Reviews

• 

  Fatbeen

  Aug 1, 2016

  I just completed the game. $15 for a 1-2 hour adventure? I feel ripped off. I will admit, the animation in the game is spectacular, but if I wanted to pay to see art I would go to a gallery. Fossil Echo can be challenging, and I consider myself competent with platform games thanks to the good ol' SNES. However, as the stages progressed, I began to realize some of my deaths were not even my fault. The character likes to forget he's able to cling to ledges and instead falls to his doom. This thing in particular caused much frustration. There are also optional stages (one of which I accidentally skipped) that send you to flashbacks in Momento order. The final flashback (technically the first part of the story) shows what the adventure had all been for with a suspensful cutscene, leading up to the extremely anti-climactic ending that I don't dare give away. All in all, this game is pretty, but needs more content to be worth its price.
• 

  YellowAfterlife

  Sep 11, 2016

  Somewhat short but very nice. Game itself is a platformer with stealth and precision elements. Has gorgeous artwork, great audio, and a curious story. Main story itself can be completed in a hour and some. Completing various challenges that the game has adds another few hours. 100%'ing the achievements would take more time and skill. The few things that I did [i]not[/i] like are: - Slow restarts. Fade-out-restart-fade-in sequence goes for good 5 seconds total, adding some frustration on a few sections with early opportunities for failure. - Doesn't seem like you can revisit challenges - if you skip something (accidentally or out of frustration), you'll only be able to redo that if you do another playthrough from start.
• 

  Vlash

  Sep 12, 2016

  First I'd like to say that I really wanted to like this game, and I would still kinda recommend it to people who like difficult games that are really short, but also really beautiful. So to some I would recommend it, but to most people no. [h1]TL;DR:[/h1] Great audiovisuals, not so great platforming. [h1]Audiovisuals:[/h1] Let's start with the good: In my opinion this game looks really good. The atmosphere is as thick as the visual style is fantastic! This could easily have been a great children's saturday cartoon in the 90-ies that I would gladly have watched. The four people working on this game are clearly talented artists! It was only after reading the "making of"-pdf from the special edition that I learned that every scene is pre-rendered. That impressed me more, as the world itself feels so alive. As I'm writing this I'm listening to the soundtrack that also came with the special edition, and it is such a treat. The orchestration is so well done, with violin, flutes, song, and a folk music feeling that fits the south/north-american setting that inspired the game. If nothing else, I'm really glad I bought the special edition just for the soundtrack! [h1]Gameplay:[/h1] So to the not so good part, namely the gameplay. My main gripe is with the insanely short timing window on some of the platforming you have to do. It felt like it was down to mere milliseconds that stood between death and just barely making it through to the next level. Don't get me wrong, I like a good platformer, after all it's what I grew up with on the NES. After recently having played through the excellent Donkey Kong Country: Tropical Freeze or the beautiful Ori And The Blind Forest, I'm sad to say that Fossil Echo just leaves a lot to be desired in the gameplay department. Let it also be said that I do like difficult games, I completed Bloodborne, and I like the Dark Souls-series. In the one hour and 19 minutes it took me to complete the game I died 119 times. In one section alone I must have died at least 40 times in a row, before I got lucky and just barely made it through. This became really frustrating, and I was close to just quitting the game more than once. The temple-levels was so bad with the timing windows, that I skipped all but two of them. I was at least happy that they were optional, but there were plenty of sections that were not. The level design overall wasn't that good, but especially the temple-levels felt bad and bland. :\ There are also some auto scrolling levels and stealth levels. I'm not a huge fan of auto scrolling levels, those are easily my least favorite part of any Mario game. In the stealth sections the timing window is a bit better than a lot of other areas of the game, but when you are in the shadows you can't see where you stand, so I died a few times just because I thought an enemy had passed by me, when he in fact hadn't. This would have been easily fixed if it was easier to see where you were in the shadows. If we take a look at the venn diagram again, we have on one hand beautiful graphics that remind me of children's cartoons, and on the other hand you have extremely difficult sections of gameplay, and I feel like these don't overlap. I might be wrong in this though, who knows. [h1]Story:[/h1] There's not so much to say about the story, it's simple and effective. It's completely with any words spoken, so anyone can understand it without any problems. Without spoiling anything, the ending was surprisingly anti-climatic and sadly a let down. The game crashed during the final ending cinematic as well, so I didn't get to see it all, and I didn't get the achievement for completing the game. I turned to youtube to see it, and I got to see the extended ending as well. I tried to start the game afterwards, and it continued from the start of the ending cinematic and this time it didn't crash. I think this was the only bug I found in the game. All that being said, I'm looking forward to seeing what these developers do next! As I said, I think they are extremely talented, so I think their next project could only get better! [h1]Pros:[/h1] [list] [*] Beautiful visuals and art style [*] Emotional soundtrack [*] Setting and story [/list] [h1]Cons:[/h1] [list] [*] Short timing windows made it frustrating [*] Level design could be better [/list] [h1]My grade: 5/10[/h1]
• 

