Towards The Light
No, Towards The Light is not some sort of pixelated existential crisis in game form. Nor is it some touching art house game where one gains inner peace through the manipulation of abstract objects that serve as a visual metaphor for people and God. Well, maybe that last one a tiny little bit if you squint and tilt your head just so, but what Towards The Light really is is a challenging but fun classic platform game with a twist.
In each level you have two goals. Reaching the white door in the level will save your progress from that level as well as unlock the next. Meanwhile, you are going to want to collect all of the light blue spirits in each room in order to power up the giant soul cannon and launch yourself to who knows where. To do these things, you'll use your [arrow] keys to run and jump using [X]. Oh, and you'll also want to hold down [C] to go into ghost mode. While in ghost mode you will pass right through most spikes and platforms and walls. Also, if you happen to connect with an enemy while in ghost mode, you will possess that enemy, and more importantly, you gain their abilities.
Borrowing heavily off of MoneySeize, Towards the Light is a skill testing, spike hopping, bullet dodging platform game. What sets this platform jumper apart from the rest is the nicely implemented ghost mode that, combined with nice level design, allows the player to explore conventional platforming in new and unique ways. Towards the Light might not appeal to a wide swath of gamers, but lovers of all things platform should find this a decently juicy morsel to snack upon.
I loved this game...I keep going back to try to get at least one more "soul" on each level.
Question:
are there "hiding" souls? On several levels it looks like I've gotten all of them, but they only total 12 instead of 15.
Thanks for the review, Kyle.
Fun concept, but not everyone has their X and C keys near each other on the keyboard... would love the ability to reconfigure the controls.
Only 7 levels in, but I like it so far.
One thing I'd like is the ability to skip levels if you're struggling on one.
Maybe something like, to access level x you need to have collected 10(x-1) souls.
Cute game, but I'm driven mad by the fact that I can't let myself go on with out getting all 15 souls! I just can't. I hate the timed levels too, because I always flub up the two buttons and have to start over :(
Great game though. 5/5
@Juxta:
The "hidden" souls are acutally achieved by reaching the flag following the conditions of the flag:
--Red has a time limit
--Yellow must be reached without collecting a single soul on the way
--White must be reached without you going ghost
If you reach them and follow the conditions, it spits out your last 3 souls. And after you reach them, you can go back through the rest of the level (depending on the difficulty of retracing your steps), or you can touch the usually nearby goal and then replay the level to get the remaining 12. Or you can get the regular 12 then do the challenge on a new play. Whatever floats your boat.
Thanks Waggles! That makes more sense now. I think I did that on one level, but I didn't connect the dots.
Nifty trick I just found:
If you jump through a thin platform, you go ghost but it doesn't count against you for white flags. With careful timing, you can use that to your advantage and capture an animal while you are forced to be a ghost. I don't know if it will be useful anywhere else, but it works in level 19.
Seriously need help. Where's the last soul in level 42? There are 9 on stage, 2 from the white flag, 3 from the red flag, so fourteen in total. Where's the 15th? It's the last one I need in the game!
The first thing I thought of when I played this game was MoneySeize. I very much like the game. Simple controls, simple objective, not too easy, yet not too extremely challenging.
I'm in the same boat as ehwat-749 souls, missing one on level 42. Normally all flags give three souls, but that one only gives two, so I'm thinking it's a bug?
Anyway, this is great. Certainly similar to Moneyseize in spirit, but way more forgiving (judging by the fact that I can actually finish it, except for the above).
I'm at the same point, with 749 souls. It's refreshing to have a platformer like this that isn't impossibly difficult.
Ok, there does seem to be a glitch with the white flag on 42. After grabbing the white flag, only 2 souls will drop onto you. The third one seems to drop into the cannon just above the flags. If you jump into the cannon, you can hear the collection sound, but the counter still won't change.
Ok,I think I've figured out what is up with level 42. It seems that collecting the white flag causes 2 souls to fall on you while the 3rd soul somehow gets caught in the cannon directly above the flags. If you jump after grabbing the white flag, you can hear the collection sound, but no soul is added. I've tried grabbing it while solid and while ghosted so that I don't get sucked into the cannon, and no luck either way. It seems that 750 is out of reach.
I need some help on 35. I can't seem to get the right jumping height to get some of them, and I know you need the frog to get from cannon to cannon. Specifically, I need the one between the bottom left two and the one in the top middle.
I hope there's no special prize for 750 souls because level 42 is pee'ing me off >.>
Waggles,
North:
Not too hard. You need the frog to get from one row to the one above it, but moving left and right you can do with just plain ghosting.
South-southeast:
Ugh, this one. don't end up in the southwest cannon; you won't be able to get out. Get frog form, take the west cannon to the central cannon, central cannon to south cannon. Shoot straight up from the south cannon, doing a double jump on your way down to get that soul and return to the south cannon again. In my opinion this was the single hardest soul (besides the literally impossible one).
Thanks for the help! I was able to get the north one and the south one, but the sout-west one and the three lined up next to it are still out of reach.
good game but stuck on lvl 39 is there a way to possess the flying dude?
@dfe
posess the red fish thing and then when you're below the pink guy, jump/ghost and you should be able to touch him at the top of your jump
It's strange: though I like platform games, I really don't like the ones you have to replay a lot of times. I found myself being annoyed by having to get the enemy exactly on the head in ghost mode, and therefore what seemed simple became a 20-or-more plays stage. It just got too monotonous for me. Still, I played through quite a few levels and enjoyed them.
Also, as far as innovation in platformers, you should review One Step Back. It's quite fun, and similarly difficult.
Level 35 solution for the three souls left-down: don't push left or right while fired out of the cannon to the side - this will, even if you press in the right direction, slow you down. -> Frog, down to the souls, back into the cannon, press only "x" to fly to the side and jump to the next cannon
I can't believe that
You can't get the last soul.
Maybe it's a comment about the non existence of a perfect heaven.
Maybe it's a terrible bug.
But it was a lot of work to get 749, and I really want that last one
Level 40 is killing me! Any help?
I am stuck in level 39. Already got all the 570 souls in levels 1-38, but I can't pass level 39.
How to possess the flying pink thing? No matter how I jump towards him, I never touch him.
on level 42 i have 14/15 souls, but I cannot see the 15th one... i have both flags and everything...
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