👹⚔️ Hellpoint | Review | PS4 | 7/10 | "Did I Mention This Game Was Challenging?" 👹⚔️ @CradleGames #IndieGames #GameDev

I will try to write this review without mentioning and drawing the obvious comparisons, to Dark Souls. 

I am better than that, aren’t I?

Let’s go!

The game opens with a spacecraft pushing out the fully-grown protagonist in a creepy water birth way. This nameless offspring is Spawn, or as my 5-year-old daughter who just walked into my gaming room just called him, Lava Man! #dadoftheyear

Lava Man is a skinless humanoid that resembles Uncle Frank from Hellraiser and I am on the edge of my couch for the horrors that await! 

I am immediately struck by the vast architecture and I’m in awe of the graphics. The space station is outstanding and made practically perfect by its imperfections. It is impressive. The whole experience drips in its intoxicating sci-fi background and you cannot help but stop and take a moment to breathe it all in. The ambient soundtrack will have you thinking of the movie, Blade Runner.  
 
What do you mean, “you’ve never seen Blade Runner?!” 
 
Spawn is stranded on the abandoned space station, Irid Novo, City of the Stars and its main objective and dark soul purpose is to explore and investigate the mystery behind what the smeg happened! Spending the entire mission being tormented by the malicious and outright nasty creatures.  
 
Irid’s position in relation to a black hole affects the strength of the enemies, God help me if someone stops paying the leccy bill! Thankfully, this setting is optional and can be turned on at the Breaches (savepoints) and it is pretty, pretty, pretty useful and can be used to your advantage as the creatures spew out better loot (Axions) when killed. 

The game is about strategy and sacrifice, or at least it is when I am playing it. The game runs at a souls like pace that will appeal to fans of the genre and is as equally as challenging. You simply cannot attack this game in a gung-ho fashion, you have to plan almost every move and take out the “weak” ones first and pray to God that you are not cornered and ganged up on, because Sir, you are D.E.A.D!

You would be mistaken to think that death is the end, it is not! When you pay the piper, your relentless ghost will come back to hunt you down and boy are they tough.  

It is like battling a PvP of yourself and the phrase battling your own demons never rang so true. My soulless corpse did teach me a few new moves, so it is not all bad.
 

“Echoes of their former selves, but these were just the nerve twitches of a dead thing. Nothing remained but a shell covered and filled with darkness.” –Alan Wake

 
The Combat is fluid and satisfying with both light and heavy attacks equipped in your arsenal and Arsène Wenger would be happy with the plethora of weapons available for modification and crafting by using the dead souls of monsters to pimp up your humanoid. 
 
Stamina is zapped by using the valuable dodge mechanism and the added indispensable jump button which is replenished when you stop expelling it while cowering in the corner or being the bigger humanoid and simply legging it. 

There is no shame in running away, and this gut grid of a game will on occasion demand it. Thankfully, your health is restored by jabbing a syringe into your neck, which is unfortunately limited, yet most satisfying.  

You will notice that I broke my word and did, in fact, reference Dark Souls.  It’s not that I have a hard-on for that game, it’s just the comparison is unavoidable. Think Dark Souls set in the Dead Space environment where you will scream and everyone will hear you! 
 
I think gamers will be a little frustrated with the loading times between respawn, the 20-second loading times when you die are a curse, but they are also a blessing in disguise for a much need breather. 

Also, if/when you die, you respawn to the last breach point which is seemingly always a light year away and the enemies are on a timer, with no pause button, so if you do go and get that much-needed drink, they just regenerate and are ready to give you a fresh kicking!

Happy Groundhog Day!

Did I mention this game was challenging? 
 
This was never really my type of game and I have never been a fan of the genre due to my lack of patience. If it wasn’t for this review, I would have turned this game off within the first twenty minutes, but I am so glad I didn’t!

Welcome to HELL...point.

Review By: Co-op Chris