Altheia: The Wrath of Aferi

I have spent 8 hours playing the game. I have enjoyed it but it has the cues wrong on which buttons need to be pushed in some areas and I have had it glitch out to where I am having to end task the game. Today I fell through the map. Fun but very frustrating due to the glitches. I don't recommend unless those get fixed.

This game is like a plain chocolate cake, nothing fancy, no cream, no sprinkles. But I like chocolate cakes in general, so I took a bite. It's then that I realize it's not cooked enough. It's a shame, because the ideas are sound. On paper, it looks good, even if a little simplistic. But the execution is flawed, especially the combat, which doesn't feel very good and is very clunky. Also, some of the achievements seem to be bugged and cannot be unlocked.

"Altheia: The Wrath of Aferi" is really unpolished. Controls, animation, fighting — everything needs more work. Maybe would get better after lots and lots of patches. Also the game still does not support Steam Cloud saves.

When I bought this game it was listed as full Xbox controller support. It has since been changed to partial support. The game looked like something I'd like a lot, so I tried various settings to see if I could get all controls to work. Even tried using a combo of mouse, keyboard and a controller. Gave up after a little over an hour. Asked for a refund. Not something I tend to do. But the game simply wasn't playable for me.

I want to start by saying that this game has been made by a dear friend of mine, and I want to support their work. It was basically just a team of 2 people, and he worked alone on all things regarding the visual part of the game (concept art, models, animations, cinematics). I have nothing but respect and admiration for him, and I believe his work in that regard is pretty damn good and he is very talented. Talking about the game, I want to start with the good first, which is, in fact, the visual side of the game. I think the concept and models of the world, the characters, and the enemies are beautiful. The design of the keepers is awe-inspiring, honestly. Regarding the story and the lore, I guess there was an idea behind it, but it's never really developed, without the chance to delve deeper into the lore. At times (many) it's straight up confusing, also because a lot of the game has (sadly) been rushed. The relationship between sadi and lili is not as deep as you would expect, and the change in their feelings is too fast for the plot. There is also a "secondary" story (not sure how to tell this without spoilers) that simply does not have any sense or conclusion to it, and it's there just to lure you in. The game also drags for too long, and there is too much "backtracking" in the sense of just having to walk back and forth. Combat is too simple yet very clunky. Some of the boss fights are okay, but they still feel very slow and stiff. If there were a single word to describe this game, it would be stiffness indeed. The exploration and some of the puzzle parts are okay, but it's very old style not in a good way, but in an "it's old design" way. It would have been okay-ish in 2002, when every game was more clunky. The sound design is all over the place,  the mixing is often wrong, with some dialogues being louder than others, or footsteps barely audible. Regarding the soundtrack, it's not remarkable, and some of the tracks remind me of tracks from other games too much. I think this game suffers from trying to be way bigger than it should, there is too much, too many characters, the combat, so many "temples". I guess it would have been better if it were more of a "silent game" like journey or rime, and focused more on the visual and just the two of them going on a journey, instead of all of these features, which are just half-developed. The best part of the game is the visual part, so I'm quite proud of my friend, but for the next game, there needs to be more focus on the polish and less of delivering lots of content just for the sake of it.

EDIT: Joguei até chegar na dungeon que tem a largatixa e depois de travar dentro da parede preciso falar do VERDADEIRO problema desse jogo Altheia é um jogo bem na pegada de ZELDA, você vê que a empresa queria fazer um jogo como Zelda com dungeons cheias de quebra-cabeças e que vc vai ganhando novos poderes para progredir no jogo A parte de quebra-cabeças e exploração da Dungeon são bem legais, claro é um jogo de menor escala por ser Indie mas as dungeons são bem legais e os quebra cabeças lembram bastante os que você veria num jogo da Nintendo, você vê que elas tem capricho Infelizmente é aí que os elogias acabam, o jogo é BUGADO, tipo num ponto de irritar tive que resetar várias vezes pq ou o jogo derretia de lento não importa que você colocasse no low, ou entrava dentro de uma parede e ficava preso O Combate do jogo é abominável, você vence por sorte de mashar o botão que nem louco, da pra ver que eles queriam q a Lili tivesse sinergia com o Sadi mas toda vez que você vai usar uma técnica o jogo trava e esse delay você apanha de graça Os chefes tem várias mecânicas mas metade não funciona você aprende no ódio pq o lógico várias vezes não funciona O áudio do jogo é uma ATROCIDADE sério nunca vi um áudio mais bugado, vozes cortam, o volume da voz sobe e desce do nada, algumas partes tem áudio outras não, música do boss só some, algumas músicas quase mal tocam de tão lentas e intercaladas que são, as cut-scenes são todas mal dirigidas com cortes brutos e você precisa se esforçar para tentar entender o que diabos o jogo queria passar No fim é um jogo que tinha um potencial enorme, se for ver temos poucos jogos de ZELDA no mercado, e até pensei em dar uma colher de chá já que claramente é o primeiro jogo da empresa, mas nossa parece que precisava de pelo menos mais 1 ano pro jogo ficar pronto, muitos problemas extremamente amadores que justamente pelo visual e ideia do jogo poderiam ter sido sanados e criado uma ótima experiência pro jogador No momento NÃO consigo recomendar é muita frustração

