I think easy mode would change the experience of the game. And me being a lazy guy would take it, and then I would not spend so much time on the game and I would forget it much more quickly. It happened with Bleed. It was an awesome game, had a lot of checkpoints, and I beat it in 90 minutes and never got back to it. So I am an advocate for not increasing the checkpoints! But I also feel the pain of dying to a boss over and over again (I'm stuck at the level 2 boss).

But I propose an alternative to more checkpoints, why not have a boss trial mode where when you get to a boss, it unlocks it for training? I think this would kinda be a happy medium. Although I think this would be much harder to implement by the developer. But at least now you would have a strategy when going for the boss.

Many games struggle with the boss battles, mega man had the checkpoint right before the boss but it had lives. The Dark- and Demon Souls usually make you open shorter path to the boss. So this is one of the unforgiving games I have played recently.

But... any thoughts on this?

PS: I played Bleed on medium, easy was too easy and hard too hard for my nerves, when trying it out on the first level :)

Boss training rooms... Loving the idea. Shame it most likely won't get implemented.

I want to share my thoughts on the topic too. I personally don´t find the game that hard so far, it just gets boring and repetitive after a while.

It´s fine up to half a stage, but it really gets boring for me after that. It just ends up to "play flawlessly" until you reach a new part, fail, and repeat. I don´t even feel powerups as a reward, as once you know the stage, it barely means anything to have them. So I have a flame sword and the hidden hammer, but it doesn´t matter, because I won´t success on the next part, I will lose them, to only recover them again on the next playthrough. At the end of each stage, if I´ve played like 3-4 hours, most of them are repeating exactly the same parts of the level, with hardly any reward or extra challenge. I don´t care about time attacks or points, so it just feels boring. What´s worse, exit the game and you have to replay both parts of the world, even if you have repeated the first part so many times that you hardly make any mistake, unless you end so bored that you start making mistakes because you just don´t care.

I understand the challenging part of the game, but that´s what I want: A challenging game, not a boring game. For me, the levels are too big. It would be nice to have something like "spend 500 gold + hidden hammer + flame sword and any other powerup just to get an extra checkpoint". Or some kind of training for bosses which shouldn´t need to replay the exact same level you have replayed so many times already, because you know, dying because you don´t know a boss pattern and having to replay a long and not challenging level is boring. Or just being able to replay a world from the middle checkpoint after exiting the game. Any of these things would make the game less boring. But so far, I´ve spent more than half the time repeating exactly the same parts of the level I already know, without hardly any reward or challenge in it.

I love the gameplay, the graphics and the music. It just needs less "repeating parts I´ve already mastered". Put the bar as high as you want for "mastered" (a time to beat to that part, spend x money, powerups, whatever), but right now it just gets boring. That´s what I think.

I think you hit the nail on the head. For me, I'm no longer a child with a lot of free time to try the same area over and over again. Leisure time is limited and personally I would rather spend that time relaxing and having a good time than get frustrated and have to start the whole level again.

I think it's a fun game otherwise. It would be nice for them to include an option to have more checkpoints but I wouldn't see it happening.

If people still enjoy this sort of challenge then good for them, but I think we could all do without the elitist attitude "Oh guess you didn't play videogames at the time when I was a child, well you're just a noob/casual/whatever then!".

Here are my two cents:

I've now invested over 6 hours into this game and I really enjoy the gameplay. The problem is that I wasn't yet able to proceed past the first boss. I was able to reach him a few dozen times and managed to hit him twice or thrice, but that's it. And after playing through the second half of world 1 again and again, I eventually get so frustrated, bored and careless that I have to stop playing, because it brings me nowhere. And when I start the game again on another day, I'm back at the beginning of the game instead of the crystal that I have already reached.

So I'm now at a point where I feel cheaply cheated out of seeing and enjoying the rest of the game for which I payed. I've seen youtube videos of people defeating the first boss, but they didn't help me. There seem to be no cheats to access the next world. The save file is hidden in some obscure place, so I cannot just use someone else's save, where the other levels have been unlocked. I'm aware that there exist trainers for Volgarr, but I don't know if they work for the gog version and I'm not the type of person that is willing to mess with the game files in such a way.

So I am frustrated and disappointed with Volgarr right now, and I think I have every right to be, because I feel I have invested enough time, energy, and money into this otherwise great and fun game that I should be allowed to at least see world 2 now.

