to attack enemies much like Link wields his sword . You can also upgrade this staff along the way to make it more powerful with these blue orbs that are scattered throughout the world . This won ’ t be easy as there is usually some sort of basic puzzle involved in reaching these blue orbs and more often than not , you ’ ll be forced to backtrack to gain access to them after you earn an upgrade from later in the game .
Where the staff really shines is in the magic abilities you need to collect . There are three in total and each will help open up new areas on the map much like an upgrade would in Metroid . The green gem lets you create green block that you can use to get height to reach new areas , a blue gem will allow you to create a temorary bubble that you can ride up vertically and a yellow gem will give you a neat lighting bolt projecticle that can kill enemies from a distance and unlock special doors .
While there is combat like most NES games of this nature , you won ’ t be doing all that much of it . Most rooms ( the game says there are 400 , but most are extremely small ) won ’ t even have any enemies in them , and the one that do usually only have one or two slow-moving ones . And after you earn the lighting bolt staff upgrade even the strongest enemies can be felled with ease from a distance . There where very few times in the game where a basic enemy of any variety killed me outright without me screwing up a jump or puzzle first .
That said my screwups were entirely my fault as the controls are incredibly tight and responsive . There was never a time where I felt like the game cheated me , and even during the most intense moments of bullshit it throws at you , when you die you ’ ll probably see what you did wrong within a death or two . I used an Xbox One controller for this review and I recommend that layout , but as this is a NES-inspired side-scrolling game that only makes sense .
And puzzle is the name of the game in Alwa ’ s Awakening . Well , not so much puzzle in the traditional sense , but more in the Super Meat Boy sense . The game is extremely easy for a majority of the adventure . There is an order to the boss fights , but none of them were that much of a challenge , and if you know your Metroidvania you are going to blast through most of the game with ease .
The problem comes in the very late game where Alwa ’ s Awakening changes gears and adds these spitting bullet blocks that can ’ t be killed or easily avoided . Things often turn into a SHMUP and you ’ ll find yourself not only avoiding enemies , managing tight jumps and using your magic abilities to reach areas all within a single room . This comes out of nowhere and really kills the pacing of the game . Add in instant spike and water deaths and you have a recipe for frustration .
It would be one thing if Alwa ’ s Awakening built to this , but it doesn ’ t . The boss fights are pretty fun , if easy , but nothing you learn during them comes into play anywhere else in the game . It almost feels like the developers built this really pretty looking game and realized it was too easy and decided to just make the end game a frustrating 1001 Spikes-like experience . It ’ s a shame really because a game being easy doesn ’ t make it any less fun or great . I point to Kirby for an example of that .
The soundtrack and audio are standouts in the whole project , but even then I had to cut the soundtrack only because I heard the same 8-bit tunes over and over that they lost its magic . Still , what is there is fantastic and if you don ’ t spend 10 hours on the game finding every little thing like I did for this review , it probably won ’ t get stale . The audio is all mixed really well and helps build this really amazing world that the team has built , so props on that .
Alwa ’ s Awakening is really great up to a point and that is sort of a shame . You end up hitting this late game wall where the difficulty spike makes the game almost a maddening experience that you don ’ t expect . I don ’ t mind hard games , but Alwa ’ s Awakening never builds you up for these sections . Pacing in games is vital for someone like myself and things needs to make sense , and I just couldn ’ t make the connection or find a justification for the weird spike .
Alwa ’ s Awakening could have been to Metroid and Castlevania what Shovel Knight was to Super Mario Bros . 3 and Mega Man 2 if only it had stuck to the things that made it special . I can imagine there are going to be a lot of Steam reviews praising the game , and rightfully so to a point , but I have a feeling a lot of them do so before hitting the last leg of the game .
All that said , I still do like Alwa ’ s Awakening and at under $ 10 you are getting a really solid title . You just need to be aware of what sort of title you are getting in order to get the most enjoyment out of it .
1 5 G A M B I T M A G . C O M