In light of the DLC coming out early next year, I figured now would be a good time to make this review
. Cuphead is a sidescroller/boss rush game for PC and Xbox One by the indie devs Studio MDHR. I had been following this game since it's announcement in 2014 showed off the 1930s Fleischer Bros. style animation and all the crazy, dark surrealism that came with that studio.
Story:
Cuphead gets himself and his brother Mugman into a bind when he bets their souls shooting craps at The Devil's casino. They manage to strike a deal with The Devil; in exchange for keeping their souls, they have to go around Inkwell Isles beating the crap out of the denizens who also owe their souls and bringing their contracts back to him.
Graphics:
As stated before, Cuphead's aesthetic draws heavily from rubber hose cartoons from the 1930s, specifically Fleischer Studios cartoons (though Cuphead with his red shorts is a bit reminiscent of Mickey Mouse). Every character is hand drawn with thousands of frames of silky smooth animation and watercolor backgrounds. Every aspect, from Cuphead and Mugman's bobbing to the film grain and crackling goes hard in taking you to that magical time in the 30s when things could be absolute insanity without needing to make logical sense (see video below).
Cuphead is lovingly crafted, every frame is dripping with personality, and I just can't get enough of some of these backgrounds. As someone who was tired of all the "gritty" "realistic" games trying to out-polygon each other and with the unique aesthetic, in my opinion, this was the best looking game of 2017.
Gameplay:
Cuphead is a boss rush game. Don't let the cutesy cartoony look fool you, this game will rock your balls and get you tilted. The good thing about the difficulty is that it's not artificial...if you screw up, you get punished, but then there's the satisfaction of learning your enemy, getting better and finally vanquishing them. To help keep you motivated, every time you die, you're shown how far you progressed, with flagpoles showing where then next phase begins and a flag at the end.
Every single boss is unique, each with their own strategies and two or three phases. You have bosses that you fight on foot and bosses that you fight in a plane. The plane bosses often have bullet hell attacks. To break up the bosses a bit, you have side scrolling run and gun stages where something is always spawning in to kill you you a-la Contra and an overworld that's every bit as detailed as anything else in the game with hidden pathways, coins and small side quests. Cuphead and Mugman fire magic attacks from their fingers. Using coins you collect from the run and gun stages and the overworld, you can shop for weapon upgrades and ability charms. In addition to the magic attacks, you also get a parry slap when you hit the jump button twice. This can be used on anything that's pink. You can also pick up one special in each of the three overworlds from mausoleums. You can also play the game with a friend on local co-op. Player 2 controls Mugman. With two players, the bosses have bigger health pools and if your friend dies, you can rez them by parrying their ghost. Now there were bugs, broken achievements and some janky hitboxes at launch, but most of these have since been patched out.
Sound and music:
The music in this game is phenomenal. Each boss is accompanied by a jazzy number. Not really much I can say to do it justice, so I'll just leave a few tracks here:
The sound design also works towards the 1930s feel, with every sound effect and voice sounding like it was recorded in the 30s and film crackling.
In conclusion:
If you want a good challenge, Cuphead may be right up your alley. The game runs nice and smooth and has tight controls, both of which are good things given that precision is key here. The visuals and music come together to create an experience like nothing has before. I definitely recommend this one and you can bet I'm getting that DLC.
Cuphead
Never heard of this game before but now I am really interested.
