Tag: indie games

Recommended Game – Killer7

Published by Greyson Ditzler on 21st February 2021

Introduction

I like playing weird games, that’s not a secret. Practically every game I’ve recommended so far during my time with Polyspice could be considered at least a little bit weird. From the puzzle-matching cooking quest that is Battle Chef Brigade Deluxe to the space shooter J-Pop odyssey that is Vitamin Connection. Weird games just grab my attention.

But what makes a game weird? What is a weird game? To say a game is weird implies that there are “normal” games, which I’d argue is only partly true. Sure, there are genres of games and popular trends in gaming, but videogames are an ever-changing medium. Game design is more art than science, and without experimentation with weird ideas, we wouldn’t ever see anything new or interesting.

Today I’d like to talk about what I consider to be the absolutely definitive “weird” videogame. A game that isn’t just a truly unique and excellent experience, but also illustrates just how great games can be when you throw out conventional wisdom and experiment with gaming as a medium. That game is Suda51’s magnum opus, Killer7.

Suda51

Killer7 is a game that’s impossible to classify into a single genre. In the simplest of terms, it is an action-adventure shooter with a horror influence that swaps between first and third person. It was originally released for the Nintendo Gamecube and PlayStation 2, and was re-released on PC through Steam just a few years ago.

Killer7 was the first game from Japanese game designer Goichi Suda, also known as Suda51, to come to the West. Suda as a designer is known best for his experimental and self-proclaimed “punk” style of making games. He seeks to defy established tropes and conventions of gaming in all his work. This usually involves a great deal of blood and gore, and eccentric mechanical and gameplay choices, of which Killer7 is the epitome of this style.

Combat and Puzzles

Killer7’s moment to moment gameplay involves exploring the current level you’re in through branching paths that you explore freely while moving on rails with a single button. You must also keep your ears alert for the giggling of Heaven Smiles, many deadly types of which lurk around every corner. They only become visible when you scan the environment for them in first person, and only dispatched after shooting their own unique weak-spots. You also solve adventure game style puzzles with key collecting and riddles aplenty, which will test your memory and observational skills quite often.

Whether you’re dealing with the combat or the puzzles, it will require the utilization of Killer7’s best core mechanic; swapping between the members of the Killer7 at will. After fulfilling certain requirements in the level, you can swap between each mysterious and deathly skilled member of the team. Each of the Smiths has their own weapon as well as unique ability, and you must learn to utilize all of them in even balance in order to complete each level. Thankfully they all play well enough that this isn’t a problem.

Dan Smith is a basic shooter who can deal extra damage with a charge shot, Kaede Smith is the Sniper of the group with a slow rate of fire, Kevin Smith (no relation) can throw knives and never has to reload, and so on. Each member of the team has something significant to contribute to gameplay.

Deconstructive Gameplay

The basic combat is helped along by a great variety of enemies, as well as methods of disposing of enemies, on top of some solid if simple RPG elements. You can upgrade each character’s abilities and gun skills a certain amount in each level, provided you have enough blood. The difficulty does eventually get pretty high towards the end of the journey, but the difficulty curves naturally to get to that point, and it hardly ever feels unfair to the player.

What I’ve discussed so far are the basic and more easily understandable gameplay mechanics of Killer7. However, there’s a lot I’d rather not discuss, as this is a game that’s best enjoyed going into it knowing as little as possible. It’s a game that makes tons of tiny alternative design decisions that make for something potentially alienating or off-putting, but much greater than the sum of its parts.

Every basic element of Killer7 has been intentionally somewhat tweaked to make itself seem skewed and off-putting to the player. The health bar is off kilter, the controls and camera are highly unorthodox, and pretty much everything else about the whole game is at least slightly strange. More often very strange. This extends to the entire narrative as well.

Plot (No Spoilers)

I will now attempt to explain the basic plot of the game while doing my best not to spoil anything serious:

In an alternative timeline where all forms of domestic and international terrorism have been eradicated, and the United Nations is on the verge of declaring world peace, a new threat emerges in the form of the mysterious beings known as the Heaven Smiles. A mysterious sleeper cell of giggling homunculi with permanently fixed grins and explosive organs.

