The game looks awesome, however the 3rd dimension they added feels a bit awkward vs the fine-tunned control scheme of the previous Trines. Skill progression is non existent. It might be because the game is incredibly short compared to Trines (especially the 2nd) Still, that wouldn't justify a one-star rating. Quality/lenght/gameplay would get it 3-stars from me compared to other games I played. The reason I chose one-star is the following: From my point of view the developer misused their good reputation and dared to release unfinished product (story/lenght/gameplay aspects). If it was a standalone game, it would be criticized for being too short for the genre and price. Based on that, it would sell too good, but probably no disaster either. But it is not a standalone game, it is Trine, part of trilogy and that's the problem. It compares to previous games and falls way too short. I, for one, would never pre-order if it wasn't Trine. I only preordered 2 games, this and Witcher 3, as I always rely on my past experience with the developer. And I feel I made a mistake with Trine 3. The worst thing for me - my 6-years old, with whom I played both previous games in local coop, was really looking forward to this. Now he will have to accept we are done in few short playing sessions. We will most likely replay Trine 1 and 2...
I got excited when I first heard about Drox. Reviews were positive - the concept of living world where your action and inaction both count is interesting, RPG in space sounds great to me too. I was expecting I will put in at the very least 50-70 hours and when I started it seemed Drox will deliver for me. It is definitely worth a try if you haven't tried other Soldak games before and don't know their formula for ARPGs. The problem is - it's too repetitive after a while. The available mechanics seem robust at first, but they started to bore me after 15hours. all in all I put 20 hours into the game and don't really plan going back. Still, it was a time good spent, so grab Drox at discount I would say.
... and it doesn't meet P2's highest standards. Maybe I'm just fed up with puzzle games (played vvvvv, thomas was alone, swapper, elemnt4l in a row), but I didn't find any aspect that would keep me playing magrunner - finished maybe first 10-12 levels and moved to Trine 2 which I enjoy much more. The biggest flaw for me is the fact the levels are difficult to observe initially to get an idea what components are present - too often some item is hidden from view and to find it you you need to make sure you look very closely everywhere (as opposite to solving some puzzle to find it). Which is not optimal given there are up to 4 different colours repeatedly used in every level, so it's easy to overlook something at first. The narrative in the game feels articicial and forced - seems it tries to duplicate the 'you have to play to our rules and go from level to level' setting of P2 and fails to be interesting. Though I admit I don't know how it ends. (And I don't care.) Somehow this game lacks identity imo - except for the idea to use magnetic fields I didn't find anything new or at least 'tweaked' it brings.
