A Kickstarter blast from the past. This is a metroidvania game that was initially estimated to ship way back in 2014. A solid nine years after the game was funded, Ghost Song has finally seen the light of day on all platforms. There have been a lot of competent entries into the genre during Ghost Song's development - as well as a new mainline Metroid game funnily enough - so how well does it fare against the Oris and the Hollow Knights then? Not that well unfortunately.
Ghost Song starts off promising enough, hopping around foggy areas and caverns clearly inspired by Super Metroid, but the initial intrigue to explore (that I at least tend to have in these types of games) starts to steadily wane after the first hour or so. The combat is mediocre and I never reached a point where it felt satisfying. Weapons overheat way too easily and even by the end of the game some basic enemies still took seconds(!) to kill. There are various ways to upgrade the player character: you can level up, find modules/weapons to equip and unlock new abilities as you progress in the game (duh). Despite all of this you'll never feel like Samus, zipping and dashing from one place to another, nor will you have interesting module combinations to play around with like in Hollow Knight. The movement feels absurdly slow and limited which is a major knock against the game.
A well-designed map is absolutely key in a metroidvania. If the layout of the areas is bad why would I care to explore it? Now I'm not saying Ghost Song's level design is terrible but once you add up the sluggish traversal, the fast travel points' placements (and scarcity as well) and the illogical in-game map it sure starts feeling like it is. Not showing a completion percentage can be a creative choice, I get that, but when you have a map that is hard to parse in general and barely lets you zoom in on it it's not exactly inviting players to fully explore every nook and cranny.
The narrative did nothing for me. Wrecked ship, who/what am I, something something purpose... An anemic and subdued protagonist isn't exactly a new concept but neither is it an easy task to make one engaging and in this case they really weren't. It doesn't help that the dialogue with other characters keeps flipping between automatically played voiced lines and generic text boxes. Voice acting was alright with the exception of some of the boss fights.
I'm not sure how I feel about the art style. The progress is undeniable and I don't want to belittle the efforts that went into it but... it might just not be my cup of tea. Going back and looking at the pre-alpha version of the game (when it was essentially a Super Metroid homage) I was honestly a bit more impressed by those visuals. Your mileage may vary of course. I didn't want to be so down on this game but the more I played of it the less I enjoyed it. Still a totally serviceable metroidvania if you're a fan of the genre but don't go in expecting a new classic. Good on the dev(s) for actually sticking to the project for all this time though, respect.
Ghost Song starts off promising enough, hopping around foggy areas and caverns clearly inspired by Super Metroid, but the initial intrigue to explore (that I at least tend to have in these types of games) starts to steadily wane after the first hour or so. The combat is mediocre and I never reached a point where it felt satisfying. Weapons overheat way too easily and even by the end of the game some basic enemies still took seconds(!) to kill. There are various ways to upgrade the player character: you can level up, find modules/weapons to equip and unlock new abilities as you progress in the game (duh). Despite all of this you'll never feel like Samus, zipping and dashing from one place to another, nor will you have interesting module combinations to play around with like in Hollow Knight. The movement feels absurdly slow and limited which is a major knock against the game.
A well-designed map is absolutely key in a metroidvania. If the layout of the areas is bad why would I care to explore it? Now I'm not saying Ghost Song's level design is terrible but once you add up the sluggish traversal, the fast travel points' placements (and scarcity as well) and the illogical in-game map it sure starts feeling like it is. Not showing a completion percentage can be a creative choice, I get that, but when you have a map that is hard to parse in general and barely lets you zoom in on it it's not exactly inviting players to fully explore every nook and cranny.
The narrative did nothing for me. Wrecked ship, who/what am I, something something purpose... An anemic and subdued protagonist isn't exactly a new concept but neither is it an easy task to make one engaging and in this case they really weren't. It doesn't help that the dialogue with other characters keeps flipping between automatically played voiced lines and generic text boxes. Voice acting was alright with the exception of some of the boss fights.
I'm not sure how I feel about the art style. The progress is undeniable and I don't want to belittle the efforts that went into it but... it might just not be my cup of tea. Going back and looking at the pre-alpha version of the game (when it was essentially a Super Metroid homage) I was honestly a bit more impressed by those visuals. Your mileage may vary of course. I didn't want to be so down on this game but the more I played of it the less I enjoyed it. Still a totally serviceable metroidvania if you're a fan of the genre but don't go in expecting a new classic. Good on the dev(s) for actually sticking to the project for all this time though, respect.
I was a backer for Ghost Song years ago and ultimately I enjoyed the game. The game does have its fair share of real flaws though, namely that Dark Souls was the worst thing to happen to indie Metroidvanias because they made indie devs think tedious ass mechanics like loads of backtracking and getting you into a penalty loop for dying in your attempts to get better were good game design. Regardless, I liked the game in spite of this and it also really helps that if you play Explorer Mode most of the mechanics that punish you for dying are cut. I’d seriously suggest playing Explorer right now too because the game needs a couple of balance patches when it come to a couple stuff like some boss hitboxes and better placement of warp zones, I can see how parts of the game could potentially be a major pain in the ass on Normal Mode.
For the positives Ghost Song nails what I think is one of the most important things to get right in Metroidvanias, it rewards exploration. There are very few areas of the map that don’t reward you in some noticeable way, may it be through currency, sub-weapons, equipment modules that give you different benefits, and permanent stat buffs. The game also rewards experimentation too as you can get some real powerful builds if you combine you sub-weapons and modules in certain ways. The game starts off rather slow and clunky but once you start getting more abilities it starts to flow better. One real cool thing is that the game is pretty open-ended in you how you collect ship parts which are required to get to endgame. There’s a bit of an annoying mechanic where you have to make the whole journey back to the ship to return the parts though. Ironically, the first part the game tells you get to is the hardest due to the walk back being weirdly kind of brutal and long compared to pretty much every other one which are much shorter and are less of a hassle. I would actually recommend not picking that one up until later because you can unlock the other movement abilities first. Combat gets better as the game goes along and you get more sub-weapons and modules. The focus on switching between your gun and its sub-weapons and the melee weapons you pick up is a neat one and gives you some freedom in how you approach combat.
The level design is mostly okay though it has few standout areas compared to others in the genre like Bloodstained and Hollow Knight. The music is also just kind of there. The writing is decent with your interactions of the survivors of a stranded ship, though the ending is just kind of a nothing anti-climax. The game looks pretty good though and nicely atmospheric.
Still as I said overall despite its flaws I had a fun time with Ghost Song and it did fill some of that Metroid shaped-hole in my heart because I was really disappointed by Dread. Worth checking out.
For the positives Ghost Song nails what I think is one of the most important things to get right in Metroidvanias, it rewards exploration. There are very few areas of the map that don’t reward you in some noticeable way, may it be through currency, sub-weapons, equipment modules that give you different benefits, and permanent stat buffs. The game also rewards experimentation too as you can get some real powerful builds if you combine you sub-weapons and modules in certain ways. The game starts off rather slow and clunky but once you start getting more abilities it starts to flow better. One real cool thing is that the game is pretty open-ended in you how you collect ship parts which are required to get to endgame. There’s a bit of an annoying mechanic where you have to make the whole journey back to the ship to return the parts though. Ironically, the first part the game tells you get to is the hardest due to the walk back being weirdly kind of brutal and long compared to pretty much every other one which are much shorter and are less of a hassle. I would actually recommend not picking that one up until later because you can unlock the other movement abilities first. Combat gets better as the game goes along and you get more sub-weapons and modules. The focus on switching between your gun and its sub-weapons and the melee weapons you pick up is a neat one and gives you some freedom in how you approach combat.
The level design is mostly okay though it has few standout areas compared to others in the genre like Bloodstained and Hollow Knight. The music is also just kind of there. The writing is decent with your interactions of the survivors of a stranded ship, though the ending is just kind of a nothing anti-climax. The game looks pretty good though and nicely atmospheric.