You can read the entire text here: https://medium.com/@melgacius/altheia-the-wrath-of-aferi-indie-game-review-ffc66536d408 I can't help but laugh. Distracted myself by taking a note? I ended up inside the scenario! Couldn't find the last enemies? They were trapped inside it. Prompts showing interactions? You shouldn't be able to interact from that side of the scenario. The controls are not very responsive, which has a significant impact on gameplay. At least it's beautiful, but at what price? €20, apparently. I would not recommend it before major fixes. Score: 5,5/10 If you want to lend a hand, you can follow my curator page here: https://store.steampowered.com/curator/28368700-Annoying-Accent-Reviews/

I'm a bit skeptical about this game. On the one hand, I really enjoyed the story, the gameplay and the boss fights; on the other, I hated the bugs that made it difficult for me to play (particularly, preventing me from 100% the game). Right now, I recommend it only to those who just want to play it for a single playthrough. Below, the bugs I found. - In the area just before freeing an altar, where the water flows, there are no collisions with the void. - On the way to the harbor of the first map, it started to lag a lot. I don't know if it's related, but the teleport located there didn't appear as seen on the map the first time I went there. - The camera gave me problems, resetting the movement speed ​​every time I started the game or entered/exited a dungeon. - Halfway through the Temple of Life's boss fight, the music disappeared. - Under the rock bridge of Aria's house, if you swim from there, you go below the map. I encountered also three other locations where you can go over the limits of the map: left from the harbor of the first map, swimming in the opposite direction of the entrance of the Shrine of Death, placing myself on the left of the first door that you come across in the Shrine of Death (on the left). - In the Shrine of Death, as soon as you enter the first puzzle room, if you dive into the water on the left and try to resurface, you won't be able to. - In the Shrine of Death, the number of balls you can collect is infinite. - At the harbor of the second map, the poisonous water is fake; that is, you can fall in and walk. - During the fight with Aferi (third phase), he launched an attack at me that sent me through the wall, "throwing" me down to the lower floor. - To get the last two tears of sap, I had to exploit a bug, otherwise it would have been impossible. Furthermore, when I bring all the tears of sap to the monastery, a cutscene starts, but at the end it glitches, showing Lili falling endlessly into the void. - I haven't been able to max out my stats. The only thing I can think of is that in some places, where Sadi was needed to clear the path, I didn't get any Void Cores, and I think it's due to some bug. EDIT: Let me start by saying that I know developing a video game is no small feat. However, it's truly disappointing to include post-game exploration without giving you the option to complete the game (because two sap tears near the port in the first area are unavailable). Despite the latest update, there are still trophies that aren't obtainable, such as completing the stats (I bought everything but haven't unlocked it).

Zelda-like (die alten aus der N64 / Wii Ära, die Vibes gehen in Richtung Twilight Princess) Sehr gute (XSX) Controller Unterstützung. Kein Sammel-Quatsch. Simple Schiebe-Rätsel. Später wird's schwieriger und weiträumiger. Einfache Kämpfe. Sehr abwechslungsreich. Es werden andauernd (sehr schlecht bis gar nicht erklärte ) Spielmechaniken eingeführt. Schade, dass so ein Spiel im Steam-Müll untergeht. Hier hat sich jemand viel Gedanken gemacht warum Zelda-likes Spaß machen (Nein, nicht weil man Gras kaputt machen kann und dann Zeug rauskommt). Und natürlich erreicht es nicht die Klasse eines AAA System Sellers. Aber ich als geduldsloser Meckerer (siehe meine Reviews) hatte wenig zu bemängeln. Das Spiel soll Spaß machen und versucht nicht einen zu nerven. Gut gemacht. Später sind einige frustige Dinge drin. Ich mochte auch Oceanhorn (1) sehr gerne, die neuen Switch Zeldas finde ich lästig und habe Tears of the Kingdom noch gar nicht gespielt (und habe es auch nicht vor).

Eigentlich macht dieses Spiel schon Spaß. Das Kampfsystem ist zwar nicht allzu vielseitig, aber nicht langweilig. Die Rätsel sind teilweise echt knifflig, machen aber viel Spaß sie zu lösen. Das einzige was mir den Spielspaß verdorben hat, waren viele kleine Bugs. Die Stimmen der Charakter wurden wechselhaft sehr laut oder sehr leise, das gleiche galt für die Geräusche, oder die Kampfmusik spielte nach einem Kampf plötzlich im Dauerloop und ruinierte für mich deswegen einige Szenen, da sie die eigentliche Musik, Stimmen oder Geräusche übertönte. Ab und zu fehlte auch einfach die Musik der Umgebung, wodurch ich dann nur die leisen Geräusche des Charakters beim Gehen und Rennen gehört habe. In einem der Schreine konnte ich auch, warum auch immer nicht die Bombe benutzen, um das Rätsel zu lösen, wodurch ich gezwungen war, den Checkpoint zu laden und selbst diese Lösung war nicht zu 100% zuverlässig, da ich das 2 Mal machen musste, ehe es funktioniert hat. Dass man auch keine Filmsequenzen überspringen kann, ist in meinen Augen nur ein fehlendes Feature, welches einen den Spielspaß nicht zerstören kann... Sofern die Audio nicht verrückt spielt, wie es bei mir der Fall war. Ich habe zwar auf "Nein" gedrückt, wenn es um die Empfehlung geht, aber wenn man über diese Fehler hinweg schauen kann, ist es eine Empfehlung wert.