Grade: B
2D Puzzle Platformer that celebrates Japanese folklore
Rising Dusk is a Japanese-themed sideways-scrolling platformer with a nifty twist. If you collect too many coins, some blocks trigger so that it can make it impossible to move forward. Also, if you collect too few coins, some of these blocks make it impossible to move forward as well. So this game has you trying to get that Goldilocks “just right” level of coin collecting, which is the game’s core mechanic.
Lot’s of pretty things to look at
The general ambiance was the best part of Rising Dusk. The music was spot-on, and the creatures were right out of a Studio Ghibli Movie. I grabbed a few selections below.
Gameplay wasn’t for me.
I gave rising Dusk what I felt was a fair chance, and even put it down and came back to it a week later, but I wasn’t vibing with the mechanics in this game to the point of frustration/annoyance.
For instance, what should have been an extraordinary level, just drove me nuts. Some sort of demon is carrying you up a waterfall. At first, you have to collect the coins to make progress, but then, you have to avoid the coins to make progress. Just felt frustrating and fiddly.
Other folks gave this game a positive review, and the final boss battle looked intense. You are climbing into the sky filled with coins. If you mistakenly catch 3 or 4 of these coins throughout the entire climb, it means you fall to your doom.
Oh well, sorry to those that love this game. It wasn’t for me.
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