Metamorphosis (2021) Walkthrough + Review, ZX Spectrum
113Huge playlist archive with games from 2021: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLxOanVBhqd3uXfij6VCUapODD02S0FBeb
Kill, Eat, Evolve. You are not the good one, they are not the bad ones, you are just one of them. The aim of this game is to evolve to a human being, and through the quest you will have three different looks while going through the three different phases (you can see the phases on the loading screen). At the bottom of the screen you have your energy bar. Your energy level can be raised by eating worms and is decreased by getting hit by spit from enemies or toxic drops. The dots on the bar indicates the max energy level for the specific stages. The more you have evolved the bigger energy bar you will have, and losing a lot of energy will take you back to your previous phases.
There are three levels and to open up for new ones you have to collect three objects and bring them to the central room where there are three circles. Your maximum energy level is increased after you drop an object in the circles. When all three objects are placed in the circles, a teleport to the next level will appear. To obtain certain objects you will first have to find a key for the Combat Room. When you collect the key a black teleport will appear somewhere on the map and this will take you to the Combat Room. You have to find secret passages in the dark to get to some of these keys. There are several Combat Rooms and after entering a Combat Room, you have to kill all enemies before the object you need appears.
Spitting at the enemies will drain them for energy and take them back to previous phases in their evolution. By jumping on enemies you can stun them, making it easier to hit them with spit. When they are drained for energy and taken back to worm phase they can be eaten and restore some of your lost energy. It is wise to pay attention to the screens where there are worms, because the enemies will respawn when going back to a screen, and the worms is an easy way to refill the energy bar, instead of having to battle enemies making them go back to worm phase.
The three levels are connected, and once opened up for the new ones, it is possible to backtrack to the previous ones, which will also be needed to find some of the objects you need. All the screens are forming a picture of a monster, a monster that was supposed to be Arachne. Arachne is depicted as a grotesque monster, half-woman, half-spider who closes people into a cocoon to feed its killer offsprings. But the monster map had to be modified, and did not turn out to be Arachne, because the legs had to be removed because of memory limitations. Actually the name of the game was supposed to be Arachne, but was changed to Metamorphosis because of this. You can read more about the developement of the game in an 85 pages presentation of the game here: http://www.retromagazine.net/download/The-making-of-Metamorphosis.pdf
MPAGD has been used to make this game, and where many of these games has blocky background graphics, this has nicely been avoided here, and all the screens are highly detailed with lots of colors. The authors can't stand color clash, so a lot of effort has been put into avoiding this.
A dark and atmospheric game with great use of black and blue colors. The gameplay is very special and unique with great looking graphics and animations, and the soundtracks are excellent. A slow paced obscure one for the normal gameplay and a fast paced trackmo for the Combat Rooms. It is highly recommended to get this game and learn to evolve!
The game was made in 2021 by:
Graphic and Code: Leonardo Vettori, Kees Van Oss
Music: Pedro Pimenta , Marco Fanciulli, Fatalsnipe
Rating = 94%
Download here (Remember to donate!): https://itnl-team.itch.io/metamorphosis