Gets frustrating after a few hours

[gamertyp95]

After having fun the first hours the game now gets really frustrating.
Not enough money to buy new stuff, running out on everything all the time, not really well controls, swapping forms every few secs through a tedious and lagging ring menu, weirdly placed checkpoints, boring backtracking with much running and little puzzle/collecting, annoyingly placed enemies, bugs, ...

This is really not fun anymore and I stopped playing now at the vulcano after 5 hours. The game feels like an unpolished alpha state, which is really poor for a game that has been released on console months ago.

I hope that this game will be fixed in future, but according to dev's response in discussions here, they think there game is 100% perfect and all problems are the player's fault.

[GSandSDS]

Ring menu: You can turn off the ring menu in the options menu. By doing so the hero will switch through his forms in a specific manner: pig, snake, frog, lion, ... and so on. And if you keep the "switch forms" key/button pressed you can still access the ring menu.

About the checkpoints: If you think that there are not enough checkpoints, especially the ones that heal, then you can use the "teleport staff" to go to another location like the one near the treehouse of Foximus' family. Inside the treehouse there is a save point that will also heal you, and you can teleport back to the location where you left off. It's a little bit like using a mobile healing station. ;) Just make sure not to quit the game or the game will forget where your location in the volcano was.

[FDG Entertainment]

We don’t think that we can make 100% perfect games and we certainly want you to enjoy our game. If you’re stuck and frustrated you can find help either at [e-mail] or [e-mail] As for the volcano: The above hint from GSandSDS is very good, also there are places in the volcano where you can grind money easily. We highly recommend using ice armor and have a look for special ceramic pots that stand around. when you throw magic bullets in it, it will return hearts. Please have a look into the manual that is downloadable from steam for more hints. Eg special effects when wearing upgraded armor sets. You can also look around in previously visited places with your new animal forms to find more heart containers and upgrade gems.

[gamertyp95]

Switching directly between forms isn't nice with 4+ forms. I would prefer a fixed ring menu which isn't lagging. Many other games have working ring menus, so this should be possible to do.

The checkpoint-tip is basically an exploit which works temporarly, but as you said yourself: Need to take a break? Checkpoint gone! Also my problem with checkpoints are situations where you have one checkpoint for two seperate levels which leads to you doing the first level over and over, while in other parts of the world there are checkpoints every few meters. Not fun at all and bad balancing. If I have to use exploits to have a not frustrating expierence, something is wrong.

I went backtracking to farm for ice armor, just to realize that I can't afford all parts anyway without a long grind and that I now have to do all the volcano stuff I've done so far again. There was also no teleport in the volcano, so I need to go the path to volcano again, too.

It's simply poor game design if you let your players hit a wall, which requires to use mechanics which were more or less not relevant so far and then let them do many levels again to go back to their old state. That get's annoying and tedious.

"have a look into the manual that is downloadable from steam for more hints."
Are you guys living in the '90s? lol

[FDG Entertainment]

@gamertyp: Oh! There *is* a ringmenu without lagging - you can set it in the control options. Ring menu ON: opens instantly. Ring menu OFF: opens when holding key

Also there is a teleport in the volcano - it’s behind a door in the hall with the big save spot and the professor. Again: We have support team to help when you get stuck and they’ll be happy to give you hints

As for the ice equipment: armor is most important as it halves fire damage

[gamertyp95]

Originally posted by FDG Entertainment:

@gamertyp: Oh! There *is* a ringmenu without lagging - you can set it in the control options. Ring menu ON: opens instantly. Ring menu OFF: opens when holding key

It's at least a bit better, because you don't need to confirm your choice by pressing a then. But it's still slow, since it then trigger only if I hold the button. So with both options it simply takes too long.

Normally, the ring menu should open directly by pressing the button and close when the button is released, switching to the form selected at that point. That they you could change forms within tenths of a second. This is also basically the state of the art in game design. The two options in this game here are both lacking something.

