Terrian Saga: KR-17

Hah! This is a fun retro style platform game. I started having SEGA Genesis and Super Nintendo flashbacks! :O
This game rocks! It's fun! You scoot and dash around as a little robot, shoot and blast your way through enemies (you even get a user guided homing missile) and even fly around with a jetback.
One level I found the jetpack and just start flying non-stop up in the air... going and going... and I found coins! (or whatever they are) xD. Now I'm exploring everything. :D And the controls are awesome with the 360 controller.
The 16 Bit style characters, backgrounds and details look great and the 16-Bit chiptune music is awesome. It's not repetitive and mixes up really well.
If you like playing old school retro style shoot-em up platform games like back in the days of Super Nintendo, Sega Genesis and TurboGrafx-16, then you should get this game.
For the price it costs, it is more than worth it. :D

Terrian Saga KR-17 is a mix of three genres which are action, platforming and puzzle solving. It starts off quite puzzle heavy but the later levels have a lot more action and platforming. Our protagonist is a robot that has gained sentience and goes off to take back a planet conquered by a terrorist. I learned the story via the Steam description, besides the intro the story in Terrian Saga is non existent. Accompanying you is a sentient missile which acts as your guide and is also briefly controllable when you summon him. All the dialogue is presented in text, there is no voice acting.
When you first gain control of your character one of the first things you will notice is that the game is locked at 30fps. That is not a deal breaker but it does affect the game negatively. Your KR-17 robot comes equipped with your basic blaster and a grenade launcher. The grenade launcher uses up energy but it is a very small amount and kills most enemies with one hit. That's the weapon to go with unless you are out of energy and have to resort to the blaster. Energy is recharged via stations scattered about the level and they are usually close enough that you will rarely run out. You can also summon your sentient missile friend but that does cost quite a chunk of energy.
The missile is controllable but once he starts moving he can't stop and if he crashes he will disappear causing you to waste more energy summoning him again. He is very useful to hit hard to reach enemies and is also used to go into places your character can't to destroy a certain object. These sections start off easy enough though they quickly become a pain as they demand further precision and add a lot of sharp turns. They are not short sections either, they take quite a while and simply scraping into something destroys you causing the missile to be summoned again from the start. Your hitbox being so large does not help either.
KR-17 controls much better though he does also suffer from having a large hitbox which an be a pain when forced to avoid insta-death obstacles tiny areas. The game does start off very easy and you may think it is much more of a puzzle game than anything else. You'd be dead wrong. It won't take long for this game to get very brutal and you will need fast reaction speeds. You will be facing much more dangerous and numerous enemies as well as tougher platforming. That is when the game truly gets fun and becomes something in the veins of Mega Man. Though no where near as brutal as that since you have infinite lives and save stations are usually scattered close together.
Certain levels sections do not have save stations and you have to beat it all in one go. One particularly troublesome section is one where you have to stand on a tiny log throughout a water filled level. The slightest touch of water will cause you to explode and that level dragged on far too long. Don't get me wrong it is fun but do not be expecting an easy laid back puzzle/platformer after the first couple of levels. One thing that is a problem though is that certain objects in the foreground can block view of your character which is problematic when facing enemies or jumping over hazards. It is not a common occurrence though. There are also some pads which will either drop down or bounce you up that probably will cause your death if you did not expect it. Changing the colors of the pad would have been an easy fix to be able to tell them apart.
Nothing about the environments feel felt memorable or unique, just random pieces of map sown together to form a level. The artstyle itself is very nice and is 32 bit instead of the usual 8 or 16 most indies use. Music is decent. Nothing special but it gets the job done. The hud is great and simple to understand though at times it can hide the view of enemies or obstacles and cause you to take damage due to it. You can take up to five hits from enemies or most obstacles and you refill it by finding a red floating crystal. Be careful though, the frames of invincibility after being hit are very few and you will likely get hit multiple times in succession if you are not able to escape after getting damaged.
Terrian Saga KR-17 was a nice surprise. I believe it to be a hidden gem that is rough around the edges. It really does feels like this would have been a classic game if this was released back in the day. The 30 FPS cap was an odd decision that took some enjoyment out of it and other problems do bring it down from being great. Overall this is definitely a title to check out if you like platformers, puzzles and the action genre. If you don't like even one of those this may not be the game for you. All three genres are mixed very well and persist throughout the entire game. For those of you that do enjoy all three, Terrian Saga KR-17 is definitely a title worth considering.

