Apotheon - Initial Impressions
Originally published October 2016Ever since I first saw Apotheon, I recognized that it had a very distinct look and style. It's a striking game with a particular aesthetic that ends up being one of the game's biggest strengths. In fact, I can say that most of Apotheon's strengths are in its presentation. The rest of the game, however, is a little disappointing.
I think Apotheon is a game with a great deal of potential. In fact, I really want to like this game. The aesthetic of playing as a character moving along an epic story told in the style of classical Greek pottery is great! I just wish the controls and combat didn't feel like they were fighting me at every turn. I would have finished Apotheon to give it a full breakdown review from start to finish, or even a Quick & Dirty review, but due to some fundamental issues I had with the game and the fact that I had seen enough to feel comfortable knowing there wasn't much left, I decided to quit early. I also feel the need to describe the reasons why I'm so conflicted about this game. Thus, I give you my lengthy Initial Impressions of Apotheon.
Ripped from Video Game Legends
The story of Apotheon feels a bit too familiar in a lot of ways. Tell me if anything in this sounds familiar: The hero of the game comes from humble beginnings as a regular guy. His village is attacked. People plead to the gods for help, but they do not answer. When the hero seeks an audience with the gods, Hera tells him Zeus has betrayed them and severed his ties with humanity. Since all the other gods of Olympus have followed in his footsteps, it's your job as the hero to seek them out and make them see things your way, or kill them as Hera demands.
Image: Alientrap
It sounds like God of War mixed with every Western RPG ever. The main plot of the game revolves around you killing the gods of Olympus for their petty arrogance. And of course, there's no way the goddess who's guiding you, Hera, would ever betray you. After all, the legends never portray Hera as a petty or selfish god with underlying motivations and a penchant for going back on her bargains. [That was sarcasm if you couldn't tell.]
Of all the gods to have as an ally, Hera is one of the least trustworthy. Even if you aren't familiar with Greek mythology, the game telegraphs her personality pretty hard, so it would be no surprise to me if she back-stabs you multiple times by the end of the journey.
I think the biggest problem I have with Apotheon's story is not actually the familiar nature of the game, it's actually the scale of the story it's trying to tell. Why do I need to go around killing the gods as this mere mortal character? O,r even if I'm a demigod, why am I killing gods like Kratos? It doesn't matter what game you're playing, when you go around killing deities, it's a big deal. I love the art style of the game, but this story feels too big for it. Why not just make up a new legend on a smaller scale? Why not just have the main character facing off against some mythological creatures, like the stories of Hercules or Odysseus? Why not just have the mortal gain favor with the gods and get their help in his adventure rather than doing something as grand as being a god killer?
Image: Alientrap
The game's mechanics, its look, and its pace would all work better with a much smaller game. When I look at Apotheon, it's a big game packed into a tiny box that is busting at the seems to contain it. It's trying to do too much with what it has, and as a result, I decided to call it quits shortly after what was likely the halfway point.
Dark Souls Meets Dual Stick
Apotheon on Steam allows for you to play with a keyboard & mouse, as well as a gamepad. I played mostly with a gamepad, but I would say that the other method would probably be better in a lot of ways.
With the gamepad, the sticks control which direction your character moves as well as which direction he attacks. The right stick acts as the mouse would: it controls which direction you point your weapon. This allows you to attack or even throw whatever weapon you have in your hand at your enemy. This amount of control on the two-dimensional plane is helpful due to the fact that you may have to deal with large amounts of enemies at once who are also capable of blocking your attacks at different heights.
Dark Souls mechanics work their way in with a little stamina bar that you'll have to monitor when you're swinging your weapon around. If it runs out, your strikes won't do much damage and you won't be able to guard attacks very well. Guarding attacks is pretty important because you take damage quickly in Apotheon. You can collect armor, which acts as an additional health bar to help mitigate the damage, but it depletes just as quickly.
Image: Alientrap
I would argue that the inclusion of a stamina bar is almost pointless. It doesn't go down quickly enough to require much management, which leads to the habit of forgetting it's there until you are suddenly getting pummeled. It does little more than just become a big inconvenience at the worst times. I'd also say that the deliberate combat of Dark Souls may have influenced Apotheon negatively, overall.
