Jelle's Marble League Reviews

After getting into Jelle's Marble League only a few days ago and finding out that they managed to create a game for themselves, I, as a newly minted Green Ducks fan, wanted a chance to lead them into immortality. So of course, once my student loans came in, I felt compelled to buy this beautiful game and try it for myself! Even though the graphics remind me of a late 90s/early 2000s video game, I will say that the gameplay experience is excellent, especially in story mode, and I can easily see myself playing this game. Worth every dollar, worth every minute, and I hope to one day see the 2022 Marble League courses included in this game!

The game has the potential there. In it's current state, it's missing a lot of core content (events & a season mode). What is playable is great, and has me wanting an update really soon. You can currently play individual simulation events but they don't count toward an overall standing OR you can play the arcade mode which are sand rally minigames. I still had a lot of fun with them and if you're a fan of the show than you'll want to support this game. It will be so much more, I'm excited to be on the journey for it.

it was bad when it came out but the story mode and new message and training is really good. I reccomend it. Good game. Hopefullly more good updates out soon! 7/10

This game is extremely fun for me to play, as I am a fan of the YouTube races. Now, some pros and cons. Pros: You can play as one of your favorite teams from the YouTube races, some "Indie League" teams or one of up to three custom teams that YOU get to make. The events are fun to watch, very well programmed and there's always the spontaneous bunch of random happenings, such as a team doing poorly suddenly making a resurgence in the last half of the season. Cons: The commentary is very repetitive and sometimes isn't relevant to the situations or events. The events are always the same and there is no way to change the order in season mode. The arcade play would be a lot more fun if the events weren't locked behind a medal requirement, some of which are pretty high. Now, this game isn't perfect and is still in early access, as it clearly states on the main screen. The developers have obviously already put a good amount of time and effort into making this game as it is. It runs very well and since the last update, I haven't seen any new bugs or performance issues. That being said, I agree with some of the others in the community that some new events or rotating events would be fun to see. I wish this game tremendous good luck and I hope you all check out the official YouTube channel for Jelle's Marble Runs. His commentary and dedication alone are what got him such a following that he was able to get this project greenlit for us so we could also have the joy of a marble olympics at our fingertips whenever we want. 4.0/5.0 is my official rating for the game as of April 4th, 2022 and is subject to change as updates and patches are implemented into the game. I sincerely hope anyone who purchases or is already playing this game has as much fun with it as I have.

Obviously it's in early Alpha but there's clear issues with the pacing and unlock mechanics of the game. Having events locked behind three different "currencies" is cumbersome at best and prohibitive at worst. This is, in my opinion, an easy fix in terms of consolidating all of the podium points into one currency. The controls and mechanics could be explained better and I assume that is the plan for future development. As of now I regret spending $20 on an early access game that has relatively little gameplay.

I unfortunately can't recommend this game. I love the YouTube channel, but this game just isn't fun. You don't really have any control, aside from selecting the marbles that do the event. The stats don't seem to matter at all, so it's all just down to luck. You can't skip at all, which means you have to sit through every single event, even if your team has already been eliminated. Especially on longer events like the funnels, this takes way too much time of just sitting there doing nothing. It's also quite buggy. In the short period I've "played," I've had several major bugs that seriously detracted from the experience. For example, with the funnel event, one marble blocked the exit (at the catchment area), causing two marbles to get stuck there and continually fuse together and jump back. When the even was over, the blocking marble was declared DNF, even though they did quite well in the event and definitely finished. Even though the game is now fully released, it still feels like an early access game and not a good one either.

