Apotheon

Developer: Alientrap
Steam Release: Feb 2015
Hours Played: 7.1
Similar To: Capsized / Intrusion 2
Rating: 2/5 Parsnips

GAMEPLAY
Apotheon is a Metroidvania styled action platformer set in the age of mighty Gods, heroes and ancient Greece. You play as a mortal hero battling through ten areas mapped out on Mount Olympus. Each houses plenty of hidden and sub-areas and a handful of objectives with exploration usually culminating in a boss-fight involving the Olympian God named in the title of the area. It boils down to a hack, slash and loot affair where you'll need to visit a market to buy your upgrades to weapons and armour with gold you pick up along the way. Personally, I found the game to be an acquired taste. Combat is initially clunky and awkward to the point where I wondered if it could be a game-breaker. Fortunately, once I got used to its naunces along with its interesting and unique progression system I was able to warm to the game nicely.     
 

BALANCE & PACE
You'll start at the bottom of Mount Olympus in the tutorial area known as The Olympian Gate. You'll then gradually unlock further areas by uncovering the fog of war and completing objectives conveniently arrowed on your map. The map, which I found to be an essential feature, is displayed in an overlay form a la Diablo III which you'll need to have active a fair amount of the time to become acquianted with the area. Although it is an open-world adventure I found that carrying out the objectives was a fairly linear process but with enough secrets and hidden extras to fully absorb my keen attention. The inventive boss fights, which often utilised the need to move around full areas, were also well-varied and intense bringing a rewarding feeling of satisfaction when completed.

 

PRESENTATION & DESIGN
Visitors to the British Museum will instantly recognise the art-style for it is inspired by  the illustrations that adorned everyday items such as pots and vases of the day. The quick enemy movement during combat and timing your attacks accordingly is the main aspect of the game you'll need to get accustomed to for it can be frustrating to pin enemies down and land that satisfying strike. Accessing and scrolling through the many items to use during combat can also be very fiddly in the heat of battle and I felt a pause feature (even as an option) might have helped alleviate that frantic feeling of having to quickly find the item you needed. Despite the teething problems with combat Apotheon's absorption of the ancient Greek culture into its game, including its intense atmospheric soundtrack, is as well done as it could be.   
 

PROGRESS SYSTEM
To review overall progress, you'll need to access the world map which you'll find by first bringing up the main menu page. You'll be visiting this page constantly on your travels as it also allows you to view other features such as your inventory, the craft page, and a local map of the area you're in. Anyway, the world map lets you view Mount Olympus and its ten areas. Clicking on a title will then bring up the objectives needed to be fulfilled in that area in the panel on the right hand side. Rather than level up your character in Apotheon, you will be levelling up your weapon and armour rank at the market which will initially be in the Agora area. Areas also have a fast travel feature to save on leg work.   


 

CONCLUSION

Apotheon's main hook lies in the way it unravels itself through exploration. Its pacing, with regard to how you get stronger and tackle ever-stronger enemies, is efficiently done and adds to the lure and how well the game pulls the player in. However, there are things you'll need to get used to: inventory management, for one, where you'll need to scroll through individual items is a cumbersome process; looting weapons is also peculiar in that some weapons stack while others do not; weapons take damage as well - so break a weapon or shield and you're out of that weapon until you buy or loot another. Stats are also hard to compare when switching through weapons and you cannot actually sell any unwanted items at the market. Still, these are largely minor and forgiveable shortcomings in a game that has far more strengths than weaknesses.