My Review
TLDR: Tourmaline is a satisfying conglomeration of tried-and-true mechanics from the games you already love, with a very nice soundtrack and ambiance to set it apart.
Art:
There is a decided character/vibe to the entire game. It's not something that's easily put to words, but the visuals of the itch.io page demonstrate it pretty well: Things feel "grander than thou".
- Chilling drops into silence after the grandure of a boss battle,
- Killer suspensefulness walking long corridors,
- Frightening and surprising enemies
Clearly, much detail is spent crafting each asset. However, assets are certainly limited right now, leaving some things feeling a bit empty. I fully expect further releases of the game will see more of these assets re-used and recycled to create a more populated world.
The music is all-original and changes dynamically based on what's going on in-game. There's actually some pretty catchy melodies in there, too. Visual effects are also nicely sprinkled into the experience -- but I won't spoil that for you. You should see in motion for yourself.
Gameplay:
The physics feel good and the controls feel right. You can tell a lot of fine-tuning went into things such as jump height and feel, etc. Once your familiar with the controls, it's actually super satisfying just to platform around the map.
I love the inclusion of many different kinds of weapons, all with unique traits and animations. I appreciate that there isn't any certain set of weapons that must be used. Rather, you can just choose your favourite combination, and stick with it.
User Experience:
Installation is easy, and updates to the game automatically write over previous installations (without losing your save-files). This is nice.
The UI is maybe my biggest complaint with the game. It's definitely not the focus of the dev, but it's at least clearly built to support future expansion. I hope to see some elements (such as inventories!) get more unique menus as opposed to lists soon. But in the meantime, they do feel very sturdy and predictable which adds a lot to the overall feel of a good game. In general actually; everything feels very concrete and solid. The engine feels robust and expandable. Things usually just work how you think they should.
Concluding:
I certainly reccomend giving it a play, it shouldn't take too much time from your day (assuming you don't start speedrunning it like I did). I urge you however, to use a gamepad. Keyboard controls don't do this justice.
I look forward to see how the full release will combine good art and gameplay with (what I hope will be) a much more narrative driven world.