4 new indie Metroidvania titles are coming next month: which one will you get?
- Thread starter JJShadow
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Contemplating all of them. It's gonna be tough to decide what's a day one and what I have to get later.
Probably all of them depending on impressions. Not sure which one at launch and which ones later.
Guacamelee is no pixel game though, no wonder it does look cleaner .-) i am on the opposite side: gimme pixels all day, i don´t really like Guacamelees look, reminds me of a Flash game.
Gah! Now between Dead Cells, Salt & Sanctuary, and Iconoclasts my Switch is going to be metroidvania (and Okami) central for the foreseeable future. I really want to play Death's Gambit too, but the lack of portability makes it a hard sell. I guess I can try it on the GPD Win if I get desperate.
Guacamelee for sure. Perhaps Dead cells too.
Hollow knight is the new gold standard for metroidvanias so I'm looking forward to seeing how these will fare.
Hollow knight is the new gold standard for metroidvanias so I'm looking forward to seeing how these will fare.
Rats, I can't find it on mine. Are you US? Did it have a discount?
I asked on twitter and they said $20 with a week 1 discount
There's so many pixel art games coming out that it's clear you're not alone in liking them, there seems to be a big market for it. But it kind of bums me out since I feel unattracted by a lot of games people rave about as great.
Just realized Guacamelee 2 is PS4 exclusive. I'll try to hold out for an Xbox or Switch port to come out - I don't like supporting third-party console exclusives if I can help it. But I'll definitely be picking that game up eventually, it looks sweet!
fair point though, not everyone is keen on the pixel look many indie games are sporting nowadays
bit of a late response, but after a while the game switches to speedrunning through the mazes, actually. There are doors in each stage that close after a certain time amount of time has passed, and daily challenge mazes that you need to complete in a few minutes
I'd be interested in hearing some impressions of Chasm. Is it comparable to any other well-known game?
The look is great but the game was pretty bland I thought. I know many people who felt similar. It reminded me of my experience with Owlboy.
I am burned out on this subgenre, buuuuuut Guacamelee was fucking amazing, so I'm getting the sequel day one.
I woud say it's like Symphony of the Night crossed with Rogue Legacy because every playthrough has some random variation. The game hooked me pretty fast and I pumped 12 hours into the game within like 4 days which is rare for me. The mechanics and unlocks felt cool and rewarding, secrets are abound. I greatly enjoyed my time with it and am considering doing a "mortal" playthrough to try and beat it without dying. If the game seems intriguing to you I would say it's absolutely worth your time.
Better late than never. Thanks for clarifying a bit. I did some searching on the topic, and found some posts (about the PC version) saying runs could range from 15 mins to an hour-ish depending on how thorough you are and how well you play.
I'm just debating whether it makes sense as a digital or physical purchase for me. It's $7 difference if I snag the eShop preorder discount, and I've been trending towards digital for games that are short session types of games. I got another Metroidvania digitally (Hollow Knight), but that was because I wanted it day one and there was no physical release.
It's pretty similar to classic Metroidvania games, namely Symphony of the Night (which I believe is the game designer's favourite game of all time). I'm not actually a huge fan of the genre so I haven't played too many, but it also reminds me of Super Metroid.
- You have a main hub you go back to where you can buy equipment, upgrade spells, craft items, sell items, get side-quests, play mini-games and rest.
- There is a main story that you continuously progress through and a lot of optional quests, some of which are quite cryptic. You get rewards at various checkpoints but it's not necessarily the main drive, the focus is more on clearing content for how it might differ.
- The game is broken down in different areas, each with their own unique Visual style, theme, enemies, loot, puzzles, mini-bosses and bosses.
- You get 8 different utility upgrades throughout the game, at a pace of 1 per area or so, which is useful in its own right (ie: Slide that can also be used as an attack) but mostly unlocks locked off areas in the previous zone and lets you access the next one. You will have to do some backtracking but there's a helpful map and a lot of teleport points to get around.
- There are a variety of weapon types with their own unqiue attack animations, and increasingly better weapons for each type with some of them having unique abilities. You can also equip armor, with most of it being stat focused but some having unique abilities like summoning a pet.
- Combat is pretty straight forward where it's about timing your attack with the enemy attack pattern. You're not pulling off combos, attack chains or fancy special moves here (though there are spells that use mana, once again similar to SOTN). There is some depth to it like doing Jump Attacks to keep momentum, or cancelling your Backstep into an attack to retreat while attacking.
- A good chunk of the game envolves platforming, though it's not pixel perfect frustration but it does require some thought to your actions as the traps can be quite deadly. As you get more utility power-ups, especially the wall jump and double jump, it'll get easier and flow better. There's some clever moving platform rooms that took me some time but were enjoyable to clear.
