Do not let the witch and her pirate crew get you RATtled. Get it?
There is no such thing as a scarcity of 2D metroidvanias within the present indie house, a sentence I’m optimistic I’ve typed no less than 3 times earlier than this. For that reason, for those who’re going so as to add on to the pile, you should be sure you have some side of your sport that makes it stand out from the remaining, and whereas we’ve seen a big uptick in metroidvanias with hand-drawn artwork lately, it nonetheless tends to be sufficient to seize my consideration on the very least. Enter Curse of the Sea Rats, a sport that first got here into my view throughout certainly one of final yr’s Steam Festivals. The demo confirmed loads of promise: 4 playable characters, hand-drawn artwork paying homage to a 2D animated movie, a enjoyable pirate aesthetic, and many others. Nevertheless, the sport sadly doesn’t fairly stay as much as the promise it exhibits, and whereas it’s not a failure, it sadly comprises issues that maintain it again from attaining its true potential.
Curse of the Sea Rats begins on a British ship carrying a number of prisoners, together with our 4 important characters. When the ship crashes someplace on the Irish coast, the pirate witch Flora Burn takes the chance to rework all people on board right into a rat. She then escapes together with her crew, kidnapping the Admiral’s son on her means out. Determined to get his son again and break Flora’s curse, the Admiral affords a deal to those prisoners: he’ll set them free and strike down fees that they had in opposition to them in the event that they defeat the witch and return his son safely. The 4 agree and set off searching for the witch, studying of her energy supply: a medallion with a connection to historical magic. Nevertheless, this medallion is incomplete, with our four-prisoner staff having the lacking piece in hand. With a purpose to attain Flora Burn, the quartet should discover the island of their new rat kinds, partaking with Flora’s crew on the best way to interrupt the curse and take her medallion away.
You possibly can play as certainly one of 4 characters, every with their very own type of fight. David Douglas is an American revolutionary soldier armed with a cutlass, Buffalo Calf is a Cheyenne huntress making use of daggers for each shut and ranged preventing, Bussa is a fugitive slave from Barbados who fights utilizing his huge fists, and Akane Yamakawa is a Japanese warrior wielding a naginata. The place this solid differentiates itself is of their total moveset, with their common combos, parrying skills, air assaults, and magic being distinctive to every character. Sadly, that is actually the one factor completely different between them, as none of them have any type of traversal skills to themselves. Outdoors of fight, each character performs the identical, goes the identical pace, jumps the identical peak, and shares the identical total upgrades. Every character does have their very own ability tree, however utterly filling only one character’s ability tree is very easy and quick, and sometimes makes them so highly effective that there’s little incentive to ever change to a different one. The complete sport may be performed in native co-op with as much as 4 gamers, however that is probably the one means you’ll ever see any character aside from the one you instantly gravitate to and take by way of the entire sport.
Fight total feels tremendous in Sea Rats; hits really feel like they’ve impression, and blocking an enemy’s assault is often fairly satisfying. I personally gravitated in direction of Akane, because the longer attain of her naginata match finest with my private playstyle, as did her water-based magic. Bosses are effectively animated and distinctive sufficient from one another, with a few of them even referencing different video games (together with one that’s actually simply Dracula from Castlevania however a rat). The voice performing for many characters is a bit questionable total, however I personally discovered the cheesiness of the road reads so as to add to the appeal in the long run. Sadly what took away from the appeal was the multitude of bugs I skilled over the course of my playthrough. If I switched characters proper earlier than a cutscene, there would generally be an issue the place the improper voice would learn the traces. For instance at one level I talked to a bunch of drunk pirates as Akane, however as I had only recently converted from Douglas, it was his voice that learn the road in query. Additionally, for those who’re questioning whether or not or not the 4 characters have their very own dialogue in conditions like that, sadly they don’t, each character seems to be studying from the identical script for a lot of the sport.
One other bug I skilled was the sport forgetting I had acquired a list improve that was alleged to let me purchase a better variety of well being potions, due to this fact maintaining me on the base quantity for a big portion of the sport. This ultimately fastened itself, nevertheless it was annoying for the time it occurred. Most of the issues I bumped into have been or will quickly be patched in line with the builders, however sadly it was a tad too late to not paint my expertise no less than just a little bit. Total, Curse of the Sea Rats is a sport I feel has loads of potential, however the samey characters and bugs maintain it again from being what it looks like it actually might be. When you’re actually itching for a brand new metroidvania expertise, or simply actually like rats for some motive, you would positively do quite a bit worse than this one, however I sadly can not say I might suggest you sprint to the eshop as quick as you’ll be able to for it.