Pulseman
Graphics-7.5 Sound-8 Control-7 Challenge-7 Story-6
Level Design-6.5 Frustration-8 Fun-7 Originality-7
Overall Score-7
+ Interesting retro/90s techno art style, some innovative gameplay (voltecher power - used to bounce around in an Arkanoid fashion and to ride wires around levels which you can also switch between when close to each other), choose your own path (three levels at a time, similar to Thunder Force), hidden items, decent voice samples (in english, fully spoken sentences after beating levels), decent variation, good length, some good bosses (Pulseman rival)
+/- Controls could've been handled better on a six button controller (one button for running, one for dashing), charging would've worked better if done like in Mega Man
- The game can't seem to decide if its focus is speed or exploration (when running and jumping you'll often hit enemies, pits or spikes due to the zoomed in view), some slowdown (almost every time you do a charged shot), the main mechanic is flawed (you can only shoot diagonally upwards and move about a screen's length if not bouncing on a wall, you need to do a double-tap dash move (pre-set length and small pause after finished) to power it up which both breaks the flow of the game and leads to a lot of cheap hits), while you can pick up a voltecher power up that keeps you charged at all times you'll lose it when entering a new sub area and they are placed scarcely (sometimes even hidden), blind jumps (can't look up or down), frustrating bonus game (poor overview - can't see where the pad controller is when the screen scrolls up), boring auto scrolling level near the end, lack of (challenging) enemies (and most of them look pretty generic - bosses excluded), some awful looking and/or distracting backgrounds, no difficulty options, somewhat boring soundtrack (sounds like boss music most of the time), you sometimes can't tell if you're damaging a boss or not, the spikes in stage 2 are bugged and sometimes do no damage, easy final boss
Level Design-6.5 Frustration-8 Fun-7 Originality-7
Overall Score-7
+ Interesting retro/90s techno art style, some innovative gameplay (voltecher power - used to bounce around in an Arkanoid fashion and to ride wires around levels which you can also switch between when close to each other), choose your own path (three levels at a time, similar to Thunder Force), hidden items, decent voice samples (in english, fully spoken sentences after beating levels), decent variation, good length, some good bosses (Pulseman rival)
+/- Controls could've been handled better on a six button controller (one button for running, one for dashing), charging would've worked better if done like in Mega Man
- The game can't seem to decide if its focus is speed or exploration (when running and jumping you'll often hit enemies, pits or spikes due to the zoomed in view), some slowdown (almost every time you do a charged shot), the main mechanic is flawed (you can only shoot diagonally upwards and move about a screen's length if not bouncing on a wall, you need to do a double-tap dash move (pre-set length and small pause after finished) to power it up which both breaks the flow of the game and leads to a lot of cheap hits), while you can pick up a voltecher power up that keeps you charged at all times you'll lose it when entering a new sub area and they are placed scarcely (sometimes even hidden), blind jumps (can't look up or down), frustrating bonus game (poor overview - can't see where the pad controller is when the screen scrolls up), boring auto scrolling level near the end, lack of (challenging) enemies (and most of them look pretty generic - bosses excluded), some awful looking and/or distracting backgrounds, no difficulty options, somewhat boring soundtrack (sounds like boss music most of the time), you sometimes can't tell if you're damaging a boss or not, the spikes in stage 2 are bugged and sometimes do no damage, easy final boss
