What are you playing right now?

[E. Gadd Industries]

I've been endeavoring to clear out my Steam library by playing, and hopefully beating, as many games as possible (some games are multiplayer or are designed to be played continuously with no clear end in sight; and I may even abandon some games for various reasons).

The most recent game I completed was Alwa's Awakening. Overall, while I enjoyed the game, I wasn't a huge fan. Although the game is a Metroidvania, you really don't get a lot of powerups that directly power up the main character. For example, by the end of the game, your jump isn't any higher than it was at the beginning of the game; you don't gain any more hearts (though you do gain a vial which refills your hearts after you die from non-instakill damage); the only special attack you gain is the lightning magic. With the relatively short length of the game I feel it works out well enough, though I'd rather have gotten two extra hearts instead of the vial, which is annoying to have to manually refill.

The game seems to enjoy wasting your time and is overall more tedious than difficult (though I'd say the first three bosses are well designed and actually difficult). There are waaaaaaay too many instakill obstacles, especially for a Metroidvania, which makes the game feel more like a standard platformer that got converted to a Metroidvania late into development. Travel is frequently annoying, since there are a lot of instances where it's difficult if not downright impossible to go back the way you came (at least until you unlock the upgraded bubble). The movement feels a bit stifled at times, and hitboxes/hurtboxes tend to feel unfavorable to you and favorable to the enemies/obstacles even when you wouldn't expect them to be.

Apparently the sequel, Alwa's Legacy, improves a lot of some of the game's issues, so I'd be open to trying it in the future if it ever goes on sale.

Yeesh that sounds like a harsh experience :') At least the dev was open to improving issues in the sequel? Though, I can't say I've heard of either of those games... I also wonder, Atcero if you read this, what is your opinion on it as our resident Metroidvania connoisseur?

Still playing through RDR2 slowly and surely, same with Tears of the Kingdom. I'm having the same problem I had with Skyrim where I interact farrr too much with the environment as opposed to the main quest.

Uf I feel this. I ended up just trying to get through TotK as fast as I can and I don't think I enjoyed it as much because of that. But I was trying to get back into a busy semester and realized I was playing entirely too much and not devoting enough time to other important things I needed to take care of.


To answer the question of the thread, I'm actually back in Super Mario Sunshine B) I've progressively gotten more focused on glitches each time I play it, and now I'm trying to max out the number of Shine Sprites I get before fighting Shadow Mario in the Plaza the first time he appears. I'm currently keeping my game open (though the Switch is in sleep mode) while I'm in the chase sequence with Shadow Mario (I think I got all 17 possible shines because I'm not yet skilled enough to access the police station shine turboless quite yet). But uh... I got distracted by a side mission mid-chase. I'll have photos for you soon. I don't think I've done anything this absurd in a video game ever.

[BlackDragonSlayer]

To answer the question of the thread, I'm actually back in Super Mario Sunshine B) I've progressively gotten more focused on glitches each time I play it, and now I'm trying to max out the number of Shine Sprites I get before fighting Shadow Mario in the Plaza the first time he appears. I'm currently keeping my game open (though the Switch is in sleep mode) while I'm in the chase sequence with Shadow Mario (I think I got all 17 possible shines because I'm not yet skilled enough to access the police station shine turboless quite yet). But uh... I got distracted by a side mission mid-chase. I'll have photos for you soon. I don't think I've done anything this absurd in a video game ever.

Are you planning on learning speedrunning for the game, or just trying to dive into a new aspect of the game with the glitches?


I beat another Metroidvania, this time Xeodrifter by the Mutant Mudd devs. Pretty fun game all things considered. It's a bit unfortunate how short it is: it only took me around 5 hours to 100% the game (aside from 1 achievement which I probably won't bother with). The movement takes a while to get used to (basically the opposite of Alwa's Awakening), but once you do it works pretty well for the game. The game could really benefit from diagonal aiming (with a "lock" button so you can shoot while standing still). There aren't any save rooms aside from your main ship + checkpoints immediately before and after each boss (all the bosses are variations on the same enemy, with more attacks than the previous boss), which is mildly annoying with how few health pickups there are. The more you progress the more linear the game feels. Right at the beginning you're offered the choice of four planets to go to and occasionally have to bounce back and forth between them, but each planet map is basically a closed loop or two with a couple hallways either connecting them or branching off of them. There isn't a lot of room for exploration or multiple branching paths to get to the same place. Because it's such a short game, I feel like there's a lot of opportunity for each planet map to essentially double in size, offering a lot more flexibility and open-endedness like a true Metroidvania. I don't imagine we'll ever get an "expanded" version of the game, or even a sequel, but the potential is certainly there!!!

