Ginger: Beyond the Crystal Reviews

This game seems like the creators wanted to make a 3D platformer without using any of the wisdom that has accrued over the decades. From heavy controls to rampant fetch-quests to clunky abilities to unskippable animations that take three times as long as they need to, everything about this game is bare minimum. That said, it does have a few good points, like the Mario Sunshine-like special levels.

I haven't quite finished Ginger yet (half way through the last level), but it's been mostly positive so far. I'm yet to encounter any of the game-breaking bugs mentioned by some reviewers. I don't know if they've been fixed, or I've just been lucky enough to avoid them. At any rate, I've been able to play through to this point without incident. Ginger is a fun, stress-free platformer... apart from the fact that I seem to die quite a lot. I received the "Too Many Deaths" achievement very quickly. The controls (I played with a Steam controller) are simple. I think some extra commands/attacks which don't rely on outfit changes would have been nice, especially since the standard attack, if slightly mistimed, can lead to losing your health... which doesn't seem to be replenished unless you die or complete the level. I agree with the complaints about late-game outfits being needed for early levels. Of the early levels I've bothered to revisit, the late-game outfits have only ever yielded additional building supplies. That's not a good incentive to replay early levels. Or was this done on purpose so you could farm materials when you need them late-game? Either way, I don't think this part was handled well. The worlds are nice, and vary enough in terms of content. There are only 3 "hub worlds", but each one contains a bunch of levels of varying sizes and difficulties. Some can be completed in a few minutes, most take 10 or so. They're small enough that you don't lose interest, and there are plenty of them so you still get a decent amount of gameplay. I find that the worlds are more linear and less immersive than in Yooka Laylee, but at the same time, you'll never get lost or have difficulty figuring out where you're supposed to go. I think something part way between these two extremes would be ideal. If you love platformers, I'd say to give Ginger a go. I'm surprised by the mixed, lacklustre reception to this game, but on the plus side, it means you can get it at a nice discount whenever it goes on sale. Also, the gameplay doesn't vary that much after the first hour or so, so the refund period should be enough to decide if this game is to your liking or not.

It got to the point where I wasn't enjoying the game and only tolerating it. I like the variety of the level design, but some of them left me confused wondering “what's going on?” and “why am I doing this?” The abilities are cute, but don't really add anything to the game as they all boil down to: look for a circle of light and press Y. The hub villages are too large and hard to navigate, even with a map and compass. The quests got repetitive really fast, given that there are only three types of quests, and sooo many of them.

A very cool and exciting game to play. There are a few bugs and glitches wich are a bit annoying sometimes, but in total i would really reccomend this game and give it a try if you love platformers.

I spent a lot of time with this game and played it thoroughly, but I just can't recommend it...the things I disliked about the game outweigh the things I did like about the game, which sucks because I had this on my Wishlist for a long time. What I loved about the game was that it was how obvious the team who worked on the game loved it. After leaving the (bland) hub worlds each of the 15 levels are vibrant and distinct. I also really enjoyed the different costumes you unlock as the game progresses and the special ability that each one of them has. Now to the cons: -Lots and lots of loading screens. Lots. -Consistently falling through the floor on the platforming puzzles -Questing in the hub world is nothing but "kill 4 enemies nearby" and fetch quests within the hub world - Okay enough on their own, but not when you're doing this at least 25+ odd times. -Very little enemy variety per area -When you hit an enemy, there's a common occurrence that it'll read as you getting damage from it...which isn't all that great since you only get 4HP/life and healing items don't exist -The repetitive music (which commonly sounds like they're covering a Banjo Kazooie track) gets old, quick -Boss fights feel like they drag on longer than they should -Various clipping/graphical issues -Achievements are glitched and aren't guaranteed to pop I loooove platformers. I was excited when I got to the platforming stages for this game. But, without fail, during a bunch of platforming stages (especially when they have a rotating platform) I'd jump where I was supposed to but still glitch through the floor and fall, resetting me back to the beginning for something I don't have control over. I also spent some time revisiting almost every level in order to get that level's accessory for an achievement and, at the end of it all, it never popped. I guess I could recommend it to younger players who are interested in a cute-styled platformer. Don't buy it full price, though.

