Axiom Verge

best game ever, would recomend to anyone who plays undertale. or just likes exploring 2d games

As a love letter to retro gaming, this game is absolutely fantastic. As a game created by a single developer, it is incredibly impressive. The art is superb and feels extremely Metroid-esque while still feeling unique. The secrets are extremely well hidden and make you feel clever whenever you find one. All that said, I spent probably the back ~60% of the game hating my life and wanting to stop playing. As part of its ode to retro games, Axiom Verge neglects a lot of QoL features that modern games of the metroidvania genre might have. In a vacuum that isn't a huge problem, but in combination with often frustrating gameplay and repetitive music it goes from being a mild annoyance to infuriating. Starting from the top, there's no fast travel. Not the end of the world, but progress in the game requires frequent backtracking, and that's where it starts to be extremely frustrating when you look back at your map, see all your filled in squares, and wonder which of those rooms you didn't *actually* completely finish. Spending 15 minutes running back to the other side of the world only to realize "nope, not here" is just aggravating in a modern game. The map fills in a full tile as soon as you dip a toe in a grid space without any indication of whether you have / have not fully explored the space which makes it easy to forget where you haven't finished exploring yet, especially if you take day breaks between playing the game. You *can* drop markers on the map... but only two, and with minimal spoilers, it suffices to say that it isn't always clear when you're missing a power you need in a given room before you have the power. Then you're stuck thinking "oh... I think I saw something when I was playing yesterday that I thought was weird... but I have no idea where that is" and questioning if you pull up a guide or spend 20 minutes running back through rooms that your map shows as explored again. Then there's the controls. Only two real gripes here, the free-aim and the dash. There are a *lot* of enemies that attack you from an awkward angle necessitating free-aim, but oftentimes (on controller at least) it feels like the button doesn't work and you end up accidentally walking to your doom. The dash's problem is that it's double-tapping a direction -- which leads to lots of accidental inputs in a game where you frequently need to microposition yourself. Both these issues combined lead to a frustrating number of times where you accidentally walk into damage in a game that is already challenging. Finally, the enemy and boss design. So many enemies and bosses are extremely predictable but have only one narrow damageable point which you have to wait to hit. There are plenty of hallways where there's an enemy that is spaced such that it *WILL* hit you unless you bait it out just outside of its range, then slowly plink it repeatedly (while waiting for it to move / become damageable again) before finally being able to move on. Or you can just take the health tax and run through the room and save 30s of your life. The simple patterns of enemies rarely lead to dynamic gameplay where you feel mechanically challenged -- instead it feels like the game is testing your patience more than your reaction time or skill. And Axiom Verge absolutely *loves* the art of the enemy popping out of the ground / out of the ceiling / from offscreen for a free hit, which further makes it a test of patience and memorization moreso than a frantic and snappy shooter. All of these factors combined make progression in the game oftentimes frustrating, artificially drawn-out, and unrewarding. Combined with weapons that all feel just average and some areas having a horribly repetitive backing track the game quickly goes from "this is so cool, I can't wait to explore!" to "ima losin mah mind". If you like Metroidvanias you should check it out. But the game is definitely not for everyone and really wasn't for me.

It's like a 2.5/5 stars for me but will give a thumbs up because I really appreciate the amount of love put into this by a solo dev. But it just wasn't especially fun to play. Tons of weapons but just ended up using the starter gun most of the time, combat not especially enjoyable so I'd just avoid enemies as much as possible. Very meh

[Intro] When I finished this for the third time, I was made aware that I hadn't written a reivew for this yet. I was sort of surprised, because if there was a hall of fame for games, this one needs to be in it. [Sound] The soundtrack is a lot of what makes the mood of this game. Although, as a musician myself, I can nitpick on some flaws in the mix of certain songs, but that's just poking at the cake instead of enjoying it. However, I must in all fairness point out that one song in particular has a vocal track with a wail on it that I absolutely hate. But you know what? It's kind of a meme for me at this point, because everyone who's ever played the game can reminisce about how we loved the sound track except for that godsdamned song! Now, the soundscape apart from the music is really good. It fits the visual and gameplay idea of the game perfectly. Everything from running to jumping, to being hit, to shooting enemies is really satisfying to hear because it enhances the feel of the game. [Graphics] Imagine if you gave a 1990s era SNES dev a modern day 2 graphics engine and the knowledge to use it. I'm fairly certain that this is very close to what they'd come up with. Although I will point out that there are rooms where the view zooms out and while on one hand it works mechanically, visually it's kind of gritty. But like with the soundtrack, that's just a nitpick. All the environments and enemies are gorgeous and beautifully crafted. While I've seen almost everything this game has to offer and probably won't replay it again in the near future, there are places I would like to just visit again. Some of the backgrounds in this game have such a scale and gravitas to them that it takes your breath away. [Gameplay] This game has pretty much perfected the Metroidvania gameplay loop. Find gear, go explore, kill bosses, find powerups, get stronger, kill more bosses, get sidetracked by exploration, end up traversing a strange new place, get lost, check map, accidentally stumble over lore, a powerup or traversal thing and .. Yeah it's addictive. I'd know, I'm on playthrough 3 now because it's just neat fighting my way through this weird world of Sudra. [Story] I'm pretty good at figuring out where stories go these days, but, I was completely blindsided by how this all turned out. You can get through the main story beats by just playing the game, but if you *really* wanna figure out how deep the rabbit hole goes, you're going to have go search snippets of lore found in notes strewn about the map. But, one thing I really love is the environmental storytelling as well. The lore snippets aren't just for show, they actually explain a lot of the architecture of the game that might at first glance, seem really bizarre. The characters are deeply compelling and have really fleshed out motivations. But again, you gotta dig for the more interconnecting thoughts and themes. But still, even if you just play through the game, you're in for a treat. [Overall] It all comes together beautifully. The world of Sudra is one that I will visit again and again over the years to come.

Axiom Verge still holds up to this day as an excellent metroidvania. The vibes are excellent throughout the whole playthrough and the upgrades you get are genuinely interesting and fun to play with. I loved the music and there is a TON of weapon variety (I was still finding weapons up till the final hour) some are better than others but I liked the consideration. Definitely a must play for anyone a fan of the genre.

I enjoyed Axiom Verge because it has that mixture gameplay of Metroid, Contra, Bionic Commando and Gunstar Heroes. Yeah there are minor bugs in the game but it's well worth playing. I love the beginning of the story because it makes you think if he's dreaming it or lived it.

风格复古且有些怪诞的类银河游戏，但很好玩，比起恶魔城，体感更像早期的银河战士。 各种武器搭配和隐藏内容也很有趣