Heart of Ice
Summer has given way to fall, and before long winter will be here, bringing with it snow, hail and delicious hot chocolate. While the pressure-suited protagonist of Heart of Ice, an action adventure platformer from Eddy Larkin, might be facing similarly cold conditions, he has no time to be concerned with sugary beverages. The Watcher lurks somewhere within, watching like the creeper he is, and it's our hero's job to take him out.
Help the hero accomplish his mission by controlling him using the [WASD] or [arrow] keys, and some parts of the game also use the mouse. Move with [A] and [D] or [left] and [right], [W] or [up] jumps, and [S] or [down] attacks with a three-strike combo. Jumping on enemies is ineffective, so it's important to get used to using your weapons early on.
You have a health bar at the bottom of the screen that decreases when you're struck by enemies. It can be restored by collecting health kits strewn throughout the caverns, though these are fairly uncommon and most of your healing will be done through continuing after being killed. While you can regenerate health over time as well, this is such a slow process that it's almost negligible so you shouldn't rely on it.
As you progress through the game, you'll run into three bosses, including a homicidal pirate and a psychotic psychic. These battles are the high point of the game by far, each requiring you to adapt to a new strategy. You can also search for several hidden items throughout the game in order to unlock an additional fight against a secret boss. All in all, Heart of Ice is slightly longer than your average flash game. Expect around 45 minutes to an hour of gameplay for your average player.
Analysis: Heart of Ice is one of those games that really nails the fundamentals of what makes a game enjoyable. It's visually and aurally appealing, the boss fights keep the experience varied enough that it remains enjoyable throughout and there's enough secrets to keep you searching. Larkin has said that he's spent a year and a half on this game, and it shows.
Heart of Ice features a gorgeous graphical style that looks like something out of a hand-drawn cartoon. It also has some memorable music and passable voice acting and sound effects. The main complaint here is the lack of effective sound effects in certain places. Attacking produces a very subtle noise, while the hero doesn't appear to make any sound at all when he's hit, which can be a pain during heated battles.
The only low point is the slightly unbalanced difficulty. The majority of the game is fairly easy, but every so often there's a nasty difficulty spike. Certain parts of the final battle, in particular, are remarkably frustrating and may turn some players off.
The relative scarcity of health contributes to this as well. As there aren't really any penalties for dying other than restarting that section (unless you're going for achievements) it's usually best to just let yourself be killed if you enter a boss battle or difficult area with less than full health. As mentioned, the game claims that you regenerate health over time and that this is affected by body heat, but in practice this never seems to be useful at all.
Despite these relatively minor quibbles, Heart of Ice is an excellent adventure that will leave you wanting more. The top notch presentation would lend itself well to a downloadable release, and with some tweaking the gameplay could be just about perfect. Sit down with a nice mug of hot chocolate and give it a try.
Walkthrough Guide
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I thought that for my first post, i'd make a...
Heart of Ice Boss Guide:
Tim the Pirate
This dude is easy. When he runs at you to swing his sword, jump over him and strike him with a combo. Repeat until he starts throwing bombs. Be quick and while he's throwing bombs, hit him. He will eventually do a heli attack at you. Just jump over him. After certain point, he will summon Crawlers. Defeat them, and he will try to smash you. When he's stuck on the floor, combo him. And his final attack is to shoot you with a shotgun (?). Just jump at the right time and do him one last combo.
Wait, you're not finished yet. He will then summon a pirate ship of doom. It seems harder than it actually is. Just kill all the creatures he summons at you, and he'll try to smash you. Hit him with a combo. Rinse and repeat.
Epic Mode
Now this guy is no piece o' cake. He'll stop doing the sword swing at a certain point and he'll shoot you a lot more often. And he summons spikes along with the enemies (not just Crawlers anymore).
And the Ghost Ship is a lot harder. There will be spikes that raise continually. They were on normal mode, but they were rare.
But he's got one more trick: Helical Tim. BS. Just jump over him over and over until he stops. Then combo him. That'll be done.
Ishmael, The Biggest Headache Ever Not Given To You By Windows Vista
You think I'm kidding? No, I am not. I find him to be the hardest boss in the game. Anyway.
He'll start of easy. Get under one of the two solar pads of the machine gun, so his electrical blasts hit the solar pad. Adjust your position as needed. Which is the main trick.
When the machine is charged (it will flash "charged"), get on it by putting in front of the chair and pressing E. Use your mouse to aim and shoot the gun at him. Now this is HARD. He's moving constantly and quickly. And, after a while (10 secs maybe), he'll blast the machine (he'll make a countdown).
After that, he'll be throwing spectres. These slide across the ground, jump over them. After some of them, he'll be throwing electric balls again. Repeat the machine gun part, except he'll move faster.
Now, after certain point of damage, do NOT get under him. He'll then throw a a giant ball at you. But repeat the strategy. And watch out for his screen flip.
Epic Mode
I could barely beat Ishamel on Epic Mode. He'll start off hard right off the bat. He'll do screen flips very soon. Worse, the machine gun barely does any damage to him. And he'll do more extreme screen flips, but he'll only do them on the first and last moments.
And trust me the machine gun is hard during an extreme screen flip. I'd rather let the screen flip pass before entirely charging the gun.
May science and reason help you on the hardest epic mode of all.
The Watcher
The Watcher
Well... First form. Easy enough, circle around, shoot at him... Rinse and repeat until he's down.
The Ascendant (Piece of cake)
I find him pretty damn easy. All you need is a good eye, as the pink explosions start with a transparent shine. Move your flyer a lot and never stop shooting at him. Do not desesperate if he bring up the shield. Just pay attention.
Epic Mode
...Easy peasy. The easiest epic mode, all the programmer did was bringing up the frequency of the pink blasts and a cheesy line.
The Fallen
No rocket science here folks. Just go and him and combo him restlessly. No compassion.
You know, if you want to, I'll post the (gets shot).
Vercingetorix
The Vercingetorix is unpleasant to the eye, but it's a very fun boss.
First floor
Very fun, if you ask me. Dodge the missiles that it aims at you. He'll then throw some weird undescriptable horizonal lighting that you can avoid by going out of the way. It'll then throw a pink shockwave that is avoided by going to the corner. Then the dragon head will come down. Attack it. Rinse and repeat until the second floor comes down.
Second floor
Now you're for it. The knight attached to it will strike the floor and cause pillars of light to raise from the ground. Then, after you've dodged the pillars of light, laser pointers will aim at the ground. Get out of their reach. After dodging the big pillar caused by the lasers, it will start raining meteorites. Take evasive action, and when one gets stuck in the ground, strike it. Rinse and repeat.
Posted by: Felix
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October 16, 2010 10:58 PM