After playing some more hours after my previous comment I´ve earned ending "C", and I seriously think the first two worlds (specially the second) are a lot longer and harder than most of the later ones. Yeah, I know, supposedly later worlds have more complex enemy, hazards, etc, but generally they are shorter and even some of them have some easier alternate paths (like 3-1). They are a lot less boring too.

For me 1-2 and 2-2 were really annoying and the levels I´ve spent more time in the game. Maybe more in 2-2 than in all the later levels together, and I´m not kidding. The only reason I´ve managed to beat 2-2 is because I´ve ended searching how the hell the boss moves on Youtube. I spent like 5-6 hours easily only to reach the boss for the first time, and it killed me like 10+ times easy without even learning its movements. Later bosses are a lot easier to memorize IMO, specially as they are slower.

The worst was reaching the World 6, only to see that it features constant checkpoints (to the point you barely memorize in some rooms), even one previous to the boss. Why is this world different? Just because it features the cheapest enemy layouts? Why not extend this to the other worlds? What makes it so different?

For those having trouble beating the first two worlds, I would personally advice:
1-2: Learn how to pick all chests. All of them are easy and can be earned safely, even the more hidden ones can be picked with nearly 0 risk. If you manage to get to the boss with the flame sword, just jump the first attack over while throwing a spear to his shield. Double jump on the spear while using a second one. Jump on the second one and if you landed it high enough, you can just smash the attack button until the boss is dead. He won´t attack a second time. A lot easier than taking it slowly, as minions spawn at a different time frame that his attacks, and that´s what made the fight harder for me.

2-2: Again, try to learn how the get all chests. One or two of them might be trickier and can be left alone if you already have the flame sword, but they can be earned with little effort too. I highly suggest to learn to jump away from ropes, use a spear and double jump again to the rope, as it really makes some parts easier. If you have trouble beating the boss, watch a video of it, as this level is loooooong. Once you know the pattern it isn´t hard at all. BTW: I hate slimes (and generally all infinite spawning enemies, but these are the most annoying for me).

A great tip too is that whenever you find a buried sword, there´s a hidden hammer close, which can really help if you can´t figure out a part of a level or make a mistake.

I would suggest people to try some more. Later worlds were less painful. Anyway, I keep thinking this game would be really better with some more checkpoints. At least on bosses.

I am ok with the save system. At least it doesn't give you passwords displayed to where you can't understand everthing there. Can't tell the difference between O and 0, I, l and 1. It could be worse.

So I've read the reviews and through this thread, and it's been a while since the game was released. So my question is: Has anyone made a mod/patch for this game to add extra save points, or maybe a save-state feature?

Like others here, I've been playing video games since the late '70s. Due to having a career and family though, I'm lucky if I can get a contiguous hour of time to play video games. Even as a kid though, I really despised the Mario-style platformers that would contain a very precise jump at the end of the level, usually with an arrow or bird flying out at you at the apex of your jump, then forcing you to replay the entire level over again if you got hit. It always felt like an extremely cheap way of artificially increasing difficulty and advertised hours of gameplay. Even then, I valued my time to the point where I wouldn't put up with that, and I'd either change the rules of the game, or play something else.

Nowadays, I have even less time, and a much larger choice of games to play. That said, Volgarr looks like a very entertaining game if there's a way to reduce the needless repetition it apparently has.

The problem with this idea is that the levels are balanced for the save points to be where they are. If you add more then you will be in a position where you potentially cannot get all the need powerups before the boss, if you just give people the powerups at the checkpoint then there is no incentive to collect (and protect) them in the first place.

They haven't omitted an easy difficulty just to spite you. I think they just didn't want to add band-aid measures that would ultimately compromise the fun of the game. (i.e. if you're going to add an easy mode, make sure you do it right)

Just start the player off at the last checkpoint with whatever he was carrying at the time. If you're in a situation where you're ill equipped to deal with the end of the level enemy, give a suicide option that starts you at the beginning of the level, or perhaps one more checkpoint back.

Anyone know if this game runs properly in VMware workstation? Pause game and snapshot. Roll back snapshot and try again.

Here is a very interesting post that deals with the subject of challenge, punishment, and difficulty. A very interesting read (as well as the comments) in regard to how Volgarr works:

[url=]http://www.pixelpoppers.com/2009/11/test-skills-not-patience-challenge.html[/url]

That's an excellent article, thank you for posting it!

BTW, the text on your link is correct, but the actual link itself points back to this page, so you can't click it, but you can copy/paste into browser url field.