Hellpoint

posted on 3 Aug 2021

It feels like an awkward trope to bring up Dark Souls in a review for a souls-like game, but I can’t help doing so. Part of me wonders if the developers of games like this are honored or if they instead become mildly nauseated when seeing another review comparing their game to their source of inspiration instead of reviewing it for what it is, floating by itself in a vacuum.

Mostly without deviation, the behavioral pattern for a Soulsborne player holds true.

A process of frustration, then hesitant neutrality, then blooming interest, and then subsequent borderline obsession that carries a player from their first Souls game until their last. The Moon Presence allowing, the hunt begins for the next game to strike that chord that makes them feel as if they are alone within an expansive yet interconnected alien world rife with cyclical death and rebirth.

You are here because you find yourself in a market that is oversaturated with the popular Dark Souls formula. You are wondering if Hellpoint strikes that same chord. It does. To some extent.

When I remember this game, I remember the atmosphere and the artwork. The environments. A comparison framework is only so helpful here - Hellpoint has hints of inspiration from Dead Space, H.R. Giger, and the environmental feel of perhaps Doom 2016 and Quake in places. But it’s weird .

The feel of Hellpoint is uniquely its own, hence my comment about comparisons. You realize this once you open up your first breach that resembles an ethereal black hole.

It is a dreary and mechanized sort of world full of ambience. The kind that you don’t find in very many places in such varied and unconventional combinations. I found myself downright intrigued and curious at most of the locations and art, and that does not happen often for me.

This would not be a positive review if not for the stroke of genius that is the Hellpoint environment and design.

Co-op play within Hellpoint is another high point. I can’t tell you how big my smile was when I realized that Hellpoint had done away with the archaic and overused souls-like feature whereby a) it takes special effort to get a player into your game through finite consumables and/or b) the player inside of your game is sent away when the player beats an area boss, never to return to that area.

Imagine that. A team who finally discards one of the worst parts of souls gameplay to reward co-op enthusiasts with a more uninterrupted and hassle-free experience. If nothing else, I give the developers credit for being progressive. My friends and I were able to share the experience of seamlessly traveling between areas, fighting bosses together, discovering Hellpoint’s unique black hole event system, and getting the best loot while not having to waste much mental bandwidth from simply trying to meetup in the first place. Absolutely brilliant.

On the other hand, the enemies are the weakest link in the formula. Most of them have monotonous and uninspired movesets and as you progress further in the game, you discover that they are rehashed bosses. Recycled assets with the same movesets. Objects on your screen that become annoying obstacles overshadowing the fascinating and enjoyable exploration of the world.

The disappointment I had with this cannot be overstated, as I’m someone who believes that the enemies and the combat within games clearly inspired by the Souls series should be paramount.

The bosses were somewhat of a different story - most of them were memorable to me, because, with the exception of the Archon Knights, they were distinct and typically entertaining. I can’t help but feel they could have been better too, though. Faster, more deadly, with louder music on a grander scale. A nearly insurmountable challenge.

This game would have been damn near perfect for me if the boss fights, enemies, and combat were fine tuned and revised enough to match the best that this genre has to offer. For whatever reason, these types of games generally fall short of being monumental masterpieces, but I’d like to think that this is what reviews are for. The development team can reassess their strategy and level up their real life stats to produce something even more groundbreaking. Not every team can produce a Hollow Knight at first, and that’s ok.

On the subject of player stats, the Hellpoint system took an interesting perspective by including two stats that I have not seen before in an RPG: cognition and foresight. Although the names are unique, they are simply black-box measurements that are associated with the damage scaling of certain weapon types and thresholds to utilize them.

Weapons which are, unfortunately, not very interesting - especially the strength based weapons. You will not find a large abundance of weapons in this game, which is not necessarily a bad thing assuming that each of the weapons is entertaining, unique, and intuitive. Instead you will likely find that you have a limited selection of weapons that do not meet the previous criteria. This is subjective of course, but I’m sure that you realize reviews are the opinions of the reviewer.

I’ve sermonized quite heavily about the shortcoming of Hellpoint, but it was important to warn you before you decide to purchase the game.

If you’re going to play Hellpoint, now is the time to do so. Unlike a lot of other souls-like games which have entire wiki pages and walkthroughs devoted to them across the internet due to their age and popularity, the information surrounding the game is a bit sparse. Incomplete wiki pages and a handful of guides inspire in the player a sense of working with arcane knowledge in a world of intrigue and loneliness, which is exactly the aesthetic that this game presents.

You will stumble across many strange and unexplained mechanics and locations in Hellpoint, and the best things to do is absorb the experience for what it is - alone, or with a good friend.

For a short time I was quite enthralled with Hellpoint, but after my first playthrough and subsequent bout of achievement hunting, I do not have any desire to play again and I will be moving on to something else.