From the creators of Jotun comes Sundered, a Metroidvania style game complete with roguelike
elements.
Take on the role of Eshe, as she fights her way through a Lovecraft inspired world, trying
to escape the darkness and to keep her sanity.
So, what did I think of Sundered?
Well... (sigh) it was OK.
I think the biggest problem I had with this game is that I just had too high an expectation
for it.
And for that I blame Jotun.
I loved Jotun, with its beautiful hand drawn art style, its imaginative world.
Epic set piece moments.
And to be fair, Sundered's got all of that too, it's just that these great moments are
spread out a little bit too thinly, with a lot of the time nothing too interesting going on.
I think that the thing to blame here is actually one of game's selling points.
And that is the mix of hand-crafted and procedural levels.
So on the world map you get to see all of the key rooms marked out, but in between these
rooms there are these are pale areas which are randomly generated as you go through them.
So the destination's always the same, but the journey's always different.
Which a neat idea, but the problem is that usually none of these areas are that interesting.
And they make up the bulk of the game.
So usually you're just going through the same set of repetitive platforming sections, that don't
have a lot going on and that repeat, a lot.
That's not to say though that they never have something interesting in them.
For example, at one point you're going through a lab that's filled with these enemy snipers,
turning the basic platforming into this exciting, nail biting dash, as you make your way for
the exit while trying to avoid enemy fire.
And of course, there's the enemy hordes that you come across and this is where things get
insane.
I was amazed by how many things they threw on the screen at once, trying to overwhelm
you, unless of course you're strong enough to take them on or quick enough to get away-
which is an option I often used.
Then of course, we have the bosses.
There's nine mini bosses to stumble across as well as the absolute highlight of the game,
just like in Jotun, the main bosses.
These fights really are best parts of the game.
Each of them is unique and huge.
I like the way that the camera draws right back to really give you a sense of the scale
of these things.
And they're not easy either, with each fight getting more and more intense as it goes on.
In fact, I think that Thunder Lotus are so good at boss fights, that I would love for
their next game to be something like Furi, where you just take on boss, after boss, after
boss- all of them awesomely designed and with the same great hand drawn style.
Because, honestly, they make some of the best enemy boss fights around.
Now, OK, onto the metroidvania style.
So as we all know, this usually involves certain areas of the map being blocked off until you
get some kind of new power to get past it.
There's nothing too groundbreaking here, with most of the new moves being pretty bland things
like double jumping, or a powerful smash to get through pink walls.
The gun that you get is a nice surprise, or should I say cannon, because this thing is
huge.
Plus it can also be used to power up generators which will open doors.
As you progress you get shards, which can be used to upgrade your character at a skill
tree.
Again, there's nothing too interesting here, with most of the points simply being an increase
to a certain stat like damage, or armour, or health.
It's a shame there wasn't something more unique to unlock.
However, I am glad that they weren't tempted to put in a Dark Souls mechanic, where if
you die, you drop your current shards, because this would have made you play too cautiously.
Instead, the biggest annoyance about dying, deep into a map, is that you may have a long
journey to get back to where you were.
But at least if you do die, you just spawn back at the skill tree, with all of your current
XP still intact.
So, every time you go out and collect shards you're making some kind progression towards
levelling up.
One thing I will say is that technically this game's got a lot of problems.
It crashed on me multiple times.
Plus the screen would often freeze for a brief second, which would be pretty off putting,
especially in the middle of a fight.
And the load times seemed pretty long, which is probably something to do with the world
getting randomly generated, again another reason I wish it was just a bog standard map.
I don't think that this was a bad game.
In fact I seem to like it the more and more I play it.
But it does have a lot of sections which just aren't that interesting and these are the
sections you're going to be playing over and over again.
And it's a shame, because if this game was just a little bit tighter, with each area
more cleverly designed rather than being just randomly generated, then it would have felt,
I guess, more fun.
There's plenty to see and do in Sundered, it's just that you've got to get through a
lot of mediocre to get there.
Anyway, those are my thoughts on the game, so let me know what you think in the comments
below.
Until next time, thanks for watching!