Exoder Reviews

Greaat concept and I love the theme they have. I just wish you can change the keybindings. As a keyboard user, it really is frustrating to be forced to learn bindings.

While the game is brutal, often unfair, and very hard to understand, it is always fun to play

TL;DR If you like VERY difficult games with no difficulty ramp up, feel free to give it a shot, but just be warned that prior to this I ALSO thought I liked very difficult games. I unironically rage quit this game 6 times within 20 minutes, and then as i started writing a negative review each time i thought "ehhhh it's too soon, let me just try 1 more time", but no.............no more times. I like hard games, but oh my god this game is obnoxious RIGHT from the very start. Character movement and gravity feels like I'm playing at 2x speed, projectiles move so fast you have literally no time to react most of the time, all while trying to jump from tiny platform to tiny platform "jump king" style. Even "rage games" like boshy have at least some kind of difficulty ramp up and learning phase. If this games first level is as easy as it gets then no thank you lol sorry. The UI is a bit odd, but otherwise visually the game looks cool. If you like INSANELY difficult games, feel free to give it a shot, but just be warned that prior to this I also thought I liked very difficult games. The trailer looks cool, and the bosses look pretty cool, but i can NOT force myself through this first level. I've never got so mad at a game so fast.

Fever Dream Gameworks definitely love to inject high difficulty into their games because god damn is this game absolutely remorseless. The first stage actually took me longer to beat than any other stage in the game. I'm not gonna lie, I don't usually play these types of games much but it was still a rather fun (with some frustration mixed in) experience. Shame that your score gets set to 0 if the abomination that is coming for you does catch you because I was doing pretty damn well before stage 5 (where the difficulty ramps up a fairy bit from then onwards)if I do say so myself which is when I finally got caught. Positives - -Art style- What can I say, I love the aesthetics, it's why I was drawn to Marrow (Their other game) in the first place. It's so gritty and raw, I love it. -Soundtrack- Really great soundtrack, some heavily atmospheric pieces and some which get the adrenaline pumping. I'm listening to some tracks now after just beating the game. -Gameplay- Very fast paced, very hectic. Controls feel great, I had no issues with them. Considering the premise of the game is so simple I'm surprised by how fun it managed to be. Oh and the boss battles were great, all of them were unique and the bosses themselves look great. Stage have a surprising amount of length to them too. Negatives- The game can definitely be frustrating at times. That's just the reality of things when talking about a game like this, you can be doing great then one enemy can shoot you off a platform and then you panic and miss another platform and fall even further which naturally can get annoying, especially when you run into a particular area that is causing you a lot of trouble. In all honesty, other than the frustration aspect that I've just mentioned nothing else really strikes me as being bad in the game. On another note though, I still have no idea what the story is about from both Marrow and Exoder despite them being connected.

Flawed and chipped, but a gem, in it's own way. Beat the whole thing in one go, since I was not sure if it had a save function. Turns out it does, presumably after beating an area. Tutorial almost put me off due to how bad it was, but there's a bit to enjoy here. The game has no difficulty curve, more or less. First stage will be a showstopper for most people, but if you can make it past that, you can beat the whole game. IMO game caters to masochistic players, since a lot of attacks can be very hard/impossible to avoid. First stage started to click once I started using dash more and bouncing off enemies to other platforms. + Good OST + Varied levels/bosses/enemies + Well priced + Easy mode, although it limits content if you use it * Story is ??? * Got used to keyboard controls but they are questionable, gamepad is recommended - Rarely unclear hitboxes, sometimes even unfair - Some jank - Explains very little about obstacles/some key mechanics - Design often expects you to get hit and then just remember to avoid that later (similar to rage games) - Checkpoints can mess up your run if they are placed in a bad spot, somewhat avoidable by your own actions but not always - Final boss is next to impossible unless you realise [spoiler]dev hid heals inside cracked blocks, looked this up myself[/spoiler] "Fun" to play through if you don't mind getting tested at every opportunity. Though first stage is the hardest, some others still put up resistance. My actual playtime is around 6h on Normal.

