When I played the demo for this during Steam Next Fest, I could tell that it was gonna be great, and the full game definitely delivered on the promise the demo showed. You can tell a lot of passion and creativity went into this game, and there's a surprising amount to do and see throughout.
[b]TL;DR:[/b] Strong recommend if you enjoy action platformers, especially Shovel Knight. Gameplay is excellent and varied, but difficulty is a little peaky. Visuals are decent. Music is excellent. Story is enjoyable, if a bit exposition-heavy.
[h2]Gameplay[/h2]
Platforming is really tight and responsive, and combat is satisfying right off the bat. These aspects only gets better as you accumulate spells and items, opening up all sorts of new options to play around with. Upgrades also help in this regard, making some items useful farther into the game, or changing their behavior entirely. Pro-tip: bomb upgrades really come in handy.
There's no lives, so dying instead loses you a portion of your money and EXP. I think this is an okay system for the most part, rewarding skilled play, but losing money can feel pretty harsh at times (see the Bosses section). Speaking of EXP, the level up system is surprisingly decent for how simple it is. If nothing else, it provides a steady, guaranteed power increase to go along with your growing arsenal of gear and spells.
The enemy variety is pretty impressive, with some staple enemies showing up throughout, but each "region" having its own share of unique enemies. I can't say that every enemy is fun to fight; some are real bastards you're better off just running past (*cough* zombies *cough*) but the majority are good and offer up their own unique challenges. Enemies also have their owns sets of weaknesses and vulnerabilities that help make combat feel a little bit more dynamic, encouraging you to switch your weapons around mid-combat. Unfortunately, I found the X-shaped quick-select thing a little awkward to use, at least on a d-pad, meaning I sometimes fumbled with it even relatively late into the game.
[h2]Levels[/h2]
Solid core gameplay and enemy design wouldn't be much without some great level design to back it up, and I feel the game shines here as well. (Perhaps the dev's experience as a Mario fan game creator/aficionado helped here?) Each level is fairly lengthy, which I personally enjoyed. To compensate for the levels' length, checkpoints can be found in each level. For the most part, checkpoints are spaced out enough so that dying still feels punishing without ever getting too frustrating.
The game does a good job at introducing new hazards as it progresses. However, I feel like platforming difficulty as a whole kinda plateaus early into the second act, possibly due to its non-linear structure. Honestly, I would've accepted a more linear second act if it meant a more difficult ramp up to the finale. Heck, maybe throw in a secret level like the White Palace from Hollow Knight. My only other gripe about the level design is the dev's fondness for putting those annoying little fireball-throwing imps and bat-like enemies in almost every platforming-heavy segment to try to knock you down bottomless pits. It got on my nerves after a while, not gonna lie lol.
[h2]General Difficulty[/h2]
I played the game at launch, so some of my complains may have been addressed in subsequent patches, but I'll speak on my experience anyway in case some bits are still relevant. Up until you get the electric seal, the game isn't too difficult if you're experienced with platforming games of a similar style. The only thing that might throw some people off is learning the attack patterns and weaknesses of some of the tougher enemies. However, after the seal of electricity, there's a noticeable difficulty spike with the introduction of the solider enemies. If you don't manage to figure out the flame shrine secret, your ranged options are very limited, meaning every encounter with these guys is an uphill battle. Don't make the same mistake as I did, solve the damn flame shrine ASAP lol. After this initial spike however, things get a little easier as you're granted more abilities and your existing ones get powered up. Act 2 by comparison is still plenty challenging, but starts to skirt the line of becoming a power fantasy come the finale. I don't consider this a bad thing though.
[h2]Bosses[/h2]
Bosses are quite enjoyable, but in my view, suffer from the same difficulty disparity between acts. I found act 1's bosses (aside from the first one) really damn hard, especially the final one. However, they all operate off of a fixed pattern of attacks (save a few), so after learning each boss's pattern all you need to do is not screw up (easier said than done). Act 2's bosses are fun, but if you're diligent about doing side activities and upgrading your stuff, they're a total breeze compared to act 1. Going back to the death mechanic, a common problem I had in act 1 was having a lot of money from going through a level, only to die repeatedly to the boss at the end to the point where I had barely any money left by the end to upgrade my stuff or buy items. I know, skill issue, but I doubt I was the only person at release with this problem. Perhaps the latest patches have alleviated this somewhat?
[h2]Visuals[/h2]
The game looks nice, if a little amateurish in some places. I think the vibrant color palette was a nice choice and really helps set the mood of each unique area you visit. From what I understand, many of the game's sprites were sourced from elsewhere, then edited to fit the game. On its face that sounds like it'd end in a disjointed mess, but the dev managed to make it work. I didn't notice anything that looked out of place. The sprites that weren't outsourced, mostly characters and monsters, do look a bit amateurish by comparison, but I found them charming all the same. They have a cartoony style to them, and are very expressive, especially in cutscenes.
Aside from the sprites themselves, the effects used for cutscenes or other animated scenery looked pretty great. Stuff like weather, explosions, parallax scrolling, heat waves, etc.
There were a couple times during some indoor levels where the foreground and background blended together a little, resulting in me shooting into crates I thought were in the background, or trying to jump onto a ledge-shaped thing in the background. Thankfully this was rare, but I figured I'd point it out.
[h2]Sound/Music[/h2]
Sound effects are good across the board. Good 'ol crunchy, punchy 8-bit goodness. The music, however, is a real treat. EliteFerrex did a fantastic job on this game's soundtrack, which really reflects the action-packed gameplay and adventurous tone of the game. It's really cool that a soundtrack this professional and comprehensive exists for a small indie effort like this.
[h2]Story[/h2]
Without spoiling anything, I can say that even though it's a little heavy on the exposition, it does a good job of establishing its world, fleshing out its characters, and executing on its twists. I personally found the characters endearing, and by the end I had a big smile on my face. That's gotta count for something, right?
[h2]Conclusion[/h2]
I can easily recommend this game to anyone who's a fan of action platformers like Shovel Knight. For a largely one-man effort, It's very impressive, doubly so since it's the developer's first indie game. To me, the most outstanding part of this game was how consistently good it was. It all just flowed so well that I found myself playing for hours at a time. I really hope that this game finds its audience and that the dev goes on to make more games, because he's clearly got the talent. Likewise, I hope EliteFerrex goes on to compose for more video games, because his work on this game was sublime.