Also the second option shows perfectly that this game isn't polished, since it still shows to confirm with a, even though you can't. That is for sure just a minor detail, but there are a lot of small details in this game, which as a whole are creating a bad experience for me, especially considering that this game has been released half a year ago.

[frognik]

It gets very controller throwing frustrating at times and there were a few areas that I had no idea what to do and I agree that character changing puzzles are pretty bad. (jump and change to snake really fast to stick to the roof was the worst)
The levels felt like they were designed to have the enemies in the most frustrating spots on purpose.
I think the biggest letdown was the volcano boss with full ice gear making you take no damage at all.

After saying all that I still think this game is not great but not terrible, just good enough.
Not good enough for the price though.

[Razed]

Originally posted by frognik:

It gets very controller throwing frustrating at times and there were a few areas that I had no idea what to do and I agree that character changing puzzles are pretty bad. (jump and change to snake really fast to stick to the roof was the worst)
The levels felt like they were designed to have the enemies in the most frustrating spots on purpose.
I think the biggest letdown was the volcano boss with full ice gear making you take no damage at all.

After saying all that I still think this game is not great but not terrible, just good enough.
Not good enough for the price though.

Maybe it's just not the right game for you. I personally think it's a bit too easy and forgiving at times. I want it to be *more* challenging and confusing.

If FDG ever develops another Monster Boy game then I hope they stick to the classic formula.

[Wis]

The shape changing without ring is what works best. You have just to get along with the number of presses needed to change from one form to another. It takes a little bit of practice but comes as a second nature after you get a grasp to it.
I'm sorry you're having a rough time because I actually think it's a very clever game, made by people who clearly liked the series and are awesomely competent at mechanics and game design.
Surely one of the best titles I've played this year, and one of the most overally polished for sure.

[Chocos Ramabotti]

Originally posted by gamertyp95:

Switching directly between forms isn't nice with 4+ forms. I would prefer a fixed ring menu which isn't lagging. Many other games have working ring menus, so this should be possible to do.

The checkpoint-tip is basically an exploit which works temporarly, but as you said yourself: Need to take a break? Checkpoint gone! Also my problem with checkpoints are situations where you have one checkpoint for two seperate levels which leads to you doing the first level over and over, while in other parts of the world there are checkpoints every few meters. Not fun at all and bad balancing. If I have to use exploits to have a not frustrating expierence, something is wrong.

I went backtracking to farm for ice armor, just to realize that I can't afford all parts anyway without a long grind and that I now have to do all the volcano stuff I've done so far again. There was also no teleport in the volcano, so I need to go the path to volcano again, too.

It's simply poor game design if you let your players hit a wall, which requires to use mechanics which were more or less not relevant so far and then let them do many levels again to go back to their old state. That get's annoying and tedious.

"have a look into the manual that is downloadable from steam for more hints."
Are you guys living in the '90s? lol

I never need to farm anything in that game, if you waste your money for useless stuff of course it's your fault then, there are rarely games out there anymore where money is actually precious.
The Volcano can be tricky in certain situations but not so much that I felt the urge to complain about it since it's still fair. Try to improve and grow past you own flaws instead of cursing the situation. Calling the game an unpolished alpha is way too exaggerated.

[Hyperbean]

"lagging ring menu" Might just be you. Maybe lower your settings?

[Aec0n]

my mean this is the wrong genre for this guy....if he like easy games he need better chose!

i played this game 100% with all archivements and i hope maybe there is a option in future patches make a harder difficult

[AuldWolf]

I managed to speedrun Ori and the Blind Forest, I laughed my way through Freedom Planet, I 100 per cent curb-stomped VVVVVV, the lovely Wonderboy III remake was a bit of a vacation, and I feel Gato Roboto is easy enough to play.

I'll brag because I'm an old-school 2D platformer and I'm really good at them. I played enough of them. Even the obscure stuff like Alisia Dragoon, Ristar, the Dizzy games, and Awesome Possum Kicks Doctor Machino's butt if we truly must go there. Suffice it to say, I've been around.

