#metroidvania

[tilac-f-f]

Metroidvania List

5 Greatest Metroidvanias Ever Made

Amid the ecosystem of Metroidvanias out there, the most highly praised include games like Castlevania: Symphony of the Night and Hollow Knig

Favorite?

Super Metroid

Ori and the Will of the Wisps

Bloodstained: Ritual of the Night

Hollow Knight

Castlevania: Symphony of the Night

more than one

none of them

Remaining time: 6 days 22 hours

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[charlezarrd]

Ultros

Time Played: 25 Hours

Status: 100%

Rating: Phenomenal

Big Pro: Music, Story, innovativeness

Big Con: Busy Visuals

Ultros is the strangest Metroidvania i’ve ever played. If you can tolerate how weird it is compared to other metroidvanias, you will likely agree with me on how beautiful it is.

The core mechanic of Ultros is a time loop, which deletes all your abilities, upgrades, and inventory. However, there are seeds you can plant which grow into different types of plants, which then mature and grow even bigger between cycles. This is one of the things that lets you access new areas. Most of your upgrades then have to do with tending to these plants in one way or another.

The art is gorgeous, alien, and psychedelic. The music is ambient, strange, and somehow comforting and disquieting all at once.

It seems like the time loop would feel like you’re being reset, but it doesn’t. Ultros is about working with and cultivating the map itself, and it builds itself around that so much that it’s coherent.

It’s a beautiful and strange game, and I love it dearly. Games like this are the reason I’m doing this quest to begin with.

[arfhisthewizard]

I made a game where Hell is God's playground for testing his dumbest ideas. And you're his favourite joke.

[charlezarrd]

Worldless

Time Played: 8 Hours

Status: Dropped

Rating: OK

Big Pro: Innovativeness

Big Con: All Style, Little Substance

The art style for this game is very pretty, it takes that specific minimalist artgame aesthetic, like Gris or Monument Valley. It is very pretty.

The weirdness in this game comes from the fact that combat and movement are distinct and seperate. Combat takes on an active turn-based action-command structure where a timer ticks down on your turn while you perform combos, and then you do your best to block and dodge enemy attacks on their turn.

The actual platforming movement isn’t half bad, but it’s pretty standard.

The reason this game doesn’t work for me, is that it fails to establish itself. From a story perspective, the game is almost textless. There are these strange guys with horns that spout vagueries at you that don’t make any sense. The most I was able to gather was that this universe was newly created.

The environments you travel through are bare, and mostly featureless, mostly being destinguished by colors. There are some landmarks but there’s no environmental storytelling, as a result of both the aesthetic and the story explanation of this being a universe that was just born.

The body language of the characters is a highlight of this, but it’s the only aspect of the story I can see. There are battles that feel important but they’re never given any weight in the narrative. Why is the Angel so hard? Why does it matter?

There’s a lot of potential here but it could have been better used if they actually tried a little harder to make the story apparant.

[countzeroor]

Where I Play Castlevania: Symphony of the Night Movement 33: Taking the Plunge

I go to finish exploring the mine. Music:“The Witching Hour”Performed & Arranged by OceansAndrewBased on “Dracula’s Castle”, “Dungeon – Main Theme”Composed by akiropito, Jeff Lorber, Michiru Yamane, Rika Muranaka, Tomoko Sano, Tony Hayneshttps://ocremix.org/remix/OCR04313 Please support my Patreon: http://www.patreon.com/countzeroorBuy me a coffee at Ko-Fi: https://ko-fi.com/countzeroWatch my…

Where I Play Castlevania: Symphony of the Night Movement 33: Taking the Plunge

[charlezarrd]

Axiom Verge 2

Time Played: 18 Hours

Status: 100%

Rating: Good

Big Pro: Expanded lore

Big Con: Weaker than previous entry

This one’s clearly taking more of a setup piece than its predecessor. That’s ok, but it means on its own, it doesn’t stand as strong as the first game.

There are a number of plot reveals that shake up the lore of the first game a lot, and I’m all here for it, but I’m also left with more questions than answers.

In terms of combat, it’s not bad. I do find myself missing the awesome boss battles from the first game. There are boss battles here, kind of, but they’re just big regular enemies, and the music doesn’t even change. You can also walk past most of them, so they don’t feel as weighty or interesting as the first game.

AV2 has taken a backseat to the first game, acting as kind of a bridge between the AV and AV3, whenever that comes out.

I can’t wait for it!

[charlezarrd]

The Quest To Find Metroidvanias That Don’t Hate Me

(Masterlist)

I love metroidvanias but they don’t always get along with me, so I’ve been exploring as many as I can. I’ve been trying to document them here, because I’ve found some hidden gems.

I’ll put links to my reviews below the cut, as they come out:

I’m trying to be unbiased about my reviews so I’m not using letter or number grades here, and I’m also trying to think of a stand out high and low point of every game.

Hollow Knight

Primal Planet

Axiom Verge

Axiom Verge 2

Worldless

Ultros