Still as I said overall despite its flaws I had a fun time with Ghost Song and it did fill some of that Metroid shaped-hole in my heart because I was really disappointed by Dread. Worth checking out.
I may or may not finish it to completion. I think what I'd have to say, especially coming off the back of Blasphemous, that the game doesn't feel so bad to play, but that I can't recommend it unless you are very sad and bored.
Every part of the experience feels slow even after you have the majority of your movement options unlocked. The dialogue with the characters, if you choose to engage with it, the traveling between locations, the accruement of currency, the long stretches of empty hallways and bland corridors. I feel like this game has a lot of good ideas but there's just so much nothing despite every path leading to some sort of reward. Despite having things to go and collect that improve your character incrementally, I can't help but fall asleep while I dash through needlessly long corridors with at most one or two enemy types. Why can't we fast travel to all of the save points? Maybe that dev thought that would make the game too fun. If you want to backtrack for exploration you have to WORK for it; and by work I mean tediously manage your stamina gauge to run and dash at peak efficiency while literally nothing else is happening 80% of the time. The atmosphere is so... mild. The music is nice and moody, but it never really stands out, or becomes more than that. The world just feels so barren. A shame really, I enjoy the visuals.
Mechanically its all there, you got a dash, you got a wall jump, you got a double jump. But man, moving around just feels so, sluggish, I'm not sure why, when you play Super Metroid it always feels like Samus is just trucking it, but here the rooms are just so wide and full of empty space. The main goal of the game is going out and collecting these ship parts, but while you have the parts you can't fast travel (which doesn't matter anyways because there are very, very few fast travel nodes, this just makes it take very little more time for story? reasons, I don't know), and these green skull things attack you. Of course, the parts range from, ehhh sort of close, to VERY far from the delivery point. It's all just so tedious. Why? I have been trying to wrap my head around what the developers thought the return sequences added to the game. Its not really like tense or anything. Its just a boring walk and climb through the same hallways as before, maybe with a few more enemies.
I wish to not be so mean. I hope the developer learned a lot from shipping this game. Apparently its been in development from kickstarter for just under a decade. Looking at past beta footage, I feel like I don't understand how the game artistically arrived where it did. It feels like the devs played Hollow Knight and were like "whoa dude, this is way better than what we're working on" and then preceded to rip the design asunder into something bland and lacking its own identity. Ernestly, why would I play this over Hollow Knight, or Super Metroid, or Metroid Dread, or anything else in the genre. Because its new? Those are some REAL contenders; for sure, we stand on the shoulders of giants, but this one has no innovations for me to applaud, and the story and characters are just not captivating enough for me to not want to just grab my switch and replay Dread.
Every part of the experience feels slow even after you have the majority of your movement options unlocked. The dialogue with the characters, if you choose to engage with it, the traveling between locations, the accruement of currency, the long stretches of empty hallways and bland corridors. I feel like this game has a lot of good ideas but there's just so much nothing despite every path leading to some sort of reward. Despite having things to go and collect that improve your character incrementally, I can't help but fall asleep while I dash through needlessly long corridors with at most one or two enemy types. Why can't we fast travel to all of the save points? Maybe that dev thought that would make the game too fun. If you want to backtrack for exploration you have to WORK for it; and by work I mean tediously manage your stamina gauge to run and dash at peak efficiency while literally nothing else is happening 80% of the time. The atmosphere is so... mild. The music is nice and moody, but it never really stands out, or becomes more than that. The world just feels so barren. A shame really, I enjoy the visuals.
Mechanically its all there, you got a dash, you got a wall jump, you got a double jump. But man, moving around just feels so, sluggish, I'm not sure why, when you play Super Metroid it always feels like Samus is just trucking it, but here the rooms are just so wide and full of empty space. The main goal of the game is going out and collecting these ship parts, but while you have the parts you can't fast travel (which doesn't matter anyways because there are very, very few fast travel nodes, this just makes it take very little more time for story? reasons, I don't know), and these green skull things attack you. Of course, the parts range from, ehhh sort of close, to VERY far from the delivery point. It's all just so tedious. Why? I have been trying to wrap my head around what the developers thought the return sequences added to the game. Its not really like tense or anything. Its just a boring walk and climb through the same hallways as before, maybe with a few more enemies.
I wish to not be so mean. I hope the developer learned a lot from shipping this game. Apparently its been in development from kickstarter for just under a decade. Looking at past beta footage, I feel like I don't understand how the game artistically arrived where it did. It feels like the devs played Hollow Knight and were like "whoa dude, this is way better than what we're working on" and then preceded to rip the design asunder into something bland and lacking its own identity. Ernestly, why would I play this over Hollow Knight, or Super Metroid, or Metroid Dread, or anything else in the genre. Because its new? Those are some REAL contenders; for sure, we stand on the shoulders of giants, but this one has no innovations for me to applaud, and the story and characters are just not captivating enough for me to not want to just grab my switch and replay Dread.
Que pena, poderia ser muito mais... Poderia, sem nenhum exagero, ser um dos melhores jogos que joguei na vida. Ghost Song é um daqueles casos que a sua jogabilidade, infelizmente, é o pior elemento do jogo, enquanto todo o resto é SENSACIONAL... E isso me deixou profundamente triste ao finalizar o jogo. O que ajudou a aliviar minha frustração foi o fato de que, como eu já tinha visto críticas iniciais à movimentação e exploração do jogo, eu fui com expectativas baixas, e acabei tendo uma boa experiência no fim das contas.
Quero começar falando logo da gameplay pra depois focar nas coisas boas (que não são poucas, apesar de tudo)... A movimentação da personagem é excessivamente lenta, o mapa mal interconectado e pontos de viagem rápida são mal distribuídos. Mesmo com os upgrades adquiridos no decorrer das horas de jogo, explorar o mapa é de certa forma bem doloroso. Ter uma boa exploração é meio que um pré-requisito para um metroidvania ser bem sucedido, e acho que é um fator que pesa de maneira EXTREMAMENTE negativa na análise. A progressão por níveis, inspirado no modelo Dark Souls, também não evolui muito a fórmula e é bem "mais do mesmo". Combate é de razoável pra bom, e a mecânica de aquecimento da arma de fogo e troca para arma corpo-a-corpo é o que a gameplay de Ghost Song traz de melhor.
Ok, falamos das coisas ruins. Agora... É incrível como absolutamente TUDO que foge do quesito "gameplay" é BRILHANTE! Ghost Song é, acima de tudo, emocional. É sobre auto descobrimento e relações de amizade. A trama é simplesmente maravilhosa, você se importa com praticamente todos os NPCs, é instigado a saber mais e mais sobre eles, entender o sofrimento de cada um e sentir empatia pela situação geral de todos, perdidos em uma lua desconhecida cheia de mistérios... E isso fez com que eu sentisse vontade de revisitar áreas e ouvir diálogos adicionais dos personagens. Todo esse sentimento é impulsionado ainda mais pela trilha sonora excelente e dublagem absurda de boa dos atores que fizeram cada personagem.
Como falei no início dessa análise, tinha tudo pra ser um jogo perfeito. Daqueles memoráveis, que entrariam para a galeria de ouro de melhores jogos indie de todos os tempos. Infelizmente, como a jogabilidade não é algo que pode ser ignorado (afinal, ainda estamos falando de um JOGO), ela ser de mediana para ruim fez com que roubasse o holofote dos outros aspectos excepcionais do jogo durante toda a sua duração. Se o resto não fosse brilhante, seria um péssimo jogo. Parabéns aos escritores dessa trama, aos compositores das músicas e a quem dublou os personagens. Ficou realmente incrível, e foram ofuscados por uma gameplay "xexelenta".
