NekoJonez: First Impression: Electronic Super Joy (Steam) ~ Thanks For The Gift!
In the name of all that’s good, I want to thank Justin from the Arpegians since he gifted me this game. Since this game has a soundtrack of my favorite style of music, I was hooked in an instant. He didn’t want anything in return yet, I have to return his kindness with a new article. By the way, this article is one before a huge milestone. Then I’ll have written a 100 articles on this gaming blog. Yay, for me! So a special article leading up to another special article. And that in the holidays. Aw man. Sweet deal. Anyways, let me know in the comments what you thought of this first impression and / or the game.
Joy indeed.
This game’s story is just plain silly. And it works perfectly. This game is a platformer and in my opinion, then you are allowed to have an extremely silly story. This game has the quest to find your… well, ehrm. To keep it PG-13, your backside.
The game opens with a warning screen to warn people who can’t stand flashing lights. Yet, the presentation is in such a silly way that I actually started to laugh. It pokes fun at many things in our gaming community. I really like what they did there.
Also, there isn’t a menu screen. Well, no a “casual” one. You are directly presented with a level select and the option buttons are at the bottom. And since the neat and bones of this game are in the gameplay, the menu is actually perfect. You can easily go to the last level and replay already beaten levels. Why would you replay then? Well, to try and beat your score or try to have a lower death count.
Greatness
Is this game creative? In a way yes, since the visual aspect really plays on the music. There are games that do this (way) before this game yet, it’s not done enough.
While I disliked the black & white level, I found it pretty amusing to play through. And before you think I told a contradiction here, I mean that it’s my least favorite level.
Graphically, this game isn’t anything to write home about. But this isn’t a negative point at all. What I mean here is that there are way nicer and cooler looking platformers out there. But what this platformer does completely right is how simplistic everything looks so that a tutorial isn’t really needed. Stars are for bouncing, and up arrows to jump higher once.
When you miss a jump, you get back to the checkpoint. There are no real lives in this game. Only a time you can beat in your next run. And this game is pretty forgiving. Since the checkpoints are close to each other. And the voices used when you reach the checkpoints are just great.
One negative is actually the attack. That’s my only gripe with this game. The attack is just a b-word to execute. I reached to the point I got the smash attack. And you NEED to jump up to smash down. Honestly, this makes me feel like I’m Mario and with the sometimes tight spaces you need to execute this, it’s just plain ridiculous.
Perfectness
While one or two tracks have some dubstep elements in them, I forgive the creator. It’s not that I hate dubstep but I hate it. I love my base to be on similar level. Those base drops kill the melody for me. So, it’s more a disliking towards the genre.
Yet, to non techno and electronic music fans this soundtrack is catchy. And yes, some of the tracks are now my alarm clock, part of my message tone and my ringtone.
In this game there is a scrolling screen. And it’s pace is just excellent. This game isn’t extremely difficult. To prove my point, a platforming noob like myself can finish some levels close to record times. Oh yes, the game has leaderboards. And this ups the replay value even more.
Besides the “undeep” story and these leaderboards, the replay value is extremely high. But everything is put nicely together by some amazing controls. I haven’t played this game using a keyboard but with a controller… Holy cheese nuggets they are perfect. When you miss a jump, it’s totally your fault. The game has no real cheap tricks up it’s selves. When you missed the platform, it’s your fault.
The presentation of the dialogue is something I want to briefly talk about as well. You pass characters who’s lines of dialogue, or line rather, is simply displayed by white text above their head. This aids the game flow a lot and doesn’t make the game crawl down to a halt for dialogues.
Before I forget, I love the fact that you can use one button for instant respawning. That’s simply amazing. When you fail a jump, you can skip the teleport to checkpoint animation and save yourself some time. And the music continues to play and doesn’t restart. When that happens I get so pissed.
Oh, and about the attacking. The sound effect ruins the music a bit in my view. But I hope that I can lower the volume on it so that problem is solved.
Also, the developer updates the game quite often from the looks of the change logs. Nice job on him.
I recommend the Steam version actually. Since that one has achievements and they are pretty sweet to get. While I haven’t received one I’m so going to do my utter best to get as much I can before I get tired of the game.
And that’s about it. There isn’t anything other special I can talk about so, I think I’ll leave this first impression here. I hope you enjoyed reading as much as I enjoyed preparing and writing this one. Thanks again Justin for the gift and I hope this article is a great way to repay you. Next up, is a special article for my 100th article! See you guys then.
