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72 Reviews
Quof
For: I wanna enjoy the Electrified Butterscotch Dandy
For: I wanna enjoy the Electrified Butterscotch Dandy
Good game. Fun needle as expected from the Wolfman. Only real problem with it is a few saves that are difficulty spikes, which is never fun, but that's not a major problem.
[0] Likes
Rating: 8.0 80
Difficulty: 56 56
Jun 10, 2018
Quof
For: I wanna be the Ocean Princess
For: I wanna be the Ocean Princess
Incredible level design, production values, and basically everything. There's a ton of content and it's all as inventive as it is fun to play. The creativity on display is stunning, and even when I feel the gameplay stumbles on the fun factor (Acid Bog), the gimmicks are still interesting enough to keep me entertained. Overall, easily one of the best fangames ever made. Personally I wasn't too fond of some of the bosses (Ice Guardian) and tend to dislike avoidances in general, but I won't dock points for that because the bosses themselves (except Ice Guardian?) are fine, they just aren't the kind of thing I personally enjoy playing. I recommend this game to basically everyone, as long as you can handle the pretty hard (but not too hard) needle.
[0] Likes
Rating: 9.5 95
Difficulty: 75 75
Jun 8, 2018
Quof
For: I wanna Traverse the Neon Rainbow
For: I wanna Traverse the Neon Rainbow
Just solid needle. I think a few too many saves had the hardest jump by far at the end, but overall the difficulty was very smoothly balanced with a nice curve upwards.
[0] Likes
Rating: 7.0 70
Difficulty: 50 50
Jun 5, 2018
Quof
For: I wanna stop the MELTDOWN
For: I wanna stop the MELTDOWN
Overall, a very solid game. I really enjoyed the needle in the first two stages and had a good enough time with next two as well, for a total of four stages I had fun with. As someone who just does not enjoy avoidances whatsoever, I truly appreciated being able to skip bosses and do hard needle in place of them. The button to show which align a jump needs and where to get it was also appreciated and is something I would like to see in more games just so I don't have to count columns and all that stuff. The save balance leans towards providing as many saves as possible, which I much prefer to games where saves are handed out stingily. There's so much good in this game that I feel really disappointed that the final stage of the game stumbles so hard.
Starting at the very beginning of stage 5 (or the boss needle of Stage 4, though since that's optional I don't want to focus on it), MELTDOWN's difficulty spikes up. Stage 3 was a step up from the first two stages, and Stage 4 was another step up from that. These steps up reflected a nice difficulty curve. Stage 5's jump in difficulty, however, was a brutal spike. I died 7,500 times getting to the end of Stage 4. By the time I reached the end of Stage 5, I had around 14,000 deaths. My death count nearly doubled from the final stage alone. On its own, the final stage being a difficulty spike wouldn't be so bad, but my problem is that the difficulty mostly arises from an over-reliance on tiny 2f-3f jumps. If you haven't mastered those, you will have a very very bad time, because the bulk of saves have their difficulty built around the fact that anything but a very tiny jump will send the Kid's head careening into a spike. It's pretty obnoxious and not very fun to play. The needle is still well designed in general, it's just spoiled by the hardest parts of each save without fail being 2f-3fs (or at least, extremely small jumps). It just ended up being more frustrating than fun to play, especially due to the difficulty being so much higher than the rest of the game.
At the very least, though, the stage ends on a high note. The final save is basically free of 2f-3f shenanigans and is generally well balanced over all. It's long, but fun to execute and satisfying to beat. The bobbing of the screen as the Kid jumped around made me feel physically ill, but I'm not really sure how you could do a vertical level like this without something like that happening, so I can't critique the game for that. If this save had been the end of the game, I would be more or less satisfied with it. But instead...
An avoidance final boss. As mentioned, you can skip bosses with extra-hard needle if you so wish for every boss in the game... except this one. Clearly the developer knows that a lot of needle players don't like avoidances. Clearly the developers knows that following up a stage of pure, hard needle with an out of context avoidance fight is not the best thing to do. He went out of his way to make optional needle screens and the select screen for each, after all. And yet... the final boss is a forced avoidance fight. It's as if the developer knew what he was doing was wrong, yet did it anyway. (As an aside, the developer's commercial game Phantom Jump suffers from a similar problem. The final boss in the game was ridiculously hard and had little to do with the platforming present beforehand). Naturally, I dropped the game immediately. My pet peeve is final bosses of games having little to do with the actual gameplay done beforehand, and the last thing I want to top off a grueling stage of 65-70 level needle is an avoidance. The elevator would have been a fine conclusion to the game, but instead, an avoidance - when every other avoidance in the game had been optional. Talk about ending on a sour note, when the final stage was already in a bad spot on its own.
