An enjoyable adventure with a serious identity crisis.
Bandai Namco have built a massive love letter to the 2D Metroidvania, particularly the Metroid part. They’ve set it on a deadly planet where they want to tell a tragic sci-fi story of doomed soldiers, deadly superweapons, and, er, sibling rivalry. So you may think deciding it should star Pac-Man sounds like a terrible idea. Because it is. Because of course it is.
Not since Bob Hoskins’ Mario shoved his face down a woman’s top have I witnessed such a bizarrely adult reimagining of a family-friendly character. While Shadow Labyrinth never goes that far (perhaps they’re saving that for DLC) this is still a game where Pac-Man helps you slaughter monsters with brains on the wrong sides of their skulls. Then he helpfully swallows their spines afterwards so you can spend them at the shop.
Well, technically it isn’t Pac-Man. Here your companion is called ‘Puck’, a cute nod to what was almost Pac-Man’s name/a helpful distancing of this monster from being considered the real deal.
Because Puck is a manipulative, untrustworthy, Devil on your shoulder who’s unlikely to be fronting any Saturday morning cartoons anytime soon. You actually play as an amnesiac who Puck summoned from another dimension to help with their shady quest, and Puck keeps referring to you as ‘Number Eight’. Brrr.
From the moment you pick up a sword it becomes clear that this is going to be a slightly more routine adventure than the oddball premise suggests. Combat’s a traditional hacky slashy affair, with a three-strike combo, a stun attack, and a lovely enemy-interrupting strike that’ll use up some of the stamina you need for dodging. All fun enough with a satisfying sense of impact, hurt only by Nine Sols and Prince of Persia rudely raising the Metroidvania combat bar unfairly high last year.
Traditionally Pac-Man has chomped on his enemies. Here, Puck prefers to munch down on the corpses after you’ve done all the fighting (someone’s getting lazier in their old age). Chow down on enough fallen foes and you’ll be able to briefly turn into a giant invincible mech with a Pac-Man centre. Good goofy fun, though I’d have liked to have seen munching woven into the combat more. The brutal finisher where a horrifying mega-Puck swallows a boss whole is sadly relegated to the cutscenes.