In the midst of a massively entangled political struggle between the United States and Japan, the UN calls upon the services of the eponymous Killer7 (also known as the Smith Syndicate). The Smith Syndicate is very mysterious. They are a group of seven highly skilled assassins, all of whom are led by the leader of the syndicate, Harman Smith.

Most of the important legwork for the group is handled by Garcian Smith, a stone-faced cleaner who gets insider information on the syndicate’s next assassination target. He does so through shadow-lurking informants, seeking to calm the storm of or even turn the tides of the West vs. East political struggle.

Anything else that I could tell you would just further spoil the experience for you, and frankly I’m not sure if I would even be doing the whole thing justice. Killer7’s story is a web of conspiracy dotted with disturbing subject matter and absolute chaos. Yet at the same time it often feels so reserved, the pacing is never too fast or too slow, and the difficulty cleanly scales up over the course of the game’s linear story; a story built up additionally by the presentation.

Presentation

The PC Remaster of *Killer7* runs very smoothly, and really shows how the visuals of the original have barely aged at all. They still look quite good.

There really isn’t a game that looks, sounds, or plays quite like Killer7, even after all this time. The game’s graphics and sounds are just as intriguing and bizarre as the story they come packaged with.

Killer7 still looks great over 15 years after its release. It was one of the most noteworthy games to ever implement cel-shaded, not because it was among the first to do it, but because it went in so hard with the style. Every texture, character, or otherwise is drenched in solid, bright colors with heavy shadows. The contrast of the colorful, cartoonish visuals juxtapose strongly with the game’s dark subject matter and themes as well.

Child abduction, organ harvesting, and political assassination are all core elements of the game’s story, and that’s leaving a lot of details to the side. Killer7 earns it’s “M” Rating easily. You’ll see inhuman monstrosities explode in fits of laughter, brains blown out the back of people’s heads, and genuinely disturbing subject matter presented with complete stone seriousness. But it wouldn’t be a Suda game without a splash of his signature eccentric style to offset the more serious tone.

The script is dotted with small moments of dark or absurdist humor, often coming out of left field. This somehow defies expectations and doesn’t undermine the more serious parts of the script. It becomes more disarming than hilarious, as you’re always left unsure what will happen next. Trying to anticipate what’s next would just be a lost cause anyway, best just sit back and enjoy the ride.

Conclusion

Killer7 will not be a game for everyone. It’s extremely strange, at times very cryptic, and it’s not easily put into a singular category genre wise. But again, all of these things and more are exactly what I love about it. Like I said, sometimes we need experimental games that break the rules and get weird on us, otherwise we’d never see anything new or interesting, and even after over 15 years, Killer7 still feels new and interesting.

The combination arcade shooting and survival horror gameplay has never really been replicated in the same way elsewhere, and very few games before or since have attempted to tell stories nearly as dark, bizarre, or openly political in quite the same way either. Killer7 truly was a product of it’s time; a more experimental era where bigger developers were encouraged to experiment and take risks. An era that feels long past now. Thankfully, with the game now available on Steam at a reasonable price, it’s much easier than it ever has been before for people to try it out.

If you consider yourself a fan of “weird” or “alternative” video games, then you absolutely owe it to yourself to play Killer7. It’s fun, funny, creepy, disturbing, and even with Suda51 still making cool and interesting games to this day, we still may never see anything quite like it ever again.

Recommended Game – The Takeover

Published by Robert Ball on 17th February 2021

Introduction

The Takeover isn’t a huge game.
But I do hope it will be remembered in the years to come. Many folk look on yesteryear fondly.
I don’t. While there are great things in the past, it’s never as rosy as it feels in your mind’s eye. No drink ever tasted so good as the pristine memory we hold so dear.
And that’s the bleeding truth of nostalgia. The reality, call it tragedy or truth as you will.

The Takeover is a Retro Inspired game that manages not to be derivative. Most notably with its visual style, both it and Fight’N’Rage seem tailor made to be adapted into incredible Graphic Novels. But while Fight’N’Rage’s presentation was perfect for what it meant to accomplish, what it meant to accomplish was a perfect 1:1 Scale Arcade Cabinet Experience.

