Recent reviews by 「Beef」

a game that dares to ask "what if bendis' guardians of the galaxy run was actually good?" and then does the impossible - it's actually good.

Therapy costs money, Va-11 Hall-A is cheap and the same thing!

This is my favourite game of 2020.

Ah yes, boomer anime AND Castlevania, sign me up!
Jokes aside, this game is not only polished to an insane level, but it plays very well. To be honest, I think I enjoyed it even more than Bloodstained and SOTN, especially in regards to boss battles.

The main feature of Wonder Labyrinth is it's primary game mechanic, where you're constantly switching between two elemental familiars, who you are constantly levelling up to a maximum of 3, over and over. These familiars will impact the damage you deal and the damage you take. If you have the water familiar, you won't be able to pierce a water enemy, as with fire. But, a water familiar would allow you to damage a fire enemy and vice versa. It's super simple, but adds an array of depth to the already tried and tested Metroidvania formula. It's akin to the Shards from Bloodstained or the glyphs in Ecclesia, but there's only two. Instead of finding the best utility for the wide range, it's about mastering the exact two.

This quality over quantity aspect adds a lot more depth than first expected. With an $18 AUD purchase and about two stages, I really wasn't expecting much. But ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ man, just how much fun this main mechanic is really does pay for the entire game.

In addition, ranged combat is slightly tweaked, now used for various arrow puzzles, which can be pretty fun and rewarding!
The melee combat is also, quite familiar. However as stated prior, it's the addition of familiars that gives it fresh air, no matter how much Castlevania you've played.

The game is quite short as of now, but it's a wonderful experience bound to get better. One of my main issues (and one I've heard from many) is that SOTN's bosses are just, way too easy for the most part. Pretty happy to say that even when you're cheesing it out here, the familiar mechanic is designed to always keep you on your toes. There's no shield rod spam, you have to play smart and play well. The final boss was incredibly tense, even if it wasn't because of constantly being on the brink of death, but it's that if I made one mistake in my familiar switching, I'd be punished to ♥♥♥♥. The difficulty is far from artificial, you aren't scared of the fact that you have taken damage from something you couldn't help, you're scared to screw up on your own and take that damage. Again, it's just how amazing the main mechanic is that causes all of this.

Of note, I played this game on an Xbox 360 AND PS4 controller, it was pretty solid for both. 360 I believe was supported from the get go, but it took me a bit of mapping for the PS4.

If you're a fan of Lodoss War? Buy it, game pays incredible respect.
If you're a fan of Metroidvanias? Buy it.
If you just like really nice, polished video games in general, buy it. It's short right now, but it'll only get better.

Don't let my playtime fool you. I've been playing this game on PS4 for ages, and have 100%ed it
Please, buy it!
It's like VOTOMS: the game.
It's $13 AUD right now! It's practically free! Buy it!
Also play on hard