Aquaria Review, yeah, spoilers, what do you expect?
So, I've just yet destroyed the final boss in an epic battle, gotten all forms and spells on the way, 100% life, all memories and most of the treasures, though not all. I killed most minibosses and have seen all areas, I believe. I wanted to share my feelings about the game, mostly with the developpers who worked so hard to create this. I want to make a very important note here: This is *not* a gamers review (although I am a gamer), but it is more from a developpers point of view. You might wonder why I consider myself knowledgeable on the topic. Yes, you are right, I am not a professional dev, nor did I ever create something as big as Aquaria (I do look up to you guys, seriously), but what I lack in practice, I make up in theory
(theoretically) No, honestly, (good) game developpment literature is rather sparse and most of it is rather new, and I've read most of what you can read (online mostly, the books I read where not quite worth the read), for example gamasutra, game commentaries and multiple blogs of game devs. I've got 15 years of game experience, so I've seen nearly all important titles. Since there are no established "what is a good game" rules, I can pretend my rules are good
Oh, and if I don't comment on something directly, I probably liked it
But if you really want to know, ask (hah, as if anyone would be interested in that!)
I'm also going to compare Aquaria directly to multimilliondollar budget games like Half life 2 and the like. Why? Because this game is easily as much fun as these, even if there were only a hand full of people involved.
First off, the obvious things.
- Wonderful graphics
- Wonderful music
- Great soundeffects (many games make the mistake of using the same common effects as all other games, I always cringe when I hear the general *lightning/explosion* sound which I've heard in 20 other games and 10 movies, I've not recognized any sounds in Aquaria)
- Did I mention the graphics? Seriously, even if it's "only" sprites, they are beautifully drawn and rendered.
- Music again: I really like to listen to game music (and it's very sad that most current gamers play with their mp3s running in the background, but then most current games have shitty music). I was humming nearly every second tune with the game, something that only happens once every year, and I do play a lot of games (I don't necessarily finish them, that saves time when the thing is mediocre
.
- Voice acting (Jenna something, sorry, I forgot the name). That is some of the best voice acting I have heard in a game ever. The emotion is so perfectly portrayed, I think that easily tops even Alyx (in HL2) or GLADOS (portal), and definitely any other game. No contest. Now go and audition for the next big Dreamworks/Pixar movie!
Atmosphere
This deserves its own topic. The atmosphere in Aquaria is better crafted than in most full price titles, in fact, aquaria beats the shit out of most easily. Yeah, I'm looking at you, Doom3, Fear, EQ2, Final Fantasy and so on and on. The voice is a major part of this, as are the graphics and the music. Very well conveyed is also the "feeling alone" part (kinda broken up with Li, but from a story PoV he is a great idea too, so I can live with that), and Naijas dislike of her power and having to kill all these nice creatures just to survive. It's hard to describe, but the pieces just fit together so well, it's astonishing. This is also the reason aquaria is such a big topic right now. You guys certainly managed to put the big boys (EA & Co) to shame!
Gameplay
I only want to comment on one thing: I liked the cooking. I am one of these people who keep every single scroll/potion/dust/one-shot item until the game is over, because I'm afraid of wasting them. But not having any other source of health (except save points and extremly rare blue flowers) trains the player to use these things frequently. Bossbattles with 3 soups, +def and +energyformshots are a lot more satisfying
That was a masterpiece of game design.
Now we're getting to the ugly part. I might be harsh, I try to be elaborate. There's a TLDR version at the end
Controls
I'm a controls freak. Not a control freak
I mean this: If a game is great, and the controls are messed up, I will hate the game. I am one of these people who have 80 WoW mods, of which 20 are for raids, 10 are for specialized tasks and 50 are for convenient controls. Why should I press two buttons if I can press one button? If I want to play a game about controls, I will go and play some Guitar Hero or Dance Dance Revolution, games only *about* weird controls, but that's their whole point. If I have to click twice to switch a weapon, I wonder why I cannot click once. Now note that I don't criticise the song system, that works great and is a lot of fun to use. No, I mean something different. For example, not being able to customize controls is pure horror. Did you know that on a german keyboard, the y and z keys are switched from english? Any game that uses zxcv as control is unplayable on these layouts, as one of your keys is unreachable (z, that's where your y is). Luckily, aquaria has *mostly* configurable controls (why can't I change the "look ahead" button from mouse3 to something else? There's really no reason not to be able to do that, but it made the feature nearly unusable to me)
But my main gripe is something else: If I play this game for 15 hours, and I fight 50% of that time, then I have to click about 7.5 hours * 60 minutes * 60 seconds * 2 times per second = 54'000 times. Is that bad? Depends. In 1985, that was normal. All games revolved about button mashing. But nowadays, we should be past that stage. I have to mention here that I spend most of my time in front of keyboards (yeah, work, who would have guessed) and I really have to be careful not to get a RSI or other long term nerve damage due to too much stupid clicking. I made an exception for aquaria, but I really avoid games which make me click more than necessary. I removed all doubleclicks from my system if possible. To cut a very long story short: Why does a game from 2007 have a control scheme that's partially from 1990? It's an obvious flaw, although not game breaking. I can already see the "OMG L2P noob!" flames coming. Consider this: If you had to click twice per shot, would that make the game better?
Being able to hold the button down and release a steady amount of shots would be so much more enjoyable. And how to handle the multishot? Either add a button or make it autocharge when you don't hold down the button, releasing as soon as you fire the first shot. Simple, really. That would also remove the tedious "hold two mouse buttons down". Really uncomfortable for your hand, don't you think?
