Castlevania II: Belmont's Revenge

The Short

Pros

- A *gasp* good Game Boy Castlevania game?

- Takes elements from the craptastic previous game and makes them actually...good

- Some genuinely cool platforming ideas within the Castlevania universe

- World selection aped straight from Mega Man 

- Kick-ass music

- Looks fantastic

- Getting hit doesn't downgrade your weapon (unless getting hit by very specific enemies)

- Not just a good Castlevania handheld game, but a good Castlevania game in general

Cons

- Calling it Castlevania II is a great way for me to think it's Simon's Quest

- The last three bosses can be pretty cheap

- Level design isn't quite as good as the NES/Genesis offerings

- Password system instead of save, but that's better than nothing

- Controls are still a bit ridged at times

Belmont is back, and he's PISSED

The Long

Holy cow guys, I don't know if it's like...weird gaming rebound because I just came off the worst Castlevania experience in my life or what, but Castlevania II: Belmont's Revenge is...good? Like...a good Game Boy Castlevania game? It exists? Whaaaaaaaa

Ok, sorry, getting a bit ahead of myself.

My expectations were pretty much dashed after playing Castlevania: The Adventure. I knew already that the Game Boy was an inferior piece of hardware compared to the NES, but I hadn't expected the translation of a classic franchise to have gone so poorly. And if Castlevania Legends  is any indication (cough spoilers for a future review cough), making a good, Castlevania-esque platformer on Nintendo's handheld proved a larger challenge than some expected. I went into Belmont's Revenge fully expecting crap...or maybe even something similar to Simon's Quest (seeing as they share a name).

Guess what? I was pleasantly surprised, so much so that I'd say Belmont's Revenge is one of the best platformers on the system. Yeah. It's pretty solid.

Plus it has MONKEY SKELETONS.

There is actual plot this time. Kind of. Christopher Belmont (the guy from the first game) is back, and his son has been nabbed by Dracula. Or joined Dracula. Or something. I'm not totally sure, there isn't exactly a lot of text in this game. But you're here for revenge, cause it's in the title. So off you head to four different castles named after different...elements? Well, the manual said elements, but I don't remember "Crystal" or "Plants" being elements.

The game here takes a page from Mega Man, allowing you to tackle any of the four castles in whatever order you choose. It doesn't really matter (you don't get any power-ups or anything from beating them), and after beating all four you have two final stages followed by the Dracula boss fight. Pretty standard Game Boy platformer stuff.

Insert "Rockman" pun here

Right off the bat you'll notice Christopher controls much better. Most annoyances from the first game have been fixed: his jump is a bit further, he auto-grabs ropes by just being near them (a fantastic addition), and gravity doesn't fluctuate randomly. Even better, when he powers up his weapon he retains the powerups even when hit, unless hit by a very specific enemy (and it gives a sound-cue letting you know). So far, so good.

I was originally dismayed, because Belmont's Revenge features tons of the same elements from the first game. Ropes still play a prominent part, as do vertically oriented sections. Enemies too, like the bouncy-ball spitters and sickle-throwers, have been kept over. But my dismay quickly turned to delight as I realized how much better things were this go around.

The game has been better adjusted to fit both Christopher's gimped jump as well as the Game Boy's capabilities. While some areas are continuous scrolling, most castles have each room be a self-contained challenge, and leaving it tosses you into another one. It's a smart use of the screen's limited real estate, and with better designed rooms leads to some really cool challenges.

This room would be hell in the first game. This time around, it's a blast.

Belmont's Revenge uses ropes in interesting ways. In the image above, the pairs of ropes switch directions (up vs down) every couple of seconds, leading to some interesting jumping challenges. Later it mixes it up by having these with enemies coming at you, but never enough to be impossible (no Medusa heads). The new grab and jump mechanics make this challenging but quite fun.

Another cool rope trick is spiders. Now, when spiders come from the ceiling, you can grab their threads and use them for platforms. Kill them, however, and the thread will end. You have to be smart as to which spiders to kill and which to use, again leading to some really fun platforming.

Explody Eyeball Bridge is also back, but actually fun.

