Space Captain McCallery - Episode 1: Crash Landing

[h1]SUMMARY[/h1] N64 without the nostalgia appeal. This game tries DESPERATELY to fix adventure game, into platformer, into shooter, into "trippy experience." While it has a comforting aesthetic to work with, using low-poly aesthetic mixed with a fantasy/sci-fi design, it fails to do anything clever, unique, or really memorable with any of it. You trapse around a bunch of narrow catwalks, harvesting plants, using rocks as a ranged weapon because of your pitiful punch, fending off ever-grander enemies, until you get the laser gun, which simplifies a lot of the mechanics and out-right erases them. The game starts off somewhat interesting with a dash instead of a jump, for you to clear gaps and move faster through the environment, and a punch which you can hurt enemies with. It will likely cause you to hurt yourself, but it's a risk. Or, you can pick up large rocks and toss them at enemies, which is far less accurate but more safe, and you have to be careful not to lose them by throwing them off ledges. This dichotomy creates an action economy which makes the game world feel more immersive for the player. You go about 10, maybe 12 minutes before you find the laser gun, and once you do, those mechanics go out the window. Indeed, even the mechanic of using the laser gun to destroy parts of the environment is only ever used a couple times, and it's only to destroy blocked passage ways, never for anything else. Once you get the laser gun, the semblance of a thought-out gameplay style goes out the window. The laser gun is long range, quickly and easily recharges, automatically targets, and lasts for a while after a full charge. The game tries to slow you down with its energy mechanic, but it proves it doesn't add anything to game, really, just a hindrance for you to keep in mind. There's a plethora of plants scattered throughout the environment which restores a ton of energy per plant, some have other effects like hallucinations, restoring health, but the main thing you'll want is energy. Dying in this game means very little, as it uses the Dark Souls mechanic of finding checkpoint marks and if you die you respawn there, with full energy and health. There is very little at stake, the combat is completely dumbed down for 80% of the game because of the laser gun, and enemies are mostly unimaginitive. The game tries to use a SNES-like 8-bit soundtrack, which clashes with the N64 vibe they are clearly trying to imitate, albeit clashing to a lesser degree. The level design is vague and boring. There are few if any stand-out features or architecture that catches the eye, it's all just a foggy blend of rock textures, moss, and dirt, with the added factory at the end which looks even more bland than the rest of the game. I can't help but feel the developer couldn't wait to rush his game out of the gate, when it obviously could have used another couple months in order to lengthen it, add more personality to the enemies and environments, and fix the broken, monotonous gameplay. Oh, and fixed the block-moving glitches, that too. I got stuck multiple times on the same puzzle because my character got stuck on the large blocks you have to move. That added about 6 minutes of extra game time, which, at 49 minutes long, was pretty significant. For 4$ you can do much worse, but you can also do much better. You could buy the entire Snail Trek quadrilogy, which I would recommend over this as an adventure game. [h1]OVERALL SCORE[/h1] Not Recommended [h1]REPLAY VALUE[/h1] Average