The Messenger

Great soundtrack, fun dialogue, looks beautiful. I'd recommend the first third of the game if that was the entire thing; unfortunately the lack of quality of life when it comes to backtracking really soured the rest of the experience. It feels like it was so close to being a solid 9/10 game, but threw it all away to pad out the runtime.

Hey, take this scroll. You've been tasked playing this game now. Trust me you will not regret it. Had a lot of fun with this title. Well balanced difficulty, lot of humour, nicely fitting music, fun to play and discover. Just be warned, if you don't like linear platformers - you have nothing to worry! After dew hours game shows its true genre providing completely new approach on levels discovered so far. And now go and do THE THING.

★★★★★º "해주실 평가라도 없습니까?" "물론, 하나 있지" "옛날옛적에..." "아 그런데 스토리 스포하는거 아니죠? 그럼 이 게임 안 살거에요." "말 끊지 말게나. 내 리뷰에는 망할 스포일러는 일절 없으니.. 에헴, 진지하지만 깊은 스토리와 어려운 난이도의 플랫포머 게임들에 지친 게이머들을 위해 서국의 한 닌자가 나타났다네. 닌자는 자신의 목표를 위해, 옛날 8비트 패미컴의 감성을 한 가득 넣은 맛깔나는 BGM과 눈이 즐거워지는 픽셀로 게이머가 게임에 몰입하도록 도와주었지. 그렇게 닌자와 게이머는 엔딩을 위해 같이 열심히 달려갔네." "게이머는 그냥 게임 사놓은게 아까워서 한동안 할인할 때 사놓고, 방치해뒀다가 해봤는데 운좋게 인생겜을 찾은건 아니구요?" "한번만 더 트집을 잡으면, 평가 마무리하기 귀찮아서 이 뒤는 여러분이 직접 플레이 해보세요 같은 열린 결말로 끝내버리는 수가 있네" "..." "엔딩까지 가는 과정에서, 닌자와 게이머는 재밌는 인물들과 웃긴 드립들을 마주했네. 그리고, 점차 업그레이드를 통해 강해져가는 닌자와 신들린 컨트롤의 게이머는 한몸이 되었고, 추가되는 지역과 숨어있는 루트도 헤쳐나가면서 마침내 숨겨진 1급 기술도 얻을 수 있었다네. 그 기세를 이어나가 마침내, 닌자는 자신의 목표였던 ?을 마주하게 되었고 이후 엔딩과 DLC까지 야무지게 긁어 먹었다네. 가격도 나쁘지 않고, 이와 비슷한 '삽질기사'나 '알와의 각성'게임도 재밌으니 추천하는 바이네." "좋은 게임이네요. 덕분에 일단 사놓고 방치할 게임이 하나 더 늘었네요." "자네 덕분에 내가 공들여 작성한 평가가, '참 재미있어따'로 끝나버리는 초등학생 독후감 숙제가 되어버렸군."

At first I was enjoying my time with this game. The pixel art is gorgeous and the music is really good. Gameplay felt snappy from the get-go as well. Yet very quickly, things went downhill. I really don't like how dying and upgrades feel in this game, especially combined with how the game is designed in general. The knockback is comical with how it can send you flying across the screen under the right circumstances. Not a fan? There's an upgrade for that! Which feels like this game was designed backwards. Instead of having a solid foundation and building upon it, the game is designed to be frustrating, up until you unlock stuff to make it feel good. Ranged weapon? Upgrade. Mitigating the knockback? Upgrade. Enemies having a chance to spawn health/ammo? Yeah, you guessed it, locked behind an upgrade. And this is where another annoyance comes in. Whenever you die, there's a little "helpful" demon, who "saves you" by sending you back to the checkpoint... For a price, of course. So if you keep losing to bad luck clashing with the game made to be annoying intentionally, that little bastard will rob you of opportunities to get the upgrades quicker. The game also incentivizes exploration. Secrets are always fun to look for, but in many games that do hidden/alternate path, you're not getting penalized for trying to find them. Yet in this game, some pits look like there's a secret down a pit (like a random, otherwise useless platform in the middle of the room), yet you fall to your death and then you get punished for trying, due to the "helpful" demon collecting every penny you collect until he's satisfied. In general, it could be a fun game, but I was really disappointed to learn, that it's designed almost as if it was supposed to be annoying on purpose. There's definitely a ton of potential here, and I'm sure that people who like these types of games may find it really good. But for me, having annoying systems to remove other annoyances is not a good time.

Хороший платформер. Отлично выдержанный ретростиль как картинки, так и самого геймплея. Рю Хаябуса был бы доволен этой игрой (⌒ω⌒)

Ok, so - I finished it. And... it's complicated. The messenger is an overall good game with fun and innovative gameplay ideas. It's a bit of a raw diamond, that could do with a bit more refinement. I taught level design and balancing in a course for game design, and here are some points that I would pic up with my students: - Gameplay mechanics: The game uses a series of well tested traversal and combat mechanics for metroidvania games and tweaks them in a way that doesn't make them feel outdated while giving you options, depending on playstile. On the other hand they are not implemented in a way that requires a very precise application or timing, meaning "mashing" works most of the time. Press three buttons at the same time and most likely one of them is going to get you somewhere.... - Balancing.: ... until it doesn't. There are passages that suddenly require the very precise application of mechanics with perfect timing. When you're used to rather easily breezing through 90% of the sections, these skill-gates can seem rather frustrating and can seriously interrupt the pace of the gameplay. Enemies and bosses however feel well designed and balanced - some are a bit challenging but never to a degree where it get's frustrating. Overall the game is rather forgiving (except for certain sections) unlike many of the old 8/16-Bit Platformers it pays homeage to (e.g. ninja gaiden or megaman). However, this makes single sections that really test your patience seem even more out of place. - Pacing 2.: The overall pacing of the game is unfortunately rather unbalanced and feels... lenghty. I believe the game would have profited from 2-3 fewer areas, alternatively reducing the lenght of each area by about 1/5. This becomes even more apparent when shifting from the linear section of the game to the metroidvania part. The third part of the game also drags out slightly too long. - Story and Setting: I did really like the story arc, the characters and the dialogue. I loved the shopkeeper and his consorts. There's a lot of humour but also heart in there, with some fun plot twists as well. - Visuals: Trying not to give too much away, the graphics distinction for the different game-settings was really cool and a great idea, that followed through to the end. Visually the game is also lovingly crafted with well though through design choices. This becomes even more evident in the 16-Bit sections, where it feels developers made an effort to put as much detail into the surrounding environment as they could, making up for the limitations they faced in the 8-Bit parts. I think summing it up, I really did enjoy the game for the most part. I took my time with it, didn't necessarily follow the hints in the second part of the game and chose to explore by myself. That may have also played into the game dragging on a bit. However, all in all a good game that I can recommend.