It isn't just ropes, though. Something the original game had was horizontal spike stakes that would come out of the walls. You'd have to use them as platforms to escape a room, but the game gave no indication when they'd stick out or retract. It became a case of trial and error, and was exceptionally frustrating. Belmont's Revenge fixes this with a simple design decision: the spikes flash just before they move. Such a simple thing, but it makes the room more about skill rather than dumb luck. Smart.

That isn't to say these changes make the game easier. In fact, Belmont's Revenge is quite tricky, though not nearly on par with Castlevania III: Dracula's Day Out. In particular, the final three bosses are super difficult, requiring some pattern memorization as well as quick reflexes. The final fight with Dracula is also very hard, though he only has one form this time around.

Drac's back, in the same room as last time.

You may note in the screenshots, but subweapons are back! Sort of! There's only two this time, the axe and the water, and they act exactly as they did in the rest of the series. Here's a Nathan Protip: Use the axe, ditch the water. Axe is so, so useful throughout. The exception is the second to last boss, where the water is actually better. But I swear Dracula is impossible if you don't have the axe, he's so hard.

So...yeah. While it isn't quite as tight as earlier Castlevania games, Belmont's Revenge's gameplay and design work exceptionally well given the limitations of the hardware. It's challenging, but really fun. My only major complaint is the four castles (which have branching paths, btw, which is also cool) are a bit long for a handheld experience. Nothing awful (and I'm glad for more content), they just seem to take a while. You still get ~2-3 hours of gameplay out of it, though (depending on how good you are), which is pretty dang good for a Game Boy platformer.

Like, you can beat Kirby's Dreamland in 30 minutes. Also, this boss is cheap.

Graphically, this game looks fantastic. The enemies have better death animations, with the eyeballs particularly having some 60 frames per second explosions that look great. The backgrounds (which were the one good thing about Castlevania: The Adventure) are even better this time around, and even though there aren't a lot of different enemies they all look great, especially the bosses.

When I first booted up the game and played Crystal Castle, my ears nearly exploded for joy. Ok, not really, that would be excruciatingly painful. But hot damn, this game has some rocking tunes. Seriously some of the best on the system, I have no idea how they made it work given the Game Boy's somewhat tinny sound chip. Really worthy of the series' legacy.

Seriously like...holy crap. LISTEN TO IT. 

Point being: Castlevania II: Not Simon's Quest, but Actually (Christopher) Belmont's Revenge is a phenomenal Game Boy game, and a really solid Castlevania game. Is it as good as the greats, like the original, Super, or Bloodlines? Well...not quite. But I will say I'd rather pick it up again than, say, Castlevania III. Or The Adventure. But I'd rather take a long dive off a short pier than play The Adventure again, so that isn't really fair.

I'm genuinely sad that I didn't have this game when I had a Game Boy growing up. It's a fantastic platformer and should be part of any Game Boy collector's collection.

I'd also like to point out that Castlevania: The Adventure is available on the 3DS eShop, but Belmont's Revenge isn't. If that isn't proof that Konami hates their fans, I don't know what is.

Oh wait. Yeah...

Four out of five stars.

When I'm comin' home, son, I don't know when, but we'll kill Dracula then, son, I know we'll have a good time then.

Donkey Kong '94

The Short

Pros

- Essentially a sequel to the original arcade Donkey Kong

- Over 100 new levels done in the style of the original game

- New power-ups, features, and tricks

- Great music and challenging gameplay

- Smart save features and level sizes make this an excellent portable game

- Has one of the best Super Game Boy (SNES attachment) borders in the business

Cons

- Game still has some cheap deaths

- Controls may feel dated for those used to more modern Mario titles

He's finally back, to kick some tail.

The Long

You know what game I like? Donkey Kong. It's arcade classic in every sense of the word. Sure it's controls feel a little old now and at times it is maybe a bit cheap, but it's still a ton of fun and a great mix of skill, patience, and memorization that makes it great.

Now how do you translate a score-driven arcade classic to a portable system? Well, Donkey Kong on the Game Boy (also known as Donkey Kong '94, because they used the exact same name as the arcade game for some reason) makes the attempt. Do they succeed in making what is essentially a direct, portable, console-style version of one of the most popular arcade games of all time?

They not only succeed, they excel. 

This seems familiar.