  Lapkine

  Sep 17, 2016

  The greatest flaw of Fossil Echo is also its greatest strength: it is a pretty game with pretty animations. In fact these animations are very pretty and the designers wanted the player to see these pretty graphics so much, the platforming had to adapt to the art. And here lies the heart of the problem: the animations and the platform collisions are clunky, which makes the platforming frustrating and incoherent. You will often expect as you run close to the end of a platform to jump out as you press the jump button, only to open your mouth and rage in anger as your character falls to his death. No you're not insane. Yes you did press the button. My hypothesis is that the game doesn't like that you press the jump button before it finishes its running animation loop, so it has to end it, but by the time it can play the jumping animation, it won't because you're in the air and now Gravity owns you. Add to that: -a poor understanding of progression... (that sequence at the start where you chase the feathers is not just EXTREMELY frustrating, it comes RIGHT AFTER YOU LEARN HOW TO WALL JUMP) -...a poor sense of difficulty balance... (namely thinking of the first jungle temple sequence with the moving platforms, where you have to time your jumps while taking into account descending wall jumps, a moving platform and clunky platforming. I basically uninstalled the game after that point) -...the PRICE... (15 dollars for a bad game, that according to other reviews can be completed in 1-2 hours?!) ...and you have a product that is very nice to look at, but horrible to play. If you wanted evidence that art does not make a game, this is it. If you want to play a good platformer with nice art, I highly recommend the recent Rayman games (origins and legends) or Ori and the Blind Forest. Stay away from this.
• 

  Hunter CatzEyes93

  Sep 25, 2016

  What an adorable game! The music is as soothing as a warm bath, and the artwork is visually exquisite! I found this game through imgur and I am glad I spent the money to get it. This is proof that a casual and laid back game can also be inspiring, challenging, artistically flirtatious and unique in a world of shoot em up games! I haven't had this much fun since Osmos!
• 

  Galadhatan

  Nov 13, 2016

  This game features very appealing music and visuals, but there isn't much more to recommend about the game. The game mechanic doesn't connect with the narrative: the young boy is climbing a tower, and the game reveals the reasons for this in flashbacks, but the ending isn't very satisfying, and the dialogue-less cutscenes don't really add up to a story. The challenges are mildly difficult in a tedious manner - that is, the latter platforms are as hard as the initial, and without any save points, the player has to redo the initial platforms over and over and over again. Between the slight narrative, that ends after very little development and without any satisfying ending, and the tedious game mechanics, the game is a missed opportunity for a lovely litte indie game with nice music, sound, and visual atmosphere. 5/10
• 

  creideiki

  Nov 20, 2016

  This game looks appealing at first glance; a challenging platformer with great art and music. Dig deeper, however, and you'll find a repetitive slog through tedious chasing of pixel perfection with an unclear story. I like challenging platformers where the fun is in figuring out how you're supposed to approach each problem. In Fossil Echo, that part is taken care of for you, since there is only a single obvious path through each room and if you have problems with even that, the level designers have often drawn arrows on the background to point it out to you. All that's left is repeating the same jumps again, and again, and again, and again, until you get each move frame- and pixel-perfect. This is made even worse by the fact that the animations for things like turning and climbing up a ledge are long enough that if you get stuck in one, you have no chance to recover your timing. Failures mean instant death, and there is no saving except when entering a room, so you'll have plenty of time to get intimately familiar with the first couple of moves in each room while struggling with the later parts.
• 

