Creator's Comments:
Nogard [Creator]
Light version: http://www.mediafire.com/file/v4zcbssa76g5veb (it removes some heavy effects on final boss).
[14] Likes
Rating: N/A
Difficulty: 55 55
Sep 17, 2017
88 Reviews:
Cutiefruity
This game was absolutely awesome. The ending was 11/10 and the rest of the game, while it had some hiccups and stages I didn't like the most ever, was super awesome. Would recommend.
[0] Likes
Rating: 9.9 99
Difficulty: 60 60
Feb 6, 2021
fubukiofficial
Absolutely real adventure fangame.
[0] Likes
Rating: 9.9 99
Difficulty: 60 60
Dec 20, 2020
YaBoiMarcAntony
Domu is a game which stands out as one of the most unique fangames I've ever sunk my teeth into. With splashes of Eversion and classic adventure fangames, you'll find yourself both titillated and bemused (and perhaps vexed) by the world which Nogard has so skillfully crafted and presented to us here.
The basic concept of Domu is this: you're a kid, you're going out for a walk or something, and you happen to witness a meteor type object crash into your homeland. Up to that point, the music and visuals were happy-go-lucky and bright, though the mood felt sinister thanks to the malicious traps here and there. Once the meteor makes its home in the ground, though, those shiny visuals and happy music are gone, replaced with a dark and moody soundtrack combined with alien surroundings. The game itself is made up of three paths with a boss at the end of each path, and then one more path with a little extra at the end: a final area after the chase sequence following the boss, and then one last big hoorah of a boss and avoidance.
The real meat of the game is in the platforming, though the bosses are pretty good too, utilizing the gimmicks of their respective paths in the fight. In your promenade through the sights on offer in Domu, you'll find yourself coming toe to toe with various peculiar gimmicks, all of which are totally unique and new to me. Perhaps the most infamous one is the ice gimmick, unique thanks to the extremely peculiar physics Nogard decided to give the ice. It's based around momentum now, with a lot of sliding and speed to spare. The most difficult aspect of it is that this momentum will affect your jumps as well, such that you'll get pulled back in the middle of a jump should you be going the opposite way of your momentum. Nonetheless, I found the gimmick to be rather enjoyable, both thanks to its interesting nature and the way which it the level design compliments it.
Other enjoyable gimmicks:
Bubble Gimmick - There are plants and you shoot them, ipso facto: BUBBLES! These bubbles travel the direction in which the plant was pointed and you can use these bubbles essentially as moving blocks of water. I found this to be really fun to play around with and would have even liked if the level featuring these bubbles were longer.
Platform Gimmick - This one is later in the game, featuring a number of platforms on a circular grid in which standing on one will make the whole shebang swing around while moving forward. This isn't the best description, but nonetheless, I quite enjoyed this gimmick.
Crazy Objects Gimmick - In the castle section, you'll come across some extremely wacky flailing blocks and spikes which place themselves properly as you come close to their actual location. For the most part, this might seem to be busywork and too much action for the eyes, but I found it to be really cool and perfect for this sort of malicious adventure game.
Now, I loved most everything about this game, from every level down to the basic sound design, but what stood out the most to me was the final avoidance. Quickly I'll say that I did enjoy every boss to varying degrees, and the final boss (preceding the avoidance) was excellent, but all of them pale in comparison to the glory of the closing avoidance. As you deliver the killing blow to the final boss, it switches gears quickly into a far away screen in which you're softly bombarded with various cherries. The music picks up the energy, and so too does the avoidance itself; with every change to the music, a new section of avoidance is ushered in, such that the entire avoidance sees at least a couple dozen unique sections. The synergy between music, visuals, and gameplay is beyond perfect, it is leagues ahead of any other avoidance or boss fight I've ever experienced, it was the only time I've ever felt chills while playing a fangame, and it is easily my favorite boss in any fangame. The balance between difficulty and enjoyment is impeccable, the music astounding and rendered perfectly through the avoidance itself. I'll never be able to listen to Sayonara Human without seeing this avoidance as its music video.
