It is that time of day again – another retro styled game has rocked up onto my review list.
The contender this time is Grim Guardians: Demon Purge, coming our way courtesy of INTI CREATES. Playing out as a Metroidvania, it appears that there is a lot of game on offer here, and with titles like the Bloodstained: Curse of the Moon series under the developer’s belt, Grim Guardians looks like it is in good hands.
As I mentioned in the opening paragraph, Grim Guardians: Demon Purge is a retro styled adventure game; a throwback to the early styles, complete with appealing pixel art characters drawn with care, nicely animated. The enemies are also pretty well designed, based on various tropes of this kind, such as spiders, ghosts and skeletons, whilst the bosses that you come across are very cool as well. In fact, when you consider that the audio, the soundtrack and the rest of the combat sounds are equally good, with the two protagonists shouting various phrases as they fight, then all is pretty bang on, if you’ll pardon the pun.
There’s a bit of a story kicking around here too. The heroines of Grim Guardians: Demon Purge are two sisters – Shinobu and Maya. Despite their tender years, the pair are pro demon hunters, returning from another successful mission when something appears to go wrong. The school that they attend has been merged with the demon realm, and the students that were inside have been captured. So, what else are a pair of seasoned demon hunters to do but infiltrate the castle that the school has become, free all the students and kick the ass of whoever caused this? The story is presented via the medium of static boxes with the person who is speaking shown in all their glory, and I must say, the artwork on the characters is very good indeed.
Of course, with this being a Metroidvania-type, we need to look at how things play out now. In common with many games of the genre, the action is split into two halves: the combat and the exploring.
Taking combat first and we find that Shinobu and Maya fight in very different ways. Shinobu is armed with an “Anti-Demon Machinegun” as she yells a lot when shooting it and this means that she can engage enemies from further away, which is sometimes an advantage. She also has a handy line in explosives as a sub weapon, which allows her to throw grenades or even TNT at the enemies. Maya, on the other hand, is armed with the power of Origami. Yes, it appears that demons – and monsters in general – are deathly afraid of paper cuts. Maya is a melee character, and gets up close and personal before slapping the foes about with a bit of paper. Luckily, her attacks are stronger, as she is closer, and sometimes an all-out offense is the best option. Maya’s sub weapons are more of a supportive type, including a handy shield and a platform she can summon to stand on, which lets here reach higher places. This must be the only game I’ve played in a long time where a double jump is not available.
There are enemies that are better dealt with by a certain sister, and you will find this as you move through Grim Guardians: Demon Purge. As an example, spiders are immune to Shinobu’s machinegun, as the bullets go over their heads, whereas Maya can slice them up in no time. Luckily, you can switch between sisters at any time when playing solo, or if you are playing in two-player mode, you can use both sisters simultaneously. If one sister should die, she can be revived by the other one – as long as you can reach her, that is! In single player mode, you must reach the area where your sister fell to revive her with CPR, which is a nice touch.
This is particularly good in the boss fights, which is when you need it most. See, if a sister falls in a boss fight, the other sister enters the fray whilst the boss stays at the same health level as when the first sister died. I don’t need to tell you that is a good thing. In fact, as long as you can keep reviving each other, the sisters are essentially immortal, and so the fights are almost a foregone conclusion. It turns out that the bosses are possessed students, and so when they are freed, they give us the new sub weapons that we need to keep progressing on.
Exploration is good fun as well. Obviously as you get new abilities, it does make it easier to get around, especially as Maya. A nice touch is a compass type affair that comes up when you touch the right stick. This shows you where the boss of the level is, along with the locations of various points of interest, such as students to rescue. Getting around the place is a lot of fun and to be honest, I’ve not had many complaints about the way the game is handled.
In all, you’ll find much enjoyment from Grim Guardians: Demon Purge. It is capable of delivering fast and furious combat, teamed with careful exploration. The strong Castlevania vibes running through it help matters. In fact, Grim Guardians: Demon Purge looks great and plays well, ensuring it can be recommended to anyone with even the slightest bit of interest.
Grim Guardians: Demon Purge is on the Xbox Store
