Reviews

• gamedeal user

  Oct 1, 2022

  In general I would say this is an improvement over the first one. The audio detection works better in general, even though it still has a couple hiccups here and there where it just doesn't properly work, could be fixed with a bit of fine tuning or letting players manually tune the map to their liking. But if you find that song where the audio detection just works, this is hands down one of the most satisfying rhythm games you can play currently Presentation is solid. the satisfying slow mo jumps now occur more frequently and at points where it makes sense, they might just need a bit of tweaking, because sometimes they can sorta ruin momentum. The sound wave effects of the environment are also solid. No problems with blurry images or eye strain. I also see potential upwards with new environment additions, more dynamic backgrounds and the planned workshop support. tldr: solid game currently, has potential to be even better
• gamedeal user

  Oct 1, 2022

  Great game! Of course, it's frustrating that it's impossible to connect your Spotify, but finding the right songs in mp3 is not difficult. In terms of graphics, I would not say that I have gone far from the first part. But now you can enjoy the bust of a musical girl to your heart's content ))) In terms of control, the game is well friends with DualSense (But the game stubbornly believes that I am an Xbox fan) and you can also play from the keyboard, but I do not advise. Gamepad only! Oh yes, and a separate plus for the song Wild by Aeseaes. Super super super! I recommend it to all fans of rhythm games.
• gamedeal user

  Oct 1, 2022

  I don't normally write reviews, but here goes anyways. I consider myself a rhythm game "veteran" (please note that just means I have a lot of experience, not that I consider myself a "pro") and so seeing one of my favorite little simple games had a new version, I had to check it out. Pros: - Graphically, the updates over Escape 1 look awesome. The character model is satisfying, the environment is very smooth, the "ocean" looks cool, and most importantly, the notes' readability is so, so much clearer than in the first game. - I was able to play for a solid 4 hours without my eyes hurting from watching the "blur" of the notes that was very present in the first game, and the flow is much easier to read in general. - The new falling droplet notes during slow parts of songs is pretty cool, though it seems very rarely used in my experience from the song generator, could be my choice of song genres but i feel it could be worked into most songs that have any dip in the bpm really. - The new Shirobon tracks are awesome. Didn't try the other ones since they're not really my genre. (Sorry, fellow Austinites) Cons: - In exchange seemingly for the smoother graphics and experience, the "course" and "obstacles" have seen a significant reduction. In the first game we had cliffs, rails, walls, narrow passageways, etc to really vary up the course and keep things interesting. In this version, we just have one straight track and every obstacle looks the same. Its very quick to get boring visually, especially for viewers rather than players. - The shift from horizontal to vertical has really seemed to dampen the "speed" of the character movement, when playing the same song side by side between versions, Escape 2 feels incredibly slow paced, like a soccer mom out for a jog rather than a girl running and jumping at breakneck speeds to "escape". - In Escape 1, when a song hit its peak at a high BPM, we would launch into a flying / gliding mode to really just start tearing up the level and this really felt like the peak of coolness when playing. In Escape 2, if you're lucky once in awhile if a track has a dramatic raise in bpm, melody will visibly show a little "sprint" takeoff animation for half a second before speeding up. It's really incredibly disappointing. I witnessed maybe 1 song total that included this in the included tracks. - Probably my biggest complaint, from both the official preloaded tracks and custom generated tracks, I can't help but say that the game feels way, WAY too "easy". I want to state again that while I'm a rhythm game veteran, I am by no means a pro, so I am not really looking for impossible difficulty 500 keys per second gameplay here, I still value a mapping following the song and being fun over pure difficulty, but I do think there needs to be a middle ground. It feels like the mapping engine is playing far too "safe" compared to the one in Escape 1, to the point where most all songs I loaded, I felt like I was playing a human metronome, not an actual song. Rarely, if ever, would the notes follow anything other than the base bpm of the song as a whole, aside from occasionally picking up on vocals as slide notes. - The dive notes are cool. The first time or two. But the more I see them the more awkward they look. I think the animation on them can be improved somewhat, if maybe the jump is a bit higher? the flip is a little faster? It just looks a lil bit awkward as it is, I always feel like she's gonna land on her head before completing the flip, lol. And just a personal suggestion, since it seems to pick those up whenever theres a pause or sudden slowdown in a song, following it up with falling droplet notes while she's crouched on the ground from landing the jump followed by launching into a sprint when the song picks back up would feel like a really cool way to jump back into the song momentum. - In Escape 1, after loading a song and getting the statistic readout, it would include some information that basically stated how confident the engine was about the map it created for the song and whether it would be accurate or not. This is missing entirely from Escape 2, where we only get the multicolored bar that has.... no real explanation whatsoever of what it means. We also don't have the option to go Back from this screen once it has loaded this far, forcing you to start and exit out of a song if you don't think it ended up mapping very well. - While it's certainly an extra functionality, most all modern rhythm games these days will have either built in, or available via mods, some sort of streamer integration. I'm not sure how well it would work in the game, but having some way for a streamer's chat to put in song requests would be a very welcome QoL feature. In summary: It's a solid game for the price tag. It does a couple things better than the first game visually, but at the same time feels like a definite downgrade in gameplay features. It is still early access so maybe some of the things can be improved, but as it is, nothing truly stands out about this game compared to any other rhythm game currently on the market. While this review was mostly negative, I'm still leaving the overall rating as a 'Yes' simply because it has potential and it is still enjoyable overall.
• gamedeal user

