Iconoclasts
PlayStation 4
Nostalgia Factor:
I am a fan of Metroidvania type games, so when I first heard about Iconoclasts and read all the positive reviews, I decided to check it out. Onto my GameFly queue it went, and before I knew it the game was on its way to my house.
Story:
Oh dear. This game’s storyline is a complete mess, and I lost track of what was going on just a few hours into the game. Things start out promisingly enough. You control a young woman named Robin. Robin is a mechanic who likes to travel around and help people out. While this may seem noble of her, it is actually considered a crime on her planet. Apparently it is illegal for common citizens to handle tools or machinery, and violating this law is punishable by death. Robin quickly finds herself on the wrong side of the law, and is forced to go on the run to avoid capture. On her journey she crosses path and joins up with other characters on the lam from the law.
Your journey takes a ton of twists and turns. You get caught, you escape execution, you retreat to an underwater city that is run by “pirates” who operate outside the rules of the planet’s governing body. Your brother gets captured. You have to go and rescue him. Other stuff happens too, but this is where Iconoclasts started to lose me. The world of the game is steeped in a rich amount of lore which isn’t explained before you start playing the game. That’s fine by me. I’ve been able to jump into things like this before (see Game of Thrones) and I’ve been fine. I can figure things out as I go. But the world of this game is just a little toooooo weird for my tastes. I would have been okay with a little weirdness, but things go off the deep end pretty dang quick in this game. Zany characters are introduced that are important to the story, and we are supposed to just know who they are and what makes them special. Terms and phrases are used that aren’t explained, and we are just supposed to know what the characters are talking about. Crazy shit like flying to the moon and battling space worms comes up at the end of the game. Too much weird, unexplained crap happens for my tastes.
Again, I would have been okay with this if the connective tissue of the game had been stronger. Explain what things are and why these people who are special are special. Pretend we don’t know what is going on, and connect the dots for us. That would have helped immensely. Instead, I just kinda threw my arms up and said “I don’t know what the hell is going on anymore” and stopped caring about the story. This game leans heavily on its story, so for me to miss out on that part of the game hurts it a lot, in my book.
Gameplay:
Luckily this game is pretty fun to play, and that makes up for the confusing storyline a little bit.
Iconoclasts is often described as a Metroidvania type game. Heck, I even used that term in my opening paragraph. But this isn’t necessarily an accurate term. This game follows a pretty straightforward, linear path. It doesn’t just plop you down in the middle of nowhere and say “okay here you go.” It is pretty clear where you are supposed to go and what you are supposed to do next. There are chests and hidden items that you can see but can’t immediately access. It is your choice to come back later once you’ve upgraded your equipment, but doing so is not by any means mandatory.
Things handle like your standard 2D platform game. You can run, jump, fire your gun, and swing your wrench. You start out with the standard pellet-firing gun, but as the game goes on you get access to a bomb gun and a wavy beam shooting thing. Holding down the fire button activates a more powerful special attack for that specific weapon. You can use your wrench for short range melee attacks. The wrench is also useful for solving puzzles. Whenever you see something that looks like a screw, you can normally use the wrench to turn it and activate a door or platform. You can also swing from screws to reach higher ledges.
Things are pretty easy to get a hang of in this game. The controls are crisp and responsive and user friendly. The map comes in great handy too. Standard enemies are super easy to kill due to the game’s auto lock on feature. Bosses require a little bit more thought, as you can’t usually defeat a boss by just blindly firing away at it. Most bosses are almost like puzzles where you have to use your noggin to figure out how to expose their weak spots.
Graphics:
This game’s graphics are super cool. I can’t even lie about that. It looks like it could have been made on a Super Nintendo, but a Super Nintendo pushed to its absolute limits. Sprite based characters, hand drawn backgrounds, a bright and vibrant color scheme. I won’t say it looks better than current gen titles like Horizon Zero Dawn or Red Dead Redemption 2, but in its own way this game is just as beautiful as those two.
Sound:
The game sounds like it could have been made on a Super Nintendo too. Lots of catchy little tunes. The sound effects are good. I appreciate how the music and graphics work together during story scenes to create atmosphere. It is very easy to lose yourself in the world of the game. Very impressive when you consider that everything was created by just one guy.
Overall:
My overall thoughts on this game are somewhat conflicted. It looks cool, it sounds cool, it’s fun to play. At the beginning, I was really digging the storyline too. I was near the end of God of War when I first fired up Iconoclasts, and I enjoyed this game so much in its early hours that I actually wanted to keep playing it rather than return to God of War and finish up that game. Considering how much I liked God of War, that statement alone speaks volumes.
The more I played Iconoclasts, however, the less I found myself liking it. I think a lot of it has to do with the game’s storyline. Not that a good storyline is necessary to enjoy a game like this. Metroid basically has no story, and I consider that to be an all-time classic. But this game leans heavily on its storyline. Every couple minutes of playing, the action comes screeching to a halt while the characters stop to chatter. I can’t just push this to the side and ignore it. It’s too much. If the story was good, that would be one thing. It’s just so ridiculous though. It was dragging down my overall enjoyment of the game. It reminded me a bit of Undertale. Silly characters, useless banter, little to no connective tissue to help make the game make sense. I stopped caring, and that is NOT a good sign.
Which is a shame, because the game itself is pretty fun. I love the boss battles. I love using my head to solve puzzles. I love exploring and discovering hidden secrets. Couple the fun gameplay with the atmospheric graphics, music, and sound effects, and this game is close… SO CLOSE to being a real winner. But the storyline… man the storyline really drags it down. The game is fairly easy too, and also short in length.
I wanted to love this game, truly. And I came close to loving it. All the ingredients were there, but it just didn’t quite come together the way I was hoping it to.
Final Score:
B-
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