Topic: Bit Boy!! first impressions

Hey Philip, let me know what you think of Bit Boy!! if you try it out. I'll do the same.

I wouldn't say Niki was the worst game EVER, in fact I found the first half of the game mildly entertaining in spite of its numerous flaws (horrible jumping physics, poor enemy design, incosistent collision detection when hitting enemies, inane requirements of having to defeat every enemy and collect every gem in a certain order to pass each level). It wasn't until the final 20 or so levels that the level layouts became so unforgiving that it seemed like the developers were embracing these design flaws in an attempt to make it as much of a frustrating and utterly painful experience as possible.

I stand by those words. And that statement includes any random Flash game I've ever played, not just commercial, console games.

I would rather play Dragon's Lair for NES the rest of my life than have to play Niki for another hour. It's at least funny how horrible that game is.

Nope. I'm avoiding this one like the plague.

Yeah Corbie, definitely. I'm excited to hear your thoughts as well.

The fact is that no matter how bad the reviews have been, the gameplay footage doesn't look that bad (I agree with Adam that it looks ugly in later generations, but the game behind the graphics has yet to convince me of its awfulness). Also, I'm a huge Pac-Man nut, and Bplus can swear up and down that the game is nothing like Pac-Man all the want...it looks like a pretty neat Pac clone to me. And I mean that in a good way.

If you guys both like it, I'll have to reconsider it. I agree, the trailer looks interesting, but the problems listed in NL's review do not paint a pretty picture. "Pac-Man Clone" sounds like a compliment to me.

Actually, I was under the impression everyone was going to expect a big fat 9/10 style rating. Like Brutus said, I have acknowledged quite a bunch of negatives about the game, but I felt that they weren't too big and didn't ruin the game experience.

Still, looking forward to hearing your thoughts, Corbie and Phil, since you both seem to be looking forward to getting stuck into the game, which means that at least you're going to look at it from a more "glass half full" angle. Not that that's necessary for reviewing the game, I just feel that the reviewers so far didn't seem to be interested in it from the very start, something that ruined their perspective of the game.

Also: sorry about the delay in the review, you wouldn't believe how busy I've been recently, what with a bunch of new things on the 'site such as the podcast, and getting a new baby brother just last week that I've been to see for most of the weekend.

@Wiiloveit - Haha I kinda did expect a 27/30 actually. You have saved some credibility with your modest rating. It seems that unlike me you didn't find the dead ends too annoying. I just really resented having to use up my special attacks through no real fault of my own.

I'm looking forward to Corbie and Chicken Brutus' thoughts later today. It should be interesting!

Congrats on the baby bro! I hope your folks called him Jimmy, so you guys can be like the Double Dragon brothers!

I've made it to the 32 bit version, and that didn't take much time at all. I'll play more after work. (I was on my lunch break.)

To be frank, I've got an armload of flaws I can rattle off. Some of them are minor (some screens can be advanced by pressing 2, others need you to press + instead...why not be consistent?) and others are pretty big.

Among the big ones:

• Up to and including the 16 bit era, Bit Boy seems to move on a grid. Think of a checkerboard. That much is okay (if very out of place in the history of non-puzzle console gaming), but instead of snapping to the next position (as one would on a Game and Watch), we need to wait for Bit Boy to gliiiide into place, during which time he can't turn, or stop moving, or anything else. This makes evading creatures that are nearby very difficult, because you can't even react to them until you finish sliding into place. Why? You could argue that The Legend of Zelda takes place on a grid, too...and you'd be right. But you aren't beholden to it, and you can stop between tiles, change directions, and otherwise respond to the game world around you. That's a game of exploration. This is more a game of confinement.
• This problem goes away in the 32 bit mode, but others arise. Bit Boy no longer has to come to a gliding stop after each directional movement, but now he takes AGES to change directions. So you can outrun a beastie down a corridor, but God help you when you need to change directions. Steering Bit Boy is about as responsive as steering a trash barge, and you'll get killed. Why can't he pivot, like Pac Man? Or, if you'd like to avoid the Pac Man comparison, why can't he pivot like EVERY OTHER CHARACTER IN CONSOLE GAMING EVER?
• If there was an instruction on how to change the camera angle, I didn't see it. So when the 32 bit camera was damning me to low visibility, I wasted 3 or 4 attacks trying to change perspectives. For some reason, "attack" is mapped to a whole load of buttons, but the camera is mapped only to one. Of course, this is a mistake you'll only make once, so...hey...no big whoop.
• Why, oh why, oh WHY OH WHY OH WHY do the bad guys still get to run around after you solve the level? This means you can't make a last-ditch suicide dash for the final pellet/bit-friend like you can in Pac Man. You know how sometimes in Pac Man you'd have to just run headlong toward an approaching ghost because the final pellet was between you and him? If you got it before he got you, the level would end, and you'd wipe the sweat from your brow. Here, if you get it before he gets you, he gets you anyway. Hooray!
• The level design is cruel and atrocious. Placing one bit-friend at the end of a series of long, escapeless corridors while hordes of random bozos rain in on you from the other end is not fun. No, it doesn't add to the challenge. Challenge is something that can be overcome. This just adds to the frustration. Don't prolong the game by making the deaths cheap...prolong it by making the experience fun.

