You read the title, it’s called ‘search action’ now. When I met with Heart Machine – the studio behind Hyper Light Breaker and Solar Ash – at GDC last month, director Alx Preston stopped me from calling his team’s new game, Possessor(s), a Metroidvania.
Preston says Metroidvanias are called search action games in Japan, which is a much better name for a genre as broad as this one has become. We don’t call first person shooters ‘doom-likes’ anymore, so why are we so stuck to Metroidvania – especially when most of them are just Metroid-likes anyway, without any Castlevania flavor at all?
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Search action is the perfect label for Possessor(s). You play as Luca, a newly empowered girl who was rescued from certain death by a demon after an interdimensional catastrophe demolished the dystopian megacity she calls home. Now Luca is searching for a way to escape the city, but to do that she’ll need to search for answers and discover what caused the destruction of her home and the deaths of almost everyone she’s ever known. Also, she’ll need to search for keys and power-ups to unlock doors. Y’know, like in a Metroidvania.
Style And Substance
The market for indie search action has been pretty saturated for quite a long time, but Possessor(s) stands out from the crowd thanks to hand-drawn charm and flashy combat. Stylistically, it’s a bit like Persona mixed with Demon Slayer, with lots of bold lines that accentuate its big, dramatic attack animations.
The setting is largely defined by recent destruction; urban environements flooded and overrun by monsters, shadowy hallways periodically illuminated by a distant glowing pillar of demonic energy, abandoned office buildings that turn from muted gray to bright red as you paint the wall with blood spray. For a hell hole, it all looks pretty fantastic.
The combat is inspired by platformer fighters (or Smash Bro.-likes, if you prefer) which means it’s high skill and incredibly expressive. Luca is at her most lethal when she’s within dagger’s range of her targets, so a lot of her abilities and movement are all about closing gaps and unleashing hell on the hellions. She’s got a rope that can pull enemies in closer and a variety of ground and aerial combos that tear through monsters like whatever it is monsters eat instead of butter. Bone marrow, probably.
An Open Endedvania
Unlike most search action games, Possessor(s) exploratory freedom is mirrored in the narrative. The different paths you choose to take lead to alternate endings, and while I didn’t get much of a chance to soak up the characters or narrative during my brief demo, Heart Machine says meeting the characters and learning each of their stories is a big part of Possessor(s) narrative. Hopefully one of them will explain the weird (s) in the title.
Even if you’re a skip-the-cutscenes kind of player, you’ll want to stick around just to get a good look at these hand drawn character portraits, which are the coolest I’ve seen this side of Hades. Also, shame on you for skipping the cutscenes. Someone worked hard on those.
Possessor(s) may sound pretty grimdark, but it seems like it doesn’t take itself too seriously, either. When Luca is rescued by her disembodied demon companion Rehm, she’s given a pair of artificial legs that give her the power to jump high and ignore fall damage – two incredibly useful skills for a video game character to have. It’s a little self-aware, but not to the point of distraction, or undermining the heart of its characters.
I’m a sucker for Metroidv– er, search action games, and this looks like it’s going to be one of this year’s heavy hitters. Any game Heart Machine makes is worth giving a serious look at this point, and I’m looking forward to diving deeper into Possessor(s) when it’s ready.
Possessor(s)