THIS IS THE CLASSIC VERSION FROM MINICLIP

Used to play this back in the day and was uncertain if it included the proper old version or just the new game. It comes with both for anyone wondering.

Right now, on Windows 11 game just opens a blank, white screen, so I have to give a negative review. Not going to refund because i'm hoping they'll fix it, and I'll revise review when they do.

after 3.2 hours of playtime. i can say.
no this is frustratingly awful and designed in a way to pad out how long you'll play

the boss fight at the end was especially frustrating due to how quickly you have to react or else you instantly lose and have to go alllllll the way back down again to try again.


i bought it because, yeah motherload is a very fun game from my childhood and i figured i'd give this one a try.



but it has problems. quite a few. most of them feel intentionally designed to "pad and space out" the game so it takes longer to beat.
these make the game very tiresome and rather boring. they will be the reason i'll probably never play this again.

i really didn't like how quickly you reach undrillable stones and those metal plates. sure you can remove them. but i was hoping to have dug a large long fall mindshaft before reaching those.

"iron to fuel converter" sometimes collected iron gets smelted with that smelter upgrade
which means that upgrade you spent 500,000 or so on has an RNG chance of working.
some might say. just don't collect anything that mixes with iron. far too RNG.

same with if your mining rig has no space for iron. it gets discarded instead of turned into useful fuel...

twice it happened to me and i ran out of fuel just a few more drill spots away something decent... so i had to slowly fly all the way back up through everything along the way...
thats not fun. that really just feels like padding. both times it happend i really felt like just shutting the game off.
iron gets crafted into "rare earth magnet" or something and you get stuck with no fuel. "how fun."


another big thing that bugs me about this game and feels like another way they've padded out the game to take far longer than it should have is how different mining stations are "out of stock" of other types of bombs or useful items... delta for example not having the weak bomb or c4. requiring you to travel up to higher levels.... what the hell? I see no fun from this. makes me feel tired like i'd rather shut off the game.

station Delta for example. is out of "reserve fuel" the layer below is the one layer where i have run out fuel the most. and have to painstalkingly travel allllll the way back up.
that ain't fun..... guess people will say whats what the teleporter is for! neat. cool. great. whys this station out of "that item" exactly?


when i collected the final tier of ore. i don't know. i kind of expected to be set flush with cash like in the OG game yet 2 pieces of them barely covered the teleporter i used to get back safely.....

im glad when you are out of fuel you can't move fast enough to damage your rig.
but you do tend to get into many many situations where you run out of fuel... sure. glad we don't explode and the game ends... but ehhhhhhhh...... not always.

im glad how when your cargo bay is full you discard the cheaper materials for the more expensive.
i'd still wish for some contorl over that so i could make space for iron....

i quite liked how you can find fuel, bomb and repair pickups along the way rather than having to make the trip back each time.


over all..... if you enjoyed the OG motherload. you might be disapointed with this one. its feels full of features designed to "pad" out the game and make it last as long as it can...
I especially dislike how shops of different layers are " out of stock " of helpful items...

in the OG game i liked how each upgrade had an image and a name. silly little thing. but i found it more interesting than just an upgrade button..



no.
no.
and no.

im done.


the part where you fight the boss.

the time framing you get is just god awful.

i chase him to the delta area.
he hoovers around there for a bit before bolting upwards
and the magma follows him SO quickly. i don't even have a chance to chase after him.
even going full speed.

no. no. no. im done this game is awful.

keep the money. its for the fun i had with old OG motherload.
but this?

this isn't fun.