Guacamelee!

At first blush Guacamelee! appears to be little more than an exceptionally good-looking metroidvania, another in a long line of 2D combat-based-platformers. But it doesn't take long to realize that the mechanics are a real cut above the rest of the crowd - in fact, they are an exemplary display of fun fighting systems. If there is such a thing is 2D AAA, this is it. Borrowing just as much from games like Dust & Marvel vs. Capcom as it does Metroid, Guacamelee! has a truly exciting and refreshing juggling brawler at its heart, and the way it uses its suite of flying uppercuts, head buts and body slams for both skull bashing and platforming make for a really mechanically satisfying, unified experience.

The story is simple, to-the-point, and tongue-in-cheek. Guacamelee! is very much a love letter to video games and nerdom in general. From Mega Man and Zelda to Journey and Team Fortress 2, from Destructoid and our very own Giant Bomb to dialogue ripped straight from Return of the Jedi – there’s a lot of reference material in Guac; I've read more than enough posts and reviews about the saturation of memes in the game but this is really a case of reap what you sow. Everyone’s mileage will vary but at the end of the day all of the references are largely innocuous and really shouldn't affect your enjoyment of the game. The storyline pits Juan, an agave farmer who comes back to life as a luchador, against Carlos Calaca, the skeletal villain who killed him, kidnapped his lifetime love, kicked the Devil out of hell, and is trying to merge the worlds of the living and dead to a no doubt disastrous end.

This merging of two worlds is the baseline for the Soul Reaver-like phase shifting abilities you come to possess and the meat and potatoes of much of the late-game’s platforming elements. At the press of a button you can move between the real world and the world of the dead. Often times platforms that exist in one world vanish in the other; combining Juan’s impressive set of moves with this rule makes for many, many awesome levels and puzzle sequences, some of which are bound to frustrate at points. All of your special attack abilities can also be chained in the air (along with the double jump, dodge and other crazy traversal moves I won’t spoil here) allowing for some pretty mind-blowing ground-to-air combat and platforming. There’s definitely a Super Meat Boy, roguelike-lite expectation in this game, as it can easily take an hour or two to crack what is in the end a 30 second jumping problem or challenge room. That statement will either make you excited or annoyed, and that’s a good measuring stick for Guacamelee!

While the combat rarely reaches the twitch-frustration/elation of the platforming there are a number of enemy rooms that will really test your mettle. Comboing enemies into the air, following them up with an uppercut, then piledriving them back into the earth on top of their buddies is always a thrill – fighting is fun in Guacamelee! While there are good options for throwing opponents, the game definitely skews towards melee combat. It’s certainly possible to lucha your way through most anything, but it takes some dedication and rule setting on the part of the player. The Goalie costume, which is a dlc challenge room reward, greatly increases the damage of throws at the cost of melee damage; I found myself using this costume on my second run through and it made for a vastly different game. Because you can thrown enemies in any direction and create throw combos, there’s some strategy to throw placement. My only gripe with the combat is that I wish Hard mode had been available from the beginning, rather then needing to beat the game first. While Guacamelee! is already too hard for some players, having the option at the get-go would have been nice. On Hard the game becomes the old school, nail-biting brawler it so much wants to be. The boss fights, in-particular, can be exceptionally tough, requiring a pixel by pixel perfection that’s both really unforgiving and really addictive. The boss characters themselves are very memorable – Jaguar Javier is definitely a contender for best enemy of the year.

The roster of villains isn’t enormous, but the variety of combat types and attack styles feels perfectly balanced against your moves list, and the mid-game addition of damage and energy shields is a twist that keeps the fighting fresh. Visually the enemies are a real strong point of the game and they’re just as fun to look at as they are to destroy; all in all, Guacamelee! is a stunning visual & aural work. If you end up getting this game on Steam, do yourself a favor and play it on a big TV at some point; the colours are as vibrant as the music is catchy and charming. There’s great attention to detail and the animations and poses all have great character and humour too. Tostada, the guardian of the luchador mask, and the avatar of the second player in co-op, even has her own suite of animations. She shares some with Juan but many of them are unique kicks – and she gets her own costumes too.

If you’re lucky enough to have someone in your life you can co-op with regularly, Guacamelee! could reach even higher highs for you. But note: this is not a game you can play by yourself a lot and then just have someone jump in cold turkey – they will get massacred and the platforming sections will become *incredibly* difficult. The way Guacamelee! deals with its living/dead world portals means that players working together need to time all their jumps in concert in many places. Sometimes it’s just easier to let one player do the puzzle and have the other join them afterwards. The co-op combat however, works great, though – small gripe – the Guacamelee! proof of concept video shows some hold & throw combos that just don’t exist in the game. Still, it’s a great feeling to elbow an enemy into the air, uppercut them even higher, then have a buddy mid-air suplex them over their back and onto the skeletons below. Hard mode is great for co-op as well since the game doesn’t up the enemy count for two players, and really good Guac gamers will find themselves breezing through enemy encounters on the regular difficulty.

The co-op is in many ways *almost perfect. The gameplay is there. The different animations are cool, the costumes are great, but the game seems only partially programmed to deal with two players. Cutscenes create a lot of weird drop-in/drop-out issues with the two player character and often the avatars are stacked right on top of each other. If Tostada is supposed to appear to deliver dialogue but is already present as the second player, the game will comically zoom in on nothing instead and give you a moment of silence. Sections with dimension portals early in the game also became wildly problematic for any pair other than Guacamelee! masters; it probably would have made a cleaner experience if only one player was able to swap dimensions. But like I said: the co-op experience can be unreal with two seasoned players knocking enemies together. You know, I would have loved a versus component – the combat mechanics really support combos, juggles, dodges and cancels. The potential is certainly there anyway…

I did my first run through to about 90% completion of the game (not counting the Infierno dlc) in about 10 hours. It’s definitely worth playing again on Hard, just because it is such a test of skill in places, requiring near perfect execution of enemy encounters. The dlc challenge rooms are indeed quite difficult too, though, luckily, you don’t need to master them all to unlock all the costumes (which are pretty cool). There are two, slightly different endings in the game. If you want the so-called good ending, you’ll want to find all the portals to Chac Mool and collect five of the six luchador mask pieces before you face Carlos Calaca and save the day.

This is the most addictive game I’ve played all year, maybe longer, and a really stunning example of the genre. I can’t recommend it more.