Recent reviews by MonkeNeuron

This game is dear to me; the experience is priceless.

Almost 4 years ago, I spent almost 14 hours to summit the mountain for the first time.
Then some weeks later I summited a dozen times or so. Then I thought I was done with it.
Recently, I picked it up, and I finally had summited it 100 times. During my 100th playthrough, I still fell down the orange hell, 3 times.

It's a journey.

Finishing it for the first time definitely is something I'm proud of, even if it took me almost 14 hours. I really relished that experience, "with Bennett Foddy." I don't quite remember much about the experience per se, but I still get nervous at the orange.

Recently I decided to pick it up because I think I can get something different by beating it 50 times or more. At this stage, it feels like a race without competitors. I'm not one of those "talented" humans and that's okay. As Bennett Foddy said, quitting (before one's first completion) is also a legitimate way to end this game. But I feel like I can do something more, and learn something precious still along the way. Alas, diligence makes up for one's deficiency.

I got a taste of failure, but also of the perseverance after many falling downs. To this day I still really adore that quote by Mary Pickford, "You may have a fresh start any moment you choose, for this thing that we call "failure" is not the falling down, but the staying down." Falling down can hit really hard. I sincerely respect persevering characters; for example, in anime, Homura from Puella Magi Madoka Magica and Shirase from A Place Further Than The Universe. Said works delivered the perseverance elegantly; however, even so one may still not be able to feel vicariously the full sublimity of persevering after many falling downs and eventually reaching some summit of some sort. One way one can experience it is through playing this game. It's really a beautiful human experience.

(p.s. I still like to listen to Bennett Foddy's narration in the game from time to time.)

The Best Waifu Best Soundtrack award 2020.

• The puzzle gets quite challenging later on but I think it ends just as you may be too tired of it. Maybe.
  
• The character art design... well that is the meat of this game. Go to pixiv (Tag: helltaker[www.pixiv.net]) or twitter (hashtag: Helltaker) or some other websites (like just google), and you can find tons of fanarts, some of them quite lewd. That will give you an idea on the meat of this game.
  
• The OST is awesome. You mainly just hear one soundtrack but it doesn't get old, not anytime soon. The soundtrack artist Mittsies had one's work published on bandcamp. Since OST isn't available on Steam at the time of this writing, if you are interested, you may want to have a look at the full OST collection on bandcamp Helltaker Soundtrack[mittsies.bandcamp.com], or game OST (lacking Apropos) plus some other tracks Equilibrium[http//Equilibrium].

If you are a Jules Verne fan, or a text-based genre fan, you should definitely play it.
This game offers you:
1. Well-written text with numerous incidents and witty/intriguing comments.
2. Very nice background artworks with awesome ambient sounds.
3. More things you may add here but the first two are sufficient.
Bad news is time flies when you are making decision (e.g., in market, on the global view), but it stops when you are enjoying the major part of the game, which is loads of reading.
Also, if you don't care for any achievements or the goal to circumvent the world under 80 days, I strongly suggest you take your time traveling (travailing) as many cities as possible, for you will get to encounter more of thsoe very interesting incidents and nice scenery on your journey!

Through the yellowish lens, I saw magnificant scenes, with great details and intriguing story and fantastic unconscious body maneuvers.
The atmosphere of every single place is hard to forget... You know it when you see the screenshot. You don't just know it. You feel it. You don't even need to see the screenshot. Maybe, you just need to see a similar lens in the right color, like the yellow one, that is.
It's beautiful.
I usually don't get any views on my reviews, and when I do, it's thumbs down. But, you know, I never asked for this. Right? ;P

Well, if everything (I mean the saving system) works just fine now, since v1.2.0 is just released. you may give it a try. Not too bad a game.
BUT, I bought it long ago and played it long ago. I unlocked 31 achievements (2 left, letter z and a-z). For some reason I have to use a new laptop and I really tried to transfer this save file (it was not technically a save file... but saved in a registration system kind of thing) but failed. (Many players also had this problem, not sure how this new version goes so far.) Now if I want to finish the business left, I have to play it all over again.
It doesn't matter too much if it does not support cloud save. But come on, you can't even find the proper save file?

