Owlboy

the game has its frustrating points, but overall my experience with it is positive

This is all in all a fun game and I like the first 2 to 3 hours I played. But there is one flaw to this game which bothers me both as a game developer and as a player. Your line of fire doesn't correspond with your position. You are an owlboy and attacking with a guy you are carrying so your line of fire is always beneath you. If a monster attacks you, you need to move up to hit it until you reach the sealing and then once it is on the same level you are lost. You can maneuver under the monster und move up into the monster to fire up. My point is that enemies which attack you are not easy to deal with because of bad game design. If you don't mind playing a game with a giant blind spot in front of the character than it would be fun.

Don't buy the game in the hope of playing it under macOS

It's overall a good game, and I've already rewarded devs with my money for that. However, I don't think they should be rewarded with high rating as well. About half the time game remembers that its main purpose is to entertain player. And during the other half it decides that it's not good enough if the player doesn't struggle with camera, controls and minor software issues (like freezing the system after Alt+Tab), which all are signature features of any PC port of any console game. This game isn't a port, but I guess devs decided that it should follow established traditions, given it's "old-school" thematic. Despite that, I think modern players when buying "retro-styled" game don't really expect something from the 90s. Instead, they expect modern high quality software product and progressive game design where only the art style distantly resembles graphics of an old era. And this game is a roller-coaster, where average but playable/addictive parts interleave with deliberate torture. I think that game (and many others modern games as well) would've benefited greatly if devs hired some independent third-party editor/censor, who would delete all the parts which devs couldn't delete themselves because they are deeply involved with their own creation. I would pay three times as much (e.g., would buy it for Switch) for that shortened product.

Solid design on platforming, bosses aren't complete pushovers, interesting little asides here and there. Characters all feel distinct and have personality. Even without voice-acting you can feel tone based on textual punctuation and timing, which can be hard to do. The music is wonderful and memorable, and the pixel art graphics are stunning and full of life. I watched a Videogame Dunkey review of it a long while back, thought it was neat. Decided to pick it up on sale recently and installed it right away so I wouldn't just forget about it. I'm happy I did.