Overall, would probably give the game an 8.2/10.

[E. Gadd Industries]

Are you planning on learning speedrunning for the game, or just trying to dive into a new aspect of the game with the glitches?

Oh I've no interest in speedrunning much of anything I was at one point, looking to 100% speedrun Wario Land: Shake It! for the world record, but the amount of time it'd take to learn the lines... I just don't have it anymore. That said, I do manage to find one track in every Mario Kart game since 7 to get really good at and get within 7ish seconds of the WR with my acceleration-heavy setup (7: MK7 Rainbow Road | 8: Mute City @ 200cc | 8BCP: MKWii Rainbow Road @ 200cc). But even then, I don't have the time needed to get consistently good at any of it. :') But that's okay! Priorities and whatnot.

The more you progress the more linear the game feels. Right at the beginning you're offered the choice of four planets to go to and occasionally have to bounce back and forth between them, but each planet map is basically a closed loop or two with a couple hallways either connecting them or branching off of them. There isn't a lot of room for exploration or multiple branching paths to get to the same place. Because it's such a short game, I feel like there's a lot of opportunity for each planet map to essentially double in size, offering a lot more flexibility and open-endedness like a true Metroidvania. I don't imagine we'll ever get an "expanded" version of the game, or even a sequel, but the potential is certainly there!!!

Overall, would probably give the game an 8.2/10.

Makes you wonder if the devs ran out of time/grew impatient, or if it's more so an intentional move for some reason? No earthly idea, just spitballing there. Which makes one wonder... does a minimalistic Metroidvania exist? What would one even look like?

[BlackDragonSlayer]

Oh I've no interest in speedrunning much of anything I was at one point, looking to 100% speedrun Wario Land: Shake It! for the world record, but the amount of time it'd take to learn the lines... I just don't have it anymore. That said, I do manage to find one track in every Mario Kart game since 7 to get really good at and get within 7ish seconds of the WR with my acceleration-heavy setup (7: MK7 Rainbow Road | 8: Mute City @ 200cc | 8BCP: MKWii Rainbow Road @ 200cc). But even then, I don't have the time needed to get consistently good at any of it. :') But that's okay! Priorities and whatnot.

Yeah, actual speedrunning takes a lot of patience and skill. Though it is fun to try and play familiar games quickly.

Makes you wonder if the devs ran out of time/grew impatient, or if it's more so an intentional move for some reason? No earthly idea, just spitballing there.

The studio was definitely on the smaller side, and I think they broke up back in 2016 (and then one of the founders died, from what I can tell). Shame, because it seems like most if not all of their games were solid.

Which makes one wonder... does a minimalistic Metroidvania exist? What would one even look like?

Metroid II is pretty minimalistic, I'd say. There isn't a lot of backtracking and most of the path you take along the game is a straight path through the map.


In my endeavor to clear out my Steam (and soon to be GOG) backlog, I played Shadows of Adam!!! Compared to a lot of the RPGs I've played recently, this one definitely feels more traditional—basically the only "modern" mechanic is the presence of static overworld encounters instead of random encounters. Overall it's a solid game that gets better the longer the game goes on, but at around 16-20 hours to 100% the game and DLC I definitely feel it could be a longer game. Most of the overworld (before you get the airship right before the final dungeon) is essentially a straight line, and there aren't a lot of true side quests or optional dungeons before the endgame. Speaking of which, some of the endgame quests also lack direction (i.e. you don't really know how to find and trigger the quests unless you already know what you're looking for). The most difficult boss in the DLC (which took me like 50 minutes to beat, no joke) rewards you with a lot of OP gear, but by that point in the game you don't really have anything else to use it on (except for the main story's final boss, who is relatively easy compared to the DLC superboss). I kinda feel like there should've been another random superboss or two just chilling randomly around the map.

Some other minor annoyances:
- Your characters don't gain XP when they're dead, which is especially annoying for boss fights.
- Most special abilities use AP. Every character has an ability that restores AP, but it doesn't take effect until the very end of the turn or start of next turn, so if one of your other characters scores a lucky crit and knocks out all the enemies in one hit, your characters just don't gain the AP you expected them to, which makes it difficult to set yourself up for the next battle.
- Cutscenes aren't skippable.

Would maybe give the game an 8.2/10.

[Tobbeh99]

Finished playing Wild Arms 2! Pretty good game. A bit darker than some of the other entries I've played from the series. But still pretty good game