Quero começar falando logo da gameplay pra depois focar nas coisas boas (que não são poucas, apesar de tudo)... A movimentação da personagem é excessivamente lenta, o mapa mal interconectado e pontos de viagem rápida são mal distribuídos. Mesmo com os upgrades adquiridos no decorrer das horas de jogo, explorar o mapa é de certa forma bem doloroso. Ter uma boa exploração é meio que um pré-requisito para um metroidvania ser bem sucedido, e acho que é um fator que pesa de maneira EXTREMAMENTE negativa na análise. A progressão por níveis, inspirado no modelo Dark Souls, também não evolui muito a fórmula e é bem "mais do mesmo". Combate é de razoável pra bom, e a mecânica de aquecimento da arma de fogo e troca para arma corpo-a-corpo é o que a gameplay de Ghost Song traz de melhor.
Ok, falamos das coisas ruins. Agora... É incrível como absolutamente TUDO que foge do quesito "gameplay" é BRILHANTE! Ghost Song é, acima de tudo, emocional. É sobre auto descobrimento e relações de amizade. A trama é simplesmente maravilhosa, você se importa com praticamente todos os NPCs, é instigado a saber mais e mais sobre eles, entender o sofrimento de cada um e sentir empatia pela situação geral de todos, perdidos em uma lua desconhecida cheia de mistérios... E isso fez com que eu sentisse vontade de revisitar áreas e ouvir diálogos adicionais dos personagens. Todo esse sentimento é impulsionado ainda mais pela trilha sonora excelente e dublagem absurda de boa dos atores que fizeram cada personagem.
Como falei no início dessa análise, tinha tudo pra ser um jogo perfeito. Daqueles memoráveis, que entrariam para a galeria de ouro de melhores jogos indie de todos os tempos. Infelizmente, como a jogabilidade não é algo que pode ser ignorado (afinal, ainda estamos falando de um JOGO), ela ser de mediana para ruim fez com que roubasse o holofote dos outros aspectos excepcionais do jogo durante toda a sua duração. Se o resto não fosse brilhante, seria um péssimo jogo. Parabéns aos escritores dessa trama, aos compositores das músicas e a quem dublou os personagens. Ficou realmente incrível, e foram ofuscados por uma gameplay "xexelenta".
Abandon Reason: The game unfortunately did not respect my time with a lot of long death runs and a lot of backtracking. As well as some very clumsy gameplay/controls.
This review contains spoilers
I've been waiting for this game to release since the kickstarter in 2014, it was all the hype back then to have a darker Metroid inspired game that put the focus on horror and tension, yet somehow it ended up being nothing special.
The atmosphere is surely great, but you end up fighting 5 different types of enemies and some bosses with innecesary high difficulty spikes. Amazingly short, too. In between completing objectives there are calm interludes about talking to other NPCs that don't contribute to anything special and instead break the momentum.
Talking about momentum, the ending must be one of the most anticlimatic things I ever witnessed. Let alone the story, there's nothing special about it: it just pretty much ends and that's it. Credits.
I enjoyed it, but it was still quite underwhelming.
The atmosphere is surely great, but you end up fighting 5 different types of enemies and some bosses with innecesary high difficulty spikes. Amazingly short, too. In between completing objectives there are calm interludes about talking to other NPCs that don't contribute to anything special and instead break the momentum.
Talking about momentum, the ending must be one of the most anticlimatic things I ever witnessed. Let alone the story, there's nothing special about it: it just pretty much ends and that's it. Credits.
I enjoyed it, but it was still quite underwhelming.
This review contains spoilers
Ero davvero molto interessato e intrigato nel vedere un Metroidvania che volesse mettere in risalto il primo segmento del nome del genere di cui esso fa parte, e ho aspettato impazientemente l'uscita di Ghost Song, totalmente ignaro di chi siano gli autori, se questo sia il loro primo lavoro o meno. Che sia così o no, non sarà giustificazione di ciò che ho da dire, e mamma mia se ho da parlare...
Partiamo con ordine. Il gioco riesce in maniera decente a ricreare un'atmosfera e un ambiente accattivante, simile ad un Metroid, nonostante la presenza di una base piena di NPC(presenti anche nell'intera mappa) non diano quel senso di isolamento e totale solitudine che mi han sempre affascinato dei Metroid, ma magari il team non puntava a questo.
Dal punto di vista narrativo non mi è chiaro molto, la narrazione è subdola, con poche informazioni che derivano principalmente da interminabili dialoghi con gli NPC, a volte davvero lunghi e molto spesso incentrati più sui problemi personali di questi ultimi piuttosto che sulle vicende che avvengono nel mondo. Non avendo approfondito abbastanza, non mi dilungo oltre.
Il gioco, come già detto, è un Metroidvania, ma trae forte ispirazione da Hollow Knight e, ovviamente, Dark Souls. Parlando di Dark Souls, mi duole anche sottolineare che vedo molte meccaniche di gioco riprese da Dark Souls 2, e da qui non vi nego che il gioco, personalmente, mi ha deluso profondamente.
Vorrei parlare prima velocemente del lato sonoro del gioco. Oltre alla colonna sonora, che ho trovato davvero monotona e per nulla variegata (non figura davvero nessuna OST ), il gioco soffre (ed è davvero incredibilmente fastidioso) di problemi di equalizzazione audio imperdonabili. Non importa quanto impostiate alto o basso il volume, ci saranno SFX o anche voci che vi spaccheranno i timpani per quanto siano alti (così alti da essere anche fortemente distorti, comunque ho giocato solo in cuffia, quindi non saprei se sia così anche da speaker).
Il gameplay, nel complesso, non è neanche malvagio; purtroppo scelte, level design e meccaniche di gioco alquanto discutibili rovinano davvero l'esperienza nella sua interezza. Il gioco tende ad avere un livello di difficoltà abbastanza punitivo nelle prime fasi di gioco per poi semplificarsi grazie a potenziamenti che otterremo durante l'esplorazione del mondo, alcuni permanenti per migliorare le opzioni di movimento, altri equipaggiabili per migliorare i parametri o equipaggiare diversi tipi di armi e cannoni (come il sistema degli amuleti di Hollow Knight).
Ora ci divertiamo.
Il gioco prende due meccaniche in particolare da Dark Souls 2. Oltre al classico "muori, perdi le anime, recuperale sul posto o le perderai irrimediabilmente ad una seconda morte", il gioco troverà anche un modo aggiuntivo di punire la morte del giocatore. La vita totale del giocatore si abbasserà progressivamente per ogni morte, fino a dimmezzarla (o quasi). In più gli Healing Cores (le Estus per intenderci) ci cureranno progressivamente e non istantaneamente. Nonostante la seconda non sia chissà quale disastro, ho trovato la prima meccanica totalmente superflua, in quanto il problema ricade anche sul fatto che per recuperare la vita mancante dovremmo ripararci presso delle statue che saranno sparse per la mappa di gioco (e in nessun altro modo).
E qui un altro punto a sfavore a mio avviso ricade proprio nel level design. Queste statue serviranno non solo a ripararci, ma anche a salire di livello e fungeranno anche come punti di viaggio rapido per poterci spostare velocemente presso altre statue. Il problema qui è il seguente: le statue non solo sono poche a mio avviso, ma sono anche posizionate in posti "scomodi", lontani da molti punti d'interesse principali, lontani da punti di salvataggio, rendendo il backtracking per ripararsi (magari prima di un boss) davvero tedioso e pericoloso se abbiamo perso i Nanogel (le anime) in precedenza. Aggiungo inoltre che anche i punti di salvataggio sono posizionato distanti dai boss e poche volte mi è capitato di trovare degli shortcut particolarmente efficaci per poter tornare ad un boss senza troppi problemi, inoltre non capisco proprio la scelta di rendere il Level Up disponibile solo alle statue sopra citate piuttosto che ad ogni punto di salvataggio avendo essi la sola funzione di salvare il gioco, valere come checkpoint e ripristinare vita e Healing Core. Meccaniche e design di gioco che rendono l'esperienza spesso davvero frustrante , e al solo scopo di allungare il brodo, essendo che probabilmente privati di queste limitazioni il gioco durerebbe anche metà delle 8 ore che ho speso per finirlo [MINOR SPOILER: Quando dovremmo recuperare delle parti per completare la quest principale, non avremo neanche la possibilità di usare il viaggio rapido, in quanto finchè non porteremo quell'oggetto a destinazione quest'ultimo sarà totalmente disattivato].