I had no difficulty with the zany isometric hijinx in Landstalker, even.

I love platformers!

And yet I don't like this game.

That probably seems like a contradiction of terms but there are things about it that rile me up. The early hours were charming enough to obscure the warts—what with all that lovely art—though after a while I just found myself unable to ignore 'em.

Let's talk about some of the issues. I'm going to use Wonderboy III to compare as my gold standard as that's the game that clearly inspired this one.

Of course, this is going to be caveat lector. Which means spoilers.

- First of all, I'm just going to come out swinging by pointing out how difficult quite a number of background objects are to tell from foreground ones.

Despite having bad sight I've never had this issue with any other game I'd played except for those that were commonly considered to be poorly designed. This is amateur platformer development 101, guys.

- This one's a bugbear of mine. The game would introduce multiple new mechanics at the same time and in the same room, which really is something you should never do. For example, the room where you both learn to spit on crystals and use cogs.

- There are random (almost non-sequitur) difficulty spikes that left me wondering whether I was supposed to go in a certain direction.

Wonderboy III used difficulty to guide the player down the path they were supposed to go until they were powerful enough to face the branches. With that in mind, I kept asking myself whether I was going the wrong way as the difficulty went up and down like a yoyo.

The area West of the town with the angry cloud, for example, or the rising platform in the wind tunnel.

- Points of no return resulting in very unnecessary backtracking. Never do this in a Metroidvania! An example of this is where you leave the caverns and pop out at the top of a room in the sewers beneath the town, and then you can't go back that way. Even fan games like Knytt know better than to do this.

- The handholding via sniffable messages meant that the joy of discovering things via subtle clues was lost, which is very present in Wonderboy III's remake. And when it's combined with the difficulty spikes some areas of the game have it's only going to come across as condescending. You shouldn't ever combine tutorialising with hard as nails gameplay challenges.

- A non-trivial (quite big if you search around) number of items can be bought at the beginning of the game which are then rendered inert by the shapeshifting and remains that way for quite some time. Wonderboy III was careful to not make such a foolish error, ensuring that the player would be able to use anything they purchased.

- There's something off about the controls and I think it has more to do with how the graphics aren't properly mapped to the collision than anything as it's most notable around ledges. I've tried an 8BitDo M30, a wired USB Saturn controller, and a wired 360 controller to make sure that it wasn't a hardware issue. It feels similar to the hitbox problems the Crash Bandicoot remake had but in 2D.

https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/528073205311864854/613336299130060820/unknown.png

Here you can see that the character is far too merged with the wall and that just doesn't feel right. If the graphics are indistinct and/or don't match up to the collision, then a teetering animation really does help to inform the player where the edge really is (that's why some games have 'em).

Wonderboy III doesn't have a teetering animation either but they use specifically hard lines to show exactly where a platform ends.

- Having a cutscene finish off the final boss and robbing the player of that victory? Mm no. That's really bad. Never do that. The final strike against any boss should always belong to the player in order for them to feel the accomplishment of it. This is the only game I can think of that's actually done that.

The next few are more subjective but they still marred my experience with the game.

- The writing falls largely flat. I feel that for the most part there just isn't enough of anything other than the cheesy humour, which whilst being nice for nostalgia doesn't really carry the rest.

It feels very meandering and aimless, and when compared to something far better written—like, say, Wandersong—those irksome shortcomings almost make me wish there'd been no attempt at a plot at all.

If you can't really do anything with mystery, suspense, good humour, or character development within the story then it might be best to just not bother? Otherwise the result will be trying too hard and not succeeding.

These next couple of points are more personal in nature but they still marred the overall package for me.

- The jokes made at the expense of the pig's weight made me feel incredibly uncomfortable. I don't enjoy ableist 'humour,' nor 'humour' that projects a negative body image. It all felt really unnecessary.

- The ending was jarring for me even after having stolen the victory of the boss fight away.

