Duskfade Review

I remember the days of the mascot platformer fondly. It seems that somewhere along the line, they faded away. That’s why I was very happy to review Duskfade, a new action platformer that comes out this week.

In Duskfade, you play as Zirian and are accompanied by a mechanical bird named Cuckoo as you attempt to save your sister Allira, who is locked away in a mysterious clock tower. The game sticks to the tried and-true formulas where you travel through distinct biomes culminating in boss fights on your way to breaking the chains that prevent you from entering the clock tower. You start out with a light and heavy attack but will eventually expand your arsenal with special attacks and traversal upgrades. Even Cuckoo will benefit from upgrades allowing him to contribute with automatic projectile attacks.

Duskfade is developer Weird Beluga’s first game on XBOX, but you wouldn’t know it by the quality of the graphics. In my research, I was really impressed with their first game Clid The Snail as well. To me, Duskfade can best be described as “What if Sora from Kingdom Hearts was dropped into a Ratchet and Clank game set in medieval times?” Zirian’s keyblade-like sword has two clock weights dangling from the handle and the goodies that spill out of enemies and breakables burst into the air and zoom to you much like in Ratchet and Clank. Zirian and bosses are stylistically animated with plentiful frames. The biomes in the levels are varied, while each one finds ways to glow brightly and provide beautiful vistas. The levels are filled to the brim with detail in the form of vegetation, carts, pots, light posts, crystals and all other (often breakable) items that make the environment feel alive and not just a string of rectangular rooms to be run through. I sometimes found myself going out of my way to smash things just to see the star shards fly even though my wallet was maxed out. In short, the game looks great and punches well above what you would expect from an indie game and an indie price.

The storytelling is primarily told through flashbacks with Zirian, Allira, and their grandfather. Collectible echoes provide additional bits of background not tied to the main characters. While predictable, the story is told through high quality animations and serves its purpose of explaining why you are going from level to level. To be fair, I don’t normally play games for the story and tend to focus more on the gameplay. Normally I’d expect an indie game to cut some corners in the cutscene department but they are well done and maintain the high bar of graphic quality present in the gameplay.

The combat is fairly basic but goes a little further to include the ability to use potions to restore health, lock on to enemies, reflect projectiles, a dodge that provides invincibility, and a perfect dodge will reward you with bullet time. New inky enemy types are introduced slowly as you progress through the game requiring you to constantly evaluate which enemy you should target first. In general, combat is relegated to open areas in the level that serve as arenas so you won’t have to worry about enemy attacks adding more difficulty to any tricky platforming section. There are several difficulty levels that can be changed at any time to shape your experience and none of them prevent achievements. The boss fights are varied and typically involve three damage phases separated by platforming phases. I played on normal for most of the game but switched to the lowest difficulty to give me time to observe the mechanics of a particular boss and just never switched back. In fact, the lowest difficulty setting would be perfect for younger players thanks to the increased health pool and increase to damage output.

As Zirian progresses through the game he’ll gain new abilities and be able to spend resources and collectibles back in the starting town that serves as the games hub. You’ll be able to upgrade the effectiveness of combat moves using star shards and upgrade gears. Armor and health upgrades increase your base stats. Music boxes can be turned in to unlock new songs. Dye bottles and star shards unlock color themes from outfits unlocked by returning lost kittens, and rainbow ingots are used to purchase different looks for your sword. Echoes spread throughout the levels serve as a way to expand the game’s lore. Coins can be returned to N1-C0 to add unique cards to fill out your deck, and lastly, stained glass shards which are supposed to reveal one of the Master Clockmaker’s secrets. Yeah, there’s a lot of collectibles.

The level design is mostly linear, but often includes offshoots that dead-end or circle back on themselves. Unfortunately for gamers, they will have to navigate each level using their memory to track where they’ve been as the developers have not provided a map of any kind. There are, however, bells placed sparingly throughout the levels that when struck will aim your camera in the direction you are supposed to go but that’s as much direction as the game will give you. I found the lack of a map to be the most frustrating thing about the game especially when trying to track down every last collectible post-game. Save points display the number of collectibles found and remaining per location, but I hope the developers consider putting in some other post-game mechanic to make this a little less daunting.

Platforming is managed through the use of your double-jump and dash for most of the game. About two-thirds of the way through you will gain other abilities that allow you to backtrack to previously inaccessible areas in early levels. Unfortunately, the basic combinations of double-jump and dash do not feel as polished as other platformers. Most times they get the job done and feel good in open areas but they never have the polished feel of a Ratchet and Clank (when you get the rail ride ability you will understand why I keep making this comparison). There were several instances of platforms that I knew I was supposed to be able to jump to, but for whatever reason fell just short of the height necessary to cling to the ledge often requiring multiple attempts. Maybe you’ll be lucky and not encounter those same hitches in the otherwise excellent experience but in my advanced copy of the game I ran into this issue numerous times. By the time you reach the end of the game your other mobility upgrades will at least help to overcome most early-game platforming issues.

Conclusion

Please don’t let my criticism of the map and the platforming issues discourage you from playing. I stress them as much as I did because I found them to be the only things holding this game back from being compared directly to earlier big-name mascot platformers. I hope that the developers add some quality of life features like a map or some system to help you clean up the collectibles after you complete the game. Even if they don’t, I’d love to see them port their first game to the XBOX and I’ll for sure keep an eye out for whatever they do next. Duskfade is a must-play for any fan of mascot platformers.