Demon Turf: Queens Edition

Sadly, I can't recommend the game. The combat feels so bad, unnecessary, out of place and is genuinely just frustrating to deal with. In most levels, it completely ruins the flow of the game. One moment you do your jump and run platformer, and suddenly you are forced to get into an "arena" and fight a few enemies by pushing them into spikes, and in other levels where it's not a small confined space, you have to search for small enemies, which you have to push down into lava/abyss. IDK who thought this was fun or good game design, but let's just say this guy needs his hardcore Minecraft world taken from him. I feel like they tried way too hard to overcompensate on the combat when they just had to copy other games like Spongebob, Spyro, Crash, Mario, etc. Simplicity works! The boss fights are equally frustrating, and no fun allowed. I get that all of them have a gimmick, but that doesn't make them fun, which wouldn't be bad by themselves, but combined with the rest, it just feels frustrating to play, especially when you want to collect all the time trophies. I also know that there are a few upgrades, but you can realistically only equip 2 useful ones, and why would you not pick movement ones in a 3D platformer? The overall level design is also hit and miss, where some feel really good and have a nice pace (3-5 min) and are fun to go through once for the collectibles and then again for the time trophy, while others again are either bottlenecked by the forced fights or are too open or rather unnecessarily prolonged by having you swim/jump through water or have you wait for platforms in a platformer... All in all, it's not the worst 3D platformer I've played, and the art style of 2D Sprites in 3D Space is not as bad as I thought it would be, but the points mentioned above, at least for me personally, ruined the enjoyment I tried to have. But apparently one of the DLCs of the game fixed a lot of the issues I mentioned, so I'm going to give that one a try and hope it's better! Update: After Playing the Neon Splash DLC, I have to say that this is what the game should have been in the first place. Most of my criticism was completely solved in it. I still have some, like not being able to reset immediately when dying so you have to watch the animation and respawn before being able to reset a run, or how some remix levels feel too much of a gimmick, like Splash City, or last but not least how the candy in some levels is going up into the air outside your jump distance for no reason at all other than to make you wait for it... But all in all, after completing it to 105%, it was overall really fun and enjoyable. Would I recommend the game now? Yes and No. If you get it on steep discount, sure, since this is the edition with the DLC, otherwise, I would highly recommend just buying the standalone version, which is currently on sale for 2.99€ as I'm writing this, but even the 5€ would still be worth it, especially since it has achievements for the DLC which for some reason this version does not have (sad). Because of this, I'm keeping it at not recommended since, for me, the DLC was the only enjoyable part.

I do not recommend the base game, not at full price at least. It's a very promising platformer that eventually gets very boring. A lot of the game feels like you're not quite playing how the dev intended, but you're not able to do so either. There is no ledge grab in this game, so if you slightly miss a jump, you're left awkwardly sliding against the surface until you fall. The first world is pretty fun, making use of just your platforming abilities. The second world is....water levels... Fortunately it's where you gain the rolling ability, which is by far the most fun and promising of the bunch, but is also so fast that the game barely allows you to use it outside of designated areas. The third world uses it a lot which is nice, making it the only world that's really interesting... The combat is quite tedious as you just push enemies around, sometimes having to use the chain to pull a shield off. Bosses are frustrating and don't really feel like battles, rather you're just chasing them down to deal damage. This is really bad in the 4th worlds boss. The final boss is decent though.

I played this game up until the end of the 4th world, having done return trips (remixed stages that unlock after beating a world) for worlds 1 through 3. I also did every trial in the game. With that as a preface, I stopped after world 4 and didn't bother to beat its remixed stages. Everything in this game is mid at best. Your moveset in most circumstances is very sluggish, and getting an equipment for increasing your run speed is practically mandatory. Any time it's not being sluggish, it's being wild and uncontrollable, like moving from standing still giving you a burst of speed (which I cannot see the utility of at all), jumping during rollout giving you a burst of speed, and ending a glide giving you a burst of speed, which actively screws up your platforming. All of the above is capped off by all characters, NPCs, and enemies being rendered in 2D on 3D environments. Stylistically, I don't have a problem with this (though I can't really say I like it either), but it is very detrimental for platforming. A game I can think of that did this with no problems is "Here Comes Niko!" but while that game was more about exploration, this game is aiming to be a hardcore platformer, and the 2D render of your character is horrible for accurately communicating your hitbox when doing things like moving through rapidly rotating laser grids that instantly kill you. Under normal circumstances I would go into more detail on things about this game that could use improvement, but the direct sequel is already out and there's little point in poking holes in an older project. I will be playing Demon Tides because I've already bought it and hope that it solves some of these problems (the fact it uses 3D assets for everything already seems to be a plus to me), but we'll see. Also, $30 is a bit of a joke as a price point for this game. I bought it for 60% off and I still regret that purchase.

I'm torn on this one. I like the overall vibe, pleasantly bouncy and fluid movement, and music, but the checkpoint system can screw you over sometimes, and the combat sucks. Like, it sucks REALLY badly. Still, it's worth checking out on sale, or at least check out its more polished, open-world sequel, Demon Tides. I like this game, though. Positive review. Oh and the music kicks ass, I love the soundtrack

👍👍👍👍👍

Really solid feel, floaty in the best way possible. I've nearly completed the game, can't wait to do the same to the new one here soon; I absolutely adore this game! If you love platformers and collectathons, then don't even hesitate, this game does it just as good as the big dogs in my opinion.

This little devilish creature is up to no good!