A Vibrant Planet-Jumper That Defies Gravity And Patience
Looks can be deceptive. Take Baseless for example. The screenshots are filled with adorable characters, wholesome dialogue and bright, bold colours. However, once you get stuck into the action, it turns out this game is no pushover.
After being rescued from the menacing Goliath, Caf is welcomed into a community who monitor distress calls which come through to its residents via a warp gate. They then set off to rescue the lost souls, and bring them back to the safe haven known as The Nile.
From Rescue Missions to Boss Brutes
Baseless sees Caf travel to many diverse worlds, each containing numerous stages. These vary and contain objectives such as destroying all enemies, freeing allies or sometimes simply navigating to the exit of a dangerous maze-like level. Each zone finishes up with a big, bad boss battle. These encounters are layered, with the boss behaviour changing as you remove each chunk of its health bar. Despite being tough, the battles are enjoyable and vary from zone to zone.
The thing with Baseless is that you can’t simply move where you want to, which makes things tricky. Given the fact you are floating around a series of beautiful but gravitationally challenged worlds, a little propulsion is needed. This means firing your weapon in one direction, to then move away in the opposite. It takes some getting used to as you use the thumbstick to direct your fire, which in turn dictates your movement path.
Recoil-Driven Movement and Combat Strategy
As well as this, Caf has access to a melee weapon and power weapon. There are four different melee weapons to unlock, starting off with the humble sword. These are helpful for getting out of sticky situations at close quarters, whereas the power weapon is essential for surviving more than a few seconds against the enemy onslaught. Whether it’s a shotgun, triple rifle or even a high powered laser beam, using these weapons are the only way to prevent becoming overwhelmed. The catch here is that these have limited ammo, meaning Caf will need to scout each level for refill stations denoted by purple markers.
Caf’s other bit of equipment, the shield, is not only used for defence but also for supporting precision firing. It can be used to suspend in the air and fire without recoiling, but this won’t last forever. Dispatching enemies will replenish it, along with offering health and ammo for your power weapon too.
Upgrades and Oxygen
Caf’s equipment can be upgraded with precious materials collected whilst out on missions. These can also be earned by interacting with the residents of The Nile, and taking part in mini-games or picking up side quests. These are broadly pretty simple, and act as a mirror of sorts for the game’s achievements. New melee weapons can be unlocked this way, as well as upgrades to Caf’s shield, oxygen reserves and more. Caf can also unlock alternative movement aids, which come with their own pros and cons. This adds variety and a little strategy to the gameplay in Baseless.
Not only do you have to defend yourself against waves of enemies, but as you enter and exit each atmosphere, your oxygen will quickly drain and then begin to deplete your health bar until you return to safety. As much of the action is often happening around the planets themselves, this is a fine line to walk between getting overwhelmed and slowly suffocating to death.
Fighting the Controls and the Environment
Boy, did moving around take some getting used to. In fact, I’m not sure I ever did get used to it. In theory the control setup is the natural choice as you hop between small planetoids whilst frantically firing and dodging between waves of enemies. However, the accuracy demanded of you as the game progresses makes moving with precision very important, but very difficult indeed.
This is most apparent when you are required to navigate dangerous paths in levels usually containing walls made of lasers, or cannons pumping out fireballs. Weaving between these varying hazards is very challenging indeed, and if you hit them, Caf will tend to violently bounce off into something else, sometimes triggering a deadly pinball pattern of movement.
This is further compounded by Caf automatically jumping (or blasting off), quite far from a platform if the game detects you trying to move up and away instead of slowly edging along the platform, side to side. Countless times I leapt into danger exactly when I didn’t want to, and would have preferred the option to turn this off.
Finally, when you do die and are waiting to respawn, Caf will remain firmly in harm’s way (especially if you are in a tight spot). Upon reviving you’re then thrown straight back into the same thing that had just killed you, rather than respawning from a safe space or checkpoint a few paces back.
Customising the Challenge
Don’t get me wrong, Baseless is designed to be challenging but the control setup adds an unintentional level of difficulty which spilled over into frustration numerous times for me, to the point where I had to switch off and return a little later.
Thankfully then, there are several difficulty modifiers you can call on thanks to the “Assist Mode”. The folks at Fermenter Games do advise to use these only if you are unable to progress in the game, and they include buffs such as infinite ammo, lives and equipment. You can choose one or multiple assists depending on how much help you need.
A Kinetic and Colourful Galactic Dance
On balance I very much enjoyed Baseless and I honestly can’t pick many faults at all. However, the strenuous gameplay will prove make or break for some, especially when the control niggles only make things more problematic.
Important Links
Buy Baseless on Xbox – https://www.xbox.com/en-gb/games/store/baseless/9nvr5vc1wvxb
