The Next Penelope Reviews

I don't know if the developer reads the reviews or even still updates the game, but i pray both happen so maybe some change for the better may occur. I am giving this game a thumbs up because this game is incredible in some areas, and in the areas it isn't already great there is massive promise showing through. I've heard this is a one-man dev team and that seems to show through, and for that alone the game deserves a little recognition in the wider public eye. however every game has its problems, and unfortunately this game is not only no different, it has them in spades. a very common complaint across every review is that the controls suck. personally i believe this is skill issue, as the controls are responsive and work perfectly, they just take getting used to. however an ACTUAL problem isn't your player character, its the computer players. the biggest problem i have seen in this game so far is the INSANE difficulty differences of some of the computer players. some races will have computers so inept and slow that even the second place contender will be easily lapped with a little skill, however on the other side of this, there are races where the computer players have such insane and wild rubberbanding and speed that you will be staying in the lead by only the skin of your teeth if at all. Another massive problem the game has with computers is how death is balanced. if the player character dies, its gameover and you restart the race. this isnt entirely unfair and it shouldnt be changed, however the computer players in those same races not only respawn, they respawn so fast and will catch up so fast that killing them is functionally useless as a mechanic. this is compounded with the fact that the weapons you use take MASSIVE amounts of energy to fire, and suddenly you are sitting in first place with no boost, no health, and about 2 seconds before 2nd place passes you and makes you fail the level anyways. even worse than this is the requirement you use the weapons, as to my knowledge it is completely impossible to actually beat the more difficult races without using them or attempting to slow down the opponents. this creates an incredibly unfun and unfair loop where you start the race, you shoot the enemy (wasting your energy which doubles as health f-zero style), they die, and then come back and overtake you forcing you to repeat the process ad nausem. the problem with this process is that you as the player will ALWAYS lose this interaction by its end. there is no winning through this method and it makes races an incredibly tedious, (in a quite ironic twist) almost sisyphean repeating of trial and error to pray you skip something or get lucky enough to pass the finish line first. to top this off, the bosses unfortunately suffer the EXACT same fate, they will either be pathetically easy and almost a joke, or they will be cryptic and infuriating to attempt to figure out and properly execute. to reiterate, despite the negativity in this review i am desperately praying for the game's success. The person who did the work to get it this far deserves recognition for their work, and i hope more eyes on it may inspire the dev to give the project more work in the future.

At 2 hours I have seen the final boss, and then quit out of a rare blend of bored frustration. Despite the game's description this is NOT a racing game. It has racing elements, most levels are on tracks, and some are actual races against NPC opponents, but most levels are about combat or survival focused. I personally wouldn't mind this dynamic if the combat wasn't so deeply flawed. The health mechanic in this game is one of the worst health implementations I've seen. Energy (their term for health) is used up whenever you take damage or whenever you use a weapon; this could provide an interesting balance of risk/reward, but health is doled out so rarely that you are constantly budgetting your weapon use. One small slip up in a match will leave you in a situation where you still have half of your health, but are forced to quit because it takes at least 2/3 of your health used as weapon energy to kill the boss you are fighting. About 1/3 of my playtime was retrying because I didn't have enough energy to beat a challenge/kill a boss, about another 1/3 of my playtime was just crashing into walls because the screen is so zoomed in that you can't see far enough in front of you to avoid damage. I discovered near the end of my playthrough that there is a RPG style leveling system that allows you to level up to zoom out the camera, but its an expensive upgrade for a feature that should be in my default.

