Iconoclasts
Robin just wants to be a mechanic and help people, but without a license she’s a sinner in Mother’s eyes. Ever since picking up her wrench, the world has been going nuts and she's wanted to bolt it back together. Now Penance is raining down on everyone she loves and One Concern agents are after her. But something big is going on – bigger than droughts of Ivory fuel and personal conflicts – and Robin’s in the thick of it. Hours of nut-twisting platform action-adventure Numerous densely detailed locations filled with fine-tuned action and puzzles 20+ gear-grinding, screen-filling boss battles stand in your way Three game-changing difficulty settings supported by a unique tweak system A heart-wrenching epic – can one mechanic fix the whole world? Iconoclasts is the masterwork of indie developer Joakim Sandberg, seven long years in the making. Iconoclasts delivers awesome action, hilarious hijinks and an emotional rollercoaster of deeply personal storytelling.
Steam User 13
The White:
In a broad sense, "yes". Iconoclasts gets the recommendation; it does a number of things really well. Visually, it's very well expressed. Sound design is decent. Musically, there are some high points, and it builds atmosphere and tone quite well. I enjoyed the movement and puzzling mechanics, generally. The sprite work is extremely detailed, and there's a ton of life and thought in the character dialogue (for most of the villains, anyway).
The Black:
I walked away from this game after blazing through ~70% of it back when it came out. I recall being ticked off about the stealth fight. I returned to it recently to 100% it. I offer some critiques with this in mind.
Turning boss fights into puzzles is an ambitious decision, and I respect it. The down-side, is that puzzle logic and combat logic often don't mix well. As a broad analogy, the best chess player in the world probably isn't all that great at chess if someone's taking pot shots at him from across the room with a 9mm. Having to split focus between survival and discerning an enemy's gimmick is a really quick way to test a player's patience.
The Gray:
For a while I couldn't figure out what Iconoclast's visual style reminded me of. It's very obvious, particularly late in the game when the sprite work gets massive and (intentionally) unsettling. It's Metal Slug. Once that piece "fit", a lot of the game-play and decisions started to make more sense to me. I still found a number of the fights frustrating for the sake of it, but I understood what I was working with.
I found most dialogue between the protagonists to be irrelevant. There was a concerted effort to use them to tell an interesting story, and there was a high note or two, but most of it felt pretty flat. (But that's just like, my opinion man.)
My penultimate thought is that Iconoclasts jumped on the bandwagon of adding a melee "parry" feature to their Metroidvania. It's incorporated well; it has a lot of versatility. Still, it's not a trend or a feature I enjoy, and I earnestly wish developers would stop doing it.
My final thought is that the boss rush is not worth your time, and I wouldn't bother with it unless you really want that last acheevo.
Steam User 11
people saying this is a metroidvania are lying, do not go in with the expectations that this is what that is. it's an easy descriptor but doesn't match up in my opinion. a lot of the disappointment i see, to me, is because of misaligned expectations.
THAT BEING SAID. i'm a complete dweeb when it comes to "metroidvania" style games, but this game is a total blast and is welcoming enough that i was confident in seeing it through. appropriate for all skill levels, i'd say. energetic gameplay that picks up as soon as the game starts, interesting characters, fun boss fights, a well fleshed out story (that leaves room for very fun discussion!), and absolutely top tier music. CANNOT recommend this enough. i really suck at words and don't know how to articulate reasons for why i think something is Good in a concise way, but i love it so much that i want to leave a review. iconoclasts will be something that sticks with me for a long time.
i am royal and agent black's #1 shooters.
also, birbasaurus rex is a good final boss. change my mind. you cannot. one of these reviews needs calm down a little bit. the final boss also being a sort of universal mechanic is a fun theme. everything in this game is completely outrageous and over the top and there's no real reason the final boss couldn't be, too. it was fun anyways!