The game starts off with a brilliant bait and switch. It has an intro similar to the original arcade game, complete with a height measurement and DK bending the floors. You then play through the four levels of the original arcade game, in order, in what is a fairly faithful reproduction. But after beating them and expecting a prize...psych! Donkey Kong learned from his mistakes and runs off again, this time with 97 (!!) more stages for you to try and beat. That's right Ninety-Seven! That's a freaking lot of stages for a Donkey Kong game!

You advance on a world-map style screen, moving from stage to stage until finally fighting a boss. The stage goals are usually simple: collect a key to open a door, collect Pauline's lost stuff (hats, shoes, etc) for more points, dodge baddies, yada yada. The trick is that, while this is clearly Mario, Donkey Kong rules apply here. Jumps require commitment and are delayed. Mario can't fall a long distance or he'll die. Movement is fairly slow and deliberate. Essentially, Nintendo made 97 stages that would have fit right in with the original Donkey Kong arcade game.

That's pretty freaking awesome.

Insert Gandalf's "I have no memory of this place." here.

On top of that, the game adds tricks along the way. Each new world introduces a new style or technique you have to master. Mario learns how to do a handstand into a high jump, requiring some precise timing but allowing for more mobility. Some stages have switches that have to be tossed or bridges that must be created. New pickups and other items are also available. The game does an excellent job of easing you into these new powerups, often having the first level of a world be there to explain the ability, then throwing it into the mix with the rest of them.

All these power-ups fit well with the previously established movesets and rules of Mario from the Donkey Kong game, and blended with the new stages it all meshes together perfectly. The only downside is the general trickiness of the later stages and the lack of checkpoints; die during a stage and you start it all over. But that being said, most stages are single screen (making good use of the Game Boy's limited real estate) puzzle and platforming rooms, so dying is often more the fault of you screwing up or having bad planning, not a fault of the game.

Small cutscenes at the start of each world explain new gameplay tricks.

The game looks fantastic. It manages to maintain the look of the arcade (granted, dumbed down for Game Boy) while still offering a ton of new graphical stuff, like new floors, enemies, and items. The music is also really fun, with classic songs showing up alongside new ones that fit right in. In particular, the game looks really good on either a Game Boy Color, or (the best option) a Super Game Boy for the SNES. This makes sense, as the game was marketed heavily when trying to sell the Super Game Boy (all the screenshots in this article are from that), which adds a really spiffy looking "arcade cabinet" style border.

Plus...LOTS O' LEVELS

If you loved Donkey Kong in the arcade, you absolutely must play this game. As an extension of the well-known classic, it not only succeeds at bringing a similar feel to a home system, but expands upon the idea in what is essentially a perfect handheld game. With stages being brief and challenging, as well as copious options to save, it's a great game to pick up and play for brief periods (or long periods, seeing as it's super addicting) and get some classic arcady feel that also manages to be fresh at the same time.

Of all the bajillion Donkey Kong games released, this one is by far my favorite. It's now available on the 3DS eShop for only a couple of bucks, and should be an essential part of your collection. Original carts are also pretty easy to find (I mean, I found one) should you prefer to play it super old school (or in your Super Game Boy, i.e., the best option). This game also inspired the Mario vs Donkey Kong games on the GBA and DS, which were good but just didn't match the originality and all-around awesomeness of Donkey Kong '94. 

Five out of five stars. 

Though why Pauline needs so many umbrellas is still beyond me.

Donkey Kong 3

The Short

Pros

- Decently fun arcade shooter

- Music and sound effects are classic

- Platform idea for a shooter is clever and adds some interesting twists

- Very faithful to the original arcade game

Cons

- The original arcade game wasn't that great to begin with

- Stiff controls, which worked for the first two games, falter here in a shooter

- The bugs' patterns are maddening to try and figure out

- Like...it's a game where you shoot Donkey Kong between his legs. That's the game. Why. 

Yes, this is actually a real thing.

The Long

If your first reaction to seeing this review was "Wait, what? There's a Donkey Kong 3?" then you'd be in the majority. After the success of Donkey Kong and Donkey Kong Jr, Nintendo decided to take the big brown ape on what would be his final arcade excursion in Donkey Kong 3: Galaga Edition. That's right, this isn't a platformer starring Mario or DK's lovable if somewhat dorky looking son, instead you're playing what is essentially a space shooter. And the enemy (aside from DK)? Bugs. Or bees, I guess, as they have hives. And little worms that block your path.

