Absolum Review – IGN

They say that “insanity” is doing the same thing over and over again and expecting a different result, but if I believed that, I wouldn’t play video games – and I certainly wouldn’t play roguelikes. By definition, they always do the same things and expect that this time, this timeSteve, it will be different. This time I’m going to bang my head against this boss until this mother goes away. down. This timeI’m going to make it to the end of the race and I’m going to look fabulous doing it. This time will be different. These are the things I tell myself as I die for the umpteenth time in Absolum, a roguelite beater that’s fun enough to convince me it might just be true every time.

There is, of course, the undeniable possibility that I’ve come around the corner, full of hello for Cocoa Puffs, lock me in a padded room, Looney-Tunes-finger to lips crazy. I leave the choice to you. The point, reader, is that if you put a gun to my head for five hours in Absolum and demanded that I score it on the spot, it would be far lower than the score you see at the bottom of this page. But I’m a professional, and you don’t stop the film halfway through. There’s a lot of Absolum’s genre-melding that doesn’t work, and those growing pains are most evident early on. But if you continue this weak start and get to the point where you have permanent rewards, have opened the map, and the races end with a full kit and good progression, everything flows pretty well, even if it’s still not quite the game I wanted it to be.

“Roguelite beat ’em up” is a combination of words I never expected to see, let alone put in a sentence, but here we are. Because it’s a roguelite, you need a reason to die and a reason to come back. The reason for dying is simple: the land of Talamh, shattered by a magical cataclysm (brother, what are mages and magical cataclysms? Why can’t they ever find their way to magical utopias?), has been taken over by the Sun King Azra. Wizards are reduced to slavery, and the general population, still a little upset by the whole “breaking the world” thing, is naturally not very upset about it. You play as one of the rebels using this forbidden magic to try to bring him down. This is the “how you’re going to die” part.

The “why you’ll come back” part is because you work for Uchawi, the last of the Root Sisters, and as you bite her, she rushes in and saves you from being condemned to a permanent end. Live, die, be saved by Uchawi, repeat. The Sun King must die. And you have to kill him.

Now, don’t get me wrong: I love a good old “someone hurt someone/a lot of people/society/the world at large and now someone has to die” story as much as the next guy, but the problem with Absolum is that the story isn’t that interesting for much of its runtime, especially at the beginning. Yes, there are some fascinating character moments, the general story of the world is cool, and some conversations enticingly imply more questions than they answer. There’s a lot more going on here than meets the eye, but much of it is couched in a fairly generic fantasy setting. The dwarves live underground, they have delved too eagerly and too deeply (figuratively), bad things have happened; the elves have a mythical and lost land; the strong rule in many places so you can enter by beating The Current Big Boss, blah blah blah. The story ends up taking place in some cool locations (and, like Hades, you really have to play it multiple times to see everything), but it takes a while to get there.

It is therefore good that the role of Absolum rules. In many ways, it’s a standard beat ’em up with four different characters to choose from (even if you only start with the first two listed here): Karl, the murderous dwarf with a gun; Galandra, the elf knight with the massive sword; Cider, an agile thief who is almost more machine than woman; and Brome, the frog-shaped spellcaster. Each character has a standard combo, throw, strike unique to that character – Galandra uses her sword, Cider pulls herself towards enemies, etc. – some unique special attacks tied to a meter and an ultimate attack.

The real sick stuff comes when you combine everything into long combos, bounce enemies off walls or onto each other, and string the moves together in a symphonic beat that would make the deepest action game fan blush. Absolum was created by the teams behind Streets of Rage 4 and, as you would expect, it absolutely has the sauce. I particularly liked how so many moves paid homage to the greats: Cider’s Gyro Drop is essentially Ryu Hayabusa’s Izuna Drop, many of Galandra’s moves are reminiscent of Dante from Devil May Cry, etc. If you know, you know. If you don’t, they’re just cool moves.

The big thing that separates Absolum from its beat ’em up brethren, aside from the whole “dude, can you get lost in this sauce and that” tastes good” Combo-crazed gameplay is all about defense. You can dodge, which is pretty normal for a modern beat ’em up, but if you dodge towards an enemy at the right time, you can deflect their attacks, potentially cutting them open. If you’re feeling particularly spicy, however, you can time your strikes with an enemy’s attack to provoke a clash and stun them for a second hot, allowing you to go after him with a sweet, gentle punishment combo. It’s more difficult, but the payoff is enormous. And it’s great to face him against a boss who was kicking you, and then the timing kicks in and he can’t hit you anymore. In terms of moment-to-moment gameplay, Absolum’s good faith is impeccable.