Non ho approfondito molto le quest secondarie degli NPC, ne ho portate a termine un paio e mi sono sembrate abbastanza godibili, senza infamia nè lode.
Piccola nota anche sui comandi, piuttosto legnosi e, per mia infinita rabbia, non modificabili...
In conclusione, Ghost Song è un Metroidvania che poteva aspirare a molto più di quello che ha mostrato. Non mi sento di bocciarlo in quanto il sistema di combattimento, dopotutto, funziona relativamente bene e l'esplorazione mostra comunque lati interessanti. Un peccato che cada sotto il peso delle sue stesse meccaniche rindondanti, obsolete e a tratti frustranti.
Davvero un peccato.
Voto finale: 6.5/10
Partiamo con ordine. Il gioco riesce in maniera decente a ricreare un'atmosfera e un ambiente accattivante, simile ad un Metroid, nonostante la presenza di una base piena di NPC(presenti anche nell'intera mappa) non diano quel senso di isolamento e totale solitudine che mi han sempre affascinato dei Metroid, ma magari il team non puntava a questo.
Dal punto di vista narrativo non mi è chiaro molto, la narrazione è subdola, con poche informazioni che derivano principalmente da interminabili dialoghi con gli NPC, a volte davvero lunghi e molto spesso incentrati più sui problemi personali di questi ultimi piuttosto che sulle vicende che avvengono nel mondo. Non avendo approfondito abbastanza, non mi dilungo oltre.
Il gioco, come già detto, è un Metroidvania, ma trae forte ispirazione da Hollow Knight e, ovviamente, Dark Souls. Parlando di Dark Souls, mi duole anche sottolineare che vedo molte meccaniche di gioco riprese da Dark Souls 2, e da qui non vi nego che il gioco, personalmente, mi ha deluso profondamente.
Vorrei parlare prima velocemente del lato sonoro del gioco. Oltre alla colonna sonora, che ho trovato davvero monotona e per nulla variegata (non figura davvero nessuna OST ), il gioco soffre (ed è davvero incredibilmente fastidioso) di problemi di equalizzazione audio imperdonabili. Non importa quanto impostiate alto o basso il volume, ci saranno SFX o anche voci che vi spaccheranno i timpani per quanto siano alti (così alti da essere anche fortemente distorti, comunque ho giocato solo in cuffia, quindi non saprei se sia così anche da speaker).
Il gameplay, nel complesso, non è neanche malvagio; purtroppo scelte, level design e meccaniche di gioco alquanto discutibili rovinano davvero l'esperienza nella sua interezza. Il gioco tende ad avere un livello di difficoltà abbastanza punitivo nelle prime fasi di gioco per poi semplificarsi grazie a potenziamenti che otterremo durante l'esplorazione del mondo, alcuni permanenti per migliorare le opzioni di movimento, altri equipaggiabili per migliorare i parametri o equipaggiare diversi tipi di armi e cannoni (come il sistema degli amuleti di Hollow Knight).
Ora ci divertiamo.
Il gioco prende due meccaniche in particolare da Dark Souls 2. Oltre al classico "muori, perdi le anime, recuperale sul posto o le perderai irrimediabilmente ad una seconda morte", il gioco troverà anche un modo aggiuntivo di punire la morte del giocatore. La vita totale del giocatore si abbasserà progressivamente per ogni morte, fino a dimmezzarla (o quasi). In più gli Healing Cores (le Estus per intenderci) ci cureranno progressivamente e non istantaneamente. Nonostante la seconda non sia chissà quale disastro, ho trovato la prima meccanica totalmente superflua, in quanto il problema ricade anche sul fatto che per recuperare la vita mancante dovremmo ripararci presso delle statue che saranno sparse per la mappa di gioco (e in nessun altro modo).
E qui un altro punto a sfavore a mio avviso ricade proprio nel level design. Queste statue serviranno non solo a ripararci, ma anche a salire di livello e fungeranno anche come punti di viaggio rapido per poterci spostare velocemente presso altre statue. Il problema qui è il seguente: le statue non solo sono poche a mio avviso, ma sono anche posizionate in posti "scomodi", lontani da molti punti d'interesse principali, lontani da punti di salvataggio, rendendo il backtracking per ripararsi (magari prima di un boss) davvero tedioso e pericoloso se abbiamo perso i Nanogel (le anime) in precedenza. Aggiungo inoltre che anche i punti di salvataggio sono posizionato distanti dai boss e poche volte mi è capitato di trovare degli shortcut particolarmente efficaci per poter tornare ad un boss senza troppi problemi, inoltre non capisco proprio la scelta di rendere il Level Up disponibile solo alle statue sopra citate piuttosto che ad ogni punto di salvataggio avendo essi la sola funzione di salvare il gioco, valere come checkpoint e ripristinare vita e Healing Core. Meccaniche e design di gioco che rendono l'esperienza spesso davvero frustrante , e al solo scopo di allungare il brodo, essendo che probabilmente privati di queste limitazioni il gioco durerebbe anche metà delle 8 ore che ho speso per finirlo [MINOR SPOILER: Quando dovremmo recuperare delle parti per completare la quest principale, non avremo neanche la possibilità di usare il viaggio rapido, in quanto finchè non porteremo quell'oggetto a destinazione quest'ultimo sarà totalmente disattivato].
Non ho approfondito molto le quest secondarie degli NPC, ne ho portate a termine un paio e mi sono sembrate abbastanza godibili, senza infamia nè lode.
Piccola nota anche sui comandi, piuttosto legnosi e, per mia infinita rabbia, non modificabili...
In conclusione, Ghost Song è un Metroidvania che poteva aspirare a molto più di quello che ha mostrato. Non mi sento di bocciarlo in quanto il sistema di combattimento, dopotutto, funziona relativamente bene e l'esplorazione mostra comunque lati interessanti. Un peccato che cada sotto il peso delle sue stesse meccaniche rindondanti, obsolete e a tratti frustranti.
Davvero un peccato.
Voto finale: 6.5/10
Loved it !
Enjoyable but has an unsatisfying, abrupt ending.
Finished in a day after some classes which was great. The game is basically Hollow Knight lite, with so many aspects feeling directly stolen including the charm system, the death system, and just the vibes. So many of the areas look so much like Greenpath. However the movement is a bit more clunky and feels like Metroid. The bosses can be unsatisfying, the ending is abrupt and not at all satisfying, and the upgrade pace is slow and kind of insignificant. However it is much less annoying than other Metroidvanias, as you constantly feel like you’re moving foward, the small map avoids wasted time. Beyond this, the vibe from the enemies and environments are really chill and it’s just an addictive short game till Silksong.
There is one single good thing about this game and it's the gun overheat mechanic: if you shoot too much it overheats, which makes your melee attacks better because your hand is on fire or something. It's clever and makes you switch between attacks. Otherwise the combat was terrible, the level design mediocre, and just simply not something I want to invest time into when there are so many better metroidvanias out there.
Game felt like a mix of Hollow Knight and Metroid, which sounds like it could be amazing, but ultimately resulted in another one of these middling Metroidvanias that come out in quantities every year. The reason why I don't rate this lower is the atmosphere of the game. There was a certain melancholy to exploring the world of Ghost Song and it did a great job at getting me engaged throughout my few hours with the game. The music also really added to it.
