Written by Patrick Orquia
Title: 3000th Duel
Developer: NeoPopcorn
Publisher: NeoPopcorn
Genre: Metroidvania, Platformer, Action, Adventure, RPG, Soulslike
Number of Players: 1
Platform: Nintendo Switch
Release Date: 19 Feb 2020
Price: $14.99
Also Available On: Steam
I can confidently say by now that metroidvania is my most favorite video game genre. That feeling of my character gradually leveling up as I progress into the game and acquiring more and more skills, abilities, weapons, and other equipment and gears is just awesome. Unlocking new secrets and finding hidden areas are also pure fun. Metroidvania games really evoke the adventurous in me and provide me a rather sweet escape from my boring, sedentary life.
Metroidvania games are dime a dozen on the Nintendo Switch eShop. This is one of the go-to varieties by indie developers, and a good lot of them have released quality titles over the console's three years of existence. One such game is this game, 3000th Duel. Originally released on Steam late last year, it has now found a new and possibly better home on Nintendo's hybrid console.
Unlike most recent indie titles, this game is not of the pixel art variety. It is presented in 2.5D art style, similar to the Trine games. It looks quite amazing, with very good use of particle effects and photorealistic textures and run at a solid framerate all throughout (I think it's 60fps, but I'm not 100% sure). And complementing the visuals is the equally good soundtrack effectively evoke whichever environment or biome that you are in. I have to say, the overall quality of this game, from its looks to gameplay, is surprisingly good. I really liked it and it's just one fun and challenging game to play which sort of came out of nowhere. This is not part of some long-running franchise, and yet, playing it feels familiar. Because, again, it's a metroidvania game.
In this game, you play as an unnamed masked hero who has lost his memory. You embark on an epic journey to regain all of your memories to rediscover who you are and what destiny awaits you. You travel across an expansive world with interconnected areas and you have to acquire skills that will allow you to traverse one area to the next. You know, typical metroidvania stuff. Along the way, many different types of enemies that vary in attack power and size will try to kill you, as they usually do, with some big boss battles at the end of the areas you explore. As you progress into the game, you also gather your lost memories, presented in a wall of text that provide backstory to your character. I would have preferred some voice acting or some cut scenes, but I guess you get all that you want.
Speaking of typical metroidvania stuff, the developers of this game seem to have studied all the common tropes and clichés of metroidvania games and ran away with them for this game. Despite this, the game still manages to stand on its own, as the developers threw in some additional RPG and soulslike elements into it. The game doesn't make your character automatically level up, but as you slay enemies, they drop karma, the main currency for this game, which you can then use to upgrade four attributes for your character: vitality (HP), strength (attack), mind (MP), and activity (the more this is leveled up, the more you can perform dash moves, similar to how it is in soulslike games). Upgrading any of these require a certain amount of karma, and upon doing so levels up your character. At the same time, you earn seal breaker stones each time you level up. These stones are used in obtaining new skill upgrades (aka Sealed Skills) from the skill tree. The skill tree is broken up in sections, meaning you can only break Sealed Skills belonging to the skills that you have already unlocked. You unlock these skills as you progress into the game by collecting them, usually after defeating a boss at the end of certain areas.
The heart and soul of this game is its combat gameplay. You can wield three types of weapons: blade-type, broadsword-type, and lance-type. Blades offer fast attacks but comparatively weak damage, broadswords (which also include axes) are slower but deal heavier damage, and lances are for hitting multiple enemies in front of you at once with medium damage. You can upgrade the attack power of your weapons with the use of some metal ores and the like that you will find in your travels. As you hit enemies, your MP meter gets filled, and when it starts glowing, you can press X to perform a special attack with high damage. The more you upgrade your MP, the more special attacks that you can perform.
On top of these weapons, you can also wield spells, referred in game as occults. These spells also use up you occult devotions, which can be upgraded by breaking certain Sealed Skills and upgrading your Mind attribute. Depending on the type of occult that you use, the number of occult devotions needed for the spells vary, with those that use up more occult devotions having greater attack power.
Up to two different weapons and two different occults can be equipped at any given time and can be switched on the fly by pressing R and L, respectively. Pressing ZR allows you do dash, which is very useful in dodging enemies or traps or in traversing gaps. Pressing ZR allows you to view the map that expands as you progress and explore more areas in the game. Discovered treasures but left unopened or uncollected are marked on the map, so that you can easily get back to them once you have the necessary skills to reach them.
Speaking of the map, as previously mentioned, the world in this game is expansive and the way they interconnect and loop back to one another is very well-designed. The biomes in each area are also varied, with matching varied enemies waiting to take a bite off you. Special mention to the background art design with amazing parallax scrolling. They make the world even wider and more spacious, plus the superb lighting that really highlights the wonderful art style. Anyway, back to the map: the game also has a fast travel system, and these fast travel points are strategically situated within the levels. This makes grinding and backtracking easier. By the way, the NPCs that sell items and upgrade weapons and occults are only found within one area of the game, so using these fast travel points is quite a necessity, especially if you want to be more powerful and more prepared for your upcoming battles.
Overall, 3000th Duel is one surprisingly good game and it plays awesomely on the Switch. It gives you a good bang for your buck, with a playtime of 15-20 hours for $15. Plus it is only about 995Mb, so it won't be too taxing on your microSD card. If you have some spare cash and you want to scratch your metroidvania itch, go give this game a try and if you are a fan of the genre, you will surely love it. So buckle up, grind, and prepare for one epic adventure and be ready for your 3000 or more duels in this indie gem.
REPLAY VALUE: Very high
PROS
- Surprisingly good visuals with excellent art style, animation, environment, lighting, and particle effects
- Excellent soundtrack that effectively evokes the ambience of the environment
- Solid and smooth frame rate throughout the game
- Very good use of HD rumble
- Wide range of customization options, from occults to weapons to skills and abilities
- Good variety of enemies to slay
- Good variety of weapons and buff items to collect
- Amazing boss battles, albeit with simplistic attack patterns, but can get really challenging near the end
- Interesting NPCs that make you feel less alone in this world
- The challenge ramps up quite steeply by the second half of the game which prevents the game from hitting a plateau and thus will make you strategize more and grind a bit
- Metroidvania tropes and clichés put into very good use, with some RPG and soulslike elements thrown in
- Good price point
CONS
- No voice acting
- Walls of text for story exposition
- The title is a bit lame
- NPCs that sell items and upgrade weapons and occults are only found in only one area, which makes going back to them quite a chore, even with the availability of fast travel points
- Controls cannot be remapped, which could have helped those who prefer the D-pad over the left analog stick for movement
- The controls are floaty at times; some control inputs not are registering in time that could result to cheap deaths
- Some sections are too dark in normal screen brightness handheld mode
RATING: 4.5/5 Metroidvania heroes and villains
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