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hyper light drifter 🎮

27 Apr 2016

Having now dabbled in the Souls series I can say with certainty that I am a masochist.

Hyper Light Drifter appeared on my Steam queue as a game it thought I would like (as Steam does). After reading the reviews and watching a couple of the videos, I was sold. 30 minutes later I was hooked.

‘okay, i’ll try one more time then i’m going to bed’

Hyper Light Drifter is a game about… well… I don’t really know. The only backstory you get is from the odd cutscene which is backed by the game’s incredible soundtrack. The cutscenes are not spoken. There are no subtitles. The only ‘language’ is the odd grunt from NPCs. So far all I can tell is the PC has some sort of illness that makes him periodically cough up blood, and some friendly fella took him to a central city. From this central city you are free to tackle the game in any direction you like. From what I have begun to gather from the game the objective is to dungeon crawl four areas which piece together four… things. These things seem to be the focal point of the game. I have encountered a couple of NPCs who have tried to distract me with what looks like optional boss rooms, but I’m not too sure yet (I’m only 30-40% through the game).

The game’s central mechanic revolves around timing. This game is fucking hard. You are given 5 hit points (which I am yet to find a way to increase), and the game is lightly littered with HP boosters (which get you from any health to max). But it’s not about hit points or healing–it’s about getting it fucking right.

The PC has three real moves (more if you collect the games rare ‘currency’). A hack/slash, a gun which recharges bullets from hacking/slashing and your bread and butter: a dash which can be used three times in quick succession. Each game area usually has an exploration area, followed by some warm up creatures unique to that area. Then there is a ‘boss room’ which throws everything at you at once. After a succession of deaths you slowly learn the area’s pattern, you change your style, you become more patient. You become a ninja. This game does not allow a simple -run in hack slash spam A- approach, in fact, it punishes it; and when you finally get that checkpoint and quadrant, holy fuck does it feel rewarding.

you could legit gfycat any scene in this game

This game is downright beautiful. It’s ambiance is created by the amazing backdrop and colours, combined with it’s sombre soundtrack, which slowly builds up from the melodic piano in the safe habour central city up to the rhythmic dungeon crawling soundtrack (which really gets me in the zone). Occasionally the game feels fairly wtf, particularly with it’s non-language cryptic backstory and random blood-coughing moments, but on the whole Hyper Light Drifter feels like a game that should cost more than it’s £15.99 price tag.