Really not swan song to end out on, guys.

DK summons pestilence from above, a sign of the oncoming ape-ocalypse.

In this game you aren't Mario, but Stanley. Stanley, as you can imagine, is very well known in that he hasn't appeared in a single game since Donkey Kong 3. Due to his purple hair and shoes I like to pretend that all the exposure to the toxins in the bugspray warped him, turning him into Waluigi, but that isn't confirmed by Miyamoto yet and he won't return my calls. So it's pretty much 100% fact. Hey, denial = proof. 

In Donkey Kong 3: To Bee or Not To Bee, you are charged with one simple task: shoot DK's...um...tender spot. His nether regions. Between his legs, so to speak. Stanley (looking straight up while firing, must be quite the view) has this big dumb monkey in his zoo or something and needs to get him out. So the logical solution is to blast him over and over until he crawls off the top of the screen. Yeah, ok, it isn't Mass Effect or anything but it gets the job done. 

DK's most embarrassing moment.

You can't reach him from ground level, as your spray has limited range. The game does, however, remedy this with it's feeble attempt at platforming. As in, there is a literal platform Stanley is standing on (and it's structure changes slightly between three variations as you play levels) and you can hop up or down it at will. Kind of different.

DK's end game (aside from reaching the bottom of the poles and murdering you viciously), is agitating nearby bees' nests. These bees are the size of a man and are way pissed off...but mostly pissed off at the flowers beneath Stanley. The bees'll try and make off with them, and Stanley has to murder the nefarious insects in order to recover the plants. Lose all the plants, you die. Get hit by a bee, you die. And, of course, DK can crush you because he's a monkey the size of Andre the Giant. 

A laff a minute in DK3

There's a few more tricks. Shoot DK enough and he might drop a spray power-up, which gives it max range and pierces multiple enemies. This also carries between levels if you still have time left on it, which is nice. There are also obnoxious caterpillars that will block your shots and are unkillable unless you have the upgraded gun. The goal is, obviously, to get a high score, as the game just cycles with more and more bees (and varying types) until you succumb to an awful, bee-infested death. 

Stanley, played by Nicholas Cage, in the film adaptation of DK3.

There are multiple problems with Donkey Kong 3 that made it far less memorable than it's predecessors. First, it isn't a platformer, and while it's a decent enough shooter the risk probably pushed most die-hard players away. Second, the bugs come off as unfair. Their patterns are only somewhat predictable, unlike most shooting games like Galaga where you can learn the patterns easily, and they're such small targets they can be hard to hit. Third, your weapon sucks, and having to constantly fight a war of attrition with an ever-lowering DK only makes this all the more evident. And lastly, the game's clunky controls don't work in it's favor at all. Donkey Kong and Donkey Kong Jr.'s movement and platforming feel archaic compared to modern games, but it was clear the game was built and balanced around that. I got none of this in Donkey Kong 3. Most of my deaths felt cheap or unavoidable, whereas in the previous two games I knew my deaths were always my own fault.

Point being, it plays clunky, feels unfair, and isn't at all like the previous two games. And that was enough to doom it to obscurity (and essentially kill the franchise, save the Donkey Kong Game Boy game and later Donkey Kong Country games). 

Stanley's enormous eye might be my favorite part of the game.

Graphically it looks good, in both the arcades on NES. While I have very limited experience with the arcade version of Donkey Kong 3, the NES version felt just about arcade perfect, for better or for worse. Again, these machines are hard to find, so correct me if I'm way off track here, but it looks and sounds almost identical.

But it doesn't really mean much if the underlying game is just a monkey's worth of problems. While still technically mostly sound, Donkey Kong 3 feels like a chore to play and fighting for high scores just isn't as engaging. As an added bonus, the NES cart still doesn't save high scores, not that you'd be inviting all the cool kids on the block over to play some high-stakes DK3 anytime soon.

How the mighty apes have fallen, Donkey Kong 3 is a misstep in an otherwise perfect series of arcade games. Two out of five stars. 

He's the now-sterile member of the DK crew

Toki: Going Ape Spit

The Short

Pros

- It's got "Going Ape Spit" in the title. Like...wow. 

- Music (in sound test) is great

- The monkeys not only have subs in the underwater stages, but have monkey faces on the subs!

