One thing about unconventional concepts is that when combined, they only result in spectacular failure or highly satisfying success. The production of Cuddle Monster Games, a small studio from Sweden, is just such an experiment, which, although it seems to be nothing extraordinary, can catch the player for a long time.
At the beginning, I must admit that I was full of insecurity when I joined Hell is Other Demons . After all, what extraordinary could this game offer me? At first glance, it seemed to be another indie-platformer in a pixel-art style. Just another eye for people who date the beginnings of their adventure with electronic entertainment around the premiere of the first Prince of Persia . I guess I couldn’t be more wrong, because Hell is Other Demons made a huge impression on me in the end. I’m in a hurry to explain why.
I need a hero…
We all deeply love fantastic stories about heroes throwing themselves into an epic battle against more or less evil. Over the years, pop culture has seen so many heroes that it would seem that this topic is almost completely exhausted. Nothing could be more wrong, which is proved with great success by Hell is Other Demons .
Behind the simple form of the arcade shooter there is quite an extraordinary story here. Well, at the bottom of the universe, in hell itself, a demonic civil war breaks out, which the resistance is losing to the bottom line. An undefined empire is not very polite with its opponents and the rest of the surviving population. Our protagonist, as the rebels’ last resort, sets off to fight the invader alone. One would like to say: it’s thick.
Hell yeah!
A short, but succinct tutorial on the possibilities of our subordinate gives a substitute for what awaits us in the next boards. The double jump, the effective dash and the recoil of our hero’s demonic blaster herald that the player will have to show great reflexes and precision. It will be dynamic, effective and you can do without prisoners, as you can see right after the training, at the first full-fledged level. Successive waves of enemies pour out on us, surprising not only with their numbers, but also with their diversity. It happens that the game throws stronger and stronger enemies on us, and then immediately lulls our attention with a few weak single shots, and then we face a massive assault of various types of monsters. The worst thing is when you have the last line of life and you think it’s over, And here’s a goodbye game serves you a dozen fast, winged demons. It is worth adding that over time and collecting gems, we can equip our protégé with a more powerful weapon, a better Ultimate, or add a few skills to him that will give us more life, a special shield, a third jump or the possibility of increasing equipment. I will warn you. Yes, each of these things will occupy our place in our infernal backpack.
Eight-bit demolition
Hell is Other Demons does not lose its retro style at all. On the contrary, the use of unconventional graphic pixelation if we take into account the plot, makes the game even more effective. Starting from the menu, through the map, and ending with the locations themselves, the game looks really cool and I used this term on purpose. It is not outstanding, wonderful or beautiful. She’s just really cool. The individual levels reflect the atmosphere of eight-bit hell. Some are more static and, apart from small trapdoors, there is nothing challenging about them, while others need to be overcome, being almost all the time in the air, because on each side there are spikes in the floor, rotating platforms or a ceiling spiked with spikes. In this respect, you do not go bored.
The animations, gunshots and explosions evoke the good old Contra , albeit in a positive way. They blend in well with the surroundings and give the game its charm. As for the opponents, we will have various abominations on our way, from flying skulls and shooting eyes, to slushy slush, steampunk machines and something like horned cultists. The corpse is dense and, as the game progresses and the location changes, it differs more or less from each other. These differences mainly concern the graphics, because mechanically the monsters are rather similar to each other, but this is not something that should be particularly picked on. Such specificity.
I didn’t really like the main character model. At first glance, it looks like Pikachu’s diabolical alter ego, which collides with the overall aesthetics, but this is what effectively marks the dynamics of the game. At some point it ceases to matter, as the character turns into a flying white missile, maneuvering among enemy fire. This, however, can be a problem for some players. Sometimes it’s hard to figure out where our character is in all this frenzy. This is probably the most problematic element of Hell is Other Demons , because sometimes everything happens too dynamically, which makes the graphics show its imperfections.
Back to the 80’s
The absolute icing on the game’s cake is its soundtrack. Laser shots and explosions perfectly match the music that is kept in the atmosphere of the eighties. Effective clashes with the hordes of hell are accompanied by synthwave sounds by the Algorithm project . Do you know Hotline Miami ? Then imagine that it is just as good here, and I would even try to say that it is a bit better. Expressive, aggressive sound perfectly fits the atmosphere of the game and its dynamics. The following chords act as a driving force, making us want to be even faster and better. The sound is a kind of buckle that finishes the composition of this game. This is the strongest point of Hell is Other Demons .
We would like to thank the Cuddle Monster Games studio for making the game available for review on PC.
