NOCLIP Pocket E55 - The Birdboss Challenge - Momodora: Reverie Under the Moonlight

This sacred podcast is one of the few untouched spots. Welcome back
to NOCLIP pocket! Today, we’re going to be talking about Momodora:
Reverie Under the Moonlight, which is the fourth game in the
Momodora series, but the first one to really take off. This is a
Metroidvania game, but one that is surprisingly compact. It’s
fairly rare in the genre to have a game this short, and it brings
with it some disadvantages but also some surprising advantages. The
smaller map makes backtracking and exploration a lot more clear,
and encourages the player to explore more thoroughly, and makes
your destination more clear due to it being more fresh in your
memory without the need of more obvious signposting. The game falls
within the Souls-like subgenre, a boon to its coming to prominence
at the time of its release, but even so, feels very at home as a
Metroidvania and less like copy-paste of Souls mechanics common in
the era. The combat system, while simple, feels very satisfying
when you’re engaging with it at face value, though there are ways
to exploit it. It’s a mixed bag, but one that feels worth your
time, as long as you don’t mind a pretty silly looking boob boss.
We’re going to be talking about using new abilities to reach areas
in a map small enough for you to remember where you should be using
them, the balancing of the combat system and difficulty, and a lot
more than could have ever been thought necessary about the Swamp
Witch. Thank you for joining us this week! We knew little about
this game prior to playing it, but it seemed like a decent go-along
with Metroid: Dread, and I’m personally pretty satisfied with the
experience. As a short indie Metroidvania, it can sometimes
highlight the things that really are cool about the genre even
though it doesn’t really strike out in too many new directions
itself. What did you think about it? Did it hit the right notes of
the Soulslike formula for you, or would you have preferred
something longer or more complex? Let us know over in the Discord
or in the comments! And while you’re there, in the Discord, doing
whatever, keep an eye out on the announcements channel, because
we’re going to be announcing all the games we chose for Fanbruary,
our audience choice theme month, very soon. So check us out then!