Along with an exciting trailer and being featured in Nintendo’s latest indie highlights video, Morphies Law just launched at 1 p.m. EST today.
Morphies Law is an action-packed game where players grow in size by shooting their enemies. It has a local multiplayer mode that allows up to 8 players, as well as the option to fight against the A.I. in its offline mode.
Players also get to create their weapons in addition to customizing their own character with various tattoos of varying rarities.
The Morphies Law trailer showcases more shenanigans players can get up to in the game with a character with huge legs that give them an advantage over others. Other parts of a character’s body can increase in mass based on where they hit an enemy.
Depending on the character’s size, they go through certain places or even be blocked from chasing down an enemy. For instance, if a player gets hit and decrease in size, they can hide themselves away in secret passages.
Morphies Law is now available for the Nintendo Switch.
Nothing pleases a game collector more than the word “exclusivity”, and amongst a few companies that offer that very thing, Super Rare Games has quickly earned its followers- specially in the Nintendo Switch community.
Elea might be one of the strangest games I’ve ever played that still follows a cohesive, and more importantly, an interesting narrative, making it a worthwhile title for fans of story-heavy games.
This month, CGMagazine explores the creative journey the development team behind God of War embarked upon. Featuring interviews with Narrative Designer, Matt Sophos, Composer, Bear McCreary, and Design Director, Derek Daniels, we learn how Sony Santa Monica evolved the God of War franchise, bringing forth a new, refreshing installment to the series.
CGM also talks about cults and chaos with Drew Holmes and Jean-Sebastien Decant, the lead writer and narrative director behind Far Cry 5. The team talks about the research that went into creating the riveting narrative the Far Cry franchise is known for, and the importance of the story they aimed to tell.
Here’s What else you’ll find this month:
Features:
Night in the Woods Captures the Entrapment of Small Towns for Queer Youth
The Best Indies you May Have Missed Out On
Interviews:
Narrative Designer, Matt Sophos – God of War
Composer, Bear McCreary – God of War
Design Director, Derek Daniels – God of War
Narrative Director, Jean-Sebastien Decant – Far Cry 5
Nelo looks beyond slick. Rushing through arenas filled with enemies at blinding speed while firing four machine guns looks like something you’d want to be a part of. However, the alpha build currently available to players shows a game that needs a ton of work, showcasing cramped arenas, incredibly awkward platforming, and many other design decisions that all seem built around making the players regret their great speed.
In video, it looks fantastic. Players act as Nelo, an alien cyborg with telepathic powers and four guns with which to blast aliens. This cyborg can also move extremely fast, allowing players to rush through arenas of enemies as they pepper them with laser blasts. It’s quite tense to play through as well, staying ahead of your enemies while aiming shots at high speeds turns combat into a frantic event.
The problems in Nelo don’t take long to start showing up, though. Considering the speeds at which players can move, they require lots of open space to really take advantage of it (like Vanquish’s large arenas), but when enemies show up, players tend to get blocked into tiny arenas. Not only are these areas small, they tend to be filled with buildings and tiny structures that get in the way and prevent the player from running around. They’re all manageable to get around, and their varied heights offer different vantage points for combat, but at the speeds the player will be moving, these structures get in the way and block running far too often.
It doesn’t help that platforming is a chore. Nelo can wall jump to hop up onto taller buildings, but can only do so a limited number of times. However, this jump is quite floaty and clumsy, resulting in absurd hang-times that can make it nearly impossible to land on even a decent-sized platform. Nelo can be irritatingly fussy about whether your wall jump connected with the wall correctly, and since players can only wall jump a few times in a row, they may find themselves stuck in an area while trying to leap up a wall that should be a snap to scale.
Players can concentrate on fighting back instead by using their four guns. These fire at a high speed, allowing players to cleave through the dozens of robot foes who show up, but they also chew through ammo quickly. Periodically, enemies will drop more, as well as other guns (which oddly switch out some of the weapons you’re already using with little rhyme or reason, at least in this build), but Nelo still mostly requires players be precise with their shots. That’s not necessarily bad, and the ammo limits are high enough that players can often spray shots when running.
The issue that hurts the core of what Nelo seems to be building is that running around and blasting foes at high speed is not actually advisable. Players need to track their ammo counts and choose their shots. They can’t rush around without tripping over environments, and they can’t use the terrain to their advantage due to the clumsy jumping. Players will always be stumbling into things, forced to stop shooting, and will have trouble getting up the structures that get in their way.
Some of these issues can be fixed by switching into top-down mode. Players can swap viewpoints to get a better look at the battlefield, moving from first person to a twin-stick shooter style, which does make it simpler to hit enemies. However, the spectacle of running around at ridiculous speed while blasting enemies is the big draw to this game, and swapping to this viewpoint to deal with it cheapens that draw.
These are just the problems players will see in combat. The game also features platforming segments where players will have to precisely land those floaty jumps (which are clumsy enough to make scaling a basic wall nearly impossible at points), or run around at super high speeds and somehow keep your character from careening off a cliff. The speed just doesn’t mix with the precision of these platforming moments, and when you’re slowly hopping around, you’ll just wish you were in a fight again.
Nelo can’t seem to stop tripping over its own speed mechanic, as if it is looking for ways to stop the player from using it in any fun ways. The speed that makes the game look so appealing is a constant hindrance, whether by having players stumble around arenas that are too small to fight in, something they need to shut off to get combat under control, or making clumsy platforming even more difficult. When players are freely running and blasting enemies, it’s a delight, but in its current state there is too much taking away from the freedom to move and shoot that makes Nelo special.
Nelo was previewed using a retail Steam download code provided by Magic & Mirrors. You can find additional information about CGMagazine’s ethics and review policies and procedures here.
Join CGM’s Cole Watson as he takes you through the first chapter of the epic culinary adventure, Battle Chef Brigade!
“In the fantasy realm of Victusia, the members of the elite Battle Chef Brigade are revered for their ability to skillfully take down monsters and transform their kills into delicious cuisine! But joining the brigade isn’t easy; chefs from across Victusia must vie for their spot in a high stakes competition. Play as two unique contestants, Mina and Thrash, as their journeys through the tournament unfold.
Battle Chef Brigade is equal parts old-school brawler and combo puzzler with light RPG elements. The game features completely hand-drawn characters and enemies, two playable chefs brought to life in a charming campaign through unique VO, daily challenges for leaderboard domination, and an original soundtrack.”
Battle Chef Brigade is available on November 20, for Nintendo Switch and PC. Check out Cole’s review of Battle Chef Brigadehere!
