I’d like to think that
I’ve got a pretty good handle on the gaming canon, but there many, many, many
titles that are lost on me. And it’s not
just titles, either; there’s a pretty strong argument to be made that I’ve got
no experience in entire genres. Case in point: shmups. I think that the first one I ever really
played was Ikaruga…the one on the
Xbox 360. I suppose in a sense
you could say that Sin and Punishment:
Star Successor counts, but that just came out a couple of years ago. It really says a lot about me when the first
time I see notable shmups like Gradius is
through an episode of Game Grumps.
So on the subject of Resogun, I can’t say that I had any
extreme interest in it. I don’t have any
attachment to shmups, so it’s only natural that I don’t go out of my way to
play one for myself. Little wonder,
then, that a copy of it has been sitting inside my PS4, largely untouched by me
and my brother. But a couple of weeks
back, I gave it a shot.
What did I think of
it? Well…
Okay, maybe not in
those exact terms. But yeah, it’s good. But in order to talk about it, you have to
understand where I’m coming from on this.
Scary as it may be, you need to see what’s going on in my head. So let’s go.
And be sure to watch your step.
Let’s start with the
basic setup. You are -- as these things
tend to go, I think -- an ace pilot making your way through futuristic
cities. (The aesthetic reminds me a lot
of Transistor, which I approve of,
though I’m iffy about being able to make the comparison.) Geometric enemies will charge and fire at you
from both sides, forcing you to survive as best you can. The twists on the shmup formula, as I
understand it, come in three flavors.
One: instead of moving on a
scrolling path from left to right/bottom to top, you move through a 2D plane
that wraps around to make a cylindrical “arena” of sorts. Two:
because of that arena, it’s not necessarily about making it through the level;
it’s about surviving waves -- or “Phases”, as the game calls them -- so you can
earn the right to make the stage’s boss appear.
Three: there’s a massive
wrinkle in the combat with the mission objective given each time you start a
stage.
SAVE THE LAST HUMANS.
As someone who read all
of NO articles on the game prior to release, that came as a surprise to
me. I mean, let’s be real: shmups are
hard enough just by way of them asking you to survive hordes of space invaders,
right? Why complicate the formula? But as the game started in earnest, I had no
time to ponder such questions. I just
had to “save the last humans”, so I went all in to try and do that amidst the
alien hordes.
You’ve got a decent
suite of tools at your disposal. You use
the right stick to shoot left or right (not up or down, or in any other
direction), so you can cover both sides of your ship. You’ll pretty much need to by the end of the
first minute; setting aside the fact that things can get pretty hairy, your
ship can only take one hit before it explodes in a burst of pixilated
flame. Luckily, you’ve got tools to
counteract that. Use L1 and you can boost
across the stage -- but it also acts as your dodge button, even if it’s got a
notable recharge time.
Pull R2, and you
can launch a screen-clearing bomb…well, it’s more of a two-pronged shockwave,
but it has the same effect. The R1
button, meanwhile, is your Overdrive attack; if you’ve got the meter charged,
you can slow time to a crawl and unleash a torrent of energy that temporarily
replaces your standard shot. In a
nutshell, you have pretty much everything you need to clear a phase; in that
sense, Resogun kind of reminds me of
a character action game like Metal Gear
Rising or The Wonderful 101;
enemies campaign to make sure you have a bad time, but judicious use of your
skill set will see you through any offense.
That’s something to appreciate.
And yet…at first, I
wasn’t really feeling the game.
Hard to believe considering all of that, right? But hear me out on this.
There’s a lot of stuff
you have to pay attention to in Resogun,
more so than the standard character action game. It leads to sensory overload at the outset
(or throughout a session with it, if you’re not the sort of gamer adjusted to
an assault from every angle). More
specifically, it led to me being confused in all the wrong ways; the game --
and the PS4 controller -- will exclaim things like “KEEPERS DETECTED” and
“MULTIPLIER UP” regularly.
Multipliers I can
understand, but on my first session I asked “Wait, what’s a Keeper?” I didn’t get an answer for a while, because I
ended up avoiding and often completely missing them as they made their trek
off-screen. As it turns out, the game
works like this: Keepers appear at certain points in a stage, as signaled by
their green auras. Shoot them dead, and
you free one of the humans caged up. If
you fail, then the human is lost. But
even if you succeed, you still have to physically fly your ship over to the
human that landed on the ground, pick them up, and cart them over to a
transporter without dying to save them.
Simple enough…though at first, it wasn’t clear just where these freed
humans were amidst the virtual storm on-screen.