This game is just unfortunately very mediocre. It has heart to it and I can tell honest effort went into this but it's just unpolished and rough around the edges in a lot of places. I will say though, the graphics and soundtrack are both pretty good, colorful and vibrant and decently diverse locales and solid orchestral soundtrack stuff, no complaints from that front. Gameplay-wise... well, the main levels are mostly decent, if I'm being honest. A lot of them are bogged down with pointless filler (cups game in the crypt, the hide-and-seek thing in the mansion, those mine carts and airships you have to murder your controller on, the minigames in the space fair, etc) but there are moments where the platforming is there and aside from the first two levels being kinda samey none of them really feel redundant or boring. I especially like the second to last level, which is really the most basic level in the game, it's just pure platforming and it works. The problem most of these have is that they are pretty linear even if they try to feign nonlinearity and the fixed camera angles everywhere means you can be stuck with a bad viewpoint quite often, it turns it into more of a crash bandicoot style platformer than anything. The bonus levels... ehh. They're optional, technically, and only a few of them are really annoying, but they're all checkpointless and often a bit too long. And a few of them seem to exist just for concepts that never got implemented in the game... the kind of weird jetpack and the absolutely awful autojump being the extra mechanics not found anywhere else. There's also a lot of issues with clipping through stuff in these levels. And some of them make you sit around and wait - if I'm triggering the in-game idle animations just trying to clear a level normally, something is wrong. And the overworld maps... they're kind of fun to explore around in at first but boy are those fetch quests boring and repetitive as heck. There's way too many of them too, should have kept it to like 10 per world at most... but no, world 1 has 15, world 2 has 25, and world 3 has 20, which is 60 in all... for exactly three different types of mission overall, so yeah, gets repetitive quickly. And they're all a bit of a pain to navigate, too. The first hub has no real identity and is easy to get lost in, as small as it is, the second hub is too big and kind of repetitive in its gloominess, the third level has a bit more too it but has these cliffs you can fall off of and die way too easily. Did I mention, Ginger dies instantly falling more than like 15-20 feet or so, it's absolutely pathetic and makes the third hub a nightmare to navigate. Also affects some levels too but not as badly. Combat in the game is also pathetic, there's a very, VERY short range punch you get, as well as a dash attack that you get hurt using half the time because it's inconsistent and can end short of your target, and the ground pound that basically destroys everything but is super slow to use. And you get a projectile attack after world 2 which is kind of useful? But the enemy variety is weak and repetitive (world two has like, two enemies total and you will be absolutely sick of those frogs in no time). And the bosses are the worst possible kind of boss, the "sit around and do nothing for a long time just for a chance to hit the boss". The second boss is the worst, he takes like five minutes to fight no matter what because of how slow his cycles are. The third boss isn't much better. The first one's the only interesting one because at least each phase is a different attack and he doesn't take nearly as long. Also there's no real "final" boss, the last level you just walk straight forward and speak to an NPC and... you win. The game just lacks polish in so many categories that it becomes tiresome to play after a while. Animations go on too long, hubs are too spread out with nothing in them, the house building mechanic gets tiresome quickly, the game has forced revisits of levels if you want to collect everything because they're locked behind arbitrary powers. Oh and the game has some glitching going on too. In the second level of world three there was a point in the first minigame of the level where I would just get random freezes that forced me to close and restart the game, and there's a lot of moments of just... clipping through stuff and falling to your death, which is completely and totally unfair. It especially sours the entire experience. Overall though... really you can do so much better with 3D platformers, even on steam. This isn't abysmally bad but it's not particularly good either and doesn't really do anything special. It's a shallow experience that doesn't feel fine-tuned and is rarely that much fun. An okay distraction but little else.