- Killing enemies gives you exp which levels you up and strengthens all your Stats by a small amount, no skill tree or stat builds here outside of gear though. You can find quite a few secrets that give you permanent boosts, and sometimes either let you make choices or give you a random boost.
- The randomly generated aspect of the game is just in regards to room set-up, both within the room itself to determine platforms/enemy placement and also with how the rooms that connect checkpoints are placed. You still go through the game in the order designed by the devs, but if you do another playthrough you have to relearn enemy & puzzle placement, unless you use the same world seed.
Not the final build, which is more polished than what is shown, but a good representation of the basic experience.
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thanks for the detailed response! It does indeed sound like a mix of SotN and RLIt's pretty similar to classic Metroidvania games, namely Symphony of the Night (which I believe is the game designer's favourite game of all time). I'm not actually a huge fan of the genre so I haven't played too many, but it also reminds me of Super Metroid.
Overall it's a simple fun game that will net you about a dozen hours in the first playthrough, and has decent replayability to the randomisation, different weapons/spells and numerous secrets. The pixel art visuals are the biggest charm, but progressing through very different environments and clearing puzzles has been a joy. Hope that gives a better idea of what the game is like.
- You have a main hub you go back to where you can buy equipment, upgrade spells, craft items, sell items, get side-quests, play mini-games and rest.
- There is a main story that you continuously progress through and a lot of optional quests, some of which are quite cryptic. You get rewards at various checkpoints but it's not necessarily the main drive, the focus is more on clearing content for how it might differ.
- The game is broken down in different areas, each with their own unique Visual style, theme, enemies, loot, puzzles, mini-bosses and bosses.
- You get 8 different utility upgrades throughout the game, at a pace of 1 per area or so, which is useful in its own right (ie: Slide that can also be used as an attack) but mostly unlocks locked off areas in the previous zone and lets you access the next one. You will have to do some backtracking but there's a helpful map and a lot of teleport points to get around.
- There are a variety of weapon types with their own unqiue attack animations, and increasingly better weapons for each type with some of them having unique abilities. You can also equip armor, with most of it being stat focused but some having unique abilities like summoning a pet.
- Combat is pretty straight forward where it's about timing your attack with the enemy attack pattern. You're not pulling off combos, attack chains or fancy special moves here (though there are spells that use mana, once again similar to SOTN). There is some depth to it like doing Jump Attacks to keep momentum, or cancelling your Backstep into an attack to retreat while attacking.
- A good chunk of the game envolves platforming, though it's not pixel perfect frustration but it does require some thought to your actions as the traps can be quite deadly. As you get more utility power-ups, especially the wall jump and double jump, it'll get easier and flow better. There's some clever moving platform rooms that took me some time but were enjoyable to clear.
- Killing enemies gives you exp which levels you up and strengthens all your Stats by a small amount, no skill tree or stat builds here outside of gear though. You can find quite a few secrets that give you permanent boosts, and sometimes either let you make choices or give you a random boost.
- The randomly generated aspect of the game is just in regards to room set-up, both within the room itself to determine platforms/enemy placement and also with how the rooms that connect checkpoints are placed. You still go through the game in the order designed by the devs, but if you do another playthrough you have to relearn enemy & puzzle placement, unless you use the same world seed.
Not the final build, which is more polished than what is shown, but a good representation of the basic experience.
so the map resets and the layout changes only when you start a new game, right? You don't start from scratch when you die like in a rogue-lite, and the procedually generated aspect only kicks in in further playthroughs?
during a normal run in DC, assuming you don't get killed in-between, it only takes about 5-15 minutes to complete each stage. You'll eventually sort of get an feeling for how the stages are constructed and after you get some upgrades you are encouraged to avoid enemies and rush through the stages as fast as you can. Eventually, should you beat the final boss, you unlock higher difficulty levels and repeat the process a number of times (but keep all your unlocked abilities)
HK takes an easy 20-30 hours at least, quite a bit longer if you go looking for all the collectibles. Also, DC isn't really a Metroidvania. Think more Castlevania 3 but the branching paths are not accessible until you beat some bosses
Damn, loving these Chasm impressions. I've watched plenty of Dead Cells and Death's Gambit on Twitch to know what to expect. Already pre-ordered all 3 on PSN. Will wait on Guacamelee! 2.
Guac 2 for me. Will probably get it for PS4.
I'm gonna need some good ol' impressions for the other ones.
I'm gonna need some good ol' impressions for the other ones.
Chasm map only restarts when you do a new run, it doesn't reset if you leave and come back.