Cosmic: A Journey Among Shadows

WOW Amazing Metroidvania. Vibes of the game Ori but with really good new mechanics. The Art style is Amazing, sound is really nice and relaxing. Gameplay is great with good ideias. Works really nice on STEAM DECK! Recommend

I was excited for this, and wanted to like it - I'm a huge fan of Metroidvania's in general. Ori is one of my favourite games of all time, the world looks fun and mysterious and the overall vibe certainly felt like I would enjoy this, but the early stages have put me off wanting to explore further. The central mechanic so far is whether or not you are inside the light, and you can only attack while inside the light, but enemies are all over the place in the shadows too, leaving you defenceless in many areas - stepping into a beam of light and actually being able to attack feels a little disconnected from the visuals, leaving me feeling like I was in the light, but unable to attack for a moment before it seemed to catch up. Combat feels frustrating and is (at least in the opening scenes) limited and unclear, the shadow that attacks for you seems to visually engulf your character when attacking, and the animations don't make it clear following the 'boof' whether you successfully attacked on time, or got hit yourself, or both, especially when more than 1 enemy is in melee range, as happened often in my limited play time. The resource for healing, and seemingly also for unlocking new abilities, are floating orbs, which are found in the world as well as from defeating enemies. They run away from you, often into un-engaged enemies, and do not adjust their height based on the terrain, often leaving them unobtainable as you chase them away, outside of your reach. Besides the combat, the game offers little to no visual feedback in many other areas, leaving the player feeling directionless. I appreciate not being hand-held every second, but some additional indication could be helpful. Early on, I came across a Rift that spawned basic enemies to kill, under a spotlight that sways back and forth. As I killed the enemies, I saw no apparent change on screen, and after 3 or 4 kills, left assuming I either didn't have the tools to pass yet, or that they were infinitely spawning. Backtracking, I found the first available upgrade which required 80 orbs, at a cost of 10 orbs per heal, needing to sacrifice the resources of 8 healing potions in the early stages of the game while combat is still so limited by light, and the enemies so abundant, felt a bit much. On returning to the rift, killing 1 last enemy, the rift closed and allowed me past, so some indication of X/5 required would be useful here. Maybe the rift grows duller, or more fractured as the enemies spawn/are defeated? I did make it as far as unlocking the ability to 'charge' some light, that is to say power up in the beam so you can still attack when you step back in the shadows, however again the lack of visual feedback left me at a loss. Was it time-based, or successful hits? How long does it last, How many attacks can I make? With no indication on screen I was often left chasing to finish an attack just as the charge ran out and the enemy instead hit me as I had suddenly become defenceless without apparent warning. It's a minor complaint, and it may just be personal preference, but the 'chime' that sounds every time you charge in the light set my teeth on edge a little, and given how often I anticipate needing to do this throughout the game, this heavily affected my decision not to proceed. Overall the game looks amazing, the aesthetic is great and apart from the frustrations with not being given enough visual information, appreciate the minimalist UI. It's possible that later upgrades further into the game resolve these issues, or maybe this game just isn't for me, but with the experience so far as it is, I'll have to refund and give this one a miss.

Great game. Love the atmosphere, the artsyle and the controls. The only thing I'd suggest is to add a few more checkpoints because I lose several minutes of gameplay almost every death just to get back to where I died.

UPDATED 1.0 REVIEW Okay, so I have finally gotten to play the full release.. and I feel a bit mixed. I don't think its a BAD game, so I will leave my rec as positive. But, I got pretty bored pretty fast. I think the gameplay just feels clunky and bland. The platforming and level design never really amazed me or kept me going, a bit tedious. The combat feels reallllly clunky. Your attack just feels like it has no contact point? It feels like your just waving "damage" through the air. The collectibles that act as health are a bit frustrating to collect, and losing half on death is annoying. And ultimately, it just felt very bland and didn't keep me invested. But is it BAD? Not really. It's mostly competent, art is well done. If I was in a good mood and had nothing else to play, it would do the job. But I felt like I was just playing it to kinda get it over with instead of looking forward to continuing... So I just dropped it about halfway or so. YMMV. I will look forward to whatever is next for the devs. The shadow mechanic, while original, just wasn't FUN. But maybe they can tackle the genre from a new angle and, with the lessons learned here, make something actually addicting to play. OLD PRE-RELEASE REVIEW: For anyone that played the demo and was underwhelmed, they have made HUGE improvements and its a blast now. The art style is great and I had to stop myself from continuing on so I can wait for 1.0. The Ori comparison is apt, and I would also compare it to DOOMBLADE. Just a cool unique metroidvania. Will update when I play 1.0!

