FORZA POLPO!

the game crashed often on my hardware, a community fix worked, but even after that the game is obviously very unpolished

I probably should have known what I was getting in too when the game didn't explain the controls until you get into the first level...and then they layout shown in game is incorrect. It really is a sign of the level of detail the dev put into this.

I haven't played the original [u] inspiration [/u] of Jumping Flash! for the PS1, and I admit I decided on a whim to snag this game in a bundle after a game reviewer mentioned it at the end of their Jumping Flash Review. I needed to expand my gaming horizons. I played Version 1.2 with everything on Ultra, so I didn't see anything wrong runtime wise. Playing it in sim mode, I was having a cautious but fun time going through the first half of the levels, platforming and jumping through pieces of the map, blasting any enemies and objects to get my score up, trying to glide as long as possible for every point to make it to the S rank. I even hunted for crypto pixels, which act as a collectible that rewards you with a enemy model on your desk. The visuals are low polygonal, with some stylings of 90's, like with the bootup screen having a fuzzy, off white visual. It works, but I think more of utility rather than a bunch of nostalgia that I keep hearing about. The english language translation has a few bumps to it, but I'm not putting marks against it, as the drawings and gameplay were more than enough to understand what they mean. There wasn't any point where I was dumbfounded on what the game was saying. The energy consumption isn't bad in my experience, acting more as a soft timer and as a mechanic to entice me to actually look around the map and gain the code cubes. It rewards shooting pink objects, and gives an incentive to collect the bubbled fruits hidden in the corners, which also reward you with a temporary modifier. In terms of movement, it's very floaty, like a hovercraft with jet thrusters on low. Changing directions and jumping high is going to be more momentum based than you would expect. There is a kind of difficulty curve in being able to maximize your jump height, as you're able to chain 3 jumps if you time it right, and can 'flutter' if you keep the space key held down. To float, you need to selectively hold the space key down, which slows your descent and plays a fluid sound to signal. Be prepared to use the float constantly. However, after the first level of the second set of levels, my interest tanked after the later levels became more of tightropes, long max-distance jumps, and enemies taking potshots at you in the air. There's people out there that probably enjoy this kind of level, but I can't say I am. I'm a pick-up-and-play causal gamer, plain and simple. The description does say that it's a vertical platformer, but I still feel like the rug's been pulled underneath my feet when the level design had a lot of elbow room to navigate. What doesn't help me is that shots have gravity drop, so some of the enemies far into the distance can't be sniped unless you have a power up that can reach them. I tried to spam click to suppress the enemies in compromise, but that visually cluttered my UI, which was already clogged with many visual effects. Maybe one of the options tones this down, but I've already adapted to it at this point. Speaking of visual clutter, getting the visual glitch effects when I got really hurt (arcade level) really messed with my interaction. Rarely you encounter a tight space with a lot of enemies, and if you mess up you get wombo combo'ed into a mess of projectiles and visual effects that mess with tracking where to aim and shoot. When the shot momentarily cut to the desk menu I thought I already failed the level. When you do fail, you have to reselect the level from the desk menu and start again instead of instantly restarting. Maybe it's trying to be old school, but if you die easily I can imagine the tedium of restarting gets to grate on your nerves. In all, there's some meat on this game that I feel like is worth playing, but I can't recommend a game where only half of it feels worthwhile. Also worth mentioning is that it isn't a clone of Jumping Flash!, it's inspired by some of the mechanics of such, so some of the hardcore JF! fans might not find this game to scratch their itch. But hey, it's on the cheap, so if you're still dedicated to getting this, buy the bundle or wait for a sale to go on.