Super Dragonfly Chronicles

Super Dragonfly Chronicles is a 2D-action side scroller adventure. In which you play as armor clad Mark West in his journey to find the truth behind his father´s death. In an experience that initially gives off Metroid vibes, coupled with a pumping soundtrack that transports the player to a 90’s adventure state-of-mind.

Mark’s armor looks wicked. And the cutscene art looks stunning. Coupled with the nice tunes. I started my first gameplay excited and optimistic that this title would deliver the metroid-esque experience we all know and love. But unfortunately, the gameplay I was met with was anything but.

Quality Control

The game suffers from major design flaws. And those shortcomings are evident right from the get go. Which lead me to believe that the quality assurance and game testing phase for this game was probably severely rushed. As it does not require a keen eye to identify the critical game-breaking issues this game suffers.

For starters, the camera is zoomed out way more than necessary. Prioritizing a viewing window that captures the often gorgeous background artwork. But leaves the playable character, the enemies, and most importantly the interactable objects incredibly tiny and ant-scaled in comparison. Just the simple act of hitting a canister that contains a powerup or a health pickup is more difficult than shooting an empty can 2 miles away with a sniper rifle with no scope on. And the minuscule hitboxes make the task infinitely more difficult. And those microscopic hitboxes are also to blame for the extreme difficulty in throwing punches at enemies, where you literally need to be standing an half an arm-length away to successfully throw a punch that actually connects.

Poor Decisions

I am not sure why did the developers opt for melee as the main means of attack. The game would’ve been significantly more fun if your protagonist could shoot some sort of projectiles. And to be fair, you could, but only in extremely limited circumstances as using the projectile powerup consumes around two units of your power meter. A meter that is only around six or seven bars when full, and is extremely difficult to refill as powerups and health pickups are super scarce throughout.

Another slap in the face is that the game showers you with powerups and health pickups in the first minute of gameplay where you’re already at full health and with basic enemies that do not warrant the use of powerups. But once you progress past that opening minute of gameplay, you’re then deprived of any powerup drops for the long and difficult stretches of the game. And that in itself is another concern, the checkpoint system is ridiculous. You almost always start the level over when you die, and you get one or two checkpoints just right before the end of the level when you don’t need them. Which could’ve been better spread-out evenly across the level.

All these gameplay technical issues translate into a game that is somewhat broken and extremely unplayable. And keep in mind that this is an old school game, with a lives system. so, you die three times and it’s game over.

Wasted Potential

It saddens me that such a good premise and story setting and even graphics could’ve been better bound together to form a masterpiece. But because of the severely defective gameplay, the most important aspect of any game’s design. This title is instead a disaster-piece. I would unfortunately not recommend this title to any readers who are thinking of picking it up.