Game claims to be made in retro-style graphics but it felt to me more like a lack of graphics really. It doesn't look awful and the levelsGame claims to be made in retro-style graphics but it felt to me more like a lack of graphics really. It doesn't look awful and the levels look nice and detailed enough for the graphics it has. It felt like it could've been a Nintendo DS game from several years ago.
Since the graphics weren't the focus, I figured the gameplay would've been better than it is. I'll some quick points:
-Game is too dark in several parts, to the point that you have to literally get within a very short distance of a surface to find your bearings.
-Enemies have very straightforward patrol paths. If they spot you though, you may as well just let them kill you as there's no way to outrun them and you'll just respawn at the beginning of the checkpoint, which thankfully means you don't lose too much progress.
-You can walk through some doors by just walking into them, and some doors you can't. No real indication of which ones are which.
-Some levels are spread oddly apart. Every exploration level needs a key, and the keys tend to be in side rooms that just feel like wastes of time as there are either no threats leading to them or the threat guarding the key is minimal. It IS possible to miss a key, go through a deadly and difficult obstacle course, and then have to restart the level.
-OBSTACLES ARE AWFUL. Between the buzzsaw puzzles that are akin to dumb luck getting through the very tight spaces with the switch controls, and needing to walk over thin beams or face instant death by falling, AGAIN with switch controls, they are just super frustrating and don't offer any kind of scare at all. The enemies one shot you, but at least they aren't broken most of the time.
-CHASE SCENES. Remember Crash Bandicoot? Now imagine a chase scene like that, except it's down a very narrow corridor filled with instant kill traps. For later chase scenes, the layouts of the traps plus the limited stamina meter mix together for a horrible time that isn't scary after the first two or three times, and ends up being SUPER frustrating just because it's just trial and error. And... once again... switch controls...
-CONTROLS!!! The little dinky control sticks on the default controllers aren't great for a game like this. Add in sluggish movements, particularly when running, and combine it with all the tight twists and turns you have to do throughout various levels, some of them during chase scenes that will insta kill you if you get stuck, slow down, or run into obstacles, and you have a very poor recipe that is not very enjoyable...
-Performance Issues. My game never crashed but it does suffer from very sluggish frame rate every time I loaded into a new level, and it would take several minutes to correct itself.
I managed to finish the game after being stuck on the last chase level. After this point, the game is still frustrating but not overtly so. It introduces combat in a couple of the later levels that is very clunky at first due to a second delay in your character attacking. However, there is a rhythm to it and it is possible to speed run through the level once you know where enemies are and get the hang of attacking.
Finally, the game is labeled with a NSFW, which surprised me on the switch. It just ends up being your character in her underwear (topless if you turn on the NSFW on the menu screen). Due to the graphics, there isn't much to look at, but it's a nice touch running around half naked with a murderer after you.
All in all, I felt a lot better with the latter levels and completing the game was eventually pretty satisfying after all the negatives of the first few levels. As a result, and given that it is a cheap indie game, I decided to double my personal score for it.… Expand