Everyone becomes a white human. It felt abstractly like whitewashing diversity away. Just look at all of those happy white people. Mm, no. It would've gone over better had there been a mix of ethnicities.

It was even more jarring narratively since most people didn't seem to mind the transformation, some seemed to find it quite enjoyable. Only a couple of notable exceptions wanted to be changed back. Thus I can't help but ask myself what made the big bad so evil, why did I fight them, and what did I accomplish?

If a game is good then I feel engaged by the challenge raher than just seeing it as a chore, and that's meaningful to me. The majority of the time I spent playing Monster Boy felt like a chore as the bad design decisions kept mounting up, I'm sure there's some I've just plum forgotten about.

The thing is? It's not like I hate the game. The art design is absolutely gorgeous and it's clear that from that perspective it's quite the labour of love. My consternation is how frustrated I am that there's just so much wasted potential here due to sloppy gameplay and narrative design.

This could be an incredible game. It should be. It isn't. It pales in comparison to LizardCube's Wonderboy III remake, and in comparison to most fan games.

If it's the first game for most of the people on the development team then many of these issues are understandable. What it means for me is that whilst—for me—Monster Boy is a flop, I do look forward to their next game.

[Bruda]

Originally posted by AuldWolf:

I managed to speedrun Ori and the Blind Forest, I laughed my way through Freedom Planet, I 100 per cent curb-stomped VVVVVV, the lovely Wonderboy III remake was a bit of a vacation, and I feel Gato Roboto is easy enough to play.

I'll brag because I'm an old-school 2D platformer and I'm really good at them. I played enough of them. Even the obscure stuff like Alisia Dragoon, Ristar, the Dizzy games, and Awesome Possum Kicks Doctor Machino's butt if we truly must go there. Suffice it to say, I've been around.

I had no difficulty with the zany isometric hijinx in Landstalker, even.

I love platformers!

And yet I don't like this game.

That probably seems like a contradiction of terms but there are things about it that rile me up. The early hours were charming enough to obscure the warts—what with all that lovely art—though after a while I just found myself unable to ignore 'em.

Let's talk about some of the issues. I'm going to use Wonderboy III to compare as my gold standard as that's the game that clearly inspired this one.

Of course, this is going to be caveat lector. Which means spoilers.

- First of all, I'm just going to come out swinging by pointing out how difficult quite a number of background objects are to tell from foreground ones.

Despite having bad sight I've never had this issue with any other game I'd played except for those that were commonly considered to be poorly designed. This is amateur platformer development 101, guys.

- This one's a bugbear of mine. The game would introduce multiple new mechanics at the same time and in the same room, which really is something you should never do. For example, the room where you both learn to spit on crystals and use cogs.

- There are random (almost non-sequitur) difficulty spikes that left me wondering whether I was supposed to go in a certain direction.

Wonderboy III used difficulty to guide the player down the path they were supposed to go until they were powerful enough to face the branches. With that in mind, I kept asking myself whether I was going the wrong way as the difficulty went up and down like a yoyo.

The area West of the town with the angry cloud, for example, or the rising platform in the wind tunnel.

- Points of no return resulting in very unnecessary backtracking. Never do this in a Metroidvania! An example of this is where you leave the caverns and pop out at the top of a room in the sewers beneath the town, and then you can't go back that way. Even fan games like Knytt know better than to do this.

- The handholding via sniffable messages meant that the joy of discovering things via subtle clues was lost, which is very present in Wonderboy III's remake. And when it's combined with the difficulty spikes some areas of the game have it's only going to come across as condescending. You shouldn't ever combine tutorialising with hard as nails gameplay challenges.

- A non-trivial (quite big if you search around) number of items can be bought at the beginning of the game which are then rendered inert by the shapeshifting and remains that way for quite some time. Wonderboy III was careful to not make such a foolish error, ensuring that the player would be able to use anything they purchased.