2 words : Absolute Cinema. The combat and platforming itself feel really smooth The switch-up between 8-bit (past) and 16-bit (future) works really well altering both the sound quality as well as the area you're currently in It has some great banter between the shopkeeper NPC and the main character for some hilarious dialogue. Absolute bangers playing throughout the entire game as well. 10/10 game

Mostly neutral review, but I'm still leaning towards a thumbs down. Spoilers ahead. I have to admit that the idea is very cool: a classic platformer that introduces time travel mechanics and then turns into a metroidvania, as if to contrast the old platformer format with the modern one that's in fashion today. Very impressive visually, though I much prefer the "retro" graphics to the fancier newer ones in the second half of the game, especially in the catacombs, where the newer graphics make it tricky to spot skeletons on the ground, and in the bamboo area where it's so bright it hurts the eyes. Navigating through the levels can be very satisfying and smooth, fitting for a ninja, but not always -- many times, poor level design gets in the way. That's where the positives end, unfortunately. The level design is a big flaw. When the game is still a linear platformer, it should not encourage you to look for secrets -- it kills the flow, and at that point, you do not yet know you'll get a map later that will make all the secrets obvious, so you end up feeling like you've just wasted your time for no reason trying to transition the screen in places where it could have, but doesn't. You cannot scroll the screen up or down without moving, so sometimes you climb right up into a sliding wall that instantly crushes you. Extremely lame. Plenty of other big flaws, too. Like the wall clinging mechanic that automatically attaches you to walls -- the same thing that made me think the Spelunky remake was inferior to the classic -- I feel like a quarter of my deaths was because I clung to the walls when I didn't want to. When you're gliding and let go of the gliding button, for a frame or two, attacking will still make you swing down instead of to the front. Enemies respawning after the screen has scrolled is annoying without adding much of a challenge, and is only put there to make the game feel more "retro" -- and, at the same time, the game still has the audacity to call the lives and continues mechanic "outdated". Deaths are mostly inconsequential. In the metroidvania part, there aren't enough fast travel points -- you'll be going through the same dull rooms several times. Sometimes, the game does not make it clear enough where you're supposed to be going next, making you rely on the in-game hint system -- in particular, why the heck is the quillshroom marsh "the place where the curse is strongest"? The silly humour did not sit with me at all. You can't really call it "breaking the fourth wall" when said wall wasn't there at any point.

总的来说瑕不掩瑜吧，优缺点都明显，依旧塞满跳跳乐+脑溢血的受击硬直+全成就又难又恶心 美术和复古音乐是亮点，8bit画面和16bit各有各的美，个人更喜欢16bit，更精美），游戏前半段基本是线性关卡，穿插一点小岔口去拿收集品，直到收集音符开始游戏转变成16bit画面，部分场景穿过后场景转回8bit，同时地图新增了部分岔路可以二次探索，这个设计挺惊喜的，让地图设计更上一层楼。 游戏跳跳乐手感还不错，配合后期新能力钩锁，跳跳乐更丝滑了（bushi）但是跳跳乐实在太多了，即死陷阱也多，一旦失误就死了重跑，好在存档点也是比较多，不用跑太长，收集物大部分也都要跳跳乐，其中几个还很难，需要时间练习，但凡游戏改掉自动吸附墙体和双击跳跃滑翔能起码少死一百次，真的有时候要被气的脑溢血了。游戏内小怪从头到尾都是那几种，都是一刀秒，除了绿恶魔（后期解锁能力也能一刀秒，不过有cd）没有区别也没有换皮，boss设计挺不错的，并不是单一的回合制，还有弹幕射击类、追逐战、互相拳击，我觉得比较恶心的是dlc的两个boss。 收集品后期获得能力可以在地图标注，后期重新收集即可，dlc收集不能错过，错过就拿不到了，每到一个新地图还能听商店老板讲个小故事，商店老板有三个成就需要注意，三个不同时间点，第一个是第一次见到商店老板就不断尝试打开衣柜，听完小故事解锁，第二个是雪山山顶打boss前他不在，也是不断尝试打开衣柜，听完小故事解锁，第三个是打完恶魔让你开柜子门偏不开，找他聊天听完小故事解锁。 最难的两个成就是屏幕全黑的情况下完成一段跳跳乐（需要背板，有视频可以脑子里模拟一遍）和6场全胜赢下与黑暗使者的比赛，比赛最难的是最后一关，关键在于第一个灯笼a完不要跳，后面几个灯笼再a跳，然后勾前后两段连接处的绳索，这里我尝试了一下午，勾了后半段a跳就高度是够的，不勾高度不够中间就掉下来，一旦停下失误就输了，小退重开游戏再来。