Review - Titan Attacks!by Jon Evans
Format reviewed on PS3, PS4, Vita |
Developers; Puppygames
Publisher; Curve Studios Formats; PS3, PS4, Vita (cross-buy) Release Date 6th May (US), 7th May (EU) |
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At time of press I haven’t completed this game. I’ve been playing it continually since receiving the preview code, mainly on Vita, and am stuck on the last bloody level. I’m sitting at my computer writing this review before embargo is lifted and I can’t bloody finish it. It’s good though, It’s rum-and-raisin-ice-cream-stirred-into-an-ermine-lined-pint-glass-of-champagne-with-Scarlet-Johanson-swimming-around-in-it-curling-her-finger-at-me-with-a-‘come hither’-look good. I know it’s bad for me, but I want more, the dirty temptress…
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Titan Attacks has been beautifully ported across, as ever, by Curve Studios from the original desktop version made by puppygames onto all the Playstation Consoles. This is a great deal off the bat, with examples like Fez and Dead Nation being other games that let you buy once and install on the PS3, PS4 and Vita. The game immediately stands out as looking like a classic arcade shooter. ‘Retro’ has been the buzzword described by many reviewers, which is true. Don’t let this fool you though; Titan Attacks sneaks up on you and steals your heart and more importantly time. The colours and shapes blossom like drug-induced hallucinations until they explode over your screen in a calvacade of bloom and particle effects. Not only that, but it fully deserves the mantle of a ‘just one more level’ game, as it also involves deeper, more tactical gameplay making it standout amongst many Space Invaders Clones.
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And let’s get to the Elephant in the Room. Space Invaders. It is obviously inspired by the 80’s classic, and initially it can feel like a clunky and slower version of the arcade game. You don’t have any defensive blocks above that wear away as they are hit by enemy fire, nor do you have the ability to shoot continually in a large swathe of ammo. You can only fire once your previous round has either disappeared off the screen or has hit an object on the screen. It took me a few goes to realise how clever this is and how far it sets itself apart from Space Invaders. You are forced to think carefully about placement of your tank and timing of your shooting to guarantee kills. Miss a Titan and you are at its mercy until your laser round has flown upwards off the screen. Hit a Titan and you can instantly let off another shot wherever you want. The further up the screen the enemies are, the faster they move, the more careful you have to be with your timing.
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As you kill Titans, you earn cash and points. The points, as always, count towards a leaderboard that is ranked either by friends or globally. Lovely jubbly. The cash, however, is where the progression comes in. As you build up your banked cash, you can buy upgrades for your tank, and replenish your shields which get taken out by enemy fire and bombs. This is where you have to think carefully. Each subsequent level can vary greatly in terms of the waves of enemies that come at you. Building up a supply of upgrades is important, but also which ones you prioritise. For instance some enemies can come in large groups, dropping huge curtains of laser fire, but are very easy to take out with your main laser cannon. This is where you should stock up on shields to protect yourself as you sweep backwards and forwards taking them out. In other levels there are less enemies, but they are much harder to kill, and move around more rapidly, sometimes dropping ground mines. Here you want to prioritise a better cannon, with more powerful rounds and more ammo delivered in one go. As you can see, eventually the game becomes the frantic frag fest you were hoping for, but you shape and tailor your tank to suit your play style and to anticipate your enemies. Notice too that, as you buy upgrades, it becomes more expensive to upgrade further and so you have to carefully plan ahead and save your cash. You also get a challenge level where you have to shoot down quick flying saucers which zoom past at high speed. These demand even more skill and timing, but also pay-off with better rewards if you do well. It is worth getting good at these. They can turn an almost impossible boss battle into success.
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More importantly these upgrades only remain for as long as you are alive. Die and all your progress resets to the beginning of the level. As I play this, there are five levels, each set on a different planet in the solar system. Within each level are ‘waves’ which are further sub-levels of enemies attacking you. Reach the end of the zone you are in and you have a boss to beat. Once you beat this boss, your current state, upgrades, shields, money and points is saved in that exact state for the beginning of the next planet. This halfway house between a standard save system and something like the insta-kill system you see in Rogue-likes and XCOM games works really well. You are forced to decide between carrying on with what you have or going back and trying again to improve your set up.
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As you play you can take out the falling enemies that you have winged for extra skill points, build up your multiplier by avoiding damage, scoop up falling alien pilots for extra cash and destroy the random flying saucer at the top of the screen for an instant bonus such as a no-damage shield, super-duper laser, even more cash or more points. All of these have a risk attached to them as they all fall from above, forcing you to travel through the hail of destruction to catch them before they disappear. It makes for a very satisfying challenge which suitably ramps up as you progress. At times this can be very tricky, especially as some screens are quite dark and it’s hard to see some of the enemies against their background. This is only a minor thing, and it could be because I was playing the game in direct light on the Vita. I did feel that I was at a disadvantage at times by not playing in a darkened room.
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This also explains the shape of the screen. The area of play itself does not extend across the whole screen, but remains in the middle in an instagram-shaped square, as can be seen from the screenshots. Initially I thought this may be do do with the porting process, but it feels like it is more to do with a constriction of the gameplay. Enemies can drop mines which produce a blast radius of damage which remains on ground level for a short time, forcing you to stay to one side of the screen. A larger, wider screen would render these mines redundant, and so the size is obviously a design choice to balance the gameplay. Your tank is constantly in motion and the challenge seems spot on with this width. Due to the nature of the retro look of the game, the game looks almost exactly the same on both the PS3 or PS4. This does explain the cross-buy as there is no increase in quality that would demand a higher price tag (and I’d love to work out how developers set a price increase for next-gen games based on the increase in graphics quality). In fact the Vita, with it’s 960x544 resolution, 16 million colour screen is the best way to play Titan Attacks. The Vita, as it has no controller-lag, is always the best device for twitch reaction games like this.
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My only major criticism is that there is no cross-save. I’d love to be able to transfer my end of level save-states from my main consoles to the Vita and carry on again. Without this you are forced to choose the system you intend to play this on and stay there. More experienced players may be happy with playing it again from scratch in different systems, as the game is set up to be replayed, but it would have been nice to have the option to do it either way.
Titan Attacks is a simple and satisfying arcade ‘shmup’ that has a deeper, tactical element affording the player many play-throughs. Its intelligence lies in its upgrade system and well balanced difficulty that welcomes newcomers, but also challenges the more experienced player. If you have a Vita, it is another great title to add to the growing library of polished Indie games already on the handheld, but with the added bonus of using it on your main consoles. Titan Attacks is released as a cross-buy on all Playstation platforms on 6th May in the US and 7th May in Europe.
Titan Attacks is a simple and satisfying arcade ‘shmup’ that has a deeper, tactical element affording the player many play-throughs. Its intelligence lies in its upgrade system and well balanced difficulty that welcomes newcomers, but also challenges the more experienced player. If you have a Vita, it is another great title to add to the growing library of polished Indie games already on the handheld, but with the added bonus of using it on your main consoles. Titan Attacks is released as a cross-buy on all Playstation platforms on 6th May in the US and 7th May in Europe.
Wrap up
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Good - Quick, fast-paced action with well-balanced challenge. An enticing, tactical upgrade system that adds to replayability. Gorgeous nostalgic graphics with a modern slant.
Bad - Some darker levels can make discerning enemies challenging. No cross-save. |
4/5 |
Game provided by Curve
Images courtesy of puppygames
Images courtesy of puppygames
