Alright, I'll be honest. I've played pretty much every major overhaul/expansion hack listed on this site. I have never rated one before - I've never felt my input would be worth much. But this hack? It frustrated me, to the point where I really feel I need to air my feelings and calm down.
So...like, maybe I'm just an impatient and unobservant player or something? But I felt lost CONSTANTLY. I was never quite able to understand what the author wanted me to look for, spending unnecessary amounts of time searching for the path forward. I spent a solid hour of my time simply trying to comprehend the setup to obtaining the Varia Suit, and I mistakenly felt I was expected to heatrun Norfair at that point. I don't remember where I got the ice beam or how I managed to crawl back to the Varia Suit's location, and honestly? I never even found the Plasma Beam. I had to complete the game wondering if it was even there...I felt like I was being laughed while I was scrubbing walls with bombs, holding left or right and praying for a secret passage. I genuinely felt like the author was playing a prank on me for believing I was going to understand this hack and get through it with any enjoyment at times.
But what really ground my gears here, were the missile packs. Dear lord, the missile packs...I was rewarded with a measly missile expansion for defeating Ridley! Is it too much to ask that major battles reward you with something better than 5 more missiles? Because honestly, sometimes, I felt like the author was making rooms for the sole purpose of placing a missile pack in them - a few times, I felt like I was being prodded at for expecting anything else. With so many packs lying around, there was hardly a need for more...
...I digress. Despite all these angry complaints, once I finally found those hidden tunnels, things tended to flow smoothly for a little while. I enjoyed finding those small, hidden spaces, even when I was constantly disappointed that they contained nothing but missiles again and again.
Lastly, as a minor gripe which is more personal - I felt like every Power Bomb expansion I came across was locked behind PB blocks, as opposed to like...actually HIDDEN. I also felt I had an unnecessary amount of Power Bombs in total, as you rarely need them for anything other than opening yellow doors.
Overall, I think this was a decent hack that just didn't click with me very well. I rate it highly for the creativity in hiding passages and the feeling of exploration I think I WOULD have had, if I could understand what was going on around me.
ITEMS @ TIME OF ESCAPE:
=EXPANSION SETS=
Energy Tanks: 6
Reserve Tanks: 3
Missiles: 140
Super Missiles: 30
Power Bombs: 25
=SUITS=
Varia
Gravity
=BEAMS=
Charge
Ice
Wave
Spazer
=MISC=
Morph Ball
Bomb
Spring Ball
Screw Attack
=BOOTS=
Hi Jump
Space Jump
Speed Booster
Exploration],
rated by LadyRena on Aug 22, 2017 (