- There's something off about the controls and I think it has more to do with how the graphics aren't properly mapped to the collision than anything as it's most notable around ledges. I've tried an 8BitDo M30, a wired USB Saturn controller, and a wired 360 controller to make sure that it wasn't a hardware issue. It feels similar to the hitbox problems the Crash Bandicoot remake had but in 2D.

https://cdn.discordapp.com/attachments/528073205311864854/613336299130060820/unknown.png

Here you can see that the character is far too merged with the wall and that just doesn't feel right. If the graphics are indistinct and/or don't match up to the collision, then a teetering animation really does help to inform the player where the edge really is (that's why some games have 'em).

Wonderboy III doesn't have a teetering animation either but they use specifically hard lines to show exactly where a platform ends.

- Having a cutscene finish off the final boss and robbing the player of that victory? Mm no. That's really bad. Never do that. The final strike against any boss should always belong to the player in order for them to feel the accomplishment of it. This is the only game I can think of that's actually done that.

The next few are more subjective but they still marred my experience with the game.

- The writing falls largely flat. I feel that for the most part there just isn't enough of anything other than the cheesy humour, which whilst being nice for nostalgia doesn't really carry the rest.

It feels very meandering and aimless, and when compared to something far better written—like, say, Wandersong—those irksome shortcomings almost make me wish there'd been no attempt at a plot at all.

If you can't really do anything with mystery, suspense, good humour, or character development within the story then it might be best to just not bother? Otherwise the result will be trying too hard and not succeeding.

These next couple of points are more personal in nature but they still marred the overall package for me.

- The jokes made at the expense of the pig's weight made me feel incredibly uncomfortable. I don't enjoy ableist 'humour,' nor 'humour' that projects a negative body image. It all felt really unnecessary.

- The ending was jarring for me even after having stolen the victory of the boss fight away.

Everyone becomes a white human. It felt abstractly like whitewashing diversity away. Just look at all of those happy white people. Mm, no. It would've gone over better had there been a mix of ethnicities.

It was even more jarring narratively since most people didn't seem to mind the transformation, some seemed to find it quite enjoyable. Only a couple of notable exceptions wanted to be changed back. Thus I can't help but ask myself what made the big bad so evil, why did I fight them, and what did I accomplish?

If a game is good then I feel engaged by the challenge raher than just seeing it as a chore, and that's meaningful to me. The majority of the time I spent playing Monster Boy felt like a chore as the bad design decisions kept mounting up, I'm sure there's some I've just plum forgotten about.

The thing is? It's not like I hate the game. The art design is absolutely gorgeous and it's clear that from that perspective it's quite the labour of love. My consternation is how frustrated I am that there's just so much wasted potential here due to sloppy gameplay and narrative design.

This could be an incredible game. It should be. It isn't. It pales in comparison to LizardCube's Wonderboy III remake, and in comparison to most fan games.

If it's the first game for most of the people on the development team then many of these issues are understandable. What it means for me is that whilst—for me—Monster Boy is a flop, I do look forward to their next game.

steam level 0 and private profile. HAHAHAHA!!!

[Wok]

Originally posted by AuldWolf:

.

Very interesting, notably the part about the hard lines where platforms end.

Originally posted by gamertyp95:

Normally, the ring menu should open directly by pressing the button and close when the button is released, switching to the form selected at that point. That they you could change forms within tenths of a second. This is also basically the state of the art in game design. The two options in this game here are both lacking something.

Your suggestion regarding the ring menu was implemented:
https://steamcommunity.com/games/449610/announcements/detail/1618401105532119976

[Sea Sharp]

Just discovering the game now, it is indeed a really frustrating game, although I don't think that the game is otherwise boring. It has a lot of the same problem i had with the original Wonderboy: the sword doesn't reach much can only swing one way so flying enemies are a nightmare. Basically, the player is a really big target with little to defend itself. Oh, and those seem to have a lot of fun jumping where you can't hit them, underwater they go up out of reach, when you're charging through walls you miss all of them. Great game otherwise but i surely could have been better balanced.