This game has potential, but I gotta say.. I do agree with most of the reviews so far (the ones on a variety of game-related websites at least) its glitchy, buggy, and has a lot of untapped potential. Unlike some, I did not go in expecting the quality or gameplay given to us by Nintendo in the past (Mario 64/galaxy) but I did expect something rather more solid than the state this game is currently in. I fell through ceilings and floors a few times, my girlfriend found a way to jump out of the first level, when changing the graphic settings a few times trees lose their texture occasionally, conversation skips that not work, hitting an enemy that miraculously hits you the same moment, stomping onto enemies not working, stomping on tree-stumps that need to be almost exactly dead center else they wont work, and not to mention the horrendous minecart controls (protip if you are stuck, right analogue stick, up>down>up>down REALLY fast) And a god forsaken amount of fetch & kill quests. Oh, and I almost forgot to mention the more than occasional weird choice of sentences and words, sometimes it makes me wonder if the dev's haven't practiced their English lately, other times the chosen words don't feel well placed. (a static font going "great" after finishing a level feels cold instead of warm and joyous) And yes, you got that right.. I am currently only two hours in and this is already taking its toll on the rather cute, mild, kiddy gameplay non/semi-hardcore gamers might like. (i.e. my girlfriend) The art (read: environments) are rather nice, the flowers, plants, rocks, houses, it all looks stylized and well made. Caves look like caves, mines look like mines, forests look like forests, and the village looks like a mess only a mother would love, but in a good way. "I am sure he'll clean up nicely in puberty" The characters could use some more "character" to feel more alive but nothing really annoying. The enemies feel like simple AI though.. Their animations are short and simple and lack the toonesque feel you'd expect from games like these, especially when occasionally the animations of NPC's do shine (like the big rat in the Mine when you try to walk past him) The gameplay is simple, you can jump, double jump.. But it sadly doesn't feel all that solid.. The last second jump when walking towards ledges often results in falling to your doom, and more than often everything is spaced apart in such a way that its either a hit or miss situation, especially with the bad camera angles the game tries to auto-force on you over and over. As I said though, the game has potential and I really think if the dev's fix all the bugs and glitches.. This could be quite a kiddy-version ala Mario 64. I am sad though that they didn't take it a little further, made the movement of Ginger more smooth, added some wall jumping/ledge grabbing, made costume changing faster, and overall gave it some more polish. Would I recommend the game though? Yes, but I'd wait for a discount or hope the devs iron out all the hitches and glitches.

If you really like platformers, you might still enjoy this game. Some issues : * Fall damage can invoke insta-death? Why.. this is a platfomer! I have it set to hard mode, but still.. what a lame mechanic. A small fall should be a small amount of damage and a huge fall should be half health (just copy SM64 here!) * The first enemies you face will lock on to you in a single frame when you attack them. It looks like someone was making their first game with their animation. * All the enemies I faced, it's NEVER obvious who is going to win the fight when you dash at an enemy and the ground pound is a little too slow so it induces some randomness. Contrast this with the enmeies in Mario 64 where you can always formulate a way to attack the enemy with the outcome entirely on you. * Dialog skipping isn't available until animations fully play out, but it will pop up an annoying message to skip the entire scene if you try to forward the dialog before the animation plays * Checkpoints aren't actually checkpoints but health restores. Again this could be because I'm playing on hardmode, but change the text. I actually died of fall damage 90% through a level and instead of going back to the checkpoint, the level reset. I don't care about losing when it's my fault, but I was playing more risky because I had JUST gotten a checkpoint. * Draw distance culling is very poorly implemented. I was getting > 60 frames when looking at the average scene but because the scenes are so richly at some parts, I was getting ~30 frames. I ultimately had to turn my graphics way down because the spikes weren't worth it I WISH this were an early access game and not a multiplatform release--then it might show more restraint with these issues because there's no guarantee they will fix these problems. I HOPE they fix the above issues because the music, art, and worlds are pretty interesting. The cutscenes were fantastic (especially the introduction). With some critical updates, this could easily be an 8-9/10 game

I was really enjoying this game. Then I came across a section which meant you had to move the mouse or controller up and down to get the mine cart to move. Well I perservered through the horrible mines with the moving the mouse up and down to get the carts to move, even though it didn't work 95% of the time and took forever. Then I found myself in a level which required the same mechanic but timed in order to pass the level. And yep, it didn't work 95% of the time, meaning I just sat there while my time counted down and the level reset itself. This is now a game breaking bug for me. I know I'm not the first person to encounter this bug, but it seems the developer may not care. There has been no response from the developer about this and no update in 6 months. Should I guess this has now been abandoned and I've just completely wasted my money? I'll be honest, I'm angry and disappointed. It's a shame, up to this point, I actually really enjoyed the game and would have given it a positive rating.

If you are a 3D platform fan you will love this. 3 huge hub worlds to explore, do side missions, and fix the town houses. 15 levels with a lot of variety, they get more difficult at the end. 3 great bosses. Music is also very nice. Story is okay, nothing too revolutionary. And the gameplay is great, you jump, attack, and change between 9 different outfits with their own ability! (You get them as you progress through the game). So if you like Banjo, Spyro, Mario, Crash, or even Sonic, get this! :)