There is some really neat stuff in this game - unfortunately marred by a few little details.
The "collectible jump" feature is lovely. So lovely I was starting to worry when I didn't think it was going to appear in level 2! But once it did it felt like a strong pillar that pulled the game together. Shame to see it literally labelled differently in every level, that felt like a lack of consistency.
Level 2 showed some great innovation by forcing me to do the drop-jump half way up and learn NOT to double-jump. A little bit of a frustrating difficulty spike but some fiendish little challenge designs.
Level 3 then introduced the springs ... not quite so much creative level design, but a fun sensation. It did suffer from the curse of the "50% path choice". Not sure why you wanted to give me two equally weighted critical paths ... doesn't add to the experience, and doubles the work you have to do on balancing it!
Unfortunately the ladder level is the downfall - bit of a swing-and-a-miss on challenge research on that one. What does the ladder do for the game? How does it empower the player to reach their goals? Or hinder them in an interesting and challenging fashion? Unfortunately, like a lot of climbing mechanics in the past, it presents all the same challenges as regular platforms but with a slightly more akward control set. An amiable attempt, but a bit of historic research with a critical eye would show you there's been very few "fun" ladder mechanics in the past, and unfortunately this one didn't bring anything new to the table - I didn't even manage to finish the last level! Which is a shame, because it was very clear the designer on that level was trying their hardest to be creative with the feature and milk all the life out of it they could. Definitely put the effort in, but sometimes these things just don't quite pan out.
Still, that aside this is a neat little project with some very creative level design ideas.
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There is some really neat stuff in this game - unfortunately marred by a few little details.
The "collectible jump" feature is lovely. So lovely I was starting to worry when I didn't think it was going to appear in level 2! But once it did it felt like a strong pillar that pulled the game together. Shame to see it literally labelled differently in every level, that felt like a lack of consistency.
Level 2 showed some great innovation by forcing me to do the drop-jump half way up and learn NOT to double-jump. A little bit of a frustrating difficulty spike but some fiendish little challenge designs.
Level 3 then introduced the springs ... not quite so much creative level design, but a fun sensation. It did suffer from the curse of the "50% path choice". Not sure why you wanted to give me two equally weighted critical paths ... doesn't add to the experience, and doubles the work you have to do on balancing it!
Unfortunately the ladder level is the downfall - bit of a swing-and-a-miss on challenge research on that one. What does the ladder do for the game? How does it empower the player to reach their goals? Or hinder them in an interesting and challenging fashion? Unfortunately, like a lot of climbing mechanics in the past, it presents all the same challenges as regular platforms but with a slightly more akward control set. An amiable attempt, but a bit of historic research with a critical eye would show you there's been very few "fun" ladder mechanics in the past, and unfortunately this one didn't bring anything new to the table - I didn't even manage to finish the last level! Which is a shame, because it was very clear the designer on that level was trying their hardest to be creative with the feature and milk all the life out of it they could. Definitely put the effort in, but sometimes these things just don't quite pan out.
Still, that aside this is a neat little project with some very creative level design ideas.