6/30/2023 0 Comments Cyber shadow bossesToo nice for NES, not quite SNES, nostalgic while doing its own thing, and it works some kind of magic in its niche. It exists in the same between-zone as the likes of Shovel Knight or Cyber Shadow. It’s as straightforward as it is satisfying.Ī large portion of that satisfaction is sourced from Infernax‘s presentation. Swing the mace, splat the demons, gore comes out. Once you mix in the expanding arsenal of spells your options will broaden somewhat but those are more for special occasions. Early on it’ll be challenging enough just to reflect shots back at individual foes, but by endgame you’ll be comfortable smashing melee enemies while simultaneously returning spears to their senders. Not swinging raises your shield which blocks most projectiles, but (once you get an early ability) your swings can reflect them, which creates an interesting choice when enemies start piling up. It’s also mostly on one button aimed via jump or crouch. And sometimes you let the NPCs just do their thing for unreasonable amounts of time.Ĭombat is a constant. Instead it focuses on making each area distinct from the next, with unique hazards and challenges, allowing each to shine for its own reason. You will have reason to revisit areas, often utilizing a new spell or tool in your arsenal to complete a quest, but it never demands the constant backtracking most metroidvanias lean on. Instead each new area is a separate branch that typically demands a specific traversal tool to access. The game doesn’t railroad you once you leave the first town, meaning you can take on areas out of order to some extent, but the map is relatively small and most areas don’t connect in that maze-y way the genre tends to opt for. You could probably describe Infernax as a “metroidvania”, but I wouldn’t. It’s the game all of those were aspiring to be, the culmination of their ideas. It plays smoother, looks better, and is more fully featured. These comparisons are intentional Infernax invites them, celebrates its inspirations, even going so far as to include a couple of direct nods and references. It’s even a bit like Faxanadu, with a strong focus on exploration and occasional esoteric solutions to problems. It’s like Zelda 2, leveling your side scrolling dude with EXP and sending you back to square one if you bite it in dungeons. It’s like Castlevania 2, with its day/night cycle and constant combat with horror critters. Infernax resembles a lot of things, mostly classic NES games. ![]() Hell’s finest may look like nightmares, but they ain’t maceproof. This is the best retro action game I’ve played in years. It’s only March, I know that, but I guarantee this will be a legitimate game of the year contender come December. I’ve now completed this game 3 times, playing every main route, along with scooping up some extra endings along the way. I figured I would maybe hop around for an hour or so to see if it was interesting. So I decided to install Infernax on Game Pass on a lark, not knowing anything about it besides it looking Castlevania-y. It’s never been easier to hop from game to game, sampling until you finally find one you want to commit to. There are a ton of new releases demanding our attention, most of which deserve it. Video games feel like an embarrassment of riches right now.
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