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Ever heard of Journey, from 2012? It's this game where you walk to this mountain in the distance, and like the name suggests, the emphasis is on the journey, not the destination. One of that game's major driving points is something called "seamless multiplayer"- where other players just show up in your world. They just appear over the horizon, and play with you. Not a bad idea, right? Well, combine that with a beautiful, (kinda) low-poly open-world with combat ripped straight from Dark Souls, and you have this nice-looking upcoming game: Ashen. Now, at the time of writing this, I had only found out about this game two days ago. But since then, I've been hooked. It has all the things I love- Unique, fun mechanics, nice, simple art that focuses on beautiful environments, exciting and fun combat, an open world, an interesting story, the list goes on and on. The game seems amazing, and it's slated for a 2018 release. Some of the new mechanics seemed to have changed over the years. It was first announced sometime during 2015, and there, the multiplayer seems to be straight out of Journey. Fast forward to a developer interview during E3 2018, the mechanic seems to have changed to where other players role-play the npc's. I'm a big fan of D&D and other tabletop games like it, so this seems genius. But I'm still hesitant. It's gonna be pretty difficult to pull of this ambitious mechanic, and if it crashes and burns, we might never see it in another game for a while. But, if it succeeds, it has the potential to start a whole new genre of games- Probably not though. I do love the ideas behind Ashen, and as a lover of narrative-driven games with good stories, I plan at taking another look at Ashen's story when I get my hands on it. I read up a bit on it, and it seems to have a pretty awesome premise- We'll just have to see how it holds up after release. Until then, you can check Ashen out at www.ashen-game.com/, and I encourage you to do so. I can't wait for it to come out. Image reference: BagoGames. “E3 2015: Ashen Announcement Trailer.” Flickr, Yahoo!, 15 June 2015, www.flickr.com/photos/bagogames/18218224303. In Dead Cells, you're a dead prisoner possessed by a pile of goo, running around a giant island littered with hordes of dark revenants infected with a mysterious disease called the "Malaise." You do battle with them using a variety of swords, bows, hammers, traps, and even grenades and turrets. Rolling and jumping between intimidating monsters is exhilarating, and is fun in a way that few games can be. But however deep and exciting Dead Cell's combat is, that's not the main draw of the game. Dead Cell's claim to fame is it's ingenious mixture of two incompatible genres. If you know what metroidvanias and roguelikes are, you'll know that they're virtually polar opposites. And yet, Dead Cells manages to combine the randomly-generated levels and gear of roguelikes, and the vast, interconnected worlds of metroidvanias. Although it's far from a perfect mixture, it provides unique and varied gameplay every time I boot it up. I almost never have even similar level layouts, but each level has a kind of theme, or level design kept constant throughout the game. There are four runes I unlocked within the first five hours. These enabled me to reach items I couldn't get to before, gave me new ways to move and attack, and even entirely new levels to explore. Dead Cells didn't mix the two genres perfectly, but they still did an amazing job. The game clearly puts gameplay first. The story is intriguing and told in an interesting way, yet takes a backseat to Dead Cells' fast and furious combat. Even so often, you encounter special rooms or areas that contain a special item(s) that you can inspect. Although some give you a slightly weak weapon or some gold to spend at the shop, all these rooms contain various bits of lore. Exploring every area carefully, and piecing together random bits of narrative rewarded me with a genuinely interesting story. The lore is often punctuated with a joke or punchline to keep the mood somewhat "light." These little jokes or references (There's a ton of those- just look at the background every once in a while) only fall short once or twice. I found them refreshing, and some even gave me a little chuckle. All in all, Dead Cells is a masterpiece of a game. I love every bit of it. It surprised me at every turn with fun new mechanics and strategies. I still remember the ecstasy I felt when finally beat that hard-as-nails final boss. (Buyers beware- the last two areas are less of a difficulty curve and more of a difficulty wall...) Dead Cells is a masterpiece of a game, with few flaws or places to improve in. And with potential DLC (Or DLC-sized updates, à la Hollow Knight), I think I'll be playing Dead Cells for a while. Image reference: Figueroa, Jorge. “Dead Cells.” Flickr, Yahoo!, 22 Aug. 2018, www.flickr.com/photos/jiff01/30321017848. In Dead Cells, you're a beheaded corpse fighting its way through hordes of revenants, using a variety of swords, bows, bombs, and magic spells. The game has been praised for its varied and fast-paced, flowing combat, its melding of two polar opposite genres, and astounding environmental design. Each area has its own mood, architecture, and mechanics, each brought to life by the game's great use of color. In the screenshot above, you can see the Beheaded standing in one of the later areas in the game, the Forgotten Sepulcher. The maze-like catacombs are shrouded in a thick, red darkness that hurts you if you stand in it too long. To help you along, however, two kinds of lanterns are scattered throughout the level. Smaller, more common blue lanterns light up when you touch them, and break after a small period of time. The other kind, a big yellow orb, is only found next to portals, and doesn't break. Below, you can see a basic color wheel. You can see that the color of the fog is completely opposite to the color of the blue lanterns. Color Theory states that this creates a complementary scheme. The high-contrast lanterns draw players in like moths to a lamp. Even without knowing what it does, they go to inspect it, and realizes that it's just a special version of the bigger, yellow orbs that they encountered earlier. Speaking of which, you'll also notice that yellow is one color away from red on that color wheel. This creates a split complementary scheme, providing a nuanced and good-looking environment. The red creates a foreboding sense of dread, while the yellow and blue provide a sense of safety, even when there is none. This is just one example of the amazing use of color in Dead Cells.
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AuthorHi! I'm Thomas MacDougall, a sophomore at DSA. Here you can check out my thoughts and recent activities. Please note that the views and opinions expressed in this blog are solely those of the author and do not represent those of Durham School of the Arts or Durham Public Schools. Archives
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