  Midnight Kelly

  Dec 5, 2016

  I played this though the first few campfire scenes before stopping. Really, really don't recommend. The graphics are lovely and the music is fitting, but that's about it. The gameplay is tedious, frustrating, and repetitive. The archways with the glowing insignia lead to especially irritating jump sequences and are easy to accidentally pass by without realizing that you can't get back to them once you've walked pass. It feels like the developers wanted to create a short animated film but threw in some nominal gameplay just for the heck of it. If you want to play a well-developed stealth platformer with a great story and graphics, go check out "Mark of the Ninja" instead.
• 

  Programmer

  Dec 27, 2016

  Pro: Good graphic Good audio Con: Sticky control (or there is a hude delay about 0.1 to0.2 sec) when controled with keyboard, did not test with controller Bad checkpoint placement in a few area game is short The sticky control just ruined this game. It might or might not be fine with controller.
• 

  tearfromthered

  Jan 6, 2017

  This game has a lot of quality : great graphics with an artistic visuals, it offers challenges and variety in gameplay : runner, stealh, platforms, puzzles.... problem is : it through them at you in a very mechanical way, always rotating between 3 variation of gameplay phases. Some of them being kind of easy and some being crazy hard in the bad sort of way : pixel perfect jumps with a strict timing needed, stealh map with only one "way" to go through. I couldn't bring myself to go to the end which is sad because the game had great potential
• 

  Soteria

  Feb 27, 2017

  Fossil Echo is a pleasant game to play. The art is good and the music is quite peaceful and relaxing. One of the few games I didn't disable the music before finishing the game. The puzzles manage to be challenging without excessive frustration. It is short, though, and the story has an ambiguous ending--that could be good or bad depending on your tastes. One flaw I found was that I had a crash to desktop the second time I beat the game, before the ending cinematic. When I reloaded, the cinematic played fine.
• 

  bicasaur

  Apr 6, 2017

  This game is engrossing. It is beautiful. It is difficult in all the right ways. (there is an easy mode too) I love it.
• 

