SteamWorld Dig

It's a great little time-waster, if nothing else, that offers constant incentives to keep mining and selling resources and explore further down. The plot is fine, but the game didn't really need it to make it fun and worth playing. The boss fight that triggers end game was very easy and anti-climactic, and again, the game didn't need to feature it to make it worth playing.

Contemporary "Boulder Dash", with good graphic, interesting tools and few funny dialogs. Only lack more levels and more items and bosses to overcome - about nine hours of play.

I just beat this and I've already forgotten stuff. The game at least has somewhat of a unique premise. You dig a hole until you get to the bottom. Sure. It's super linear. Don't believe the Metroidvania tag, there's very little of that here. Particularly since the areas themselves largely lack any kind of intelligent design. It's hard for a game like this to have any kind of design when the point is for the player to be able remove stuff at will. Granted, the player can't destroy everything, and there are a few side areas that take advantage of the indestructible objects to create challenges for the player. These caves are undoubtedly the best part of the game, but they are short. The main game, however, is mostly just monotonous downward digging, with the only tension being whether or not you can return to a checkpoint. It can be easy to accidentaly softlock yourself if you run out of water for performing your high jumps, and the game has an absolutely ridiculously tiny limit on placeable ladders that you might use to get yourself out of such situations. Instead they give the player a kill yourself and restart button, which seems asinine when there was a more obvious and intuitive solution right there all along. So while the main gameplay's interesting, it wasn't really enjoyable to me. The side areas were, but they're only about 1/5 of the runtime. You might feel different, but what I can say for sure is that this game certainly ain't worth $10. Wait for a sale.

When is the 2nd one coming out!!?? I'm not much of a platform gamer, but I must say this was a pleasant surprise. You'll be able to read most everything about the game in previous reviews... With that said, the game overall is fairly easy, as are the puzzles & finding secrets. The steampunk & western elements are a great mix. It is rather linear and having map markers lead to you every next step takes away some of the adventure, & hopefully the next installment will be longer. Regardless, it's a great buy!

Initially, I was sceptical about the content of the game - can you enjoy the game, where you're digging deeper and deeper in searching of minerals, selling them & upgrading the gear to.. Dig deeper and deeper (etc, etc.)? But the answere is positive! I've really enjoyed with this title. Good amount of new enemies, gear, different conditions on various "undeground levels". And it's fine. Unfortunatly, I've ended this game in 6 hours (probably it would took me even shorter, if I wouldn't explore so much in search of minerals and "challenge pits". I didn't like the "voices" of in-game characters, but that was rather the minor issue.