- Your primary attack is to spit things to death. Spit spit spit 

- Tons of difficulty and customization options

- Underwater level (level 3) is probably the best level

Cons

- Toki would lose a race against a snail

- Bad camera means you can't see much above or below you

- Cheap beginner's trap segments throughout

- No checkpoints; a death starts you all the way back at the start of a stage

- One hit deaths

I'm so mad I could spit!

The Long

Ever been so mad you could spit? No? What, are you saying that expression is outdated and probably tied to the old west's culture of chewing tobacco? Why are you saying all this in a video game review?

Let me tell you: spitting is pretty great, in my experience. Spitting is an exciting thing you can do pretty much anywhere, and all it requires is a little bit of saliva. On top of that, you can up your spitting game by spitting off things that are really tall. Trees, the Empire State Building, the International Space Station; these are all things good to spit off of. 

Why do I bring this up? Because Toki: Going Ape Spit is a game about a monkey that spits on everything. Everything. Mostly other monkeys, but, yeah. Some game designer was sitting down one day and thought "We need a new idea for a run-n-gun game. People have already made Gunstar Heroes and Contra, what else can we do? The well has run dry!" and then...

A Spitting Monkey. 

It printed gold. Well, it actually didn't, but The Legend of Toki (as the game is known in Japan) was an arcade game that was ported to both the NES and the Genesis. The Genesis version is the one we're reviewing today, because it's the only version with the awesome subtitle Going Ape Spit. Which makes it earn the award for "Best monkey game ever made that almost has a swear in the title that could double as a pun."

Don't order the hot wings next time. Toki.

The story makes as much sense as most retro games, that is, it makes no sense at all. Toki is a studly, studly muscle man hanging out with his super-hot wife, when an alien city appears out of nowhere and a giant blue hand steals his wife and transforms him into a piece of spit monkey! Holy cow! Actually, now that I think about it, this is like a combination of the openings of Congo's Caper and Adventure Island 3! Nobody will get these references, great review!

Anyway, Toki is going batspit insane without his lady-friend, so he decides to go off on an adventure. And his primary weapon of choice? Saliva. Mucus. Phlegm. Loogies. And sometimes triple, multi, or charged shot variations of those. 

Toki: Going Ape Spit is a "run-n-gun." Well, I use that in the loosest sense of the word: it's more like a walk-n-gun or a trudge-n-gun. Toki moves extremely slow, though he has an impressive vertical jump distance. As you move forward you spit the ever loving spit out of those spithead enemies you come across (usually other jungle critters) with your spit-slinging powers. Toki can fire in all eight directions, and with powerups being plentiful and lasting a long time, you'll be toting some serious spit-power as you attempt to get your lady back.

Assuming you don't touch anything ever. Because this is one of those "one hits kills you" games. 

You'll meet some ugly folks along the way.

It's about halfway through the first level when you realize that you kind of hate Toki: Going Ape Spit. Novel (as in "weird") concept aside, the game revels in it's unfairness. Toki's slow speed means reacting to faster enemies is almost impossible; you'll have better luck dodging traffic trying to cross the California I-5 freeway in a wheelchair. Spitting is (thankfully) fast, and honestly your only saving grace, but it does you no good if you can't see the enemies. And here's where Toki's biggest problem lies: the awful camera.

Because of the large sprite size, the camera doesn't really give you much of a field of view. Which is fine most of the time, unless you want to go up, down, left, or right into the unknown. There is a series of steps on the very first stage where an enemy will fly literally out of nowhere and kill you if you don't know to stop, look up, and see him coming. And don't get me started about stage two, which is vertically oriented. They give you Nikes (shoes that increase your jump height) which might as well have had a "die faster" sign next to them, as leaping higher almost surely puts you off the top of the screen and right into an insta-gib enemy. It's infuriating.

But then something happens. Something really weird. You start to get it. You understand now: every step must be cautious. Taki's slow, deliberate movements. The enemies' obnoxious yet calculated placement. The dangerous heights and unfair deaths. You have to take everything slow, examine every ledge and upward climb, and be fast to react on the trigger. You have to expect to die again and again until you memorize enemy placement and patterns, calculate exactly what weapon to use when in this elaborate dance of death.

