I just bought this game and I have to say I’m slightly disappointed. The music and visuals are good but the controls are slightly awkward. Mawthorne can stick to some walls like Ryu from Ninja Gaiden but unlike Ryu to do so you have to press up against the wall. You can either tap the attack button once to do a short attack or you can double tap for a long attack. There’s no apparent use for the short attack and you can’t walk while you attack (although you can attack in mid-air during a jump). It’s a bit of an unusual way to handle the usual platformer formula.
The game advertises itself as a Metroidvania, and while we may debate the meaning of that, to me that means it’s about exploration and obtaining abilities that open new paths of exploration. I have only played about 30 minutes and it’s not evident to me from the manual or the gameplay that any abilities will be unlocked. It appears to simply be what I would call an exploration platformer.
There are a few other niggles. Surprisingly, there’s no pause button, so if I needed to take a sudden break, I relied on the pause function of my emulator itself. There are no passwords or save files, so you have to do the game old school, in one sitting. There’s a limited map system: you can’t check a map at all times, only the one you see on the wall. I would have liked a better audio or visual cue for a few events like enemies being defeated or Mawthorne being damaged. Finally, a limited life system is also something I find unusual in something called a “Metroidvania” and reminds me more of exploration platformers like Blaster Master.
I don’t mean to sound too negative. The game isn’t bad and I had fun with my short time with it. I think I’ll go back to it and learn more to see what else the game has to offer. These are just my initial impressions after 30 minutes of gameplay.