  Oct 2, 2022

  I really like the new graphics and the design, it's a big improvement over the first game. The ocean looks great, the movement is smooth and the animations feel good. Note readability is a big improvement over the first game with the lower two difficulty levels. On Intense difficulty all obstacle notes have the same purple color, no matter their direction, which makes it a bit harder to read in my opinion. Now that that's out of the way: let's talk about the mapping algorithm. I kinda wish there was some UI to show the mapping confidence like in the first game. Some of the songs I tried felt like they were mapped off-beat and thus weren't fun to play. Personally I also feel like the slow-mo jump is a bit overused in some songs. Most of the songs I've tried were mapped pretty good though, including songs from very different genres. Overall I think there could still be a bit more polish and the mapping algorithm has some room for improvement but it's fun to play. I'm excited for the 1.0 release! Edit: I've played Melody's Escape 2 on the Steam Deck now. Runs perfectly fine out of the box but I had some considerable input lag with my external controller. Maybe we could have some input lag calibration please?
• gamedeal user

  Oct 3, 2022

  For what it is trying to be, a relaxing and immersive rhythm game, it's a good enough product and a vast improvement over the first game with its visuals and general improvements like better hit detection. Unfortunately, the problems I had with its predecessor are still present but in the interest of time, I'll just dumb it down to a small list: - Map coding is still wonky and most songs that I have tried that are more 'complex' musically resulted in very weird or unfitting parts where an intense section is chill but mid-chorus it sped up rather than starting from the climax of the song. - It's way easier than Melody's Escape 1, and the challenge usually ends up being having to constantly remind yourself that you are still playing rather than just listening due to how dull the gameplay is. - Why are the instructions imprinted on the road? This thing works when it was 2D but now that it's 3D, Melody is blocking most of the incoming notes and not only that, I spent most of the time looking at the ground rather than the visuals happening off to the side. Why not in the middle of the screen or on a bar to the side? - The animations are stiff as hell and Melody's actions just doesn't feel smooth, at least not like the first game. Not only that, where are the crazy flying sections? There needs to be more variety when it comes to different parts of the song. That's all I can remember for now but it's not like I dislike the game, it just doesn't feel like it's worth the purchase when it's the supposed 'improved' sequel. Not much has changed aside from the jump from 2D to 3D and I don't know if relying on the workshop once again for your game's lifespan is really a good idea. Obviously, this is just Early Access and things are subject to change but as of the time of writing, I gotta give it a no. Not to mention that this isn't even worth its current price tag, which is asking way too much for the lacking amount of content and features.
• gamedeal user