That said...the game really isn't that bad. I played it, and it was actually kind of fun. It wasn't world-changing, and, being totally frank, it needed quite a lot more work, but it's not a bad game, and I can easily see how someone could have a lot of fun with it.

The only problem is that I only played it for around a half hour, or less, and at one point in the 16-bit era, I started thinking to myself, "Why am I doing this?"

As many times as I've cleared stages of pellets in Pac Man, I've never asked myself why I was doing it. As many times as I've scaled construction sites to stand next to Donkey Kong, I've never asked myself why I was doing it. As many times as I've stayed up all night stacking random blocks in Tetris, I've never asked myself why I was doing it.

So it's not good when, after a dozen stages or so, you realize you're steering an unresponsive cube around some garish scenery...when you could be outside, reading.

I think the 5 score it got here was absolutely correct. It is NOT a bad game. It has problems...including some big ones...but that doesn't make it bad. Its worst crime is that it feels kind of pointless.

And, hey, as I've said, Tetris and Pac Man are arguably pointless as well. The difference is you never get the chance to realize it.

And boy oh boy is that a huge difference.

Recommended? Maybe not entirely...but I wouldn't steer anyone away from it either.

@Wiiloveit:
Congrats on the new baby brother! Don't you also have a baby sister or something? Must be getting crowded at Wiiloveit Industries!

Nice impressions Chicken! I can't wait to hear what you think when you make it to 128-bit world.

This bit puzzled me too as the bad guys do become almost stationary when the level ends, but will sometimes move weirdly and kill you. I just stay clear of them now just in case! Doh!!

Great first look, CB. I have some similar problems. The game isn't a big deal to me thus far. It's just... "okay" and Wiiloveit said it best in his review that it's nothing "outstanding" or anything. It doesn't really do anything wrong but I think that's the problem: it doesn't do much to make itself known amidst the WiiWare crowd other than the retro/nostalgia feel. If that were absent, the game would probably get an even more critical rating.

So far, I can't say I recommend the game when considering the price. I mean, it's not a bad price or anything but at the same time, you could get other things.

I've only wanted to play in short bursts so far so I'm like only on the fourth world I believe. I'm hoping the game improves because if it doesn't... well, we'll see...

Oh and I love the ability to change the camera view. Definitely makes things more interesting. But some of theg ame's flaws are still inescapable and/or made worse.

I'd rather buy Karate Phants.

Was waiting to hear someone use Karate Phants to insult a game. Before it used to be Hockey All-Star Shootout but now we got Karate Phants to help us insult games now.

Huh. Sounds a bit like some of the Castlevania games (Rondo of Blood for instance) where, after you deal the final blow to the boss, he can still hurt you, and he might explode into piece, dash towards a wall, or something along those lines as he's dying, so even if you've killed him, you might get hit by that and still lose. I suppose it's a bit out of place in a Pac Man style game, though, where one expects a certain instant invulnerability upon completion.

Yeah, it's true. There are precedents for it, but it never feels "right" to me. At least, it hasn't yet. We take the invulnerability for granted, and sometimes we don't even deserve it. (I beat a boss in Mega Man 2 recently, as an example, and both of our projectiles were in the air at the same time. His killed me and mine killed him at the same time. The "success" music started to play as I was exploding, and my death didn't register!)

I think it's fair to assume that your trials should end once the goal is accomplished. If it was something like "collect all your friends and return to the entrance," I can understand the monsters moving around until you get to where you need to go. But instead there's nothing else for you to do...so why are we even there?

It would be kind of like finishing a level in Super Mario Bros., only to have a goomba that may have been pursuing you follow you into the castle and kill you. Or in Punch Out, if you won by decision or something, but then got knocked out because, for some reason, your opponent was allowed to stand behind you, punching you in the back of the head while you were celebrating.

You'd just have to time the fireworks properly to blow him away.

This would be great fun in multiplayer.

That is awesome. There should be a speed-run kind of challenge where you have to play through the entire Mega Man 2, using one life, but dying with every boss.

If this game ends up outselling Bit. Trip Core I will puke!

At this rate, Bplus seems to be in the running for being remembered as the Ed Wood of video games. Each new game will seem like this will be the big break they've been waiting for... but success will elude them again and again.

I didn't bother with Twist N Paint, but I gave Niki a try... It was okay, but the difficulty was a bit high for me and I got stuck at... the 2nd set of levels? I don't even remember how far in I got exactly but I couldn't get more than halfway through that set of levels before it was just too much.

I might give Bit Boy a try eventually because the concept does still look interesting. It's kind of low priority though. Very low priority.

@Dazza @Chickenbrutus
Thanks, btw, his name's Eddie. I hate it, but that ain't gonna change nuthin', so I'll just have to get used to it.