Orbis(Unfinished Game)

First let's talk about game concept, which is both clear and not clear:

1. It's obviously "Megaman but Different" going by the stage design, powers,  obstacles, and aesthetic. But what's implemented doesn't demonstrate Megaman's concept.

2.  For one thing, I have all four elements at the start, so there's a jarring overload of abilities. I never managed to spot the distinction between them. Megaman approaches this by having you unlock them gradually and also in some places using sound and graphics to indicate strength and weakness against foes. (this is actually a thing the NES Megamans could have done better, probably)

3. There is little definition in the moment-to-moment platforming. What I mean by this is best illustrated by the distinctions between Mario, Megaman, Metroid, and Castlevania, and how each controls and what that means for the physics of motion. In Metroid, for example, your jump is extremely floaty, which helps both with precise shooting and with easing exploration in difficult terrain. In Castlevania your jumps are committed which encourages you to plan and strategize around the enemy patterns. Mario adds difficulty of control at high speed with a sense of momentum, and then plays that off against you by making the levels challenge you to keep up your speed. And in Megaman, you have both shooting and platforming challenges, so the jump is faster than Metroid, but still somewhat controlled so that you can place shots and dodge. All four games have pretty good platforming jump physics, but they're distinct because there's an overall intended feel to the game guiding them at an abstract level, and defining this abstract part is something you need, otherwise you won't have a benchmark for whether you've succeeded.

4. Because the moment-to-moment isn't well defined, there also isn't a way to pace the level around the character's abilities, and therefore there isn't an opportunity for the kinds of set-pieces that occur in Megaman. An interesting level design tries to stretch the boundaries of what the player abilities can do - not to the breaking point like a Kaizo level, but it presents scenarios where the strategies have to change slightly, where there is a different "puzzle" to be solved through your use of abilities. Nowhere is this more clear than in boss fights: if the player can solve a boss fight by mashing fast enough, then the game probably isn't aiming to really study and explore the abilities it gave the player, rendering them cosmetic.

5. Cosmetic abilities actually are not all bad, but it helps to acknowledge that that's what's going on in the design if you're going to have them because it's the kind of thing you want to cut for scope early on. A broad spread of abilities with really substantial differentiation and strengths and weaknesses is much, much harder to design than, say, three "archetypes" with mostly cosmetic variation.

Now, some technical/polish critique:

1. On boot I went to the the options menu first to set it to fullscreen and it is pretty unexplained. I knew that the combobox with "High" meant graphics quality because it's the same one that every Unity game has, but it still needs a label.

2. Once ingame I didn't know what the controls were so of course I had to alt-tab to look at the instructions here.

3.  I started testing the fire rate of each power and couldn't figure out what was controlling how many shots I could get out, so I couldn't develop any sense of how much firepower I could put out under pressure.

4. While I shot at stuff, there was no reason to try to fight anything, really, since it was so easy to run past and tank the damage, which contributed to me not learning if the abilities did anything differently from each other.

5. I let myself slide off the conveyor belt and didn't fall immediately. Wile E Coyote behavior intended?

6. I didn't recognize that the ladders were ladders, I just happened to notice that I was double-jumping and it looked like a glitch.

7. Once I reached the boss the game softlocked.