I don't like bashing an indie game, i really don't... But sometimes they're so fundamentally flawed that you just can't otherwise. First of on a technical level this game is a mess, it's so incredibly buggy that it's hard to believe this game had an early access period. I'm not talking harmless bugs either, these are some gamebreaking ones. From crucial platforms not spawning in their models/collision, forcing a restart to fix it, to one of the key movement upgrades just outright not working 9/10 times. These didn't happen once, they happened often, it's so infuriating to deal with these issues to the point that i was very glad i unlocked the final achievement because then i could stop playing. Even if these issues would be fixed the game still wouldn't be worth playing due to some very flawed game design. As a metroidvania it's important that there's meaningfull collectibles to find and there are, 3 of them... across the entire map... Those being health upgrades that are actually helpfull. The only other collectible is a sort of wisp that comes out of bushes and tries to run away from you, these are the games' currency that you use to... heal? Yup every time you wanna heal, 10 of these go out of the window and most enemies only drop ONE which makes combat just not worth it. Whereass bushes can drop about 10, but you gotta catch them first which can take upwards of 10 seconds if they're feeling cheeky. The fact that these are consumed upon healing also means that if you hoard them to try a boss and fail after having healed 3 times, that 30 of them are just gone. So either turn around to go grind some more or just have less heals for your next bossfight. The most aggrevating thing about these is that if you die they all spawn at your shrine but you have to catch them again. Catching 10 is a hassle, your entire hoard? Obnoxious... This ads upwards of 20 seconds to each respawn for no reason at all! Apparantly they used to be gone outright but this is only marginally better to be completely honest. This is not the only game design blunder in this one though btw. The level design is also generally atrocious because they have no flow to them. So many sections, enemy placements and platforms are completely obsolete and can be entirely ignored. Nearly every 'room' in this game is a bunch of floating platforms over an endless void with a pretty background image. Now the images look cool and have a lot of detail but they don't mesh with the level design at all, they feel plastered on and random almost as if they're AI generated. This also makes the world non believable and breaks immersion as literally everything in the playing field is 'floating' whereas the background does have supports and suspending chains. Also the void means that there's many sections to fall into which resets you to the NEAREST solid platform. Now luckily this does no damage but many rooms are set up in a 'getting over it' style where you can fall all the way down but given that you're put at the nearest platform instead of the last one you stood on, you may end up having to claim all the way up AGAIN. There's also tons of instakill lava that sends you right back to go collect your wisps, this mechanic is also used in some combat rooms and even boss battles. This makes combat incredibly infuriating, not that it would be better without the lava though because the combat just sucks. You can only attack with your shadow that's only present in a source of environmental light. Which is cool thematically but in practice it's clunky and adds needless difficulty. Regular enemies are annoying and bosses are bland. The combat is not hard it's just gimmicky and if you're stocked up on wisps you can brute force everything, without it it becomes artificially super difficult. The only boss that was genuinly fun was a crab you played beach ball with... Yeah i know, makes no sense but at least it was funny. Now there are some quirky and fun characters but all the charm just fades away due to annoying game design. Even the platforming which is the game's strongest aspect is ruined by poor finnicky controls, bugs and poor level design. Like i said before some backgrounds and areas look pretty decent and the lighting effects are pretty nice but the design is just lacking. It does not feel deliberate or thoughtfull but atleast it's pretty on a surface level. The music though is really unremarkable and forgetable which is a shame because maybe that could've at least been a positive. The sound effects aren't better, in fact they're worse because they feel as if they're just some free stock sounds from the unity shop or whatever. The writing was also just inconsistent and silly too. Other than the cool premise of 'your shadow is stolen so you team up with a shadow who's body is stolen' they did nothing with it. Atleast they made me laugh once with a dumb joke but that was about it. This game is technically broken, fundamentally poorly design and lacking any creative artistry to set it apart. It's one of the weakest games i've played and it's a poor metroidvania. Even if you'd like it there's only about 5 hours of content here which is based on the low quality a poor deal for the asking price. I'm sorry devs but it's true :(

Cosmic: A Journey Among Shadows is a precision platformer metroidvania with lots of action and enemy challenge sections. You venture on a journey in the shadow realm to recover your lost shadow, on the way you will find so many allies that will help you throughout your journey. The game offers multiple platforming sections with over 9 different biomes, the platforming is fun and not very hard which makes it enjoyable even for average platformers players. Also, at the same time it has lots of enemy encounters which sometimes will require your quick reactions in a battle. The soundtracks were a nice touch, relaxing and enjoyable throughout your gaming session from the beginning till the end. The boss battles had some really nice and unique ideas, enjoyed each single one of them. The story dialogues were very funny and interesting to read every and each single one which is a plus. The game recently came out of Early Access and it definitely didn't disappoint. Thanks to the team for their hardwork over the past few years. If you loved a mix of Precision platforming and action, then this is really recommended. Overall Rating 10/10

game needs a ton of work - its pretty but feels clunk is hard to see and doesnt well explain mechanics.

This game has some great art and movement but unfortunately that's where the pros end. There are just more cons and annoyances more than anything else. The currency flies away from you, Long gaps between save points, I had bugs (which were now resolved) trying to get 2 of the main abilities, falling into the void brings you back on a platform with 0 damage but falling in lava is a 1 shot, combat felt clunky, there were points on the last boss where I couldnt charge my light in areas I shouldve been able to and was able to charge it in areas I shouldnt have been able too. I feel like this game was rushed to 1.0 and couldve used another few months cooking. Pretty disappointed overall.

Stitch lost in dark, no needle like in Hollow Knight just a stranger shadow to smack things up. I found a tentacled friend, forgot where I need to take him so his name is Steven now. I'll keep him till the end of the game xD

I cannot recommend this game. I just finished playing DOOMBLADE and I'm very fond of Hollow Knight and Ori (both Blind Forest and Will of the Wisps). I played more than the recorded, unfortunately the first 40 minutes have been on transit so I had no internet connection and that wasn't recorded. Overall after 1 hour of gameplay, my main take is that this game is a **platformer** with metroidvania elements. The main gimmick that is being under the light shows your shadows, which allows you to attack, is incredibly annoying rather than fun. The platforming sections are frustrating, not fun, because a lot of the times it boils down to waiting for the light to be in the right position to make the platforms solid. The movement is good, feels fluid, but the level design kills it. I got the double jump and the attack so far, but I can't keep dragging myself into this. DOOMBLADE showed me what it will deliver within 10 minutes (when you grab the sword) and it was so innovative that I was hooked. I gave this game 1 hour but I felt more bored than the beginning. The art is nice though. Good luck with your game though, I hope my take is only because of my very limited gaming time.