The Legend of Gwen review for PC, Nintendo Switch

I?m going to admit right up front when talking about The Legend of Gwen that I was terrible at it. Just astoundingly awful. Seeing as it describes itself as a ?hardcore platform game?, that means it achieved its objective, right?

Goodness, no. In this case, ?hardcore platform game? is just another phrase for ?terrible controls and an awful camera.? The Legend of Gwen presents its 3D world from an isometric point of view, except there?s almost no depth to it so it?s incredibly hard to tell where you are in relation to anything else at any given moment. Given that the game consists of platforming and fighting with enemies on a 3D plane ? two things that require some amount of depth perception ? that?s a pretty major drawback.

This is clear right in the very first part of the very first level. You have two options: you can either a) jump onto a moving platform so you can pick up a star, or b) go after a spider that?s walking back and forth on a different platform. If you choose the moving platform, you?ll immediately discover that there?s no real way to tell where you are in relation to the platform. You jump off the side of where you start and hope you?ve guessed right; if not, you plummet to your death. Repeat that experience dozens and dozens of times, and you have a sense of what The Legend of Gwen?s ?hardcore platforming? is like.

As for the combat, it?s only marginally better. You fire your spells off in straight lines, which means you need to aim directly at your enemies. The problem, of course, is that without any sense of depth, you?re guessing here as well: you can hope that you?ve lined up your shot so that it hits the target directly, but it?s more a hope than anything else.

Even if you somehow ignore the platforming and the combat ? and you shouldn?t, because those are the most important parts of the game ? there?s nothing here worth recommending. You have a garish color scheme, annoyingly repetitive music, and grating voices. The Legend of Gwen is just an all-around bad, bad game.

Flynn?s Arcade provided us with a Legend of Gwen PC code for review purposes.