A game that's surprisingly thematically deep game with clear care
taken on artwork, just a shame it plays like wet garbage being carried by a Alzheimer's
patient.
Price:
£3.99 / $4.99 on Steam
Reviewed on: Laptop 1
Review:
So Mastema Out of Hell is a tough game to talk about and review because on one hand quite a lot of it feels well done and to talk about the thematic elements that are worth celebrating would require spoiling some major plot points so all I will say is what happens that's not normal in the last level of the game does make some really nice sense and is a sort of foreshadowing for the ending.The Basic story is you end up in hell with no memory of who you are or what happened other than remembering something about fire. After an angel attacks hell it's killed by one of the demons that guard hell but the angel drops it's weapon when it's killed and the demon ignores it. You choose to grab the weapon and use it to try and fight out way out of hell. That's your motivation for the game.
Now before I rip into the game I'd like to go over what I feel it does really well other than the thematic elements related directly to plot points. The art in the game is rather nice for the most part, the background and style of the areas you go to are quite unique and are strikingly different in aesthetic.
The enemy designs are also quite varied with a far variety of mechanics associated with them, as an example one enemy takes a lot of hits from behind but only 1 hit to kill head on, other enemies can shoot projectiles at you and some swing a sword when you're close. A few do just walk about and then stop but considering the variety of enemies and mechanics on how the fact somehow even these feel varied, moving at different speeds and stopping more or less frequently does make them feel different beyond merely their look.
I can also point to boss aesthetics as a strong point of the game along with the environmental aesthetics each very much making different areas look distinct.
I have to give additional credit to the design of the health system too where your character looks more torn apart the more damage you take giving you 4 hits before death but displayed in such a visual manner.
I'd also like to say that the variety of special moves is very nice to see and prevents stagnation as you'll likely use a number of different one throughout your playthrough.
It's also very appreciated by me that the game has branching paths, it almost reminds me of something like the old Star Fox game only with a Super Ghouls and Ghosts make over when seeing the map screen and the alternative routes.
All this positive stuff however is hugely undermined by ill thought out
gameplay decisions and clunky, sometimes even broken mechanics alongside a game
that relies a lot on trial and error.
Lets start with the most basic and likely the first thing you'll run into. You can't attack enemies unless you find a sword pick up. If you die you lose the sword pick up and have to find another. Sword picks up are really rare at most 1 per level (which do respawn after you die) however some levels have 0 sword picks up and you might end up with 2 or more levels in a row without a sword pick up. This means rather than fighting enemies you now have to avoid then, this turns them into yet more obstacles to try and get past often by jumping over or running past or under them. I should note it is possible to beat levels without having the sword (except boss levels) however the difficulty increases dramatically without a sword.
Lets start with the most basic and likely the first thing you'll run into. You can't attack enemies unless you find a sword pick up. If you die you lose the sword pick up and have to find another. Sword picks up are really rare at most 1 per level (which do respawn after you die) however some levels have 0 sword picks up and you might end up with 2 or more levels in a row without a sword pick up. This means rather than fighting enemies you now have to avoid then, this turns them into yet more obstacles to try and get past often by jumping over or running past or under them. I should note it is possible to beat levels without having the sword (except boss levels) however the difficulty increases dramatically without a sword.
Not being able to get a sword wouldn't be so bad as you can pick up single use special moves. These range from summoning giant monstrous fire demons who sweep across the screen either horizontally or vertically (depending on the pick up). Others include a tornado of fire, a fireball that circles round you and of course the good old projectile style fireball. The problem being to get most of these pick ups you have to smash objects in the level. To smash object in a level you either need to hit them with a special move or hit the with a sword attack. So to get the item you can use to kill enemies without a sword you either have to have a sword or use a single use special to try and get another one......... seems like a bit of a game design issue there.
The bosses while well design are mechanically fairly dull. Each boss has about 2-3 moves and often follow a fairly set pattern with no real deviance from it. This means once you've figured out a bosses pattern and how to deal with each of its moves it's simply a matter of a battle of endurance to see how long you can keep dodging attacks / damage while dealing damage yourself rather than anything else. The final boss I managed to beat after about 2-3 deaths and using 0 continues because by that point I'd figured out all I had to do was learn the pattern and learn how and when to go in and attack and the rest of the time I've be fine. I will admit other bosses did take multiple continues worth of lives to learn and beat though sometimes due to the subtlety of how they telegraphed their next move and the short time to react along with often quite precise timing to dodge the attacks.
Another problem is the plat forming mechanics themselves. There's a weird issue where if you're too close to the edge of a ledge you're trying to jump up to then you just can't.
In the footage I was pressing to the left and jumping and as you can see I can't get up unless I take a step or two back from right up against the ledge I'm trying to jump up. It's a weird issue. Also the jumping often requires pixel precision or close to it to make some of the jumps without falling down a pit and losing a life instantly or hitting into one of the hazards in a level and taking damage.
