Akatori

I have very mixed feelings about this game. The devs say the game should be around 9-13 hours long. However, I finished it in under 5 (!!!) hours and I did explore quite a bit. I haven’t gotten all the collectables (in this game cats) but if I would go get them, it shouldn’t take longer than an extra hour, two if I take it really slow. And even then I would be at 7 hours which is still below the estimated 9 hours from the devs. Sound/ Music: No complaints here. The soundtrack is nice and is perfect in the background. But it is also nothing I would put on in the background as chill out music or when working on other projects. Graphics: Very beautiful. In my opinion the best part of the game. Level design: I quite enjoyed the jump and run parts of the game. There were enough ledges to climb, the path was always clear and easy to follow and there were no parts where I got frustrated. But it is also quite easy. If you are looking for a challenge then another game might be better. If you just want a fun time, then it fits. HOWEVER I did get the sense that the game was once different. And looking through a few posts I wasn’t alone with this feeling. After looking at gameplay of the demo (Akatori First Chapter) I was right. They changed the way you interact with the staff which made the whole game feel less immersive. Not in a terrible way just in a lost potential way. Difficulty: I started playing on the second difficulty, so basically the level experienced plattform players would normally want. However, it was extremely frustrating and I found myself dying to the smallest things. Especially the second boss made me decide to start new as some attacks made me take 1 life damage and then suddenly, I took 1,5 life damage from the same attack´(and at that point I had 4 lives so it did matter when I took a health potion). As it was a guessing game if I should take a health potion I started again on the normal story mode – which was way to easy! Now I basically did not have to pay attention to damage at all. Only one enemy was an actual threat – and this was a flying enemy with a kind of homing missile that fired in quick succession. So getting to it meant taking at least on attack to the face. But the bosses were a walk in the park. Just jump out of the way a few times and they died like flies. Especially the final boss was a joke. I do hope the devs played on the second difficulty mode to get the estimate of 9-13 hours as you would have to invest a looooooot of time searching for the collectables to get to the 9 hours in story mode. But if you are a beginner and haven’t played a lot of rougelikes then Akatori might be due to the easy setting just right for you! Upgrades: You don’t need them. Really, you don’t. The strong attack takes way to long to charge. And you don’t need it for simple enemies anyway. The other upgrades are also not needed. Everything you get through the purple bells aren’t needed to progress the game. So, unless you enjoy enemy wave rooms you don’t need to interact with the glowing bells. Items: Apart from terrible dialogues with EACH merchant they haven’t got anything valuable. Only one merchant sells you an extra life but also only once. And you buy it all at once. Everyone else sell four different “potions”, three of which I didn’t touch. A healing potion, one to strengthen your attacks, one to give you more money and one to give you more purple elixir (sorry, didn’t play in English so don’t know what it was called by the game). You get more than enough money, you can cheat the system by just attacking the first enemy on a screen, then walking back out and attacking the same one to get the purple stuff and if you don’t want to down enemies even faster than you already do you also don’t need the strength potion. Writing/ story: Oh dear, the writing. This is an absolute mess. Not sure if the devs let their teenagers write the dialogues but they are bad. Really, really bad. It is clear they wanted to be funny and witty but no. No, it is neither funny nor witty and I began to dread the next time Mako and Akatori would start to talk. The story itself is very basic. Nothing to write home about but it only makes sense when you reach the final boss. For me it seemed the devs wanted to have a clever story with an interesting twist but they missed the mark by a mile. You just sit there and think “Why?”. Why should I be invested in this journey of this girl? And why should I be sad about the death of this NPC? And the sad part? Looking back at the demo the dialogue was also changed. The dialogue made sense back in the demo! I really don’t get why they changed this part. It was so good back then… End rating: I did enjoy playing the game – apart from the story but I can overlook that. I don’t think it was a waste of my money or time. But it isn't a game I would recommend my friends. It’s just mediocre. Get this game if you are a beginner with 2d plattformers. Do NOT get this game if you are looking for a good story driven game or a game with an interesting combat system.

Interesting, catchy setting. I liked dialogues, characters. Curious, what game can give to me, but so far so good 👍

This game is pretty great. I have some issues with the difficulty being locked, so when I'm having issues with an area I can't bump it down. Something akin to the Nine Sols systems would be ideal with fine tuned difficulty, but simply allowing me to switch the general difficulty from the settings would be fine as well. I might also add the ability to custom controls from the setting instead of forcing the player to switch between presets.

Приятная игра, стильная и красочная. По первым впечатлениям как метроидвания совсем не душная: минимум бэктрекинга, локации просторные, а не вот эти клеточки с переходом через 10 метров. В пространстве легко ориентироваться, всегда понимаешь где что находится и куда идти. Про сюжет пока мало что могу сказать, но диалоги лёгкие, с большой долей юмора - я оценил. Ну а какая красота на задниках мне и говорить не надо, всё видно на скриншотах. В динамике смотрится ещё красивее. За поражение ничего не теряешь, ни валюту, ни расходники, что очень полезно на боссах. При этом челленжа хватает: стоит расслабиться и пропустить пару ударов и игра сразу отправит вас на чек-поинт. Боссы тоже дают немного попотеть, но долго на них не сидишь (пока прошёл двух). Платформинг приятный, управление отзывчивое. В арсенале довольно много приёмов, как для платформинга, так и для боёвки, так что не заскучаешь. И что самое приятное - в игре не получаешь урона за касание противника, если он не в состоянии атаки! За это разработчикам от меня большой лайк)

Крайне рекомендую эту игру, визуал, боевка, левел дизайн, прописанные диалоги - те вещи, которые смогут зацепить в этой игре. Я как человек, который любит разглядывать модельки, шейдеры и прочую визуальную составляющую остался доволен на все 100%. Сочетание 2дшной пиксельной и 3дшной лоупольной графики здесь сделано на крайне хорошем уровне, визуал никак не выбивается, энвир в этой игре просто потрясающий Играл на предпоследней сложности, любители метроидвании заценят баланс в этой игре, не слишком душно, но и в то же время играется тяжело К слову много интересных врагов, не наскучивают со временем, у врагов по нескольку типу атак в зависимости от расстояния до него, это тоже порадовало

nice game :)

Пока за несколько часов игры: + Перемещение интересное, что очень важно для метроидвании. Вроде много где видели, но комбинация решений в платформинге ощущается свежо. Точность прыжков требуется высокая даже на самой низкой сложности. + Визуал местами приятный, а местами прям красотища, хотя пиксели - не совсем мое. + Боевка раскрывается постепенно - дождитесь посоха, он могет + В наличии легкий юморок и интригующая история. Это однозначный плюс, потому что не фанат платформинга ради платформинга. - Индикатор кулдауна для кувырка за километр от персонажа - Не меняется сложность в процессе. Можно было бы сделать хотя бы откат на более легкую