Game:

Cactus McCoy 2: The Ruins of Calavera (2011)

Duration: 10:49

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26

Thistle Trail! Might as well call it Barrel Rocket Trail since that mechanic first appears in this level. Its a rather interesting vehicle of sorts so most of my efforts went into playing around with them. The device is exactly like it sounds; a wooden barrel with 2 fins on both sides and a rocket cone made of wood.

The manuvering on a barrel rocket is sluggish, and when you combine that with the fact they have fast accleration, moving in any direction that isn't a straight line proves to be a bit challenging. They activate after holding them for about 3 seconds or if you jump in the air while holding one. The range is limited and will explode after moving three screens in any direction or if you collide with a solid object, whichever comes first. Fortunately Cactus McCoy doesn't take damage when a barrel rockets explodes so there isn't any punishment for bad steering or just experimenting with them. The time makes it annoying if the intent is to reach a point not directly near where the barrel actually is but you can move them by picking them up and then throwing them quickly. As it can be determined, you can't damage enemies by throwing a barrel rocket at them, but you can however kill them by steering into them mid-flight.

When I did get a handle on guiding these stout barrels, I found them a very fun addition to the game. Cactus McCoy doesn't take damage when barrel rockets explodes, so there isn't any punishment for bad steering or just experimenting with them. As with any element in a good platformer after a couple run throughs the rocket barrel becomes an organic part of level design that the player adds to their repertoire of moves.
The barrel rockets were great but the challenges (excluding one mentioned below) felt a bit too vanilla this level. Don't misunderstand me, Thistle Trail is very fun and not in the so bad its good way. However despite being well done from the perspective of pure nitpicks I have a few criticisms.

The Lepidopterist challenge had me rather confused at first. The goal is to capture 12 butterflies in the level, but I actually had a hard time seeing the butterflies. They didn't stand out enough and it wasn't until I checked the challenge list that I saw it. A more contrasting color than orange would have been a better choice for butterflies. I enjoyed the Big Bang challenge if only because mowing over the helpless is amusing in video games but the other three (including Lepidopterist) didn't feel hard enough for me and or felt too much like other challenges in the game. Or just boring, really running around trying to find cans to shoot was the first time this game was boring to me. This is one of those times where the new element being introduced (in this case rocket barrels) needed to be a much bigger focus than it normally would, given just how enjoyable it is and how distracting other elements are compared to it.

So this level was good but its mostly the rocket barrels that made it stand out. A lot of the other elements are a lot like other levels but because of the unique way Thistle Trail blasts you around and the ways that you can play with it, its pretty easy to forgive the nitpick gripes and forget them. With that, onward to Prickly Praire.

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