Another Indie team releases its effort but is this game worth it’s price of admission? Find out here.

A lot of indie games are releasing that take inspiration from an 8-bit art-style. While High Strangeness emulates 8-bit and 16-bit adventures it’s too bad that it doesn’t reach the height many predecessors reach. High Strangeness isn’t bad but there is too much keeping it from reaching greater heights.

Skulls which will determine your destiny.

High Strangeness is about a young man named Boyd, who while in the middle of his preparations to move, gets involved in a trans-dimensional adventure with his cat, a mysterious cloaked person and an old and wise man; fighting an ancient race of god-like hooded beings called the keepers. The keepers are after a specific set of objects called the crystal skulls, which have immense power and could potentially wipe out all of existence. After one day being attacked by the keepers, Boyd gets his hands on two of these skull and is teleported to a mysterious place where he meets an old man named Jacob who brought the young man to him. As it turns out Boyd is the only one who can stop the keepers from destroying humanity with the help of the skulls. And now the race has begun to be the first to get the skulls. The plot of High strangeness is nothing special because the concepts and lore of the game don’t get explored enough or aren’t used in a way to make the story really interesting. Add on top of that, that the plot twists are just there for the sake of having a twist that doesn’t make much sense and you got a story that’s trivial.High strangeness story isn’t bad it’s just a bit pointless.

Zelda-esque puzzle but not as complex.

High strangeness plays a bit like a Zelda game with all levels playing like the dungeon sections. One of the main attraction of the game, is the ability to switch between 8-bit and 16-bit graphics to solve puzzles and fight enemies. This mechanic, while fairly good-looking, isn’t implemented as well as it could have been. Combat is simple: in 8-bit pressing the attack button does a stab like in the original Zelda while in 16-bit the attacks being a bit similar to Illusions Of Time with a few extra attacks the player can select and upgrade. The main weapon is a Flashlight which has a very small range that gives combat a few problems. Along with a health-bar you must also watch your mana-bar which will deplete rather fast with each attack you do. Combine these two elements with the fact that there is no hit-invincibility and you got a game in which you die way too easily if you engage in combat. That is if you engage in combat because a lot if not most of the enemies you can run past with the exception of bosses. Puzzles are quite fun if a bit too easy at some points because they usually follow the same pattern and don’t try to combine elements to make things harder.

Switch between 8 and 16 bit.

Graphically the game looks ok. The sprite art is not bad but feels like it’s missing a bit of charm at least in 16-bit. in 8-bit the game evokes the graphical style of GameGear games. While it won’t be seen as an amazing masterpiece, it looks fairly good if not a bit bland. The music can almost be described as the graphics, it’s nothing bad and serves it purpose but it doesn’t reach the chip-tune heights it could have. The main problem is the game’s aspect ratio which is abysmal. Not only doesn’t the game support widescreen on Wii U, both the top and lower part of the screen aren’t filled and there was no effort to make the background a bit appealing.

High strangeness isn’t a bad game. However it’s more of a game you’d find online created by a small team who just wanted to make a game for free. And that’s the core problem of High strangeness, the price. The game is a good first try but ultimately should be a free experience to be played by all and those who enjoy it want to support it could. Developer CrystalLabs could have some great games if they at least try to make a full retail experience. High strangeness isn’t long and doesn’t over-stay its welcome nor does it get annoying or frustrating but at its core the design length and price hold it back from being a really good experience.

4/10

Tested on Nintendo Wii U