Steel Assault (Switch eShop) Review

Steel Assault is a fairly simple game. You play as a tough good boy whose job it is to kill the tough bad guys, and you do it by violently exploding many minions, ninjas, and mechanical suits with the power of a lightning whip. It’s hard. Like, really difficult. And just when it seems like they’re running out of ideas, the credits pile up. Sometimes that’s all you need to have fun with a game; just some good ideas that are done very well. Steel Assault gets what it’s looking for and wastes no more time, and in that sense, it’s almost impossible not to like it.

In terms of gameplay, Steel Assault plays like a smoother, but no less difficult, version of the classic Castlevania platformer games. Taro Takahashi’s main means of getting rid of enemies is a Super cool Electric whip that dispatches most enemies in one hit, making you feel quite powerful once you slow down and whip dozens of enemies in rapid succession. You can launch it in eight directions and there is a nice sense of momentum behind each swing as Taro takes that important short pause after each button to finish before starting the attack.

For mobility, Taro has a short double jump and a blink glide and you miss it that he offers some precious I-frames to overcome some brutal attacks. Neither of these are of much help if you’re not timing jumps or dodging correctly, but they offer enough ‘switch factor’ that you can sometimes correct near misses. Most importantly, Taro can also use a zip line which adds a creative dimension of jumping.

The zipline can also be fired in eight directions, but with the caveat that it will only hold if there is something solid on both sides, as the two ends are moving away from you. So if you miss the time of a jump and fall into a pit, you can save yourself by thinking fast enough to shoot a zip line and catch you at the last minute by clinging to the two walls. Alternatively, you can use floor-to-ceiling zip lines to gain more height faster and give you a bit more aerial maneuverability to better dodge shotgun blasts, and there are even some brutal platforming sections that require several of these joints to be chained together quickly. It seems like a small feature, but the zipline is a really great feature and it helps give Steel Assault its own unique kind of gameplay.

Now, we would be remiss to talk about the gameplay without first warning you that this is really a game for super players only. We are not exaggerating when we say that almost every second of this experience is filled with something shooting, sliding or attacking, and it is usually expected to respond to such threats while also navigating the dangers of the complicated scenario. Each level is only two to three minutes long, but it will probably take a couple dozen attempts to clear each one before you make it to the next checkpoint. It’s a worthwhile experience, but we’d say it’s definitely not for the faint of heart.

We think it is also necessary to say that Steel Assault is a game that burns quite bright and fast. It is memorable, challenging and original in many ways, but we managed to erase the entire game in fifty eight minutes. All of the content here is excellent, and it honestly feels like Steel Assault would be more than welcome if it lasted much longer, but keep in mind that this is not designed to be a game that you spend a lot of time playing. Of course, if you really are a glutton for punishment, there is a 1CC mode that tasks you with beating the entire game in one life, but that only asks you to run the same content in a single glove.

In case you haven’t heard of the screenshots, Steel Assault is quite impressive in its presentation. CRT filters are convincingly applied, and the 16-bit aesthetic is lovingly done here. Just as every snapshot is littered with enemies trying to kill you, there are always plenty of details and activity in the images to give you plenty to take in as you fight to survive. All of this is completed by a high-energy metal and chiptune soundtrack that is absolutely Perfect for the ridiculous pace and intensity of the game.

conclusion

Steel Assault is like a bite of an extremely delicious, well-seasoned steak. Only one to bite. It stays in your mind and makes you want more, but in some ways, that’s much better than if you were given it all and took it for granted. If you liked the nimble action and ridiculous difficulty of many of the old arcade classics, Steel Assault is absolutely a must-study. It’s absurd, it’s fun, it’s difficult. And it is short. It doesn’t offer much more once you’ve reached the end, but what’s here is very well executed, and we definitely recommend that you give it a try.