Domu is one hell of an experience, one that I believe everyone should give a go. The foreign and unsettling world that Nogard has crafted is a world that I am more than happy to have explored, and I would love it if more fangames followed in the peculiar footsteps of Domu.
P.S.,
I 100%, without any regrets or guilt, looked up a video for the puzzles near the end. My brain is far too small to deal with those sorts of puzzles, or at the very least I'm far too impatient. Obviously, this does not impact the score nor the difficulty rating.
[0] Likes
The basic concept of Domu is this: you're a kid, you're going out for a walk or something, and you happen to witness a meteor type object crash into your homeland. Up to that point, the music and visuals were happy-go-lucky and bright, though the mood felt sinister thanks to the malicious traps here and there. Once the meteor makes its home in the ground, though, those shiny visuals and happy music are gone, replaced with a dark and moody soundtrack combined with alien surroundings. The game itself is made up of three paths with a boss at the end of each path, and then one more path with a little extra at the end: a final area after the chase sequence following the boss, and then one last big hoorah of a boss and avoidance.
The real meat of the game is in the platforming, though the bosses are pretty good too, utilizing the gimmicks of their respective paths in the fight. In your promenade through the sights on offer in Domu, you'll find yourself coming toe to toe with various peculiar gimmicks, all of which are totally unique and new to me. Perhaps the most infamous one is the ice gimmick, unique thanks to the extremely peculiar physics Nogard decided to give the ice. It's based around momentum now, with a lot of sliding and speed to spare. The most difficult aspect of it is that this momentum will affect your jumps as well, such that you'll get pulled back in the middle of a jump should you be going the opposite way of your momentum. Nonetheless, I found the gimmick to be rather enjoyable, both thanks to its interesting nature and the way which it the level design compliments it.
Other enjoyable gimmicks:
Bubble Gimmick - There are plants and you shoot them, ipso facto: BUBBLES! These bubbles travel the direction in which the plant was pointed and you can use these bubbles essentially as moving blocks of water. I found this to be really fun to play around with and would have even liked if the level featuring these bubbles were longer.
Platform Gimmick - This one is later in the game, featuring a number of platforms on a circular grid in which standing on one will make the whole shebang swing around while moving forward. This isn't the best description, but nonetheless, I quite enjoyed this gimmick.
Crazy Objects Gimmick - In the castle section, you'll come across some extremely wacky flailing blocks and spikes which place themselves properly as you come close to their actual location. For the most part, this might seem to be busywork and too much action for the eyes, but I found it to be really cool and perfect for this sort of malicious adventure game.
Now, I loved most everything about this game, from every level down to the basic sound design, but what stood out the most to me was the final avoidance. Quickly I'll say that I did enjoy every boss to varying degrees, and the final boss (preceding the avoidance) was excellent, but all of them pale in comparison to the glory of the closing avoidance. As you deliver the killing blow to the final boss, it switches gears quickly into a far away screen in which you're softly bombarded with various cherries. The music picks up the energy, and so too does the avoidance itself; with every change to the music, a new section of avoidance is ushered in, such that the entire avoidance sees at least a couple dozen unique sections. The synergy between music, visuals, and gameplay is beyond perfect, it is leagues ahead of any other avoidance or boss fight I've ever experienced, it was the only time I've ever felt chills while playing a fangame, and it is easily my favorite boss in any fangame. The balance between difficulty and enjoyment is impeccable, the music astounding and rendered perfectly through the avoidance itself. I'll never be able to listen to Sayonara Human without seeing this avoidance as its music video.
Domu is one hell of an experience, one that I believe everyone should give a go. The foreign and unsettling world that Nogard has crafted is a world that I am more than happy to have explored, and I would love it if more fangames followed in the peculiar footsteps of Domu.
P.S.,
I 100%, without any regrets or guilt, looked up a video for the puzzles near the end. My brain is far too small to deal with those sorts of puzzles, or at the very least I'm far too impatient. Obviously, this does not impact the score nor the difficulty rating.