Graphics

The Takeover doesn’t go for that. And is the only recent Indie game I can think of offhand to go so thoroughly Retro without dipping into Pixel Art. Instead, it sports this very radical look of Pre Rendered characters akin to Mortal Kombat and especially to Killer Instinct. It keeps and cherishes this arcade game feel while being an HD game meant to run on modern systems, with beautiful HD characters animated as if they had those same old memory limitations of twenty some years ago.

The closest comparison I can come to is how Guilty Gear Xrd has captured the 2D hand drawn animated style of Guilty Gear while in reality being a 3D rendered game with phenomenal shaders and animations that deliberately imitate the limitations of traditional animation. It’s a surreal and very beautiful experience that every fighter fan must experience. The Takeover has accomplished similar wizardry here, and I love it.
And I hope you and others pay it the time and attention it deserves from you.

Beyond the visuals, I have to emphasize the quality of the original soundtrack here. It’s amazing, and I want it. It has this Grunge-y Rock sound with the main theme, look up anything even tangentially mentioning this game and you’ll see far more musically literate folk invariably showering the OST in praise.

General Gameplay

The graphics have a distinct digitized 3D look, much like the original *Killer Instinct*, and with just as much style.

The Takeover is a Beat Em Up. You wander the streets delivering pain to people that need it. And there are a lot of people in need of it, you are their only hope. Go, deliver righteous beatings.

Sooo how does The Takeover Play? Very well. I’ve been playing the Switch build, and it’s never had any trouble in performance.

On the Switch, the A button performs a Punch, pretty standard.
The X Button performs a Kick, which have a bit more range,
and the Y Button executes a Special Move that drains a little of your Health with each use.
Lastly, the B button Jumps. It is the only one of the four Face buttons that is intuitively placed for me.

After a bit of practice though, these odd Button Mapping choices didn’t interfere with my fun.
The Left Shoulder (L) or Trigger Buttons (ZL) can be held in order to automatically Run, which I love as I often have a little trouble with movement in this type of game.

Gameplay Basics & Tips

Players must mix their Punches and Kicks to make some lengthy combos, and the last Punch can be made into one of two alternate finishers by holding Up or Down when executing it.
Holding Up will launch the enemy into the air, and allow you to Punch and Kick them a few extra times before their body hits the floor.
Holding Down will slam the enemy into the ground, very handy for getting them out of your way for a bit so you can move.

Walking close to an enemy will automatically Grab them, at which point you may temporarily Throw, Hit, or Slam them. Pressing X a few times will Hit them, pressing it while aiming Backward will Throw them that way. Pressing A will Slam them, dealing an attack to floor them much like a Downward Finisher. By pressing B to Jump, you can leap around to the other side of your opponent so you can Throw them in the opposite direction.

A Combo Counter will keep count of how many consecutive blows you can dole out without taking Damage or taking too long between hits. Do well enough, and a Rage Meter at the top of the Screen will fill, allowing you to activate Rage Mode. Rage turns the Screen red, boosting your attack power while allowing you to automatically Block all incoming attacks.

Another Meter will fill to allow a Super Attack by pressing Punch and Kick at once. It’s called a Super Attack but it’s really a Screen clearing Air Strike. No reason or justification in the game, it just happens. And you’re totally safe from harm during all the explosions. Because Videogames are weird.

Characters

Connor Grayson
Connor isn’t a complicated guy. Actually, at least in terms of moveset he’s incredibly similar to Haggar the wrestling mayor from Final Fight. Which is definitely deliberate considering Final Fight was clearly a source of inspiration for the developers. Running with Connor and pressing Punch will let him grab a nearby enemy and perform a DDT. This along with his ability to perform a German Suplex as his default Slam move makes him my favorite character.

Megan Brookes
She is easily the fastest of the main trio, and wears a bright red Motorcycle Racing Suit.
She’s got the best Combo ability, and her legs go alllllll the way up, which is handy both as eye candy AND a means of whacking enemies just outside her Punching radius. Cleavage joke!

