Laika: Aged Through Blood is a Crazy Gaming Casserole that Actually Works [Demo Preview]
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- เผยแพร่เมื่อ 7 ก.ย. 2024
- Laika: Aged Through Blood is a motorized twist on Metroidvania action with some really fresh pieces to it (i.e., vigilante dog riding a dirtbike). In this preview of the game's demo, I discuss how Laika's ability to combine different influences and styles pushes the player out of their comfort zone in a genre that has become perhaps a little too complacent with its framework.
#laikaagedthroughblood #metroidvania #indiegames
Like Metroidvanias with a unique twist? Here's another preview I did for Ebenezer and the Invisible World. It's not as polished as Laika, but you DO get to play as a reformed old curmudgeon who slaps the hell out of enemies with his walking cane, so... th-cam.com/video/p02l9HjUoI0/w-d-xo.html
Really looking forward to this game coming out, to be honest. Can't stop hearing "The Whisper" in my head sometimes.
Talk about a catchy jam.
Talk about a catchy jam.
Playing in the sun is so nice
2 weeks ago i just finnished the full game (100% steam achivments) and i wish i could forget this game just to experience it again and again. i never was so emotionally invested. the plot, atmosphere, rollercoaster of emotions. my heart broke when i saw the credits, "thats it?! finele?" BUT it's worth your time. get it. enjoy it and take ur time with Laika because you'll nener know when it ends.
The game play makes you feel so badass, rushing head first into a crowd of bird just to blow them to hell
I found the game mostly an exercise in constantly refocusing my eyes from screen edges back to center on my char so I could see how she was oriented before I landed or was hit. Rarely felt like death was due to anything but inability to read orientation of my char in my peripheral vision while simultaneously aiming or looking ahead. This was exacerbated by some critical design mistakes.
Not directionally color/shape contrasting the player char more was a big design mistake. You need to look at your char in middle of screen to orient yourself to not die, but also look out at edges of screen to see terrain coming & shoot enemies before they shoot you. This means either the muddy, brown/tan poorly color differentiated terrain is in your peripheral where it's hard to read or player char is in your peripheral where her white/red/grey symmetrical design makes it difficult to read her orientation without refocusing your eyes on her. The effects on your char of bullet impacts & blood make it even harder to tell which way you're oriented due to color/shape inconsistency & overlaid VFX sprites. When your char is all dark red from blood, it's impossible to tell which way she's facing in peripheral vision.
All of the clues which indicate the left/right direction of your character are tiny details on the sprite as well. Even the most prominent asymmetry, her red cloak, is a dark red the same color as the blood VFX, gets lost in them all the time & doesn't register well in peripheral vision anyway against the mostly brown/grey background. Difficult to tell which way you're facing if you lose track without refocusing on your character. This actually happens more than you'd think due to the back & forth level design & how often you end up rolling backwards or stopped. The 'turnaround' button also requires holding to fully turn, so sometimes at low speed you try to turn, but don't hold it quite long enough & end up not facing the direction you expected. Would've been much better to make facing left the left bumper and facing right the right bumper so you always can orient with confidence without having to check your character's facing by refocusing eyes on her.
Loved the demo, so I bought this as soon as it released. Absolutely loving it.
one thing i think is fantastic about this game, compared to other games that have you regularly going up against the same enemy placements again and again (like darksouls for instance) is that the games combat feels fantastic pretty much consistently, and regardless of WHAT you're fighting.
a lot of these games muck it up by having moment to moment combat not be repetetively satisfying, but in the demo i found myself regularly speeding through the same small sections of areas again and again just honing my skills because it always felt incredibly satisfying ramping off of terrain, blocking bullets, slamming rounds into enemies mid flip reloading just as i run out, parrying incoming attacks rinse repeat.
i was never too bothered when i died because i was always having fun killing enemies, as opposed to other games that have frequent death and respawning enemies where it becomes a tedious chore because areas between respawn points are both lengthy as well as the combat itself being lengthy, and cruicially, with health being a valuable resource in these kinds of games, unlike laika in where its simply a one hit KO, there's no stress in worrying about wasting resources, so long as you dont die repeatedly, you can just kind of enjoy killing enemies even if you die... this does wonders at keeping me playing for long stretches as you never really feel like you're "losing" progress
I had never heard of this game before watching this video. Great job! I'm thinking of picking it up now with how cool it looks!
Definitely gonna check out this game, great video
Ok, the full game recently came out and i already finished the story, gotta say it has awesome gameplay and soundtrack but GAWD it keeps getting darker, and the ending is so good and sad at the same time i love and hate it
Same. The ending KILLS
loved how brutal and unforgiving (and fun) the demo was
Very nice video, this game looks really cool
she a coyote
Must not have ever played Free Rider.
hehe. nyxing.
anyway yeah Laika is an easy all time favorite of mine despite being super recent, the full game meshes everything together just as well as the demo if not dramatically better - and the story is *so* well-done, start to finish, and the sidequests are so incredibly well-written as well. it's not a flawless game - looking at you, boss fights - but start to finish, it's yet another testament to how formulaic success is lame and synthesis from various influences to support vital central themes is a path to a truly great game.