The combat is your standard Metroid-fare with some RPG-bloat added to it. Bossfights were mostly bland and normal enemies way too spongey.
I was also a little disappointed by the sudden ending of the narrative. I figured I triggered a bad ending or something, but apparantly it just ends like this. Oh well.
The combat is your standard Metroid-fare with some RPG-bloat added to it. Bossfights were mostly bland and normal enemies way too spongey.
I was also a little disappointed by the sudden ending of the narrative. I figured I triggered a bad ending or something, but apparantly it just ends like this. Oh well.
Hollow Knight really changed how metroidvania games are designed and Ghost Song is quite emblematic of this.
Ghost Song succeeds at being a mostly good game with a very striking atmosphere. The gameplay is pretty good albeit simple and straightforward. The story is just there. It's really nothing special.
Overall, it's an above average Metroidvania game that doesn't really excel at anything it does but it's comfort food. I wanted to play a cozy vania game and that's what I got out of this.
I did enjoy my time with it, overall, but it's hard to recommend when there's so much better stuff out there.
Ghost Song succeeds at being a mostly good game with a very striking atmosphere. The gameplay is pretty good albeit simple and straightforward. The story is just there. It's really nothing special.
Overall, it's an above average Metroidvania game that doesn't really excel at anything it does but it's comfort food. I wanted to play a cozy vania game and that's what I got out of this.
I did enjoy my time with it, overall, but it's hard to recommend when there's so much better stuff out there.
esperava bem mais, realmente não gostei. entediante demais
One of my first metroidvanias, and I enjoyed the whole thing. Difficult bosses, but took me just about 12 hours to finish.
Unfortunately, the best way I can describe Ghost Song is 'aggressively average."
The game has some very nice ambiance and atmosphere to it, thanks to some top notch sound design. Satisfying clanks of metal hitting the floor as Deadsuit walks, the churning life in the backgrounds of the more biological areas, etc. From quiet to noisy to everything inbetween, the soundscape sells each area rather well.
But alas, the gameplay of Ghost Song isn't anything particularly special. There are plenty of secrets to find, behind breakable walls and all the usual affair, but the map is... shockingly uninspired. It's not bad per say, but it's everything you've seen before and more, with nothing especially notable about the execution.
I'm not against limited fast travel, as I think making things too convenient for the player in regards to speeding across the map in a metroidvania can break the players relationship with the world, but in Ghost Song, not only is fast travel limited to an incredible extreme, there are parts where it straight up turns off. Every time you accomplish one of the main goals of the game, you have to laboriously crawl back to the surface in a death stranding esque delivery job, without much or anything having changed to make the journey any more interesting. It's a strange addition of extra busywork that the game didn't feel like it needed.
Storywise... it's one of those games you have to go digging through lore notes and finding obscure flags and then have to piece together things yourself. It's not bad, and it lends to the sombering atmosphere of the game and has a few interesting ideas, but not worth staying for.
Overall, it's a nice looking game with some solid atmosphere throughout, accompanied by the most average metroidvania loop of all time. I couldn't finish it, but maybe I'll get the urge one day.
The game has some very nice ambiance and atmosphere to it, thanks to some top notch sound design. Satisfying clanks of metal hitting the floor as Deadsuit walks, the churning life in the backgrounds of the more biological areas, etc. From quiet to noisy to everything inbetween, the soundscape sells each area rather well.
But alas, the gameplay of Ghost Song isn't anything particularly special. There are plenty of secrets to find, behind breakable walls and all the usual affair, but the map is... shockingly uninspired. It's not bad per say, but it's everything you've seen before and more, with nothing especially notable about the execution.
I'm not against limited fast travel, as I think making things too convenient for the player in regards to speeding across the map in a metroidvania can break the players relationship with the world, but in Ghost Song, not only is fast travel limited to an incredible extreme, there are parts where it straight up turns off. Every time you accomplish one of the main goals of the game, you have to laboriously crawl back to the surface in a death stranding esque delivery job, without much or anything having changed to make the journey any more interesting. It's a strange addition of extra busywork that the game didn't feel like it needed.
Storywise... it's one of those games you have to go digging through lore notes and finding obscure flags and then have to piece together things yourself. It's not bad, and it lends to the sombering atmosphere of the game and has a few interesting ideas, but not worth staying for.
Overall, it's a nice looking game with some solid atmosphere throughout, accompanied by the most average metroidvania loop of all time. I couldn't finish it, but maybe I'll get the urge one day.
A decent Metroidvania that's HEAVILY inspired by Hollow Knight. It takes a while to get through and until you have some upgrades the enemies are a bit spongy and annoying to kill. Also has an anti climatic ending that doesn't finish explaining much of the plot.
Deixando claro que: Eu fui filtrado. Essa análise foi feita com pouco tempo de jogo, é possível que a nota mude se eu chegar a zerar algum dia, e talvez você considere injusto analisar um jogo sem nem chegar na metade, mas não tenho vontade alguma de ir até o fim, e achei interessante analisar o motivo que me fez largá-lo.
Com pouco tempo, fica bem claro as inspirações em Metroid, Hollow Knight e Souls, e até pega bons aspectos desses jogos, o problema é que parece que tudo que Ghost Song faz, são coisas que esses jogos já fizeram melhor. A inspiração em Metroid se dá nas mecânicas, mas Metroid tem um ritmo frenético e bem calculado, e aqui, por mais que a mecânica de compensar o sobreaquecimento da arma com o corpo-a-corpo seja genuinamente interessante, eu não sei como o jogo quer que eu jogue, eu entendo que o jogo quer que eu otimize meu dano aproveitando o máximo da arma antes de sobreaquecer, usar o dash para posicionar o personagem para o melee, e logo depois já usar o dash novamente para reposicionar, o que na teoria é um loop mais rápido e agressivo, mas o ritmo na verdade é lento e metódico, pois o ataque é extremamente lento, possui um range pequeno, e não pode ser cancelado em um dash, então, o posicionamento se torna difícil, e o ataque é facilmente punível, isso são características de um ataque que deve ser usado de forma mais metódica, não como parte do loop principal de um combate mais rápido, ainda mais quando os próprios inimigos exigem velocidade de reação, assim o combate só acaba parecendo travado. Quanto a Hollow Knight, é claramente uma inspiração estética, e nisso, o jogo até que acertou, a atmosfera solitária e a arte são interessantes e foi o que me chamou atenção ao jogo inicialmente, só não é nada de novo, é realmente muito parecido com Hollow Knight. Agora indo para Souls, é onde reside maior parte das minhas críticas ao jogo, e o que me fez largar ele de vez, além do clássico sistema de almas, Ghost Song busca misturar uma exploração de Souls, com poucos checkpoints e levels punitivos, com a exploração clássica de um metroidvania (o que não é novidade no gênero, mas enfim), mas, acaba errando onde menos deveria: no design dos níveis.
Dark Souls 1 possuia poucos checkpoints, pois tinha confiança no posicionamento delas, os mapas eram feitos para que a exploração seja interessante, desafiadora, recompensadora e nunca excessivamente longa, sempre tem diversos atalhos para voltar às bonfires e o jogo te recompensa, além de apenas te punir. Já nesse jogo, não é bem assim, as recompensas são pequenas, os corredores são excessivamente longos e o posicionamento dos checkpoints é péssimo, voltar para um checkpoint sem fast travel é um sacrifício, é cansativo, punindo o jogador excessivamente, e o pior é: Isso é o começo do jogo, eu sei que é um metroidvania, visivelmente, o mapa vai se conectar melhor com o tempo (Mas mesmo assim os caminhos ainda parecem ser excessivamente longos), mas essa progressão é feita para manter o jogador entretido, se no início do jogo, a exploração é desnecessariamente cansativa, tendo apenas uma suposta promessa de melhoria, você não vai entreter o jogador, você vai afastar ele do jogo.
