I don't know about you guys, but this game seems pretty "bass" to me. Hey is that a pipe bo-
After a quick visit for my new robotic armaments, I wanted to say upfront: I don't like rhythm games and Hi-Fi here hasn't changed my mind on that. As a concept and in execution they were always very underwhelming to me, namely for how you're just pressing the buttons the game tells you to press. I'm not so close-minded to think they're all just QTEs, though some sections of this game are more QTEs then traditional rhythm, but regardless they don't embody what I find fun about games as I'm told what to press, when to press, and in a specific order.
But I do love me some action games, and after hearing that you don't have to be a rhythm fan to actually finish this game I decided to dive in. And promptly struggled for nearly three-fourths of the game.
So I picked hardmode for my first playthrough. My thought process was that, while rhythm games aren't my jam (HA!), I also didn't want to ignore half of the games mechanics either. I find that if I'm not punished enough for my mistakes in games then I'm never going to actually improve myself in learning them. Hard mode increases enemy damage, but unlike 'Very Hard' it doesn't make timing to the rhythm any stricter. I felt that was a good compromise, at the time. I don't regret that I did that, but the first playthrough was certainly rough.
I am someone who gets bothered by ranking systems in games. Not that I hate them, but more that I can get too addicted in trying to improve my rankings when there's little reward in doing so. Hi-Fi judges you base on combo, time, and timing. All self-explanatory: vary up your attacks and do harder combos, don't daddle during fights, and... ugh... stay on the beat. This last one really fucked me up. My whole time playing I managed only ONE S-Rank in the timing category for one battle. Most of the time I was on the beat a mere 50% to 60% of the time, though often saw sub-50% which count as a D-Rank. And this weakness of mine bothered me non-stop. Anytime I do try to land my attacks more carefully, I ended up getting the shit kicked out of me since I was not focusing enough on the battle itself. I know in hindsight you usually aren't suppose to start chasing ranks in action games till after the main story, but this just irked me way more then I cared to admit. Really said to my face how I ain't got rythym. Hell, it wasn't just the rankings but the many sections where action is all but absent, and you have to do a traditional rhythm section that I struggled with. Anyone who played this game will know of the one "boss" that is only just this, and I failed at that way more then I'd care to admit.
And I'm explaining how bad I am at (arguably) half of this game because I still ended up having a good time. Sure I would've preferred a lot more variety in combos and combat tech and maybe even more then one weapon, but it still had enough fun to keep me playing to the end, plus some post-game content. The core mechanics were solid enough, the attack feedback is incredible with how the music reacts to your success, the enemy roster has enough nuisances and punching bags to make fighting them cathartic, and heck I really love how every enemy and many bosses can all be juggled. You'd be surprised how often a game allows you to perform some sick ass mechanics on certain enemies, but because it's "imbalanced" they then limit that to the early game; whereas the latter half have foes completely immune to the most fun mechanic in said game. Even the biggest of foes in Hi-Fi Rush can be juggled into the air, so long as you can stun them first. That's perfectly fair and it makes it all the more satisfying to render those asshole robots helpless once you succeed in staggering them.
The action mechanics are all solid, but there's quite a few nitpicks I have that start to add up overtime. The most minor one is the parry, namely that it's given to you way later then I would've like. I suck at timing attacks on the beat, but parrying attacks on the beat was, somehow, way more comfortable and I was actually good at it. I wish you had access to it from the start, even if they wouldn't tutorialized it immediately and let you figure it out on your own. It would've made the second boss way more fun that's for sure.
And before getting into the negatives more, similar to juggling you can parry nearly everything in this game. There's actually a number obstacles and AOE attacks that you can guard against that wouldn't think would be possible. It was damn cool figuring out that I could parry the rotating laser obstacles or the bomb explosions dropped by those drone enemies. But you can also parry something that I don't like about this game, and that's when the strongest enemies initiate a showdown (I think there's a different name for this mechanic but I can't find what it's called). When low on health, a powerful enemy can put you into a force rhythm section where you have to perfectly parry their attacks in order to finish them off. Combined with my poverish rhythm skills and I dreaded these everytime. I ended up dying to the giant samurais so many times because of this mechanic. They do have a tell before unleashing the shockwave that pulls you into a showdown, that can be parried as previously mentioned, but this honestly kills the flow of combat for me as doing them doesn't feel particularly rewarding. To me, I either lose a bunch of health and am now at a bigger disadvantage, or I do complete them and I just skip the rest of their health bar which makes it feel anticlimactic. I think one change would've made this flow way better, and that would be to allow the player to engage the showdown rather then the enemy. That way there would be a risk-reward decision of succeeding in this rhythm mini-game and wiping out a big threat sooner, or play it safe and try to finish it off the normal way. And in my case, I'd likely choose to not utilize it at all since the base combat is a lot more interesting.
