Resolutiion

Resolutiion, no the name’s not a typo, it’s clever wordplay, I think! Resolutiion is an action-adventure videogame with enough neon pinks and 90s synth music to satisfy any indie gamer. The 16-bit style graphics and color saturation remind me of Hyper Light Drifter, but you'll hear that a lot. Monolith of Minds has borrowed some aesthetics from their competitors but there's enough here to make it unique. Unfortunately, the story is a bit cliche. A robot named Valor has lost its memory and has to retrace its steps with the help of a sympathetic AI named Alibii who is trying to patch into the Cradle Network. Yes, plenty of techno-babble to keep any sci-fi fan happy. The only hint you get to Valor’s past is a cut scene at the beginning of the game where Valor is transformed into, well Valor! The story doesn’t give much away. Snippets of narrative are delivered to you by Alibii and various NPCs which are sprinkled throughout the game. Resolutiion: Look & Feel You wander past monolithic skyscrapers, lofty walkways, and pixel-scapes of neon pinks and blues as you descend from Cloud City where the color scheme is slightly more orangey-beige. In the desert of Giants, there’s a burrowing sand cat a la Dune that chases you but there's no way to kill it. Like many things in Resolutiion, it's just there as a perfunctory obstruction to pad out the game. There's plenty of chaotic combat in the form of a simple slice-and-dice combo but that's it. No melee attack upgrades, just simple mechanics. The combat and environmental puzzles open new areas, but the one-button combo does become boring very quickly. If you're looking for a game with more combat options then you will find Resolutiion severely lacking. This wouldn't be such a problem if the game relied on dialogue choices like an RPG to guide you, but Resolutiion's mechanics are more combat-centric. As you ooo and ahhh at the profound, yet strangely cliche world, your audio senses are tickled with a Daft Punk-esque score. The techno sync punctuates the gameplay like a good conductor guiding an orchestra. It enhances the game in ways that the gameplay, sadly doesn't. However, in other areas, the music is profoundly melodic and haunting. Once you reach the Light/Dark Forest you can speak to the animals like Doctor Dolittle, but yet again they yield very little info so go ahead and slash them into bits with your claw-like hands. The music is particularly haunting with a melody that reminded me of the piano concerto in World War Z. I found it quite depressing after a while. There are some strange, if not damn right bizarre things in the forest like an abandoned Mad Hatters tea party table, a desperate head-thumping bear, and a huge beating heart. None, of them seem to have any consequence or purpose. You can pick up weapon upgrades such as the Stardust bomb, the Chromatic aberration that changes the way you see things, and the Martyr's Boot which turns you into yellow goop. There's a lot to like here, and the upgrades are quite original in concept. If you find a flashing NPC you might get a helpful hint, but you have to search for them at the beginning. Resolutiion: Mechanics and gameplay Save points are quite frequent which is handy for whenever you're obliterated into tiny cyborg bits. You just respawn with a full health bar and carry on. enemies don't respawn in the same session which makes it easy to focus on those more challenging boss battles. Speaking of boss battles, there are a few difficulty spikes that push you to your limit. So be prepared! Each biome makes excellent use of color and shade and it is one of the best things about Resolutiion. It's nice to look at, and it sustains you while you wrestle with the confusing map which looks like a badly wired circuit board. It offers no use except to give you a vague direction of where you're going. You will spend the majority of your gameplay retracing your environment. The more you progress, the more defined are your objectives and goals, but the environments are designed to be confusing, to mix the foreground with the background so you miss those exits, or overlook an important piece of info. Standard game design stuff that prolongs the gameplay. Levels are designed like a Metroidvania game. Some obstacles prevent you from progressing to the next area and unlocking upgrades, however, the upgrades sadly don't change your combo attack. As the game progresses more NPCs vomit exposition. These are normally profound and deliberately obtuse like a Yogi who's just fasted for two weeks and has reached total enlightenment. When you find the AI Shinto shrine things get trippy! You can use the Chromatic aberration upgrade to extend walkways and access other areas. Be careful of the Conspirator who says he can make you invisible for the dead cheap price of 33iec. What are iecs? Don't know! He then sends you down a pitch-black well only to find the words "Voila" graffitied on the walls. As the game progresses you're tasked with more mini quests, like using the stardust bomb to access the phantom pit and activating the pumps in the mechanical mine. Here you combat monks whiplashing you with the rubber-like goop from the mines, and why not? Spiritual enlightenment doesn't mean you can't thwack someone and knock their teeth out! Resolutiion: Graphics and sound Many of the bosses feel like they've escaped from a Mario game or some kind of Cuphead spin-off. The style is very eclectic and doesn't always feel like it fits with the overall tone of the game. One boss looks like a giant yellow wiener with legs. But the overall tone is philosophical and thought-provoking with strong anti-imperialistic undertones. Resolutiion suffers from too much form and not enough substance. In the early stages, it takes a little too long to get going and feels like it meanders. It also suffers from a lack of identity with too many different concepts and styles thrown into the gameplay. The Sprites are minimalistic which seems to be the vogue style at the moment. But the aesthetic clarity and artistic direction are bright and colorful with neon colors to promote a 70s retro style. However, the visual style is a little too similar to HyperLight Drifter.