Maze

This game is the perfect combination of frantic and relaxed. Hard enough to require focus, but not so hard that it becomes stressful. Each level is the perfect length to be a challenge without feeling like you have a lot of progress to lose. However, the controls for this game are very frustrating, at least on keyboard. The best way to play is to constantly tap move commands instead of holding down keys. If you hold down a movement key for a second and then start holding another direction in addition, your character will only move in the new direction slightly. The only way to move perfectly diagonally is to tap two directions simultaneously. There is no menu and very little UI. I'm a big fan of that choice, however you cannot adjust volume or even quit the game without using the windows key to bring up the taskbar so you can close the window. The game looks 3D, but is actually 2D. That creates some issues with hitboxes not working the way you would expect. Your character's hitbox is only the shadow below them, and the walls look bigger than they actually are on the edges of the circle. The circle seems to be split into 3 rings, with a laser covering each ring. However, the 1st and 3rd ring lasers cover way too much space, leaving only a tiny gap in the middle of the 2nd row to hide if lasers are covering the 1st and 3rd ring. That would be a kind of fun mechanic if only the controls and hitboxes weren't so unintuitive. The music is incredible and never gets boring even though it is fairly simple. The artstyle is incredible, the animations are very fun, and the overall vibe makes me want to spend more time in this game. It reminds me a lot of classic flash games. However, I felt like I was fighting the game's quirks instead of figuring out the puzzles most of the time. This game could easily be much, much better than it is. The circle format for levels is truly genius and creates incredibly fun challenges. This idea should be explored a lot more. The name choice is very questionable. For a game with so much character, "maze" is incredibly generic. There are a million games on steam called "maze", the only reason I found this is because I was searching through games with very high ratings.