Touhou Luna Nights
You’re a knife throwing maid who can stop time and slow time and it’s awesome. Slowing time constantly and weaving through Patchouli’s almost unavoidable attack patterns just now was seriously some of the most fun I’ve had in a game since I was a kid. I haven’t even beaten it yet, but my feeling is this game is a solid 10/10. Boss fights are really quite fun. Marissa’s was great too. Regular enemies range from super easy to somewhat difficult and sometimes enemies or traps will be immune to time shenanigans. There are some neat time puzzles involving fluid dynamics too, but I think where the game really shines is the boss fights and the time mechanic. You can also heal a little bit by getting very close to enemies or their projectiles, so it encourages a high risk play style that feels great when you pull it off. The art style and music are good too. Great game.
– Real player with 20.8 hrs in game
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A beautiful Metroidvania game. The music is incredible, the scenery is gorgeous, and the gameplay is fast paced. Even if you’re not a metroidvania fan, I feel that you could play this and enjoy it nevertheless.
– Real player with 20.0 hrs in game
ENDER LILIES: Quietus of the Knights
Bought the game because of Mili, but it turns out that this is a well-polished Metroidvania. Great soundtrack and immersive atmosphere, good range of abilities to use making the game far from monotone, okay-ish lore and plot. The combat felt kinda clunky at first, but feels good once you get used to it. Another good point is that it is very easy to get 100% in this game.
My only complaint was that the final boss was a total pushover compared to some previous bosses
That said, the audio aspects are the charm, so I nominate this game for Best Soundtrack award.
– Real player with 32.1 hrs in game
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Beautiful art style and music, with an environment fitting of the souls-like tag, and fun combat, ENDER LILIES is a wonderful experience I recommend to anyone who loves metroidvania or souls games. Moreover, It’s subtle and hidden story is both haunting and majestic.
Worth every penny.
– Real player with 27.4 hrs in game
Shantae and the Seven Sirens
Shantae and the Seven Sirens is the 5th game in the series and I think it plays about as strong as Pirate’s Curse did. It fixed a lot of issues I personally had with Half-Genie Hero and I’m glad they were able to touch on that and not make it feel like they barely made any changes. I had high expectations for this game since Half-Genie Hero felt a little on the weaker side, and they met my expectations with this game and beyond actually.
Graphics
This is one of the things I loved about Half-Genie Hero is the art style fits this game so well. Seven Sirens returns with the same art style, but is an overall upgrade. It’s the same idea of art, but there is a very clear difference in colour contrast and overall vibrancy from Half-Genie Hero. There is also more fluid art/animations in terms of enemies and NPCs from the previous game, which is always a plus. The biggest thing graphically wise is fully animated cutscenes that really give it an anime type style and it works out perfectly. I loved the style they did for the teaser/trailer that was shown and was a really not getting my hopes up that we would see anything past that, maybe the ending scene but nope, every boss encounter and every important story element had cutscenes that were fully animated. It’s very obvious that a good amount of the budget for the game went into the animated cutscenes and I can’t express how much I appreciate that choice because they nailed the style to reflect for this game. Background for the zones is fantastic, sunken city, wrecked ship, underwater laboratory, lush jungles/overgrowth, underwater volcano, they nailed it and that’s just something Shantae games have always nailed I feel, which goes even further this art style they’ve used for the past two games.
– Real player with 37.1 hrs in game
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Shantae and the Seven Sirens is the best Shantae game since Pirate’s Curse.
Almost everything wrong that was in Half-Genie Hero is fixed in this game, and it feels like the proper HD Shantae game that Half-Genie Hero should have been.
One of the best things about it is the new fusion transformation system. These transformations work similarly to the pirate gear from Pirate’s Curse. Instead of having to stop and dance to transform, they automatically activate with a press of a button. This is by far the best transformation system the series has ever had and I hope they stick with it for the next game. Now that doesn’t mean the old dance menu system from Half-Genie Hero has gone away. It’s still here in this game but instead of having go through 3 menus of animal transformations that play similar to each other, you now have a single menu that contains 4 transformations that can affect the environment around you. These range from revealing hidden enemies and items in an area to causing earthquakes that can damage enemies nearby and move heavy obstacles out of your way.
