Juna - The Dreamwalker

[b]My Playtime:[/b] 25.3h (100% achievement, finished the game) [b]Grindy Achievement(s):[/b] Yes (~2 achievements). [b]Optional Achievement(s):[/b] Yes (10 achievements). [b]Difficult Achievement(s):[/b] No. [h1]Intro[/h1] [b]Juna - The Dreamwalker[/b] is an action-adventure game that focuses on exploration and puzzles. You are armed with a wand that can morph you into anything, both monster and object, and use their ability. It's a game that tests your creative thinking skills, figuring out what you can do with the abilities to clear the area. [b]Pros:[/b] - 16+2 dungeons - Unique bosses that require the use of a specific ability to beat - Huge area to explore [b]Cons:[/b] - Sometimes it's hard to figure out where to go next with the numerous backtracking - It's easy to get soft-locked - Bombs' area and damage are too big [b]Specs[/b] Intel Core i5-9300H 2.40GHz, 8GB RAM, NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1650 [h1]Should you buy this game?[/h1] [b]Yes.[/b] [i]If you enjoy playing Zelda-likes and want one that doesn't have the same ability as other similar games, this game is for you.[/i] [hr][/hr] [h1]In-Depth Review[/h1] [h3]Visuals[/h3] [b]Juna - The Dreamwalker[/b] offers 2 kinds of d…

Action adventure with a neat but time-consuming ability of turning into anything you want. The game begins by telling what happened several years ago. There once existed a portal through which horrible monsters emerged. Fortunately, a group of priests stopped them before they could get a foothold, shattering the portal into multiple pieces. To prevent this from happening again, each priest took a piece and kept it locked inside their temple. That clearly did not succeed, as creatures reappeared a few years later, when the game takes place. There is no one to stop them, so they soon spread throughout the land. This is when you enter because you are attacked by one creature and flee to a nearby village. There, you learn that some sort of sleeping magic has taken over the priests, so you naturally decide to do something about it. The art is quite decent. Although the game was originally designed in a 16-bit retro manner, it eventually received an update with 32-bit visuals. The old style has its appeal, but the new version is just superior in every way because it adds a lot of nuances to the world, making it more alive. Gameplay is a classic Zelda-like experience. You control th…

Very similar game in vibes to Alundra from PSX. It is good - I love Alundra. Exploration is similar, vibes are similar, dreamwalking is similar but slightly less detailed. BUT The game is hard. Not in a combat meaning. But the puzzles and exploration is hard. In Alundra, exploration was like: "Do something. Now, walk around and talk with everybody, until you find new dialogue. Then do something, then walk and talk some more." Here - exploration is similar, but also - gimmick with changing form opens a lot of ways to solve puzzles and often I don't know if I don't have some kind of new power to move forward and have to keep exploring, or I don't see a way to solve my position with changing form. Like - to move super heavy crystal pillar, you have to be a raccoon. In Alundra, there was a story teller, where you could spend some coins and get some tip of where you should go. I think, it would be great if something like this would appear in this game. Right now - I love it, but for now - I'm just in dungeon 2 after 2 hours of playing, and I was already checking solution for about 5 times to move forward.

I played a lot of The Legend of Zelda clones and this one nails it the most. While it is pretty unknown, it captures what made the 2D Zelda games great. Clever puzzles, fluid gameplay, a lot of different items to play around and a great open world. My only nitpick would be, that I'd like to play with the analog stick instead of d-pad, but that's fine.

Finally beat this cursed game. The promo art is AI slop. Its got plenty of bugs where you'll just phase through a block as you're pushing it or you'll reload a save to fast travel to the dungeon entrance only for the next stairway you take to trigger an out of bounds wrong warp or you'll fall through the floor to a lower level and end up falling out of bounds and off the map or you'll use a monster ability to jump a pit you shouldn't be able to yet and end up having to reload your save or you'll get a key for a later dungeon early and all your quest hints are now for the later dungeon and you have no idea where you need to go now. There's bugs, there's lots of bugs. On the positive side, I do feel like the game's main mechanic - the transformation rod - is very well designed and the game's puzzles often caught me off guard with its different mode of thinking. I can appreciate games with puzzles that go beyond the simpler "go-with-the-flow" style seen in so many other puzzle games. The way these mechanics were then integrated into the 7th dream boss and 9th dungeon stealth sections were fairly notable. I will ultimately give this a thumbs up for its unique mechanic, but note tha…

What a neat game! I'm glad I tried it out. The developer really seems invested and was able to push an update that I requested on the forums, having to do with the control scheme and my old hands having trouble with a dpad. Thank you so much for doing that! The art style reminds me of old Playstation/PC games of the mid 90's, and the game hits that Zelda feel I've been looking for. I love the game's presentation, it takes you back and is very, truly unique. Fun times here!