Geez now you tell us, I would never have figured that out. The ghosts look like angels so why would anyone expect a cross to repel them? When I first played this I assumed they were portable respawn points until I died the first time, than I spent until now thinking they were just "breadcrumbs" to help remember where you've been.
All in all MINDER (is it mind-er or men-der?) is decent throwback to the NES era but takes the horror game route that Nintendo never did.
Reviews for "MINDER"
Wow. Been playing for a while, hoping that the fixes and tweaks you kept putting in would make things easier, but it's actually more brutal and more difficult now. It seems like the player character falls twice as fast now, and I don't remember the ghosts dealing 2 HP worth of damage before. Also, finding out that the red crosses don't do anything special after saving up 12,000 credits for them felt like you were punishing players for asking you to make an easier game.
However, the concept is stellar, as are the design and the music. This could be something great, perhaps as a sequel or something else. Concrete suggestions:
1. There needs to be a way to kill the ghosts besides wasting bombs on them. It would be fine if they actually stuck around to get hit by the bombs, or if they even approached them, but they turn tail and run as soon as a bomb is placed near them. My suggestion is to add a projectile weapon, from the start, not as something you have to buy late in the game.
2. Randomized level generation is insane the way it's handled here. There are sometimes unavoidable obstacles or situations where you have to use all of the bombs you have. The one that took the cake for me was having to put down seven bombs to get to a journal page that was in a room full of spikes and ghosts. It was absolutely impossible to have survived that.
3. More predictability is needed in the store and with rewards. I can understand maybe keeping it random with rewards for killing ghosts or using tombstones, especially if ghosts became easier to kill, but dropping 5,000 credits or more on a health potion to only find that it gives you 1 HP back when the last one could have given 5 HP or more is painful and cruel. I consistently felt like you were toying with me with things like that.
4. Checkpoints or saves need to happen. I can never get past the second green level. If you're going to insist on making things random, and thus impossible to memorize or learn from, then you need t be more forgiving in these regards. I'd love to see a show of hands for how many people have actually beaten the game; I'll bet it pales in comparison to the number of players. It's made even worse by never knowing how close I am to beating the game, or if it even has an end; it could be like an old arcade game that just gets harder and harder until you die, for all I know.
I can do without a map or a compass; I think the exploration here is key, but if you're going to stress exploration, it needs to not be so insanely hazardous. Again, the ideas are brilliant, but the presentation and execution are just way too painful. I want to like this, really I do; I've been playing it a few times each day since it came out, but it just feels impossible, and nobody likes an impossible game.
MNWS responds:
Hi, the character really shouldn't be falling faster, he doesn't on my end so I don't know about that and ghosts have always dealt 2 hp of damage. Planting a red cross makes the monsters go for the cross instead of the player.
And thanks for the suggestions, I'll have the final version (1.0) out sometime in the coming days with a friendlier random system in regards to item/hp drops and crosses that'll be more useful than they are currently. Also I guess I'll make some alterations to the level generation.
Thanks for playing.
sorry this one just blew by me
I don;t really get it
I must be missing why this is supposed to be good
I can appreciate the retro vibe you are going for
I don't get why every one hates this game, personally i think its cool, retro style graphics, the gloomy atmosphere, (You don't get that in most cave games) and its really cool cause there's no guide you must test things and learn how they work and stuff its really original to!
only down side is there's no map...
5 Stars!
You use crosses on the tombstones, then you gain some health.