Com pouco tempo, fica bem claro as inspirações em Metroid, Hollow Knight e Souls, e até pega bons aspectos desses jogos, o problema é que parece que tudo que Ghost Song faz, são coisas que esses jogos já fizeram melhor. A inspiração em Metroid se dá nas mecânicas, mas Metroid tem um ritmo frenético e bem calculado, e aqui, por mais que a mecânica de compensar o sobreaquecimento da arma com o corpo-a-corpo seja genuinamente interessante, eu não sei como o jogo quer que eu jogue, eu entendo que o jogo quer que eu otimize meu dano aproveitando o máximo da arma antes de sobreaquecer, usar o dash para posicionar o personagem para o melee, e logo depois já usar o dash novamente para reposicionar, o que na teoria é um loop mais rápido e agressivo, mas o ritmo na verdade é lento e metódico, pois o ataque é extremamente lento, possui um range pequeno, e não pode ser cancelado em um dash, então, o posicionamento se torna difícil, e o ataque é facilmente punível, isso são características de um ataque que deve ser usado de forma mais metódica, não como parte do loop principal de um combate mais rápido, ainda mais quando os próprios inimigos exigem velocidade de reação, assim o combate só acaba parecendo travado. Quanto a Hollow Knight, é claramente uma inspiração estética, e nisso, o jogo até que acertou, a atmosfera solitária e a arte são interessantes e foi o que me chamou atenção ao jogo inicialmente, só não é nada de novo, é realmente muito parecido com Hollow Knight. Agora indo para Souls, é onde reside maior parte das minhas críticas ao jogo, e o que me fez largar ele de vez, além do clássico sistema de almas, Ghost Song busca misturar uma exploração de Souls, com poucos checkpoints e levels punitivos, com a exploração clássica de um metroidvania (o que não é novidade no gênero, mas enfim), mas, acaba errando onde menos deveria: no design dos níveis.
Dark Souls 1 possuia poucos checkpoints, pois tinha confiança no posicionamento delas, os mapas eram feitos para que a exploração seja interessante, desafiadora, recompensadora e nunca excessivamente longa, sempre tem diversos atalhos para voltar às bonfires e o jogo te recompensa, além de apenas te punir. Já nesse jogo, não é bem assim, as recompensas são pequenas, os corredores são excessivamente longos e o posicionamento dos checkpoints é péssimo, voltar para um checkpoint sem fast travel é um sacrifício, é cansativo, punindo o jogador excessivamente, e o pior é: Isso é o começo do jogo, eu sei que é um metroidvania, visivelmente, o mapa vai se conectar melhor com o tempo (Mas mesmo assim os caminhos ainda parecem ser excessivamente longos), mas essa progressão é feita para manter o jogador entretido, se no início do jogo, a exploração é desnecessariamente cansativa, tendo apenas uma suposta promessa de melhoria, você não vai entreter o jogador, você vai afastar ele do jogo.
I don't really like putting reviews for games I drop, I feel like I dont want to throw my hat in on a game i didnt finish even if I think my reasons are legit, but I was looking forward to this game since the crowdfunding days and getting really let down by this game was big bummer.
The big thing for me is that this game made me think this was gonna be the indie metroidvania that gave me what I wanted: metroid, not castlevania or hollowknight or dark souls but in 2d. It sure seems like it; it's scifi, you got an armcannon, you kinda look like samus, surely this is the one, right?
Sadly, it's not , especially because it really doesn't want you to do the shooting part of metroid. The game has a heat mechanic where if you shoot too much your weapon will overheat, resulting in really weak shots, and improved melee hits. However, it overheats in like 2-3 seconds of shooting and it takes a lot time for your weapon to reduce heat, often leading to constantly having to swap between ranged and melee. It doesn't feel good, if you want to metroid shoot it up it feels really bad even if you're taking upgrade pieces with the shooting in mind, because you're constantly in overheat and will stay overheated unless you start meleeing, and the melee combat just feels mediocre and limited overall. Special weapons are also attached to their own meter, which i guess is nice rather than ammo but the special recharge is so slow. I feel like no matter what I do im just out of resources at all times even when using equipment with the goal reducing the downtime.
the game also has a lot of Souls mechanics because every game needs them now for some reason and this game did not need them and does not improve the experience. Enemies drop souls which you use to improve stats and upgrade slots, and if you die you drop them and have the pick them up. However, very curiously, not every save point in this game is where you can level up. infact, most of them aren't. In my playtime I only found like 3 of them that let me level up/quicksave. Thinking "i have a lot of souls i should look for a bonfire and level up" becomes an entire endeavor of backtracking through many, many screens to hit a levelup bonfire. It turns out, the souls thing where you hit a bonfire after being alive for a long time and carving through with a ton of souls in your pocket stops being a good feeling when most bonfires wont let you actually dump your souls.
you also do the thing where you lose max health when you die, and picking up your souls does not bring your health back and instead you need to... once again go back to a levelup shrine to repair yourself. It's just tedious.
Ultimately it all comes to head for me when I died on a foggate'd section, went back to it, and found that the foggate was activated, I was locked out of the fight, and I couldn't progress anymore. Maybe if I explored around more and did some other stuff it would've fixed itself, but I wasn't really enjoying myself so I just gave up on it.
It's all disappointing. I think the game's character designs look nice, even if it has that flash movement to it, it gave up on the good parts of metroid by replacing it with melee and souls mechanics because idk hollow knight was popular.
To any indie devs interested in making a metroidvania who is following this: PLEASE stop making souls game in 2d i beg you. i want to play metroid. please rip off metroid i am begging you.
The big thing for me is that this game made me think this was gonna be the indie metroidvania that gave me what I wanted: metroid, not castlevania or hollowknight or dark souls but in 2d. It sure seems like it; it's scifi, you got an armcannon, you kinda look like samus, surely this is the one, right?
Sadly, it's not , especially because it really doesn't want you to do the shooting part of metroid. The game has a heat mechanic where if you shoot too much your weapon will overheat, resulting in really weak shots, and improved melee hits. However, it overheats in like 2-3 seconds of shooting and it takes a lot time for your weapon to reduce heat, often leading to constantly having to swap between ranged and melee. It doesn't feel good, if you want to metroid shoot it up it feels really bad even if you're taking upgrade pieces with the shooting in mind, because you're constantly in overheat and will stay overheated unless you start meleeing, and the melee combat just feels mediocre and limited overall. Special weapons are also attached to their own meter, which i guess is nice rather than ammo but the special recharge is so slow. I feel like no matter what I do im just out of resources at all times even when using equipment with the goal reducing the downtime.
the game also has a lot of Souls mechanics because every game needs them now for some reason and this game did not need them and does not improve the experience. Enemies drop souls which you use to improve stats and upgrade slots, and if you die you drop them and have the pick them up. However, very curiously, not every save point in this game is where you can level up. infact, most of them aren't. In my playtime I only found like 3 of them that let me level up/quicksave. Thinking "i have a lot of souls i should look for a bonfire and level up" becomes an entire endeavor of backtracking through many, many screens to hit a levelup bonfire. It turns out, the souls thing where you hit a bonfire after being alive for a long time and carving through with a ton of souls in your pocket stops being a good feeling when most bonfires wont let you actually dump your souls.
you also do the thing where you lose max health when you die, and picking up your souls does not bring your health back and instead you need to... once again go back to a levelup shrine to repair yourself. It's just tedious.
Ultimately it all comes to head for me when I died on a foggate'd section, went back to it, and found that the foggate was activated, I was locked out of the fight, and I couldn't progress anymore. Maybe if I explored around more and did some other stuff it would've fixed itself, but I wasn't really enjoying myself so I just gave up on it.
