Let's Talk... Transistor

2011's Bastion was a huge hit that was both a critically and commercially successful debut for the newly-formed studio Supergiant Games, which meant that Supergiant Games' next game had a lot to live up to from a narrative, gameplay and presentation standpoint. Thankfully, Transistor manages to stand out as a fresh and exciting game that easily stands alone from Bastion but still feels very familiar to anyone who played Bastion. Transistor maintains the same level of extraordinary visual  presentation and thoughtful, ambiguous storytelling, and offers an attempt at seamlessly blending real-time action and dynamic turn-based combat that is unique and interesting but may be somewhat frustrating to some. 

The story of Transistor follows the plight of Red, the game's protagonist, who had her voice and implied love interest taken away from her by The Camerata, a small group of powerful, administrative officials implied to be similar to a governmental body. The Camerata unleashed a robotic army known as the "Process" into the city of Cloudbank, where the game takes place, to do their bidding and effectively act as, presumably, some kind of security force or law enforcers for the city. For reasons unknown, the Process go seemingly berserk and begin tearing apart the city as they appear to gain their own free-will in some way. Leaving Red and her sidekick/weapon referred to only as the "Transistor", the bad-ass greatsword-like weapon that has assumed the essence of a man heavily implied to be Red's love interest (he's never given a real name). The voice of the Transistor acts as a kind of real-time narrator, commenting on things as they happen and frequently weighing in on the situation, making him feel similar to the narrator in Bastion but not exactly the same, since the narrator in Bastion was telling the story retrospectively rather than as it unfolds.

The game's protagonist Red and her sword/companion, a talking sword referred to only as the Transistor, also an example of the game's fantastic art

Unlike Bastion, however, you should immediately disregard any plans to play Transistor as the fast-paced action game it may appear to be. Since the game's "Turn" system, a quasi-turn-based mechanic that you're heavily encouraged to use, combined with the speed at which enemies attack and  drawn-out length of your attack animations, makes playing Transistor as a real-time action game both highly undesirable and significantly harder. By effectively pausing the game world and freezing all enemies in place, the Turn system allows you to stop and form a plan of attack before quickly queueing up a set of movement and ability commands. You are limited to a small number of commands per each Turn (your abilities cost varying amounts and movement slowly drains the indicating bar), and are forced to wait a short period before using it again. During which time you cannot execute any abilities and are simply left to, somewhat frustratingly, run around like a headless chicken until Turn comes off cooldown. The Turn system and the explicit ineffectiveness of real-time combat sets up an unusual rhythm to the combat that is, strangely, very similar to a pseudo-turn-based game in the vein of XCOM, since when your combat meter is full it is your "turn" to attack and when it is depleted it is the enemies' "turn" to attack. However, calling the combat in Transistor "turn-based" is fairly reductive since you can still run around and dodge and avoid enemy projectiles during the enemies' "turn". Your appreciation of the Turn system ultimately depends on how much you like the idea of constantly, and very quickly, jumping between being in complete control to being an extremely vulnerable target just trying not to die before your next big move.

An example of a typical combat scenario

Regardless of whether you enjoy the occasionally frustrating combat system, it's impossible to deny the sheer volume of abilities and insane number of combinations, combat set-ups and ability mix-and-matching the game allows you to do. With over a dozen different abilities (referred to as Functions), four slots for passive abilities and four slots for active abilities (all of which have two extra slots for upgrades and added effects unique to each Function). An example of the customisation would be that there's a Function that allows you to summon a weird-looking cyber-dog to fight with you which can be upgraded, when combined with the right Function, to summon two dogs with 25% reduced damage instead of one. Add another of the right Function and you can summon two dogs with reduced damage but add another Function that increases all damage done by 25% to create two dogs with no damage reduction... And so on. Naturally, the sheer volume of combinations and customisation available prevent the combat from ever getting stale, and the frequency at which you can change your abilities around mean that you could potentially make every single combat encounter different from the last. Furthermore, the game allows you to increase the difficulty of the game in a number of interesting ways that make an nice change from the extremely arbitrary ways in which most games increase and alter difficulty. These "limiters" allow you bend and distort various values and behaviours of both enemies and yourself, ranging from simply doubling the damage of all enemies to giving enemies a chance to multiply upon death.

