Morbid Metal Review - The Deeper the Weld, the Dirtier the Grind

Roguelites, the genre that feels like slamming one's head into a wall over and over until someone finally puts a cushion there, a genre that asks what if the game is just this over and over again until you run out of steam, a genre that delights thousands of gamers every day, which is lucky because there are seemingly thousands of them launching every day. Morbid Metal is the newest roguelite to hit the scene, and despite our usual rule of not reviewing early access games, we think this one has an interesting enough origin that we’d stray from our usual rules, which is twofold actually as this AA game is being published by big dog Ubisoft, which, as you may know, is not an indie company. But does this new roguelite carve itself a new loop in the dirt, or is it just doing the same thing as all the rest? 

Ok fine, roguelites are clearly not my favorite genre. It takes something very special for me to really enjoy it, one that pushes the boat out and tries new things, one whose story is so interesting that I simply MUST find out what is happening, or one that is bright and colorful enough to keep all my synapses firing, and Morbid Metal tries very hard to do some of those things. 

Before I get into the game's content, let me tell you about how it came to be. Morbid Metal was initially created years ago by just one man, Felix Schade. He uploaded a small clip of this university project onto Reddit in 2017, and it got A LOT of attention. Subsequently, his one-man band became a small orchestra, and he and around 10 people began to develop the game in their new studio, Screen Juice. All these years later, Ubisoft has picked up this bad boy to make sure this last stretch of development is just perfect. 

SO, that is how the game began, but what the actual flip is it! 

AI is notoriously bad, kind of sloppy, and also a bit dumb, but not in Morbid Metal as you play as the last AI created by an all-powerful and kind of bossy entity known as the Operator, a being who aggressively sasses you the whole time, instructing you to take down the rogue AIs that inhabit this mysterious collapsing simulation. But what are we fighting for? Well, we are attempting to stop this never-ending violence loop and repopulate the earth by, I assume, plugging our hard drive into their Linux box.

While we fight through waves of the Operator's mistakes, an enigmatic and gorgeous giant woman called Eden takes us away from the battle to give us kind encouragement and also boosts our skills and abilities. She has also provided us with a safe space to hang out between runs known as The Void, in which you can find permanent upgrades, unlock new Corpora (more on that in a minute), discover pieces of lore, and compete in an endless combat encounter to test your mettle…your Morbid Metal.

Your character has a few different attacks that they can use to take out their enemies: a basic attack, 2 regular abilities, and a special attack, all of which currently have 1 alternative that you may find in the many chests dotted about each area in the loop. 

Our starting character Flux is a speedy fighter, their abilities also all about fast-paced action. Blink Strike zips you to your targeted enemy, landing a powerful blow, Nano Blades launch out of your sword and can be aimed at enemies, and your special attack is a series of fast-paced blows that can insta-kill your enemy when they reach a certain threshold. But like I say, all of these have alternatives, and the ‘routines’ you pick after each battle may skew your attack choice. 

But Flux is not the only character you can choose from. The early access has 3 characters, all with their own set of skills and playstyle, though I can only tell you about one other, as unfortunately, I never made it past the first boss, so Vekta is a character that I simply did not meet. Ekku, however, is probably best described as a heavy. While Flux zips around, Ekku smashes his large sword down into the battlefield, flinging enemies into the sky or smacking large groups with his spinning blade. His routines are focused on ‘Special Armour,’ which stops enemies from being able to damage him whilst his slightly longer special attacks take place. 

What is unique about Morbid Metal is that these characters can be swapped out at will during each run, meaning you’ll need to keep track of all of their attack gauges as well as their shared health bar to make sure you’re fighting in the most efficient way. This fluctuation of the fighting styles can be a bit jarring but does lead to some interesting battles and some pretty big damage numbers when played well. 

Now here I raise my first problem with the game as it currently stands. I will admit that I am not good at melee combat most of the time; however, I do feel like there were multiple times in which I died because I was hit while my character was exiting an animation after doing their special ability. It wasn’t consistent or repeatable when I tried, but the boss in particular will rock your shit as you exit an animation, and there is simply nothing you can do about it.

As well as different attack protocols and the mid-run upgrades or Routines, there are certain collectibles known as Corpora that buff the entire run, giving you more health, higher damage, quicker skill charge, and lots more, though I have to be honest getting Corpora out of a chest was few and far between. In order to unlock more options for Corpora and to upgrade character stats as well as to ensure certain shrines appear en route, you’ll need to spend the void points you acquire during your runs, because as we know, nothing comes for free, not even the sweet release of death.

Within the current early access build, you have access to 2 of the biomes, Sublime Garden (which btw is ALL the footage because, as previously mentioned, I couldn’t kill that gosh darn boss) and Steel Sanctuary, which I have only seen pictures of but does look as pretty as Sublime Garden. Each biome has a pretty decent selection of different arenas, most of which have secret hidden chests or items that can heal you or give you some of the in-run currency that you can spend on buffs from the exchange points either midway through the biome or, once upgraded, within secret arenas. Unlike other roguelites, there aren't branching paths, and while there are multiple doors you can enter in most areas, all but one will be dead ends, much like most of my relationships to be honest. 

And so herein lies my other issue with Morbid Metal, much like me after eating cheese, I think the runs go on for too long. To get to the first boss, the average length (for me) was 20 minutes, and that was without doing the optional challenge rooms that set us up with some kind of combat trial to complete, and while that may be pretty average for most roguelites, with their only being a somewhat limited selection of rooms per biome, I found myself bored, which is something I know can be countered thanks to games like Hades. 

The game ran well for about 70/80% of my time with it, though there were a couple of occasions where I experienced pretty significant slowdown during combat encounters, which in a game all about timing and dodging is a little bit tricky. In terms of Steam Deck play, when playing via remote play from my PC it worked fine, but when running the game natively it was not optimized and I would recommend waiting it out. 

Visually the game looks great, it’s the perfect blend of sci-fi and a little sprinkling of fantasy. The character designs are really detailed and interesting, smashing together android designs and traditional Japanese stylings for all three characters that do blend well with the Japanese inspiration that can be found throughout Sublime Gardens. There are a few different enemy types (10 to be exact), all of which range from small melee and ranged flying enemies to giant bosses that will kick your ass. They are also perfectly designed for the world which the developers are trying to create. 

The sound design is lovely, with some decent music and sound effects, but I truly can’t say it really stood out to me, though the voice acting from The Operator and Eden was suitably haunting and regimented, which did lend themselves to hammering home the simulations we were a part of. 

Overall, I think Morbid Metal has the potential to be people’s favorite game. It's fast-paced, challenging, and has a pretty interesting premise, though I fear it is not interesting enough for it to stand out from the crowd at this point. I am hopeful that with some amount of time in early access and with big money Ubisoft propping up this small team, hopefully, they can tweak a few things to really bring it to a wider group of people. If you’re looking for a roguelite to play that’ll get you into the genre, I can’t say this is it, but if you’re interested in actively making a change in a decent roguelite that just needs some tweaking and you already love the genre, then perhaps getting in on Morbid Metal early isn’t a bad shout. 

The full early access roadmap will be revealed at the Find Your Next Game Show on April 17th, so if you’d like to know exactly what you’re going to get and when, you’ll need to wait a few weeks for full details.

BRONZE/GOOD

Bronze Genie Lamp of Approval