[h1] A Precision Platformer with some Imprecise Issues [/h1]
[UPDATE: some of the things listed below such as incoherent save spots and weird tech-y issues have been mostly patched out by the devs, I am choosing to leave my review as negative due to the issues i still find with the game, but i do implore people to make their own decision after reading my review as to if they want to play or not, as i didn't actually dislike the gameplay experience myself.]
Grey Area is a precision platforming game with charming pixel art, which is in itself usually a winning combo. It puts you in command of a Hailey, a small child with the ability to dash in midair, as she tries to retrieve some breakfast cereal.
[h2] === The Art === [/h2]
The pixel art is simple, small, and charming, which easily sells the game on its own. probably its highest highlight. Hailey is an adorable character to be forced to stare at for over twelve hours (if you're as bad at the game as I was), and the world and characters have a certain Look to them you aren't likely to forget among the crowd of indie pixel platformer titles. The game uses a very small sprite resolution, yet captures the fleshy folds of the grey denizens easily, and the animations of every sprite are effective and appealing.
However in some of the titular Grey Area segments, the monsters and obstacles (and checkpoints!!) might blend into the muddy background of dull grey to black, making some threats a bit unfair as you have to look really carefully to even see them coming. Likewise, the enemies are reskinned in almost every new background. so some that share a behavior might not share an appearance, leading to some frustration.
[h2] === The Gameplay === [/h2]
Grey Area's gameplay might be it's most contentious portion. which is kind of a bad thing to say about a video game...
The controls are snappy albeit bound to J and K, even on the initial menu. If you are not aware the buttons are bound to J and K you might have trouble even starting the game. But the controls ARE snappy: Hailey will respond to your key presses with (after a patch to fix some bugs, more on this later) minimal slipperiness, and once you get the handle on the timing of jumps a lot of the game becomes a fairly fluid breeze, with ample checkpoints in the beginning and middle sections to give you time to breathe between complex jumping puzzles.
However, as mentioned before, sometimes the visuals make these jumping puzzles harder than intended, with the monochrome tileset leading to avoidable and frustrating deaths. This is compounded by the game being strange about where it wants saves to be. There's very few save 'benches' a mechanic you are told early on is when the game saves, and yet sometimes the game will save your place just at random when transitioning to a new screen. Notably this happens Twice with no bench in sight before the final boss. but doesn't put a save point after said boss is defeated. In my playthrough I had to fight the boss I had just beat a second time because I had assumed the game was going to save on a screen transition, since it did this twice before.
That's the kicker here- Grey Area isn't a bad gaming experience, but it really is an obtuse one. Unusual button mapping, weird save and checkpoint availability, lack of notifications when an item is collected, lack of letting the player know items CAN be collected, or, that an inventory even exists. Inventory screen dangling the possibility of "abilities" over your head only to learn from word of mouth myself later that said abilities are not only optional, but also completely out of the way, requiring extensive extra platforming to reach, and prior knowledge that the item is there in the first place.
It's a game with a lot of neat potential buried under a somewhat frustrating gameplay system that is likely to have players burnt out from scrambling for unlocks they can't actually get to, staring until their eyes strain for enemies that pop out of nowhere, smashing Hailey into the puzzles with brute force till her skull bleeds, and hunting for save benches that might never appear.
[h2] === The Story(Spoiler Warning Ahead, i warned you) === [/h2]
I'm... not sure how I feel about the story here, I'm gonna be honest. Maybe it's because I was burning myself out to the point the plot blurred in my head, until nothing but spikes and death pits remained but i'm a bit confused what i was going through as I went along. Was there dialogue I forgot to read? Maybe. But the ending(s) felt a bit unsatisfying after the Hours I poured into the last chapter, between the clockwork borbo and the goddess of ichor is such a struggle to complete that i just couldn't keep focused on the plot, so when the goddess died(?) and i finally got that bubble, a single cutscene of plot and a promise of Grey Area 2 Greyer Area! was a bit underwhelming. I don't think Hailey even got that cereal, shame.
[h2] === The Bugs!!! === [/h2]
The devs of this game are incredibly generous with their time, and working really hard to make Grey Area work with rapid post-release patches, and I appreciate that immensely! I love devs who listen to the people that play their game! HOWEVER-
the fact this game needed at least two and counting immediate post-release patches means it was probably not ready to hit store shelves yet, and the fact that some of these glitches and issues are basically game-ruining, such as the character and enemies getting entangled on the tileset, or enemies literally respawning because their spawn point scrolled offscreen for a tick, lead me to doubt the dev team's efforts, even though I really don't want to.
Game development is hard! Video games are a brute of a beast and taming their unruly code is a challenge, but as this is an indie game and not, say, Pokemon Scarlet, I don't think the devs were held to the release date at gunpoint, and I think ironing out the kinks before release should have been higher on their priority. so I didn't spend 5 hours on one jump because Hailey had butter in her socks that day.
[h2] === Conclusion === [/h2]
I like this game, I really do! I'm glad I played it and I think other people enjoy it too, However i can't recommend it in honesty as I liked it despite its flaws, of which it has a lot, and I think a more discerning platform gamer, or one less used to constant frustration and punishment, might find it even more dissatisfying than I did down the line. It's an honest effort, and I can't say I hate it, but if I hadn't gotten it as a gift I probably would not pay more for this than like, Hollow Knight. Sorry that's just not a competition.