One of Transistor's biggest strengths is its amazing presentation throughout, with its beautiful art style, wonderful art direction and simply wonderful soundtrack, coupled with the stunning fluidity of the animations combined make Transistor an immediate eye-catcher. Furthermore, the game's excellent soundtrack and solid voice work from Bastion's Logan Cummingham (the voice of Rucks, Bastion's narrator), which is different enough from his performance in Bastion to not feel recycled and unoriginal. Transistor oozes so much style, from its presentation to its incredible art, that one could potentially enjoy their time with the game even the game's combat and story didn't do anything for them. 

The game's hugely customisable Functions system, allowing you to create potentially hundreds of combinations 

Ultimately, the game's wonderful presentation and interesting story easily make up some of the misgivings I had about the occasionally frustrating combat. Although a game that certainly feels familiar to anyone who played Bastion, Transistor easily feels fresh and original enough to feel like a new set of ideas and is different enough that those who didn't appreciate Bastion or couldn't get past a few things should definitely consider giving a Transistor a try.

Let's Talk... A Story About my Uncle

1st-person platforming is an idea that's been tried a number of times but never really been done right. Naturally, a side-scrolling or behind-the-shoulder perspective makes spatial awareness and navigation much easier in a 3d environment. Thankfully, A Story About my Uncle makes it both exciting and easy to handle by making some smart concessions to the platforming formula and adding layers of grapple hook-esque mechanics. The tight controls and easy-to-use setup makes A Story About my Uncle's unique blend work excellently.

Unfortunately, however, the game seems to think that it needs to have some kind of story to contextualise the world and the grapple mechanics, and so, for some reason, opts to have a bad and uninteresting story rather than simply not having a story at all. It feels extremely weak, poorly fleshed out and, frankly, completely unnecessary, especially in a game where the core mechanics are easily novel and interesting enough to make up for a lack of narrative. The story essentially is as follows: you are retrospectively telling a story to your daughter about a time when you went searching for your uncle (it is quite a literally a story about your uncle). The writing is clunky, the voice acting is kinda terrible, and the story mode ends before anything remotely interesting happens. Although it doesn't completely ruin the story mode but it certainly slows the game's fast and fluid pace with its frequent, though never particularly lengthy, storytelling moments, which usually just consist of listening to some people talk for a few minutes.  

The game's grapple device, and an example of the game's excellent environment design

However dull the story may be for the most part, the game's novel and unique platforming mechanics: a grapple hook that allows you to fluidly swing through the world. Starting with only one available swing per jump, you eventually build up the capability to swing three times before having to land and recharge (recharging your swings happens instantly when you land on a solid surface). Although 1st-person platforming has always been a pretty awkward thing, A Story about my Uncle manages to make it feel both natural and smooth, with the game's large, open environments feeling very suited to the way the platforming feels. On top of being able to swing, you can charge up your jump to increase the height of your jump, a mechanic that is hugely integral to some of the game's platforming puzzles. Furthermore, as you progress you eventually come across a pair of rocket boots that allow you to boost forward a significant distance in whatever direction you're looking in. It's another neat gimmick that really sets the stage for some rather complex manoeuvres, especially in some of the game's later puzzles. When all the different platforming mechanics come together and are used skillfully it feels extremely tight and making complicated jumps feels highly satisfying.

Despite having some novel core mechanics, the value of the game really depends on how much you're willing to dive into the game's time trial modes that unlock as you finish each respective level. The story mode lasts a couple of hours and there are approximately half a dozen levels to replay in the time trial modes, which, naturally, has you replay each level in an attempt to beat the game's set times for bronze, silver and gold medals. The story mode is a pretty linear endeavour, but the excellent environmental design and art direction make many of the game's larger set pieces well worth seeing, although the time trial mode allows you to experience many of the game's levels without having to sit through the rather tedious story elements of the story mode.

Although certainly more than just a simple gimmick, the grappling mechanics of A Story About my Uncle feel more like an impressive proof-of-concept for a larger, thicker and much more complex set of mechanics and future title. The story mode feels like an unfortunate and unnecessary inclusion, but thankfully the forced story beats are short enough to be easily ignored. Ultimately, it's an interesting, unique and well-executed platformer that's well worth checking if the idea of 1st-person platforming done right sounds appealing to you, even if it is a little thin on fresh content.