Cuphead is the Dark Souls of 1930's Cartoon Shooters

Why This Cartoon Shooter is Worth Playing to the Finish

I recently finished Cuphead, so allow me to brag for six paragraphs. Okay, not really, but the kind of accomplishment that I feel from beating a game like Cuphead is hard to match with other games. As a guy that actually beat the game, let me tell you that it's definitely worth the frustration and effort to reach that final boss. Whether you're already stuck in the game or still on the fence about buying it, take my recommendation, this game is worth it. There's a lot going for this indie title, from the obviously great artwork to the satisfying challenge and crisp controls, this game is worth playing more than most easier games. So get ready to fight for your immortal soul and take on the devil himself, this is Cuphead. 

After a gambling away their own souls, Cuphead and Mugman are in a serious jam. They must collect the soul-contracts of Inkwell Isle's gambling addicted cartoon characters in exchange for their own freedom. It's the premise to set up a series of bossfights that are only interrupted for the occasional run-and-gun segments. The real substance of the gameplay are those multi-staged bossfights that'll put even seasoned gamers skills to the test, it did for me anyways. Cuphead is brutally difficult at times, it will take some serious gaming grit to overcome the hurdles and projectiles hurdling towards you, but that's the appeal here, it's those crushing lows followed by narrowly won victories that are so satisfying, a level of engagement that only butt-clenching difficulty can provide. Now the wrong kind of difficulty comes from sloppy controls, so it's worth noting just how smooth Cuphead is from a controls standpoint. 

Battling bosses throughout an entire game means that precision controls are a requirement, not a feature. There's no room for floaty or unresponsive character movement, especially when the screen is being filled with projectiles and enemies. Either of the beverage brothers can run, dash, shoot and parry to collect those contracts. There's a special attack and the option to buy upgrades, but I found that the two basic attacks were enough to finish the game, the special attack I kept for that last bit of hectic action to seal the deal on near-death bosses. Most of the game is jumping and shooting, so you'll find utility in the dash and parry moves, dash being pretty straight forward, and Parry being probably the only blemish on the game. Specially marked pink objects, like projectiles, switches and mobs, can be parry-slapped to either activate or nullify their danger. The problem is, after fifteen hours of Cuphead I still found the parry move to be unreliable enough to just avoid all together. Call me a sore loser, but that thing cost me entire boss battles, worse yet is that it's not always optional throughout the game, pretty bad when a single collision costs one life. 

His turkey is cooked

Something that just can't go without mentioning is the animation and design of Cuphead. It's the visual appeal to draw people in before getting clobbered by the difficulty. The tinny announcer's voice between every battle with well animated characters is another highlight of the game. Almost every boss is multi-staged, so that means for every fight there's at least two fully animated character designs to see when they morph and change attack patterns. It's not often that you see a game with this 1930's art style, but then again, it's fitting considering that this is a hard game and the 1930's were hard times. You'll see all kinds of creative design as the inhabitants of Inkwell Isle fight to avoid hell itself, kinda dark when you think of it

Not all hard games are good, and not all good games are hard. Cuphead is one of those rare titles that can be both and earn the effort that it takes to beat it. If you have the game then you should win it, and if you haven't bought it yet, then I urge you to. Come on and join the hard-games club, Comrades.