Splendid.

Possibly a spoiler:
"I did it. - I killed him."

Definitely a spoiler:
Spoiler alert!
"She did it. - She killed them."

Very decent game.


Revised: (relatively more serious, second time, changed a bit of alignment)
(Still, spoiler alert!)


I was born, into a world far less than pretty.
Personnel: 5859.

Nuclear war declared, a small group hid under debris.
Outside unknown while inside leaked.
Just as it happened, I was born.
Born into the world where there's no flower to see.
Joyous and happy, my mother with me.
One day I was playing with my little friends.
Overheard the gloomy condition, that people might die.
Radiation and starvation, one really needed to try.
My mother always busy, occupied and sullen.
Didn't want to make me cry, she got a plan.
I didn't feel too bad, though outside was fallen.
Ration, supply, living or dead.
For me I just wanted my birthday glad.
Beens or sardine?
Anything was better than being dread.

A disaster unknown happened inside.
No one survived except my mother and I.
Personnel: 592.

I was told not to wander around ever since that day.
Staying in that floor to keep the danger at bay.
Good boy as I was, every word she said I kept in mind.
Lonesome as can be, I still had my mother with me.
Lived for 30 years, too much silence, and too much obedience.
And I read as usual to make her sleep.
She was weak, and I knew.
That day would come, not too late and not too early.
Nothing to do but to cry and weep.

But, for me, same old schedule, same old routine.
Except my mother, never talks to me.
27 years of food, 27 years more to suffer.
For one man living under great solitude.

Routine breaks as the machine strikes.
I have to leave my floor, break my promise for sure.
All is empty, all is silent.
But inside my head, nightmares never cease.
One problem fixed, another follows.
I get panicked, all the bitter bits I have to swallow.
I start to wonder, I start to get sick.
All these nightmares, I try to follow.
All the memory bits scattered and tattered.
But I try to make sense like playing a jigsaw.
Then I hurt myself and radiation leaks.
I can't stand anymore but to go and exlore.
Then I found a piece, in a place where I never thought to tread.
The one matching the jigsaw above my mother's bed.
I almost get to the exit, with my memory also complete.

30 years of love, in such a gloomy space.
But it's not beautiful, and it's not great.
It's like a coin which is two-faced.
The reality is the coin, and it never stands.
Either head or tail.
That love from your mother, cheated to make it head.
The head is 2, and the tail is 57.

It reminds me of The Witcher 2: Assassins of Kings Enhanced Edition.
Also, never have I ever played any RPGs with such funny junks.

Buggeration! Why are there not much games like Bector (Hector)?

Funniest point & click game I've ever played!

The game itself is not bad, even though it is not really my cup of tea.
I don't want to talk much about the content of the game, like how fun it is to me. No. I want to talk about the bugs first, since they are the reason I uninstall this game. I switch off fullscreen, and it turns out to be no resolution to set up, but luckily you can resize it as you wish. BUT the thing is, every time you open this game, you have to resize it again and again. Okay, this may not be that vital.
The other bug that really annoys me, is when you can't pick up the weapon. Normally I will meet this bug on first level, since usually you have weapon to pick up on very early stage. And this phenomenon is totally random, at least from my perspective. Initially when I click retry button, I may encounter such bug. Then I use back to manu and everything seems to work out just fine. But later I notice this is not the case. Once I start the game to show my friend this bug, thinking I may need to play and die few times to see this bug working, but no. I have it right after I start the game.
There's many minor things (not bugs though) that bug me, but not as serious as the one I just mentioned.
The game itself is not bad, I repeat. What is bad is the serious bug that's bugging me.

Beautiful yet sentimental journey. It makes you want to cry without tears. After what happened, you started to question yourself: what is life?