Furi, a game by indie developers, The Game Bakers, almost perfectly shows how indie games are not shackled down by mainstream gaming concepts and is a perfect example of art that many games fail to provide in modern day gaming.
Furi is one of those few games that delivers completely on what it promises, i.e, epic boss battles and for a genre with this limited a scope, it does enough to surprise you and also gives you the thrills that this genre has to present. It takes a lot of elements from Dark Souls, as in long health bars, small maneuverable areas, memorizing the attack pattern of opponents etc, puts all these into a much more fast paced hybrid of twin stick shooting and 1v1 sort of hacky slashy close combat, and delivers a game that has you on your toes in all it’s fight sequences.
(+) Samurai X:
This is a Japanese style game, you can make it out pretty much make it out from the contrast in the character himself, all cybernetic and uses a sword & a gun and the art style as well. And if you have ever seen anime, a lot is there to feel ‘at home’ about. The controls are simple implementing the right analogue stick for the twin stick shooting parts and a set of other controls- Dodge, parry and attack, and in spite of the simple controls, it is anything but easy.
The dodge and attack can be charged to gain more distance and inflict more damage, but that’s all the complexity that the game has. I tried it first with the keyboard and mouse, even though the game recommended that I use a controller and it was clear that the twin stick shooting part was just impossible with the K&M setup, so I took up my dusty Xbox controller and then it became seemingly easy, until I reached the 9th level, that is (Explained below in the same section).
The basic mechanics of the game are, you gain health when you successfully parry an attack and if your timing is critical, then you stun the opponent and get a short flurry of attacks that do a certain amount of damage. For the twin shooting parts, the game requires you to dodge a lot and simultaneously hit the target which depletes his/her seeming shield.
Overall the game is quite simple in terms of button use, there is nothing which will be given to you at a certain stage and will be forgotten later on. The skill set it does require though, are reflexes and a lot of quick critical thinking. The attack patterns of enemies can get quite complicated in the twin stick shooter parts and you have to be on your toes, to look for quick gaps to exploit the space.
The gameplay is quite polished and responsive and I had no complains in my playthrough except for the portions of no actions, where you had the option to walk on your own or you can press X/A depending on which controller you have, and the latter is much more convenient between boss battles of lots of thumb twiddling.
Coming to the bosses, it is kept quite simple, you have to deplete the shield of the boss in the twin stick segments mixed with touches of melee and once his shield is down, you go into 1v1 melee mode where you have to parry all the attacks and finish the health bar this time.
Each boss may have a variety of phases depending on the difficulty you select, which also determines the number of lives you have. On the Furi difficulty, you have a total of 3 lives, and after each life is taken away from you, both you and your opponent’s health is regenerated. After 3 lives you have to start all over again and as per the difficulty, the number of phases of the boss and the number of lives keep increasing and decreasing respectively.
Picking up from reaching the 9th level, you must be wondering, what I meant. Well the 9th level;was one which I found to be the toughest, and when I thought of lowering the difficulty to move ahead, the script guilted me into continuing the game on the recommended settings and there I was trying to defeat the boss after 12-15 losses in a row.
So I picked up my trusty K&M, and wholla, there I was, done with the boss in the next few tries. The reason you ask? Well the game does overwhelm you with attacks from various directions and the bright balls and streaks from the attacks seem to create a bleach vision effect if you distract yourself from the screen.
Maybe it was due to my screen settings, but well, it does seem pretty hypnotic at times. And for me the analogue sticks simply don’t provide enough accurate movement as compared to the keyboard. The 8 directions system works in this case for me, the same reason why FIFA felt better to me on keyboard than on a controller, the precise movement.
Yes I know you may point out that an analogue has 360 round movement, but sometimes, it’s just a small angle due to which you might make a mistake. On a keyboard with limited directions to go, you know where you are going exactly and hence I had to use the K&M setup for that boss.
(+) Artistic Brilliance:
The game immediately caught my attention with the sense of art style and with the non-real beautiful textures. It doesn’t do much in the technical sense, but the design of each character and environment is well done and diverse, making every level and boss seem unique and pretty distinct. The world is filled with contrasting elements and have a very good quality of bringing out the contrast when it is truly required. The animations are slick and the graphics overall feel very bright and refreshing.
(+) The Score Definitely Scores:
Just one word for the sound tracks- Phenomenal. Not being a fan of EDM music or modern music in general, I was surprised at how much the music was getting me into the grooves. The way that the music resonated with the surrounding environment or you can say the sequences running on-screen is one of the best I have seen till date.
The slow thumping of beats in the intervals, the fast paced EDM tracks during the boss battles, it totally seemed like I was watching a visualization on VLC media player while running an EDM track. I have read that the music is composed by some of the most talented people in the music industry and well, it definitely shows here.
Apart from the music, the SFX perfectly aligns with the action and the animations which is a minor aspect, but still the finesse totally worth mentioning. The voice acting is not something out of this world, but is good enough to not make it feel robotic.
(+) Plot:
The story may not be it’s strongest point, but it is well presented through lengthy walking sections which are the only bummers in the game. Being a nameless samurai, reminding you of the Samurai Jack era with the addition of neon lights, released from prison by an eerie man donning a rabbit mask, you are hell-bent on freeing yourself from the clutches of the jailers (Or guardians). The plot is nothing very complicated but sure enough keeps you engaged and for what it’s worth, the ending is quite a surprise.
The silence of the protagonist may feel empty at first, but as the game moves ahead, we are given vague hints about our past and why we were detained in prison through the various bosses as well as the Rabbit Man (I like to call him that). The main attraction here is the history of the bosses we are about to face, which is explained vaguely by the rabbit man.
(+) The Bosses:
It is quite obvious, that a game with only boss battles will need an in-depth look to their bosses and as you go hacking and slashing through the bosses, you will notice the difference quite clearly. All the bosses are design wise unique as mentioned above, have different powers and are driven by a certain strong motivation. Each of the bosses have different opinions about us an what they have experienced while dealing with us in the past and there were moments in the game that felt inspired from anime, not only the design, but also the feeling.
The bosses contain within themselves a sense of synonymity with the environment they are found in, an aspect that is very tough to explain, for which you’ll have to experience the game. Being dark and bright at the same time, literally and symbolically, the emotion I felt while playing this game are hard to express in words.
Having an original personality is one aspect where this game excels. Unlike many other games where the personality is the only aspect taken care of, here the movement and attacks of the bosses are pretty much parallel to their personality. It is difficult to find a game that does this in such an excellent manner.
VERDICT
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