Letting you get the gist of the game's controls and physics in the loading screen, that's something surprising to not see more of. This is promising already.
It eats me up a little inside having a comment at 6 points and the top comments are 6, 6,6, 5, and 3. Not that I feel my comment was so insightful the world must read it, but it makes me wonder what is actually going on with the top comment system. Are they essentially locked in as the first 5 comments to ever get positive scores?
As much as I enjoyed Portal 1&2, I'm really happy to see a game which involves a test subject and NOT a Glados proxy. (I'm looking at you Qoosh). I'm glad that imitating Portal is no longer industry required mandatory.
Let me tell you why this gets 5 stars. You repeatedly get the option to solve a problem which happens near TNT but the answer is not to explode the TNT. Its just kinda there. Yet you will blow yourself up many a time only to realize other games have trained you that TNT is always the answer. Life pro tip: never use TNT when a brick suffices or you will likely kill yourself.
Update, 7:14 on stage 8. Creeper generators seem only useful on the room to the immediate southeast, along with shields (and turning them off and on based on current direction of creeper) but they're not as useless as I've previously claimed.
I replay this game only for stage 8. Stage 9 is beatable but such a nuisance I wouldn't recommend it. But you can learn a lot about the game's strategy from stage 8 alone. My best time is 7:25 right now. Part of how I do that is putting drones on shoot drones only in the beginning, then dig past the dotted creeper field, detonating the drone spawner and fill that space with reactors. Its interesting which rooms you can attack in what order, and you don't want to assume consecutive is necessarily better. I do feel that the allied creeper spawner is very weak, and on many stages where you are simply given an inexhaustible supply of ore I get much better times using other units. Particularly so on stage 8.
Leave crew on earth, get there, open doors, everyone out, drill bomb, drop bomb, everyone in ship, takeoff properly, "Success but at what cost?" What cost? The Astronauts are all here on Earth safe and sound.
If you plant the bomb right, and on the return trip open the doors, the astronauts fly out in space. But when you blow up the bomb, you get the "Everyone Lives" message. Guess they can survive space.
Was having a good time. Got to the room with the lowering laser ceiling. Realized the game was going to continue in that sort of direction, quit. There's already too many pixel platforms with awkward controls that rely on trial and error and a lot of player death to get somewhere. It is a saturated genre.
This is a game that makes you feel sad when its over because its over. And I don't think a level pack would be enough. But its 2015, where's a sequel? Petition the White House if you have to, this needs to happen!
Stage 34 is amusing, as it looks like its set to be a tough race with Ed. OR you skip the first piece, pick up everything at your own pace, and come back for that last piece at your own pace. I like games that give you options.
I agree with Cevgar that this isn't a real metroidvania game, I think that most metroidvania fans might find this a nice quick game up their alley. To be a genuine metroidvania you would need some collectible upgrades that expand where can travel on the map, which this doesn't have, but I don't feel that this game would be improved by their arbitrary addition.
I normally like to either beat or give up on beating a game like this before giving a rating, but I made an exception. If the game were half the length, I'd have beaten it and decide its 5/5. And I won't punish Kajenx in rating for making a longer game when that doesn't mean withholding a story conclusion. If you must, pretend everything past stage 40 or so is a bonus map pack which is sometimes times ridiculous. But that's okay.
"Level 36 is impossible", I thought. "I can get the special blocks but no matter what I do I can't remove the bottom line." Attempt 241 or whatnot get special blocks done and points over bar at the end but two of the immovable blocks at the bottom remain. Prepare to rage. "Oh, remove the bottom line wasn't a requirement. I'm a dumb."
The cycle "This stage is just bullshit, how do they expect you to [do thing]??!?" ... Anger and Despair ... "This game is bullshit." ... Beat stage ... "Hot damn I'm a sexy god of puzzle skill, this game is the bee's knees." ... Next stage ... repeat.
 "Llamas in Distress"){kind=icon}
 "Absorbed"){kind=icon}
 "Darktopia"){kind=icon}
 "Creeper World 2: Academy"){kind=icon}
 "Chuppy-Shills"){kind=icon}
 "A Second Chance"){kind=icon}
 "The Visit"){kind=icon}
 "Infinity Inc"){kind=icon}
 "Monster Bark"){kind=icon}
 "Viva Caligula"){kind=icon}
 "Escape from Puppy Death Factory"){kind=icon}
 "Blast Magus"){kind=icon}
Haha, maybe the game will have a really low score, but lots of plays, then.