Ethan Rivers
Ethan has a very balanced playstyle, serving as a middle ground between the Strength of Connor and the Speed of Megan. Ethan’s attacks similarly have Medium range. Ethan’s being an All ‘Rounder makes him a good choice for beginners, and he’s voiced by the Internet Celebrity Takahata 101!

Jackson
Jackson seems to come out of nowhere, and is unlocked after completing the Arcade mode.
I’m not really sure what connection he has with the main trio of playable characters, but it’s nice to have a fourth playable character all the same.

His Baseball Bat comes out to play if you use his Forward Special attack or perform a Punch Combo Finisher. Bringing out his Gun actually pistol whips enemies in front of him, which is just a nice little touch. His running Kick can hit enemies twice.

Items

As you go through the Stages, which consist of three Levels each, you’ll see background objects that can be broken. By inflicting damage on them, one of several items will fly out!
It could be Food for recovering Health, it could be Cash for increasing your Score, it could be Ammo for your Gun, or it could be a Weapon for you to use like a Crowbar or Sword!

Simply stand over an item and press Punch to pick it up.

To throw a picked up Weapon, press Kick. You can Attack with the Weapon by pressing Punch!

Stages & Level Skip

As touched upon earlier, there are 7 Stages with 3 Levels in each. Two of these are actually Vehicle Based levels that completely change up the gameplay. The Difficulty setting determines if you will be able to select your Stage and Level to continue from or not, with Hard requiring a player to get through without a Game Over. (I plan to beat it on Hard next.)

I don’t know if this was intentional, but I discovered during my repeat playthrough on Normal as Jackson that I could Exit to the Main Menu from within a Level and then immediately have access to the next Level via the Stage Select screen. This could even be used all the way to the Final Boss fight! It makes unlocking the Relay Mode much easier, though Relay on Hard is what I consider the best way to play The Takeover.

Story

Steel Haven was a tough town on the best of days. But in the days just before our story begins, things have gone downhill fast. At the peak of this chaotic crescendo, the adopted daughter of two police officers is kidnapped, seemingly by whomever has organized this crime wave described by many as “The Takeover” from which the game derives its Title.

So Ethan and his girlfriend Megan head off to rescue their child along with their enormous commando friend Connor.

It’s very light on Story. Which works since it’s essentially a modern take on a classic arcade game.

Challenges & Survival Mode

There are two game modes set aside for players looking to just blow off some steam, with Survival available from the start and Challenge only unlocking after having cleared the Arcade mode at least once

Challenge is the more in depth, asking players to complete each stage while avoiding using any specials, grabbing all the dropped items (in this case Stars) from enemies, and keeping their Health above 50%. Each of these conditions is tracked individually, and completing 2 or more of them unlocks the next level of Challenge Mode.

Survival is the simpler of the two, but I prefer it. It’s your garden variety Survival mode wherein enemies come out of the woodwork towards you until you lose and you try to defeat as many as you can until then. It just feels more rewarding due to the simplicity.

You’re gonna have to give it your all to survive all this, especially in Survival Mode.

Nitpicks

These are not big deals, but I did notice some things I would change.

The Relay Mode is too good to stash away behind two playthroughs to unlock.
Folk with trouble processing visually chaotic sequences may have trouble in the Rainy portions.
I really want a Relay mode that gives each character 1 Life and a Game Over once all 4 are defeated, much like we see in Bloodstained: Curse of the Moon.

Conclusion

The Takeover isn’t revolutionary, and comparisons to Streets of Rage 4 are inevitable. But the experience here was very enjoyable to me, and it manages to evoke nostalgic emotions while measuring up to modern expectations. I can’t ask much more from a game designed to capture the wonder of the past while building upon that foundation. The music is great, the mechanics are solid, and The Takeover is well worth your 20 bucks if you like what you see and hear from looking at it.

The Game Recommendation Podcast – Mibibli’s Quest

Published by Greyson Ditzler on 2nd December 2020

On this month’s episode of the Polyspice Game Recommendation Podcast; Thorbjorne, Robert, Gerardo, Daniel and Greyson discuss the experimental, art-house style 2D Platformer Mibibli’s Quest! Brought into the world by the hands of Resni, a unique and outspoken indie developer also responsible for games like Peen Peen and Salad Fields, Mibibli’s Quest turned out to be quite the intriguing experience for the crew to talk about. Join us on for our third episode of the podcast to see if this game was just too strange to recommend, or maybe just strange enough.

