Devolver Digital finally draws the curtains on Mediatronic Games’ Foul Play for the PS4 after its initial staging in 2013 on PC. Porting Foul Play across to the black box took its time, but was it worth the wait, or should we be throwing some rotten vegetables at it?
As the stage curtains rise you’re greeted with Sebastian Dashforth, a daemon hunter like his old father. He tells the tale of his past deeds with his trusty sidekick Mr. Scampwick. Brandishing their canes and broomsticks, they scupper off into the world to save mankind from daemons.
Ploughing through daemons is a matter of mashing buttons through a total of twenty-two acts, four plays comprising of five acts each, and one play that comprises only of two acts. During the acts you enact scenes that typically comprise of different types of daemons and, like every other scene, you need to use your wits to slap silly the daemons that come before you.
Each act gives three criteria as bonuses, which can be anything from combos, leaving the boss till last, to performing special moves a certain number of times. Some of these challenges can be tricky until you have unlocked new skills to help strike down the suited extras faster than before.
What helps you through each act are charms. If you’re looking for trophies then these will come in handy. Equipping them allows you to carry out double the combo hits, the special move counter increases at a faster rate, you get better audience approvals, and more. There are a total of seventeen charms and they are unlocked in order, so it doesn’t matter which act you complete all three challenges on.
A real shame about all of this is that once you have unlocked your final two skills, the game becomes a walk in the park with no real challenge at all (including the bosses); even the three challenges you get become very easy to do – with the exception of combos which can be a hit or miss affair as they require your character to be perfectly inline with the daemons themselves, that is unless you press circle when they’re charging an attack, and by then you would have most likely lost your combo counter.
The aesthetics are simply wonderful. Every act is like a moving story on stage. Every scene is greeted with the scenery changing, invisible strings, workmen still working on set, and even the daemons have the actor’s faces still showing. Simply charming. There are some lovely touches too, like having the actors that are supposedly dead either crawl off the stage or get dragged off by a cane’s hook from the side. Little touches like that makes the game a lot of fun and it really does look like you’re in the audience watching.
As you increase your combos you get to please the audience. The higher your combo gauge rises then the louder the audience will cheer. Get hit and your gauge meter will drop a level. Drop it too low and get hit with no gauge left on the meter and you will have to restart the scene again. There are no lives in Foul Play and essentially the only failure state is to retry the scene again.
Foul Play’s control system is somewhat rigid rather than fluid.. Even if you constantly button mash, it seems like you only can get a move out every second. Grab a daemon in the air and then that’s the only time you can start hammering the square button to rapidly hit the enemy, but that’s the only time the combat was enjoyable.
Later in the game you’ll just find that all you need to do is press circle over and over again with the same piledriver or human cannonball move. Despite there being twelve different moves to use, there are only three or four that you’ll probably use. The depth to the combat just isn’t there, and because of this the game is too repetitive; it can only be played in small doses at a time, much like every beat’em up game.
It is nice to see a game try something different than from the written scripts of Hollywood’s gaming generics. You will be able to find a fun game beneath the surface, but Foul Play’s depth is lacking and the combat feels too stiff. To enjoy this game the most, you will want to play it in short bursts or with a friend, but don’t expect a deep and involving brawler.