The Indie Mixtape Reviews

Did you know that writing & drawing are magical acts? Are you hip to the SECRETSPACEPROGRAM? Got mushrooms? Do you eat sushi? Do you wish Andy Warhol had developed video games? Are you tired of Corporate oppression? Want to stick it to the man? [i]ewww![/i] Well check out this mixtape I found. Your mom is going to love it. Remember you have to flip it over before the tape stops because the cassette keeps getting stuck if you let it reach the end of side 1. Other than that 1989/1989 'nuff said.

I love this so much! For one thing, the games in this "mixtape" are all great (I'm especially a fan of LAZA KNITEZ). Even if they weren't the format is fantastic; I'd love to see more small creators putting out these short experiments together in their own mixes.

Not good for PC players. The control is not introduced. It's assuming you know how to play.

I remember playing Rogue Light when it was created for a GameBoy Jam in 2014. I really liked, so when I fund it here by chance in this beautiful collection, I just bought it. I have enjoyed it from start to finish and now I'm trying the others. Totally worth the price.

Roguelight is the best thing here,Hets is kinda like GoNNER but good,Detective Chirpums looks fine,and the other 2 games are hard to look at

It is the year 2020 and the two most promising games of this bundle (hets and Roguelight) still do not support the standard WASD-controls. I don't want to go left and right by pressing the left and right arrow keys, jump by pressing W and look up by pressing arrow up. And I don't want to press Alt+Enter to be able to see something else than a completely white screen in Roguelight. LAZA KNITEZ!! could be fun with some friends, but should get old very quickly. I can't say much about the other games, since I'm not very interested in them.

The Indie Mixtape is a collection of 5 small indie games of various genres and styles. As such, I'll split my review into sections for each game, and I'll keep it brief for each. The order I'll talk about these games is from best to worst IMO. [h1]Roguelight[/h1] I'll be perfectly honest: [b]The Indie Mixtape is worth buying just for this game![/b] That's how high quality it is. Rouguelight is a roguelite game where you traverse deeper and deeper into a dungeon that gets progressively darker. Your way of lighting the path ahead is with your bow and arrow, and in there lies the biggest charm of the game: you constantly have a limited amount of arrows. Choosing whether to draw an arrow to light the way or to brave the dark blindly, or wether to kill an enemy or dodge them to preserve the ammo is a constant worry, which keeps the gameplay fresh and engaging on every run. The roguelite progression also happens at a pretty perfect pace, so you'll learn more strategies and get "stronger" at a consistent pace. You should be able to max out and be ready for venturing into the deepest levels after about 90 minutes, which is about the duration promised from each of the small games in this collection. Roguelight remained fun from top to bottom, and made the admission price worthwhile right out of the gate. [h1]Test Chamber[/h1] Test Chamber is your traditional sokoban inspired puzzle game, comprised of 29 short levels. The puzzle design was the highlight, it felt really well made and the later levels provided a decent challenge. There is a subtle lack of polish, as the lack of a dedicated reset key-bind makes resetting levels a bit more cumbersome than usual, and rewinding moves feels a bit too slow. Visually it's pretty mundane, and I just muted the background song after 15 minutes or so of playing. Should take about an hour to beat all levels, overall a fun time. [h1]Laza Knitez!![/h1] Laza Knitez!! is an arena fighter game that can be played in single or multiplayer. I loved the pixellated visuals, and the gameplay is pretty unique as you constantly move forward while trying to either joust or shoot your enemies. Lots of powerups to grab, with some feeling like negative effects, though since you can never slow down/brake, those "downgrades" act more as stage hazards, and I like that. Seeing as I didn't have anyone to play this with in MP, I only got about 10 minutes out of this in SP and felt satisfied. Cool game. [h1]Detective Chirpums[/h1] Detective Chirmpus is a point & click adventure game/visual novel. I'll be honest, I didn't get much mileage out of this one, as I really don't care for point & click games, but beyond that the game didn't have any music or SFX while I played it, and the controls and menus felt extremely barebones. The best part of it is the art, which is charming, cool and cute in equal amounts. Maybe you'll like this more than I did. [h1]hets[/h1] Okay, this is the stinker. hets is a rouguelike 2D platformer. Each time you play you start from scratch, and have to kill 3 statues on each level while many enemies try and stop you. You gain powerups between each level, and after around 15 or so levels there's a boss. There's many design issues with this game: [list] [*] Each level has many enemies on them, however other than not dying to them, there is 0 incentive to go after the enemies on the level. In fact, if the 3 statues spawn close to you and the exit, it's just better to get them fast and leave without even looking at the rest of the level. [*] Some powerups vastly outclass others; extra bullets and HP is so much better than retaliating after losing health. Also, the "statues drop hearts" powerup straight up feels necessary to get far. [*] The game recommends keeping shake on by default: [b]DO NOT KEEP IT ON[/b]. The visuals are pretty colorful, but with the excessive shake on, playing this is simply unbearable and headache inducing. [*] The biggest issue: [b]You don't have any form of i-frames, at all.[/b] Couple that with the fact that enemies and bullets push you as they damage you, this means any melee enemy can potentially kill you in mere instants with 0 counterplay. It's especially bad on the final boss, which can just move over you IN A PHASE TRANSITION and take half your HP. [/list] hets simply isn't it, but don't let it's presence in the bundle dissuade you from buying it. And if Ditto ever reads this: [i]please keep making more games, I know you can do better.[/i] [h1]Final thoughts[/h1] I really liked this Mixtape. Simply learning about Roguelight and it's developer would be worth it, but I also had fun with most of the other games. A really cool collection of small indie games, well worth the cost. Highly recommend it!