The “save the last
humans” element creates a wrinkle in the gameplay, but even now I’m not 100%
sold on the mechanic. Setting aside the
fact that it fuses a shmup with impromptu escort missions, sometimes it seems
like they’re more trouble than they’re worth.
Sure, saving them gives you points, power-ups, or even extra lives, but
you’re putting yourself at extreme risk by trying to play savior.
And failing to save
them threatens to be way too easy; invaders can still abduct and/or kill them,
and if you’re reckless with your bombs, they’ll get wrecked in kind. Much to my horror, I found that while trying
to save a human scrambling across the ground, you can actually shoot them…which
means that if you’re getting rid of a grounded foe and one of your lasers
passes through as they explode, you can hit the human. And send them tumbling
off the level to their doom.
Not surprisingly, I
heard the line “HUMAN LOST” a lot more often than I would have preferred.
I’m also not too keen
on the points aspect. Yeah, sure, it’s practically
fused to the genre (and arcade games, no question), and this is coming more
from a personal place than an objective one, but…well, I can’t say I see the
point. Yeah, getting a high score and
uploading it to PSN is something that can add some staying power and give
players something to aspire towards, but I would have thought that playing and
enjoying the game was its own reward. It
wouldn’t be so bad if it was just an out of the way thing, but the game goes
out of its way to push points as the gospel.
Example: activating Overdrive is, according to the game, something I
should use when there are tons of enemies on-screen so I can get lots of
points. And my response to that is “No,
no it isn’t.” I use Overdrive to save my
ass. I don’t care about points, because
I’m likely to get a healthy amount as long as I, you know, don’t die.
Points aren’t a feature
that matter to me, but the game does its best to make them matter -- much to my
dismay. What you get from saving humans
is random; you can get things like shields, bombs, or lives, but it’s just as
likely -- maybe more -- for you to get points and nothing else. Given how frenzied and difficult the game can
be, then why would that ever be a reward I’d want? I mean, I’m getting points along with each
successful rescue, aren’t I? How are
extra points going to help me survive -- especially since, as far as I can
tell, getting more points doesn’t give
you an extra life? If the game’s trying
to be like the arcade games of old, then it seems like a strange omission.
If it sounds like I’m
dumping hate on the game, let me say right now that my complaints don’t lower
the game’s standing or overall quality in my eyes. It really is fantastic. I wouldn’t say it’s a game that justifies the
purchase of a PS4, considering that A) it’s not quite a revolutionary step
forward, B) it could have appeared on the PS3, graphics aside, and C) much like
Infamous: Second Son, I suspect Resogun could have been just as easily
called Particle Effects: The Game
considering how lavish the level-clear effects can get. But I’ll gladly play this game again over Second Son and Watch Dogs. And indeed, I
already have.
At first I wasn’t
really feeling Resogun. But shortly after I started -- likely before
I even reached the second stage -- I started to feel it. After a certain point, everything started to
click; one moment of realization after another led me to blend all the
individual systems together, and to accept the game as a whole instead of just
trying (and failing) to reconcile its parts.
To put it simply, I got lost in the flow.
And when that happened,
the game turned into something very close to magical.
Like I said, you have
all the tools you need to survive, and succeed as well. It’s just a matter of using them when the
time is right. And once you do -- once
you figure out the timing, and the way those mechanics were meant to be used --
then what starts out as a seemingly-simple shmup turns into something
more. That in itself is praiseworthy,
but it goes further than that. See, the
reason why you learn how to use those mechanics is because there’s a need to
learn, and a need to use them. The
game’s difficulty is something you’re bound to feel, whether it’s from the
outset or the murderfest that is Stage 5.
The challenge creates tension; you’re always on the edge, given that one
hit -- one moment of inattention -- can make you go down in flames.
I know that earlier in
the post I gave the “save the last humans” mechanic some guff (because an
unfortunate side effect is that the CPU voice keeps on babbling), but in the
grand scheme of things it not only works, but I’m actually thankful it’s in the
game. Setting aside the fact that it
feels great to actually be a genuine force of good in a video game again, it
adds a layer of depth -- a self-imposed challenge, as well as a test of your
morality without adding a full-on Karma system.
Are you willing to drop everything and blast past walls of enemies just
to save one human on the other side of the map?
Or will you prioritize your safety at the cost of the power-ups they
offer you, as well as a shot at end-of-level bonuses? If you decide to save them, you get more than
just bonuses; you get to feel the pressure of knowing that there are people
that are counting on you. And if you ask
me, managing to save every human in a stage is its own reward.