  Nov 3, 2022

  Don't Fix What Ain't Broke

  I really didn't want this to be a bad review, but Melody's Escape 2 completely fails in its endeavor to revamp the original on pretty much all levels, primarily due to its attempt to move into the third dimension. Before I tear into this game however, I want to give credit where it's due: The Good <*>New rhythm detection algorithm tends to stick to the song's actual rhythm more. <*>Stricter Hit Window and scoring raise replayability a bit. <*>Great looking Outrun-esque visual style. <*>Less straining on your eyes than the original. <*>Great rework of the game's Blue Zones. Sadly, that's where that list ends for me. The Bad <*>New rhythm detection algorithm hates sticking to the song's melody, resulting in long hold Obstacles being weirdly rare now. <*>Slow-Mo Jumps are annoyingly common now, and their new obstacle is boring compared to the original's leaps of faith. <*>Slow-Mo Jumps love to chain into extremely short Blue Zones, causing a Hero Landing Pose that completely takes the momentum out of the game when it happens. <*>Complete removal of flying in Pink Zones. <*>No more long strings of Orbs in Pink Zones. <*>Next to no perceived speed difference between Green, Yellow, and Pink Zones, since jogging, sprinting and flying faster sprinting all share the same animation. <*>Removal of background locations (together with Flying) also removes the escalating feeling of "Escape" present in the original, and contributes to the lack of percieved speed. <*>Extremely lacking visual feedback for Orb Hits. <*>Lacking variety in obstacles. <*>Essentially complete lack in track verticality. <*>Character animations are a bit janky, and the 3D artstyle and perspective don't suit themselves to Melody's featureless, 2-Tone design. <*>3D OTS perspective essentially removes reaction gameplay since you can now see future track in the distance, making songs predictable and boring, as well as taking any tension out of longer hold Obstacles. <*>3D OTS perspective loves covering up the direction indicators for Up and Right inputs on both Orbs and Obstacles, just as they enter vision, ironically making it harder to react to them. <*>The lack of tension and reaction in gameplay makes it extremely hard to enter a Flow state. <*>Removal of Overload Difficulty. I want to make clear here, that I don't intend this review to come across as toxic, and I want to apologize if it does. As it stands this game is good. Well put together and good fun for a generative rhythm game, with already surprisingly much polish for a fresh Early Access release. I am aware that my criticisms are extremely subjective and go into a lot of the games' nitty-gritty. I can definitely see this game outdo the original at some point down the line, such is the nature of Early Access, and the potential is 100% there. That all said, in its current state, for its current price, I can only give a good faith recommendation for this game to old players, of the (currently) vastly superior original, that want to support Icetesy. If you're new and want to give this concept a try, maybe try the original first, given it's available at half the price. If you like it and want more, feel free to give this sequel a shot too. https://store.steampowered.com/app/270210
• gamedeal user

  Nov 7, 2022

  It's a huge improvement than the first Melody's Escape. In this one, it is more challenging even on easiest difficulty, feels more like a dance mat game with arrows and buttons which is what I love most and the best part, I can do it with my own music. I highly recommend this game for music lovers. 5/5 Game Rating: G (General) GENRE: Indie, Early Access RELEASE DATE: 1 Oct, 2022
• gamedeal user

  Dec 6, 2022

  You can clearly feel the improvements on the algorithm, the maps are smoother and more enjoyable, the 3D model is very well animated (even though the 2D had its charm, I like this 3D version). Even though it's not possible atm, I hope that one day, we will be able the music streaming services. Also, I don't know if this is possible, but an interactive Discord integration could be fun (like displaying the current music being played on the game). Great work Loïc!
• gamedeal user

  Feb 15, 2023

  Much better than the previous part in terms of graphics, but absolutely nothing new has been added to it yet
• gamedeal user

  Feb 28, 2023

  It's the right time... to rise up to the top. Prime time... cause we can't get enough. And fight for... this city that we made. To take back... the power that you crave.