My initial thoughts/Stats Update

Look: 7/10 Some cool graphics, I love the absurdity of the enemies like the Scissors enemy closing and opening, or the Ghost Gang (from Pac Man) type enemy, just such a goofy variety. Otherwise quite boring/functional/usual SpeccyandC64 era, but nice to have that surreal aspect to the enemies a la Manic Miner and Atic Atac and others that just fully embraced the absurdity of early game programming and limitations to early game graphics. I'm wondering if the lead character is intended to be Black? My husband thought so when he watched me play for a bit. If so, interesting since I haven't seen that much so far in graphic games... kinda questionable tho considering the role of the main character. Hm. And tho I liked a lot of the enemy sprites, they didn't stay that interesting and surreal, plus some of the "lava" platforms were hard to discern, and other practical "non-functional" Look issues.

Sound: 6/10 No

Play: 7/10 I didn't want to fully get into this because the controls are quite clunky and not as tight as Manic Miner, plus these type platformers tend to be frustrating and several online reviews mentioned the difficulty in this. Oddly, I didn't have to use any cheats, and I only used savestates at the beginning of each level after getting down to 1 life. In other words, I didn't really have to exploit much heh. Which only made me more hooked to this technically mediocre game that nonetheless got me. At least it wasn't as bad as that Quo Vadis game, this one is good by all measures of my taste, it's just not sure if it was worth devoting several hours to it when I have so many games yet to play heh. But here I am... Many of the mechanics were tacky: the heigh-to-die was very unclear, it seems it's just how much time you spend in air cuz sometimes a long jump caused death just as much as a far jump, it just didn't seem consistent nor logical. I am quite sure I was dying in one mid-air because the game saw in-that-moment there wasn't a platform below me except far below, but then one appeared. It nonetheless had me die. The slowness of the jumps and mechanics in general, along with the inability to move mid-jump (which I know was a possibility in this era), oh and the Air aspect (which as of Level 6 has not been relevant, but still), are all mechanics of early microcomputer platformers I don't prefer. For instance, this jump here, you can't just jump from the platform to the one down below, it counts as "falling too far"; instead, you have to place your jump exactly to land on the upper one-spot ledge, then fall from there. Meh, those type parts are just tacky/frustrating, not challenging/interesting. Just poor programming imo, not a matter of difficulty but rather annoying mechanics. Nevertheless, I kept pushing through, finding the right place to jump from etc. Why do I do this to myself lol, or is this what I like about games after all?

Feel: 8/10 Some interesting level design ideas that I appreciate utilized the absurdity/imitations/surrealism of early microcomputer games, like I've mentioned: Manic Miner did a lot of this too. Unfortunately, most the experimentations/4th wall breaking/goofy fun ideas in this game weren't as well executed. Like having disappearing/re-appearing platforms that spell out the Developer company is a cool classic early game idea, but it just mostly resulted in a frustrating level for how early it was.

2nd Play Session: Kinda cool how there was a progression of learning the mechanics, even if some were clunky. One good mechanics progression across levels, which reminded me of Manic Miner but also even more ahead-of-its-time than Manic Miner in that it had a Klonoa/Tomba feel (in Klonoa, I slowly discovered all what you could with, say, the Bubbles that held the captive guys you freed, knowledge of which became necessary to complete later levels but was optional for extra collectibles/convenience earlier in the game), was how those chute-esque black "slide downs," as I called them, could have conveniently been jumped up the opposite direction at any point in the game. But since I didn't use a guide at all, not video or written guide, I only discovered this convenience once it became necessary to progress in Level 8. Even if this game might not have the ability to fight back or level up/acquire skills and items--2 of my favorite platformer elements--it does at least have that progression of mechanics element. Another element of platformers that I like, Crash 3 comes to mind, is when glitches/poorly done collision masks result in your landing on a platform you didn't or seeing past a wall with early 3d games, etc. There was some of that in this, but let's be honest, I only really like that when it's to my favor lol. I definitely landed on some platforms I technically missed. Kinda seems like any part of the platform sprites counts as a platform even if you land "within" it heh.

Attachment: 7/10 2nd Play Session: Yes I actually returned to this, in spite of myself, and tbh, I was really excited/looking forward to it. The mind is a weird thing. Indeed, the game is frustrating and has many clunky aspects, but it's definitely one of those good classic early platformers a la Manic Miner. Out of all the pseudo-Manic Miner "clones" (not that it's a clone), and indeed out of all early platformers that alas lack a way to fight back (which I always prefer), this is among the best. Well, darn, I was enjoying this (well, as much as a frustrating platformer can be enjoyed), but this part seems impossible to get past, and all the videos I then looked up online have a different level setup there. Seems to be a bug or a glitch with this ROM? Boo. I don't like it enough to start it from the beginning again, but I could see myself replaying this some day (indeed, I already played 2 sessions and looked forward to it) to properly finish it. Argh I was so close!

Completion: Through Level 8 but one key could not be accessed due to bug (seemingly... I spent plenty time trying to work around it ha) Playtime: ~3 hours over 2 play sessions