The menu to browse the game feels sluggish and awkward to the point i feel like i'm using some pirated third-party software. The games aren't much better; each one has its unique flaw that will make the game annoying to play and get very boring within the first minute of gameplay. And the little cherry on top is that these are byte-size games and you probably would be hopping from game to game, but to do that you need to close the game you're playing, re-launch the collection because apparently it won't open by itself after closing one of its games, and then select the game in that buggy menu just to wait another 5 minutes for the game to actually open properly and let you play it. What I'm saying is, a good chunk of your time will be spent on the launcher and the game's title screens. Definitely wouldn't recommend it

Out of the 5 games in this, there is only one I've disliked. Roguelight is a fun and clever little Roguelike with a light and dark mechanic, hets is a really fun and fast-paced action game, Test Chamber is a cute and interesting puzzle game, and Detective Chirpums is a cute little noir-style adventure game. The only game I disliked was Laza Knitez, which I felt was sorta slow and poorly made. Overall, though, a really great package that is absolutely worth the price.

I've played all games, and completed one of them (Detective Chirpums). Here is what I think: Test Chamber: After playing some levels, I can say this is, to me, the best game in this package. Very interesting puzzles that require seeing things from different angles, nice Fez-looking characters and clean, cool graphics. Roguelight: Really nice rogue-like game, which has a very interesting play with light, nice gameboy-like graphics and many upgrades. I've reached level 3, and I plan to try it a bit more to see if I can finish it. You can get this game for free or pay what you want here: http://managore.itch.io/roguelight Detective Chirpums: The game is mostly filled up with dialogs, with only 3 puzzles and some dialog choices that don't seem to matter much (you just get a different dialog response). It's not a great game, but it's OK. Hets: cool graphics, randomized levels, you get upgrades when you finish a level. Not too bad, but after playing it 44 times, I got bored and decided to never play it again. Laz Knitez: joust game with shooting mechanics and some weird power-ups. Played it for a couple of minutes (by myself) and quit. Could be nice with friends, but it is boring alone. So, to sum it up, I think Roguelight and Test Chamber make ths mixtape worth it, specially if you get it at the current discount (80%). If you read this later, make sure you wait for a discount.