Reviews

Review by amarillion all reviews by amarillion

This game actually made me laugh. The writing is terrific. Dialogs are very witty, full of puns and jabs. Trashtalk cans? Pedestriangles? Hexagon square? I see what you did there! Hmmm, this guy is hard to reach, I wonder what he has to say. "Oh, you walked all the way around to talk to me? How nice!". There are inside jokes too (after all, how many people will know that P. Pils is an old nickname for his Royal Highness King Willem-Alexander of the Netherlands?) All the dialogs make the city really feel like a living place, with lots of culture and lore behind it.

The game plays like an old fashioned RPG. You have to do various quests for the inhabitants of the city of shapes. Moving items back and forth between NPCs to advance the plot. No combat mechanic though, as the game itself dryly notes.

The really cool thing is that the items you collect can change your shape! You start as a kite shape (At first, the inventory is a little confusing. The game seems to give you the option to use your kite, but since you are already a kite shape nothing happens. Only once you collect more shapes, the meaning of this becomes clear). Shape-shifting can help you reach places that you otherwise could not. So this is a really neat puzzle mechanic. It would have been even cooler if all citizens reacted differently depending on your shape! But given how much writing there already is, I totally understand that this was not achievable during TINS.

There is a bug with the inventory limit - you can run into a full inventory even though there seems to be space left, and the game can end up in an unfinishable state. It would be nice to see a fix for this.

The ending feels rushed and is kind of unsatisfactory. I'd really love to see a post-competition version with an expanded ending, or, dare I ask - multiple endings!

Overall: 5. The game is really playable and there is a lot of content to explore. It stays interesting for quite a long time. I'm docking half a point for the unsatisfactory ending. Luckily for you there are no half points and I'm rounding up.
Art: 4. Nicely drawn, everything is animated in tune with the music. The plug is well hidden and a cool discovery. I'm giving you 4/5 because I think the link to Escher is the weakest aspect of this submission.
Tech: 4. the Hexaking is a hexagon. There is a hexagonal square. The ending I was hoping for would have made a bigger deal out of the hexagon / Hexaking thing but it's still pretty good.
Genre: 5. The writing on this is really funny.

Scores: Overall 5 Artistical 4 Technical 4 Genre 5

Review by Kuros all reviews by Kuros

This game was very cool. A game full of small quests, funny dialogue, and a world filled with happy colors and cool music. The first time I played this, over two weeks ago, I thought the world was huge. I soon realized it was all one huge hexagon.

I've read the previous reviews, and I agree with most of the points. The ending was a bit underwhelming, the first time I made it to the king I thought there were more endings to unlock. So I kept playing to get (almost) all of the shapes. But this is still a limited time gamejam, so overall awesome job guys. Also I wasn't able to use the kite but later figured out that I already was in the kite form.

Talking about turning into shapes to reach new areas, really cool idea.

For future gamejams I would experiment more with the main mechanics and maybe expand upon it. Try out different things. The gameplay is pretty standard and feels 'save'.

All in all, awesome!

Scores: Overall 4 Artistical 5 Technical 4 Genre 3

Review by SiegeLord all reviews by SiegeLord

The world that you're thrust into in this game is delightfully fleshed out. I was really impressed how the technical and artistic rules permeated the entire game, from the quests to the story. The humor was well written, appropriately subtle without being overbearing. I particularly enjoyed the rectangular man's quest and the interactions you have with other NPCs as part of it. The graphics were good, with an appreciable amount of variety.

I managed to complete every quest in one playthrough (not an easy task, since it's easy to brick some quests if you fill your inventory up too early), but sadly that had no effect on the end state, which was a shame. I would have figured that morphing into every possible shape would have made you somehow stronger than you were before. Oh well, I still enjoyed the process.

Scores: Overall 5 Artistical 5 Technical 5 Genre 5

Review by Solver all reviews by Solver

A nice rpg that's interesting to explore. I love the pixel art and it suits well with the music and theme of the whole game. There is humor all over and very well done in such a short time.

Scores: Overall 3 Artistical 4 Technical 2 Genre 3