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The Binding of Isaac

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Author Topic: The Binding of Isaac  (Read 70 times)
Squire Grooktook
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« on: March 06, 2012, 08:03:25 pm »

I got this game on Steam for Christmas, and it's absolutely amazing. Consider this my official review/recogmendation

Seriously, this is the kind of "old school game" that you would have fond memories of popping into your super nes and playing all night as a child. And when I say oldschool, I don't mean a bunch of stripped down indie platforming pretending to be cool, or any of the actual generic platformers that populated the old platforms. I mean this is the kind of game you'd like to think of when you say "old school gaming".

The best way to describe the gameplay, is it's like legend of zelda style top down 2d view with robotron/gradius style shmup combat, and roguelike style adventuring. Every stage is laid out like one of the dungeons in Legend of Zelda 1. That is, a bunch of interconnected square rooms, filled with traps, monsters, treasure, secrets, and bosses.



However, as I said before, the games combat is more along the lines of a classic shmup then Legend of Zelda, so each room is more like a Robotron stage. Filled with enemies who will shoot lots of bullets at you, charge you, jump on you, home in on you, melee you, and various other nasty things which you must dodge and weave through. It isn't bullet hell type stuff, as your hitbox is about medium size. If you're a shmup player and want a good idea of it, think the first 3 Gradius games or Robotron.

There are items hidden in each level that power you up, sometimes in treasure rooms, sometimes hidden in secret places, and sometimes awarded for killing the boss. They come in several different categories. Some are primary weapons  (charge shots, homing attacks, lasers, ect). Others are your "bomb" type weapon that does something extremely potent but has to recharge for long periods of time. Some just give you stat boosts (speed, hp, damage, ect). And some give you new abilities like flying over holes, turning into a super powerful demon when you have 1hp left, or summon familiars to defend you. There is actually a huge number of these items to find, and can be combined in a variety of ways, giving you a multitude of play styles at your disposal. Also many of them alter your characters appearance in a variety of ways. Many of them...rather unpleasant.




One of the coolest and most important things about the game though, is that all of the stages are randomly generated. No matter how many times you play through, it'll be different each time. There is a pool of bosses for each stage that is randomly drawn from. So you can never prepare for whom you're going to face. The items too, are randomly distributed, so you'll find yourself being forced to use a different playstyle each time. Sometimes you'll be a glass cannon with enormous fire power but who dies in several hits. Sometimes you'll have lots of hp but little in the way of offense or defense. And sometimes you'll have tons of familiars making up for your lack of defense. It's different each time.

What also keeps it exciting, is that when you die you start from the beginning of the game and lose all your items. And you have no extra lives or continues. This keeps things intense. The difficulty of the game is definitely challenging, but it's never unfair or cheap. And let me tell you, there is almost nothing more exciting or satisfying then defeating the true final boss of the game with 1 hp, 0 lives, and 0 continues remaining.

The game is fairly long, with 5 pretty lengthy stages, and 4 additional ones for getting to the true final boss. There's also plenty of unlockables, secrets, and achievements to keep you coming. Not to mention they are working on an expansion that will add a ton of new stuff.


As for non gameplay stuff, the art style is actually really cool. It's like Silent Hill or Splatter House drawn in the style of South Park's main cast, and the animation is quite good. The soundtrack is amazing. It's unique as hell, varied, and atmospheric. Probably worth buying by itself. The story is an intriguing minimalist mind screw that's best described as a Silent Hill about an abused child, with biblical allusions layered on top for even more mind screw.

Also it's only 5 dollars.

All in all, I give this game Grooktooks approval sticker of 100% pure sexcellency.
« Last Edit: March 06, 2012, 08:10:45 pm by Squire Grooktook » Report Spam   Logged

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« Reply #1 on: September 23, 2012, 05:46:54 pm »

I'm going to check this one out. I want a game like this I can play by myself when the tv's are being used by everyone else.
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