Mibibli’s Quest is available for PC through Steam and itch.io. If you have some thoughts you’d like to share on the game or the podcast, feel free to let us know on Twitter!

Listen to our Podcast here!

Recommended Game – Salad Fields

Published by Greyson Ditzler on 30th September 2020

There are a lot of interesting creators in the video game industry. There are mainstream Triple-A developer with huge budgets and heavy duty marketing, smaller independent developers who tour convention scenes and spread positive criticism mainly through word of mouth, and then there’s the classic tale of the lone bedroom programmer. This leads me to our subject for today, the highly unique works of one particular developer, his partner, and the weird and dreamy game they made together, Salad Fields.

Puzzle game

Salad Fields is a self-proclaimed “dreamyqueer” puzzle game where you have to solve challenges by pushing blocks around, peppered with interesting mechanical gimmicks and loads of bizarre charm. This game comes to us as a joint effort from developers Resni and Jars, a couple development team, the former of which gave the world games like the highly underrated arthouse platformer Mibibli’s Quest and sexually explorative titles like Peen Peen. I know less about Jars as a developer, though I believe they’ve helped Resni with music in the past, and now they’re fully on board with the creation of Salad Fields.

Ever since Resni’s last game with Mibibli’s Quest I’ve been doing my best to keep my eye on him as a creator, because there’s really not much else I’ve seen before quite like his work. It’s often unapologetically queer and sexual, irreverent and comedic, and always well-designed and uniquely executed on a technical level. Your always in the market for weird and charming gameplay and writing when it comes to this person’s work, and with Salad Fields I’d say we have another success on our hands.

water bottle — *Let go of your inhibitions and let the weird and wonderful wash over you.*

Salad Fields is a block-pushing tile-based puzzle game, and really that’s about as simple as it can be summed up. There is a framework of sorts that gives you a reason to do the puzzles. But for the most part the game doesn’t bother with an extensive explanation of the setting and circumstances, and honestly, you shouldn’t worry too much about it. You’re here for some solid mechanics and a unique personality, and boy does this game have it in spades.

Graphics

Starting with the graphics. The game has a mixed media artstyle consisting of a pixel art at different scales. And intentionally dated looking 3D renders of character an objects like one might have seen in the 1990’s on old computer screensavers or bowling alley animations. I personally love the look of this game. I found the style and tone to be a fairly even mix of ironic and genuinely charming. This mostly stands out when interacting with characters and collecting one of the game’s many veggie pickups. And let me tell you, seeing a lumpy and nobly piece of broccoli rendered at 5 frames a second accompanied by the phrase “vegmazing” really put a smile on my face. The pixelated landscapes are also very varied in style and color palette, with every item and location looking visually distinct and nicely detailed.

*Remember, whenever you’re feeling down, just remember that you are absolutely Vegmazing.*

Music

The music is also fantastic. It ranges in tone from intense and rocking to eerie and emotional. Always complementing the level each track is made for quite well, and helping to create an almost other-worldly atmosphere in conjunction with the off-color dialogue.

Gameplay

I’ve saved the gameplay for last in this recommendation because I have the least to say about it over everything else that this game has to offer. It’s very solid and fun gameplay. Just that on the surface it’s very simple. It’s more complex elements are both difficult to describe, as well as surprises I’d rather not spoil for you. You push blocks to solve puzzles, which often involves pressing switches, avoiding insta-kill hazards, and utilizing limited-use magical power-ups. There’s a lot of balls up in the air a lot of the time. And it can be difficult to juggle all the mechanics without getting confused and flustered. But over time you’ll come to understand and appreciate how each new mechanic operates.

game map — *If the density of this screenshot scares you, you should see level 2.*

Design

Salad Fields also has a surprising number of quality if life design choices for a game so difficult. Firstly, while the level design connecting the puzzles in each level can be somewhat repetitive and have twisted, overlapping layouts. This is easily handled by the addition of a competent map on the pause screen. Additionally, early on you gain the ability to conveniently warp between the actual puzzles themselves within each level.

