The feeling that each area is not just a level of play, but a structuring part of a more complex and organic world, is definitely missing.Ĭave Story 3D adds a new easy difficulty to the original game, making it more enjoyable for newbies. Too often in Cave Story each of the areas feels like a long path starting from point A and coming through many obstacles to point B, making exploration, one of the most beautiful mechanics of this genre, limited. If on the one hand the game mechanics such as growth and progression of the character follow those of its inspirers in an excellent way, Cave Story is inferior to the best Metroidvania in at least one aspect: the level design, always rather linear, and devoid of that abundance of secrets and alternative passages that often make a map alive and pulsating. It is a tried and tested system, but undoubtedly working, given the satisfaction it gives the player with every progress made.
As well as the weapons, even the health and skills of Quote will be enhanced over the course of the game, similar to what happens in the Metroid and in the two-dimensional Castlevania, with each upgrade that will open paths previously closed to exploration. This will force the player to a reasoned approach to clashes, which favors the study of attack patterns in the frontal clash, and which is very satisfying, even if not very immediate. In fact, we will be able to upgrade the level of our weapon by collecting the bonuses left by defeated enemies, while every time we are hit by an opponent's attack, the level of the equipped weapon will drop. The management of upgrades is a very special feature of Cave Story. In balance, between combat and exploration. For each weapon, three distinct upgrades will be available that will not only change the power but also the type and range of attack. At our disposal we will have an arsenal of various weapons that we will find in the course of our adventure, from the gun to the missiles, from the fire to the sword, up to particular weapons equipped with partially search or repeating projectiles. which will first concern the salvation of the cute bunnies and then the entire planet.
Soon Quote will meet the Mimigas, a peaceful race of talking rabbits that inhabit the island, and the Doctor, the evil antagonist who is having the Mimigas kidnapped in order to carry out terrible experiments on them, and will find himself embroiled in an adventure. Cave Story puts us in the shoes of Quote, an anthropomorphic robot who wakes up with no memory inside a cave located on that one then turns out to be a flying island. Cave Story in fact belongs to the popular “Metroidvania” genre, titles that like Super Metroid or Castlevania à la Symphony of the Night are based on 2D exploration and on a certain progression and growth of the character. Despite a different graphic presentation, gameplay, level design, positioning of enemies and so on are taken on an equal footing from the other versions of Cave Story, and considering their excellent pedigree it certainly cannot be said that this is a bad thing. What sets Cave Story 3D apart from previous versions of the same game? Essentially, as the title suggests, the entire game has been recreated using polygonal graphics and maintaining two-dimensional gameplay, in all respects identical to the original. The title of that game that caused so much sensation eight years ago was Cave Story, and the version we are going to analyze now is precisely Cave Story 3D.
Just at the same time as the Steam version, Nicalis was able to work, together with the publisher NIS America, on a further remake of the game, this time for Nintendo 3DS.
With the help of Pixel himself, Nicalis made ports of the game for WiiWare and DSiWare in 2010 (although the DSiWare version never made it to Europe), while in 2011 a full remake was released on Steam. Gradually, thanks to solid game mechanics that paid homage to some classic titles and word of mouth on the internet, the fame of that game grew more and more, to the point of arousing the interest of the indie development team Nicalis.
Back in 2004, Japanese developer Daisuke “Pixel” Amaya released a freeware PC title made in his spare time over the course of five years.