Halcyon Days

I just finished my first run today, I could easily start with a series of critiques on pacing and world space, but I'm also just so genuinely smitten with the charm of it all. I really think there's something to explore here, Gameplay is in a loose but fun state, there's a lot I desire in terms of animations. I'm unsure how entirely intentional it is, but you can fire both left and right hand weapons at the same time. There doesn't seem to be a dedicated animation for this, however it still fulfills a want for the ability to do so from old. Where there are rough edges there is also ambition and care. Lock on is serviceable in almost all case, I found myself having a lot of difficulty with a Whack-A-Mole minigame though. The world almost gets the look right, I think there's a certain scale to everything that still needs a bit of fine tuning, but nothing truly heinous. Sometimes a room seems too large or a building seems too small, there are full release games with issues like this from big developers, so I don't want a singular person to feel like they've made some heinous misstep. Open field areas might benefit from additional fencing to path away from some of the emptier areas towards points of interest. Little aspects about gathering weapons and gear are treated with care. Each armor upgrade changes your chest piece slightly, most accessories are visually reflected. It's a system made with obvious care and speaks to the active polish happening for the title. I think it's fair to say we've all considered the fun of a MML like game, but I didn't realize how fun one would be with shoulder rockets. I haven't even collected every fun surprise. It's cute, it's rough, it's charming, it's still polishing, and the ambition is admirable. I'm already planning a replay.

I got to the start of the game and I'll be honest? There's some real big jank here, like so much of it Let me explain, there's a kick move that you can do and you can also move during the kick move and spam it as well, giving this weird lookin dance to it and quite honestly? It's kinda funny but probably shouldn't be able to do that Next is that your character's movement is really really slow and you kinda turn like you're on ice and even turning the camera slows ya down too. It just doesn't feel as if you're grounded and more like you're walking on ice Next is that while you're hanging on a ledge? You can also shoot at the same time but you're standing up normally while shooting while hanging next to the ledge And there's also the cutscene stuff which allows you to fire your arm cannon for some reason. You also can't seem to have your health bar on display to know how much damage you take but only in the pause screen which is just kinda weird? Most games tend to have that Lastly there's some camera issues that work greatly in the bosses favor if you lock on them, their shockwave attack gets to reach to you MUCH faster than you could ever react and so with that being said? I really do hope that you read this review as first impressions with this much jank at the start? It needs some serious reworking before a purchase

This game really takes you back to the good old day of action games. Having a lot of fun with the game and will definitely spend many more hours on this game. That said, it is a bit rough around the edges and it feels like it is missing some polishing all around. After playing a bit more I have a couple of examples: - Options do not save, I have to set them every time I open the game. - Health bar does not show for me, and I have seen other people with it on screen. - Saving system is a mystery at first. I restarted from scratch 3 times, because I only had 20 minutes to play and only on the third time I found out that I have to go to the submarine to save. That should be more clear from the start. Even with the game missing a lot of polish, I still recommend it because it is quite a fun game. Loved the music and the polygonal art style also!

The game is unplayable for me. The lock-on function is buggy. Every time I play, at some point, the camera gets locked backwards after releasing the lock-on target. When I beat the boss on the volcano dungeon, I got teleported back to the dock and my player was stuck so I couldn't save the game. I had to force-close the game and lost my progress. Since you can only save at certain times, it's real pain to have to restart after a death. Every time, I have to re-equip the jet skates, talk to Vela, wait for her to slowly run back up the hill before re-entering the dungeon. Why can't we just save whenever we want? Also, why can't we change controls? Caps locks for targeting is not my preference. Very disappointed. Please update the game soon. Thanks

I never played Megaman Legends so this review is based solely on the game itself. The game feels like it has lots of customization and side content, also it seems to be made with a lot of heart put into it. It is a bit buggy and/or glitchy here and there and the design partially might need some overthinking but I can imagine that fans of the Megaman games can totally find something to relate with. What would be another selling point is, that it tries to be well staged, so there are diverse cutscenes with lots of different viewing angles and so on.