You heard it here first folks: Toki: Going Ape Spit is the Dark Souls of Genesis monkey games. 

Plus Toki can now defy the laws of physics.

The game's difficulty curve makes no damn sense whatsoever. Anything on a platform is difficult, with stage two and its vertically-oriented stage being a horrible offender. But then you get to stage three, which is a water stage, and it's so much easier, in fact it's probably the funnest stage in the game. This is probably because you not only have decent movement speed, but also free range movement. The camera also is now forced to follow you (because of that movement change) which means you can actually see enemies as they come. Plus every course in stage three is absurdly short, making the whole area a cake walk. This is, unfortunately, the only water level in the whole game, out of the total of nine stages, each with their own bosses. 

Which reminds me: the majority of the bosses are cake. The first boss requires you to employ the most difficult of strategies: learn how to shoot up. The second boss requires an even more complex strategy: press "spit" a lot. And so on and so forth; not particularly challenging. 

He looks scary, but he's a piece of spit.

Graphically, this game is a mixed bag. It has that "super muddy" Genesis look, like everything is covered in spit. But some of the enemies and bosses have a good amount of detail. The monkey subs with monkey faces on the subs are by far the highlight, and the fact that the boss of the stage is an even bigger monkey sub with an even bigger monkey face only makes it that much better.

Music is good...in sound test. See, going through sound test in the menus, I found a ton of really decent music in there. The problem is that in-game you'll be hearing one or two songs over and over and that's about it. Stages one, two, and four all have the same song. Three (thankfully) being underwater changes it, but that's it. Sound effects are minimal and hardly worth mentioning. 

Pictured: The best enemy in any game since Mega Man 3 PC's jogging fish

Toki: Going Ape Spit is a game that's hard to love, but even harder to hate. It gives an awful first impression, has some super dodgy level design, and altogether feels a bit like a bad arcade port (which is probably is). But on the flip side, once you spend the time to unravel its nuances, it isn't quite so bad. While the one-hit deaths and lack of stage checkpoints is brutal, it compensates by having a ton of options for continues, extra lives, and difficulty settings. Is Toki a spitty game? Well, kind of, but it's also one I actually spent the time mastering in order to eventually beat it. So, in the end, I guess it could be a lot worse. 

But it could be a hell of a lot better, too. Two out of five stars. 

Monkey see, monkey poo. See, I can make puns too, Toki!

Hatred

The Short

Pros

- Reasonably fun dual-stick shooter

- Art aesthetic reminds me of early-isometric era PC games, like Fallout

- Black and white color scheme (with explosions being in color) is striking

- Character's one-liner's are so bad, it has to be intentional

- Made me feel edgier than I did playing Doom in secret back when I was a kid

Cons

- Shooting controls are fairly lackluster

- Black and white makes it hard to differentiate objects in the environment

- The same button for executions (aka healing) is the same as swap weapons. Why.

- Very hard, with a minimal continues

- Short, especially for retailing at $20

- Subject matter and its "extreme edginess" will certainly turn off a few people

This guy should probably just go to a metal concert, and let of some steam.

The Long

I don't know whether to praise or condemn Destructive Creations (makers of Hatred), but I will say this: like Scott Cawthon of Five Night's at Freddy's fame, they know the state of the current gaming climate.

Hatred is a game about a mass-murderer. There is no beating around the bush here, no subtext or anything like you might have with Grand Theft Auto (or all the Call of Duty games for that matter): Hatred is about a dude in a trenchcoat wandering around town gunning down everybody he sees. If you are already grimacing, then this probably isn't the game for you. Because apparently it also wasn't the game for a lot of people, especially game journalists.

Due to its obviously controversial subject matter, Hatred got lampooned by a large number of blog style gaming websites. For a while there was nothing but a stream of posts about how repulsive the game was, how it should be banned, and so on. This was only exacerbated when the game not only got an AO rating (which the ESRB usually reserves for hentai games), but Twitch outright banned it, and it was temporarily pulled from Steam Greenlight despite being Greenlight within 24 hours (it was later returned). Like I said, Destructive Creations knew the state of game journalism. Like Scott used YouTubers as free press, these guys kept pushing the "edginess" of their game out there and sat back as the game marketed itself. On it's release (at the rather inflated price of $20) it became the best-selling game on Steam.

