Mechanically it feels fine and sound, but aesthetically I find it to be pretty bland, and aesthetics are the first thing anyone's going to take note of. Such is the life of a 2d pixel art platformer these days.

>>725953902
i do think if the store page keyart was different the game would sell more, but i don't necessarily care if it sells well. i just want to talk about it. i want to see if my estimation of it as an amazing platformer is shared by other people.

if i entertain the question of "from what attributes do i derive enjoyment from a video game", aesthetics is on the list to be sure, but it's not at the top. the original donkey kong country series is aesthetically very accomplished, but it wouldn't be worth shit to me if it wasn't a solid midcore precision platformer. i have played many games that are aesthetically very pleasing but have dogshit gameplay. those games get left in the dustbin of history for me.

the other thing about it is the game has a demo. you really get a good sense of what the game is about from that demo, you can know pretty much immediately if the gameplay is going to be fun for you or not, if the aesthetics will be acceptable for you. the one thing the demo doesn't do well is it doesn't show you how difficult the game is after world 1, but it more or less implies how it will develop via the extra level in w1 that's still in the demo i think.

>>725954479
I think Windswept's issues go a bit further than just its aesthetics or presentation. They're perfectly competent for a solo developer endeavor, but it's like, it's missing something that makes it all come together?
Like, think of it like this: in Donkey Kong Country, you play as DK, who is going after the Kremlins who stole his banana hoard. You then go through various levels that have various types of Kremlins, and so forth. Collect banana, beat Kremlins, beat game. Simple enough, video game plots don't get simpler than that.
Comparatively, Windswept is like, oh, bird gets carried off from the nest by a gust of wind, and now here's the rest of the game? And you rather randomly accompany a turtle on that adventure? All collectibles are themed after, what, moon, comets, clouds, levels end with a spinny wind wheel because the game is called windswept? Why are we collecting anything in the first place? All enemies are basically just random wild life you beat up for some reason, lest you take damage?
It might be a weird complaint to have for a 2d platformer, especially one that's more mechanically focused on its platforming, but it's basically like the throughline that contextualizes why you are doing anything at any time is missing (aside from the implied goal of just getting back to the nest, I guess). I've played for some couple hours, about at the end of the second world, and it just feels like a set of levels strung together because it's a platforming video game, and so you of course have levels. It's an odd feeling, and I can't help but feel it might be playing a part in why it might not be catching as much attraction as it could.

>>725955586
i'm sympathetic to this critique and i can see what you mean, but i have to say that i'm just not this kind of player. i do not care about this factor, which might best be termed... 'narrative-aesthetic-consonance' or 'narrative-aesthetic-harmony'. for me level design in a platformer is paramount and windswept clearly mogs most other competitors here imo.

>>725955914
Yeah, as a game it's perfectly fine, could even say it's a step above DKC2 in terms of how finely tuned the gameplay mechanics are. I'm sort of amused that I actually like playing as the turtle more than the bird, which is a stark contrast to the balance between Dixie and Diddy (or Kiddy in DKC3). It's just that unfortunately people more often than not pick up on a game's presentation first, and without a strong "hook" to keep playing they might drop it. People are notorious for not finishing games, after all, even if it means great games get left behind.
Hopefully the game does well enough for the developer, so that they can keep making more games. They at the very least got the chops for making the core of a solid platformer.

>>725956483
I do gotta say though, it kind of feels like 80% of the main collectibles are placed in ways that require you to have both characters. Nothing necessarily wrong with that, but since I'm more or less doing 100% on my first playthrough of each level, I found myself intentionally taking damage just to respawn at whatever checkpoint, so to get the other character back if I had somehow taken damage prior.
I was delighted to find that in the game's options, you could actually enable "soul link" at all times, which helps sidestep this issue.