Rating: 10.0 100
Difficulty: 60 60
Jul 1, 2020
Chrisay
Really well made and impressive game. Nogard really knows how to make stuff look and feel good.
Visually it's one of the best looking fangames out there. Some great variety in visuals and tone. I didn't like all the visuals though. The fear zone stood out as a pretty bland area visually.
Some of the saves are incredibly fun, with some creative ideas. There were some great gimmicks here that really made the game feel unique. I'm gonna steal some of the ideas for my own project MUHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
The end avoidance really is something special, I wish I hadn't spoiled it for myself by watching it on Youtube, but even then, it still was an incredible time.
I would recommend this game. It's a fun time, however it definetly has its flaws.
The traps stopped really being funny after the first stage, and they became a moment of frustration every time I died to them at the end of a save.
While all of the ideas are pretty good, I disliked how a lot of them were implimented. The growth area was pretty hard to figure out, and the final save in that area is really frustrating, having to go back and forth so many times. Areas such as the fog one had a pretty tough first jump, but were easy after that.
There's a tower chase segment which is really long. It's my least favorite section in the game cause of it's length and how easy all the individual parts were. It would have benefitted greatly from a few more saves and some tougher platforming, cause it got so boring having to redo two minutes every time you died.
The bosses were nothing to really write home about, while they were all fine, I would have liked them to have less i-frames because the two seconds feel way too long.
While the final avoidance is an achievement, I would have wished the avoidance didn't have so many slow moments, cause having to wait in one spot for like 15 seconds twice isn't that fun.
Again overall, I had a fun time, but with some moments of frustrating too. Despite the less great moments, this is an experience I'll definetly recommend.
Visually it's one of the best looking fangames out there. Some great variety in visuals and tone. I didn't like all the visuals though. The fear zone stood out as a pretty bland area visually.
Some of the saves are incredibly fun, with some creative ideas. There were some great gimmicks here that really made the game feel unique. I'm gonna steal some of the ideas for my own project MUHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA
The end avoidance really is something special, I wish I hadn't spoiled it for myself by watching it on Youtube, but even then, it still was an incredible time.
I would recommend this game. It's a fun time, however it definetly has its flaws.
The traps stopped really being funny after the first stage, and they became a moment of frustration every time I died to them at the end of a save.
While all of the ideas are pretty good, I disliked how a lot of them were implimented. The growth area was pretty hard to figure out, and the final save in that area is really frustrating, having to go back and forth so many times. Areas such as the fog one had a pretty tough first jump, but were easy after that.
There's a tower chase segment which is really long. It's my least favorite section in the game cause of it's length and how easy all the individual parts were. It would have benefitted greatly from a few more saves and some tougher platforming, cause it got so boring having to redo two minutes every time you died.
The bosses were nothing to really write home about, while they were all fine, I would have liked them to have less i-frames because the two seconds feel way too long.
While the final avoidance is an achievement, I would have wished the avoidance didn't have so many slow moments, cause having to wait in one spot for like 15 seconds twice isn't that fun.
Again overall, I had a fun time, but with some moments of frustrating too. Despite the less great moments, this is an experience I'll definetly recommend.
Tagged as: domu_game
[0] Likes
Rating: 8.5 85
Difficulty: 55 55
Apr 30, 2020
Mrzwanzig
Adventure game with a ton of different stages. Most of them are fairly short, but just long enough to do some interesting stuff with the gimmicks they introduce. I liked the vast majority of the gimmicks in this game a lot, with some favourites including the spider stage and the "spinny platforms on rails" stage. There's a few places I wasn't a fan of, mostly at the very start of the game and the infamous ice stage, but those are exceptions. The bosses are all fun and well-balanced, capping off with a pretty spectacular avoidance (though I personally found it quite easy outside of the platforming segments). Absolutely worth your time.
[0] Likes
Rating: 9.0 90
Difficulty: 59 59
Dec 10, 2019