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RIP Gramps

  • Liberty
  • 01/29/2019 05:04 AM
  • 1804 views
Timothy and the Tower of Mu was a game created for the 2018 IGMC. This review is based on the contest version demo, and thus will not be rated. It will be based on as much of the game as I played in the video below.




Visually, the game is really nice, with a sweet retro look and really cool vibe. It's obvious it got its inspiration from old games and both graphics and sound reflect a lot of that. The music was a good accompaniment and helped set the tone of the game quite well, too. The overall aesthetic was pretty great.

The story was pretty light, from what I saw, used more as a framing device for a goal than anything else. The overall idea was decent and it presented a good enough reason for the journey.

The gameplay is where the game fell a bit apart. I'm not sure if it was the script that was used that caused the issues or not, but the movement was very floaty and slippery, which made controlling the character quite difficult. This was especially treacherous when it came to moving platforms as sometimes you would have landed squarely on the platform but slide off as it moved anyway.

Another issue was how life was used in the game. Now usually games like this utilise checkpoint systems with auto-reloads based on how many lives you have. That is not the case in this game. Instead, you have save spots where you can save your game, and if you die for whatever reason it's game over.

Add to this the weird choice of having health-based aspects in the game that don't mix well with the instant-death aspects. See, if you fall a certain height you take damage, which will remove some of your health. If you lose all your health, it's game over. This would be kind of okay if some of the height fall damage is wonky, making you take damage from places you'd assume you wouldn't because it's not quite as tall. It was also an issue as there were many auto-death parts that you'd assume might just take a bit of life instead of killing you outright.

I can see why the developers wanted to go the route of 'have a health bar' but it just doesn't work with the expectations of 'game over if HP is gone' and 'game over if you touch something straight away'. Either/or - pick one, not both.

Overall, the game looks a treat and sounds really great but it just doesn't play well in this version. I know that the developers are doing their best to fix that, however, so I'd recommend giving an updated version a try. If I were to score it I'd probably give it a solid average of 2.5 stars.

Posts

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Well, I got up to the village, but can't figure out how to advance after that. After all, I can't open the locked chest, budge the block in front of the door, or get to the chest on top of the small buildings in the village.

Never mind, I found a breakable block in one of the buildings, but the lack of an auto save feature really starts to piss you off after that. Since you begin to run into areas where you need to cross multiple rooms and do multiple tricky jumps where there's a good chance you'll slam your head into a platform above you even if you don't appear to touch it.
author=Liberty
Awesome! I look forward to seeing the full game once it's complete! You have a great base to build off and here's hoping all your had work eventually pays off!


Fingers crossed :) thank you, it's really inspiring!
Awesome! I look forward to seeing the full game once it's complete! You have a great base to build off and here's hoping all your had work eventually pays off!
Hello Liberty and thank you for your review!

Totally agreed with your points there and i have good news :)

First of all we FINALLY have a skilled RPG Maker programmer working with us (the author of https://rpgmaker.net/games/10681/ into MISAO list) and we can finally improve our games dramatically.

The current version (in development) now have auto-reload system after death, balanced gameplay, many other aspects under refining and a lot more to come :)

We will deliver a final well-polished game, mark my words :P

Thanks again!
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