Review - Sundered

An ancient and dark force force whispers in your mind. Gather the Elder Shards and retake the land for the dark voice. Sundered is a metroidvania, rouge-like game where the player is to decide whether to embrace the old ways or permanently cement the power of the human faction. While the game is quite enjoyable overall, it does not live up to the metroidvania title.

The gameplay is fundamentally a hack and slash platformer with a semi-rouge-like map. The player explores a dungeon that has two design levels to it. The first is the overall structure. Large rooms connect to one another with some of these rooms containing bosses, upgrades, or other important points. This layout does not have any rouge-like features to it as it remains the same across each death. On the other hand, the second design level does change. Each of the constant large rooms is actually composed of many smaller rooms that interlock to create the terrain that the player actually traverses. Every time the player dies, the layout of the second level is changed. In this way, exploration is given meaning since the player will still know the general path to take to get to any landmark. However, the specifics of that path are always a new challenge to overcome.

In terms of enemies, Sundered has a system that they call “hordes.” Instead of placing enemies on the map in specific places, the player will occasionally be attacked by large groups of enemies as they are exploring. While some people seem to be annoyed by this system, I quite enjoyed it. It always kept me on my toes as I was exploring and created quite difficult combat scenarios where I happened to be in the wrong place as a horde attacked. On top of that, it forced actual good combat out of the player as one could not easily cheese a horde into an easy encounter like can be done in a lot of other metroidvania titles. On the other hand, the hordes create a situation wherein all of the combat experiences end up being quite similar. The bonus to placing enemies in particular spots is that the developer can craft specific challenges that play to both enemies strengths and the player’s weaknesses. There is more potential depth in each combat experience when they are finely crafted. Overall, I did find the hordes to be enjoyable.

On the face of it, this exploration system is quite nice. It allows for there to be something gained across almost every run and certainly speeds up exploration over time. However, the failures of this system are really seen when you consider that the game is also a metroidvania. One of the hallmarks of the metroidvania genre are dense maps with many side-areas, secret rooms, and clever challenges. These are seen all through other titles like Metroid Fusion, Axiom Verge, and Hollow Knight. With Sundered’s rouge-like map generation, the elaborate side paths no longer exist. The closest that one gets is a few challenges to reach fairly obvious treasures. That fundamental element of the metroidvania was lost, quite to the detriment of the experience overall.

Here we come to the big impasse of this game: it does not deliver a metroidvania experience. Now don’t get me wrong, I really enjoyed this game. The combat was fast and exciting with some interesting exploration to boot. However, removing both finely crafted levels and specific enemy placement removed almost everything that is a metroidvania. The only element that remains is that there are certain areas that cannot be passed without specific upgrades. That is an important part of the metroidvania, but it misses all of the actual gameplay elements that are necessary to create the overall experience. Honestly, I didn’t enjoy the first hour or two of gameplay because I was looking for a metroidvania experience and just wasn’t finding it.

What this game should really be labelled is a hack and slash rouge-like. The fast pace, horde combat created frantic combat experiences that are right at home in the hack and slash genre. If one was to come into the game expecting more hack and slash then metroidvania, I think that my problem of the initial slog of the game would disappear. Really, the worst part of the game so far is the mislabelling that was done on the part of the developers. It is likely that they initially planned for it to be metroidvania and simply couldn’t accept that their experience had strayed too far from their initial conception to retain that label. Regardless, as a hack and slash, Sundered is a brilliantly fun game.

The narrative in Sundered focuses on conflict between the old and the new. The force that the player’s character, Eshe, is working for is the old force. They are rooted in mysticism with magic and monstrosities to match. The other force is the Valkyries, a group of technological humans who came to the land to learn some old secrets and ended up in conflict. The player has to decide whether to banish the old force by destroying the Elder Shards or embrace it, at once gaining power. The old versus new paradigm is altered by not having a clear good and evil force. Neither the old nor the new are shown as any more dangerous than the other. Before the Valkyries arrived, the elder force was at peace while the elders not only did not share their secrets, but seem to have a near xenophobic attitude towards the encroaching humans. Not to mention their eldritch horrors. This duality is interesting in that the moral choice to embrace or resist is not presented as a clear dichotomy between an evil or good act. Instead, the choice reflects the values of the player. Does this player consider an outside force entering the scenario to be a threatening action, thereby justifying the elder force? Should technology and arts be given freely to all, thereby showing that the elder force was not the utopia that the dark voice hinted at? Either option can be taken without a predetermined moral judgement upon the player.

Overall, Sundered is a great hack and slash experience. By labelling it as a metroidvania, the developers geared the player towards expecting a set of experience that did not occur. If you exclusively want a metroidvania, I would look at other games like Hollow Knight. However, Sundered is a great experience if you know to expect frantic combat and heavy rouge-like elements throughout. The narrative was somewhat nuanced as it played off of the standard old versus new paradigm while not passing damning judgements upon either group. The player decides which force was justified. Sundered is quite a fun experience and is definitely worth picking up.

Thunder Lotus Games, Sundered. Thunder Lotus Games, Jul 28, 2017.

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