Developer: Zootfly
Publisher: 505 Games
Rrp: £3.99
Released: 20th September 2013
Available on Steam
Do you like the action films of the late 80’s and early 90’s? With their ridiculous over the top action and cheesy dialog? What about hack and slash games? If the answers yes to both then this may be a game to check out.
Marlow Briggs and the Mask of Death is a dumb hack and slash Game in the style of the likes of God of War and it knows it. It embraces the idea gladly, with over the top action sequences and daft one liners.
As you may have guessed you play as Marlow Briggs and you were dead, but it’s ok because an ancient entity inhabiting a mask has brought you back to life and you’re the sacred warrior now.
The aforementioned mask is the main source of comic relief in the game, occasionally quoting lines from other games (not repeatedly mind you), ripping on your lack of skill or just from misunderstanding what’s going on. That being said the main antagonist isn’t exactly short of humorous things to say nor Mr Briggs himself.
Combat in this game is similar to that of God of War or Devil May Cry though not as well polished, which is a shame as fighting is what you’ll be doing about ninety percent of the time.
Enemies you kill give you experience points (XP), a small amount of health and a small amount of mana. As you progress through the game you will unlock new weapons and skills which can be upgraded by spending XP. A nice feature of the game is that, besides the usual avenues of gaining XP, you can also gain it by going into the combo training screen and successfully pulling off a combo. You can also gain XP by completing challenges and can be found scattered around the levels.
Enviably you will need to heal and recharge your mana, this can be done by collecting red masks for health and blue for mana. This process takes a few seconds to complete and during that time you are very vulnerable to attack.
The game is a linear experience, it’s not a criticism but more a statement of fact, not every game can be a grand sandbox adventure. Unfortunately the games aesthetic makes a lot of areas look accessible that really aren’t, meaning there are also lots of invisible walls.
Beyond that the game also has quite a few flaws, a major one being that occasionally the game crashed to the desktop for no apparent reason. Thankfully checkpoints are plentiful so play wasn’t really hindered, beyond having to start the program back up.
Your biggest enemy will likely be the camera, you can’t control it and it seems to like positioning itself in very unhelpful positions.
On the whole I actually really liked it. It’s stupid and it knows it. I like to think of it as video game junk food, cheap, fun and requires little to no thought. It’s not a long experience but I think if you give it a try you’ll enjoy it.
