➤ Baleful wrath 🎮

The theme of the clash between men and gods is not new in the videogame field, just think of the God of War series and the massacres of divinities perpetrated by Kratos.

Apotheon, however, aims to visually characterize this theme in a strong way, taking its cue from the ancient Greek ceramics of Exekias, who loved to represent the protagonists of mythology through black figures, to offer us an original and fascinating graphic style. The protagonist of the game is Nikandreos, a brave warrior who agrees to challenge Zeus and the gods of Olympus in order to restore peace and serenity to his lands, tormented by the consequences of abandonment by the gods: the oceans do not give fish, the sky does not has sun, the fields have become arid and conflicts are raging in the streets. Thus begins an adventure that will lead him to visit ten different environments with a view to climbing the mythological mountain, facing many opponents to obtain a series of objects that can give him the power to oppose Zeus.

Visually original, Apotheon is a solid action platformer with some shadows

Are you a god?

Let's start with the peculiar graphic style adopted by Alientrap for Apotheon, inspired by the classical Greek majolica. There is no doubt that the impact is strong and that this solution has been well adapted to all the various contexts, from the scenarios to the characters, but it is impossible not to notice how the developers have taken advantage of it to try to mask some sensational shortcomings. Nikandreos, the inhabitants he encounters and all his enemies boast puppet-like animations, with a movement of joints that perhaps in the authors' ideas should have offered a better rendering, but which in practice appears rather ugly to see.

In fact, entire portions of connection for the movements are missing, and the characters, for example, "print" themselves on a platform trying to climb over it, or are thrown away from the shock wave of a powerful blow, revealing an absence of "weight" at this juncture. "and consistency that is felt also and above all during the fighting. The latter have a certain variety on their side, also thanks to an RPG-style approach that sees each weapon having different characteristics and its own resistance to hits (after a while it breaks), as well as inflicting more or less damage depending on the part of the body hit, also referring to a bar that regulates the strength of the attacks launched. The protagonist of the game can wield swords, daggers, spears of different sizes, axes, hammers or his bare fists, holding a shield or a torch in the other arm (where applicable), but the categories available are four and acting on the directional cross it is possible to scroll through them dynamically, selecting the tool we prefer for each fight. We thus pass from weapons for close combat, which can also be thrown, to those for shots from a distance: javelins, stones and throwing knives, bows with various types of arrows; and then, again, explosives, traps and some types of elixir, from the one for the simple restoration of health to the one that makes us invisible for a few seconds, or momentarily enhances our attacks. In short, there is great substance, undoubtedly the result of the desire to give the game a strong personality, but the many ideas put in place sometimes seem to stumble on their own legs when they move on to their concretization. In the case of fighting, we have in fact a questionable collision management, with incredible "smooths" that occur when we do not hit the enemies exactly with the tip of the weapon.which makes fighting using axes and hammers particularly cumbersome. The opponents, then, generally tend to move away when we try to reach them, giving rise to tragicomic chases and making everything particularly "slippery" and chaotic, especially when you have to defend yourself from multiple opponents, with the parade that is valid only for one side and therefore leaves us uncovered behind. The choice of attacking and locking the triggers contributes at first to worsen the situation, even if this type of layout makes sense when you realize that with the back buttons the same weapons can be launched. Of course, solving some spectacular bosses (see Poseidon) by taking advantage of the limits of the combat system, or by sticking to the enemy to avoid his blows, inevitably ends up diminishing the positive aspects of production. Which, unlike what one might think, are many.

Guacamelee in salsa greca

Apotheon is a metroidvania-style action platformer, which for the type of map and the level design used is very reminiscent of the excellent Guacamelee! by DrinkBox Studios. The development of the scenarios, with the things to find and interact with, without too much downtime and with some interesting secrets to discover by experimenting, undoubtedly represents the most valuable part of the production, despite the burden of a narrative that fails to involve , thanks to the lack of a Spanish translation and dialogues that we would have preferred more concise.

However, we were talking about the level design, which even manages to surprise in some moments, asking us to solve environmental puzzles that often consist of activating a lever, finding a key or activating a device that must be hit with an arrow. , perhaps respecting a particular timing or even aiming blindly, upwards, so that the shot lands in the desired point. There is a sensational moment from this point of view, in which one is asked to shoot an arrow towards an area of the scenario that cannot be seen, except by activating the overlay map and thus following the progress of the arrow itself. There, these are really pearls that two-dimensional gaming is still able to offer, but in the case of Apotheon one is stunned by the contrast between the goodness of some aspects of the experience and the limits that we have described previously. If the developers had tried to replicate a combat system like that of the aforementioned Guacamelee !, in fact, we would be talking about a very different product. Because there is really nothing to complain about the rest: the enemies are many and well differentiated, each with precise patterns of attack and movement (even if all this is debased by the "slipperiness" we have talked about), as mentioned there are very interesting solutions regarding the level design and also the bosses are very beautiful, challenging and different from the usual.

PC System Requirements

Test Setup

Processor: AMD FX 8320
Scheda video: NVIDIA GeForce GTX 970 Jetstream
Memory: 8 GB of RAM
Operating system: Windows 8

Minimum requirements

Processore: Intel dual core da 2 GHz, AMD Athlon X2 5200+
Video card: DirectX 9.0c compatible
Memory: 1 GB of RAM
Operating system: Windows XP, Windows Vista, Windows 7

Comment

Tested version PC Windows Digital Delivery Steam Price 14,99 € Resources4Gaming.com

8.0

Readers (15)

7.1

Your vote

Apotheon has undeniable qualities: an original and fascinating graphic style, an excellent level design, a large amount of different weapons and enemies, an excellent sound sector, a good duration (it is completed in about eight hours, if you don't dedicate yourself to the secrets and hidden places) and bosses able to stand out, to stay in mind, which is far from obvious today. If a solid and impeccable combat system had been added to these valuable elements, rather than cumbersome and "slippery", we would therefore be talking about an absolute reference point for the genre. It's a shame it didn't happen that way, but the end result still manages to stand out.