The combat of Apotheon just isn't fun to me. The aiming of your weapons in a dual-joystick shooter style works fine for shooters, but a majority of Apotheon's weapons expect you to use melee methods with a shield in the off-hand. When you do attack with the weapon, it's sluggish and awkward to control. It's as though the developers wanted to give the level of complexity and control in the combat of Dark Souls to a 2D game that had no hope of being able to utilize such a system—which makes me worry about how Salt & Sanctuary controls. When hit, the enemies fly off in different directions like they're getting repelled by a magnetic force. You do the same when struck by something, which can lead to some awkward combat scenarios.
I really did not dig the combat of Apotheon. I don't think it's necessarily broken because I rarely died or felt like it was being unfair, but it doesn't control in a way that feels very satisfying. I'm not willing to say that it flat-out sucks either, because I can see why some people may enjoy the level of control of the combat of a 2D game like this. I just think that it might have been better if the game just doubled down and forced you to use control schemes tied to the weapons you were using. If I were using ranged weapons, the dual-stick style would come into effect. If I was using melee, it should be more like Castlevania with deliberate, straight-forward strikes that had some real impact to them, and not with some wild bouncepad effect.
Mediterranean Metroid
Apotheon takes a great deal of inspiration from the classic Nintendo game, Metroid, and the other games that utilized Metroid's exploration and Castlevania's combat and character progression; a Metroid-Vania, if you will. Apotheon definitely follows suit in this familiar sub-genre of action games with rather large dungeon areas that have multiple levels and interiors to explore. For the most part, the areas are actually quite open, as opposed to the more claustrophobic and sectioned levels of Castlevania or Metroid.
Image: Alientrap
In terms of the actual level design, I like what Apotheon has done. I enjoy the diversity of the tight, cramped dungeons mixed with the open areas on a 2D plain. It provides more room for the developers to show off their distinct art style. It also allows the game to display the epic scale of Greek myth in this style, despite the story needlessly being over epic.
That same level design creates some fundamental problems I have with Apotheon, however. For one thing, the movement of your character in this environment is not ideal. The character can run and gain some speed as he moves through the levels, but if there is an upward slope or some sort of invisible barrier, he slows down to a stroll through molasses, which always bums me out. Once I hit that fast-paced stride, I just want to keep moving with that speed through the level.
I realize that this is more of a preference thing because it isn't like Metroid or Castlevania made the players capable of running through levels at super-speed all the time. However, the levels of Castlevania and Metroidtended to be a lot more confined. The big open nature of Apotheon's levels makes getting around feel like a bit of a hassle. This is especially true for moments when you need to ascend the environment vertically. The pace just slows down immensely.
Image: Alientrap
In all honesty, I think Apotheon is just too big for its own good. I realize I just praised it for having the open levels mixed in with the more maze-like dungeons. At the same time, I think Apotheon just stretches itself too thin with mechanics and influences from too many other games. Your main goal may be to go around and assassinate gods like a demigod hitman, but to do this, you need to do a bunch of smaller tasks and quests. And most of this feels like busy work.
Going through Hades, for instance, was a prime example of how tedious and bland the tasks felt. To progress, I needed to cross 4 separate rivers, which actually meant just running through 4 puzzle-platform sections and not dying. I had already navigated through the maze of Hades with numerous respawning enemies, which did plenty of damage to me, just to get to these 4 rivers. I didn't understand why there were four more mazes within this maze. When I finally finished their arbitrary challenge, I then had to fight some random boss in a room that encapsulated how the combat and platforming worked against each other. I kept accidentally going up stairs in the middle of the fight, which made it difficult for me to properly evade or defend attacks, and it significantly limited my attack range. This mainly kept happening because I would get thrown back from his attacks because everyone was made of a bouncepad. Ironically enough, this is about the spot where I decided to stop playing Apotheon.
Grand Theft Zelda
There are some other systems at work in Apotheon that feel a little unnecessary. I find the economy, which is the primary way in which you improve your character, a little too expensive and stretched out. To "level up" you have to just buy items that improve your health and armor capacity. Or you have to pay to improve your skill at using a weapon. Or you have to buy a recipe to be able to craft potions. Yes, there's crafting in this game too—I'm suddenly reminded of Rage for some reason. The point is, there are a bunch of different things you can spend your money on to improve your character, but you also may need to buy weapons, considering the fact that your weapons break over time.