The pixel precise jumping however isn't helped by the fact sometimes the controls just seem to not respond as though they've forgotten what they're meant to do (see the Alzheimer's patient comment wasn't just me being vulgar). It's rare enough that I initially just put it down to me not pressing the button quick enough or random error due to my laptop, until I checked the games reviews on Steam an found plenty of other people complaining about the same issue of controls being somewhat unresponsive. I was still dubious until all these issues came to a head in one area.
The ice area. Holy crap is this bad. You can only stop by running into a solid
wall otherwise you're constantly moving in one direction or another which means
you need to do a series of well timed fast and precise jumps in a row sometimes
changing directed mid air to bait down icicles that drop from the ceiling. The
ice area and ice levels are hell, luckily they're one of the levels that aren't
mandatory as you have the option to take a different route. My advice is take
the other route no matter how bad it is it can't be as bad as the Ice area
(though as I have no inclination to go back and try it myself I'm only able to
speculate that).
The next thing is the game is awful at explaining new mechanics to the player. Some stuff is platforming 101, the different coloured platforms crumble and sometimes you need to hit a switch or get a key to open certain paths. Other stuff though it's trial and error: In the desert level you can actually jump on the sand and as long as you don't sink too low and jump to stop yourself sinking you can walk on said sand, the thing is the sand is just where you'd normally see instant death pits or pools of acid or other nasty stuff you wouldn't know you can go on the sand without trial and error. Another example comes in the final level where you come across a sort or witch on a pillar shooting energy webs out, next to her is a jump and after failing it multiple times and dying I started to wonder if it was possible. However when I jumped and got my timing wrong she hit me with a energy web. I thought I'd screwed up but to my surprise I took no damage and the energy web carried me across the gap, oh and that mechanic is only used once in the whole game. Another level sees you having to keep jumping as a platform sinks to stop it sinking too far before it reaches the end of its path, the game never tells you this. The final example I'll give of the game just not explaining mechanics was a section where you're being blown backwards and having to fight against a strong wind while dodging projectiles all going towards a seemingly simple looking jump. The problem is despite 20 minutes of trying I couldn't make the jump even when I thought I was near pixel perfect. I was ready to give up in despair when just I decided maybe there was a switch to turn off the wind that I was missing. I went back and then this happened.
The next thing is the game is awful at explaining new mechanics to the player. Some stuff is platforming 101, the different coloured platforms crumble and sometimes you need to hit a switch or get a key to open certain paths. Other stuff though it's trial and error: In the desert level you can actually jump on the sand and as long as you don't sink too low and jump to stop yourself sinking you can walk on said sand, the thing is the sand is just where you'd normally see instant death pits or pools of acid or other nasty stuff you wouldn't know you can go on the sand without trial and error. Another example comes in the final level where you come across a sort or witch on a pillar shooting energy webs out, next to her is a jump and after failing it multiple times and dying I started to wonder if it was possible. However when I jumped and got my timing wrong she hit me with a energy web. I thought I'd screwed up but to my surprise I took no damage and the energy web carried me across the gap, oh and that mechanic is only used once in the whole game. Another level sees you having to keep jumping as a platform sinks to stop it sinking too far before it reaches the end of its path, the game never tells you this. The final example I'll give of the game just not explaining mechanics was a section where you're being blown backwards and having to fight against a strong wind while dodging projectiles all going towards a seemingly simple looking jump. The problem is despite 20 minutes of trying I couldn't make the jump even when I thought I was near pixel perfect. I was ready to give up in despair when just I decided maybe there was a switch to turn off the wind that I was missing. I went back and then this happened.
I was able to pick up a statue head and it weighs you down so the wind doesn't push you back, this makes it possible to finally make the jump. The game never tells you this and introduces mechanics like this very much in a trial and error way requiring you to discover the mechanic often by accident.
Some other minor annoyances
Collecting 100 of the Gems (which turn into skull and back to gems) grants you an extra life, in later level this becomes fairly pointless a lot of the time due to the instant death pits and tricky platforming as when you die you lose all the gems.
There is no options menu as such. You can turn the CRT effect of the game ON or OFF but only when you start the game up so to change it you need to close the game and re-open it.
The lack of an options menu also means no rebindable controls (this won't be a big issues for most people but the option is nice to have). It also means no list of the controls, the only list of controls is when you start a new game.
While I quite like most of the art I do question the larger art of the character you play as because is that a leotard? It looks odd in a comical way and not really in keeping with the hellish style of the game.
Verdict:
A somewhat ambitious title with rather surprisingly strong thematic elements and art style / art work that fails once it comes to gameplay and mechanical execution which ultimately drags the score down.It took me 3 hours to beat the game it's asking ~£4 and at least an hour of that 3 was me failing over and over due to failing near pixel perfect jumps and poorly planned out mechanics making the game much harder. I paid far less than the ~£4 asking price but I score games based on the standard price. As is while I think people looking into video game thematic elements will get a lot out of looking at aspects of this title I think anyone going in for gameplay will be disappointed and the thematic elements really aren't enough to overcome this huge black mark on the title.
Composite Score:
Overall Score:
And remember volcano Yoga may sound all fun and games but you might end up like this guy too
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