Parasite (2016)

Even with its low price, the game is still an "almost" that really falls on the "no" side. Music is somewhat catchy but extremely short loops, scrolling isn't smooth despite the serious hardware I'm running on, and difficulty is more a function of distance from a save point than any other factor. It's tough to rate the central morphing mechanic, as the game regularly provides multiple paths suitable to more than one morph (and a few optional spots that you need two morphs in quick succession), yet in practice you'll end up playing in one particular morph without switching (given that the game wants you to try to avoid switching). Overall, sadly cannot recommend.

First impressions after 30 minutes are it's a fun game with decent controls. It very much reminds me of many old home computer games from the '80s, complete with droning, looped music. For some reason, Zorro and Dr. Who on the C64 come to mind, but It's not a lot like either of them. There's something about it that reminds me of games like those. You can morph between 4 forms, each with a special ability to get past obstacles. It takes one heart of HP to switch, so this makes it a bit puzzle-y to get past some parts without being stuck in a form that doesn't help you proceed. It could do a better job of explaining what's going on. I'm running around and picking things up with no idea what some of them are for. I can't get it to go full screen, just a maximized window. I'll post more once I've put more time in it. Edit: I finished it in 4 hours, 20 minutes. I feel like it took me longer than it should have taken. I had to redo a couple of parts many times because I kept making the same mistakes. It was definitely fun for the most part, but was quite frustrating in a couple of places where you have to quickly switch between two forms while in the air. There are also several…

This game has some elements of a metroidvania with backtracking with new abilities you unlock. But it gets annoying to use certain ones and doesn't control well enough. The text in this game is way to big that sometimes it will just take up the entire screen while you are playing the game and you have wait till it disappears till its comfortable to keep playing. Also changing to different forms to progress through the areas costs one heart every time you change your character and I would love to know why that's the case cause if your confused and don't know which form to use as your cycling through them you then realize you are about to die in one hit and can make the game frustrating when that happens constantly. I haven't gotten far to tell if this would happen but what if you get in a situation where you need to change to different forms and if you don't have enough health at one point you might be stuck, just a random statement of how annoying that is. 3/10, I don't recommend this game at all.

This game only cost me a $1.24 but I will be requesting a refund on principal. I was almost instantly frustrated with this game. The menu cannot be navigated with a joypad. Once in the game, there is no way to adjust settings or exit the game through the pause menu. When the game is paused, pushing buttons reveals the menu is an overlay and the game is still active underneath allowing you to waste skills or get injured while the menu is up. Not a well made game. This simple pixel platformer (my favorite genre) feels like a free android without much modification. The moving and jumping feel floaty and wrong. Its impressive how a game that blasts the screen with huge block letter instructions can still leave me baffled on how to progress.