So all that aside...is the game actually, I dunno, any good? Is it a cess-pool of evil and filth and should be banned from society? Or is it really just mediocre and would have probably been ignored if people hadn't made a big stink about it?

Read on to find out (though you can probably guess where my money is).

Jack Thompson must be having an heart attack right about now.

There isn't much in terms of story to Hatred. Much like Postal and it's titular "Postal Guy," "Hatred Guy" is an angry trenchcoat wearing, dreadlocks donning crazy person. After a tutorial that could have been replaced with the game saying "it's a dual stick shooter," you leave your house and just start shooting people. While this is going on, they scream and run and beg for mercy (which you can't give them, as the objective is literally "Kill all the civilians"), and Hatred Guy mouths off some absurdly stupid one-liners. Honestly, I kind of chuckled at the one-liners, which probably makes me an awful person. But him saying things like, "Where's your guardian angel? Oh wait, I killed him." is such an absurd attempt at being EDGY that I can't help but chuckle.

To be honest, I was secretly hoping that this whole game was gonna pull the rug out from under everybody who criticized it and end up being some sort of elaborate critique of game violence. Seriously, I was really hoping for it. Considering how ridiculous the entire thing was, I was waiting for the Spec-Ops: The Line moment where the game became self aware of its atrocities and critiqued me, the player, for continuing to engage in them. Honestly, as some sort of meta-analysis of gaming violence and outrage (especially seeing as this is literally the sort of "school-shooting simulators" Jack Thomson was warning us about back when he attacked Grand Theft Auto 3 in the early 2000s) it really could have done something brilliant.

It doesn't, in case you were wondering. It's just some vain, B-movie attempt at EDGE. 

For some reason, the police aren't really cool with your murdering rampage.

Gameplay itself is dated, as in "the indie scene finally got over dual-stick shooters like three years ago." Essentially, it plays like Alien Shooter or Zombie Shooter (both better dual-stick shooters where you murder tons of stuff in gory violence and for great stress relief, but lacking EDGE) but set to the idea of Postal. You can have three weapons and three grenade types at any given time, and can switch them on the fly. You also find new ones as you run around. Weapons have surprisingly small clips, so you'll have to reload frequently and play somewhat strategically if you're going to survive. Shotguns, in particular, suck really bad because not only do they have next to no range and do trash damage, reloading them takes exceptionally long. You also have very limited ammo, as it is only dropped by the police (and they can be hard to take down), so the game advises you to use handgun ammo on civilians (or just kick them and execute them) and save the heavy artillery for those who can actually fight back.

On that note, civilians are essentially just walking health potions. The only way to gain life is to "execute" fallen enemies, which is done by putting them in a wounded state (either by shooting them or kicking them) and pressing Y. You then get one of several canned charming executions, usually involving the person begging for their lives as you gun them down. It sounds shocking (and it arguably is), but context is important here, because most shooter games also have similar execution animations (complete with begging) as part of their systems. I'm not making a statement one way or another, just tossing out facts.

You also have a plethora of side-missions, which actually end up being part of the main objective for each area. Completing the side missions gives you respawn points (of which there is a very limited number) should you fall in battle. Fall and not have any respawns and you're done, game over, but luckily there's a stage select so you don't have to start the whole game from the beginning.

Executions range from quick and painless to long and tedious.

Hatred looks decent in stills, not as much in execution.

There are lots of problem here, though, and I don't mean just the content matter. Hatred's dual-stick controls feel sloppy all around. Normal aiming puts a reticule only a short distance from you, and the option for a longer-distance zoom (with the left trigger pressed in) makes the camera sloppy and somehow harder to aim (despite giving you a laser sight). I found myself gravitating towards a "spray and pray" style, meaning using the handgun was more of a chore than fun. Keep in mind: I love dual-stick shooters, and consider myself pretty good at them (I got all the achievements in Geometry Wars 2, so there's that). The controls just felt overtly stiff, and the aiming straight up bad. A little auto-aim probably wouldn't have hurt. That or some sort of visual indication when dealing with height/obstacles blocking your vision.

