Written by Patrick Orquia
Title: Smelter
Developer: X PLUS
Publisher: DANGEN Entertainment
Genre: action adventure, platformer
Number of Players: 1
Platform: Nintendo Switch
Release Date: 22 April 2021
Price: $19.99
Indie games are of high abundance on the Nintendo eShop. With thousands of indie games in across multiple genres, what else can a game developer do to make their game stand out? Of course, there is the tried and tested route: emulate a past classic, use a pixel art style, and use catchy chiptune music. But what else can they do?
How about… mash up genres? A platformer and a real-time strategy game, perhaps? Will it work?
Before I answer that, let me just introduce the subject of this game review: Smelter, on the Nintendo Switch. It is a side-scrolling platforming game that takes heavy inspiration from the Megaman X series. It can be quite challenging at times, with some platforming sections really testing your skills. The game looks and feels like a 16-bit classic, with a matching awesome soundtrack to accompany it. But the platforming bits are only half of the game; the other half is a real-time strategy game where you have to expand your kingdom across vast lands, building structures, managing units, and defending them against intruders. Apparently, the game is very reminiscent of the game ActRaiser released about 30 years ago. I won’t pretend to know it because I really don’t, since I have never heard of that game until now. Anyway, it was supposed to be a classic, and this game captures the essence of the game, or so I heard.
The game starts with an awesome anime intro that shows how Adam and Eve get booted out of the garden. After some lengthy albeit humorous, 4th wall-breaking exchanges of narration, you get to control of Eve in search for the missing Adam. Near the very beginning of the game, you will meet Smelter, a sentient living armor also trying to find his way out of the Garden to get back to his people, the Zirms. Smelter decides to merge with Eve, making her his means of navigation, and in return, allowing Eve to fight baddies and do some awesome moves. As you progress into the platforming levels, you get to unlock new abilities, opening up the rest of the world for you to explore.
You have three sets of abilities, each with its own skill tree. The more you progress into the game, the more skills you unlock, which opens new ways to traverse levels, attack enemies, and do specialized moves to help you in some platforming sections. Early in the game, once you have unlocked each set, you will be able to freely switch between skill sets on the fly by pressing the shoulder buttons. This is very handy as you don’t have to pause the game and you will just be able to use whichever skill you need at any given time. Aside from this skills, Smelter also allows you to perform Smelt abilities, wherein you can grab objects, like rocks in midair or electrified poles to reach new platforms or finish a stunned enemy to replenish your HP. It makes navigation and combat less challenging.
Outside of the platforming levels is the Rumbly Lands where you, playing as Smelter on his own, aim to expand your dominion for your people. Bit by bit, you get to reach new areas where you can build structures like houses for your Zirm units, apple orchards, etc. You will also have to defend your bases and units, either by creating fighting units or doing it yourself. You can freely move Smelter across the map and have him attack enemy units or repair damaged bases. Whether you are defending your bases or not, you can expand your domain by claiming empty spaces on the map. By expanding in these lands, you also get to unlock new platforming levels for you to explore. The collectibles you get within the platforming levels allow you to upgrade Smelter outside, and additional abilities you unlock outside make Eve more powerful.
And to answer the earlier question, yes, the melding of these two genres work most of the time.
By the way, that last statement is an objective statement. I appreciate the effort and how the two seemingly contrasting genres complement each other, with one feeding back to the other that makes you want to play some more. But personally, I find the RTS part of the game a bit too tedious to my liking, to the point of it stopping all the momentum that the platforming levels bring to the table. Upon finishing a level, I get so hyped to play the next time, only to find myself having to go through the expansion and structure-building and defense and whathaveyous. I wish there was a way to skip those parts or maybe have the game autoplay them. I heard that there would be an upcoming update that will bring arcade mode into the game, wherein you will only have to play the platforming levels. So far, that update has not come yet, but that would be a welcome addition for the likes of me who only want to scratch our platforming itch.
Overall, Smelter is one good game despite some shortcomings in its execution. I really do appreciate how the two genres get combined and I want to really like the effort, but the RTS is really not my cup of tea. Still, for the other players who like RTS games, this one is a gem. If you are a bit iffy still, maybe wait for a sale and give it a chance by then.
REPLAY FACTOR: High
PROS
- Awesome visuals and 16-bit pixel art style
- Catchy chiptune soundtrack
- Humorous dialogue that often break the 4th wall
- Excellent level design
- The platforming sections are quite challenging but very fun to navigate through
- Lots of collectibles, some of which are located within hidden areas that are fun to discover
- Has a wide variety of enemies
- Lots of skills to unlock and upgrade as you progress further into the game
- Cool NPCs to interact with
CONS
- The challenge rooms are more of a source of frustration that fun
- Floaty controls at times
- Checkpoints are far in between at times which can result to much frustration as you can only respawn at the last checkpoint that you reached
- Very noticeable frame rate drops
- Encountered some bugs, like going through and getting stuck in walls, the controls moving on their own, etc.
- The RTS sections halts the momentum of the game and can be very tedious to play; though the game provide an extensive tutorial at the start of the section, when it comes to playing on your own, it is just all over the place and can be such a pain to manage just to unlock new levels for the platforming section
RATING: 3.5/5 ass-kicking Eves
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