you beat the game. It's just that the gameplay gears more toward the hardcore.
-=========-
Very little sense of progression in terms of powerup that opens new paths. A lot of times it felt like wandering around for a measly weapon upgrade that has little stopping power.
Only 1 defense upgrade is available, and is very late into the game. Rest all rely on hp upgrade and dodging.
Fast travel is literally an afterthought, only possible after you've collected all 4 keys, which is the very end. (And not obvious to you either, need rediscovery)
Some too spacious areas with nothing but mobs.
Inability to take notes on the map.
The initial map that limits your view to the immediate surroudings makes it very disorientating.
Very little memorable chip tunes, of all the various area themes, I only remember the one for the wet cave with water currents.
-=========-
The jumpy alien shooters that asks you engage in chase shooting while it runs around like it's in a circus also did not help, I lost steam midway.
Some of the later bosses are so unforgiving, a collision takes out half of the fully upgraded hp bar while spamming the screen with projectiles, at that point, no interest is left, the game became just a chore.
Kudos to the author for allowing cheats right from the start I guess, saves the trouble of doing hacks manually. It even has save states available.
Regardless, it is well made, even offering a randomizer after you beat the game. It's just that the gameplay gears more toward the hardcore.