Originally posted December 26th 2014 on the SeafoamGaming forums

Title: Xeodrifter

System: 3DS (eShop)

Price: $9.99

Release date: 12/11/2014

The main game/story

In this Metroid inspired action game, you take control of a mysterious space explorer who must explore between four different planets in order to find out where his ship’s core has landed. Along the way he’ll encounter many enemies and will find many secrets as he tries to continue his journey…

Graphics

The 8-Bit pixel art looks great, and the animations are as smooth as you’d expect from a game inspired off of the NES era. Each of the planets look very cool, as they all have their own unique feel to them, and the only major menu you need to use is on the bottom screen to access anytime. The 3D effect really helps it shine, especially when you are in the background, similar to Renegade Kid’s other game, Mutant Mudds Deluxe.

Music and sound

It has a nice soundtrack, that fits the science fiction theme quite well. While it has a lot of good songs, it doesn’t have nearly as many excellent songs as in Mutant Mudds Deluxe, so I ended up forgetting some of the songs after completing the game.

Gameplay

Being inspired by Metroid, it plays just as you expect it to. Explore numerous areas, get items to move on to more areas… The same as it always would be. While this game doesn’t do anything revolutionary to make it different from other games in the genre, that’s OK, as what you see here is a top quality game, with good level design, cool upgrades and clever secrets to find, this was certainly made with love and care, which is good for any game to be honest. You can also customize your weapon with gun powerups, similar to Blaster Master on NES, which is a neat option to have.

However, one major gripe I have with this game is the lack of variety with the bosses. They are essentially all the same, except each battle adds a bit more to it that lets you show off your new powers, but in general it’s pretty much the same bland boss over and over again. This was really disappointing as I at least expected to see some variety later in the game, or at least the older boss teaming up with a new one or something. The next problem I have is with the game’s length. If you are a really good player, you can pretty much 100% this in 5 hours or so, as long as you know where to look. While it’s an amazing experience, the fact that it’s so short hurts it quite a bit. With no extra modes or bonus levels like Cave Story and Mutant Mudds had, it feels rather shallow, which is a shame.

Conclusion

Xeodrifter came out of nowhere, having been announced by a site I help out (GoNintendo) in August, and it’s already out in December. While I worried about the quality taking a hit because of such a short timeframe, luckily my worries were proven wrong, as this is still a great game for Metroid fans. The sad part is that it’s quite short, and that there’s not too much reason to replay it after 100%ing it, but if you are willing to look past that, you have a good quality game on the eShop to add to your collection. The price may be a bit high for the length of the game, but I still encourage you to give it a shot regardless if you can. I give Xeodrifter an 8 out of 10

Thanks to Renegade Kid for the review code.