![]() ![]() This offers some customisation and allows your to be reactive to how your build is progressing. It’d be so easy for the developers to limit these because of the strength, but they know that is what makes Dead Cells fun, so it’s like “hey, go nuts, have a good time”.Īs you battle your way through the island prison, you will uncover scrolls which boost your stats in some way. It speaks to the design of this game that even though these abilities are on cooldown timers, they are so short you barely notice, and use of these are encouraged, not penalised. It is so satisfying to enter a room, deploy all your weapons and decimate a group of foes in seconds. A whole lot of the fun in combat comes from deploying these traps and experimenting to find combinations which seem borderline broken. You can access more than just a sword and shield however, you also have access to bows, bombs, traps, turrets and a whole lot more in your arsenal as you begin to unlock more and more weaponry. ![]() Each kill is performed with a chunky spatter effect and just the right amount of screen shaking to not be nauseating. The fact that you can dodge almost instantly, and attack animations are kept short meaning that you can keep whacking your attack button and keep getting that fantastic audio-visual feedback. The pace of each stage is frantic, which feeds into the combat too, being some of the best 2D hack and slash gameplay I’ve experienced.Įach weapon feels powerful and lands with a satisfying crunch, swish or chank. It easily is the best in the genre to pick up and immediately start having a blast. ![]() This might be something explored in the DLC, but I don’t know yet, I’m probably going to pick it up though, this game slaps.Īll of this world building and progression is great, but how is the gameplay? Well, this is where Dead Cells truly shines. The grim surroundings here are given life the best they can be, however, it’d be awesome to see more biomes and perhaps more unique mechanics for each zone as they can all begin to feel a little samey after a while. This contrasts with the pixelated backdrops which scroll and scale in layers to add some real depth to the environments. However, look deeper and you’ll begin to notice that the character models are actually rendered in 3D. The art style of the game is a weird one to pin down, it looks like your typical pixel art at first glance. The animation of your player character is expressive, reminiscent of a teenager complete with air punches and double thumbs up. It’s a breath of fresh air and injects some humour into what could have easily been a depressing slog. For example, each time you visit a shop, your character sees a pile of dead bodies and exclaims “hmmmm, these look familiar… Oh”. The dialogue and story beats are delivered with tongue firmly in cheek. The whole title has a fantastic feeling of progression, and whilst it may feel easy at first, after finishing the game a couple of times, the challenge soon ramps up.ĭespite the grim surroundings and premise A shapeless being takes control of a host body to escape an island prison packed with failed experiments and twisted monstrosities, Dead Cells is surprisingly light-hearted. Upgrades bought with “cells” are permanent too, giving you more options in future attempts. Methods of traversal such as the ability to grow plants and reach previously inaccessible areas can help make rushing through early parts of the game a little smoother, this is what earned it the label of being “Metroidvania”, however, it really doesn’t feel that way. Thankfully there are some leniencies to help alleviate the frustration of a foiled adventure. Like with all rogue-likes, when you die in Dead Cells, you are booted right back to the start, the only way to get further is to get better. I think that is the main reason I was slow to pick up Dead Cells, and I’m such a dummy for holding out. Except for Hollow Knight of course, because Hollow Knight is the bomb. Now, as I have mentioned previously, Metroidvania isn’t a genre which usually gels well with me, the amount of backtracking and time spent looking at a map really puts me off. Yep, that is the best way to describe it. Dead Cells is a “rogue-like Metroidvania” title.
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