In Eyesteam's action-packed platformer Call of Sword, swords aren't actually swords. ... well, I mean, yeah, they are, you can totally do sword-y stuff with them, like stabbing and cutting a tin can in half on late night TV. But they're actually powerful symbols of leadership and alien technology that might be able to save a crumbling world, so when a young boy discovers one, it's sort of a big deal... not that other people are content to let him hold on to it. Use [WASD] or the [arrow] keys to move and jump, with [C] or [L] to attack, and press [S] or the down [arrow] to block. If you can reach a ledge, our hero will pull himself onto it, and he can also wall-jump to reach high places. Make sure you keep an eye on your health in the upper-left corner (healing items can be found in crates), and touch terminals to save. Call of Sword's gameplay is simple, but well-executed, though maybe not as fast as some might hope for. You'll need to make use of blocking to get enemies to open themselves to attack, and crawling around the big, lovely levels is fun. It's considerably more complex than Eyesteam's previous titles, and looks great too. Though it may start to feel a little repetitive, Call of Sword is still a fun, well-crafted action platformer for the spiky young swordsman out to save the world in all of us.
This is pretty good. Looks nice, the gameplay is fun and the story is captivating. The introduction of the grapple mechanics wasn't so good though. It was still not clear how exactly it worked (what is the minimum distance, when to press up again etc) when I found a situation where knowing how to use it was vital. You fall down a pit if you don't grapple fast enough. So I replayed that part a few times and gave up.
But I like where the game was going. This is a level design problem I know too well. The developer knows the gameplay better than he thinks he does and it's hard to create levels for people who are just getting to know the game.
I like the part where you're in the middle of a sword battle and then you activate the elevator you're on because THE "USE ELEVATOR" KEY IS THE SAME AS THE ATTACK KEY.
sigh.
Sorry, but even mapping the keys to a gamepad makes this game frustrating as heck with the knockback during combat. I just couldn't deal with it.
Yep, totally agree with this. It's a really cool game, looks nice and plays fluently. However, the grappling is far too precise which sucks. Totally annoyed me when I have to pass that gap mentioned above where you need three well-timed grapple actions. And after that far too difficult and random part, you die because of the next hard part, without save and have to do it all over again.
And the, cherry on the pie, my character froze because I think I tried to
fire my gun mid-air
and I couldn't get out of it, so, a bug, right after the extremely difficult part.
In short, my annoyance threshold was reached and I quit. Pity, because if that grappling mechanic was okay, it's a pretty good game.
Not to mention the end boss, which adds HUGELY to the aforementioned annoyance factor. Still trying though ;-)
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