When I first saw the game in the store, I saw it was similar to games like "Hot Lava" and "Speedrunners" which are some of my favorite games. So paired with the 80% discount, I jumped on that. However, what I got was disappointment. In my opinion the game is having an identity crisis. It want's to be fast but; The camera is too close for that even while fully upgraded to zoom out, When you crash into an enemy normally, you get completly out of wack, Not to mention crashing into walls, now crashing into a wall in a racing game means very bad news, but even grazing or crashing with an angle that would bounce you back into a course, instead just stops you dead in your tracks. So if you can't make perfect turns (which are quite hard to pull off consistantly), you will have a very hard time trying to win. The energy meter that also doubles as your healt bar isn't helping either. However I don't have much of a problem with that. The 3 main gametypes consist of; "Learn the new thing while playing this easier course" type tutorial, Race these bots and if you make some mistakes you'll lose 35 times until you are 1st, and The Boss Fights. The Tutorial part is pretty normal and helps you kind of pick up the new ability. And I actually like the Boses I've played, but the actual Race Part is very frustrating. In every race stage, you are against 4 bots, you obviously start at the very back, but unlike most other games where all of you start at similar speeds, they all take off before you can and stay at a predetermined order. Besides being so hard to catch up, if you make a mistake tiny mistake you fall behind fast and have to work up to it again, but "oh no" the fastest of the bots already won.

The game seems fun on the videos, and I thought it was a nice racing game from a top-down perspective, but there is too much annoyance to make it good. My advice if they wanted to make this game better would be to unzoom the fu@#ing camera and make the ship's life and the energy for weapons separated from each other, each with it's own bar. The game is too zoomed and even with +10% unzoom stills too close, only getting a little bit far when you are inside corners and can't react properly. Sharing the same energy with health and weapons is a pain, because that makes everything more difficult and for a game this simple it shouldn't be that way. That means if you use your weapons you lose health, if you lose health you can't use your weapons. That sucks. And I dindn't play further, only to unlock the first 4 weapons, but if what I see on the map screen is all the game has to offer, it's just too few stages for my taste. Jumping from medium difficult to very hard difficult also doesnt' make any sense. Too bad, I was hoping for a nice relaxing casual racing game.

The controls take time to get used too but it's a fun game and an interesting take on the Odyssey.

If I could give a neutral recommendation I would, but you know this is Steam. I understand this was made by one guy and I give props to him, he made a game that's functional. However, it's mired in some strange quirks and wonky design. So running down the list of issues I had with this game. First, the camera too close in on the vehicle and the fix is an IN-GAME UPGRADE. Coupled with no map of the stage (Only a dinky Progress bar at the bottom of the screen) it can lead to you failing over and over until you learn the stage by memory and the mechanics associated with it. I'm gonna call this one a cardinal sin by racing game standards. Second, The controls sometimes don't work and are needlessly loose. Maybe it's my controller, but I had a hell of a time playing this game on it and I play games with it fine all the time. I think it's just this title at this rate. I'll give this one a pass, but only because it might be my controller. Third, the Difficulty is another issue and only hurts this title. It starts at "Medium" and only goes to "Very Hard" with no in between. Some stages are super-easy, but it's labelled as "Very Hard". Other stages are labelled as "Medium" but will kick your teeth in for no reason. This odd curve of difficulty combined with the "Life as Energy" system just adds just needless frustration. Finally, The Mechanic of "Life as Energy". Your energy is so truncated due to equipment usage and the energy costs for them that many stages are hurdles due to it. Expend too much or run into a wall enough times and you just might as well restart the level. Most of the racer levels have energy recharge pads, but other open area zones don't and you only get the "Mine" option to recharge your energy meter. However, the Mine needs to kill a target to gain energy back for you, but the mine itself doesn't have a proximity detonation and you can kill yourself with it by running into it or by chunked down by the cost. The mechanic adds needless complexity and many pieces of equipment are dubious in usefulness which leads to many unneeded restarts. All in all, I had a bad time playing "The Next Penelope". Some of the issues are fixed by the in-game upgrade system, but many aren't and lead to a slanted experience. However, if you can put up with the odd mechanics and strange layout, give it a shot.

