- You often ask me on Twitter, on Facebook,
on YouTube comments, what games I'm currently playing
and right now, I'm in the middle of
playing one of the hardest games
I've ever played in my life and that is Cuphead.
Now Cuphead was announced a few years ago,
it was actually announced back in 2014,
and even at that time, they were already
working on the game for a couple of years.
I think it actually started being worked on in 2012
and it just came out
here in 2017
for the Xbox One and for PCs.
If you're unfamiliar, Cuphead has a
very unique visual style and audio style
as well quite honestly.
It looks similar to the cartoons
that are being played back in like the 30s and 40s
and it has that jazz big music feel
of that time as well all combined into one.
So basically, it's like you're going back in time
playing a cartoon video game
but also you're in video game hell because
it's impossible to beat anything
at least when you first start the game.
It looks nice and sweet but it's deceptive
because this game will kill you again
and again and again.
The most obvious point, as I said, to Cuphead
is the fact that it looks amazing.
It's the 1930s animation style, all watercolor backgrounds
and surreal, juddering, hand-drawn characters.
Somehow it manages to balance dozens of moving elements
and a slight rear projection blur without
ever feeling unreadable in its most frantic moments.
There's never been a game that looks like this
and there may never be a game that looks like this again
unless we see a Cuphead sequel.
Hopefully it doesn't take five years to get that out.
Every scene is a masterpiece.
It's a near unbelievable achievement and work of art.
Now as gorgeous as the game is, as I said,
it's also super hard.
It's equally hard as it is gorgeous
and as I said the game looks amazing
which means it's also amazingly difficult.
It's absolutely uncompromising in its difficulty
from the outset right away.
No level includes checkpoints, with the exception
of one matchup late in the game,
and there's no way to regain your health.
You get three hits per level,
if you get hit three times, you're done.
There's no checkpoint, you can't go back to a save spot,
you can't regenerate health by eating some sort of fruit
or chicken or whatever, none of that.
You get hit three times in the level, peace out.
Because of that, you could hit levels that take literally
hours to beat and the final boss is locked
until you beat every other level on regular difficulty.
There's a simple difficulty
and there's a regular difficulty
but the regular difficulty is super hard,
kill me every 10 seconds difficulty.
Now let me be clear, that's not a complaint.
Initially when you first start playing Cuphead,
it is a little frustrating until you realize that
this game isn't so much about just breezing through
as it is about meeting the challenge
and figuring out how to beat it,
it's also randomly generated.
Every level and every boss have random movements
so each time you play it's different.
It's not like you can go to a boss,
like you can in most games,
figure out the pattern of how the boss operates,
and then plan your attack based on that pattern.
The first time you face the boss, it may do one thing
but the second time you play,
it may do something totally different.
And you're gonna get thrown off,
you're gonna throw off your game
and that's what kinda makes the game fun.
The fact that you die so much actually adds to it
'cause it's super easy to jump back into the level again.
Once you die, you just reset and you keep going.
StudioMDHR clearly took great pains to evoking
that 1930s era aesthetic that
Cuphead lovingly pays tribute to
and it shows in every frame of the game.
Likewise, the game sounds just as incredible
with a big band jazzy score.
Even though the game's visuals are
constantly and widely different within each encounter,
the soundtrack matches it beat for beat
with music that pops with style
like the visuals pop with flare.
With the years of anticipation and delays,
it started becoming easy to write Cuphead off
as something that would be a flop.
And although Cuphead isn't perfect,
and as a gameplay experience
it has some room for improvement,
on a technical level and artistic level,
Cuphead is a stunning achievement
in both gaming and interactive art
and it's unlike anything I've ever played before
and it's probably unlike anything
you've ever played before either.
And quite honestly, some of the game's levels
had me on the edge of my seat and edge of my sanity
trying to beat them.
Cuphead is a two-player game
so you can play it by yourself
or you can play it with a friend locally
and you'd think by adding in a second player
that might make things a little more easier
but to the contrary, it makes the action on the screen
even more crazy and you have more things to monitor
and you have to make sure,
because it's so easy to die,
that you have your eye on your partner
because you can bring it back to life when they die
if they don't float away too quickly.
So you're looking at the enemies
and watching your partner as well.
For anyone interested in getting a taste of Cuphead
without facing almost guaranteed defeat,
like I said there are simpler versions
of every boss that you can fight
but you won't be able to access the final battle
unless you beat every standard boss on normal difficulty.
And the reality, you may as well stick with
the standard difficulty anyway
because Cuphead is relentless
no matter which mode you choose.
So just get used to those harder levels
because you don't wanna play through the whole game
on simple and then turn it up and then realize
that the game is way harder than you thought it was.
Cuphead has been a long time coming
and it's great to see that it lives up
to its initial promises.
It's beautiful to look at
and with a pitch perfect soundtrack,
it flawlessly captures the era
its developers so clearly revere.
It's also an intense action game that pulls no punches.
It could benefit from a few tweaks
and a two player co-op doesn't feel like
the valuable option you might imagine at first
but Cuphead remains a rare and unique game
that truly stands out.
Now I'm not a guy that likes to spoil games
so I'm not going into the story or
revealing all sorts of bosses or anything
other than the gameplay that you've seen during this video
but if the play style that I mention sounds like something
you'd be interested in, I do whole-heartedly
recommend Cuphead for you.
Now my question, have you played Cuphead?
Have you had any interest in playing Cuphead?
Let me know down in the comments below
I'll meet you there for further discussion
and if you have tips for your boy
on getting through the game a little easier,
let me know that as well.
If you enjoyed this one, feel free to drop a like
on this video and if you haven't done it already,
you click or tap on my face
when it appears we're at the bottom of the screen
in order to subscribe for free to the channel
so you don't miss any future videos.
Thanks so much for watching.
As always guys, I appreciate your support.
I'm Andru Edwards and I'll catch you in the next video.
(rock music)