Back in 2018, Steam put their Steam Link on deep, deep discount. Like, 95% off. Since it was originally selling for something like $249, that’s the only way I’d end up getting one. So I picked up a Steam Link and Steam Controller (also on discount) and figured “hey, I’ll give this a shot”. Well, the Steam Controller is the worst controller I’ve ever handled. Seriously, it’s an ergonomic nightmare to hold, the touchpads aren’t that great, and the buttons are almost exactly in the wrong place. It’s like it’s a specialized tool for an artist rather than a controller intended to be used to play games. I put the controller down and said something like “this is why you don’t use a controller for PC games”.
I played Red Dead Redemption 2 on Playstation and was delighted with the experience. I played Doom (2016) on the PC and was delighted with the experience. So I didn’t bother playing controller games on PC.
Well, the FX3 Pinball games are best on controller. So I started using an old dusty XBox compatible controller to play that. And… well, I’ve got Steam Link. Maybe play on the big TV instead of the little monitor? Hey, this is *AWESOME*. And I started branching out into all of the little controller-optimized games on my PC that I picked up in this or that Humble Bundle and never got around to playing.
One of those is Guacamelee! (note the exclamation point). This is an absolutely delightful Metroidvania from 2015.
You play Juan, a humble agave farmer in Santa Luchita. When The Big Bad comes in and steals your love interest, you become a Luchador! And you’ve got to fight your way through this madcap universe and pick up new powers along the way to open new areas that have new and different obstacles that will require new powers to overcome. You know, the usual: Switch back and forth between the world of the dead and the world of the living, the double jump, the headbutt, turn into a chicken. That sort of thing.
The game alternates between hand-to-hand combat sections and platforming sections. The combat is fun and surprisingly intricate. Each new area gives you new fights that act as little mini-quizzes on how well you know your various powers. This monster requires an uppercut to defeat. Oooh, this other monster requires a headbutt to defeat. Now put both of them in the same fight. Put some monsters that can only be defeated in the world of the dead in there with some monsters that can only be defeated in the world of the living… now you have to jump back and forth between worlds to win the fight.
The platforming sections are similar. You’ll get areas where you have to turn into a chicken on the fly, jump back and forth between worlds, and be really precise in your jumping. If I had a complaint, it’d be that some of these areas are really, really unforgiving and an old guy like me just doesn’t have the twitch skills that I used to. I mean, check this out:
That’s insane.
If you’re a big fan of Metroidvanias that require twitch-level skills to play, you owe it to yourself to pick this one up. The universe is fun, the combat is fun, and the platforming is tricky as heck. (If I stop playing, it’ll be because of one of the levels that requires jumping between universes as you’re jumping up a bunch of walls.)
(Huh. I wonder what else I have in the old back catalogue that deserves looking at again…)
So… what are you playing?
(Featured image is a screenshot from Guacamelee!, taken by the author.)
