Difficult, but not so difficult that it caused me to rage quit :P I like how you combined a linear game with a non-linear game.

Can't say the same, spent the last 10 min trying to pass the first level xD

Very hard shooter game, I wanted a way to shoot diagonally to get those pesky towers in the corners. Good job!

Hey I recognize that enemy pattern :P Really cool concept! I like the exploration mechanic and how the rooms still seem to make sense (enemy pattern-wise) when going through them backwards. Difficulty was fairly well balanced too. Pretty tough without a map though - I got as far as getting the phase shift then got lost and didn't know where to go next. It's a pretty big mental burden to try to remember all these different paths and previously-seen obstacles that I may be able to surpass with a new item. Still it was fun to explore, and this definitely has some potential with some quality of life improvements. Awesome work!

I got through the first level three times and then got killed almost immediately. Some way to tune the difficulty, or at least not have to re-do the whole game on every death, would be nice. (I tried pushing 'X' on the menu screen and it doesn't seem to do anything).

Perhaps that's just part of the genre, but it certainly makes it more difficult to rate the game.

This game is really polished, and, I imagine, pretty interesting. Sadly I can't seem to get farther than slightly through the second 'level'.

Hey, thanks for the comments so far, though I do feel I need to address how saving works. At the end of the second screen there's a save point where you can, of course, save your game, and there some other standalone save points scattered throughout the game. Collecting an item will also save your game, as a way to cut down on extra save points.

After finishing the game, it did occur to me that the first screen is significantly more difficult than the middle game, and I probably should have toned down the difficulty. Unfortunately, it's now too late. :P However, this is a fairly difficult game in general, and I'm aware that not all people will be able to enjoy it to its full potential.

Just beat it! Pretty insane for a compo entry. Sadly I think most people won't get to the first save point where the game really opens up. I think there needs to be a save right after the opening segment. I almost gave up myself but I'm so glad I didn't because man is this good. So much content, design works excellent going both ways. Everything is really polished too from start to end, 5/5.

Really entertaining and nice looking game :smiley: :thinking: not sure if metroidvania implies backtracking, but the look of clasic metroid is clearly there :thumbsup: great job!

I am in LOVE with this!! It's perfectly challenging and fun at the same time. Oh man good job.

I really love this game! Combining metroidvania with a shoot-em-up is pretty genius, and it is so well executed here. You've really managed to capture the winding cavers of Metroid with the gameplay of Gradius, as the name suggests. Also, I'm a total sucker for that authentic NES look, and the music is fitting, adding to the overall atmosphere. My one major complaint is, as many others have pointed out, that the first segment before the metroidvania aspect begins is far too difficult, taking me several attempts to complete. It's not necessarily that any given obstacle is to difficult, but that the whole thing goes on for so long without a checkpoint that a new player is bound to die at some point before they reach the end. For something that should really just be a basic tutorial to get the player used to the gameplay, that first segment serves as a major gatekeeper to the main part of the game. As many of the above comments have shown, a lot of players never got far enough to even realize that this is a metroidvania, which is a shame, since that is what makes this game special. But once, you get past that roadblock, the rest of the game is fantastic. Excellent work!

Really awesome game! The mechanics are very well combined and really fun. The visuals are minimalistic but beautiful for that particular style. Like others said, getting to the first checkpoint is really hard and might scare off a lot of people. I managed to do it after 6 or 7 tries and the game opens up beautifully afterwards. I played it for quite some time (around 20 mins), but did not finish it for two reasons:
1. My shooting finger got quite exhausted, it would|ve been awesome to just be able to hold down the button and continuously shoot (and map the charge shot to some other button). Speaking of this, please support different keyboard layouts, having Y be the main interaction button is really hard for people with qwertz or azerty keyboards.
2. I got lost and didn't know where to go next. A map would've been incredibly helpful.

Nevertheless I enjoyed this game a great deal and it's just extremely impressive for a compo entry. Amazing!

Impressive game, love the old school look of it. Good job!

To anyone reading the comments at this time:

I just uploaded a patch that adds an interface to change one's controls. Technically, custom controls were already supported when the game was finished, but there was no interface to change the controls.

