Review: ScourgeBringer

No cucumber references were made in the writing of this review!

Boy, even without the store closing, the Vita is headed to developer-supported retirement in style. Recently we got Astro Aqua Kitty and now ScourgeBringer launches, like the big (by Vita standards) fireworks at the end of a new year show. 

As Flying Oak's successor to the class-A drug that is NeuroVoider, ScourgeBringer tells a tale of loss and failure, plastered across a string of compact levels, split into single rooms. Somewhere on each level is a massive locked door and a mid-level boss (or two) that needs killing to open it. 

Update: the version 1.60 patch adds adaptive gameplay to make it an easer/fairer fight along with in-game saving and other improvements, that should easily add another .5 to the score. 

Within each room, Kyhra - the white-haired brutal-class mutha of a warrior - quickly learns to slice, dice, bash and blast the enemies. It is murder ballet, with such sophisticated and on-the-nose control that I feel invincible, until noticing the fast-dropping health in the upper-left corner. 

Oops, how did that happen? The enemies have fairly standard attacks to identify, and on their own they are no problem. But in the melee - things gets tough quickly with slow bullets, charge attacks, walls of fire and other aggressive moves. Add in the spiky sections of floor, shoot-through areas and screen-wrap warping of the later levels which come as an unpleasant surprise and going in full tank-mode is not really an option. 

Welcome to the murder ballet

To last a bit longer, take a second at the start of each room and ID the tricky enemies and take them out first. Choosing carefully when to use the sword or bash attacks, and when to snipe with the variety of guns in ScourgeBringer is another part of mastering the game. 

Some vanquished souls drop power-ups to boost weapons power or speed by a few percentage points, but crying for health and ammo for the powerful shotgun or chunky laser is my usual mantra. 

As the weapons and enemies increase in power, making the correct decision at the right nano-second is vital. But whatever you do, going up against a Judge with two health and no way to boost it is a royal pain. So, I learn to hide in the handy corners of terrain and fire with care, or when to go wading into a mob for some quick kills, when to stun and generally treat my health like a valuable egg in a wrecking yard. 

Being a roguelite, regular death is a fact of life in ScourgeBringer, with a need to balance the urge to cause mayhem and taking a tactical approach to each room. Taking out a poison bomb that explodes gas at the wrong moment is just one example of self-induced annoying stupidity. Another dumb move of mine is winning the battle but instantly heading out a door, losing a power-up at just the wrong moment. 

Some rooms might have a totem or store where you can restore health, at a price or collect a useful buff. And completing the level and defeating the Judge, the collected blood can be used for more goodies. Back at The Chiming Tree, in between each play, you can use tokens to permanently upgrade Kynra. 

Most useful is the Fury, a targeted massacre of the key enemies in the room, and a great way to get out of a panic. When playing really badly, sometimes the game takes pity and a chubby merchant will drop some freebies at the start. Then, at some point after many failures, the first Judge explodes in a shower of blood and rewards, and we're onto the next realm.  

Dying in a good way

But, not for long, the new enemies can easily startle you with their new attacks, or you get through with just one or two health and its back to the beginning. But the developers aren't total sadists and this small success opens up more challenges on the first level to add variety and more ways to boost your health. TIP - don't go straight to the latest world without maximising your goodies in the current one. 

Even so, it's a slow climb up the experience tree and there's plenty of failure to cope with before starting to get a big enough health bar or enough skill to take on the later Judges and their acolytes. One of the useful early power-ups is the ability to deflect shots back at enemies, something that will help with the brilliantly-designed Judges. They have their own set of predictable moves, our hero just needs to be tough enough to take the beating, or players need to be nimble enough to avoid them (that's me out, then). 

As with NeuroVoider, every aspect of ScourgeBringer is finely-polished to awesome. The graphics are pin-sharp with a high shine and gorgeous detail and enough variety across the levels. The music, suitably pounding with restful interludes and there's a great deal of love poured into every aspect of the design and story. 

Ultimately though, its the many small clockwork pieces of the game from the multiplier to the weapons and tree benefits that make this a really special piece of game. 

If I had one gripe, there are secret rooms in Scourge, something that was missing in NV. But their presence is a bit clumsy, I was expecting to find them through clever multi-room shooting puzzles and the like, but they are accessed via hidden doors, noted by little graphical quirks in the edge of the scenery, and bolted on to the map. 

That aside, its hard not to love ScourgeBringer, no matter how crap I am at it. The game is also a bastard to screenshot, most of my grabs are of me dying, so apologies for that! 

Updated: Its the year 2023 and I finally finished the ScourgeBringer's normal mode through ludicrous hours of trial and error. 

If you are mad enough to continue, there's an underwater part of the tree that reveals extra levels and challenges, where you can add increasing amounts of chaos to your play (lower health, tougher enemies, fewer boosters) - as if the first outing wasn't tough enough! 

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Developer Flying Oak (review code provided) 

Price: £13.99 (PSN)

Score: 9/10

Progress: Finished in normal mode