Helskate solutions a query that I don’t assume anybody requested: “What when you might kill demons in between lengthy trick combos in Tony Hawk Professional Skater?” The reply, it seems, is: “It might be fairly rad.” Its energetic artwork and soundtrack name again to these 2000’s-era skate video games triumphantly, and actually nails the straightforward inputs and concentrate on huge strikes versus minute technicalities. That stated, issues get hellacious, and generally unwieldy, if you try and meaningfully mix the fight and the rogue-lite parts with all of the grinds and grabs.
You embody the partially feathered body of Anton Falcon, infamous troublemaker and proficient skater, who simply needs to tear up some half pipes in peace. And by “in peace,” he means touring past the boundaries of the hell he and his cohorts are trapped in as outlined by its supreme ruler, Garland. However for somebody like Anton, this purgatory is extra like a skater’s paradise, and with the flexibility to combat by Garland’s monstrous enforcers with magical weapons, he’s adventuring to locations beforehand unexplored and discovering greater and scarier resistance as he persists.
Each stage in Helskate resembles the form of messy city detritus that doubles as wonderful obstacles to trick on. However the place the Tony Hawk collection’ ranges have been extra grounded in relative actuality, Helskate’s seems to be at what is feasible in actual life and makes that the ground of potential. Grinding readily available rails and brief obstacles are the place the motion begins, however you’ll often be utilizing freeway indicators dozens of ft excessive as partitions to trip, or grinding on phone wires. Tips are as simple to execute as hitting brief directional inputs adopted by the proper button for grinds, grabs, or flips.
After which there are the monsters, which are available in all kinds of sizes and styles. Some are caught to partitions and harass you with lasers from distances, others take the combat to you straight and chase you across the stage. Others nonetheless may very well double as a rail to grind, changing into one other line to trip do you have to be so inclined. These monster mixes do exactly sufficient to maintain you in your toes, particularly as you get deeper and deeper into the helskate itself, and you should defeat them earlier than you may progress. However I discovered the dearth of well being decide ups all through the run to be the largest think about my demise. Longer runs change into wars of attrition, making what little well being you’ve got final so long as you may, often boosting it a bit by rising your max well being as a part of a reward for clearing the extent.
Moreover killing enemies with unlockable weapons like a katana or ninja stars, every stage has a listing of sub objectives that earn you extra currencies to unlock and improve extra stuff. Discovering the letters and numbers ‘HELSK8’ strategically positioned across the map or performing stage-specific actions like grinding up this crane is the place the sport feels most like its most blatant old-school inspiration. Fight, although simple to understand and finally enjoyable, lacks the depth of its most blatant character-action inspirations. The skating and chopping would not at all times mesh nicely collectively both. Often, like if you decide up tapes that make sure methods provide you with fight buffs after efficiently nailing them, you may actually get right into a synergistic rhythm of popping a fast trick for a harm bonus after which crushing a baddie in a single blow, as an example. More often than not, although, I felt that simply rapidly smashing the enemies first after which tackling the precise skating challenges felt like the most efficient strategy to keep within the sport. Treating these like virtually two halves of the identical sport was simple to do, since there is no deadlines hurrying you alongside to the subsequent encounter, nevertheless it additionally felt antithetical to the spirit of the factor. To have the ability to bust loopy maneuvers AND kill the dangerous guys effectively looks like reaching for a ability ceiling that my three-ish hours of runtime to date has not put me anyplace close to.
Helskate’s roguelite parts appear sound, to date. On the finish of each part, you may select from as much as three completely different rewards as objectives for the subsequent part, letting you select the one which’s finest on your pursuits on the present second. There appears to be no strategy to actually manipulate how usually sure varieties of rewards pop up, a la Hades, and it’s not obvious to me to date that attainable future rewards have any relationship with those presently in your stock. Gear and stickers, the previous being wearables that give Anton’s methods and skills extra powers and the latter offering extra passive buffs, do really feel sturdy and have a lot of potential to stack and combo results for consequential outcomes. I simply usually felt like I used to be going with the circulate as an alternative of choosing talents with any intentionality.
Even when it is messy and doesn’t really feel like all of the programs are becoming collectively completely, each little bit of Helskate makes it apparent that I’ve by no means performed a sport fairly like this earlier than. Its distinctive cocktail of procedurally-generated development, skating video games of yesteryear, and beat ‘em ups is enjoyable and frantic, and the transient time I spent with it has me very curious about what different methods this one has in its arsenal. Fortunate for me, I received’t want to attend too lengthy to hit the Helskate once more, because it’s set to drop into Steam Early Entry on February fifteenth.