Man, this game certainly needs more views! I really dig the retro aesthetic, plus the gameplay is pretty solid! I managed to get all the way to the final boss (I think), but MAN is this game tough as nails. Quite like the old days! Took me a while to get used to where things were on the map, but otherwise, both genres were mashed up rather well!

One bug got me stuck for a while: when you transition to the next screen, and you're moving into the ceiling or floor, you die after the transition. Not so bad, but I died after getting the shield, which meant I had to replay that section WITHOUT the worms being frozen. So that was hell.

While I understand you made a design decision with the charge shots, it meant that I had to constantly spam the shoot button, and now my fingers are dead tired. It was especially tricky at the boss fight, when you had to use the shield wisely AND shoot at the same time.... Also, if my bullets go through walls, what's the point of the door that protects the boss???

This thing could be a complete game on its own... Scary amount of content for a compo! Great sound, great art, fun gameplay... One of the best entries I've seen yet! Great job!

As a caveat I'm not particularly fond of the metroid aesthetic or metroidvanias; and there's not all that many horizontal shooters I actually enjoy. So this probably soured my opinion of the game which, as has been mentioned, is very polished and stands up quite well objectively.

A couple design concerns that seem standard for scrolling shooters these days:
- The starting weapon (the only one I've used so far) requires repetitive tapping instead of holding down the attack key. I understand that you wanted to be able to charge the weapon, but I'd much rather have the charge shot be on another key. maybe X.
- There is no way to control the speed in this game. I'd like shift to slow me down and let me dodge tight clusters of bullets (you can have ctrl be used for boost, though I'm not actually sure what that adds to the game). With the current control scheme I ran into bullets way too easily because my character would fly across the screen at the slightest provocation.
- The hitbox seems to extend beyond the character a bit, making a box around him. This might just be my perception, but it was frustrating to be hit by things that shouldn't have hit me. Almost every scrolling shooter I've played has a hitbox the size of a few pixels in the middle of the character.
- I like the healthbar; it's less punishing than instant death whenever you hit a bullet. And I like the health refills that get dropped. This is not too common in the genre but I like what it does for the game. What I do have a complaint about is how little invincibility you get after a hit. I ran one game where the entire first screen (including the first boss) I got through taking no damage, entered the second screen with full health, and got shot to death by the first set of turrets.

These might seem like nitpicks, but given how standardized and formalized a genre you're working in it's pretty vital to have speed controls and a tiny hitbox, at least in my book.

A couple more minor notes:
- There seems to be a bug where you can move off the screen while traveling to the left.
- There's no indication when the boxes are going to spawn a new enemy. I've lost count of how many times an enemy would just spawn on top of me and take off my health.

The game is pretty good overall, in terms of level and enemy design, in terms of the weird branching path idea, in terms of the aesthetic and mood. But there are too many sources of frustration for me to continue playing to the end. I might come back to it later when I have more patience.

I may have rage quit, but I did have fun! The controls feel reliable enough that when I got trapped or smashed into something, I only blamed myself. The music and sfx were great and fit well with the graphics!

Wow, this is really good, you nailed the look of old metroid and it's really polished considering the compo limitations! I hope you keep working on it in the future because it has a lot of potential, great job!

Pretty difficult, but a good mashup! Nice work!

Oh my god you can turn around. The whole time I was playing I was taking mental notes, "Nice visuals. Feels nice when you hit an enemy. Health drops on kills make a nice risk/reward when you are getting low. Don't like mashing to shoot. Wish enemies couldn't shoot me through walls.," and so forth. Then I reached the first dead end and had a really terrific moment of awe. Love the idea of adding exploration and item collection to this style of game. Nice work.

Congratulations for your amazing game ! I love metroidvania and shmup too so that was made for me haha. I included it in my last compo review video : https://youtu.be/mo-pUdQ3lKc?t=766
Feel free to ask for translation because it's in french :)
Have a wonderful day !

@satanos I'm glad that you seemed to enjoy my game! I tried using the auto-translate feature on YouTube to translate your video into english, and I think I got the basic idea of what you said about my game, but it would be nice to have a more proper translation if you can get that.

@BeamKirby Here it is : https://pastebin.com/qw0BqD77
Thank you and I wish you the best in all your projects !