PEGBRJE: They Bleed Pixels and PuPaiPo Space Deluxe
Today is Murder ’Em Up day. Which flavour would you like?
They Bleed Pixels is a platforming action adventure made by Spooky Squid Games, an indie studio close to home in Canada specializing in pixelated fun. In this tale, players will be following an unnamed student joining Lafcadio Academy for Troubled Young Ladies who keeps having bizarre nightmares of her turning in to an eldritch monster. Turns out she isn’t exactly far from the truth, either.
Players will descend into each nightmare as the eldritch version of our little protagonist with the goal of making it to the final door that leads back to the real world (or possibly another level, I don’t make the rules). The platforming is relatively standard with its double jumping, wall sliding and wall jumping as players need to find ways to navigate throughout the world without dying to those nasty spikes that are just everywhere. The combat is the first unique aspect that players will learn, for depending on the directional input before attacking the style of attack will be altered. This sounds like a standard practice, but They Bleed Pixels takes it to another level with inputs determining if the claws are used or not. By standing still, the protagonist will utilize kicks on her opponents depending on how long the button is charged for — simple press is a horizontal kick, while a charged press will kick them sky high. Input a direction, and the kicks are replaced by claws that slice and deal actual damage to enemies, which creates the crux of the gameplay balance. Enemies need to be sliced to be killed, but mashing buttons will cause them to block attacks and retaliate rather than just die. This means that players need to input attacks that displace their enemies as either a way of breaking up their attacks to ruin the guard, or to displace them into literal buzzsaws to destroy them.
The other aspect that makes They Bleed Pixels so unique is how it handles the checkpoint system. See, players will find red circles littering the map to collect — this is blood, and just like the blood that is gained from enemies it too fills a forked meter at the top of the screen. Once this meter is filled, standing still allows for players to create their own checkpoint at that spot in the map, effectively saving the map state. This is an absolutely genius idea in a platform heavy title, for now players have semi control over where they wish to return to upon death, although players also need to be aware that if they die before putting the checkpoint down, they are returned to their last checkpoint and therefore lose all the blood. For those that feel they don’t need the safety net, the fewer checkpoints created allows for bonus points offered at the end of each level, which further creates a balancing act for players to decide whether or not they wish to save or continue onward. Speedrunners also can avoid checkpoints this way thanks to simply refusing to kill enemies, which greatly reduces the amount of blood gained.
These adaptations are what make They Bleed Pixels stand out amongst the many action platformers I’ve played throughout the bundle, almost making me forget how much I dislike platformers. The ability to create checkpoints anywhere coupled with the unique approach to combat allows for newcomers to explore and dive in while offering an alternative approach to seasoned veterans of the genre. That doesn’t mean that it isn’t hard, however; once the platforming challenges start to ramp up — specifically the use of floors gives me nightmares — the game can be brutally punishing. The ‘Novice’ difficulty does help with this a little, but it does remove the extras plus the final mission so it’s a tradeoff that players will have to decide if it is worth it. Overall those that love action adventure platformers will adore this title’s alterations to the genre staples while offering dozens of levels to complete and extras to find and collect. Those of us not as adept at the genre will still love the gorgeous artwork and killer soundtrack, but might be hesitant to play anything other than Novice. Regardless, it’s definitely one that will be dependent on players, so the only way to find out is to boot it up and become an Eldritch horror to see.
PuPaiPo Space Deluxe is an arcade space survival shooty made by BolHut, the indie dev that brought us the lengthily titled ‘You Died but a Necromancer revived you’ earlier on in the bundle to definitive success. In this tale there are no necromancers, there’s not even a plot really; players are just a spaceship in space that is tasked with surviving against an onslaught of enemies that are extremely adorable.
PuPaiPo leaves players with the simplest of premises: survive. Armed only with a canon and a set amount of self-centered explosions, players need to last ninety seconds in the ‘ring’ with constantly spawning enemies of different kinds. Knowing what each does is part of the fun, learning that the adorable rock is actually a bomb that explodes or that the smiley ship shoots just like players do is all part of the fun. Thanks to their designs all being relatively distinct, there won’t be many times where players may get confused as to which is which and accidentally get injured. If players can survive the ninety seconds and clear the map, the boss arrives to put players in their place, offering a singular target and a completely new style of moveset to be wary of while taking them out. Succeed, and move on to the next level to do it all over again. Failure, however, is an interesting tale; as mentioned earlier in the description, I called this title an ‘arcade’ thanks to its use of the Continue system. Players that die at any time are given a prompt to continue from the exact location they left off, with the only caveat that they lose a continue charge and all of their points. To those that seek the highest of scores this is bad, but for those of us wishing to experience the game in any way this is a fine trade off. Run out of continues, however, and it’s game over unfortunately.
It’s simple, but that is exactly what PuPaiPo wants; fun through simplicity. There are seven stages to defeat, each with their own boss that block the way to the legendary space pizza we so crave. If you have a friend or 3 the entire title can be played together in a semi-competitive, semi-cooperative way by competing with friends to see who can get the most points while still ensuring everyone survives thanks to more bullets. Even outside the game there’s a radio that players can use to listen to the sweet tunes in the background to which I am currently guilty as charged. If you love cute pixel destruction with a massive emphasis on the cute — seriously the enemies are adorable — then this might be your style.
