Crash Test Oliver

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A bit short yet amazing platformer that packs in all the features of bigger titles. Sadly, issues with collectibles and achievements leave a bad taste. You play a test dummy that is stuck in a simulation. The main objective is to gather a certain number of caps and fuel tanks so that you can launch a rocket. Because you already have access to a very helpful minimap that you don't need to unlock anything for, completing this task is simple. Right off the bat, the map displays the entire world along with all of its caps, gears, and fuel tanks. The game is linear even though there are three different locations. You even get a lot of abilities that might suggest a metroidvania experience, but you get most of them in the first area and there’s not much reason to revisit previous locations unless you deliberately didn’t collect some of the collectibles. The collectibles are very gamer-friendly, which means they stay with you even if you die right after collecting them. Short obstacle areas where you must grab all caps without dying are the only challenging parts. If you die, the caps are reset, and you must give it another try. This is not the best game if you care about grabbing al…

OK so this is a game that I actually decided to get involved in promoting, which is funny because I knew absolutely nothing about it other than that it is a 2.5D metroidvania that occasionally becomes 3D. Now that I've played it I can give a real judgement on it. First of all, despite technically being a metroidvania it doesn't feel like one at all, instead this feels like a precision platformer similar to super meat boy. There is actually a game similar to this called "Bad Pad" but Crash test oliver is both more polished and more well done than that game. Another comparison might be aeterna noctis in noctis mode but that game is way more punishing than crash test oliver. Overall, I have a lukewarm recommendation for this game for fans of precision platformers. Metroidvania fans might not enjoy this though, especially when considering the world design.

absolute hidden gem, more people should play this.

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"Crash Test Oliver" is a rather mediocre low poly 3D rendered 2D speedrunner/precision/rage platformer... ambitious in design and deficient in delivery. What do you do in the game? You do a lot of platforming, parkour style... and yeah that's about it. Having very little to offer gamers (platformers are already a mostly-dead genre), the price tag on top of such godawful visuals really killed this. In terms of visuals, this features fairly low quality low poly 3D visuals which will deter a lot of gamers, understandably. Gaming is a visual medium, and while some developers struggle with creating high quality visuals, failing to do so is a disservice to gamers. It's very difficult to recommend bad looking games. It's free... now, but it wasn't before. The developer was charging $10 USD for this!! Absolutely delusional. Price barriers, especially on low quality products, can be a direct cause of failure. It's a nice gesture for the game to be given away for free, but it also tells us that the game wasn't good enough to succeed as a paid product. Even though this is "free", it failed to appeal to the 120 million+ gamers on Steam. SteamDB showed the game peaked at only 6 conc…