cool design, if you can get past the difficulty. took me a few goes at the game to get past the first level/boss and fully enjoy it and that's a year after buying it

[h1][b]The good:[/b][/h1] - Upbeat retro music and visuals - Some neat design ideas and concepts - Challenging bosses [h1][b]The bad:[/b][/h1] - The checkpoint system can end a run - Seizure-inducing flash and strobe effects on certain stages - Extremely annoying level design and enemy placement with bullets everywhere - Bugs and weird hitboxes - The first level of the is one of the worst gaming experiences I've ever had since the days of Atari and made 85% of the players give up before even facing the first boss [hr][/hr] After finishing this game, I can say that Exoder got some neat concepts and ideas that would be enough to turn it into a hidden gem, but unfortunately it falls ways too deep into the masocre genre with some strikingly bad decisions. Let's start with the elephant in the room: the entry bar. Beating this game or unininstalling, it all depends on wheter you are going to have a Budda-like patience to beat the first level or not. And the first level of Exoder is remarkably bad. It's horrificaly bad, it's harder than any end-level of a rage game, to a point that everything after it is as pleasurable as a summer breeze. There are some wild ideas here, enough to make for an interesting ride, like stages with gravity switches that let you walk upright on walls and ceilings, ice caves, a doomsday castle, some really weird and spooky bosses - everything gated by this first stage. It took me more than six hours to clear the first stage, while all the rest of the game took me about 2 hours. Most games have ways to warm you up like Celeste, Super Meat Boy and I wanna be the guy, but Exoder throws you immediately at a brutal tower climb littered with some of the tiniest platforms that I've ever seen in a game, with super precise jumps that in case of failure will potentially erase most of your progress, if not outright giving you a game over because not only you are climbing a huge tower, you are doing it while escaping from a monster that is slowly crawling its way up. All other stages got this same monster chasing you, but they are nowhere as bad because the way you progress through them is much less of a hassle. Don't get me wrong, those are very hard and rage-inducing too, but nowhere frustrating like the first stage. The checkpoint system allow you to create a point to revive anywhere you want after you have made enough progress, but oftenly it can be a pain in the ass. You have a limited time to create it, which can be HARD since you need to charge it like a spell and there are sections with no room to breath with monster and bullets everywhere. Failing to do so will have it forcibly made anywhere you are at the moment. It can even have you spawn mid air, above a trap or in a place with dozens of invencible monsters shooting at you. Another issue is that the levels are super long outlasting their welcome, in some of those it's also impossible to progress faster since the screen is slowly scrolls from left to right and you have to follow it. I only recommend Exoder to whoever enjoys pain, there's better games out there when it comes to test your skills. Apparently this was supposed to be the second part of a trilogy of games, but the dev has been silent for years. Good luck finding anything about the lore of Marrow or Exoder by yourself, all of the supposed lore is actually scattered through the devlogs and posts he made on steam and a couple other sites explaining it, instead of being inserted anywhere in both games.

Just like Marrow, it took 2 playthroughs for me to really start appreciating this game. Gameplay is more focused on precision platforming than the dev's previous work, and the goal is to beat each level as quickly as possible so you don't get caught by the Wanly's shadow. Most enemies can't be killed, and your melee attack is instead used for destroying or reflecting projectiles, and also bouncing off enemies to gain additional height. One of my favorite things about Exoder is how different the areas are: every stage looks different, introduces unique mechanics, and has an entirely new set of enemies to keep you on your toes. Bosses are easier than the stages, but are pretty interesting and fun overall. Exoder herself also controls well once you get used to the movement, although, just like Marrow, the game is missing out on some basic modern features like control rebinding. At least this one included a pause button (and the keyboard+mouse controls work just fine). In terms of difficulty and length, Exoder is both shorter and easier than Marrow, although the 1st stage can be a major difficulty wall. Stages are long (5, 10, 15 minutes), and the starting level is relentless: tiny platforms, tons of enemies, and projectiles everywhere, and don't forget that you're on a time limit. Things get easier after the intro stage, though, so if you can beat the 1st level, you can 100% beat the rest of the game. Music is great, and the retro visuals looks good (it reminds me a lot of Axiom Verge). Like Marrow there are some small bugs, jank, and general frustrations that can make a 1st playthrough difficult to get into, but due to the shorter playtime and linear stages, I think Exoder is the easier of the two to pick up and play. While I still prefer Marrow's exploration and slower pacing, this 2nd game is worth picking up too if you want a tough platformer, and it's been just as sadly overlooked. It's taken 6 years to finally hit enough reviews for a score listing on steam, and that ain't right. I hope FDG is still working on the 3rd game in the series.

