by Padfield
Gods Eater Burst…is a game readily enjoyed but difficult to admire. It’s fun to team up and chop at giant monsters; they usually have a weakness to figure out, taking into account attack type, elemental affinity, and body part of the enemy. Once the most effective method has been mastered, there’s the satisfaction of making quick work out of, say, two sphinx-like monstronsities when one gave you trouble earlier. The weapon and armor crafting certainly plants a familiar addictive seed, especially with a friend to comment on just how cool that new chainsaw sword looks, but skillful playing is usually favored and the game’s almost condescendingly friendly difficulty curve ensures that the players’ know-how grows faster than the little number next to a given stat.
The flow of gameplay is tight; fight, diddle around in menus, then back into battle. The gameplay design itself, however, is less so. The fighting has a quick, bouncy, and approximate feel to it, but mostly effective since there is still to some extent, geometry to the weapons and shooting that must be taken into account. Plus, there are simply way more actions in the game than buttons on the PSP, so when the awkward clicking about on the device translates into effective maneuvering in-game it’s almost dazzling. I should not be this adept at jumping from d-pad to analog nub, but thanks to this game I’m almost at twin-stick levels of aiming smoothness.
What is more problematic from a design philosophy standpoint is that, in Gods Eater Burst, one must switch between shooting and melee combat to be effective, since sword attacks recharge the long-range “ammo” meter yet the most damaging abilities in the game, the more potent Burst bullets, require shooting while in Burst state, which can only be attained at melee range. The result is a fun rhythm imposed on the combat but it also makes multiplayer cooperation feel superficial- since no player has a clearly defined role, the main interaction is a quick “thanks” for the Burst bullet, then back to playing what mostly feels just like the solo game.
What is most jarring, however, about the games’ attempts to reconcile its single- and multiplayer sides is its incessant war on common sense, which mainly manifests as the storyline designed clearly to engage players without PSP-slinging friends. For example, why is the game called Gods Eater when it’s consistently pronounced in-game without the “s”? It’s like the voice actors couldn’t bear to so defile their native language, but then again with all the made up words the game’s narrative throws at the player it’d be a wonder if they knew they were speaking English at all. Honestly, if a nine-year old boy with a Naruto lunchbox looked over my shoulder during a Gods Eater cutscene, I would be embarassed. I would frantically try to explain that I have to watch them so I can fully review the game, but it would be too late. Don’t be like me. Hover over that “start” button after every Story mission with clinical intent, ready to abort the game’s script like a first-pass edit should have. Unfortunately, the inane anime clichés spill out into the gameplay now and again, such as the case of a special effect conferred by an in-game weapon that is literally called “Burst Limit Edge.” That’s a triple combo of words that Namco/Bandai apparently only kind of knows the meanings of, and frankly I still don’t know what the hell it does. Then there are the times when, at certain points in the story, the game will interrupt the players’ viscious romp and make them track down a non-player character, who inevitably has lots to say about Aragami, Gods arcs, or new-types (that’s monster, weapon, and monster hunter in English (I think)).
Yet after all its attempts to erode the human psyche, there is still a number of good times in Gods Eater Burst. It won’t take long to sink its teeth in, if you let it, and although you might hesisitate to celebrate its design, you’ll probably have trouble putting it down.