– Real player with 34.5 hrs in game
Terra Pulse
A city in ruins… a past to be unraveled
Decades after a disaster that disabled most of the planet’s electric artifacts and turned nature against civilization, humans are trying to get back on their feet, keeping away from the cities now infested with mutated creatures. You are Lena, one of the Seiva Hunters, individuals that brave the cities of old using a mix of gunblade arts and capoeira to survive the dangers of the Pulse.
After Lena’s mother - a Master Hunter - disappears on an expedition, Lena embarks on a journey leading her to one of the only cities which no hunter has ever returned: Rio de Janeiro.
You will explore the ruins of Rio, discovering the memories of a city that holds many scars - even before the disaster - that may help unravel the mystery behind the event that changed humanity’s destiny forever: the Terra Pulse.
Features
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Explore the ruins of a futuristic Rio de Janeiro overtaken by the tropical jungle, forging your own path Metroidvania style in a Top-Down perspective.
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Slash, dash and shoot your way in a combat system inspired by Capoeira, combining your evasive habilities with fast-paced, skill-driven gunblade wielding attacks.
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Build your Basecamp, recovering lost artifacts from the old world, rescuing mysterious robotic inhabitants of the city and upgrading your equipments, creating a small bastion of humanity in the ruined city.
Aquaria
Aquaria is a Metroidvania game where you go about as Naija, learning songs and dishing out malice upon the bosses of the under water world. I 100%’d achievements in 21.5 hours (A big part of this was not having the fish form until later), but you can beat it in 12-15 hours easily. Difficulty is deceptively hard. Used a game controller for the bulk of it, with mouse for the menu and keyboard for quick changes. Recommend keyboard over controller.
Pros:
- The art and environments of the game are great and really do stand the test of time. Each area of the map is unique and identifiable. There are plenty of fishies in this sea.
– Real player with 23.2 hrs in game
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Large beautifully detailed world with various different looking areas
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Dozens of spieces to discover
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Astonishing soundtrack
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Lifetime (about 20h)
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Sweet story and swell voice acting
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Lightweight system requirements
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No RPG elements
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Stiff controls on the land (very rare)
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Pad is supported, but basically useless
Many might have not heard about Aquaria which was released in late 2007 by two men independent game company Bit Blot. Being an indie title is one of the oldest of the genre and it was realeased much before Braid which is considered a game that launched wide a boom of independently-developed video games since 2008 and onward. Whatsoever Aquaria is absolutely marvelous game all the way! Thanks for its excelent gameplay design and classic colorful graphical design - years have threated it very well.
– Real player with 22.1 hrs in game
Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night
Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night is a heart-warming tale about how even a woman who spent ten years in a coma can get up and be in better shape than you are.
You play as Miriam, a walking fashion disaster. A bunch of alchemists performed evil mad science on her, giving her a host of strange and unnatural powers. Chief among these is the ability to grow stronger and healthier simply through the power of diet and exercise. She can also bind demon souls to her body to gain magic powers, but this is par for the course in games like these. Together with her personal trainer Johannes, they seek to convince an old friend to go back to the good old days of loving his body, again, and save him from his toxic, unrealistic body standard girlfriend.
– Real player with 67.3 hrs in game
I’ve played almost 50 hrs and got all the achievements, so lemme tell ya
This game is one of best metroidvenia i’ve played.. however, story-wise it’s normal.
The controls and movements ain’t as smooth as other 2D games, but ti works fine
There are a variety of weapons, armors, skills and shards to use and upgrade.
The game is full of castlevenia references but the story-line has nothing to do with it,
I got the game on a discount, so i will suggest you wait for a discount before paying full price
– Real player with 51.2 hrs in game
Chronicles of Teddy
I loved the atmosphere of Finding Teddy, the orignal game, and obviously was really interested in its sequel. I almost died when I saw they completely jumbled up the orignal’s mechanics and changed up even the basic GENRE of the game. We went from a simple Point & Click with a pretty original gimmick to a full fledged love letter to The Adventure of Link, my 2nd favourite Zelda game of all time. That alone made this an insta-buy for me and I was not dissapointed.
