Recent reviews by kupocake

Hello! I loved going for a nice walk in this game.

Perhaps if we all went outside and got a nice lung-full of air from time to time we would write fewer negative steam reviews.

Or perhaps we'd all just fall down a ravine while shouting "curse you esss jay dubuyewwwwsssssss". Either is good.

Above all else, this is a game for anyone who gets a kick out of precise controls - assuming you have a decent controller to hand. Strider's signature katana arc is in full evidence here, allowing you to let loose a pleasing flurry of attacks or charge up for a longer-range strike. Movement includes an array of somersault jumps and combine with a wall-climbing mechanic that is never too clingy (as such mechanics can sometimes be). Basically, every room of enemies can be a fun, adrenaline-filled dance - and this is just with the basic toolset the game starts with.

There's some interesting depth here - you not only get ranged kunai attacks, a short teleporter hop and three extra modes for your sword, but each of these get different effects in combination, giving you plenty of high-energy options to take down even bigger foes with finesse. There's also a chain-based higher damage mode you can get to if you score a high succession of hits - I never popped the achievement for doing this 25 times, but I managed to quickly take down the one boss I had any real trouble by trigging a succession of these, and like everything else in this game's combat, it has the capacity to make you feel like the ultra-badass you probably aren't.

Elsewhere, the game can be unexceptional, though not in any significantly detrimental way. This Strider goes full Metroidvania, and while the aforementioned puzzles are great to track down, it lacks the clever item placement of something like Super Metroid (and for better or worse, there's nothing like that game's shine sparking to test your skills/patience). The environments are thoughtfully if visually unspectacular in their construction - though gameplay is on a 2D plane they've done a great job of layering things in the background and foreground, but it can all look a little samey and the series' distinctive cyber-soviet environments seem a little low-key this time round.

Enemy design is a similar story - in terms of function they've nailed it (on sight you have a good idea how an encounter is going to go down, and attacks are appropriately telegraphed so you can get on with the business of dodging and obliterating) but the designs don't really stick in your memory. Bosses are a little better on this front, though they're ultimately lifted from earlier games (and they have some over-used chatter before you encounter them).

Still, unless you've recently burned yourself out on Metroidvania-esque titles, there's more than enough style and substance in this game. I've owed this one a review for three years now - taken me around this time to actually have a machine that can run it (oddly) - Chris covered for me on thereticule (http://thereticule.com/strider-the-verdict/), but I couldn't resist singing it's praises myself, especially as three years on, it seems to have largely been forgotten. A shame.

The following is an extract from the full review available here[thereticule.com].

How do you spend 50 hours playing a game with a 25 minute campaign?

[...]

That unreachable, perfect run drives you forward for a lot of your Ikaruga playtime. Mastering a level could be compared, at least superficially, to learning a song – at the very least, the game’s constant forward crawl and emphasis on perfect timing on a succession of coloured marks shares a lot with the typical rhythm game.

But this only really explains the long tail of the experience. For all the zen-like, dot-eating mastery that you’ll strive for in the long term, Ikaruga’s early appeal is sustained remarkably effectively by the base elements of gaming that we’re often so quick to dismiss. Developed for the now antique hardware shared by the Dreamcast and Naomi arcade board, Ikaruga isn’t exactly pumping polygons, but it still looks fantastic.

This world of elaborate black and white mecha – always accented by reds and blues respectively – is an alluring invention. The art design gives us a unique science fiction world that is more inventive and arresting than the worlds spun out of a long list of triple-A miscellany. The music is rousing, building to some strangely affecting moments near the tail end of the game. The sound effects are pitch perfect, whether digitally screaming at you on a boss approach or punctuating your deft control with explosions and that impossibly unrepetitious chorus of ‘MAX CHAIN, MAX CHAIN, MAX CHAIN’.

[...]

Don’t disqualify yourself from playing this game. You’re probably never going to be someone who can complete the entire game on a single credit playing as both ships, but there’s so much more fun to be had at the shallow end of play than you’d think at first glance. 50 to 5,000 hours of fun, in fact.

Episode One: All That Remains
Full review available here[thereticule.com]
Gaming audiences are usually a lot more comfortable with protecting little girls than they are playing as them – and any general audience may well find controlling an 11 year old in a world of bloody character deaths, fatal failure states and dangerous adults potentially distasteful.

Going into this first episode, you’ll lower your guard because of this. Surely you’ll be spared the worst of the world because of who you are? Don’t count on it: the episode is more or less a compilation of all the worst crap that happened to you in the first season. Thankfully, it isn’t spiteful about it – The story is well paced, ensuring some downtime to reflect on the lowest lows. Additionally, the way each occurrence unravels the new setting, or causes coincidences that motivate later happenings, ensures you’ll be gripped until the conclusion.

Episode Two: A House Divided
Full review available here[thereticule.com]
With two solid episodes under its belt, Season Two has moved into unequivocal recommendation territory for all but those who’ve failed to gel with the series’ acquired taste. Even then, A House Divided helps to further the impression that this could be a season that exceeds the first: it’s far more assured than the plodding first half of Season One – and if it’s going to hit the highs of the second half, it’s well worth buying in sooner rather than later.