Infernax Review

I watch a ton of game trailers, mostly because I want to keep track of all the cool games releasing so I don’t miss out on anything. When I saw the trailer for Infernax I was hooked: a retro-style platformer that looked just like the Castlevania games that were on the NES, but with a lot more gore. This game promised to be a lot gorier and bloodier than other 8-bit style games I have played, thus the warning at the beginning of the game saying that it is not suitable for children. I do have to say this was one of the best warning screens I have ever seen; not very often do you see a warning for “half-clothed demon people of varying degrees of attractiveness.”

You charge into battle with your soldiers, but are soon expected to fight alone as they are swiftly slaughtered around you into a bloody mess. You then have to fight — equipped with a measly weapon and a shield — against the demon that easily took down the whole army. Alone. It’s impressive how scary the guys at Arcade Fire have been able to make these 8-bit creatures look! They are bright and vibrant which really makes them stand out from some of the dark, moody backgrounds that create the different elements of this world. The music in Infernax is great, I would even say it’s on par with NES classics like Castlevania. There’s a huge variety, they’re incredibly catchy, and never get repetitive or annoying. I would love to have a soundtrack of the songs!

After defeating the sword-wielding demon, the priest comes asking for your help in defeating the five strong demons so that the seals on the door of Urzon Citadel break, defeating the evil once and for all. Every time you beat one of these foes, an orb that is on the seal will break, eventually allowing access into the Citadel. These large demons are found in the fortresses and castles that are spread out through the world. You won’t only find enemies here though, spells that you can learn can also be found inside if you explore the full area. You could miss these if you defeat the boss and move along to the next place, but luckily you can go back in and look for stuff if you think you had missed something the first time through. These places are also great for grinding and getting XP to level up your traits or to make money for buying weapons. Once you want to leave the dungeon and don’t want to walk all the way back to the door, you can go to a save point and select the Leave Castle option. This acts just like using an Escape Rope in a Final Fantasy game.

There are three different traits that you can level up to make your character stronger:

• Power: which makes your attacks stronger and do more damage
• Health: gives you more HP
• Mana: this is what allows you to use magic attacks when you learn spells

You can level up by going to one of the save points you come across, and each time it will costs more XP to reach the next one; it begins with needing 500 XP, but soon you will need 1,000, 2,750, and even 5,000 to increase. The highest level you can upgrade to is seven, and after that, it will show that it is at max and you can’t spend anymore XP on them. It is totally up to you to figure out which of the traits you want to focus on first. For me, I felt having a stronger attack was the most useful, followed by health, so I spent more experience points on these two before concentrating on mana. At the beginning of the game, you don’t have any spells, so I didn’t worry about it until I started learning magic.

As you explore the world, the residents who live there will ask you if you can help them out and perform tasks for them; you can choose whether to help or not, since these work as sidequests, and the game leaves it up to you to decide. If you do complete the task for them, when you return to let them know that it was carried out, they usually reward you with money; it is definitely worthwhile to help out. This are a few instances in which the villagers you talk with start talking weird and try to convince you to burn and cause mayhem. If you say no or never, you realise that it was a villager who was possessed by a demon and they come out to murder you. If you decide to agree with them, then you will then have different tasks than those presented to the players trying to do good. One time, a villager gave me the task to get rid of a skeleton that was at her late mother’s house. When I got there, the skeleton begged me to spare him and said he would leave. I decided to spare him, so — once he left — he gave me money and said that maybe our paths would cross again. I went back to tell the lady that had sent me that he was gone; all I found was a ton of blood and her corpse. Wow, I clearly made a bad choice! It is interesting to see that your choices really do make a difference though. This will add to the replayability, and I definitely want to go back and see what happens when I side with the bad guys!

There are two difficulty modes to choose from: Casual or Normal; the difficulty can be changed at any point during the game. If you happen to find yourself stuck and unable to get through certain region, don’t give up. There is another option to help you out that I happened to find buried in the accessibility section of the menu: a Game Wizard. The Game Wizard is Infernax’s version of the Game Genie that was available for multiple (now retro) consoles like the original NES. This would allow you to input a code that would give you special abilities like Invincibility. The Game Wizard has two codes available: Infinite Jumps, which is like double jumping on steroids, allowing you to jump around in the air as much as you need and Invincibility. Once you turn on the Game Wizard in the menu, you can access it whenever you go to a save point by selecting the Wizard and entering the code that you want to use. Once you use a code, you can turn it off at any point by going to any save point. I used the Infinite Jump power a few times when I couldn’t traverse through certain zones of the game world. I am not sure how you would be able to get through these sections without using it! So I don’t feel too guilty about using the tools available to me.

Infernax is truly a metroidvania at heart. I went back to the same areas multiple times as I learned new abilities and spells. There would be walls that had blocks that looked like they could be broken, but not unless you have learned the right ability. When I would get stuck and not know what I had to do next, I would go back and check the places I couldn’t enter before and see if I had the necessary ability to unlock it; this really reminded me of playing Metroid. I definitely got frustrated multiple times while playing when I didn’t know what to do next. So, instead, I would use it as an excuse to grind and level up my character while I tried to figure out where to go. The game doesn't really give you any idea what to do in order to progress. It’s especially hard when there are no guides to look at or people to ask for help. Though that just means it felt like playing the retro games of yore that didn’t include guides (like when I was young!). You are on your own and have to figure it out yourself, and when you do, you will feel such a sense of accomplishment and relief.