Game: A Fading Melody
Developer: Anchor Cast
Release Date: 3/20/2009
Version Reviewed: Full Game
In the indie platformer, A Fading Melody, you play as a girl who happens to be in a coma. Your mission is to bring light back into her world and find out what happened to her. It’s a simple, yet interesting premise and it instantly attracted me to the game, hoping for a story-driven game on XBL Indies. I’ve always been a big supporter of story in video games, so I was hoping this game would deliver on that promise. Instead, I was given a game that tried too hard at being artsy and it fell flat on its face because of it.
The second you start up the game you immediately feel a heavy connection with Braid since you don’t really have a start menu, but instead you’re “in” the game. As I moved my character across the screen, I noticed even deeper connections between A Fading Melody and Braid; instead of the game sitting you down for a cut scene, the story reveals itself via text while you’re actually playing. It’s an interesting way of telling a story, but unfortunately Melody’s story becomes dry and boring and I soon found myself disconnected from it. The story has zero personality or character, which really put me off since my main interest in the game was because of its story.
The presentation is atmospheric and had a really interesting art style that focused a lot on moody colors; the character and enemies are all portrayed as silhouettes. The classical music was charming and really added to the game’s vibe and feel, but unfortunately that great atmospheric feel would soon be broken. At about half-way through the game you face a monster that looks exactly like the Beholder from Dungeons & Dragons. After that, the atmosphere was destroyed as that monster showed up in every level after that point. The poor character animations, which were a bit stiff and robotic, didn’t help.
Like every other platformer, you traverse the world by jumping around and eventually earning abilities like double jumping and rolling. You also get the ability to dash by holding the ‘X’ button, but unfortunately almost all of the jumps require a dash jump. This basically forced me to hold down the ‘X’ button throughout the entire game and my hand got tired fast; it’s very awkward trying to hit the jump button and the dash button at the same time. Another problem is that the hit detection on platforms can be wonky at times and sometimes you just fall through them, or even worse, get killed by an enemy from a couple inches away without ever touching them.
Another interesting gameplay mechanic is that while you’re moving around this world, your screen will slowly darken until you can’t see anything, which leads to death. To restore light to the screen you must kill enemies; this pushes the darkness back. This mechanic rarely comes to play since the darkness moves extremely slow. During my entire playthrough, I only died once from the darkness.
A Fading Melody is a game that tries too hard to be artsy and falls on its face. The game has a poor, dry story and the gameplay is only serviceable at best. The presentation is well done until the Beholder shows up, but the music and art style are probably the best things about the game. The game only features seven levels and at the price tag of three dollars, I can’t recommend this game.
Isaac Wagner
GT: millwrought
(Thank to Kush for editing, and hit up Pixelated Sausage!)