Salad Fields can be quite hard when It wants to be, which is what I should have expected after the classic Mega Man style adventure that was Mibibli’s Quest. But it’s a more cerebral type of challenge. Resni and Jars have managed to get some seriously intense challenges and mechanics out of a formula as tried and tested as pushing blocks around.

Am I saying that the ability to skip through the gameplay is a genuine positive? Yes. Am I saying that the gameplay is bad and that I want to skip it? No. I’m saying that the puzzles are quite hard, and occasionally when I’m stuck on a particularly difficult one and all I want to do is see what cool or weird thing happens next for the fun of it. It’s a nice feature to have. The game also very kindly keeps tracks of what puzzles on each level you have completed and which ones you have skipped. All the while you can come back and solve them for real if you eventually feel up to it. I just really appreciate that Resni felt obliged to cater to two completely different audiences and actually put in the effort to make your experience easily changeable at any time.

My experience

Whatever it’s minor flaws may have done to hamper my experience. I came away from Salad Fields confused and happy. It’s base gameplay may be a very old formula. But it spices it up greatly through seriously challenging puzzle design as well as very unique and well-realized gimmicks. A lot like what he managed to pull off with Mibibli’s Quest years prior.

It’s an inexpensive game that hides a weirdly unique and richer experience than you might be expecting. It’s mood-swing writing and dreamy atmosphere paired with excellent music, unique and elegiac style, and surpsingly deep and difficult gameplay makes for a great game that I highly suggest you check out if your either looking for a real challenge or just want something weird and unique. I’ll have to keep my eyes on Resni and Jars in the future to see if anything else cool shakes loose. Please give Salad Fields a try! It might just expand your horizons, and even if it doesn’t, it’s still quite fun.

Greyson is an aspiring author and YouTuber with dozens of consoles and hundreds of gaming hours under his belt. He’s always looking for something new to play, and is always happy to share it with other people. He also likes the Shantae games, like, a lot.

You can recommend games to the Polyspice audience too. Take a look at our content guidelines.

Recommended Game – Battle Chef Brigade Deluxe

Published by Greyson Ditzler on 20th August 2020

Introduction

Battle Chef Brigade Deluxe is a highly unique cooking game. It was originally released for Nintendo Switch and PC in 2017 as just Battle Chef Brigade. Before eventually being expanded on into its current version with several new modes and the added title of Deluxe. It remains to this day one of the most unique indie games that I’ve ever played. It’s unfortunate that more people haven’t heard about it. I suppose that’s the benefit of writing for a site like Polyspice. I get a chance to recommend a neat little side dish like this.

Battle Chef Brigade Deluxe is – in the simplest of terms – a combination of a side-scrolling beat-em-up, platforming, cooking, and match-three gameplay elements. It might sound intimidating or like too much to handle. But I can assure you that it plays like a dream. Once you get used to the controls, you’ll be eagerly slicing and dicing your way through fantastical beast galore in order to assemble gorgeous looking gourmet meals.

I barely even care that that egg yolk is also an eyeball, that looks delicious.

You play as Mina, a small-town cook working at her family restaurant who runs away from it all to accept an attempt to join the Battle Chef Brigade. Most of the plat after that is twists and turns that I’d rather not spoil here. But it’s a largely light affair. The story smartly never compromises the gameplay and keeps it safe with cooking challenge after cooking challenge. Making sure to take the time to characterize your opponents in the time between the matches. While also allowing the difficulty to gently curve upwards at a reasonable pace.

Gameplay

In the average battle, you have several judges who want certain flavors emphasized in the dish you serve to them. And each ingredient that you collect from different enemies has different levels of three different types of flavor. All with their own set color. You mix the ingredients into the meal as necessary in order to match the general flavor profile the judge wants. And the rest of the details are up to you.

The dev team really wanted to make a cooking game that encouraged creativity, rather than forced you to strictly follow recipes as many other games do. Battle Chef Brigade shines once you realize that you can basically just do what you want. And as long as you do it well, you’ll succeed. Even if you fail a cooking challenge, most of them are only a few minutes long. As so retrying steals little time from you. And every failure teaches you a little more about how to play the game more optimally.