A big issue that's been brought up by many is the lock-on, or lack thereof. You have to rely on the autolock to target the right enemy for your grappling hook or your partner attacks. It can and will do things you did not want it do, but I was more bothered by needing to babysit the camera stick if the enemy went off-screen. The camera doesn't always keep to the enemies and it can have you take potshots from attacks you couldn't see coming. Though to give credit where it's due, the game does have clear visual and audible tells for attacks. You will hear "shings" and "beeps" before being struck on the next beat or two. Enemies with projectiles will light up the floor underneath Chai and will change to indicate when and where it'll strike the player. Because of the universal parry, plenty of times I heard a offscreen attack coming and parried on the next beat consistently. Still not ideal to need to make that guesstimate when playing a action game, but they did make some smart decisions to not make it as frustrating as it could have. Plus your normal attacks don't have a ton of stickiness to them, so I was always hitting the target that I wanted in that regard.
And lastly you have partner cooldowns. This isn't a deal breaker to me as it would be for some, but yeah there were times where I needed to make a foe vulnerable with a partner attack but since they were on cooldown I just had to wait in the middle of a fight before getting back to the fun. I made that sound more damming then it actually is since the cooldowns aren't too bad honestly. I do find it strange that you have to use your limited number of equipment slots in order to decrease their cooldowns if you want them more readily available, but by default I didn't think the wait killed the pacing much.
If there's one thing Hi-Fi has done for me, it's that I'm now marginally better at rythym in general. Between the ranking systems as well as the many benefits of timing your attacks to the beat (increased damage and special meter build-up to name a few), plus the parts where I had to rhythm or die, I actually started performing to the beat subconsciously. It was borderline surreal honestly. One of the bigger examples was the dash. It's your traditional dodge with invulnerability frames and the like, but if you can time these dodges on the beat then you can initiate three in a row. This is also the fastest way of moving around, so while you're making your way from one area to the next you're practicing your rhythm simultaneously. Despite its repetitiveness, I never found doing repeated dashes to get a move-on annoying in the least. Rather it was rewarding training.
This feeling of improvement felt a lot different then getting good at other games, as rhythm and music is more universal across the many cultures of our world; it feels like I can appreciate music a lot more now. But again, marginally. I could've played on Very Hard to have less room for error and really have needed to adapt to the beat, but at the moment this is as deep as I'm interested in learning. Any harder and I would stop enjoying myself.
God damn, why did I write so much about this game and not have said anything about the presentation? Probably because it's more valuable to experience it for yourself then to read about it.
Well, it knocks it out of the park in so many ways. Everything moves to the beat. Every character, every enemy robot, every action, every machine, the manholes, the designs on the walls, the potted plants. Everything moves to the beat. Even in the crampest of factory hallways and closests tend to have something bobbing up and down. And if there really isn't anything of note, then the player character, Chai, will always be snapping his fingers to the beat, and each of his every steps will synch up to the rhythm too. The world just pops with so many vibrant colors, characters have such memorable designs and facial expressions, cutscenes may turn into a actual cartoon unexpectedly; how is this a game that was kept secret till the day of release?
However, and this may cause me lose any goodwill I had left on this site, but I don't remember much of the soundtrack. Chalk it up to the music being a genre I don't listen to often. It does fit with the tone and setting perfectly, even the licensed songs were added with purpose and not just "this song was in the director's Spotify". (Autocorrect wanted to call Spotify "SpongeBob")
Story: It's good. So are the characters. I don't have much to say honestly. OK some can be borderline obnoxious depending on your tolerance for ironic "bodacious dudes" speech and modern lingo, yet I'm terminally online and a Kingdom Hearts fan so this game couldn't hurt me even if it tried. Well maybe that early game villan doing JoJo poses constantly came close, but everyone has hobby and who am I to judge. Oh wait, you overwork all your employees with unreasonable demands for your multi-billion dollar company? Nevermind, death penalty for you.
Yeah the themes and messages of this game are far from subtle. Even the many journal logs are more of an excuse for gags then added lore like in most games. It actually made me want to read them at least since this game's humor is really good. Especially the slapstick and physical comedy, never got tired of our idiot protagonist getting the shit kicked out of him for his dumbass decisions. Hmm, I guess Chai may be contentious for some as he's the protagonist but also the biggest bonehead I've played as since Yakuza 7. I can't help it though, I really like the guy. Something about his unwavering confidence in himself and for the world around him makes himself really charming. I both love to laugh at him and with him.
It always admirable when a game comes along with such passion and nails everything it sets out to achieve. Polished to a tee (except that one glitch where I got stuck inside a boss) with personality oozing out of every orifice. Even if I inherently don't jive with parts, it's still a game worth rockin' to.
