Max curse of the Brotherhood review
Recently I've been enjoying the Xbox one gem Max curse of the Brotherhood. Curse of the Brotherhood is a 2.5D side scrolling platformer which puts you in the shoes of Max, an adventurous boy who accidentally wishes his little brother away to a world full of monsters and magical markers. Yes I said markers, early on you gain access to a magical pen that can change the world around you allowing you to solve the games numerous and at times inventive and fun puzzles.
The marker has limited use at the start but gains new abilities as you progress allowing for more complex puzzles further through the game, the trouble is once you have used these new abilities a few times the puzzles become repetitive and I was left wishing for yet another upgrade to my abilities to be challenged again. As for enemy encounters and combet its the standard platformer letting you jump on some enemies heads in order to kill or stun them and forcing you to simply run from others. The part of the game that excels and makes even the most repetitive of puzzles fun again is the level design which is superb. Each level is a pleasure to traverse and provides top notch platforming gameplay with incredible variety from having to outrun a giant monster to climbing down a huge crevice using magical plants or zip lining your way across a great chasm you'll always be thoroughly entertained.
Visually Curse of the brotherhood lacks the pure beauty of some other platformers like Limbo or Ori but it can still hold its own. The Unity engine provides the perfect platform to show of the bright colors of Max's new world he finds himself in and the 3D models look sharp and crisp when layered against each other to provide the platform view point.
The one part of Curse of the Brotherhood that really lets itself down is story or should I say lack there of. The main villain is rarely heard from or spoken about neither is the state of the game world or why your brother has been kidnapped. The magical properties of your pen is not really explained or why for some reason Max is chosen to go and defeat the bad guy which to me at least is frustrating when I like to know all the geeky backstory stuff that most people wouldn't care about.
Another point where the game is lacking is its very imprecise controls. There are times when you'll make a jump and there's a 50/50 chance if Max will grab the ledge and hoist himself up or fall to his death. Sometimes you'll be hoping for that to happen as well based on where you are and if you need to go back and start a puzzle over again.
Max Curse of the Brotherhood is a very good and very fun game as long as you don't mind a lacking in story and will give it time to get used to the controls, its by no means a candidate for game of the year but for 12 quid the level of design is excellent value for money.
The marker has limited use at the start but gains new abilities as you progress allowing for more complex puzzles further through the game, the trouble is once you have used these new abilities a few times the puzzles become repetitive and I was left wishing for yet another upgrade to my abilities to be challenged again. As for enemy encounters and combet its the standard platformer letting you jump on some enemies heads in order to kill or stun them and forcing you to simply run from others. The part of the game that excels and makes even the most repetitive of puzzles fun again is the level design which is superb. Each level is a pleasure to traverse and provides top notch platforming gameplay with incredible variety from having to outrun a giant monster to climbing down a huge crevice using magical plants or zip lining your way across a great chasm you'll always be thoroughly entertained.
Visually Curse of the brotherhood lacks the pure beauty of some other platformers like Limbo or Ori but it can still hold its own. The Unity engine provides the perfect platform to show of the bright colors of Max's new world he finds himself in and the 3D models look sharp and crisp when layered against each other to provide the platform view point.
The one part of Curse of the Brotherhood that really lets itself down is story or should I say lack there of. The main villain is rarely heard from or spoken about neither is the state of the game world or why your brother has been kidnapped. The magical properties of your pen is not really explained or why for some reason Max is chosen to go and defeat the bad guy which to me at least is frustrating when I like to know all the geeky backstory stuff that most people wouldn't care about.
Another point where the game is lacking is its very imprecise controls. There are times when you'll make a jump and there's a 50/50 chance if Max will grab the ledge and hoist himself up or fall to his death. Sometimes you'll be hoping for that to happen as well based on where you are and if you need to go back and start a puzzle over again.
Max Curse of the Brotherhood is a very good and very fun game as long as you don't mind a lacking in story and will give it time to get used to the controls, its by no means a candidate for game of the year but for 12 quid the level of design is excellent value for money.
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