I love the psuedo-Gameboy aesthetic, I love the theme, and I love 2D platformers, so I'm the type of person who's most likely to forgive this game its shortcomings and give it a thumbs up.
My first issue is it's a platformer without controller support. It doesn't even have keyboard mapping. Also it was programmed by an insane person who mapped it backwards. The arrow keys are used for movement with your right hand, and A and S are used to jump and attack with your left.
There are more control issues besides that, and although the game is technically playable with a keyboard it's far too frustrating to be fun, so I mapped the keys to a gamepad to give it a fair try.
Both the level design and the game itself are simple, but not in a bad way. This could've been an okay game, except the controls are really bad. The only attack you have is with your whip, and you can't whip while jumping or moving. You have to completely stop moving before you can whip, and there's a noticable delay between when you stop moving and when you can whip. Every move you make has to be carefully planned so you can get within striking distance of an enemy and have enough time left over to wait out the delay and attack before getting hit. A lot of the platforms in the game are small as well, and so your timing has to be pretty precise, and properly timing your movement is where most of the game's challenge comes from. It turns what should be a fun action game into a slow slog.
There's also problems with hit detection. Sometimes you get hit when it seems like you should have enough room. Sometimes it takes multiple tries to jump on a hard to reach platform. That's normal for the genre, except with Indiana Boy it isn't because of anything the player does. Sometimes you hit the platform by dumb luck, and a lot of times you don't, and you won't know what you did wrong all those times you missed it.
Then there's bugs. One time I just died for no reason near the end of the level when there were no hazards or enemies near me.
You die after one hit in this game, and once you die you have to start the screen over, although you do get unlimited lifes. The screens can get kind of big and most have a lot of backtracking. Most of the enemies on a screen usually need to be killed, and since every kill is a slow process that needs to be well planned out and expertly timed getting through a screen can be tedious. Every screen already feels kind of like a chore, and dying makes them worse because now you have to redo everything. Dying not because you made a mistake, but because of bad hit detection or worse a bug, is frustrating.
Despite all its issues, I don't hate this game. I did have some fun playing it. Considering the low price (and it was even less for me because I think I got it in a Groupees bundle), I feel like I got my money's worth. I just don't feel like it's good enough for a recommendation.
