Marmoset Reviews

I have a denial problem, I don't know why I kept playing this game. It looked really cool and promising, from the trailer and description it really seemed interesting. So I gave it a go, but as it turns out it is really unfinished. You may be wondering what the gameplay actually consists of. Well, there is the main town hub, and there is going into cave levels. The hub has two main floors, of note the first floor has your house where you mainly just sleep, and this science building where you craft like four work stations (crafting table, refill health and energy, and some other one) and later on also there's one or two bits of useful tech upgrading. Second floor notably has some grocery place which you can also sell stuff at, but most importantly the second floor has this casino place, I'll get on to why it's important later. There's is also extra little bits but they are not substantial in the slightest (if they are then that function has not been put across to me). As for the actual levels, well.. they are actually numbered levels like some conventional cheap flash game or something. Every three or so there's a boss, bosses are actually neat enough. But those levels are really basic and annoying. Everything is kind of really finnicky, nondescript, sharp edge maze, and that's how all the levels go. Later on you go in a rocketship, but it's still similar maze stuff. Oh yeah, here are some things this game is definitely not. It is not a metroidvania, like no way hosey I've played tons of metroidvanias even of experimental forms and this is not it by any stretch. Also probably not fit to call it a collectathon. There are these jigsaw puzzle pieces found in a chest in some of the levels, but the kicker is that if you place the pieces early in this one place you're supposed to put them then it won't actually save and you lose those pieces you put down since you didn't complete it all at once. But there's inventory so you can't really carry them around either without it being a hassle. Oh and these individual unique pieces stack for some reason too. And also this game is not open world, just the hub and going into basic levels. So here's a thing with that casino I mentioned earlier. It's got this wheel you can spin to get lucky right? You can win some multiplier of the money you paid, or your money can stay the same, or you lose what you paid. But the chances of winning are higher than losing, so overall you make money. So by far the fastest and least laborious option for making money in the game is just gambling, because here the house always loses. This way you can get as much money as you want, and without this I would have stopped much earlier. Now all should be good, you can actually buy almost everything you like through money. BUT. There's one thing in particular that you can't, and I really really don't feel like grinding the same level for 75 times just to make some necessary boot upgrade. It's these spider silk things and I need like 300 of them. I've beaten the game levels all the way to the third boss of some eyeballs, but after that I need these boots. At this point, it's too much. So I think I've had enough. Some other problems (though there's tons I don't mention) incude: -you can easily softlock in some levels, not fun, have to reload day or wait until night when you pass out stardew style. -story has cool potential, but it really does not go anywhere beyond being weirdly simplistic, whereby even with the poor localization it makes me think this game was made by a kid (no offense kid, great first try but seriously needs polishing). I think most other people played for a couple of hours at best and came away thinking it was pretty neat, but I've actually gotten into playing this game proper, and it is not enjoyable. I think what would significantly improve this game is if at the very least material requirements were like 5x less, puzzle pieces wouldn't disappear, and the softlock situations were sorted out. It would still be a very janky game, but at least I could get through it without the pain in my butt. This review is bad I know, but I'm tired, and um, uh, it's like the game see! So it is a great review after all.

To normal, functioning members of society, I cannot recommend this game. However, I do recommend this game as long as you know what you're going into and enjoy delving into very flawed media. This is a game made by one guy with a clear passion, and it's very noticeable in both good and bad ways. This is less of a game you want to beat and more of a game you want to play for a bit as it gets pretty bad in the later sections. Let me state that I believe myself to be one of the EXTREMELY few people to have actually beaten this game. I'm basically a Marmoset god. I have also EFFECTIVELY gotten every achievement, except for three bugged ones. I think the three are the food items (recipes with milk did not work), the trophies (one of them opened but didn't give me anything), and the millionaire (stopped registering money towards the achievement). I KNOW what I'm talking about. So: The Game: Let's get to it; Marmoset is broken into two different games: one is a platformer, and the other is a poorly done crafting game. Basically, you go play through levels that you can repeat, and you can collect resources by mining mineral deposits, killing enemies, or opening chests. You can also collect money that can be used to buy things in the village. You then use these materials to craft items or upgrades that make completing the levels easier. This could be a key to open rare chests, a health consumable, or an upgrade that lets you hover. This is all encompassed by a time mechanic. You have a limited amount of time each ingame day that evenually runs out, in which you will die and start the next day in your bed with a money penalty. The same thing happens if you run out of lives. Your lives are called SUS by the way, that is the icon in your inventory. The time mechanic basically just breaks momentum when you're playing. At least one level is very long and will use almost the whole day to complete it, so you kind of have to speed run it. It adds little depth to the game and it would simply be better without it. The crafting system also isn't very good. You just collect a number of a resource and it lets you make something. Ususally if you want to make a specific thing you have to backtrack to a previous level in order to get the materials, and often times replay it multiple times. This gets extremely bad with an upgrade about 50% through the game, where you need to collect an absurd amount of string (I think around 300?), which only spawns from killing spiders in the first set of levels that are not very common. Plus each spider drops 1-3 silk, so you'll be killing at least 100, replaying levels where there's like 5 of them. The levels themselves are not super good but can still be interesting. There are 5 sets, with 4 levels and 1 boss in each. They are often nonlinear and you can go through multiple routes to get to the exit. Some of the spike traps instant kill you for touching them at all which is sometimes frustrating. Towards the end of the game the design becomes more interesting as more mechanics are introduced. The 3rd set of levels has you use a flying ship that controls very poorly, that set was probably my least favorite. The art, while somewhat simple, often looks very pretty. I like it a lot at times, especially the big blue tree thing. The story is not very in depth but I still really wanted to see where it went. After you beat the final boss, some dialogue happens, and you start back at the top of the village, and can just redo the final boss again and again. I don't know what the deal with that is, it seems like the story is incomplete or something. Anywho, that's it. I look forward to the dev's next project, Planet IX. Marmoset was very cool in the context of coming from a single guy (as in, the only guy who made the game. Idk his marital status) and I want to see how he grows and learns as a game dev. Cheers! - Univlateral Phase Detractor (✿-‿o)

For a dollar it is worth trying this indie game with new ideas. I played on a linux desktop with steam's proton compatibility. Did not make it very far in the game, because of difficulty with keyboard controls, but others may find it more approachable.

A solid indie game with nice ascetics. Surprisingly good considering it was developed by only 1 guy. Nice to see a dev from South America on Steam. Keep up the good work man!