Keylocker review | PC Gamer

It’s Saturn, sooner or later. Music is outlawed. Society is run by tyrannical Satellites that preserve the nice residents silent and subjugated, unable to supply their very own Electrical energy and beholden to the tough palms of their overlords. Our protagonist Bobo is an unlawful, tremendous glamorous, tremendous cool musician, continually on the mistaken aspect of the regulation due to her insistence on making music. She’s in simply the appropriate spot to upend the pure order of issues and put the Satellites of their place, liberating the lots by taking part in a sick guitar solo at key moments. Certain, she’s obtained a grand plan—the Keylockers scattered round Soundwave Metropolis include trapped djinn (and in addition town’s music or sound or each?) and if Bobo can free the djinn she will even have Launched Music and Defeated Fascism, or one thing.

None of that issues very a lot, as a result of Keylocker is generally a recreation about taking part in a sick guitar solo. Violently. Versus principally each different character you work together with. The revolution will solely succeed as soon as Bobo has overwhelmed the shit out of all the populace of Saturn together with her sick guitar.

The fight is primarily turn-based, with some “rhythm” recreation parts that by no means show to be very rhythmic. Most of fight is balancing Bobo’s Life Factors and Electrical energy Factors, determining how greatest to chip away at enemies’ well being with out giving them house to make use of strikes which may heal, energy up, or shield themselves. I selected the Juggernaut class, a reasonably easy tank-style character, a lot of my fight concerned swapping between EP-charging strikes and heavy hits, which might make a dent in all however probably the most annoying of enemies. Often Bobo is joined by Rocket, a Jukebot she present in a scrapyard, or her brother Seller, who’s a hacker with a TV set for a helmet—their skillsets can diversify Bobo’s techniques in additional advanced battles, although I discovered every character tends to have a go-to talent that proves extra helpful than the others.

Nearly all of expertise are triggered by timed button presses, both a small sequence or as soon as when a personality flashes white, and in case you get your timing proper you possibly can dance your manner via many of the fights within the recreation, as you’re taking no injury from excellent dodges and do fairly a quantity in your enemies with an ideal hit.  In contrast to the video games identified for doing this type of system nicely, like Nintendo’s Mario RPGs, the entire mechanic tends to land on the mistaken aspect of finicky, requiring a response nearly earlier than the indicator is definitely triggered.

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Frustratingly usually I needed to repeat minor fight encounters three or 4 occasions due to what appeared like dangerous luck, a pixel within the mistaken path chewing up the final of my LP after I swear my timing wasn’t a second totally different than a earlier excellent dodge. Fortunately all battles may be restarted from the start, as an alternative of getting to load a save upon each demise—in any other case the quantity of retraced steps would have been genuinely unbearable.

This repetitive annoyance of fight would have been mitigated if battles truly felt vital. As a substitute, each space within the recreation is saturated with encounters that pull from the identical geographically-determined roster of enemies, none of that are individually an issue however when encountered in such speedy succession grow to be borderline painful. Worst are the fully meaningless and unbelievably ample Cleric encounters, triggered by erratic drones with searchlights that like to hover over bigger areas on the map, forcing you to sprint randomly round them to keep away from fight. They will usually get caught hovering over Bobo whereas she interacts with gadgets, enters conversations, or makes use of merchandising machines, leaving you with no selection however to stroll into one other mind-numbingly uninteresting sequence of trivial squabbles with Saturn’s cone-headed cops and their litany of lesser buddies. What’s extra, the drones have an terrible behavior of triggering once more instantly after leaving fight, their hover sample smacking them proper again into me earlier than I may even transfer. It is perhaps consultant of Saturnian surveillance, the watchful eye the Satellites carry on their topics, however in apply it simply quantities to an enormous ache within the ass.

Sadly that feeling echoes all through many of the recreation. Hour after hour, Keylocker actively sabotaged itself. The fashionable artwork, enjoyable writing, and cheerfully off-beat humor have been exhausting to get pleasure from when the world was laborious to navigate, the methods have been difficult and obscure, and the fight—the centerpiece of the sport!—simply straight up wasn’t enjoyable.

I grew to become massively rich within the in-game forex and spent it nearly solely on primary therapeutic milkshakes; I collected key after key after key, which I invested in Bobo’s talent tree principally at random, as I could not determine why I might care about fractional micro changes to the dozen results current on my Standing web page if I knew in each battle I’d simply be charging up and hitting the man with my axe. The quantity of textual content on weapons and results menus felt barely ridiculous, particularly when in comparison with the Quests display screen, which updates so hardly ever and offers you so little info that I nearly surprise why it was included in any respect.

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All over the place I went I used to be given monologues of lore about this world—which may be very pleasing, drenched in Paradise Killer-eqsue irreverence and punctuated by Bobo’s cheerfully misanthropic responses—however all of that story is misplaced media the minute you first hear it. It grew to become absurd how a lot info I used to be given in conversations or cutscenes that appeared vital that I used to be then by no means allowed to entry once more. Why would I wish to verify on the identify of the Satellite tv for pc I will kill or the Djinn I’ve already launched, when as an alternative I can take a look at an Acquaintances web page that hasn’t up to date for the reason that tutorial, or the marginally illegible numbers subsequent to an inventory of stats I’ve by no means used? 

It is a disgrace, as a result of previous the frustration there’s rather a lot to like about Keylocker. The occasional boss battle is definitely a respite from the uninteresting grind of basic fight—it is refreshing to really have to make use of techniques for as soon as, to need to plan and watch out along with your characters to get via a multi-enemy robotic battle membership or to interrupt aside the Orbital Resonance between Satellites that forestalls them from taking injury. Minigames scattered round like a shameless Guitar Hero ripoff or an arcade-style hacking sequence are a enjoyable break from the remainder of the routine, although just a few of these additionally have a tendency in the direction of the finicky. The technicolor cyberpunk world seems beautiful, the character sprites are cheeky and assorted, and the writing is carelessly humorous, by no means taking itself too significantly.

There’s additionally the trace of a way more sobering story beneath the enjoyable: I discovered myself particularly touched by the connection between Bobo and Seller as they try to guard one another and steadiness their reverse approaches to Bobo’s revolution. It is clear that a whole lot of care and enthusiasm was put into Keylocker’s universe; it is a disgrace that the mechanics round it make it so exhausting to understand.

By the tip of the sport, I discovered myself understanding Bobo’s anarchism. Her cheerful violence, her rudeness and happiness, her want to resolve every thing with music that is perhaps homicide—the system is rotten, Bobo, you are so proper. The construction holding this place up is mindless! There’s a greater future underneath the filth, someplace, and there is in all probability a greater recreation underneath Keylocker, too.