Awakened Evil Reviews

I have to admit the first impression was not very good. Far from it. The game did everything what's wrong with classic Castlevanias: [list] [*] moving at a snail's pace [*] low air control [*] knockback on being hit [*] too slow to dodge anything if you don't know what to expect [*] a lot of instant-death pits [*] occasional bullsh!t enemy placement [*] agility of a thrown brick [/list] I hate low control and slow movement passionately. Visually, well, it's hard to find proper words. Wait, I know! "Ugly as sin" is the expression I was looking for! It probably looks worse than the first Castlevania but at the same time has this DIY charm of sorts. I actually started to like it, kind of. Especially the bosses that look like something scribbled in MS Paint over the course of a lunch break. Let's address the difficulty next. You'll be eating a lot of unavoidable hits during the first playthrough. You'll be repeatedly stunlocked by small, agile enemies (godd@mn frogs!). You'll be knocked of tiny platforms into bottomless pits while having a full health bar. You'll be intercepted mid-jump with no way of knowing prior. It can get pretty infuriating. Some quotes from my journal to illustrate: "[i]The fourth stage is such a piece of crap. ... Cleared the fourth stage on expert. The dragon boss changed from almost harmless to a very difficult fight just by adding those fu©king birds.[/i]" ----- "[i]The fifth stage doesn't look that bad. ... The fifth stage is, in fact, very bad. It itself is far from easy but the minotaur fight at the end is really something.[/i]" ----- "[i]...and best of all, when losing 50% HP, he spawns a resurrecting mummy. I hate that rag-wrapped piece of sh!t so much.[/i]" ----- "[i]I hate this game and yet I play more every day. Need to get more consistent at stage 3.[/i]" ----- Awakened Evil is a good anger management training. Why should anyone even consider playing this game, you might ask? Let me list some of the good bits so the final rating doesn't seem completely out of place: [list] [*] Good music. I love good music in my games. [*] The layout of individual levels changes based on selected difficulty. The expert difficulty level design is especially good. [*] No screen is free. No screen is a filler. [*] All bosses are good. Some bosses might feel lackluster but those become very dangerous on expert difficulty (see quotes). [*] It is a rather challenging game so, naturally, it feels pretty good to successfully complete an expert 1-CC. [*] All the sub-weapons are useful. I like the throwing axe the most (very original, I know). [*] The dev is nice and responds very quickly on Steam. [*] First to master the game according to SteamHunters! What an achievement! (what am I even doing with my life?) [/list] Hated the game initially but it grew on me pretty hard. Not a love at first sight by any chance but it gets better the longer you play. A very solid 7/10.