Vernal Edge

Entertaining, yet a bit shallow. It starts strong, makes you want to explore, makes you want to learn more and gain more abilities. The platforming and traversal are great, combat is sleek. However, towards the last 30% of the game, everything feels too repetitive, there's little depth as to why go to the end. The story, the characters, the world... all end up being too shallow. I recommend it because I truly think it's hard to get something better for the amount of money you pay, but if you've played way too many metroidvanias, you won't find anything worth doing here. The good stuff: - Great pixel art. - Awesome movement and traversal. - Nice combat. - Nice set of abilities to unlock. - Funny dialogue. - Good difficulty. Both combat and platforming can be challenging while not being overwhelming. The meh stuff: - World traversal - I didn't like that you have to break the gameplay to go from one part of the world to the other and would much rather prefer an interconnected world. - The enemies: Repetitive. - The spells: Definition of Meh. The bad stuff: - The story is... weak. - The power ups: You don't really get more powerful, you just improve in the game. - Got boring towards the end.

I really wanted to like this game. I really did. The art style is gorgeous, the soundtrack is excellent, and both the characters and world-building immediately pulled me in. I loved the way the world transitions into a pixelated 3D style during airship travel. Unfortunately, I just couldn't get past the combat and traversal. It felt like I had to wait 2-3 business days between inputs before attacks or movement abilities would actually connect. And with combat and movement make up the majority of the gameplay, it quickly became frustrating. I'll admit that I'm not the best action game player (my usual strategy is to button mash until I find a strong combo and stick with it until something better comes along). Even so, only a few hours in I found myself repeatedly failing to land combos because enemies would absorb my attacks, recover almost instantly, and clip me with a hit that sent me flying across the screen. Instead of feeling challenged, I felt like I was fighting the controls and timing. Maybe a more skilled or more patient player would get much more out of this game than I did. I genuinely wish I could have, because everything outside of the gameplay showed a lot of promise. In the end though, I realized I wasn't going to enjoy pushing through the combat, so I decided to stop playing. That was disappointing, because I really wanted to see where the story went. If you're someone who enjoys deliberate, timing-focused combat, this game may click for you. But if you're a more casual player looking for fluid, responsive gameplay, you may find it just as frustrating as I did.

É um bom jogo indie. Jogabilidade, combate, gráficos, músicas, e o ambiente são bons, recomendo darem uma chance.

Overall it was decent. The combat is a bit clunky, and to me there seemed no reason to use any spell but timebomb. Music has nothing noteworthy. The movement was great though. Bite sized pieces of metroidvania in the form of islands worked for me, though I wish the maps were better and had more features. I wished that I could move the camera. I enjoyed the story.

Love the game but wth control is meh imo :'((((

Хорошая игра с крутой боёвкой, мб лучшая боёвка в метроидваниях. Хороший пиксель арт, сюжет ну нормальный, может вам понравиться. в общем всё.