This game is ten gallons of creative level design crammed into a 5 gallon bucket, or litres for the folks across the pond... FDGW knocked it outta the friggin park with this game and it oughta be pretty much at the top of everyone's list. If you're fence sitting on Exoder, do yourself a favor and gird your loins (cuz the game can be crazy tough at times) and conquer it! It's truly a journey worth the effort!

I tried writing a review for this game and it ended up becoming so long I hit the steam review character limit while I was still describing the first level. I think I'll try another way of sufficiently describing my thoughts on this game. But for now all I'll say is, this game is pretty beautiful. It blew my expectations away for a super unknown indie game I had never heard of... though to be fair, I love that stuff. The art and general vibe of the game definitely drew me in pretty hard with its retro style, its difficulty, its beautiful visuals and sound. The small bits of story I gleamed from it were also very interesting and hit pretty well into what I like in narratives. I love the art and music a lot. The developer has an incredible art style, it's very sort of raw and grimy yet in the cool retro way (the cover art is also very impressive! Maybe a weird thing for me to point out but I like doing art myself and am a bit of a nerd about that). The in game pixel art gets especially fun with how crazy some of the bosses look. And there are quite a few bangers in the soundtrack. Shout out to the title screen theme, the first level's theme, the 4th level's theme, the 6th level's theme, and the theme for the first phase of the final boss. The ending had me sobbing. That pretty much never happens with me with anything - I'm going to be speaking a lot about that I bet if I get around to talking about this game again. The song there ruined me - I was going to mention it in the last paragraph but thought that would be better to mention here. The gameplay is very fun, the controls are responsive and the moveset strikes a good balance of simplicity while still being versatile and interesting. I like how you can't attack, only parry. The ground pound is satisfying, and the dash makes you have to learn it but its fun as well. If you're reading this review because you're judging whether you want to get the game or not, I will tell you: the game is hard. It's quite hard. I personally love difficult games, and I don't think this game is too unfair, but the first level is a filter and you'll need determination and patience to get through it, just like the game's description says. If you stick with it though, I hope you'll feel as rewarded as I felt. I really hope Fever Dream Gameworks is still out there making stuff. I've heard there's apparently a third game that was mentioned a few times - I hope it isn't cancelled. I hope the developer is doing well in general, as when I scoured through the steam discussions, youtube, and their twitter I didn't find anything recent. They're doing god's work is all I know. I still have Marrow to play too, since I bought it with this game. I've been spoiled on it since I watched a video about it (Yes, the DoshDoshington one) which is how I found out about this game, but I still want to experience it myself, despite how difficult and unfair I've heard it is. Exoder is very worth it in my opinion. Absolutely one of my favorite games right now. I know this may sound weird, but what was especially cool and a big source of motivation to play it was how unknown it is. I checked steam db and through most of my playthrough, I was apparently the only person playing the game in the whole world. It felt like I alone was allowing the game to exist in those moments. A bit egotistical when I put it that way, but that's not how I felt about it - I felt a sort of reverence for the opportunity, especially with how beautiful the game is. And to be fair, I really really wish the developer got more attention. They deserve it so much... but for now, I'll do my best to spread the word around. I've already convinced someone else to buy this game. I hope I wasn't rambling too much. Game is good. Love it a lot. I hope you'll love it too. Thank you Fever Dream Gameworks. I'll save the rest of my thoughts for perhaps a video on this game I think. Have a good day, whoever may be reading this...