It's all disappointing. I think the game's character designs look nice, even if it has that flash movement to it, it gave up on the good parts of metroid by replacing it with melee and souls mechanics because idk hollow knight was popular.
To any indie devs interested in making a metroidvania who is following this: PLEASE stop making souls game in 2d i beg you. i want to play metroid. please rip off metroid i am begging you.
Completed on "ordinary" difficulty with all items/upgrades collected. Ghost Song is an overall decent Metroidvania, with a strong sense of mystery and otherworldliness in its environments but to be honest, only serviceable game mechanics. While the level design fits the bill with an apparently quite open layout, encouraging exploration, the means through which to undertake that exploration are quite limited - perhaps most immediately demonstrated by there being only two meaningful upgrades to traversal abilities. Combat is a clear focus here, with an interesting combination of ranged and melee weapons - repeated gunfire causes heat build-up that slows the rate of fire, but in doing so, also increases melee damage. However, the significant combat encounters typically come with bosses, and in many cases these are far too risky to encourage use of melee, epitomising the generally high level of difficulty throughout - to punishing and often frustrating effect. A 'corpse run' mechanic that sees the loss of experience from repeated deaths alongside lengthy distances between bosses and their closest save point serve to increase the potential for frustration.
There's some decent potential for customisation of approach, with interchangeable ability modules being the game's most significant collectibles, which does serve to bring some greater levels of interest to the experience - but this variety can't offset the feeling of frustration that was my overriding takeaway from the experience. Ghost Song isn't without value, and it's an impressive experience for a mostly solo developer, but if you do want to give it a go, I'd recommend playing on the easier "explorer" difficulty.
There's some decent potential for customisation of approach, with interchangeable ability modules being the game's most significant collectibles, which does serve to bring some greater levels of interest to the experience - but this variety can't offset the feeling of frustration that was my overriding takeaway from the experience. Ghost Song isn't without value, and it's an impressive experience for a mostly solo developer, but if you do want to give it a go, I'd recommend playing on the easier "explorer" difficulty.
The good thing is that this absolutely feels like the closest thing to Metroid without being Metroid. I don't really like the paper doll thing, but this one actually manages to pull it off pretty well.
The bad thing is like...everything else. The enemies take forever to kill. The combat has interesting ideas that it does nothing with, or poorly implements. Movement isn't fun. The fast travel points are far away from anywhere you'd actually want to fast travel.
The ugly thing is that this should be like a 3 hour game but is riddled with such annoying decisions in order to pad the time out to around 8 hours.
The bad thing is like...everything else. The enemies take forever to kill. The combat has interesting ideas that it does nothing with, or poorly implements. Movement isn't fun. The fast travel points are far away from anywhere you'd actually want to fast travel.
The ugly thing is that this should be like a 3 hour game but is riddled with such annoying decisions in order to pad the time out to around 8 hours.
This game got me back into playing and enjoying games after several months of wishy washiness. It's not perfect, but it is solid, and utilizes a lot of concepts from games I love.
Aesthetically and in core combat, it takes a lot from Metroid. It's Module system is nearly a direct lift of Hollow Knights charms. And of course in it's death and currency system, it pulls from Dark Souls, as so many games do (it also takes elements of DS leveling)
It's own identity comes from a) the characters and the storytelling, of course, which is so far quite engaging and charming, and b) the overheating and melee system. Firing your gun for too long will cause it to overheat, which in turn boosts the damage of your melee attacks, setting up a balanced play style between close and far range. Unfortunately this mechanic doesn't quite shine as much as it could, as melee attacks are rarely directly needed, and you can amass a vast arsenal of secondary weapons to help you out of tough situations
Aesthetically and in core combat, it takes a lot from Metroid. It's Module system is nearly a direct lift of Hollow Knights charms. And of course in it's death and currency system, it pulls from Dark Souls, as so many games do (it also takes elements of DS leveling)
It's own identity comes from a) the characters and the storytelling, of course, which is so far quite engaging and charming, and b) the overheating and melee system. Firing your gun for too long will cause it to overheat, which in turn boosts the damage of your melee attacks, setting up a balanced play style between close and far range. Unfortunately this mechanic doesn't quite shine as much as it could, as melee attacks are rarely directly needed, and you can amass a vast arsenal of secondary weapons to help you out of tough situations
I really wanted to like this game. I don't dislike metroidvanias at all, but Ghost Song just doesn't click with me. Enemies have so many HP, combat feels weird, controls are somewhat clunky, feels aesthetically uninspired and too much derivative of other titles. I see Metroid, I see Dark Souls, I see Hollow Knight, but I don't see any of those derivative mechanics done right, or at least fun. I played it for 4 hours before realizing I was not having fun at all, so I dropped it. Such a shame :\
It's the bladerunner of metroidvanias
https://youtu.be/pn8OLMX4P68
https://youtu.be/pn8OLMX4P68
simply no reason to play this
Peguei a versão do switch por conta da portabilidade e por ser um jogo aparentemente leve. Estava redondamente enganado.
Infelizmente, no presente momento, o que temos é um jogo absolutamente quebrado, com travamentos constantes e fps drops a torto e à direita. Uma pena, porque era um dos jogos indies que eu mais aguardava nos últimos anos.
O switch não é nenhuma máquina da nasa, claro, mas a falta de otimização aqui é gritante. Temos jogos na mesma vibe no sistema, como Hollow Knight e Unsighted, e ambos rodam mil vezes melhor.
Talvez volte a jogar no futuro caso saia um novo patch, ou pirateando a versão de PC.
Infelizmente, no presente momento, o que temos é um jogo absolutamente quebrado, com travamentos constantes e fps drops a torto e à direita. Uma pena, porque era um dos jogos indies que eu mais aguardava nos últimos anos.
O switch não é nenhuma máquina da nasa, claro, mas a falta de otimização aqui é gritante. Temos jogos na mesma vibe no sistema, como Hollow Knight e Unsighted, e ambos rodam mil vezes melhor.
Talvez volte a jogar no futuro caso saia um novo patch, ou pirateando a versão de PC.
Personally, I enjoyed Ghost Song quite a bit. The artstyle was nice, the gameplay was fun in my opinion (although the spongier enemies were annoying), and I enjoyed the different areas. However, the ending felt disappointing, and I feel like more could've been done with the characters - especially since some of the very key lore conversations revolve around you being in the right place at the right time, meaning that exploring a section and being done with it too early could mean you miss out on a character being there later on. The fact that a few characters got "you heard all my dialogue and possibly helped with a sidequest, have a reward" while others were left with nothing also felt a bit odd to me. The voice acting for characters was generally solid, nothing exceptional but not bad at all. My biggest disappointment in the character department revolves around a (spoiler) character who seems like they'd be a major force, but they only have a single conversation with you where they drop plot points.
The bosses and minibosses seem to be one of the more divisive things from what I saw, but personally I enjoyed them. They usually had some good designs, and the bosses had some pretty fun fights most of the time. The game's atmosphere was also great, and areas such as the far left one left me with a heavy sense of dread thanks to one of the enemies found within.
tl;dr good art and atmosphere, fun gameplay, spongy enemies, some disappointments when it came to characters and the storytelling method
The bosses and minibosses seem to be one of the more divisive things from what I saw, but personally I enjoyed them. They usually had some good designs, and the bosses had some pretty fun fights most of the time. The game's atmosphere was also great, and areas such as the far left one left me with a heavy sense of dread thanks to one of the enemies found within.
tl;dr good art and atmosphere, fun gameplay, spongy enemies, some disappointments when it came to characters and the storytelling method
A passion project a decade in development turns out as yet another carbon copy of Super Metroid with great presentation and tacked-on soulslike elements that serve no real purpose.
