Review | The Guardian

LifeisXbox’s The Guardian review | I’m always in the mood to try out a new platformer, and that’s exactly what I’ll be talking about today. The Guardian is a new game by developer IT-Fun Studios that is being described as a 2D platformer with a lot of interesting levels. I can already tell you that even though the looks of The Guardian are quite simplistic, the gameplay is something else entirely.

If you love to challenge fate, then the game The Guardian is definitely for you! After all, under the guise of a simple and colorful platformer, there are incredible levels, unexpected surprises, and a fun pastime. Let’s see if this is really the case, shall we?

We played The Guardian for 4 hours on PC. This game is only available on Steam.

What we liked!

• Different characters | You can play through the game several times because The Guardian offers various classes to play as. You have the Robot, Wizard, Elf, Druid, and Assassin. Each of these characters has its own strengths and weaknesses. They also have their own unique look, with the robot standing out the most, obviously. All characters have this darker, muddier look and feel, while the robot is just shiny. The various classes ensure replayability, which I think was a nice touch to The Guardian. If it wasn’t for these, I think the gameplay may have actually been way more boring.
• Short but fun levels | There are nine levels in The Guardian. These levels are not very long, but thanks to an increasing challenge at every level, the developers managed to keep the gameplay interesting. I do have to admit that the second level seemed to be incredibly hard compared to the others. I had to run through this level countless times and usually failed at the same point. When I did get past that point, I was not yet familiar with the rest of the level so I quickly died again. It’s a trial and error kind of process, yet the gameplay remains challenging and fun.

Somewhere between

• Controls | The controls were really easy and straightforward, but these felt so unbalanced. Walking went okay, but when I wanted to turn around, it all went a bit too slow, and enemies would be able to hit me because turning didn’t go smooth enough. But the jumping was the worst, really. I felt like I barely had any control when it came to jumping, and unfortunately, you’ll be seeing a lot of jumping in The Guardian.
• Graphics and sound| The graphics are quite colorful but they’re also super basic and simple. The movement of both the characters and the enemies looked a bit forced and stiff, which may have been intentional, but it feels a bit ‘cheap’ somehow. I did not put the graphics in the dislike section though, because this is a game that only costs around 2 Euros, so I’m not expecting any grand graphics. The soundtrack and sound effects were definitely implemented but they felt a bit all over the place. Sometimes one sound would cut out because it had to make room for another one, and it all felt quite chaotic really.

What we disliked

• Text | A few things bothered me about the text in The Guardian. First of all, the game starts with a big chunk of text explaining the story and giving some background information on it. The text appeared on the screen very slowly, and since I’m a fast reader, I like to press a skip forward button in order to read faster. Unfortunately, this was not possible. The font that’s being used also isn’t ideal to read, but maybe that’s just personal taste. Anyway, what annoyed me the most was the repetition of dialogues. When I first tried out this game, my character died a few times and had to restart from the beginning. However, some wizard told me some things at the start of level 1, and every time I died, I had to read what he was telling me AGAIN AND AGAIN with no option to skip. I once tried to just walk past him quickly, and just kept moving forward, but the conversation he was having with himself kept going so I could not see my enemies very clearly. This was so frustrating. I eventually found that jumping over him kept him from rattling on, but still, this is just standard gameplay mechanics that should be implemented.

How long to beat the story | 2 to 4 hours
How long to get 100% achievements | 10 hours
Similar with | Any other basic platformer

CONCLUSION

LifeisXbox.eu is the largest Belgian Xbox centered website, your reading time is greatly appreciated! Please consider sharing this review with your friends on social media, that means a lot for us! If you are Dutch speaking also consider joining our Dutch exclusive Facebook group Xbox Gamers Belgium. Feel free to use quotes for PR purposes.