Cuphead Review

Cartoons of the 30’s are revived in a gorgeous test of patience, skill and charm.

By: Ryan Ramakrishnan

Reviewed on Xbox One

“Cuphead” is a visual masterpiece with some of the most challenging gameplay its genre has to offer, coupled with utmost charm.

This indie game proves to be a an incredibly worthwhile experience thanks to its unique art direction alone. A series of increasingly difficult boss fights make the shoot em' up an exhilarating time. This is all backed up by a feeling of pure satisfaction upon each level completion. Mastering the difficult challenges and admiring the visuals and music all complement each other’s addition to the overall joy that is “Cuphead.”

Story

The titular Cuphead and his brother, Mugman, are big-time gamblers. After becoming so obsessed, Cuphead takes a huge risk. Should they win, the entirety of the casino’s money would be theirs’. However losing would result in them giving up their souls to the Devil himself. From there, Cuphead and Mugman must gather soul contracts for the Devil to get out of this deadly deal.

The plot “Cuphead” presents is delightfully charming. This story is however rarely focused on what with a lack of actual story moments save for the soul contracts resulting from boss completions. This doesn’t matter much though thanks to the simplicity of it all and the gameplay, sound and visuals taking significant priority.

Gameplay
“Cuphead” has a control system with the abilities to move backwards and forward, jump, shoot nonstop, dash and shoot a charged up blast. Gameplay sees fast movement with the fire button being held down at all times, spraying unlimited ammo at the grand foes.

The main draw of “Cuphead” is its consistently challenging and fresh boss fights. “Cuphead” is more or less a boss rush but what makes it so good is that each boss fight comes with many special abilities, quirks and more.

Each of the boss fights offer significant challenges. “Cuphead” is the kind of game made with an intentional difficulty in mind. I admittedly failed dozens of times, even in the earlier boss fights. These failures do ultimately lead to a feeling of true satisfaction once conquered. I cannot deny the fairness in most of the fights either; “Cuphead” may be absurdly challenging but the game is designed well, so well that failing a boss fight is rarely the game’s fault for cheapness. I eventually discovered the patterns and the reasons I continuously failed and then finally succeeded to get the aforementioned feeling of satisfaction. However, the failures lead to extremely satisfying successes. This is a genuinely addictive gameplay loop, though definitely not so welcoming to casual players afraid of high difficulty spikes.

Besides the core boss fights of “Cuphead,” there are also some run and gun levels. These are a fun change of pace at times but never as exciting as the main levels. With no special bosses or any other particularly intriguing aspects of these levels, they rarely stuck with me or even gave me an incentive to complete them, especially knowing there are truly exhilarating challenges right around the corner.

During the game’s boss fights, there is no sign of progression until you fail. Of course, with the difficulty of “Cuphead,” there are no checkpoints during the boss fights; however, after dying, you will see how far you got.

Multiplayer in “Cuphead” is limited to local co-op. A second player can hop in, playing as Mugman. Unfortunately, I found this cooperative gameplay to be a bit overwhelming with the extra player and significantly higher amount of bullets on screen. Positively, it was a fun time collaborating and joking about the many failures. Local co-op isn’t necessarily easier, contrary to the idea that double the fire would take the bosses out in half the time.

Graphics
Ever since its debut at E3 2014, “Cuphead” wowed viewers with an art direction inspired by cartoons of the 1930’s like those out of Walt Disney Studios or Fleischer Studios.

Studio MDHR nails boss design in the visual department as much as with the gameplay. “Cuphead” is filled with so many unique, charming designs for each of the bosses in everything from their projectiles and attack patterns to their multiple forms and transitions. There is a great deal of heart put into all of them.

Cuphead and Mugman both have unforgettable designs as well. The two of them are both perfect adorable video game mascots, as well as easily suitable for a cartoon of yesteryear.

The artistically gorgeous visuals and atstyle of “Cuphead” prove it to be a wondrous work of art.

Sound
In the same vein of the graphics, the music of “Cuphead” is immensely satisfying to listen to. The music sticks with you thanks to the incredibly catchy tunes, perfect for the time period it represents.

In the audio department, I also found myself satisfied with the voices, despite them being few and far between. The opening phrases from the announcer such as “this match will get redhot,” and "a brawl is surely brewing," were executed in a charming manner and were fun additions to the tone of the game overall, despite being such a miniscule aspect of it.

Content
After completion, “Cuphead” doesn’t offer a whole lot to do. This is quite unfortunate due to the addictive nature and pure charm of the entire game; I couldn’t help but want more. Of course, with the extreme difficulty, I can’t imagine “Cuphead” will be completed too quickly by many, so I suppose you’ll get a bang for your buck. Here’s to the hopes of DLC in the future.

Conclusion
Ultimately, the new indie developers of Studio MDHR have executed a passion project with an equal amount of heart and charm. Once I got into the action, even after the countless failures, it was hard to put the controller down thanks to the addictive challenging yet satisfying loop of “Cuphead.” A love letter to 1930s-era cartoons, artists of that time and the gaming industry as a whole, “Cuphead” looks and sounds simply delightful. Coupled with the exhilarating boss fights and shoot em up gameplay. “Cuphead” is a testament to the amount of heart and dedication developers can put into their games to make a worthwhile and entertaining experience like no other.

Do you think “Cuphead” does well balancing style and substance? Did you find its difficulty to be fair or unforgiving? Let me know your thoughts in the comments below.