The Curse of Issyos 12+

I love that this is a retro “pixel” game that “plays by the rules” of actual 8-bit gaming: limited palette, pixels are all the same size, animations take place on a pixel grid, actual “chiptune” soundtrack. A lot of games that try to look like this fail because they aren’t faithful in these ways. The gameplay is smooth and gratifying on a SteelSeries Nimbus on Apple TV. So glad to finally have a great platformer on tvOS. Worth many times its price. I can’t wait to keep playing!

If you have and MFI controller than this game is effectively a masterpiece of 2D platforming. Borrowing elements from great games like Castlevania and Metroid (especially Castlevania), and yet avoiding the mistakes of those games, means that this game is essentially “perfect”. Good writing, good level design, and fantastic boss fights. The only downside is the length. I didn’t want it to stop haha.

Great soundtrack as well. If you love old school games from the 80s and 90s then this is a must play.

1. This is unplayable without a controller and there’s no reason for that to be the case.

2. A common trope in reviews is to designate the reviewed media as a “Love letter to …”. Conversely, this is a Hate Letter. The art/aesthetic is great but, in terms of gameplay, it’s the worst aspects of early console games collected in one place. It’s like a satire of early video games - bad level design, bad hit detection, luck dependent progress, enemies with movement patterns that don’t match the limitations of player movement, worthless power ups and illogical allocation of health/lives.