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She's got a Crystal of Blast-ing! Ba-da-boom!

  • Marrend
  • 07/08/2014 12:37 PM
  • 895 views
Game Title: *Witchworks*
Engine: RPG Maker VX Ace
Status at review: Complete

Background:
Here's a game that was made in three days...

Three freaking days!

...for the Indie Game Maker Contest. If nothing else, it seemed like a fun little diversion. "Fun" being the operative word, of course. Anyway, enough with that. Let's get a-blastin'!


Audio/Visual:
The soundtrack is among my favorite parts of this game. I have no doubts that I'll be jamming to the likes of "RPM", "Uprise", and "Valiant" for weeks (months?) on end.

Enemy graphics tend to be on the cute side. Which could, feasibly, bother some people? I dunno. They didn't bother me. The only background I really noticed was the library. I'm sure the other stages had backgrounds, but, the library stood out the most.


Playing the game:
The game is a horizontal shoot-em-up with a bit of "bullet hell" nature thrown in for good measure. That is, if you can call bullet hell "good measure"? Though, to the game's credit, it has a life bar. It's not a one-hit-death scenario! It struck me as an unique feature, but, maybe, I'm more used to arcade-style shooters (Think R-Type and Gradius)?

Anyway, players have access certain abilities (which are cycled with the press of a button), with each ability being more powerful than the previous (until it loops back). These abilities include firing bullets that track down enemies (my personal favorite), though there is also a "fan" ability and a "super-shotgun" (out of lack of a better term) ability. Each of these abilities require a certain amount of Magia to use. The more powerful the ability, the more Magia it will use. The meter charges a little bit on hitting enemies, but, defeating them seems to charge it more effectively. Perhaps it's some kind a cumulative effect, since any given enemy takes however-many hits before going down?

When the Magia meter is full, players can activate an Overdrive mode. While the mode is active, you can use the aforementioned abilities without the Magia meter depleting. The meter does deplete itself over time, and the mode ends when it's gone. The mode also ends if you take any amount damage while it's active (your meter is also gone as an after-effect).

Then, there is the Ultra Move! This is activated by double-tapping the Overdrive button when the Magia meter is full. What this does, in basic terms, is wipe the board. Stage bosses are still going to be there, but, most regular enemies are gone, as are whatever projectiles were on the screen.

Here's an interesting interaction that tickled my fancy: wiping the board with the Ultra Move depletes your Magia meter. However, the enemies dying from the board-wipe charges the meter. I only played on Easy, but, I think, on higher difficulty levels, it might be possible to get a full-ish recharge, and do it all over again.


General Observations:
In regards to cycling bullet abilities, I'd prefer a way to both cycle forward and backward. Maybe via the shoulder buttons?

The first few times I played this, the game hung on me a short while. Thankfully, I was on "Easy", and the life bar, in general, means that there's a bit of wiggle room in regards to the possibility of randomly dying from game-hanging. I imagine, on higher difficulty levels, with more bullets/enemies on the screen, the chance that the game will hang would be higher. The life bar can certainly be a godsend, in this regard.

If you manage to clear the game, there's a credits roll, and... not much else after it's done. Thankfully, there is the F12-reset.


Summary:
I think this game does pretty much what it wants to do, and does it pretty damn well. Even if I forgo the accomplishment of the three-day development time, I'd have a hard time not recommending this.


BOTTOM LINE: 4/5


Side note on ratings (since there is/was/will be somewhat of a spate on what rating means what between each user):
1/5 -> Terrible. Forget about hitting an audience. The game is so bug-ridden, or otherwise unplayable, that what entertainment can be found in the game has a hard time coming to the surface.

2/5 -> Bad but playable. I had a poor experience with the game. When played by a player the game actually caters to, it would serve it's purpose.

3/5 -> Average. A solid experience, but snags somewhere along the line cause it to be held back from being "good".

4/5 -> Good. I enjoyed the experience, and have no qualms supporting it if was considered for a featured game (if it wasn't featured already).

5/5 -> Excellent. Among the paragons of gaming experiences, and instant feature material in my humble opinion (if it wasn't featured already).

Posts

Pages: 1
Rhyme
Tear Harvester Rhyme
7582
Thank you for the review~
If you feel like another run, try it on Normal!
Magia charge rates and health regeneration in Easy is very lenient, so it's pretty quick to spam overdrives!
Pages: 1