Jelle's Marble League is a game announced shortly after the 2021 Marble League, hosted by the Crazy Cat's Eyes. It received a large amount of publicity and quickly became very popular among the JMR community, with plenty of talk, news, ideas, and videos surrounding it. If you wouldn't mind, keep reading to see if it lives up to the hype! Upon loading the game for the first time, there's no tutorial, however, there's a button with instructions on the upper left of the main menu tab. Jumping into offline simulation play, you're given one event, the 5M Sprint to try to unlock the remaining events. You can unlock the remaining events by getting medals, which you earn by finishing in certain positions. This varies by event. While some people, myself included, may enjoy the grind to unlock the events, it's very understandable why this can be very annoying, frustrating, and time-consuming. It would be nice if there was a setting to choose between having them all unlocked and having to gradually unlock them, satisfying both parties. Arcade play, where you can control your marble, only has a few events- the Talisman Challenge, where you try to collect all the talisman along the Sand Moguls course, Roldo's Entourage, where you're challenged to find Roldo among the Felynia crowd, and a mode where you try to collect a certain amount of stars and/or collectibles and/or finish a certain position. These are entertaining, but eventually the magic fades, and I hope for more in a few month's time, hopefully all the ML21 events in the future. Seasons were just released a few days ago, from the time of this update. Despite there being a few bugs in some events, it's amazing and one of the main reasons to buy this game. You get to choose your team and the other teams participating (it would be nice if there was a qualifier though), and run through all 16 events, just like you would see in the actual Marble League. There's an opening ceremony, and podium ceremonies for all 16 events, although no closing ceremony, but hopefully that will come soon. Arcade mode has also been released, adding additonal elements of team control to the seasons (it's optional). Online play would benefit from there being more people in the lobbies. This is completely understandable because it's early access, so hopefully the lobbies will be busier in the future. It would also be nice if there was a way to compete with people and AI. There's a way to make your own team in this game, with 3 slots for multiple different teams if you so desire. The actual team creating process is a bit dull, but still worth it. It would benefit from more different marble presets rather than just JMR skins plus a few different ones, but it's still fine the way it is. A fun idea would be to use your leftover medals to unlock more skins, since medals become useless after unlocking all the events. There's a team biography section, worth going through even if you're familiar with the JMR teams. Some other things, the music was composed by Minos Fylaktos himself, and some of it was even taken from the 2021 Marble League! All of it is fantastic, and I'm very excited to see if more will arrive if this game gets expanded in the future. A physics engine overhaul may be in store a while down the road, as some events are either way easier or way harder, in comparison to the actual Marble League. However, I'm not sure if this is even possible. This game is a bit pricey for the content, but absolutely worth getting on sale! Thank you for reading my review!

The you tube channel is awesome, the game is NOT. The physics is a mess. The wave - most marbles stop dead before the first wave hit. Jousting - dont even know what goes on there, alot of marbles get stuck behind the big one and just keep sinning. The water is where the worst physics is. Most events your marble stop dead when it hits the side. Ive played 9 seasons. No gold medals, no silver medals, couple of bronze, havent finished higher than 11th, Then online, earning marbles to unlock other events, i dont want to grind a game where i cant even do anything. Ì doubt this game was Beta tested. Not worth the money.

[copy/pasted from a previous reply] While this is an early access game, there are some troubling signs that the developer is out of step with the quality fans of Jelle's Marble Runs have come to expect. First, the ads. This game is $20, and the static advertisements are constantly flipping, making it not only a huge distraction but also cheapens the Jelle's brand. Are these paid ads? Why are they so low quality? It really screams "free-to-play mobile game", not something I paid $20 to play. In my opinion, the developer should remove them entirely, especially if they are not sponsors of Jelle's Marble Runs themselves. Second, there doesn't seem to be any thought put into streaming or competition with friends so far. This game will directly compete with Marbles on Stream. Fans will want to recreate the YouTube experience for themselves, their friends, and maybe followers. There is very little here to do that. Third, and I don't think anyone will disagree, the graphics are sub-par. This is likely a problem with the developer themselves not being technically proficient or simply more experienced with mobile games. The "Best" quality appears to run at 640x480 resolution or something similar. The menu and buttons look like a mobile game, with no thought into how a player would use a mouse. Arrow keys aren't even an option for menu navigation. If Jelle's Marble League is intended to attract any interested audience beyond those superfans, it should stop and reevaluate whether Big Head Games is capable of delivering a final product that meets the level of quality they demonstrate with their real-life marble runs, that has earned a huge following. The brand frankly has huge potential, and a great videogame could lead to brand growth far beyond anything they have achieved so far. A bad videogame inversely could actually hurt the brand and disappoint/anger fans, especially at a $20 price tag. No one likes a rug pull.

In its current condition and for the asking price I can't recommend this game even to fans of Marble League. Unlocking anything is pure RNG grinding, game is ugly, content is lacking, sound is lackluster. I'd expect the crowd to react to the presence of O'Rangers, details like that.