After a quick visit for my new robotic armaments, I wanted to say upfront: I don't like rhythm games and Hi-Fi here hasn't changed my mind on that. As a concept and in execution they were always very underwhelming to me, namely for how you're just pressing the buttons the game tells you to press. I'm not so close-minded to think they're all just QTEs, though some sections of this game are more QTEs then traditional rhythm, but regardless they don't embody what I find fun about games as I'm told what to press, when to press, and in a specific order.
But I do love me some action games, and after hearing that you don't have to be a rhythm fan to actually finish this game I decided to dive in. And promptly struggled for nearly three-fourths of the game.
So I picked hardmode for my first playthrough. My thought process was that, while rhythm games aren't my jam (HA!), I also didn't want to ignore half of the games mechanics either. I find that if I'm not punished enough for my mistakes in games then I'm never going to actually improve myself in learning them. Hard mode increases enemy damage, but unlike 'Very Hard' it doesn't make timing to the rhythm any stricter. I felt that was a good compromise, at the time. I don't regret that I did that, but the first playthrough was certainly rough.
I am someone who gets bothered by ranking systems in games. Not that I hate them, but more that I can get too addicted in trying to improve my rankings when there's little reward in doing so. Hi-Fi judges you base on combo, time, and timing. All self-explanatory: vary up your attacks and do harder combos, don't daddle during fights, and... ugh... stay on the beat. This last one really fucked me up. My whole time playing I managed only ONE S-Rank in the timing category for one battle. Most of the time I was on the beat a mere 50% to 60% of the time, though often saw sub-50% which count as a D-Rank. And this weakness of mine bothered me non-stop. Anytime I do try to land my attacks more carefully, I ended up getting the shit kicked out of me since I was not focusing enough on the battle itself. I know in hindsight you usually aren't suppose to start chasing ranks in action games till after the main story, but this just irked me way more then I cared to admit. Really said to my face how I ain't got rythym. Hell, it wasn't just the rankings but the many sections where action is all but absent, and you have to do a traditional rhythm section that I struggled with. Anyone who played this game will know of the one "boss" that is only just this, and I failed at that way more then I'd care to admit.
And I'm explaining how bad I am at (arguably) half of this game because I still ended up having a good time. Sure I would've preferred a lot more variety in combos and combat tech and maybe even more then one weapon, but it still had enough fun to keep me playing to the end, plus some post-game content. The core mechanics were solid enough, the attack feedback is incredible with how the music reacts to your success, the enemy roster has enough nuisances and punching bags to make fighting them cathartic, and heck I really love how every enemy and many bosses can all be juggled. You'd be surprised how often a game allows you to perform some sick ass mechanics on certain enemies, but because it's "imbalanced" they then limit that to the early game; whereas the latter half have foes completely immune to the most fun mechanic in said game. Even the biggest of foes in Hi-Fi Rush can be juggled into the air, so long as you can stun them first. That's perfectly fair and it makes it all the more satisfying to render those asshole robots helpless once you succeed in staggering them.
The action mechanics are all solid, but there's quite a few nitpicks I have that start to add up overtime. The most minor one is the parry, namely that it's given to you way later then I would've like. I suck at timing attacks on the beat, but parrying attacks on the beat was, somehow, way more comfortable and I was actually good at it. I wish you had access to it from the start, even if they wouldn't tutorialized it immediately and let you figure it out on your own. It would've made the second boss way more fun that's for sure.
And before getting into the negatives more, similar to juggling you can parry nearly everything in this game. There's actually a number obstacles and AOE attacks that you can guard against that wouldn't think would be possible. It was damn cool figuring out that I could parry the rotating laser obstacles or the bomb explosions dropped by those drone enemies. But you can also parry something that I don't like about this game, and that's when the strongest enemies initiate a showdown (I think there's a different name for this mechanic but I can't find what it's called). When low on health, a powerful enemy can put you into a force rhythm section where you have to perfectly parry their attacks in order to finish them off. Combined with my poverish rhythm skills and I dreaded these everytime. I ended up dying to the giant samurais so many times because of this mechanic. They do have a tell before unleashing the shockwave that pulls you into a showdown, that can be parried as previously mentioned, but this honestly kills the flow of combat for me as doing them doesn't feel particularly rewarding. To me, I either lose a bunch of health and am now at a bigger disadvantage, or I do complete them and I just skip the rest of their health bar which makes it feel anticlimactic. I think one change would've made this flow way better, and that would be to allow the player to engage the showdown rather then the enemy. That way there would be a risk-reward decision of succeeding in this rhythm mini-game and wiping out a big threat sooner, or play it safe and try to finish it off the normal way. And in my case, I'd likely choose to not utilize it at all since the base combat is a lot more interesting.