Rather, its problems come from its roguelite structure. Unlock new rituals that strengthen your attacks, deflections, clashes, dodges, etc. every race, it’s good. I especially like the ones that spawn throwable knives and let you extend combos by trapping guys in a bubble or hitting them with a light chain. Are you looking for a mount to help you? Awesome. Buy or find trinkets to improve your stats or hire a mercenary (or find a chicken) to follow you and help you in battle? This stuff is awesome.

What’s a shame is that parts of each character’s kit have clearly been cut up and segmented into upgrades called Inspirations that you can temporarily acquire during your runs. Galandra’s diving kick? Amazing. Life changing. The same goes for his three-hit sword combo. She should always have it. It’s not just because it’s a roguelite and we have to have something to improve on, a reason to choose this path that you know will end in inspiration. When you go from that one-hit sword attack to the three-hit combo, it’s like being struck by lightning. The same goes for Cider’s legally distinct Izuna Drop or its ability to pass through enemies. “Oh,” I said after receiving them once. “This is how it should be always be.” These are essential parts of these characters’ identities and kits. They should not all being locked behind random upgrades. Like, give me something here that I don’t need to unlock other than my special strikes and attacks, y’all. Just a little fun, as a gift. Certainly, once you learn which paths lead to upgrades (Absolum is a roguelike, but its map doesn’t change), you’ll quickly learn what the optimal path is and will likely never deviate from it.

The other problem is persistent progression. Absolum isn’t a game you’re supposed to beat on the first try. You’re meant to die – often – as you accumulate the currency needed to acquire permanent upgrades (and find new paths full of rewards) to help you get through future races. Yes, of course, if you’re really good at Absolum you might be able to progress faster, but the margin for error in the beginning is very, very small. In both solo and co-op, I often felt like I was dying because my numbers just weren’t high enough. It doesn’t help that Absolum is quite stingy when it comes to health. This structure might work in a game like Hades, but there’s very little narrative fodder to chew on between races, and in a beat ’em up – a genre where you can traditionally get by on talent – it feels bad to be a slave to the evil god of numbers. I really hate it when RPG elements get in the way of my action gameplay, and it happens a lot in the early hours of Absolum.

At first, races feel like you’re going through the motions. You always start at the same place and have very limited paths to choose from. This means seeing the same enemies, environments, and bosses over and over again with very little room for change. Yes, there are quests, and exciting new things appear from time to time – I’ll never forget the first time I went (redacted) (trust me, you’ll know when it happens) – but there’s a lot of repetition here, and Absolum doesn’t handle that the way the best roguelikes do, like FTL, for example. In the early morning hours, I often felt like a broken record, testing this definition of insanity. Even the joy of finding a secret chest is dulled by the fact that it lies always therein the same place, every time. Even though the items you get will change and new things will be added, the map itself never fundamentally changes. There isn’t enough Rogue for this roguelite. It can’t just be a progression system. Everything has to be about that too, and the implementation of that conflicts with the way beat ’em ups work.

It finally clicks; About 8 hours later, my Mastery and Having Enough numbers matched, and I started making more and more progress with each run. The jump was pretty big, and once that happened, I started having a lot more fun. On the one hand, yeah, less repetitions! On the other hand, I think there’s something to be said for games that use mechanics and structures to strengthen their storytelling. Dying over and over while you work to take down a tyrant would suck! This would affect you! I think this decision helps Absolum’s story, but I don’t think this story is strong enough, especially early on, to merit this. This doesn’t seem intentional; instead, it feels like it’s padding a runtime that could (and should) be much shorter.

And it sucks to feel that way, because Absolum is so good. When it hits, it’s blowschildren. It’s beautiful, the soundtrack is wonderful, the fights have flavor, there are cool building opportunities, and so on. But man, could I have gone without rehearsal. There’s a better version of this game out there somewhere, which is about half of the 20 or so hours it took me to see the conclusion of the main story. Unfortunately, that’s not the one we got, and if I hadn’t reviewed Absolum, I probably would have bowed out before even clicking through. My co-op partner did it, and I can’t blame him.