In conclusion, MELTDOWN is a great game... until it isn't. The first four stages are fun and worth playing, but the difficulty spike near the end with (imo) largely unfun needle sours the experience, and the forced avoidance fight at the end is basically a slap to the face. I would say MELTDOWN is worth playing until the end of stage 4, and if the boss needle there or the beginning of stage 5 starts giving you a hard time, to just drop the game cold turkey. I don't believe it's worth pushing through.
[1] Like
Starting at the very beginning of stage 5 (or the boss needle of Stage 4, though since that's optional I don't want to focus on it), MELTDOWN's difficulty spikes up. Stage 3 was a step up from the first two stages, and Stage 4 was another step up from that. These steps up reflected a nice difficulty curve. Stage 5's jump in difficulty, however, was a brutal spike. I died 7,500 times getting to the end of Stage 4. By the time I reached the end of Stage 5, I had around 14,000 deaths. My death count nearly doubled from the final stage alone. On its own, the final stage being a difficulty spike wouldn't be so bad, but my problem is that the difficulty mostly arises from an over-reliance on tiny 2f-3f jumps. If you haven't mastered those, you will have a very very bad time, because the bulk of saves have their difficulty built around the fact that anything but a very tiny jump will send the Kid's head careening into a spike. It's pretty obnoxious and not very fun to play. The needle is still well designed in general, it's just spoiled by the hardest parts of each save without fail being 2f-3fs (or at least, extremely small jumps). It just ended up being more frustrating than fun to play, especially due to the difficulty being so much higher than the rest of the game.
At the very least, though, the stage ends on a high note. The final save is basically free of 2f-3f shenanigans and is generally well balanced over all. It's long, but fun to execute and satisfying to beat. The bobbing of the screen as the Kid jumped around made me feel physically ill, but I'm not really sure how you could do a vertical level like this without something like that happening, so I can't critique the game for that. If this save had been the end of the game, I would be more or less satisfied with it. But instead...
An avoidance final boss. As mentioned, you can skip bosses with extra-hard needle if you so wish for every boss in the game... except this one. Clearly the developer knows that a lot of needle players don't like avoidances. Clearly the developers knows that following up a stage of pure, hard needle with an out of context avoidance fight is not the best thing to do. He went out of his way to make optional needle screens and the select screen for each, after all. And yet... the final boss is a forced avoidance fight. It's as if the developer knew what he was doing was wrong, yet did it anyway. (As an aside, the developer's commercial game Phantom Jump suffers from a similar problem. The final boss in the game was ridiculously hard and had little to do with the platforming present beforehand). Naturally, I dropped the game immediately. My pet peeve is final bosses of games having little to do with the actual gameplay done beforehand, and the last thing I want to top off a grueling stage of 65-70 level needle is an avoidance. The elevator would have been a fine conclusion to the game, but instead, an avoidance - when every other avoidance in the game had been optional. Talk about ending on a sour note, when the final stage was already in a bad spot on its own.
In conclusion, MELTDOWN is a great game... until it isn't. The first four stages are fun and worth playing, but the difficulty spike near the end with (imo) largely unfun needle sours the experience, and the forced avoidance fight at the end is basically a slap to the face. I would say MELTDOWN is worth playing until the end of stage 4, and if the boss needle there or the beginning of stage 5 starts giving you a hard time, to just drop the game cold turkey. I don't believe it's worth pushing through.
Rating: 6.8 68
Difficulty: 70 70
Jun 2, 2018
Quof
For: I wanna be Minimal
For: I wanna be Minimal
Fun game, but two screens near the end (bottom right one in the multiple choice, and the very last one) are uncomfortable difficulty spikes the bosses are easy enough to not be problem but just hard enough to be obnoxious. Bosses have no place in a needle game, I say. Mixing needle with avoidance is interesting but having to redo the avoidance over and over if you mess up on the needle is not really fun (even if the needle and the avoidance is made easy to compensate for being obnoxious... it's still obnoxious). So, a good game that stumbles a few times. Still worth playing just for the comfy visuals and the overall quality needle design of the first 34-ish stages.
[1] Like
Rating: 6.8 68
Difficulty: 52 52
Jun 1, 2018
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| I wanna Distort the Travesty | 41.1 | 5.1 | 9 |
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