I've only spent a short amount of time in this game, but as a continual fan of the Mega Man Legends series, I can say that, similar to 20XX and 30XX by Battery Staple, Halcyon Days is already shaping up to be a wonderful love letter to Mega Man fans in general, and those of us who are rabid fans of the venerable 3D action platformer RPG that the originals were, in particular. Rock and Roll Gas Station has done an excellent job of preserving the charm of the originals, whilst crafting a unique experience of their own. So, let's get particular as to what I particularly like about this game. The writing had me chuckling as soon as I'd reached the end of the introductory dungeon, and I'm intrigued to see where the story goes. The voice acting is decent, the dungeons are a loving throwback to classic Legends ruins with their own interesting twists on the environments and enemies, and the outdoor environments are enormous and obviously shown the same amount of love. As soon as I'd exited the introductory dungeon, I spent a bunch of time just wandering around to take in all of the unique scenery, along with all of the little details that encompass what an experience these games were back in the day, but now with some more modern embellishments. In 1440p, the game is absolutely beautiful, striking a wonderful balance of the old low-poly PS1 titles, while preserving more modern graphical features to make the world feel very charming. I know some other reviewers have complained about the music, but in my (so far) short time in the game, I've found most of it to be just as atmospheric and appropriate as the original Legends titles games were. I haven't unlocked any of the weapons yet, but the weapon upgrade and development system will be very familiar to any Legends veterans. The world feels lived-in, which is something many AAA games still struggle with, so bravo! So, astute readers will note that I haven't mentioned much about how the game plays. And it's here that I have to place some reservations. As of the time of this review, the game is barely out of launch, and Rock And Roll Gas Station has been consistently patching, updating, and taking feedback from both Steam and Discord on bugfixes, QoL improvements, and polish suggestions. The game is a bit rough around the edges right now, so take what I'm about to say with a large lump of salt. Movement, jumping, and jet-skating all feel good, very crisp and clean. However, I've noticed some issues with collision detection on certain surfaces when trying to climb. This was in an area with potentially small detection areas, so I'm willing to give this a pass. Shooting the game's basic cannon feels good, but I find myself wrestling with the camera stick in order to hit smaller enemies. This is on an Xbox One pad, and pushing the stick to full deflection, like muscle memory has trained me to do, results in the camera practically snapping to one side or the other, which can be very disorienting. More careful movement allows me to aim better, but a camera sensitivity setting or slider would be helpful, as I find myself practically needing to stop moving in order to aim well. It's not bad enough to make the game unplayable, but it's definitely something that needs improvement, and may be addressed in a future patch. Some of the UI needs a bit of polish; I sometimes find myself having to squint at the screen in order to determine whether I've selected an option for confirmation that I want. A small nitpick, though, since you can cancel out of most menus with the Y button. Sound cues for enemies sometimes don't seem to register, I'm not sure if that's my aged hearing or an issue with the game itself, but it can sometimes be hard to track enemies that are behind you. The largest gameplay quibble I have is that there's no map, either in the pause screen or a minimap, which means you'll be rocking old-school graph paper if you want to make sure you visit every nook and cranny of every dungeon. Performance is potentially another issue, and I'm sure Rock and Roll Gas Station is working on this, but on my machine, running at 1440p on an RTX 3070Ti that's water-cooled, with all settings except frame rate limit set on max, my card occasionally spikes to over 70C in certain areas. Most of the games I play don't push it nearly that high, so I was surprised to see it get up there. The frame rate doesn't dip or stutter, though, it just pushes my card more than I'd expect it to. CPU usage is much lower, which is good. I'm sure if I turned down the pretty, it wouldn't push my card, but I just can't bring myself to, if the gushing above about how the game looks is any indication. All criticism and complaints aside, though, I really like this game. It oozes charm and genuine love from every corner, much as its inspiration did, and I find that it is a more than worthy addition to any Mega Man fan's library. I am eagerly awaiting more patches and updates, as I'm sure that as more is added, the game will turn from a diamond-in-the-rough into a wonderful gem.

Glitched AF

I neglected my cat to find a virtual cat in Halcyon Days. 10/10, would recommend.

As a massive fan of the Mega Man Legends series, this game hit all the right strides - especially with the jet skates. I can see the potential for this game to be something truly special.

Game pretty much feels like megaman legends, I like megaman legends