Pseudoregalia

WOW. I am shocked by this one. Left an impression for sure. I didnt expect this game to be this fun due to its tackiness and its concept... A 3d platformer metroidvania? But this game I am excited to say absolutely nails its concept and sets a wonderful template for how games that combine these two genres can be structured... Ignoring this games quirks. There's a quote from one of my favorite game developers, Hakita (Ultrakill director) I absolutely love. "if you make the main gameplay loop fun then 90% of your game will already be great." And this game is the perfect example of that. This game isn’t the best designed thing in the world very obviously, in fact its just a wee tad bit half-assed (hyperbole). They sacrificed an astronomical amount of quality and detail in things that aren’t the way the platforming rooms feel and how they blend into one another, gameplay loop and item locations and only really focused on the things that make that game fun while rushing that as well in a good amount of cases. They ignored polish in many areas and pumped out a game that is just the gameplays core elements. There isn’t much intricacy and detail. There isn’t much amazing design in the little things to really truly awe out about. Geometry is crudely slammed together and feels rushed in a lot of cases, the themes are uninspired. Nonexistent detail for the most part, just boxes with textures looking like a copy paste Roblox game or an area behind a map you aren’t supposed to be at. The ui is tacky and unpolished. The audio mixing and volume for the music is all over the place. The stuff that they didn't feel like were as big of a deal they half-assed to such an extent that a professor would probably fail them because of it and towards the end of the game you can tell they lost all ♥♥♥♥ giving and just rushed it in a Scoop Du Creepy Run sort of way as they lost passion with the project, especially towards the end. The finale was depressing and so damn bad. If you look into the dev of this game, Rittzler, they have a trend of this. Their projects are largely similar to pseudoregalia platforming, and this is another iteration in the refinement of the concept of extremely poloished and nuanced platforming abilities. The game feels like a playground for said iteration of polished movement. They have spent their career refining this concept. With that said... That does not make this game not fun though. Quite the contrary. Every room is paced great and flows into each other nicely, each feels like a reiteration optimization puzzle depending on what you are trying to do with your current moveset and everything has this wonderful flow hopping from room to room and its all very open ended with many solutions. What succession of doing things can get me to where I want to go? How far can you push it all? Hell you don’t even NEED the abilities in most cases if you are skilled enough. The skill ceiling here is so high. Once your moveset is complete too the flow of flying through rooms is so, so nice. Feels like im in a race track. Whenever you get any new moves there is usually stuff in most areas for you to collect as you are finding your way. As you get more movement abilities it opens up even more solutions to getting around, changing the rooms optimization puzzles completely so it stays fresh. The more effortfully designed areas are really addicting platforming playhouses with amazing flow and so many different ways to tackle things! Giant open ended jungle gym play houses with so much you can do on them. Even the smaller rooms that have very straightforward flows and operate more linearly have a great flow and are a blast to fly through. The overall map and every area is really small too and because its 3d there are many branching paths that allow you to get from point a to point b faster and the game is rather short so backtracking doesn't take that long. In addition to it being so small the rooms/platforming puzzles are visually distinct and every location stands out in your brain, its seriously ridiculously easy to make a mental map. So much so that this game initially shipped without one, but the dev forgot to consider that people get rather dull witted so they added one eventually. Sybil's movement is extremely nuanced, satisfying, responsive, precise and tight and only gets even more fun somehow as you progress and gain more abilities, but from the second you start the game its really satisfying. It's so precise that you even have the little shadow under you see in Crash Bandicoot so you know where you are going to land! The movement abilities you get later are all sublime additions and chain into eachother so, so well. They only get more and more fun and give you a very powerful moveset for getting around. Any absurd jump you could possibly make you most likely could do with enough skill. This game has my favorite long jump by far, you do a sorta Cranky Kong Tropical Freeze Pogo to maintain your momentum. The wall run mechanic is one of my favorites I have ever used too and its honestly broken, but in the best fun way possible. You cling to the wall and glide against it very fast but eventually you will start to drop, so you jump to the next wall and you get a lot of them you can do in a row. The wall jumping is great and its your main correctional tool. It's so versatile, its like the Mario Galaxy spin in its utility but you bounce off walls and you can do it two extra times after bouncing off one. People complain that the combat is lackluster and that's valid, but it doesn't impede on anything that makes the game fun. It just doesn't add much. It's more of a pace breaker or something ambient to do. The real meat comes solely from the platforming. If it didn't have what minimal combat it does though I think the game would still be worse, it still serves a purpose. I too wish there was more to it though. I love the collectibles too! They aren’t just key items for progression. This also has collectibles like pieces of hearts from Zelda, minor abilities (like the ability to move around while healing) major abilities (new moves) and outfits and honestly they are great! Always fun and super nonlinear to grab. Some of them have very boring Mario Odyssey moon ass placements but those are usually rare cases and thankfully only for lamer things. They are also still fun to grab. All in all I really loved this one and I highly encourage people to give it a shot, trying their best to disregard the perverted design of the main character. Seriously, what the ♥♥♥♥. The second I got pants I instantly slammed them on. Please dont do that in the next game "rittzler" thamk yuo