  Khronikos

  Jun 23, 2017

  I don't really get the mixed reviews for this title. Fossil Echo is a cheap game with a great visual foundation that is at least worth experiencing for no other reason than to marvel at its fascinating art. I will admit the controls probably are not the tightest around, but that doesn't stop the meaningful story and exemplary visuals from providing entertainment. I actually quite enjoyed the challenging platforming. After a while you get used to the controls, and the only thing that takes practice is timing your runs nearly perfectly without fail. This requires patience and precision. But in the end you don't even have to explicitly do the dream sequences--the hardest platforming sections--if you don't want to. I use a -35 to -50 deadzone setting with my DS4 and Input Mapper, but that is no different from Super Meat Boy where I use -50. Steam now has a toggle anyway if you need it. I recommend control tuning for pretty much every game. Anyway, the game is purely gorgeous, has nicely animated cutscenes, and an artstyle that is intuitive to the gameplay and the theme of the game. The themes concern family, moon phases, animals, and other things that pertain to the boy's journey up the guarded tower. I am having a blast going through the worlds. I do think maybe the achievements are a little crazy, but I don't mind having rare ones that very few people will ever attempt. I could not imagine spending the time to go through this game without dying while completing all the temples on Normal anyway. Maybe an Easy mode playthrough would be a bit more accommodating, but I won't be trying that anytime soon. The game simply asks for too much precision out of the player in the later temples for me to even attempt a no death run. And one mistake in timing, which has a very limited duration for your success, and you are done. There are some hidden extra modes if you feel you can beat some of the achievements, and 8-bit mode is simply hidden behind the play it all in one sitting achievement, which is super easy. I feel like the save system, and the occasional missed temple door, are a cause of some players' frustration as you cannot backtrack at all. But once you get the idea of the game, you won't miss any doors. Not too bad here. A challenge for those that really want it. The devs probably marketed this game wrong. They went in thinking this was a game with the clout of something far greater, and you really can't do that these days. FE should have been ten bucks on release, and it should have never released right before the Summer sale. Some of those decisions were just not very thoughtful, and they definitely killed this game in the end if they were thinking about a bigger audience. I have played just about all these art/experience games and Fossil Echo is definitely a memorable one if a little on the rough side. Beyond the complaints this is a classic little gem to me. It has overtones of Miyazaki works, and in bringing back a certain nostalgia for old school platforming it fuses a beautiful world within a time and tone familiar to those that played when this genre was once king. Totally recommended for the cheap price it resides at on sales. I disagree with others saying to skip the game because of controls. It's just a bit challenging in places, and you need to make sure you tune your controller. In reality it's not the controller but the strict requirements of the timing on the platform sections that makes it a bit overwhelming for some. But on a second playthrough it will go much easier once you are familiar with the puzzles. This is the same type of gameplay most of us love in all the other great platformers. It has some issues, but the enchanting soundtrack, mesmerizing visuals, which are a good step ahead of the usual indie, and charming animations all make up for it. I thought the story did everything it needed to do. It's a short game, but it's a sweet experience for around 5-10 dollars. This game is underrated. A damn shame in my opinion.
• 

  KJ_Tailor

  Jun 28, 2017

  I have a love/hate relationship with this game. As most other reviewers I have to say, this game is short; heck it even has an achievement for finishing the story within 45 minutes. But that is not my personal main negative. This game is frustrating! It is a 2D-platformer but unlike it's genre-brethren it is unforgiving to a fault. You missed the platform by half a pixel? Too bad, you die! It has nothing to do with skill, at least not fully, but rather with making absolutely no mistakes. The timing has to be right, the position has to be right, everything has to perfect, otherwise you'll start the level/room anew. Besides this critique, the game is lovely. It has a beautiful art, a strong story that gives you the feels and a wonderful soundtrack. It won't get a 5/7 from me, but it is a solid deal, especially when you buy it on sale ;) get it now!
• 

  Celery

  Jul 5, 2017

  I know the screenshots look pretty, but whether you want a good story [b]or[/b] tight gameplay, [h1]you'll be deeply disappointed.[/h1] By the end of the game at approximately the 1-hour mark, the simple and unimaginative story and all its potential side arcs are left unconcluded and unexplained, and there are some "mysterious" insinuating visual cues throughout the game that will amount to nothing. A complete waste of time and very unsatisfactory in that regard. The wordless storytelling accomplished nothing except corny gesturing and leaving things in the dark. The gameplay consists of three modes. The first is normal unhurried (and sometimes hurried) platforming that's pretty okay. Then there are obstacle courses that require you to follow some incredibly exact route with very exact timing or you die, and even if you survive some mistake, you probably blew your chance and have to commit suicide anyway. Lastly there are stealth sections with exactly two enemy types that have predictable but annoyingly timed movement patterns. The game gives close to zero room for improvisation and creativity, you just need to do things exactly how the developers envisioned it. And even with the game's very short length, it still manages to be repetitive both in its levels and cutscenes. So boring and frustrating. The makers obviously spent a lot effort creating the background art, but considering that, the characters look lazily designed, the animations are very choppy, and they couldn't even keep the main character's asymmetry (two feathers on the [b]right[/b] side of his head) in check: the gameplay sprite is mirrored for both sides, and in one cutscene the feathers momentarily jumped to the left side. All in all, the developers didn't seem to care much about this game beyond impressing people at festivals. Speaking of which, I no longer have much regard for the parties that decided to shower this game with awards.
• 