A big issue that's been brought up by many is the lock-on, or lack thereof. You have to rely on the autolock to target the right enemy for your grappling hook or your partner attacks. It can and will do things you did not want it do, but I was more bothered by needing to babysit the camera stick if the enemy went off-screen. The camera doesn't always keep to the enemies and it can have you take potshots from attacks you couldn't see coming. Though to give credit where it's due, the game does have clear visual and audible tells for attacks. You will hear "shings" and "beeps" before being struck on the next beat or two. Enemies with projectiles will light up the floor underneath Chai and will change to indicate when and where it'll strike the player. Because of the universal parry, plenty of times I heard a offscreen attack coming and parried on the next beat consistently. Still not ideal to need to make that guesstimate when playing a action game, but they did make some smart decisions to not make it as frustrating as it could have. Plus your normal attacks don't have a ton of stickiness to them, so I was always hitting the target that I wanted in that regard.
And lastly you have partner cooldowns. This isn't a deal breaker to me as it would be for some, but yeah there were times where I needed to make a foe vulnerable with a partner attack but since they were on cooldown I just had to wait in the middle of a fight before getting back to the fun. I made that sound more damming then it actually is since the cooldowns aren't too bad honestly. I do find it strange that you have to use your limited number of equipment slots in order to decrease their cooldowns if you want them more readily available, but by default I didn't think the wait killed the pacing much.
If there's one thing Hi-Fi has done for me, it's that I'm now marginally better at rythym in general. Between the ranking systems as well as the many benefits of timing your attacks to the beat (increased damage and special meter build-up to name a few), plus the parts where I had to rhythm or die, I actually started performing to the beat subconsciously. It was borderline surreal honestly. One of the bigger examples was the dash. It's your traditional dodge with invulnerability frames and the like, but if you can time these dodges on the beat then you can initiate three in a row. This is also the fastest way of moving around, so while you're making your way from one area to the next you're practicing your rhythm simultaneously. Despite its repetitiveness, I never found doing repeated dashes to get a move-on annoying in the least. Rather it was rewarding training.
This feeling of improvement felt a lot different then getting good at other games, as rhythm and music is more universal across the many cultures of our world; it feels like I can appreciate music a lot more now. But again, marginally. I could've played on Very Hard to have less room for error and really have needed to adapt to the beat, but at the moment this is as deep as I'm interested in learning. Any harder and I would stop enjoying myself.
God damn, why did I write so much about this game and not have said anything about the presentation? Probably because it's more valuable to experience it for yourself then to read about it.
Well, it knocks it out of the park in so many ways. Everything moves to the beat. Every character, every enemy robot, every action, every machine, the manholes, the designs on the walls, the potted plants. Everything moves to the beat. Even in the crampest of factory hallways and closests tend to have something bobbing up and down. And if there really isn't anything of note, then the player character, Chai, will always be snapping his fingers to the beat, and each of his every steps will synch up to the rhythm too. The world just pops with so many vibrant colors, characters have such memorable designs and facial expressions, cutscenes may turn into a actual cartoon unexpectedly; how is this a game that was kept secret till the day of release?
However, and this may cause me lose any goodwill I had left on this site, but I don't remember much of the soundtrack. Chalk it up to the music being a genre I don't listen to often. It does fit with the tone and setting perfectly, even the licensed songs were added with purpose and not just "this song was in the director's Spotify". (Autocorrect wanted to call Spotify "SpongeBob")
Story: It's good. So are the characters. I don't have much to say honestly. OK some can be borderline obnoxious depending on your tolerance for ironic "bodacious dudes" speech and modern lingo, yet I'm terminally online and a Kingdom Hearts fan so this game couldn't hurt me even if it tried. Well maybe that early game villan doing JoJo poses constantly came close, but everyone has hobby and who am I to judge. Oh wait, you overwork all your employees with unreasonable demands for your multi-billion dollar company? Nevermind, death penalty for you.
Yeah the themes and messages of this game are far from subtle. Even the many journal logs are more of an excuse for gags then added lore like in most games. It actually made me want to read them at least since this game's humor is really good. Especially the slapstick and physical comedy, never got tired of our idiot protagonist getting the shit kicked out of him for his dumbass decisions. Hmm, I guess Chai may be contentious for some as he's the protagonist but also the biggest bonehead I've played as since Yakuza 7. I can't help it though, I really like the guy. Something about his unwavering confidence in himself and for the world around him makes himself really charming. I both love to laugh at him and with him.
It always admirable when a game comes along with such passion and nails everything it sets out to achieve. Polished to a tee (except that one glitch where I got stuck inside a boss) with personality oozing out of every orifice. Even if I inherently don't jive with parts, it's still a game worth rockin' to.