This is a pretty good game. The concept wasn't overly complicated, yet there wasn't any feeling of handholding. The music, while isn't all too memorable, was quite enjoyable and I never felt tired of hearing it throughout the game. I was about to just stop playing by the end of the first chapter because it didn't feel engaging enough until I realized that there was more to the mechanics of the game in the next chapter. That's one of the things that really made this game to me. Having a new ability every chapter made everything refreshing and interesting to last long enough to continue playing through each chapter. It was quite apparent that each level had some thought into it. It was quite the basic level progression, but games can't really go wrong with that, just that nothing was spectacular or brilliant. The secret collectibles were nice and sometimes felt satisfying to find them, when they were actually hidden. The controls were tight and usually responsive. The boss was kinda fun.
Now, I feel like the game would have benefited quite a bit if there was more feedback in combat. It was quite clear I was hurting them and they were hurting me so it had an okay amount of feedback, but it didn't feel all that engaging to fight. Once I got the fire, I didn't bother with the sword anymore. The sword just felt impactless when it came to the spiders, like as if I was meant to upgrade it. Maybe making the enemies receive significant knockback, preferably enough to knock away the spiders a bit when they lung at me. I see that it does have some knockback, but if I attack at lunging spiders, it is often just enough to make them stop right in place which often ends up me getting hit anyways.
The secret collectibles (XP) didn't feel rewarding enough. The only thing to do with them was cash them in at the end of every level for more health. Especially considering that it's kinda hard to die in this game. The only time I died was to the lava, which my health wouldn't have helped.
I feel like the regenerative health wasn't necessary, or at least to the extent that it was. It was just too much. It made most enemies feel quite worthless.
I wish there was a bit more to it for the final boss. I initially thought it was a mid-boss. It was simply too easy and simple. With my amount of health and regenerating, I felt boringly invincible. And I didn't feel any challenge aside from figuring out that you need to hit one of the limbs once. It wasn't much of a challenge to figure that out as well, since there isn't a whole lot of options to try due to the game's simplicity. A game having a simple concept can go either way here, it's definitely good that I wasn't dancing around the tiny stage for an indefinitely period of time wondering "What the hell am I suppose to do?", but the boss would have really benefited from having more to it. It would have been fine if I didn't just have regenerating health. Then where the boss lacks in needing me to think and figure things out, it'll make it up for the combat not feeling boringly easy. I just really think this game would have been fine without the health regen and that you only get health back through checkpoint, death, and moving on to the next chapter, or maybe even getting some health back from slain enemies (would have more incentive to fight, while adding the risk factor of just losing more health in the process, making the game feel more engaging). Anyways, the boss really could have had a bit more to it. It's fine how it is in the first half, I suppose. But by the second half, it really is just the exact same thing but with a little more "hazards" that aren't that hazardous. You can just hang back in one of the corners then slash at the limb once it appears to go for the open mouth attack. The damage you might take while waiting doesn't really matter. It would have been good if the boss had a phase for every chapter, if done correctly it would have made the boss actually kinda incredible. It was fun, and had a bit of a nice concept going for, but the boss battle just felt kinda disappointing in the end. It felt like one of the weakest parts of games, especially when it made a lot of the problems with this game seem more apparent.
Also, the player physics sometimes didn't feel great. Mainly when there were walls, because sometimes you can stick to them. Not terrible, just not amazing.
Also I sometimes had an issue with the platforms made from the green chapter, sometimes I will just jump down when the only thing I was pressing was the jump key. But it wasn't much of an issue thanks to infinite platforms anyways.
This game shows to have a good amount of thought and effort into it. I have difficulty on imagining me rating it any less than 4. However, it does not come without a few issues, so I can't imagine rating it any more than 4. It was enjoyable, good job.
