Jack Axe

Jack Axe looks cute, but it is by no means easy. It is, however, hard for all the wrong reasons. The controls aren't that great, you die in a single hit, there aren't enough checkpoints to make up for dying so quickly and the story is... just there I guess. I don't even really remember it, as I have played this some time ago. I think I did play through it fully, but had a feeling of relief once it was over. I did have my fun with it, as I do enjoy hard games, but I do not enjoy frustrating games. If it is just making you repeat a lot of stuff everytime you die, it isn't fun. Especially if it feels like that you died because of the controls. I don't know if it had any updates regarding that since I played, so I could be wrong about some things, but from what I remember, the negative feelings outweighted my positive ones. I really enjoyed the pixel artstyle though. Its nice to look at!

i like what i played of this game, not sure why it seems so under preforming. this concept turned into a metroidvania would be better than Celeste IMO. but on sale, i think this game is good for anyone who likes precision platformers with some bosses. ill return to this game at some point, and update the review if i have to.

I cautiously recommend this one. It's basically Celeste with Mario Odyssey style achievements. The checkpoints are unforgiving, a lot of deaths are really cheap, deaths come in one hit, and the axe throwing mechanic has weird timing. It's fun after adjusting, but the game will become trivial after a short time. The bosses really hurt the overall experience, it's a lot of waiting. the final boss is so awful that I nearly stopped. This is a very okay game.

I have played a lot of 2D platformers, and I had a lot of fun playing Jack Axe. I would absolutely recommend giving this a try on casual difficulty - if you get unlucky with crashes like some people seem to have experienced, opt for the refund.

I would recommend this game cautiously. The gameplay is fun if you only care about gameplay then it is a fun platformer with a cool premise. I enjoyed the axe throwing and retrieval mechanics that did not overstay its welcome with different enemies and mechanics in each world with a nice artstyle. Negatives (AKA my rant on the flaws with the game) But the game is unpolished outside of the gameplay. The story starts and stops abruptly with all characters being one offs. World 3 does not have any npcs with zero explanation on why. World 4 I cannot figure out where the shop is if there is any. World 5's subworld looks like it is untextured. [spoiler] You cannot escape World 6 until you beat the final boss (I accidentally got stuck playing it again by deciding to click the world again) [/spoiler]. Shop skins do not save until you exit the world and go back. There is no way to see if you got all the main collectibles in each world or in the game so if you want to get everything you either need to guess or hope the numbers in the discussions are accurate.

I generally prefer to focus on the positives, especially in indie games with discount price tags, but Jack Axe has at least one game breaking bug. In the last level, right before the boss, I got stuck in a scene after going through a door. I quit to the title and restarted, and... now loading my save boots me back to the title screen! Even creating a new save file is stuck in the same way. Aside from that, here was my impression of the first 99% of the game: Pros: + Satisfying axe locomotion. You can combine wall jump, arc jump (down+attack), air axe, dash-to-axe, and extra jump after axe catch. You can sequence break a few things in a really satisfying way! + Great color palette, very legible platform graphics, very fun to look at despite simplicity. + Fast loads, so there's very little downtime, like Super Meat Boy or Celeste. Very easy to guzzle in one sitting. Cons: - My save file is broken, and I am extremely discouraged from ever playing it again - The swimming is unacceptable. Jack doesn't swim like Mario or other well-known platformers. She pivots 360 degrees around a point above her head, so changing direction can swivel her into obstacles in directions other than wher…