Where the arcade style of games are concerned. having played this intriguing indie the past couple of days, SUPER FLAIL is the type of game that, although short in complexity as far as the gameplay cycle itself goes, manages to offer the one thing it does do rather well which, in this case, is a classic journey of seeing just how far one can go whilst coming up against increasingly difficult odds in the never-ending pursuit for either that big new high score or the next round, whichever flavour of poison suits your game style!
To touch upon the actual game itself though, SUPER FLAIL has the player control a skull that is connected to a giant flail via several hoops forming a loose chain of sorts as the goal is to kill off as many enemy skulls as possible, with there being several variants to deal with as I will touch upon later on, with the ultimate objective being to achieve as high a score as possible whilst also seeing just how far you can go with just three lives. (Of which I do not believe there is any way of gaining additional lives in this, so make each life count!)
Since no doubt one of the stand-out points of this unusual indie is just how awkward it is to properly utilize the flail in an effective manner, seeing how anything that touches it will get killed unless it is a foe that can resist being hit or takes multiple blows to fully kill, as you need to move your little skull to have the giant spiked ball of death follow you close by, with the technique lying in how you maneuver your character in such a way that you can both lay waste upon the incoming enemies via a nice swing across the field without accidentally bumping your own skull into one of the enemies closing in on you, especially with how surprisingly easy it is to lose track of it as the game progresses!
No doubt the variety of said skull enemies, albeit lacking for my own personal tastes, still offers a fair challenge to keep things interesting, as the red skulls simply walk towards you and can easily be taken care of by a good swing of the flail or simply sitting inside of it (a viable tactic surprisingly!) so that they kill themselves by running into it, the beefy grey skulls challenge this though as they require three hits to take down and simply remaining idle would have them phase through the ball after the first hit and kill you requiring you to adjust positions, then the yellow skulls spicen things up by shooting projectiles at you, green skulls blow upon impact which invalidates the above strategy completely by requiring hitting them from a distance and blue skulls are harder versions of the yellow ones by shooting three projectiles at once alongside emitting a blast of projectiles once killed, so on and so forth!
Obviously I won't spoil all of them, albeit I do sorely wish that there was more variety to them so that, instead of simply relying on bigger numbers and faster speeds, it could also add in new complexity of dealing with former enemies having 'evolved' alongside completely new threats to make for a great challenge for later rounds, (with each round requiring the boss at the end to be conquered, sadly being the same giant skull foe over and over again) so it is disappointing that not more was done to incentivize further skilled gameplay for those willing to learn.
Although to flip things around, seeing as this is very much a skill-based game that requires a lot of practice to get into the 'swing' of things as it were, SUPER FLAIL is generous enough to allow the player to choose one of five abilities (with only the Fire ability unlocked at the start, requiring certain achievements to grant access to the others) so that they can carry with them a temporary power-up activated via the push of the space bar to help them out when the going gets tough, whether it be to use the Fire power-up to give their flail a bigger radius, the Shock ability to combo groups of skulls together upon contact or the Pulse skill to act as a 'shield' against projectiles as well as slowing any skulls within range of the flail and so on, though bearing in mind you can only use it three times per life but will replenish when you lose a life which encourages immediate usage for newer players whilst more skilled players are tempted to conserve them for when it matters most.
Alongside having two separate modes, a normal regular mode that all players start on coupled with an unlockable 'Insane Mode' (basically spawning far more enemies at a faster rate than in the normal game) by means of attaining a hard achievement, certainly the challenge is there for those who are looking for the usual Arcade goodness in their indies, although it must be said that the lack of variety in SUPER FLAIL's challenging gameplay cycle leaves something to be desired.
Though to conclude this review, for what small of an amount the asking price is for such a title here, SUPER FLAIL is fun enough to warrant at least a couple of hours gameplay for the casual gamer and could potentially stretch to over the two-figure mark for more dedicated Arcade enthusiasts, albeit I do wish there was a couple of simple changes to add more variety in the long-run, but alas it is only a £0.79 game here so make of that as you will!
TLDR Version:
• An arcade-like game that rewards skill and effort by mastery of the unique controls of a flail attached to a skull to smash many enemies with (+)
• Multiple power-ups that encourage repeated playthroughs to discover which one suits your playstyle best (+)
• Different types of enemies that grow in numbers as you progress into further rounds, testing your quick reflexes and skill over the flail whilst evading ever-growing waves of foes (+)
• SUPER FLAIL being a very cheap game on Steam allows for easy access for a short but satisfying gaming experience (+)
• Gameplay does not offer much variety once you are familiar with the cycle and it's challenges, with no 'evolution' of enemies in later stages alongside other obstacles to contend with (-)
• Building on the point above, there is only one boss that doesn't change which could have also seen additions for the end of each round to further challenge skilled players (-)
• The two different gameplay modes, although neat in concept, does not do enough to differentiate itself outside of the number of enemies thrown at you in each round (-)
