izigame.me

I always thought this one was a tad pricey for a 16 bit platformer, so have been patiently waiting for a sale. At 24 AUD, I thought it was more reasonable, so took the plunge.
After all that, this is really one of the tougher games for me to rate, as I love 16 bit action platformers and action platformers in general, but I don't really love Tiny Thor.
So ultimately, I can't recommend it, and will explain why in this review. In a nutshell though, for those who don't want to read everything, I didn't like it enough and didn't like the feel of the main weapon.
There was also never a point where I LOVED the game. I am an old man who comes from the 8, 16 and 32 bit console era, not to mention arcade. So I know what I really like in a platformer, and control feel/weapon feel is always right there at the top of importance.
First, let's get the good out of the way. The jumping mechanics feel 100% precise, and input lag is low. You can confidently make edge jumps.
There's layers of parallax and overall it looks pretty, mostly. Even though I only played for an hour, I flicked through a long play video and noticed the basic brown building blocks are present throughout the ~6 hour game.
The variety, visually, doesn't seem to really be there, so whilst somewhat striking, it all becomes a bit samey after a while.
It has native 4K support in full screen mode or borderless, which is a great feature that every game should have. The actual bordered window options were very limited to 3 sizes though, all way too small for a 4K panel, so forget playing it in that mode. So borderless windowed it was. I am ok with that.
What I am not ok with is the main weapon and soundtrack.
Firstly, the hammer.
Even after an hour, it felt completely alien to me and hence the main reason why I decided to uninstall and refund.
Rather than feeling like a natural extension of the character, the hammer feels, well, kludgy. I am trying to find the word. Unwieldy perhaps?
Rather than feeling precisely connected to a button, it feels more like a chore every single time you want to aim it.
The game also heavily encourages use of the left analog stick, as for some reason d-p ad aiming is limited to up and down rather than the direction aiming of the stick. This I can not understand, as a precision platformer (IMHO) should be played with a digital arcade stick or d-pad. 30 minutes had gone by and I was still trying to aim the hammer by pointing it where I wanted it to go, and eventually I just succumbed and used the analog stick.
Even a non aimed, straight ahead quick hammer attack feels wrong to me. Kludgy.
The best action platformers have combat that feels entirely natural and never fighting the player. Tiny Thor does the opposite.
Oh, a quick word about difficulty. If you can get used to the hammer mechanic, the rest of the level design feels fair and polished, form my limited time with the game in any case. It's again nothing bad, but I just didn't enjoy myself. I hope I am making sense. I mean I can see that real love and effort was put into this, and on paper it should be my type of game, but it just doesn't work for me.
I did notice in a long-play video that you get some dash and hammer upgrades, and that would certainly be something to look forwards to for those who want to stick it out with Tiny Thor.
Music, well, it's good, compositionally speaking - the problem is that out of the tracks I heard, none truly fit the gameplay! The first level was downright lethargic and sleep inducing, second picked it up and third again, and so on.. (boss music was the best bit for sure in the time I played but still not quite there). Music is SUCH a big part of a retro gaming experience for me, and Tiny Thor really let me down in that department. In an action game, I want action music. Something that excites me and helps drive the game along. A perfect example would be the two bloodstained curse of the moon games. Masterful music that goes with exactly what you are doing and what I expect in a $30 game.
Man I will probably get hate for this, but if I had to sum it up, I'd honestly say it's the elevator music of the retro platform game genre. Nothing is ever unpleasant, but it's just "there".
Some minor issues: The game refused to recognise my 144hz refresh rate, all the in game resolution options showing it as a 60hz panel (I double checked that the screen was set at 144 and not 60, and even went to 60 and back to 144 just in case that would trigger the game to realise it was a 144hz panel), so the unlock frame rate setting in the options screen did nothing, it always maxed at 60 FPS, even with v sync disabled.
That said, I highly advise turning off v-sync as the game exhibited no tearing with it off (and if the frame rate works above 60 for you, obviously cap it at a couple blow your refresh rate with RTSS and this should maintain a tear free experience).
As already mentioned, lag was very low like this. The thing is, according to pc gaming wiki and indication from the game's own settings, this game should support higher FPS. Had that worked on my system as it should have, the lag would have been improved even more, and who knows, may have helped the hammer throwing feel better. I can not say as I was stuck at 60 FPS no matter what I tried.
I also didn't like how I could not change sound levels in game, and yes, you have to leave the level you are playing to do so! So, fine tuning the SFX/Music ratio was a chore. EVEN THAT! Lol.
I mean this is something I want to do in game as I play, whilst I hear the sounds in real time. Ultimately, it took only about 8 goes to get the balance to my liking, but still, sound level should be accessible at any time in game. Actually I think this is the first game I have played on Steam where it's not!
I just realised I used the word chore above. I think that sums it all up for me. Rather than having a blast, it more or less feels like I am working for no pay yet having a *little* fun here and there to break it up, but overall, I am just getting tired and more tired, bored even, and want to go home. And then I take another look at it and think, "hang on, it all looks like it should be the kind of thing I want to spend time on", so I try again, but then am reminded why I want to go home.
I can't be the only one, since the reviews for this one are "mixed". I hate giving a negative review but at the same time, well, honesty is the best policy.