They actually managed to make a platforming game with similar battle elements to Adventure of Link while keeping the spirit of teh first game intact, both in atmosphjere and in the original gimmick, that being able to communicate and solve riddles via musical notes. They added a whole new langauge element to the game as well which felt like the obvious upgrade.
– Real player with 42.9 hrs in game
A GIRL SITS IN THE DARK playing a video game one summer evening. It looks a lot like another game you may have seen before, or perhaps even played yourself. Abruptly the strong glow of the television cuts out and shrouds the room and its contents into shadow. Upset by this, the girl tosses her controller to the carpet, stands, and roots around in a nearby chest – eventually pulling out a small dagger and green coloured shield. Now so equipped, the girl traverses the disparate rooms of the nigh empty house with the resolve to find out the cause of this unwelcome interruption. In the basement she finds something strange… and peculiar. The nebulous shade of a teddy bear floating next to an open doorway full of bright light beckons the girl to follow it into the luminance beyond the portal. She renews her grip upon her dagger and shield, descends the basement steps, and begins her adventure.
– Real player with 26.5 hrs in game
Demoniaca: Everlasting Night
I haven’t finished it, I’ll update if I find anything noteworthy later in the game.
There is R rated content, turn it on in the settings.
This game is playable, enjoyable, and quite unique. Very, unique, far more so than it might seem at first glance, some interesting enemy designs populate the game, from teddy-bear adjacent creatures, to almost cuddly looking mummies Pretty women, and creepy men. It could use some tuning, but if you think you’ll like it, you will.
So far, I absolutely love it. I think it’s worth the try even if you just play an hour and refund. It’s Metroidvania with beat-em-up combat and fighting game special moves and combos. This means there are some things, I find a lot of things janky about it. Blocking is tricky to get used to, wish teleport was just double tap in a direction, but that would limit your combos.
– Real player with 36.1 hrs in game
The game is largely inspired by Symphony of the Night as with any metroidvania that has RPG elements, although the actual combat is more like a beat’em up game. If anything the base move set is very similar to a Street Fighter with 2 variations on the kick and punch. Those 4 attacks can be chained into different combos and improved versions that require resources, granted you have to unlock those first. Some of the bosses will drop special powers that will interact with the environment, that is where the ‘Metroidvania’ comes in. The game has a map, waypoints, secrets and optional challenges in a form of unique enemies. Unfortunately, the save system is kinda old school, when you die you might lose progress as you can only resurrect from the last save or the previous teleport, at least to my knowledge.
– Real player with 29.4 hrs in game
Myastere -Ruins of Deazniff-
i’ll give it 5/5, its pretty difficult to control the character while mid-grapple but once you get the hang of it its all easy, also it would be cool if we can store health potions.
– Real player with 12.1 hrs in game
The English translation was likely done by a computer, but the Umihara Kawase-style rubbering action is pretty fun once you get the hang of it. If you love Umihara and need more like I do, you’ll enjoy this game. For anyone else, probably stay away.
– Real player with 5.5 hrs in game
Record of Lodoss War-Deedlit in Wonder Labyrinth-
Impressive game, I enjoy it a lot. Felt a rush in my heart while I was playing it, Remind me a lot of Castlevania:SOTN. By far a true gem, I will hope for the sequel to buy it ASAP.
Thank you for creating such a beatiful experience
– Real player with 19.6 hrs in game
Warning: If you’re photosensitive, stay away. There are a number of flashing cutscenes and transition effects that cannot be turned off or disabled. At the end is a series of flashes that are painful to watch even without being photosensitive.
Another very solid Metroidvania-lite from Team Ladybug, who made the wonderful Touhou Luna Nights a few years ago. Like their previous game, this is a “lite” form of the genre, where you have the game broken up into stages (while still being interconnected) and it is much more linear than some of the other examples of the genre. Each stage after the first contains one major progression ability, two bosses, and a scattering of other upgrades, spells, and weapons lying around.
– Real player with 16.4 hrs in game