Every now and again I'll play a game I paid no attention. I see it one day and think; "yeah, I'll have a go" and it's like wow! Where have you been all my life! Time Spinner was that game for me; I got to play it via the Game Pass on PC (mentioning Game Pass in another post, surprise!) and I would have never purchased it beforehand. I'm one of those strange people that views all indie games with a suspicious and cynical eye. I think horrible thoughts like "I bet it's wafer thin on content" or "it's probably a procedural rogue-like" and "it's probably some shit cash grab with a bit of fancy sprite art". See, horrible, horrible mean thoughts that I tar every indie with like some sort of indie game bigot and I don't want to be like that, I want to be an open minded optimist but I don't have the money to invest in someones hopes and dreams that could potentially be a shit game.
Fortunately, Game Pass mitigates my financial concerns and I can play indies with reckless abandon and thanks to this I've gotten to try some very fun games and one thing I can tell you, is that I'm slowly learning that the indie market is emerging to become the best place for singleplayer games. All the triple A games are interesting in anymore are games as a service and that means prioritising a multiplayer platform that can sustain interest over months or years and sell microtransactions. When I got into videogames years ago, there was a plethora of genres and individual games. New franchises appeared all over the shop, sure not everything was great. In fact most were probably average at best, but you had so much variety. Now publishers just want you to play the same game for eternity, paying real world money for digital hats or face paint so that they can mitigate the exorbitant cost of development but that's a whinge for another time!
Talking about variety; when I'm going to rave about a Metroidvania game it seems like a misnomer, because the reality of it is, every Metroidvania out there is trying to be more like Dark Souls than Symphony of the Night. This is an important comparison, because Time Spinner has a lot more in common with Castlevania's apex Symphony of the Night. To call it a clone would be criminal but an homage it definetly is. Time Spinner handles combat, exploration and RPG elements with fine balancing, no element outweighs the other and you have a beautiful, if slightly linear experience. Time Spinner also has a multi-ending story that changes based on some key choices and whilst it's not Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets. Time Spinner's story is fun and entertaining with enough mystery to encourage further play.
The combat is fun, there's plenty of enemy variety and elemental weaknesses and resistances encourage weapon variation. There aren't really many weapon types or abilities or even progression based skills, (more or that later). Time Spinner's protagonist Lunais, attacks her enemies with orbs that she can equip in each hand and successively attack with. You can mix and match orbs but I never bothered. It's not long before you're able to switch between three loadouts. You can also equip necklaces that act as spells that drain Aura (MP) and rings which act as passive skills, such as floating orbs around you that damage enemies.
One of Lunais' most interesting abilities is to stop the flow of time. This ability is linked to Lunais' sand gauge, a literal hour glass that decreases as the ability is activated and restores when you deal damage to enemies. This ability is really well integrated in the game, initially the game uses it to teach you how to navigate the environment by jumping on enemies and later in the game you can even jump on projectiles whilst time is stopped to access secret areas. But it also comes into it's own in combat: most bosses have near unavoidable, high damage attacks and you'll think it's all so unfair. That is until you remember you can stop time and evade these vicious beatings with ease. I like that Time Spinner doesn't rely on it's time mechanics entirely. It'd be very tedious if you'd have to freeze time often, it's the carefully curated instances it's required that makes the ability fit in so well to the game. It's further evidence of the brilliant balancing I told you about.
Like any Metroidvania worth it's salt, exploration is a big part of the reason you play. Time Spinner is probably one of the most linear Metroidvania's I've every played, but I still felt a sense of achievement as I progressed through the game. Only twice did I check a guide for my next steps but that was more a case of impatience on my part rather that utter misdirection on the game's. It's a breath of the freshest air after the last Metroidvania I played: Hollow Knight. (Warning! Unpopular opinion incoming): I played Hollow Knight for over 10 hours and explored most of the game and beat most of the bosses but I never actually finished it. That game was exhausting, not only was the combat Souls like but the platforming Meat Boy-like (not a thing yet, should be) but exploring Hollow Knights world was a fucking nightmare. I know it's fans/fanatics will claim that is the beauty and essence of the game. Getting lost, not knowing where you're going. I personally think it was a huge cop out and entirely unnecessary to put so many obstacles in the way of navigating a game I've ever witnessed. Hollow Knight was mean, it was cruel and that's fine when it's boss time. But when you just need to find a bench to save your game so you can go to sleep it's depressing.
That's enough talking about other games! Time Spinner is great, the only problem with it is that it's all over so quickly, which is actually a blessing for me and the limited time I have to play videogames these days. I was yearning for more, left wanting and that's a far better feeling than "ooh, thank god that's finally over". You can extend your play time by trying the harder difficulty modes and achievement hunting, but for me. It was a nice slice of game pie, I was almost full. But I certainly couldn't have another portion... Oh dear, all this food metaphor bollocks has made me hungry. So with that, it's time to end this entry and get some pie.
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