It's not often you find a game with a genuine sense of humour - but Guacamelee is one such game. Telling the story of Juan, a downtrodden wannabe wrestler (or in the Mexican lingo, a luchadore) who sets off on a quest to rescue El Presidente's daughter, you'll be switching between dimensions, suplexing skeletons, and at times, turning into a chicken, throughout a world plastered with memes and other stars from the internet. Even Grumpy Cat makes an appearance. While it may not be as outright mental as some (it certainly can't hold a candle to Katamari, or Muscle March on the weird-ometer), it's safe to say Guacamelee has its tongue in the right place. Firmly in its cheek.
Poor old Juan doesn't seem to be the luckiest of types, though. On hearing of a commotion at El Presidente's house, Juan, ever the eager hero, rushes to investigate, only to find the president's daughter being held captive by the evil Carlos Calaca, a former wrestler who's now been turned into a skeleton and taken over the world of the dead, presumably by making the devil tap out. Having shown up with the intention of rescuing the lovely mamacita, you've barely managed to reach for your half boston crab before Calaca summons some magic, snaps his fingers, and kills you in the blink of an eye, banishing you to the land of the dead. Luckily for Juan, though, his story isn't over there. On wandering around the underworld, he just so happens to come across a magical luchadore mask, which, legend has it, will only reveals itself to some sort of chosen one. As you'd expect, Juan is the one. Putting on the mask, he's promptly returned to the world of the living, having been transformed into a fully blown luchadore, with rippling muscles, shiny tights, and everything else that comes with it.
Bounce off walls, beat people up, switch between dimensions. All in the space of Juan day.
From here, Guacamelee essentially splits off into two segments. The first takes place in the residential parts of town, which sees you wandering around, chatting with the folks of Mexico, and solving quests for them. Whether you're hunting down the evil chicken thief (that's actually a chicken that steals things, not a person that steals chickens), or trying to reunite the members of a mariachi band, the quests you're given here may be a distraction from the meat of the game, but they're certainly a welcome one, as after twisting your fingers together like a pretzel playing your way through the main game, you'll welcome the change of pace.
Essentially a platformer, the main part of Guacamelee mixes puzzles, platforming, combat, and exploration to good effect. While there aren't any levels as such (you're free to explore the game's world as you see fit), a large part of your time will be spent simply figuring out how to reach a certain place in the game's maze-like world. With a map that shows you where to go, but only shows you rooms you've already been to, the onus is on to you to figure out how to get there. Whether it's a platform you can't quite jump to, or a barrier you haven't yet learnt the power you'll need to smash through, there's a lot more thinking here than you'd probably expect, as you feel your way around the world.
Luckily, the further you get through the game, the easier it becomes to find your way around it. As you progress, you'll be rewarded with certain powers, each of which are as much use in combat as they are in exploring the world. Press circle and push up, down, left or right on the analogue stick, and you'll perform one of three different moves - an upper cut (which can be helpful for reaching high up places), a headbutt (which can smash through yellow blocks), and a ground pound (which can obliterate green blocks). As you make your way through the jungles, desert and temples of Guacamelee, you'll undoubtedly come across sections you simply can't reach - with the solution often being that you'll have to come back later, when you've learnt how to jump that little bit higher, or smash that annoying block, and see what lies beyond.
Stun an enemy (by whacking them enough), and you'll be able to grab them by pressing triangle, and chuck them round - either bouncing them off the walls, or into each other.
However, things aren't always as easy as just smashing a block out of the way. One of the powers you earn roughly halfway through the game is the ability to switch between dimensions on the fly. At the press of a button, you'll be able to jump from the land of the dead into the land of the living (and vice versa) - and things often aren't quite the same. If you spot something that's sparkling (or a silhouette that's sparkling), the chances are it won't exist in the opposite dimension - so if you want to get past a wall that's in the way, all you'll have to do is switch dimension.
Sounds simple enough, right? Wrong. Guacamelee may be challenging enough in terms of figuring out how to get to a certain point, but actually getting there is harder still. Often, you'll have to switch dimensions mid jump, or chain several jumps and moves together (like the aforementioned uppercut, that helps you get a little bit higher), and then switch dimension once you've made it far enough. Change at the wrong time (like when you're still overlapping the silhouette of something that exists in another dimension), and you'll botch up your jump. It's about as confusing as it sounds - and at times, about as challenging as it's possible for platforming to get. Many of the jumps require split-second timing on your part, as you weave your way between spikes, pits, and walls. If you've ever played N+, you'll be in familiar territory here - while Guacamelee doesn't get quite that difficult (for the most part, it's just the optional parts that are stupidly tricky), towards the end it certainly comes damn close, and you'll find yourself increasingly falling over your fingers.
From time to time you'll wander into a room only for a pair of walls to randomly spring up, blocking you in. These are Guacamelee's fighting challenges, which lock you in a room against an onslaught of enemies,with the intent of pushing your fighting (and wrestling) skills to the limit. There's a wide range of enemies they can throw at you, too - from skeletons that swipe at you with lightning speed, to cactuses that'll chuck grenades your way; giant, armoured skeletons that wield equally huge mallets, and even giant, random exploding bombs that detonate if you don't destroy them first - and you'll have to clear them all to progress.
Unfortunately, though, the more you play Guacamelee, the more the game seems to fall into the same old "indie game" traps. It's almost like it simply tries to do too much. The combat is a good case in point - when you first start playing, you'll likely find it tricky enough, but the game keeps adding layer upon layer to make it even harder. Enemies start popping up with shields that can only be broken by performing a move of the same colour (each of your direction-plus-circle moves has an associated colour). Then they gain the ability to switch dimension on the fly. Break through the shield, and they'll just change dimensions, at which point it'll instantly recharge. Annoying? You bet - and it's even worse in the boss fights. Bosses that can kill you in a handful of hits that take several minutes worth of beatings from you are not fun - especially when they have such terribly cheaty ways to get around things.
And it's a shame, because Guacamelee does so much right. The platforming, to begin with, is fun. The world they've created is interesting to explore, the combat's entertaining enough, while the game's support of Cross-Buy (where you buy the game once, and can play it on both the PS3 and PS Vita) is a really nice touch - as is the ability to use a Vita as a controller. But then things get ramped up too much, fights are made too hard, and things start to feel unfair. But perhaps the biggest question is, why? Why make things unfairly hard? Why make it so there's only a single difficulty? Is it to retain some sort of indie game cred, so it doesn't get sneered at for being too easy by the hardcore? Or was it simply a mistake - a lack of focus testing that didn't pick up a learning curve that skyrockets around the half way point? While it sets out so well, with a sense of humour, and a completely unique flavour, whatever the reason, the difficulty ends up robbing Guacamelee of a lot of its flair - and that's a real shame.
Format Reviewed: Playstation 3