Terrain Saga: KR-17 is a linear side-scroller featuring a torsoless blue robot and his sidekick, a mysteriously resurrecting missile with arms named "J1M" in their quest to quell the robotic rebellion on the planet Valiant. Graphically, the game does draw influence from blue robot games of greater repute, however, the similarities, more or less, end there.
KR-17 suffers from an overall lack of polish. Graphics I often found were stretch and scaled and sometimes it was difficult to tell which was foreground and which was background. The difficulty of the challenges seem to follow no particular pattern and much of the gameplay feels a bit like filler. The bosses I found to be incredibly weak and more than half of them involved running through a gauntlet of hazards while the boss destroys the level. The music, rather than employing catch chiptunes, assaults us with MIDI-esque synthesized music. Because of the overall lack of polish, rather than feeling like a classic, it feels like a bit like a b-list side-scroller downloaded from a BBS circa 1993. This game needs at least another 6 months in the oven before it's fully baked.
The game looks better than it actually is, however if you're a vintage gamer and in the mood for this sort of gameplay, dispite it's many flaws, it does offer some respectible challenges. If you're a particular fan of this genre, pick this game up, but don't expect anything life-chaning.
5.5/10

KR-17 is pretty obviously a retro-style platformer that harkens back to the good old days of the SNES. It plays very similarly to the 2D Duke Nukem Games or Megaman, but with some different twists. Really, if you like games from this genre, at $4- you can't really go wrong here. It won't knock your socks off, but it'll be a pretty good nostalgia trip.
Features:
* Gameplay is pretty generic, jumping shooting are standard faire.
* You have 4 extra attacks, plus a guided missile, largely for enemy destruction, but sometimes for puzzle solving. They're largely unecessary, but can be useful in certain cases. The guided rocket is a bit OP if you can manage to control it properly.
* The soundtrack is pretty solid, and while the songs can get repetitive, you won't be around a level long enough for it to get annoying.
* Most levels are pretty simple: the only goal is to reach the exit. Unfortunately, most levels require you to flip a bunch of switches, and it's pretty easy to miss one or two. Doesn't take much time to go back and find them, but its still a bit annoying.
* The controls are weird. Especially with the jetpack (you have to hold up on the right stick, and move horizontally with the left stick, otherwise you'll stop flying and probably die). Once you get used to that, it's pretty smooth.
* The enemies feel more like traps/obstacles than proper opponents, which isn't bad, but it does make them feel a little slapped down on the levels.
Also, here are our thoughts in video form!

9/10. Retro, smart and simple. This game has a great difficutly, so if u want to take some hours doing something, playing this game will be a great idea.

I wasted $4 for your game, cuz I love your drone name KR-17 haha

Pretty great arcade platformer in the style of old games.
In the role of the only surviving robot - we must complete our mission to neutralize the "enemy agent".
On the way we will meet many different robots - ready to sacrifice their lives for the sake of killing the hero. In addition, the game has small logical tasks and "boss battles".
The game is made in the form of a retro game of the 90s - both in the graphic / musical component, and in terms of control. The only "innovation" that distinguishes the game from the background of old games can be called save points. Therefore, the player does not need to sit and go through the game from the very beginning to the final - in one go.
Pros:
+ Nice retro graphics
+ Atmospheric retro soundtrack
+ Difficulty
+ Trading cards
+ Achievements
+ Big discounts
Minuses:
- Difficulty - not suitable for every player, which significantly reduces the reach of the audience.
- Does not support gamepad.
- Cannot remap navigation keys.
Total:
A complex, hardcore project - which will be appreciated by a rather small part of the audience. The game was promised to be the beginning of a whole series of games in this universe - but apparently the author was disappointed with sales. Since we did not hear anything more about the promised games.
I recommend this game to fans of complex projects.
p.s. To use a gamepad - I recommend using the Xpadder program.