The meat is a little tough... — The meat is a little tough…

Elements

There are multiple elements and items added to the gameplay the course of the story that builds on the established mechanics quite well and added at a reasonable pace so that the gameplay doesn’t get too repetitive. Things like fragile ingredients and removing bones from meat, all-natural things for a chef to consider that makes the experience that little bit more skill-testing and immersive.

What also helps the gameplay expand from it’s already solid core concept is the simple but strong customization system. Different types of cookware, spices, and stat-changing gear can be equipped between matches in order to sway the odds in your favor or alter the playstyle more to your liking. It’s a system that provides depth to whatever you decide you want your playstyle to be without being too alienating with it’s depth.

The gear customization screen has more combos than an old fashioned diner.

Graphics and Content

Then of course there’s the aesthetic of the game. Battle Chef Brigade Deluxe was inspired by the works of developer Vanillaware, such as Odin Sphere and Muramasa: The Demon Blade. This all shows in both the fantastical setting and beat-em-up elements, as well as the graphics. The visuals are all hand-drawn with an anime-inspired look loaded with both bright and soft colors and loads of memorable and diverse character designs. The animation itself might be rather minimal, but it’s mostly forgivable due to how expressive the art is by itself, held up additionally by the fantastic voice acting and solid soundtrack.

For $20 on all platforms Battle Chef Brigade Deluxe also offers a solid amount of content. On top of the roughly 12 hour long story mode, there’s also a local multiplayer mode, daily challenges with online leaderboards, free play mode, a mode similar to “Break the Targets” from the Super Smash Bros. series. It’s a great big buffet of a game with a one time fee, which is the best type of game and buffet.

Conclusion

There is not much that Battle Chef Brigade Deluxe does that I can criticize. The story could have been a bit more fleshed out in certain places, and some additional animations and characters to play as would be nice. But aside from that there is a lot here to love. It is a serious value for money, addictively fun, and still now wholly unique among both puzzle and cooking games.

Playing a game like Battle Chef Brigade is like taking a break from your favorite restaurants that you normally order from to try out a weird new food-truck. Perhaps it isn’t as familiar to you as your other typical meals. But sometimes it’s good to try new things and experiment because you might find something new to love. Battle Chef Brigade Deluxe is available now for PC, PS4, and Nintendo Switch.

What are you waiting for? Strap on an apron! Vive La Brigade!

You can recommend games to the Polyspice audience too. Take a look at our content guidelines.

Recommended Game – Bug Fables

Published by Greyson Ditzler on 24th June 2020

Moonsprout Games’ turn-based RPG Bug Fables: The Everlasting Sapling is a love letter to the first two games in the Paper Mario series. Those first two entries in the console-based Mario RPG series are regarded by many as some of the best games ever made by Nintendo, which is no small feat.

Bug Fables was made with a crowdfunded budget of just under $25,000. Considering the massive scale and high standards of quality set by the original two Paper Mario games. It seems that attempting to capture the magic.

I can say confidently, after having – at time of writing – dumped more than 35 hours into the the game, that Bug Fables is the single best Paper Mario game that I’ve played since Paper Mario: The Thousand-Year Door.

If this image triggers the same chemical response in your brain as mine, then I suggest you keep reading.

Story

I don’t want to dwell on or over-emphasize the extent to which Bug Fables takes inspiration and mechanics from classic turn-based Paper Mario. So I’ll refrain from going into detail about the similarities unless a major difference between the two comes up. Okay? Okay. For now, let’s take a look at the story in this self-titled “Fable”.

Bug Fables tells the story of Kabbu the Beetle, Vi the Bee, and Leif the Moth, three complete strangers who end up forming an expedition team by circumstance to carry out quests and treasure hunts for the mighty Ant Kingdom. What starts as a simple and friendly quest into the local monster cave turns into a surprisingly long, emotional, and effectively dramatic story of three friends learning and growing together in an attempt to save all they love.

In many respects, it’s a standard RPG story. But it’s presented very well and the high density of memorable and likable characters both in the main cast and on the side kept me intrigued over the course of the plot. Especially when the odd serious moment popped up in the middle of what was mostly a lighthearted tale. I’ll avoid spoilers for now, but just now that there are a solid story and overarching quest to follow on this adventure. With that laid out, let’s talk about gameplay, and how it differs from the familiar Paper Mario formula.

