This is a good looking and polished twin stick shooter with constant action. At the end of each stage is a challenging boss fight with some bullet hell sections. Your dash ability helps to get out of tight spots and there are some useful powerups to find. Overall the game is hard but fair. The big problem is the length, expect to get through it in around 1-2 hours. I wish I had known that before buying the game.
Weird style decision for a shooter. First time I passed, it looked like a kids game. Then I saw some gameplay and became intrigued. Decided to try myself and got positively surprised. Very few games these days allow you to run and gun. That's all you do in this game. It felt very refreshing to not have to stop and aim down sight, duck, hide or any of that nonsense. Just charge forward and shoot. And it worked perfectly for the first 2 worlds or so. Then things got annoying. Less running and more platforming. Jumping off a platform, shooting a moving target behind you while landing on another platform blindly, and quickly turning around to hit a falling target in front of you. Too much trickery and memorisation. Maybe some people will like those sections too. But for me the first 2 worlds felt refreshing, the rest not so much.
This is like chewing on a dead rat after being used to grilled beef. I fired it up hoping it would be Commandos with Robin Hood. The games look and play similarly with interface being a straight rip off. But boy is this one clunky. Your arrows are unreliable, you move like your holding in a shit and everything feels sluggish. The biggest problem is the map design. Good luck sneaking past the enemies. It seems the developers put together some scenes that looked nice and forgot to playtest the maps. Or maybe they don't care about stealth because you often are left to duke it out. At least the combat is semi interesting. You can drag the mouse to attack in different ways. But the soul of Commandos isn't here. It's a shallow copy that looks the same on the surface and even has a more interesting setting, but underneath is a tepid mess.
I can't remember last time I played a game with such tasty combat. There are tons of options and every little decision matters. It's a micromanagers dream. Skills are very diverse and you are free to creatively come up with combos, in fact you have to or the enemies will kick your ass. They all have their own unique traits and some very deadly abilities. Game is hard in the most satisfactory way. Try to bash through the enemy resistance and you will be locked down in no time, but once you learn their weaknesses some adversarial gonads will be hurting. Every character come with their unique skill tree and you can rebuild it any time you like. It's brilliant. Combined with your ability to choose which 4 of the 8 characters to bring you can try all kinds of interesting builds. Between fights there are some puzzles. I quite liked them. Nothing too hard but leaves you feeling clever and they're always logical. Story kept me engaged, albeit some voice work is terribly over acted. I'd say you might be disappointed if you're expecting a fleshed out rpg. 100% focus is on gameplay. There are no side quests or lore to get lost in, no grinding, no backtracking. It's a game for strategy enthusiasts who want streamlined thinking man's action. It's a game for people who thrive on grim opposition and squeel a little when they finally figure out the perfect response and fire off 7 deadly spells in perfect harmony.
When I first got this game I played through it once or twice... every evening for a few weeks. The true test of a game is to pass that initial obsession and this is one of the few that managed to do that. First we have the atmosphere. You enter a fairytale and never want to leave. Then we have the gameplay. After the first playthroughs the story isn't what keeps you in. It's the gameplay. You can instantly switch between the 3 characters to do increidble things. Block incoming arrows with the knights shield, freeze enemies with thief's frost arrows, lift them up with the wizzard and watch them shatter at the ground. Or trap them in a box with the wizzard and charge them off a cliff with the knight. The flipside is you can "cheat" all puzzles in multiple ways. Coming up with new solutions is very satisfying, but sometimes I wish it wasn't quite so easy to fly past everything. Play creatively and not power through and you will have a blast. Adding to this is the coop. Laugh at eachothers mistakes, impress with creative kills and goof around with boxes and stuff. As for negatives? Some skill combos feel a bit broken. Plank with charge and airshield for example. And then in expansion gravity field came. It's interesting but is abusable to tears. There is also no randomization of levels. All in all it's almost a perfect game. Lots of room for creativity and scaling well with your skill level. Attention to detail and just solid magical fun.
The game has a very serene feel with a soothing soundtrack and oddly captivating theme. But under the hood is a monster competitive score chasing game. It's a weird mixture that somehow blends very well. In it's best moments you flow through the levels dusting everything off in one glorious motion. But something is wrong with the controls. It started to creep up slowly but became very apparent in the later levels. They are absurdly floaty. At first it seems to fit the flowing nature of the game, but when you are asked to chain together long jump sequences and land on small platforms in the later levels frustration skyrockets. It feels more like you have to memorize the levels rather than improving your general skillset because fine tuned air controls doesn't work very well. I really enjoyed the game initially, you can do some really cool things. Sadly the controls ruined the later levels for me.
After playing through it I have mostly positive feelings but the sweetness doesn't come without salt. Combat is tight and challenging. 1 shot and you're dead. Gameplay is incredibly fast and when everything clicks it has high badass factor. As I understand game was made by 1 guy with little previous experience. Unfortunately this shows. Load up time is around 10-20 seconds which is weird for such a lightweight game and worse I had several problems with game crashing. Yet if you can look past these technical difficulties it's clear the project was made with passion. Gameplay nitpicks: I am a bit disappointed how easy it is to abuse AI by standing behind doorways waiting for them coming to slaughter one by one. The bosses are also more about trying to find exploits rather than straight up fights. Graphics are... unique. Overall though game was enjoyable. Probably will not pick it up again anytime soon but while playing I had fun.
You jump around like a madman shooting everything in your path while heavy metal music pumps in the background. Primitive satisfaction everytime something dies by your hand. The gib factor is high with all weapons. To proceed everything in the area has to die. My pleasure. Allright I have to say it sometimes is a bit repetitive. Also like all eastern euopean studios the game comes with dreadful mood and a few bugs sprinkled in. But it's a damn blast to play. Mindless killing have never felt better.
