ADEPTUS CRITICUS GAME REVIEWS

Developer: Kasey Ozymy

Code provided by Electric Airship

System reviewed on: Xbox series X

Systems available on: Xbox, PlayStation & Nintendo

Jimmy and the pulsating mass were originally released in 2018 on the PC, it drew comparisons to classics such as Earthbound and Final Fantasy 5 which is not a bad thing as they are excellent games.

Jimmy and the pulsating mass which I will now shorten to just Jimmy for the sake of this review is now coming to consoles and I will be reviewing this on the Xbox series X.

The game starts in an 8-year-olds dream where an alien entity appears and threatens his family and the stability of the dream world you are going to be exploring to save your family and the dream world.  Where your first major mission is to collect some honey for your mother, but you quickly find all not as it seems. Your first party member is your older Brother Buck who to be honest is a bit of a moron who thinks he a tough guy, who you find out quickly that this guy is a moron and the bees have beef with him as he is known as the destroyer. The villain of the game is called the Pulsating Mass who can corrupt the inhabitants and turn them into mindless drones.

Jimmy has the power of empathy which allows him to imagine himself into other monsters which you will need to transform into to traverse the world for example you turn into a blob you can go through drain cracks, or turn into a flower and you can go through the ground and these are also used in combat with each monster being able to be levelled up making Jimmy stronger

There is great variety when it comes to NPCs and monsters to kill for example a biker gang and various monstrosities.

The gameplay loop is simple which is fine as this is an RPG maker game (nothing wrong with that as I enjoy games made in that engine as well). Keep in mind this game is grindy when it comes to levelling up and wanting to survive as you get further into the game, this can lead to combat becoming a little repetitive but that is just a minor gripe from me.  The art style used is cartoon style which makes perfect sense seeing as you are playing this game through the eyes of an 8-year-old.

There is a lot of combat in this game roughly every 15 seconds give or take you will be thrust into a random battle encounter this for some might become a bit much and I would have liked the spacing of the random battle encounters to a little further apart.

Whilst exploring you will come across toy boxes that will hold items for Jimmy and his party to use and of course complete puzzles.

There is a variety of party members, and I will list them below.

Buck Jimmys older brother who has skills such as Bully, Mag, Combo, insult and inner rage.

Helga (Mom) skills are High five, Comforting Smile, Mental Clarity, Pep talk

Jonathon Bear whose skills are High five, sunshine, Natural alarm, energise.

Lars (Uncle) whose skills are Undulate, counter stance, afternoon nap, metabolize.

Andrew (Father) whose skills are Cryodynamics, Toxicosis, Focus, Analyze.

Punch Tanaka whose skills are Counter stance, Clled Shot, Shakedown, Mag, Combo

Hitomi whose skills are Protect and lovely, Milky way Fists, L.M. Starshine, Magical Heartbeat.

By the time I got to the end of the game I had realised what I had played and I had to take a few moments to process what I had realised what this story is about I don’t want to spoil this so I will not say any more about the story but it’s a message I can personally relate to.

I did not encounter any performance issues, and this is something I expected to have which is no issues as it’s not a power-hungry game. 

In conclusion Jimmy and the pulsating mass is an excellent well put together game with an excellent story which I fully recommend that you play, I advise that you really pay attention to the dialogue and the theme the developer Kasey Ozymy has done a brilliant job with this game.

This is a must buy for me 4 out 5.

Even though I was provided with a code I will be purchasing this game on my Nintendo Switch 2 as I want to play this game again on the move.