SuperEpic: The Entertainment Wars (Nintendo Switch)

SuperEpic: The Entertainment Wars is the tale of a Racoon and a Llama on an adventure to stop an evil game company monetizing everything in its path, take from that what you will!.

SuperEpic seems like a statement from developers Undercoders and publishers Numbskull games, the game takes several direct swipes at the current state of gaming through its story telling, settings and satirical levels/enemes/music and does it in a glorious Metroidvania style. 

Superepic is set within the office of Regantcorp, they are taking over with Free to Play games riddled with micro transactions, throughout the game you’ll see an almost eerie commentary on the state of gaming which will strike true with every gamer.

Naturally the office of Regantcorp is a giant Metroidvania style “castle” for you to explore, each floor has its own unique feel and theme which helps break up the tedium of just balling through an office block!. 

Visually the game employs some fantastic sprite work with over the top animal character designs, the Llama never stops being a joy to look at!. As mentioned despite the game being set in an office block the levels manage to be very varied, there is even a Castlevania themed floor!. 

The music is incredibly infectious and will appeal to your nostalgia if you are familiar with the 8/16 bit era, something I really appreciated while exploring the floors of Regantcorp.

As mentioned SuperEpic: The Entertainment Wars is a Metroidvania, for those less familiar this is an action platformer with a focus on exploration and backtracking when you unlock new abilities, much like Metroid and the IGA Castlevania games. 

The combat consists of 3 attacks, a standard attack, a launcher to send foes into the sky and a meteor which sends them plummeting, outside of them you also unlock special attacks later on in the game, a dodge.

The controls feel buttery smooth throughout be it platforming or combat, the amount of choice you have in the combat and variation of the enemy types really help keep the tedium away throughout the adventure, I never tired of fighting any of the enemies. 

You upgrade your items either by finding better ones, playing coins or paying gems to unlock new moves, of course the game has 2 currencies, what self respecting f2p parody would only have 1!.

The first moment that SuperEpic really clicked with me and made me fall in love was when I came to my first passcode, in order to discover the code I had to use a QR scanner on my mobile, then play a mini game on my phone based on a popular f2p game to get the code. It was that moment I realized that SuperEpic wasn’t just a parody of today’s gaming woes, but it’s an absolutely brilliant parody and creative to boot!.

It wasn’t soon after that when I noticed just how hard it was to put down SuperEpic and play or do anything else!. The last time I was THIS hooked on a Metroidvania game was Hollow Knight which is testament to just how good this game plays!. 

One of the more hooking aspects of the game is seeing just what part of the industry the game will poke and prod at next. Some of the bosses are familiar faces and that also translates to the stages and quotes, the game is full of Easter eggs and other nods just begging for you to find them!. 

As an even tastier bonus for players there is a 2nd campaign of sorts based on Randomly generated stages and rogue like progression. The game does make fun of this but it’s amazing that there is effectively another game in this package and it’s fun enough to keep you hooked.

The only downsides with SuperEpic are the difficulty spikes throughout the game, the placing of the toilets which are your save points are quite sparse and on two occasions my character just stopped dead and forced me to go to HOME and back into the game to get it to move. 

SuperEpic: The Entertainment Wars is charm, good fun and a commentary on the current state of gaming all wrapped up in a lovely Metroidvania bow, I have no hesitation is suggesting everyone plays this title, it’s one of my favourite games released this year and is in my humble opinion an essential purchase for any gamer.