Haste

Very fun, well put together game.

I played this game mostly coop with 3 other friends of mine. This is one of those games that I started out enjoying, but then I reached a certain point where I didn't want to play it anymore. So for those who don't know, this is essentially a 3D auto-running platformer. There's a hub world that is free roam where you can pick which shard (world) to play through and places to buy permanent upgrades, traversal items that you can use, cosmetics, etc using anti-sparks (this game's currency which you get by beating a shard). When you select a shard, you play through a series of levels until you get to the boss, which you must defeat without losing all your lives (you start with 3 but can upgrade to 4). The levels range from "race to the end", "race to the end extra hard mode" (where the level itself is harder, but you are rewarded with an item that can aid you), "shops where you can buy items with sparks (this game's other currency) you collect from other levels", "rest areas where you restore health and regain a life", and "encounters which can result in you gaining an item or doing a challenge which rewards you with sparks". When you enter a shard, a random assortment of those kinds of levels are determined and laid out in branching paths that all lead to the boss level. So while the available levels are determined at random, the path you take to the boss is entirely up to you. About the race levels, the idea is that the level is collapsing and you need to reach the end without dying. You die by losing all your health, which can happen by running into obstacles, running into lasers or explosions, falling into a bottomless pit (instant death), or staying in a "collapsed" part of the level. In order to outrun the collapse, you have to maintain your speed/boost your speed by making sure you land your jumps perfectly (so you don't stumble), not colliding into anything, going through boost rings, using items you get from other levels (like the shop levels), or using 1 of 4 available traversal items you can acquire in the hub world. There's also sparks for you to collect as you run through the level, and depending on what your rating is after you reach the end, you'll get a certain amount of sparks for completing the level. When you play online, only 1 person has to make it to the end and beat the boss for the shard to be cleared for everyone (and everyone gets the same amount of anti-sparks). Also, if one or more of your friends loses all of their lives, if you go to a "rest area" level, they'll regain 1 of their lives. Playing with friends on the 2 different "race" kinds of levels involves each of you racing to the end on the same level (meaning you see everyone) but you can't interact with them physically (so you don't have to worry about colliding with them). Also, the sparks available to collect in the race levels are unique to each player, so you're not all gunning for the same sparks. Now, as for the shop worlds, the items available for purchase is shared. So for example, if Player 1 buys Item 1, then that means none of the other players can buy Item 1, and only Player 1 has that specific Item 1. Items available for purchase are determined in groups of 3, and if you want to generate a new group of available items, someone has to pay sparks to do that. Lastly, boss levels are like the race levels in that you're all playing on the same level and can see each other, but you can't collide with anyone. But you're all trying to take down the same boss. If you're playing by yourself and you lose a life on a race level, then you have to start the race again from the beginning (there are no checkpoints). However, if you're playing with friends online, only 1 player has to make it to the end for everyone to progress to the next level, and you only have to restart the race level from the beginning if every player dies on the level. Same sort of logic for boss levels. Say for example the boss has 3 HP. If you're fighting the boss by yourself (offline), and you damage the boss twice, if the boss kills you first, then you have to start the fight from the beginning (meaning the boss has 3 HP again). Contrast that with playing with friends (online). If a player damages the boss once and then everyone loses a life, then all players with available lives spawn back in and the boss only has 2 HP left. So in a way, its like the game is more balanced to playing online then offline. Regarding the permanent upgrades you can buy with anti-sparks, those include increasing your health, increasing your energy (which you use to activate a traversal item), increasing the amount of lives you have (though you can only increase it to 4 in total), increasing the amount of sparks you have at the start of a shard, increasing the amount of sparks available in a level to collect, and increasing the rarity of the items that spawn in the shop levels. So what were the things that killed the enjoyment of the game for everyone? The main one was the difficulty spikes. It doesn't take long for this game's difficulty to suddenly jump (some say it was Shard 3 where the first spike happens). I'm not kidding when I say you have to quickly get good at making sure ALL your landings are perfect, which is a lot easier said than done when the game starts having levels with insane obstacles and a lot of things that send your character into the air. Also, eventually the game starts throwing "race levels" and "extra hard race levels" that have some kind of distortion. Sometimes those distortions are helpful (like restoring health at the beginning of the level), but often times are detrimental (like halving your boost for the level or making you take double damage). But even if you are perfect at landing your jumps AND you're not bombarded with a selection of difficult race levels in later shards, you still have to cross your fingers extra hard and pray that the items available to you in your run of the later shards are actually good. Because if you get stuck with bad items in those later shards, it's basically impossible for you to win. And since you can't permanent increase your speed or boost, you're completely reliant on the RNG providing you the CHANCE of getting items that can aid with that. Another annoyance was that, outside of the final boss, this game only has 3 bosses, which each get re-used throughout the game. Each time they get re-used, some mechanic about them is altered to make them more difficult to fight. So it was disappointing to see them cheap out on the bosses. If you're wondering why I haven't mentioned the story, its because it's not much of one to comment on. Its about as interesting and deep as one you'd find in a Sonic game, and its mostly brought across via static drawings of the characters talking about it. So in short, the story is there and that's all there is to say about it. I was only able to get to Shard 8 of 10 before I called it quits as it felt like I was completely beholden to the RNG at that point. And losing because less because you suck at the game and more because the game dealt you a bad hand isn't what I call at good time. So while there was initial enjoyment, the more we played, the less fun we had.

its a fun game to play for 20 min at a time. i use it as a timekiller pretty much. get it on sale.

Race the Sun with some Slay the Spire, and Risk of Rain flavouring tossed in. Art direction reminisent of supergiant games. Do recommend mostly because if you like games of controlling your momentum and such the gameplay loop is really well done.

Its funny :)

Juegazo, si necesitan dopamina jueguenlo