Wirewalk()↳

小粒ですが綺麗にまとまった謎解きアクション。 ・扱いやすいモーションとテンポのいい戦闘 ・ちょっと考えれば解ける仕掛け ・ちょっと頑張れば終わる実績 と、手に馴染むとでも言うような塩梅の良さが素晴らしかったです。 街を散策→バグの発覚したコードを取得→自宅PCからステージ開始 という全体の流れが最初分からなかったので、この点だけ書いておきます。 もちろん人の話を聞く気があればまったく問題ない事です。

[quote]Follow my Curator page, [url=https://store.steampowered.com/curator/41363546-Fruit-N-Doggie-Reviews/]Fruit N Doggie Reviews,[/url] so you can be updated whenever I post a new review.[/quote] [h1]Overall Rating - Average ★★★☆☆[/h1] [h1]First Impressions[/h1] Wirewalk()|> (WW) was one of those games that showed up, had a small asking price, and looked interesting enough for a quick playthrough. I have several larger, longer titles in my library, and somehow procrastinating with smaller games makes me feel a bit better about not getting to all of them. Would playing WW be as unpleasant as walking a tight wire or just be a walk in the park? Considering I 100%'ed it within 3 hours, that should be fairly obvious. [h1]Gameplay[/h1] Although I didn't play Game Boy Color games myself, I was still widely aware of them due to video game magazines I read while younger. Everything about this title was built on the foundation of that old handheld system, and I think it's a decent love letter of that era. You'll explore the city, getting Wire IDs to plug into your PC at home. Some of them are simple mini-games, but clearing them will provide a worthwhile boon. The other half though allow you to go into these programs and clean out the virus, by completing a simple stage and defeating the boss. It won't be as easy as just bee-lining toward the exit, as you need to find the code in order to make the boss accessible. Another decent feature for each stage is that they involve the use of a secondary weapon with additional traits. For instance, a ball that can curve around corners and hit switches, or a pickaxe that breaks cracked walls. The stages involve a bit of exploration and basic puzzle solving, with bosses having small touches that feel like more than just mashing your weapon at them. Ignoring the most obvious example with the second boss, the third one involved avoiding attacks by swinging around with the claw. Overall, because of its inspiration, WW is fairly small-scale, but played like a decent adventure title. https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3047766831 [h1]Controls[/h1] Throughout your playthrough you'll unlock new weapons and have to manually swap them out as needed. It's a little annoying that you have to pause in order to switch around your inventory, but that'd be my biggest complaint. Another downside I noticed is that if you move diagonally, your speed seems to drop. With how large the city is that's a bit of a hassle, but it's not that big of a problem. After all, everything else handles just fine in the game. [h1]Story[/h1] In the not so distant future, a virus begins spreading throughout the city. Rada, a female of drinking age, starts roaming around and cleaning up infected technology. Oddly enough though, there's some positive effects from when these items weren't working properly, such as pet-owners spending more time with their dogs. Was this a malicious attack, or was there a benign motive behind spreading this virus? https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3047766342 [h1]Visuals[/h1] Earlier handheld games were severely limited with their visuals, to the extent that they had to work with restricted color palettes. WW works within the same limitations, using three colors at any given time; black, white, and the last is based on what palette you select from the options menu. You start with two, but can find more throughout the game. On the one hand, nothing is going to look that amazing with what WW is looking to emulate, as you sometimes have to use a bit of imagination to recognize an object for what it's meant to be. However, while making use of only three distinct colors, this short title is perfectly playable and looks pretty good for what they had to work with. There were some colors I wouldn't want to look at too long, but otherwise it's not even a strain on the eyes. [h1]Sound Design[/h1] Coinciding with the Game Boy Color aspect, the music is made up of chiptunes. I enjoyed them if for no other reason than because they were upbeat and perky. Since each dungeon was based around a different kind of item being infected by a virus, they all had a different tune to match that theme. For instance, the first dungeon centered around the dog entertainer included barking, in a way that sounds far less annoying than you might think. It's a digitized noise, like someone saying the word bark, as opposed to a chihuahua sim. Aside from a few sound effects that might be a bit high-pitched, nothing was unpleasant on the ears. https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=3047765965 [h1]Pros[/h1] 🌟 Even though you could skip them, the tutorials over how each new item works are quick and helpful. They demonstrate additional effects you might not expect, such as the jet skates' drift. 🌟 Most secrets are worthwhile, as many gave some kind of upgrade. Also, since a new palette might be more enjoyable to a player, I wouldn't say they're worthless. 🌟 There aren't many tools, but I like how almost all of them had more than a single intended effect. I'm not sure if the jet skates do, but 4/5 isn't bad. [h1]Cons[/h1] ❌ For the effort put into the game, there's not many dungeons to clear. If I'd been a bit more efficient, I think 2 hours would have been enough to 100% the game. Also, the third dungeon had a tile that stays black on the map, making it seem like you missed something, but you can't go over there. ❌ Sometimes it took me longer to figure out how to beat a new enemy than I'd like to admit. ❌ Being able to swap weapons with the shoulder buttons would have been convenient. [h1]Tips[/h1] 🔍 If you die in a dungeon, you'll return to the start. If you've cleared a puzzle room to get a key, it might reset that progress, although it won't be clear from checking the map. Confusion around this made me restart the game, as I thought I couldn't get an optional item. 🔍 To beat the moles, smack the rocks they throw back at them to knock their helmet off. Then they're vulnerable to normal attacks. The drills can only be beaten by throwing a ball at the target on the wall and leading them into the death pit that opens. 🔍 Completing all of the old lady's wills gives an upgrade to your main weapon. If you can't find the last candy machine, [spoiler]go back to where you first spawned in the game.[/spoiler] [h1]Final Thoughts[/h1] No matter what else you say about WW, something no one can disagree on is that it's a short game. Unless you really struggle with it, I think 3 hours would be the most time many people would take to finish it. Plus, for all the effort it'd take to have made the game, the ending fell a bit flat. There's no ending dungeon, you just transition into a final boss that didn't have any puzzle-like mechanics to give it some flair. It just felt like I needed to survive long enough. Since the story doesn't provide any answers as to who was behind the virus attack, or even what their motivation might have been, it's hard to feel very satisfied. It does leave open plenty of room for a sequel to flesh more of this out though, so maybe it'll go further into the plot at some point. Admittedly, despite my critique, I did enjoy the playthrough more than not, as the gameplay was satisfying. I'd say it's worth picking up, most likely in a bundle of some sort, since you can finish it within a day. [table] [tr] [th]PC Specs[/th] [th]Performance[/th] [/tr] [tr] [td]Ryzen 2700 RTX 2070 16GB RAM ADATA SSD 1920x1080 [/td] [td]The game ran without incident on default settings. 💖 - WW is healthy [/td] [/tr] [/table]