Another big problem is the difficulty. Hatred feels unnecessarily punishing, both in delivering you ammo to continue fighting, to recovering life, to its archaic checkpoint system. I managed to beat the game on Easy only failing once or twice, but on Normal it proved a considerably harder challenge. On the harder difficulties it turns into a game of hide and seek with the cops, praying a weak enemy is close enough for you to execute and get health. It isn't particularly fun, nor stress relief, which is what I envisioned this game being when I first took an interest in it.

The pervasive control problems continue throughout the game. The button for execute (Y on a controller) is the same as "Change Weapon," and since executions are necessary (and hard to see if they're in the right state due to the homogeneous black and white graphics) I often found myself changing weapons instead of executing, or ending an execution with the wrong gun equipped. It can also be hard to see objectives and where to go, though the mini-map does provide a little bit of help in that regard. All in all, what should have been a fun stress-relief orgy of violence is instead a clunky, mildly frustrating mess. At least I get to hear Hatred Guy's stupid quips while "crashing" a party.

Hatred looks decent in stills, not as much in execution.

Graphically, Hatred is as mixed a bag as its gameplay and controls. I actually found the black and white visual aesthetic striking (also giving the game more EDGE), with only certain things (red barrels, explosions, blood, police lights) providing a splash of color on the bleak world. If I were going to actually analyze this game, I'd praise them for having the world appear mundane in the eyes of the protagonist until he's doing something awful (blowing up stuff, killing people, etc. are the only actions that have color in them), but honestly they probably didn't think that far ahead when making the game. But, to be fair, it does do some really cool stuff with shadows, particularly in the mandatory sewer level. Also the explosions (and the destructible environments) look pretty rad. I like the 2000s-era Fallout style of isometric visuals they went with.

The color scheme does have a lot of issues, however, especially in darker areas (which is...like everywhere, but especially the sewers). Since it's all gray, it can be extremely difficult to see enemies in the dark against the also-gray backgrounds. This got me killed several times, where I was being shot at but couldn't quite spot the enemies in the darkness. Yes, I could click in the right stick for a quick scan, but you try clicking the right stick while also aiming with it, moving with the left stick, zooming with the left trigger, and firing with the right. It's bloody controller Twister, and considering how inconstant the aiming is anyway it probably wouldn't have worked out regardless.

Music and sound is...there. The music is generally uninteresting, and the voice work mostly consists of people screaming and Hatred Guy saying stupid stuff. I'll say it's all just mediocre and leave it at that, because I can't think of anything else to say.

Lastly, I'll mention that (since this is a PC only game), Hatred stutters from time to time, even with a souped-up rig like mine. I imagine that's just poor optimization, but those load times? Really?

The roof...the roof...the roof is on FIYAH!

In closing, I'll address the obvious elephant in the room: how I felt about Hatred's content matter. Honestly? I did feel a little like a horrible person the first few minutes I played through it. But the game's so blatant attempt at EDGINESS actually became kind of endearing after a while. Is Hatred's subject matter all sort of screwed up? Yeah, kind of. I mean, video games as an industry often feel built around violence, and the fact that a game like this just cuts any pretense of giving that violence justifiable context and essentially is a school shooting/murder simulator is weirdly...I don't know, honest? Is it damaging the industry by existing and should be condemned? Nah, and honestly the uproar given to it was predictable and probably not justified. But even so, a game is only as good as its actual gameplay and mechanics, and Hatred just falls short on so many levels.

To me, this is fairly synonymous to me playing Doom as a child. My parents outright banned it in the house, and even banned me playing it at friends' houses. I'd have to sneak over to the right friends at the right time in order to play the game, talking about it in hushed tones when we'd meet and hope our parents didn't hear about how we blew demons away in bloody viscera. Both were EDGY at the time, and both caused a lot of uproar, but honestly I don't see anything wrong with something like this existing. If anything, it could prove that games, even mainstream ones, have no limits in the content they'll dare to tread on. I'm just really annoyed they didn't pull the rug out during the final act and do something clever with it.

The game released at $20, which is kind of absurd considering both its length (only a few hours, if that), mediocre controls, and general repetitiveness of the gameplay. If you still have some interest in it, I'd say you could at least sate your curiosity at a lower price tag (say, $5 or less or in a bundle), but honestly there are much better dual-stick indie shooters out there.

Plus then you won't cut yourself on the EDGE!!!!!

Two out of five stars.

Carmageddon, eat your heart out.