É uma ideia legal, e eu gostei muito da vibe de computação velha misturada com mecânicas de xadrez, mas a ideia das peças serem itens consumíveis destruiu a experiência pra mim.
Cool concept executed well for the most part. I liked the retro computer aesthetic and sound effects, a good fit for Playdate! Chess pieces make for excellent game mechanics, of course, and the idea of using them in this way is a really fun one. The levels were generally short and sweet, with a lot of freedom in how you approach them.
I felt like some aspects of the game were poorly communicated - I'm still not sure what all the items do. Having to farm pieces as you used them was also a bit annoying, and being instantly booted out with no option to change piece was frustrating, especially at the start! Sometimes I had to literally go back and redo a different level to change pieces. The level completion metrics are also a bit strange, punishing you for having low health even if you did the level without losing any. I also couldn't figure out how to "kill" a king piece, just got checkmate and thus I got 0/1 pieces for the bosses.
Still, overall a fun time and I had no hesitation picking the game up for a few minutes here and there over the course of several days until I finished the campaign.
I felt like some aspects of the game were poorly communicated - I'm still not sure what all the items do. Having to farm pieces as you used them was also a bit annoying, and being instantly booted out with no option to change piece was frustrating, especially at the start! Sometimes I had to literally go back and redo a different level to change pieces. The level completion metrics are also a bit strange, punishing you for having low health even if you did the level without losing any. I also couldn't figure out how to "kill" a king piece, just got checkmate and thus I got 0/1 pieces for the bosses.
Still, overall a fun time and I had no hesitation picking the game up for a few minutes here and there over the course of several days until I finished the campaign.
A really cool idea for a game, let down by the amount of time it wants you to waste going back and forth to collect resources
Questy Chess es un juego que cree que posee una premisa interesante, y que si te la explica en abstracto puede parecértelo a ti también, pero que en la práctica resulta insoportable. Su estilo de juego rígido no se compenetra en absoluto con su soporífero avance de niveles, que en la mayoría de los casos ofrecen una única solución que tienes que repetir una y otra vez. La frustración original de jugar sólo con el peón se mitiga para cuando empiezas a manejar caballos, alfileres y torres, pero para entonces el daño ya está hecho, y mi interés en seguir jugando se ha desvanecido por completo. Me da mucha lástima tener que echar por tierra un juego que claramente tiene imaginación puesta detrás, pero a día de hoy, no creo que cumpla con lo que se propone hacer.
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Questy Chess is a game that thinks it has an interesting premise, and that would seem interesting to you if they were to explain it abstractly, but turns out to be unbearable at the end. Its rigid gameplay style doesn't mesh at all with its languid progression, and most of the time you're stuck the same thing over and over again until you reach the final level. The frustration that comes with playing with just a pawn at the beginning diminishes somewhat by the time you're being offered knights and rooks to play with. But by that time the damage is already done, and my interest in playing this has all but faded. I feel bad for trashing a game that clearly has imagination behind it, but as it stands now, I don't think it accomplishes what it sets out to accomplish.
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Questy Chess is a game that thinks it has an interesting premise, and that would seem interesting to you if they were to explain it abstractly, but turns out to be unbearable at the end. Its rigid gameplay style doesn't mesh at all with its languid progression, and most of the time you're stuck the same thing over and over again until you reach the final level. The frustration that comes with playing with just a pawn at the beginning diminishes somewhat by the time you're being offered knights and rooks to play with. But by that time the damage is already done, and my interest in playing this has all but faded. I feel bad for trashing a game that clearly has imagination behind it, but as it stands now, I don't think it accomplishes what it sets out to accomplish.
A cool concept, but the gameplay elements are poorly introduced or explained, if at all. Many levels became a series of (painfully slow) restarts until I finally guessed right about how a new item worked.
Too finicky of an idea with too much tedium with too little fun, but with some fun ideas at it's core. Mainly the chess piece switching, but it was too clunky to want to see the end of.
I really enjoyed the aesthetic, gameplay wasn't superb but it is decently fun. I've tried to review all the S1 games on their own, but it's hard not to compare them all to one another. This is one of those ones that looks a lot worse compared to better puzzle games, but isn't half bad on its own.
Another cool concept but too frustrating and buggy for me.
Questy Chess is a game that I found myself wanting to like far more than I did. With intentioned, methodical level design that is predicated on repeat attempts for completion, it becomes frustrating that all resources are finite.
The introduction of single-use upgrades feels like an unforced error that demands grinding and even further repetition of levels just to tee up an actual repeat attempt. This shortcoming is exacerbated when certain Chests containing resources will respawn in certain levels, while others don't. There's really no way to tell. Health is finite, and as a completion metric for each level it seemingly became impossible for me to reach max health after reaching max level and beating the game.
Menus don't feel incredibly snappy, it was nearly half the times that I'd fail or exit a level, only to click out of the pop up and land back into the same level for a circular "system crash". More robust explanations of mechanics and items would be much appreciated.
Upon beating the game, my system crashed and I lost all my resources before accessing the True Ending. I can't tell if it was the system crash or game design to strip me of everything, and I wouldn't be surprised if it were the latter. This is ultimately what put me off of 100%-ing all levels. The puzzles were fun, the grind and ultimately the gameplay were not so much.
Despite all of my misgivings and frustrations, I really enjoyed my time with it. While writing this review I found myself dropping my rating twice more...
The introduction of single-use upgrades feels like an unforced error that demands grinding and even further repetition of levels just to tee up an actual repeat attempt. This shortcoming is exacerbated when certain Chests containing resources will respawn in certain levels, while others don't. There's really no way to tell. Health is finite, and as a completion metric for each level it seemingly became impossible for me to reach max health after reaching max level and beating the game.
Menus don't feel incredibly snappy, it was nearly half the times that I'd fail or exit a level, only to click out of the pop up and land back into the same level for a circular "system crash". More robust explanations of mechanics and items would be much appreciated.
Upon beating the game, my system crashed and I lost all my resources before accessing the True Ending. I can't tell if it was the system crash or game design to strip me of everything, and I wouldn't be surprised if it were the latter. This is ultimately what put me off of 100%-ing all levels. The puzzles were fun, the grind and ultimately the gameplay were not so much.
Despite all of my misgivings and frustrations, I really enjoyed my time with it. While writing this review I found myself dropping my rating twice more...