Blade Chimera comes with some serious pedigree. Developer Team Ladybug is known for its terrific Metroidvanias, although this is the first major release of theirs to be an original property. Their previous two games were also very short, so I was surprised to see this one take me a solid 9 hours. It would have been significantly longer had a specific convenient feature not been included, but I was pretty happy with the amount of content on offer. That combined with the excellent visuals, tight controls, and entertaining gameplay make this a Metroidvania fans won’t want to miss, even if it’s more linear than some of the greats.
The game puts players in control of Shin, a Venator for the Holy Union, the defenders of Japan against a demon threat in the 2060s. Three decades prior, the country (and world at large) became inundated with demons that put humanity on the brink. Shin was woken up from cryo a few years prior and is naturally missing his memory. After killing a strong demon, it turns into a green apparition named Lux who offers to join with and help him. The two of them set out to uncover the mystery of just what happened thirty years prior. The story is awfully familiar in a lot of ways, but the writing is pretty strong and it had me interested the whole way through.
Everything here is pixel art, but it’s one of the best-looking pixel games I’ve seen in recent memory. Sprites are fluidly animated and extremely detailed. Plus there’s a huge assortment of enemies. As far as Metroidvanias go, Blade Chimera does let you reach some new places via upgrades, but you really only get a few of these over the course of the game. You buy them via the skill tree and they’re mostly entirely optional, though. Instead you’re given a beacon to your next objective to progress the story. You can often explore other areas early, but the story moves forward in a fairly strict way. As such, the game is arguably not even really a Metroidvania, although it has enough of the characteristics of one to pass.
Shin controls in a fairly familiar way. You can move, jump, dodge, attack with a melee weapon, and shoot with a gun. You can have one of each equipped and you’ll naturally find and be able to purchase more as Blade Chimera goes on. Melee weapons consist of swords, greatswords, whips, and daggers. Yes, the whips function like in a Castlevania game, much to my delight. Guns are pistols, rifles, SMGs, shotguns, and a grenade launcher. The game isn’t packed with new weapons but I found them nicely spaced out. The more unique aspect of Shin’s arsenal comes down to his demon compatriot, Lux.
Lux typically takes the form of a sword that hovers at Shin’s back and by default can stab at enemies and plant herself in the ground or walls (which Shin can then climb on.) Once planted, she’s then recalled to you. Her abilities use magic power, which regenerates as you hit enemies. She can also be used to interact with objects by rewinding their time, allowing you to recall objects that were in a location in the past. This usually means you’ll use them as platforms, but there’s a variety of different uses that are often quite clever. I didn’t figure out how to use Lux’s special abilities until I’d already beaten the game, sadly, as I would have liked to have used them.
These abilities are unlocked via the skill tree and you’ll purchase them with points accrued by levelling up. The aforementioned movement abilities are unlocked this way, including a slide and double jump. Granted, Blade Chimera‘s difficulty is often on the low side, so it wasn’t that much of a problem for me to not use such a major part of the skillset. Early on, the skill tree allows you to buy a warp ability. This literally lets you warp to almost every spot on the map you’ve been and I do mean every. I thought it’d just be save points, but you can go almost anywhere at nearly any time.
Of course, this means that if you’re out exploring and you’re about to die, you can just warp to a save point, which restores your health and magic to full, and then warp right back. Not only does this make Blade Chimera much easier, it also makes it take multiple hours fewer than it would have otherwise. It was a curious choice, to be certain, and I’m not sure it was the right one. However, having it to quickly complete the games fair number of short side quests was indispensable and I might not have done most of them otherwise. Side quests unlock a ways into the game and can be accepted at save points.
They’re mostly of the “kill x number of enemies” or “find this one item in the highlighted area,” so they’re not all that compelling, but you get money from them. There’s even a chain of connected side quests with a bit of story, plus a few extra boss-esque enemies. Speaking of bosses, Blade Chimera has some very impressive ones. You can’t warp while fighting these and their difficulty was often on the low side. There are 56 green puzzle pieces to find while exploring the map that are used to open certain locked doors that guard new gear or useful items, and I found that the new gear kept trivialising a lot of enemies.
I have to say, the gameplay in Blade Chimera feels particularly terrific. Shin moves quickly and the controls are responsive and intuitive. The dodge grants a solid number of invincibility frames and both Shin’s and his enemy’s attacks feel weighty. Melee attacks are smooth and quick and ranged attacks are satisfying as well. Team Ladybug just really did a great job here. There were a couple of sections in the game that I didn’t care much for, though, where the gameplay changes quite a lot. One of these is a trial-and-error forced stealth section that I thought was weird. However, these are fairly brief and don’t cut into the pacing too much. I especially liked how there were hidden HP and MP ups to find, an obvious nod to Castlevania.
Blade Chimera is a hell of a game that fans of Team Ladybug’s past works will definitely want to check out. It’s got a decent amount of content, has great gameplay, and some truly wonderful pixel art to tie the package together. Anyone looking for a more non-linear experience might be disappointed, but this game delivers on most fronts.
Blade Chimera: With terrific gameplay and some mesmerizing pixel art, Blade Chimera offers up a very satisfying experience. – Andrew Farrell
More from Blade Chimera:
Blade Chimera pre-orders are up on the Nintendo eShop with a discount |