So your money, which takes a while to accumulate, runs out pretty quickly. I wouldn't go so far as to say the economy of Apotheon is broken, but it certainly felt like I was financially limited and unable to level up my character as much as I wanted to without having to grind for gold. This may have been intentional on their part, and I'm just not the right audience for this anymore. Maybe if I enjoyed the combat more, this wouldn't be as much of an issue.
Image: Alientrap
The last thing I'll mention about unnecessary systems in place is the Wanted Level. Yes, Grand Theft Auto can be added to the lengthy list of games that have inspired Apotheon's creation in some way. While it may be Zelda-ish for giving you a bunch of small quests to pad out the game's length needlessly, it sure isn't like Zelda for letting you smash whatever boxes and pots you want. There are numerous locations where this is allowed, but in the main hub areas, you better not overstep your boundaries. Any destroyed property or accidental assaults of NPCs result in the guards of the area hunting you down. They're not necessarily strong, just annoying and overwhelming. When I had a mountain of bodies in front of me for accidentally attempting to pick a locked door, I wondered: "What was the point of that?!"
There is no need for a wanted level in this game. Of the various systems at work in Apotheon, I'm willing to concede on the implementation of everything BUT this. The needless padding with quests, the strict economy, the bouncepad fighting, the Sonic the sloth-hog movement, whatever. All those things I'll accept. This wanted level bullshit is pointless. It just forces me to endure more of the combat that isn't much fun, and it prevents me from wanting to explore the levels. It is a negative reinforcement for exploration, and exploration is necessary if you want enough money to improve your character.
There are rooms throughout Olympus that have tons of treasure behind them. They also happen to be well-guarded and I just have to be willing to accept the fight that is going to follow for trying to get inside. Rather than having this mechanic in place, they could have made a door-hacking mini-game or just placed the treasure in areas that were well-hidden and harder to get to. Or they could have just put monsters in front of them if they wanted me to fight things that badly. Just let me break boxes in public without having to worry about doing so in front of a guard so I don't have to wait forever, or pay him off to make my wanted level go down! There are so many other restrictions in place in Apotheon, I didn't see the need for yet another to control my behavior in the hub area, especially when the control in the combat left a lot to be desired.
Artistic Brilliance
Easily the best part of Apotheon, the art style and presentation of the game is phenomenal. I really dig the way Apotheon looks and what they did to bring out the classic pottery aesthetic that is rarely used for little more than a brief moment in most films and games. I think the last time I saw it used was in the game Rock of Ages and in Disney's Hercules movie.
There is a constant layer on the screen that resembles a smoothed-out stone or ceramic texture as you move through the game to give the sense that the story is taking place on a hard canvas. Color is used in some neat ways while still incorporating the stone and clay textures as you move through the different dungeons. Lighting is also in effect as certain places, like Hades, are dimly lit. Using a torch is similar to how one might light up a cave or ancient exhibit of classical art before the invention of electronic light sources.
Image: Alientrap
You could tell the developers of Apotheon really had an interest in Greek art and myth from their dedication to the look of the game. They even scatter around little snippets from the famous legends and literary pieces of the era for you to find in the game, such as excerpts from Homer's Iliad and Odyssey.
There's also voice-acting in the game that isn't terrible. It was a legitimate surprise to me that there would be voice work beyond simply an opening narrator, but all the gods and numerous random side characters are voiced. The voice-acting is good and the text they're reading is well written. It's a nice touch, albeit an unnecessary one. I think that the voice-acting, like many other things, could have been removed in favor of spending more time on other design elements of Apotheon, but it's still a positive touch to the game.
TL;DR (Conclusion)
I know I was rather rough in my really long "initial" impressions. I actually think Apotheon is not a bad game. It's well-made and has some distinct positives to the overall package. I just happen to disagree with a lot of the design choices the developers made in regard to the combat, platforming, level design, and story. I really want to like Apotheon because there's a lot here, but my personal preferences prevent me from doing so. I'd still recommend it, overall. Just know, you're getting a grindy Metroid-Vania with some deliberately peculiar combat mechanics, a stiff economy, and a character progression system, amidst an overly epic story about Greek mythology. It looks damn good though.
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