Steam User 11
best recommendation is can give is, this is the kind of game Owlboy attempted to be, great pixel graphics and a great story to go alongside it
the experience is carried by a very good story that gets just a slightly bit weaker by the very end, but as a metroidvania, its only ok, exploration is hardly worth it because the rewards are very insignificant, some of the character and object hitboxes are slightly janky, some bosses are fun, and some can be frustrating the first time around because new game mechanics are often introduced alongside a new boss which is an AWFUL idea, also exploration is constantly interrupted by cutscenes
like i said, the best part of this is the story and helps carry some decent gameplay
Steam User 8
Iconoclasts is a metroidvania-like game that you would never want to miss.
From all the same genre games I had played so far it has the best Boss Fight Design and also interesting game mechanisms. The game does a really fantastic job on shaping characters and building a complete world view from pieces while telling a deep, shocking story. You can really tell that the developer put a huge amount of effort on the dialogue lines.
A little flaw of this game that I would like pointing out is that sometimes it may lacks of some hints when the player encountering new enemies/bosses. It will usually take a while to let the player figure out that what kind of attack can actually damag the target.
Here is my two cents about the plot after completing this beautiful piece
In the final boss fight, the bird-look alien jumped out of the Starworm after we beat it, angrily pointing the ivory meter, accusing that the humans had drained out all of their storage. Personally I was really shocked when seeing the alien's funny, angry behavior: We have killed so much agents, we have overthrown the One Concern, we have lost Royal...we have done so much and sacrificed so much, to just face a funny-behaving alien???
......
I calmed myself down after a few minutes, and then when I looked at the name of the game, I suddenly realized that, the reason why I felt the ending is being ridiculous, is because that I had also somehow idolized the Starworm as some kind of higher beings, subconsciously through the game. How ironic...the game itself, has became an iconoclast that broke my established belief.
Steam User 4
Decent linear platformer with very slight Metroidvania elements. Puzzles and combat are based on electricity and magnetism.
Best description will be - Teslagrad but with combat (and with arcade-style physics).
Very good for a game that was done by one single developer, but compared to other games in same genre - just decent.
Steam User 4
Iconoclasts is probably konjak's magnum opus. It has all the things his games are known for (tight gameplay, great pixel art, a killer soundtrack, elaborate boss fights) but refined and turned up to 11.
There seems to be a lot of divisiveness in regards to its narrative aspects for some reason, but personally I loved the story, characters, and world this game had to offer. If it all clicks with you then you'll probably feel compelled to continue partly out of a strong desire to see what happens next. I 100% completed this game a long time ago but I still think about it from time to time just because it left such a strong impression on me. I'd love to see its universe expanded upon more; Everything is wrapped up pretty nicely by the time the credits roll, but it leaves just enough questions open to make you wonder about its larger mysteries.
My only complaint regarding its narrative is that sometimes it moves along at a lightning pace with major events often happening quickly one after another (especially in the game's latter half). Some more gameplay segments inserted between those big events would have been very welcome. Not only because of how good the core gameplay is, but also for helping pad out the game's runtime more.
On the topic of gameplay: It's a puzzle-Metroidvania with a heavy narrative focus. The protagonist is equipped with an oversized wrench that she can use to interact with enemies and the environment in various ways, and progression is usually tied to using it to solve puzzles that impede your progress. Boss fights typically follow a similar style of feeling like dangerous puzzles that you have to solve before you can actually inflict damage. There isn't a single boss in this game that isn't ludicrously over-the-top in some way, which is always a big plus in my book.
Overall, the excessive cutscenes and dialogue might be a big turnoff for some, but I honestly think this is one of the best and most memorable action-puzzle-narrative-platformers available. Here's hoping we'll get to return to its universe in the future.
Steam User 5
The religious scripture in this game has a quote from Charles Manson lol. I went in expecting a metroidvania. I got that plus a puzzle platformer and a story about people taking religion too far. 10/10 would destroy the space worm again