The Tower on the Borderland

Технически игра сделана довольно плохо, и это постоянно чувствуется во всех анимациях и если вы не переносите кривости в играх, то эта игра точно мимо. Но задизайнена она хорошо. Приятная мистическая атмосфера, хороший левел дизайн, неплохая прогрессия, хотя как будто бы можно было сделать ещё какую-то абилку на передвижение где-то во второй половине игры, ну и как-то пораньше открыть центральный связующий коридор, хотя большого смысла в бектрекинге все равно нет. Боевка по началу кажется какой-то ультра плохой, в том числе из-за анимаций и плохого хит детекшена у ударов ножом, но постепенно в ней раскрывается своя логика в некоем кайте противников, потому что нужно ждать пока пистолет прицелится, чтобы нанести нормальный урон, или идеальные доджи позволяют этот заряд ускорить. Особенно хорошо то, что драться надо совсем немного, кое-где противников нужно побить, чтобы открыть лифт, кое-где, чтобы забрать апгрейд, но подавляющее большинство врагов можно смело игнорить. Боссы не блещут разнообразием атак, но у всех по две фазы и здоровья как раз, чтобы это всё не успело толком надоесть. Ну и плюс они задизайнены так, что если ты понимаешь основную фишку босса и как его правильно кайтить, то победить всегда легко. И у них крутые дизайны. У игры вообще довольно клевый и уникальный сеттинг. Важно и то, что игра закончилась за четыре часа, было бы подольше - надоело бы, а так в самый раз.

really like the style, atmosphere and enemy designs but the gameplay and combat is abit rough, spamming evade is faster then walking and combat feedback is lacking. But i would still recommend as those shortcoming aren't that major and the game is still quite fun

I got this game after playing the demo and almost immediately I sat down and played 4 uninterrupted straight hours of it. I did not expect to love the experience as much as I did. At first it seemed like the scenery was repetitive but it just kept the same theme. All the rooms and areas looked very similar but as you progressed they still had enough to keep them cool and entertaining - whether it be random enemy encounters for the first time or bossfights or a little bit of new props or enemies or a different layout. The different enemy designs were all pretty awesome and there's enough enemies that you don't feel like it's the same thing on loop every time! the combat seemed iffy at first but when I learned it and grasped the mechanics of it, it really REALLY grew on me. Suddenly everything didn't seem as bad and the dodge was super cool to see too. When I learned that you could crit after a successful dodge I was ecstatic!!! that's so cool !!! I really enjoyed the combat even with That One Bossfight (not naming any names but I had to redo it 5 million times) and I genuinely had such a good time learning how to knife every enemy up close :-) the music was awesome & the characters were the main thing that drew me in. So little dialogue but their dynamics and alt. forms were all so freaking neat! The way each of them spoke to Erin was so cool to see and I loved their different fighting styles. All of the designs were awesome too ! It might not have been my traditional type of retro survival horror, but it scratched the itch! Genuinely awesome game. I cannot believe more people don't know about it! I really really liked this ! <3 :-D

"The Tower on the Borderland" wears its influences on its sleeves (and references them in the credits) but it's its own thing. A haunting, morose game with spectacular atmosphere. A search action game focused on exploration, "...Borderland" is incredibly stylish and haunting. It's one of those experiences I wish I had gone through as a child, because its imagery, tone, and atmosphere would have followed through those very impressionable years (just like the Metroids and Zeldas did for me). World building is interesting and after all was said and done I would definitely want to see more of this universe. The biggest issue with the game is that it's really clunky. The exploration is satisfying on a basic, intrinsic level but the combat has no weight or fun to it. It's just there. Yet in spite of that I still pushed through the game because of how interesting and engaging the world is. I also love the use of a certain piece by Maurice Ravel. I hope the developer hones their craft and smooths out some (not all) of the clunkyness in future games. Clunk and friction is good, it generates interesting gameplay wrinkles from a dev level but also from those playing the end product. "The Tower on the Borderland" is a no brainer for anyone interested in atmospheric pieces, Search action games, and haunting universes.

"The Tower on the Borderland" is an intriguing survival-horror action-adventure by a single dev, where you play a rookie military-techie that gets trapped in a nightmarish in-between realm by an eldritch ritual. You scour the desolate building, searching for answers, spare ammo and first-aid-kits (you get full refills of both of them during save-spots, which is nice but not quite on par with typical survival-horror) and battling the occult-spec-ops that went feral. The atmopshere and presentation is quite unique and the biggest selling point in my opinion: It has a very distinct feel to it. The retro-look is also spot-on. Combat can be a bit wonky, but it gets the job done (and is better than some old genre-classics this game tries to emulate). Also I found some bugs: Bosses can get idle for no reason giving some nice free shots, also I clipped trough a floor and stuck on a transitionary staircase, forcing a restart. Luckily the game saves often. All in all not a perfect but a nice and unique title that took me around 5 hours to complete it. Give it a try if you like the genre and don't mind a little rough but eerily charming indie-entry!

The art style and atmosphere of the game are pretty nice. The exploration is a mild letdown. There's only about two and half distinct environments, and only one movement item in the whole game. There was not much of a point for the radio feature either, the map highlighted all the points of interest automatically without me ever having to use the radio. The map is useful, but hard to move around. It feels like the camera gets stuck or doesn't want to rotate the way you want it to while using the map. The combat is honestly pretty decent, if not explained very well. I might have missed the explanations though. There is a perfect dodge feature that helps you keep the melee attacks up instead of just shooting. Though the camera combined with how janky the lock on is makes it a little harder than I would think was intended to use melee. The "standing still for better ranged damage" is fun to try and find the right timings for. But that falls a bit flat in some of the boss fights. (looking at you sniper boss batman thing.) Story is interesting enough. I'm interested in finding out more about what the bad guy was up to, and the backstory of your now evil squadmates. The flashback bits with the man with the halberd are spaced out enough to give you a nice change of pace and some lore at the same time if you're into that. I only had one major bug. There is a central staircase that gets unlocked pretty close to the end of the game. I was ending up under the map whenever I tried to use them. I tried returning to my save point to see if that would fix the issue, but I was still ending up under the map whenever I used the stairs in the central staircase. I was able to fix it by restarting the game itself. I would've been able to finish the game without fixing the bug due to where my save point was, but I wouldn't have been able to gather all the collectibles if I was unable to fix the bug. Overall solid game with some expected indie jank. Combat is interesting enough and the art style carries the rest of it. Looking forward to more.

jankiest dodge in video game history 10/10

I didn't click with this game. The gameplay is very slow and clunky, and while the premise is interesting, the environments failed to catch and hold my attention for long, since you move so slowly through them.

An entertaining mix of soulslike, survival horror, and light metroidvania elements. the combat can be a little sketchy at times is overall decent. the environment is a great mix of modern day buildings and occult megastructure, like Control's Oldest House but taken in a completely different direction. Overall a decent game that i would recommend if you like any of the three genre's it mixes

too many enemies and too much empty space, and no clear direction on where to go. And the begging is so painful at one point, i said Just give us guns already. And yes combat is with a knife and it is hit run hit run hit run again the hit and run until the enmie dies this is so painful.