Ah, I forgot: Using a multishot is only worth it if you do a complicated walljump/spin/release maneuver, and then your damage output is at best on par with just spamming projectiles. Also, many enemies have huuuuge health and take way too long to kill. That doesn't make the fights more dangerous, only more tedious.
Power design
Many of the forms are pure Plot Devices, sadly, but could have been so much more.
Normal form: Useful, can sing, has a shield (that thing is probably the most powerful ability any form has, brilliant idea to put it on the noncombat form)!
Energy form: Too much clicking involved. Else very useful and plays well. The multishot could use some more oomph though, spamming is just way more effective. (even with walljump + spin, which is not quite as easy to do and hard to target bosses with)
Beast form: I call this form the "travel form with wall jumps". The bite attack is utterly pointless (very low damage, huge risk due to low recovery and terrible range, and I'd rather have some loot items, thankyouverymuch). No charge either? Shooting is "bugged" in that the shots don't travel to the mouse cursor but where you are currently swimming with the wasd keys. And the shots are weak and ammunition is low.
Nature form: Required at exactly two points of the game, for the flower puzzle and for the door into the body. Charge attack needed for two minibosses, doesn't even have a normal attack (why?).
Sunform: As I call it: Flashlightform. Reminded me of doom3 and its flashlight...
Fish form: Oi, TravelForm Mk2! I used that one a lot, since its fast. And cannot do anything (except if you eat some rare food for poison aura).
Dual form: Finally a very cool form again, although it could have had a normal attack (in both forms, especially in female). Also: Why do I have to do so much button holding here? Just pressing in male to shoot and have a reload time would have been so much more comfortable to do for my fingers. But see the controls topic.
What I want to say is: Surely, adding more stuff to the forms would have been even more work, but that is not what I criticise. I am only opposed to having "forms" which are just spells. "Cross currents" and "light" are the two most obvious examples. And if you want to stick to light form, then add something to it. Some new projectile, different anything. Just more than "It's like normal form, except you cannot shield, sing or anything, but you are allowed to look at the graphics again!"
I would also have liked to see Nature forms normal projectiles doing more than nothing, and Beast form doing some decent damage while biting. The numbers are off there, the design is fine.
Fish form is suitable and doesn't feel wrong, even if it is powerless. But Nature and Beast are supposed to be "OMG THE POWERZ!" and in reality are even less used than fish. Some more shortcut Flowers would also have been nice, just to get a chance to use the form.
It would also have been cool to get upgrades to energy form (permanent spicy roll after half the game for level2 shots?), to make backtracking more fun. The game is about exploration (I think), not primarily about combat, but before you have dual form, any area is exactly as dangerous if you go there a second time.
Abyss/Light form
This deserves its own topic, as it is THE major flaw of the game. Doom 3 was widely criticised for forcing the player to choose between flashlight and weapon. The idea is good: "Sight versus firepower". That works, if you provide *some* light. But not in the abyss (or in doom3 either, for that matter). One is forced to be in light form 24/7, or else the screen is completely black. To quote the HL2 commentary: "If it's not fun, it's not a good idea." When I entered the abyss, I was really impressed. The horror came well across, shivers ran up and down my spine. For the first minute. And then it was boring, boring, boring. Nothing to look at, nothing the collect, no neat enemies, graphics, items or ANYTHING. It's just "swim 3 seconds, blink, swim 3 seconds, blink..." ad nauseum. I was deeply disappointed there. And the fix is actually simple: Instead of having a huge, dark abyss (it's really big, I spent a lot of time there due to its inaccessible layout with very few shortcuts, go from Whale to Body to see what I mean.), just have a small dark map where the Sun form is required to get trough, put a tortoise before it and behind it and make the things below well lit and interesting. Hell, just use the Sunken City design, that was totally underused anyway, I spent like 10 minutes there (and those where great 10 minutes)! (And then I went back looking at a dark screen some more). Is the abyss fun? No. No. No. Is the flashlight form fun? No. No. No.
Body
Similar to the abyss. Nothing to look at, it's just rather bland and boring and very large. If it was half the size, I would have enjoyed it more, even if that cuts out 20 minutes of game time. I liked the battles though, some where rather challenging.
Savepoints anyone?
That's the other "hey, are we back in 1990?" thing. I don't save/reload because I die often (in fact, I died four times in the game, three times because I just did not realize I was badly hurt and once because I badly messed up (and that cost me a full hour, due it being just before the second safe spot in the body after having freed li and everything)). I safe often because I might have to do something else. Losing thirty minutes of game is also absolutely not fun. Games never get "too easy" if you can safe anywhere. They get easy for the bad/new players, but in exchange "save" adds some free challenge adaption. Bad players can save every three minutes and retry if they die. Good players never load anyway, since they don't die. This was a hugely discussed topic in Gamasutra a couple years ago, and the result was: "there's really no reason not to put in easy save options, EXCEPT for technical things (memory card size)".
TLDR: So yeah, that's already it. Criticism is:
- Too few savepoints
- Controls need too much pointless clicking
- Abyss is extremly boring.
- Pointless Flashlight form.
- Underused Beast/Nature form.
- minor gripe: No 1440 x 900 support (yet).
(oh, and I want more spells and things and levels and sounds, and and and! But that requires more developpment time, whereas the things I would want to change would not have changed that significantly).
But I enjoyed the game a lot (see the beginning of the post, there's really much more good than bad about the game). Make a second one. NOW! Oh, and give me the Soundtrack! I need it for my mental sanity!
So, that's it. I don't think I'll have much to add.