  joyrock1

  Jul 6, 2017

  I love indie games but this was an exception. It is the same 3-4 stage designs over and over with very rigid red-light-green-light gameplay. If you don't do exactly as the creators planned you die and try again. Most of your time is spent waiting until the exact moment you're allowed to advance. The character can never decide if he's going to land or grab onto a platform which slows your momentum and causes you to fall off platforms and start over from the beginning. The game is pretty but not fun.
• 

  dearinma

  Jul 16, 2017

  Fossil Echo is a tight rewarding platformer. Frustrating at times but rewarding when you get it right. Which is perfect. I love the soundtrack - pay for it - it is relaxing and very nice The game is roughly 1 hour+ so buy on sale if you want value vs time. More time is added depending on your platforming / temple times. Temples are extra and hard. I compare them to shorter versions of Donkey Kong Country Returns temples. Once you know the moves you get them easily, but it takes tries to know whats coming. Gameplay makes sense and progresses well. Several levels (and all of the extra temples) require trial and error to complete which is fine. There is nothing unordinarlly hard. I completed several levels avoiding active enemies trying to hurt me. I.E. my stealth sucked and I made it work. The story leaves questions no matter how much you finish but it is interesting. I'm not sure what I accomplished as the main character, but I liked accomplishing it. And the extra achievements. Well most of them. No way I was going to beat the game and all temples without dying.
• 

  Txster

  Nov 24, 2017

  It's pretty yes.. very, very pretty. And that was it for positives. The controls are too floaty. There's no margin for error. Right away the 'temple' levels have actual arrow painted ont he walls to tell you which way to go because the design will not to that itself. Pointless "cutscenes" not telling anything. No resolution options. Really pondered about getting a refund. Not doing it in the end, hoping it'll help the dev do better next time.
• 