Combat

Unlike the games that it takes inspiration from, there are no bonus partners that get added to party over time. The three members of your party that you have at the start of the game will be your whole party for the rest of the game. Normally for myself and many others part of the fun of an RPG like this is found in adding new characters with new backstories and all to the party. You may not have that to look forward to in Bug Fables. But as a trade off the game is wholly designed around having just these three party members.

Each member of the party gains new abilities both in the overworld and in battle over the course of the story. Which leads to continuous development of new strategies. As well as new obstacles to overcome and puzzles to solve in the overworld. Not to mention, the core combat itself is built around.

The combat is a familiar and time-tested affair. But with it’s own twists on the classic staples of Paper Mario-style turn-based combat. Every character has their own distinct advantages in battle. Which makes each of them equally useful for different reasons. Kabbu can only attack the first ground enemy but can piece defense. Vi can hit airborne enemies, and Leif can attack enemies buried in the ground. Everyone also has a series of different special moves which take TP (Teamwork Points) which they gradually earn throughout the story as well as by leveling up.

Leveling and Medals

Adding further depth to the combat are both the leveling system as well as the Medals. Every time the party levels up you get to choose between a permanent addition to health, Teamwork Points, or Medal Points. So your growth in each area is dictated entirely by how you want to build your strategy.

The Medals on the other hand allow for many, many different battle strategies and builds for your characters. There are medals that swap defense for attack. Some that prevent status ailments, and even some that unlock moves for certain characters. It’s straight out of classic Paper Mario. It is just as wonderfully simple and yet staggeringly deep as before.

Side Quests & Bonus Content

As for what you do outside of battle, there’s plenty extra to do. There are boss fights hidden away on secret paths, dozens of side-quests with their own associated characters and storylines. In general a ton of positive reinforcement and rewards for experimentation and exploration. While the world isn’t the largest out there, but no space is wasted. You’d never guess how small the game’s budget was when looking at some of these massive areas loaded with different enemies and obstacles. Had this game released at the time of the original Paper Mario on the N64 or PS1, it would have easily been a rival to the original series’ quality and scale.

There are so many mysterious and curious moments in this game that you’ll find yourself searching around every corner for goodies and new things to fight and collect.

Special

The side quests in particular are something special. Don’t expect Witcher 3 levels of depth and scripting for them or anything. But you still get a ton of excellent side-stories, extra bosses, and loads of intriguing lore and secrets that help build the world of Bugaria. On that note. there are also Lore Books you can collect to help fill you in on the history and culture of the world around. Adding more texture and narrative depth to what appears on the surface to be nothing more than a cutsey game about bugs.

There’s also a simple yet deeply fun to explore cooking system that encourages risks and experimentation. A Magic the Gathering style card game on the side that gets better the more you study enemies in battle, and tons of different items to find and collect. It almost seems like you’ll never run out of things to do, and even though you do eventually. I promise you you’ll be satisfied with your own journey by the end.

Conclusion

There is much more good I could say about Bug Fables. I could go into detail about every little reference and element directly lifted from Paper Mario (of which there are MANY), or how many moments from the story will stick with me for a long time. But I’d rather say this: If you enjoy classic Paper Mario or good RPGs in general, you need to play Bug Fables.

I must stress that Bug Fables is not a perfect game. I did come across the occasional minor bug or performance issue. But it was only ever a minor annoyance at worst, so I can forgive that. The controls for overworld abilities can be a bit difficult and sometimes annoying. But it never becomes too serious or stressful of an issue.

Any other complaints I might have would be to the tune of “the Paper Mario games did X element better”, and I don’t want to linger on thoughts like those, because I believe this game stands strong enough on its own.

While Bug Fables may not be better than the classic Paper Mario games. It might be just as good and deserves to be regarded as a modern RPG classic all it’s own. I am hopeful that many of you will go and enjoy it for yourselves. This game made something fresh and new out of an old formula and made something magical that is all their own.

Watch this video for some extended thoughts on the game.