Future racers, if you have played Wipeout, F-Zero, etc. You will all love this! You can take on any of the challenges in any order. It is challenging, but once you figure out the right way to beat a track you will eventually pull off a win, and it feels damn good to win in this. The electronic soundtrack is a very nice fit for the game and the controls feel smooth. You can spend XP in different attributes which adds an rpg element to the upgrade system in this game. The visuals are just right. Considering the fact this was made by just one person, i tip my hat off to you! This would make an epic arcade cabnet game.

A warning to anyone! This game looks pretty but it is insanely hard. In a bad way. No difficulty curve. Right after tutorial you face the level selection where the easiest "Medium" choice already requires perfect reaction and efficient use of abilities. No room for mistakes. You will fail a lot in this game, and to make things worse, the reload time is really slow. In a certain situation the five seconds it takes to load the race is already longer than the time until you fail it. (The same map is reloaded after each failure.) And controls in this game make it hard to enjoy the process. Requesting a refund, since I see no way to progress in this game and keep my sanity at the same time. Spontaneous purchase on a sale was a mistake. Looks like I was smarter when I kept this game out of my wishlist before. - Wanna git gud? - Good luck. - Choosing games by pretty artwork, like me? - Avoid this one.

This game has so much potential... I really hope they create a sequel or add more content! tl;dr: + Gameplay is fun!! + throws constantly new situations, playstyles and conditions in, never gets monotonous + good presentation: cool graphical style, fitting music + feels a bit like a mix of F-Zero and R.C. Pro Am + good difficulty: starts easy, ends with lots of challenges o if you expect racing, this may not be for you - controls need some time to get used to - the camera is way too close! It's really hard to see anything, this makes the game more about memorizing than racing - unlocking bonus missions is wrongly explained in the game - short, took me 2.6h to beat the singleplayer Long version: I love games like F-Zero, but there hasn't been a sequel since a long time. I played some topdown-racing games in the past, so I knew they were fun, too. Anyways, after watching the trailers, I was convinced this game should be fun to me. The camera looked really close, but since a screenshot showed the possibility to zoom further out, I bought the game anyways. First of all: this is not a racing game. It contains several levels where you have to be faster than others, but it feels more like a fast Arcade-Puzzle game. You cannot accelerate or brake, instead the focus is more on figuring out where to use which weapon. Every world in this game has 3 levels, of which 1 is a racing level. If I remember correctly, there were 5 worlds with a Racing-Level. The other levels are obstacle courses where you have to make use of your weapons, time trials or bossfights. While the bossfights look really good and are well designed, for me it was always about figuring out how to recharge your energy so you have enough power to beat the boss. Once you know the pattern and how to get energy, the bosses are not a big problem. The leveldesigns felt very intelligent and the overall experience was quite enjoyable, but it was really short and it took a while to get used to the controls. And the camera... the camera is REALLY weird in this game. Even if there are 3D-Elements, the camera makes everything look flat and 2D. It makes it even harder to control the machine without being able to slow down... Not to mention that the camera is still really, really close on the track - even with the 10%-upgrade. You hardly notice it at all. About the worlds and levels: You can choose which world to play in any order you like. Additionally to that, there are several locked bonus missions, that tell you to get all the weapons first. This is wrong: you have to beat all the worlds in order to unlock the bonus missions. I wanted to do the bonus missions before starting the last levels, but I couldn't find a way to unlock them. I wanted to grind XP to make the last levels easier, but without the bonus missions, it felt stupid to redo the previous levels again. Overall, I liked this game a lot, but I would've liked it more, if the focus would be more on the racing-part. I really miss some kind of Grand Prix-Mode, like in Mario Kart or F-Zero. Stil, it was fun and enjoyable to me.

Quick Score: 3/5 Really good visually, and a decent foundation. But extremely short and feels very underdeveloped mechanically with zero replayablity. The entire exp and upgrade system is pointless. The games difficulty is extremely low. The only challenging sections are 2 bonus events at the very end that are more frustrating than difficult. Overall very underwhelming, but it was fun for about 2 hours. Would never recommend this at full price.