Its gameplay is perfectly serviceable, with an interesting overheating mechanic that not only prevents you from firing your guns non-stop, but also greatly boosts damage from your melee attacks when your gun is red hot, encouraging switching between ranged and short range combat. It's definitely not Ghost Song's fault that during its troubled development the indie metroidvania scene has been so prolific that such games are by now as numerous as the stars of the sky, oversaturating an industry with an ocean of perfectly competent copycats that make if far more difficult for any single one to stand out. In a different time, Ghost Song would have been special, but the way things are, it's yet another metroidvania that does nothing different from the crowd.
Extrinsic factors aside, it has problems of its own as well: taking a page from Hollow Knight, the world is frustratingly dispersive, requiring the player to wander around for far too long looking for the one way to make progress, running into dead end after dead end, which can get infuriating. The 3D geometry that composes platforms has strange hitboxes, which can lead to the player sprite falling through them when you feel like you landed on one properly. Bosses are few, far between and not very good.
The music is quality stuff, but it rarely fits the action: Metroid did not feature many loud and bombastic tracks either, but its moody and haunting ambients conveyed a sense of danger. Here we are treated to beatiful tunes that belong more in a walking simulator than an action game. Silence would have been more tense.
The soulslike elements boil down to the usual currency retrieval mechanic after being killed, plus that irritating feature from Dark Souls 2 that chips a small percentage off your maximum health each time that happens. Only here it doesn't require some rare resource to restore: just go to one of the broken robots that serve as level up/fast travel points and repair the damage for mere pocket lint. All it does is add a minor inconvenience after every death: walk out of the respawn room, shoot one critter enemy, go back in, spend that currency to repair the damage, go back to your business. One minute wasted on what only amounts to pointless busywork.
You also have the usual dodge move tied to a stamina bar, different stats governing your attributes, and the game is smart enough to not respawn enemies immediately after leaving a room to discourage level farming. Leveling up grants energy points, which set a hard cap to limit how many of the upgrade modules found around the world you can equip at once. These range from some that will decrease your overheating rate (or increase it, for a melee build), make collecting currency easier, display enemy health bars, increase your i-frames, and so on. It's a good system, similar to what is found in The Surge, allowing for fairly deep customization, even though none of the modules is really necessary for beating the game, since it's fairly easy.
A similar principle applies to the many weapons, which use the same energy pool and therefore require you to choose which ones to equip, usually only being able to afford a couple. I found the basic Metroid-style missile attack to be the most efficient, along with a blob weapon spawning small jellies that seek out and damage enemies. It's not as dispersive as Axiom Verge, which gave you dozens of weapons, with only a few of them being useful, but you still get the feeling that most of the advanced ones are little more than a gimmick.
There is a story, and a quite verbose one at that: a number of friendly NPCs living in a stranded starshipwreck will talk your ear off about how they are sick of mushroom soup or they can't comb their hair properly. There is some interesting stuff in there, but you'll have to sift through the uninteresting drivel to get there, all the while what you really want is to go out and explore. It's bored depressed people telling you how bored and depressed they are, and that is not very conducive to urgency and engagement.
The map feature is precisely what you'd expect, with the feature from Hollow Knight to place abstract markers on it for reference. The problem is that not only do these not represent anything, forcing you to make note of what you decide each one stands for, but as of the time of writing this they are completely bugged, since they will change at random to a different one, completely defeating the purpose to have multiple types in the first place.
Imagine deciding that, say, a triangle means "I need double jump here" and a circle means "need air dash here", placing down markers accordingly, then the next time you boot up the game discovering that all your triangles have become circles and all your circles have become squares. I had to bypass the bug by setting multiple markers in the same room and associating different meanings to their number instead of shape. Sloppy.
All in all, Ghost Song is fine, it's competently made, but it's confusingly laid out, too easy and with an invasive and unengaging story that doesn't really explain anything by the end. It's a shame, but with all the similar games that populate the market these days, it really doesn't do anything to warrant too much attention.
Its gameplay is perfectly serviceable, with an interesting overheating mechanic that not only prevents you from firing your guns non-stop, but also greatly boosts damage from your melee attacks when your gun is red hot, encouraging switching between ranged and short range combat. It's definitely not Ghost Song's fault that during its troubled development the indie metroidvania scene has been so prolific that such games are by now as numerous as the stars of the sky, oversaturating an industry with an ocean of perfectly competent copycats that make if far more difficult for any single one to stand out. In a different time, Ghost Song would have been special, but the way things are, it's yet another metroidvania that does nothing different from the crowd.
Extrinsic factors aside, it has problems of its own as well: taking a page from Hollow Knight, the world is frustratingly dispersive, requiring the player to wander around for far too long looking for the one way to make progress, running into dead end after dead end, which can get infuriating. The 3D geometry that composes platforms has strange hitboxes, which can lead to the player sprite falling through them when you feel like you landed on one properly. Bosses are few, far between and not very good.
The music is quality stuff, but it rarely fits the action: Metroid did not feature many loud and bombastic tracks either, but its moody and haunting ambients conveyed a sense of danger. Here we are treated to beatiful tunes that belong more in a walking simulator than an action game. Silence would have been more tense.
The soulslike elements boil down to the usual currency retrieval mechanic after being killed, plus that irritating feature from Dark Souls 2 that chips a small percentage off your maximum health each time that happens. Only here it doesn't require some rare resource to restore: just go to one of the broken robots that serve as level up/fast travel points and repair the damage for mere pocket lint. All it does is add a minor inconvenience after every death: walk out of the respawn room, shoot one critter enemy, go back in, spend that currency to repair the damage, go back to your business. One minute wasted on what only amounts to pointless busywork.
You also have the usual dodge move tied to a stamina bar, different stats governing your attributes, and the game is smart enough to not respawn enemies immediately after leaving a room to discourage level farming. Leveling up grants energy points, which set a hard cap to limit how many of the upgrade modules found around the world you can equip at once. These range from some that will decrease your overheating rate (or increase it, for a melee build), make collecting currency easier, display enemy health bars, increase your i-frames, and so on. It's a good system, similar to what is found in The Surge, allowing for fairly deep customization, even though none of the modules is really necessary for beating the game, since it's fairly easy.
A similar principle applies to the many weapons, which use the same energy pool and therefore require you to choose which ones to equip, usually only being able to afford a couple. I found the basic Metroid-style missile attack to be the most efficient, along with a blob weapon spawning small jellies that seek out and damage enemies. It's not as dispersive as Axiom Verge, which gave you dozens of weapons, with only a few of them being useful, but you still get the feeling that most of the advanced ones are little more than a gimmick.
There is a story, and a quite verbose one at that: a number of friendly NPCs living in a stranded starshipwreck will talk your ear off about how they are sick of mushroom soup or they can't comb their hair properly. There is some interesting stuff in there, but you'll have to sift through the uninteresting drivel to get there, all the while what you really want is to go out and explore. It's bored depressed people telling you how bored and depressed they are, and that is not very conducive to urgency and engagement.
The map feature is precisely what you'd expect, with the feature from Hollow Knight to place abstract markers on it for reference. The problem is that not only do these not represent anything, forcing you to make note of what you decide each one stands for, but as of the time of writing this they are completely bugged, since they will change at random to a different one, completely defeating the purpose to have multiple types in the first place.
Imagine deciding that, say, a triangle means "I need double jump here" and a circle means "need air dash here", placing down markers accordingly, then the next time you boot up the game discovering that all your triangles have become circles and all your circles have become squares. I had to bypass the bug by setting multiple markers in the same room and associating different meanings to their number instead of shape. Sloppy.
All in all, Ghost Song is fine, it's competently made, but it's confusingly laid out, too easy and with an invasive and unengaging story that doesn't really explain anything by the end. It's a shame, but with all the similar games that populate the market these days, it really doesn't do anything to warrant too much attention.
A good metroidvania with some great 2d art and atmosphere. The backtracking became tedious but the game was short enough to keep me engaged throughout. Looking forward to the studios next project.
Better than Dread for only $20.