This game's combat and movement systems are phenomenal. If you are a fan of DMC-based, free-flowing combat systems, you will thoroughly enjoy Vernal Edge. The game is a metroidvania with a simple revenge story and heavy focus on "locked room" arenas. 100% gameplay took about 10 hours, and a bonus difficulty is unlocked after being the game once (there is a code to unlock early, do not do this, you will be frustrated). Vernal edge has very sparce tutorials, which I believe actually work toward the game's benefit. Most mechanics are shown and not told, and discovering how systems interact through discovery rather than tutorial textbox creates many [i] holy crap you can do that [/i] moments, it scratches the itch just right. You aren't given much signposting as to where to go either, but I believe the tradeoff is balanced rather well. Most areas are able to be 80% cleared in their initial visit: you find the metroid progression move and the entire area revolves around using it. Cleverly, most larger-sized islands contain movement upgrades, while smaller ones contain optional content. An almost nearly essential combat item is located in a slightly hidden spot [spoiler] in a shop in the first major town [/spoiler], but the game clearly indicates something is important nearby with a textbox (and honestly, if you have any intuition from previous metroidvanias it should be very simple to find). Very minor sequence breaking is possible, but no major item can be sequence-broken, all the majors are out in the open. There is an "easy" order to collect items (some movement is really strong), but you can get an island's major item on the first visit every time. The pixel art is good, the progression/escalation feels good (for the most part), the story is simple yet has very interesting subtext/implications, and the combat has the sauce. For a comparison against its contemporary heavyweight contender Hollow Knight, Vernal Edge is much less "smooth" and more gritty, but substitutes graphical polish and precision control for weightier, comital, and more inter-connected gameplay/interaction systems. [h3] Now I will glaze the combat and movement. [/h3] The primary combat loop revolves around managing enemy stagger bars, denoted as blue orbs below enemy health bars. Once an enemy is "broken", a timer begins in which they can be freely attacked without retaliation. If an enemy is grounded, they recover very quickly. There are multiple ways to knock these enemies airborne, the easiest are the up-attack (simple launcher) and the down-attack (slide). Keeping enemies staggered is key to success. Basic attacks have a normal, up, down, aerial, and charged variant. Depending on the direction you hold (or hold for charge), you will perform a different attack. Charged attacks and the final hit of a fully executed combo (no up or down held) will deplete one orb of the stagger bar. [spoiler] A charged down attack does 2 stagger damage, and is necessary to upgrade on higher difficulties. [/spoiler] You can also guard attacks from one direction, and deal stagger damage on retaliation. Attacks are rather comital, as you are locked into an animation for the duration of the input. Dashing can interrupt some inputs, letting you narrowly escape, while guarding cannot (although guarding is much stronger defensively). Some enemies track you very well, however, so dashing can be a worse alternative than the almighty simple jump. The titular "pulse edge" is a major healing/movement component of combat. At any point you can throw a projectile to mark the first enemy struck. Attacking enemies builds up "pulse mana", and once the bar reaches solid white, you can perform one of several [b] PULSE [/b] moves, depending on the direction held and if you're airborne, on the marked enemy. Activating these moves generates red healing orbs from enemies on hit. Some pulse moves also act as movement. [b] Do note [/b] there is minor hitstop during some moves, meaning directional inputs can be "eaten" and you perform a different move than what you want. There's a learning curve in knowing how much hitstop happens, and when to slightly delay an input rather than spam. There are two upgrade/customization options as well. Spells act like traditional spells, and you can have 4 equipped at a time. You have a "spell mana" bar that starts full, and each spell depletes a certain amount of mana. Once your mana is fully gone, the bar will turn green and slowly recharge. Spells can be cast [b]as long as you have mana[/b], meaning if you have a sliver left you can still use an expensive spell. Memories act as a passive bonus, changing or improving combat capabilities. Equipping a memory takes "memory points", which you'll find as an item. Each memory takes a certain amount of points, usually proportional to the strength of the upgrade. One of the earliest memories lets your "pulse mana" recharge faster if your "spell mana" is drained/recharging. Never unequip this. Pulse is the only way to reliably heal, so if you're going to die, spend all your mana so you can recharge pulse faster. The movement, much like the combat, is comital. It's both very rigid yet super smooth, I can't describe it well. You have a short dash, and the earliest upgrades are a "wall jump" that's just one jump to reach higher spots, and a slam down that breaks boards (no combat damage) and lets you slide fast down slopes. Later, you receive much more airborne mobility. Platforming is challenging but fair, and shows you the simple way to use your movement options. Cool mechanics if you want to be spoiled [spoiler] Slamming into a slope causes you to slide. You can jump to conserve momentum, and attacking during a slide does a cool spin. Once you have the air-dash move, if you dash diagonally downward and slam in quick succession, you can begin sliding [b]anywhere you want[/b]. [/spoiler] [spoiler] Hitting taunt in the air makes you do a little spin. After getting the launch move, hitting taunt now makes you do a small double jump. [/spoiler] [spoiler] If you need more height, use the charge aerial up attack (makes you spin). I find jumping, charge up-air, and dashing lets you collect some items early. [/spoiler] [spoiler] [b]All moves[/b] allow directional inputs. This includes the taunt attack memory, it has different versions depending on the direction you hold, and if airborne (taunt down air is really good). [/spoiler]

Unintuitive exploration, poor enemy variety. Got stuck a little bit and realized that I just didn't care about the game enough to go around the islands another time. Combo system is cool, but outside of when there are multiple enemies you aren't really incentivized to do anything other than the one combo you normally do.