  typesanitizer

  Nov 26, 2017

  [b]Tl:dr; If you want to play a pretty, short, precision platformer with a little bit of stealth, Fossil Echo is for you. Otherwise, pick some longer/easier game.[/b] I just completed the game on normal mode with all the challenge/temple levels, finishing with 197 deaths in 2 hours. Here's a summary of my thoughts. [h1]Gameplay[/h1] The levels are either based on precision platforming (1 error and you've very likely failed the level, especially in the latter half) or stealth + platforming (again errors are deadly). While the platforming mechanics aren't perfect (e.g. Mario or Super Meat Boy), they are pretty good. Once you get used to the slightly floaty jumps in a few levels, it is not a problem. I played with a keyboard which worked fine. The stealth mechanics are also solid (i.e. predictable, no cheap deaths) but you are mostly powerless (as befits the player character - a little boy). There are two ways to kill enemies - jumping on their heads (of course) or getting them to shoot one another (entertaining if you can pull it off). Often the best strategy is just running for the exit instead of trying to kill enemies. There are a few different kinds of levels, but all of them require a perfect/near-perfect run to pass the level on normal difficulty. There is a little bit of room for creativity for some of the stealth levels, not all. [list] [*]Timed platforming (story) - Keep climbing higher quickly. There are no dangers except the bottom of the screen which keeps going up and can kill you. [*]Challenge platforming (temples, optional) - There is the usual variety of platforms and walls (brittle, sliding in and out, moving periodically along a guided path). You will commit suicide often here if you already broke a brittle platform/wall but couldn't get across. [*]Stealth + platforming (story) - Get to the end of the level without getting killed by an enemy. The platforming is basic here. [/list] One good point of the level design is that almost each level has the right size. With this level of difficulty, it can get annoying if the levels are too big. Also the restarts on death are almost instantaneous, which is good. What's odd is that there are clear arrows in the temple levels for how to traverse the level. This breaks immersion and doesn't really add much as the level design feels sufficiently self-explanatory. It would be better if this were optional and off by default instead of the way it is now. Similarly some stealth levels have hints displayed on what strategy you can use. It would've been nicer if the player were allowed to discover things by trial and error here and show/offer the hint after a few deaths. The only complaint I have is that you need to figure out the time you need to hold onto certain walls by trial and error which can get frustrating, especially if it is near the end of the level. It would be nicer if the timing windows were adjusted slightly for this... [h1]Visuals[/h1] The game is very pretty in all the cutscenes and in the art in different levels. This is a clear case of quality over quantity, it would've been really hard to scale this to a larger project -- it would have taken either an inordinate amount of time (e.g. Owlboy) or too many people (too expensive?). It is hard for me to put in words how pretty the game looks; you should check the screenshots/trailer for this. All I can say is that the game consistently looks as good as shown in the trailer, which is not a trait that many game share. [h1]Story[/h1] The story is mostly told through beautifully animated cutscenes (no voice or text). The "reward" for beating the temple levels is an abstract wall painting, which relates the symbols seen in different parts of the game. Again, the stuff isn't given to you on a plate, you have to put in effort to understand what is going on apart from the straight-forward main story (although it is told in mixed chronological order...). I wish it were possible to view the paintings separately to piece together the story, in a gallery or something from a menu. The ending is a bit weird as it is not clear what happened (the boy's quest ends without any solid conclusion) and whether this is just setup for a sequel. There seems to be a good case of ludonarrative dissonance here - there is a strong disconnect between the story and the gameplay for the platforming levels. It is not clear why the bottom of the screen is moving upwards (smoke? poison?) and the kid doesn't seem to care about the temples at all. For the stealth levels, the existence of enemy thugs makes logical sense but the drones feel a bit outlandish in the game's setting. [h1]Misc[/h1] [list] [*]The music complements the visual style and level design well. The only odd part is some stealth levels have really cheerful music which feels out of place as you're getting stabbed by a dagger. [*]If you like really hard achievements, you're in for a treat. Finishing the entire game + temples with zero deaths is an achievement which 0.6% players have. By comparison, 1.7% of XCOM 2 finished the game on Ironman mode (no save scumming possible) on Commander+ difficulty, [/list] I'm not really sure why many reviews are complaining about the difficulty. The game's blurb reads [quote=author]Fossil Echo is a story-driven, short and challenging 2D platformer with hand drawn visuals.[/quote] which is a 100% honest description. If you don't like a challenge, then you probably don't want to play this game. While the developers have added an Easy mode recently (I haven't tried it), the changes seem to be minor so the game will still be more difficult than a medium difficulty platformer.
• 

  Mindcrime

  Jun 12, 2020

  I wanted to like this game because it has great art and music, but it's a rage-quit game. The store page calls it "challenging", but it's far beyond challenging. In the 30 minutes or so I played before rage-quitting, there were two types of sections. The first type of section is a vertical climbing stage in which the game auto-scrolls the screen upward and you have to keep running, jumping, and wall-jumping your way up. This requires precisely-timed jumps. You will die if you're even 1/10 of a second too slow, which is easy to do since your character does not control well. As other reviewers have commented, the character is "slidy" (it seems that momentum carries him forward a bit once you release the movement key/button) and you cannot jump immediately after climbing/landing). This is the first section you encounter, so it's very possible you will rage-quit within the first five minutes of the game. The second type of section is one with enemies which shoot and instantly kill you. You need to avoid these enemies by jumping and climbing while their backs are turned. The problem is that their backs are not turned long enough to successfully make it through these sections. You need to learn their movements and be able to start your progression several seconds in advance so you are in the right place when the guards turn. In this section, too, if you are even 1/10 of a second too slow, you will die. It doesn't help that there is a lack of consistency when it comes to wall-jumping. Most of the time, you cannot jump and grab onto a wall and then jump again and grab the same wall again, but sometimes you can, with nothing indicating when you are allowed to do this. This happens in the auto-scrolling levels, so following the game's established rule of no double wall jumps will contribute to your number of deaths and rage level because some places require double wall jumps. This may not look like a game which requires perfect timing, but that's exactly what it is. I'm not against challenging games, but a game which requires timing this precise is beyond challenging -- it's nearly impossible, especially given the troublesome controls.