Hey, have you heard of a game that plays a super soldier who goes to hell to kill everything you move? Does it involve exchanging exotic weapons to address the ever-changing challenges posed by a permanent horde of twisted fleshy mutant helions? Well, Scathe isn’t exactly Doom. It does its best, but for at least the last seven years, there has been a huge lack of balance between a handmade gun puzzle arena that kills first-person demons in the head and airtight weapons. But what it lacks in polish, momentum, and wit is replaced by some interesting but dull dungeon crawls and perhaps its greatest outstanding feature, cooperation.
It may not be perfectly fair to compare Scathe directly with Doom. From a distance, the similarities are clear, but within minutes of Scathe, it was clear that he was playing the game with a completely different approach than the more famous first-person hell shooter. The id signature game is designed to help you unstoppable with a lasting forward movement, but a damaged take requires a more stable hand as it is a running enemy. myself under. They spawn aggressively, with long-range attackers filling the zone with barrage shooter-like projectiles like spotted pigeons and cupheads, and close-range troops assaulting me directly or turning behind or at corners. Ambush me.
Freezing to line up shots was a death sentence, but instead of assaulting an enemy as owned by Doomguy, Scathe needs to place much more emphasis on personal safety. Health can only be reliably regained by picking up shiny orange healthy juices scattered in a particular room and can be in limited supply. Many of the enemy relationships are stroking oncoming fires, strategically ducking horns and obstacles, shooting stock super rifles from a distance, expelling most enemies from at least medium range, and rocket minis. It was about firing swarms. frequent. Moreover, the more elusive enemies were a great feed for my long-range Thunderbolt. It could also be an arc lamp among multiple bad guys who do damage over time. Ripper is absolutely necessary if I’m pinned and feel a horde invading my personal space, or to get through the blockade of the bad guys, my dashing attack If was a cooldown, it was my destination for a close encounter. There is even magic that can freeze the turret and crush everyone near the waves of your hands. Scathe’s aggressive options are plentiful and diverse.
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However, in co-op, up to 4 players can run this gauntlet together. During the demo, I was not able to participate in more than one other action. In a sense, there are more friends to burn, as there was no noticeable difference in the strength or number of enemies during cooperation, except in rooms where a certain amount of enemies had to be killed before increasing the total. Bring you to the depths. But we shared a life pool. In short, you are as efficient as the dying people on your team.
The demon army was pretty good at stopping me from my goal-navigating the labyrinth of hell, collecting runes, unlocking the boss’s room, and what was waiting for me inside. It can be erased. They come in a variety of shapes and sizes, from large humanoid beasts to giant statically created demons to sensuous spike clouds that fly around like a school of sea fish. They simply wield a sinister bone blade, a giant projectile canon, or sometimes throw a bouncing ball body into you. It’s not hard to kill yourself, but in a constant wave, they handle your 10 life allocations quickly and efficiently. Fortunately, in addition to health drops and ammo, everything you find will be found forever. This rogue light feature is great for runes. This means you don’t have to backtrack to pick up a room full of runes after you die. But this is bad for things like extra life, and every time you have to go through a room on your way to your goal, it creates a much more dangerous additional time.
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The maze itself is full of rooms, each with a symbol. Remembering the symbol can help you identify the associated room, but nothing can help you determine which direction you are heading. There is a map, but it’s very inconvenient to look up the menu between hordes of murders. It’s also easy to miss valuable items because you didn’t know what you didn’t know because you didn’t mention power-ups or weapons, just enter the room and how to connect it after exploring the room. know.
The room itself is at least interesting. There are plenty of platforms and obstacles to navigate and place between you and the bad guys. Many rooms have platform puzzles and switches that hide access to additional life and other collectibles. The biomes of the rooms themselves are also quite different, with some corners of the underworld all being fire and chains, and other corners being dark and swampy. In addition to aesthetics, each of them also contains unique enemies that force you to tweak your strategy a bit.
Scathe clearly proves that there is room in hell for a first-person shooter that isn’t named Doom. Filling the screen with bullets to maintain defense creates an interesting and completely different atmosphere than a frontal attack in competition. Running and artillery are attractive and solid, but the map feels like purgatory to explore competently without direction.
