Medusa

Medusa is one of the few metroidvanias released after oct 2022 that has fair pricing for norwegians. unfortunately this is already an extremely cheap game so this only means a difference of around 10 kroners. Still, its the thought that counts, this dev listens... As for the game itself, its better and longer than you expect and longer. I bought it back in christmas 2022 and its the most indie of all the games I bought at the time, the closest 3 were all refunded for being of very poor quality, but not this game! This is good! It has modern QoL features, an intuitive and well made map. Having said that, it does have a number of faults: - The midgame is a slog - the purple biome has a number of frustrating bugs, especially the largest room - the chariot item is prone to causing serious glitches and softlocks - aesthetically, the biomes have no logical consistency between each other - many of the enemies in each biome don't aesthetically fit there edit: correct playtime is 12 hours, not 18, i was afk for 6 hours.

smooth, responsive gameplay and good level design. really nice NES inspired game with a lot of content for the money

Positives -Fun -Combat is decent -Some good puzzles -Creative upgrades, one in particular is really fun -Big world map to explore -Good variety of biomes -Fair price for what's on offer, even better when on sale -Runs great, no crashes -Medusa is thicc Negatives -Traversal can be a pain -Annoying to have to use the menu so much to switch between abilities -Too many abilities, a lot are useless -Level design is not great

[i]---see where this game landed on my Metroidvania tier list beneath this review!---[/i] Can't recommend this one to very many. Its very basic, but has some QOL features like a map and things that a bunch of other low budget MVs lack. It's perfectly playable, and if other videogames didn't exist, I would happily play through this whole thing. ..But they do, and It's difficult to find a reason to be spending the seconds we have on this earth on this one. I didn't play for too long, the environment didn't really hook me in for whatever reason. I think a bit more cohesiveness with the environment/improved production.. [i]something[/i] to heighten the immersion may have been all i needed to get invested in a world, rather than feel like I'm playing someone's school project. It really is otherwise fine. ===================== [b]My Metroidvania Tier List[/b] [i] (excluding Metroid & Castlevania titles)[/i] ===================== [b]S Tier:[/b] Aeterna Noctis | Astalon: Tears of the Earth | Monster Boy and the Cursed Kingdom | Hollow Knight | Cathedral | [b]A Tier:[/b] Doomblade | Afterimage | Elderand | Ori and the Will of the Wisps | Environmental Station Alpha | Ender Lilies: Quietus of the Knights | Depths of Sanity | [b]B Tier:[/b] Blast Brigade | Alwa’s Legacy | Steamworld Dig 2 | Islets | Blasphemous | After Death | Haak | Outbuddies DX | Mortal Manor | Escape From Tethys | Treasure Adventure Game | Chasm | Haiku, the Robot | Monster Sanctuary | Rabi-Ribi | Elliot Quest | [b]C Tier[i] (enjoyed playing)[/i]:[/b] Momodora: Reverie under the Moonlight | Lone Fungus | Aggelos | Iconoclasts | Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night | Death’s Gambit: Afterlife | Catmaze | Omega Strike | Plague of Yamorn | Infernax | Wuppo | Sheepo | Ato | [b]D Tier[i] (liked some things, but had issues)[/i]:[/b] Moonscars | Rusted Moss | Carrion | The Messenger | Castle In The Darkness | Alwa’s Awakening | Pharaoh Rebirth | Yoku’s Island Express | Guacamelee! 2 | Shantae and the Pirate’s Curse | Shantae: Half-Genie Hero | Axiom Verge | Strider | Minoria | Souldiers | Bone Appetit | The Witch & the 66 Mushrooms | Transiruby | Destroy Space Aliens | La-Mulana | Guacamelee! | 8Doors | Gato Roboto | Super Panda Adventures | [b]E Tier[i] (Didn’t like)[/i]:[/b] Rain World | Dandara | Vernal Edge | Blaster Master Zero | [b]Medusa[/b] | Sundered | Salt & Sanctuary | Valdis Story | Insanely Twisted Shadow Planet | Chronicles of Teddy | B.I.O.T.A. | Shadow Complex | Grime | Timespinner | Rex Rocket | Phoenotopia: Awakening | Aquaria | Nyaruru Fishy Fight | Apotheon | Bad Pad | Lootbox Lyfe | Angel’s Gear | Fearmonium | Dust: An Elysian Tale | ====================

This is almost a yes. Decent metroidvania in many ways, with some points of creativity I really liked, such as being able to use items in unexpected ways (summoning the chariot just to stand on it, summoning hoplites and stoning them to build a wall that you can climb up as the snake, tapping the jetpack to go further with it, etc.) and the generally crude-but-charming art. The movement feels a little awkward at first but once you pick up the snake shift and (eventually) the jetpack things start to feel more intuitive and more fun. Things that pull it to a no: - The backtracking isn't fatal but it was a big negative. If the teleport relic were available very early on that would solve this 100%. - Slightly faster movement speed would have been nice, especially with all the backtracking. - Related QoL, needing to manually restore magic and HP by breaking jars endlessly... especially silly to have to waste 5 minutes doing this when you're right next to a portal anyway. Save points and portals should just restore magic and HP, don't waste my time so blatantly. Nothing in the game offers this sort of restoration. - Fatal softlocks when movement bugs result in getting stuck somewhere. What I don't understand is that sometimes the game catches these (esp with the chariot) and teleports you back to the room entrance (which is good), but sometimes it doesn't. It's extra annoying because you can die and still save your progress, but if you can't find a way to die and have to just quit, you lose all your progress. - Some of the rooms are well designed and creative. Others are pretty generic. The jars -- many varieties, distinguished solely by the odds of blue/green restoratives dropping -- were a very monolithic universal presence. - The ending is pretty abrupt, explains next to nothing, and as the game has no boss fights, everything you've collected is irrelevant. As refreshing as it is that there's no archenemy or revenge quest and Medusa is just into learning things... it's very "well I guess a game just happened here maybe" - After the ending you are deposited back in starting position. I can't tell if anything has changed -- is this a postgame? The one thing that definitely changes is that the teleport relic ceases to take you anywhere else. This is incredibly annoying if there was one little bit of the last area you hadn't explored (hi) thanks to finding the ending first. Now I will never know if the invisibility ring has an upgrade or what it does. - Somehow my display says 100% anyway despite having a piece of map missing... I think it's just set to say 100% after finding the ending to avoid player complaints, regardless of your actual completion... this feels bad. - Some promising mechanics that would have been fun with more or more options, like the shop. All in all, it was OK, but needs improvements to fully live up to the genre.