It’s strange for me to
think of it in such terms, but I really can’t think of anything else: as it
stands, I consider Resogun to be one
of the best PS4 games to date.
That’s…kind of troubling, considering that it was a free download for PS
Plus users. But it comes together a lot
better than a lot of other games released so far. It offers up something more, even if it is in
a distinctly-smaller package.
The visuals are
good. The gameplay is on-point. The lasting appeal is in full force, whether
you’re chasing a high score or just looking to clear the hardest stages the
games have to offer (thank God for infinite continues). The music is damn near infectious, to the
point where I suspect the
Stage 2 theme is what made me get so entranced by the game at large. All in all, there’s a lot to love.
But that just
highlights a bigger problem at hand.
Speaking personally,
I’m at odds with Resogun. You know me; I’m a guy who thinks games can
have (and have had) good stories, and they should aspire to include them more
regularly. Likewise, I think that games
across the board should work to reach their full potential, no matter the
front; that is, the days when we were limited by technology -- by hulking
arcade cabinets -- have long since passed, and we have the chance to both reach
for and ask for an approach on endless possibilities. But here I am, saying that what’s effectively
an arcade game is the best the PS4’s got to offer so far. Is that something to be excited about, or
concerned about?
These days, it’s
getting harder and harder to divorce the creative side of the industry (of
games, and movies, and more) from the business side. The latter has started to seriously affect the former in the case
of games, but to what end? What does it
say about the industry when games that should be the biggest and best we’ve
ever gotten actually act like they’re stepping backward, and regressing to
levels of quality seen at the start of the last
generation? What does it say about
others -- about me -- when I’m more excited to play a space shooter than the
copy of Killzone: Shadow Fall that my
friend’s left in my care for weeks now?
And again, I have to
lament the ass-backwards nature of the industry. The small stuff -- whether it’s by smaller
companies, whether it’s a downloadable release, or whether it’s one of the
increasingly-praiseworthy indie brand -- has consistently shown quality. It’s probably no stretch to say that the
quality has gotten even better. They’re
showing the growth and skill and innovation that gamers are looking for…so why
aren’t they center-stage instead of the big-budget releases? If Resogun
(or something like it) had on
average the same resources as, say, Uncharted
4, then what would that mean for the industry?
Well, in all fairness,
it could run the risk of turning a straightforward game into a bloated
mess. Absolute power absolutely
corrupts, and all that. Smart use of
resources can make for an awesome product (see: BioShock Infinite), but the lack
of it can bring out the best in a creator.
That’s a given. But even if the
industry and the relationships therein are -- to some extent -- fine as they
are, there’s still one thing on my mind.
It’s something that’s been brought up by others elsewhere, Jim Sterling
well among them.
What happened to all
the games in the middle ground?
I know they’re still
out there -- there’s a One Piece game
due out pretty soon, for one -- but this still feels like a point of
concern. Like, maybe I’m reaching on
this, but shouldn’t there be more games between indie/downloadable titles and
bank-busting triple-A releases? Why does
it seem like entire genres have evaporated -- called “obsolete” or “unprofitable”
by company executives (survival horror comes to mind, and Squeenix has only
just realized that they need to make quality JRPGs again after Bravery Default), but no small number of
downloadable titles have proven that there’s a demand? When did the gulf get this large? How did things get this bad?
Maybe this generation
would be in better shape at its outset if the gulf wasn’t so huge. As
Jim Sterling once argued in a Jimquisition video or two, there need to be
smaller releases between the big stuff so that gamers get some use from their
spiffy new consoles. And speaking from
an artistic standpoint, it’s the chance to explore new ideas and such without
having to risk a hundred million billion dollars. There are niches that people will support,
and itches that need to be scratched -- so why not tend to them? How much longer are we going to be at the
mercy of an industry with so much potential, but seems almost adamant in
getting it wrong? And how long is it
going to be before a big crash forces change?
Valid questions, I’d
wager. But on the other hand…
I’m pretty freaking
glad that a game like Resogun exists,
no matter its faults, and regardless of its “size”. It’s unique, it’s challenging, it’s
rewarding, it’s stylish, and most of all, it’s fun. It’s true that it does cast a negative light
on its competitors and the industry in general, but individual titles like this
mean something. They’re as much a part
of the gaming canon as any other. I
can’t help but pray for the day that a smaller title gets the respect -- or at
least numbers -- of the average Call of
Duty release, but until then, being able to point to a single release and
say “This. Do more of this” is something
that puts a smile on my face.
Screw the
industry. Resogun’s a hell of a game,
and I want to play it again.
Among other awesome
things.
YEAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAH!
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