Unforgiving though it looks from the plethora of gameplay videos that have proliferated on YouTube since it appeared on E3’s floor, Cuphead looks like the kind of game that constantly rewards the player’s effort through the sheer quality of its design. Nevertheless, Cuphead looks like a brutal, unforgiving game of the old-school variety – The Behemoth’s rock-hard run-and-gunner Alien Hominid might be a fair comparison, or maybe Super Meat Boy‘s dizzying array of fast and repeated deaths. To even things up a little bit, a second player can join in to lend a hand, while mastering the art of deflecting bullets by double jumping just at the right second will fill a meter which, once topped up, will unlock a powerful counter-attack. ![]() Then a carrot shows up and tries to kill you with its deadly third eye… A colossal potato emerges from the ground and spits what appear to balls of earth at you. Like a Fleischer cartoon, the game presents a world where seemingly anything can happen – a pair of giant frogs wearing boxing gloves alternately lob projectiles at you and roll across the screen. As a 2014 article over at Kill Screen reveals, the title character was inspired by a Japanese propaganda film from the mid-1930s.įar from mere retro window dressing, Cuphead’s hand-drawn animation feeds into its bullet-drenched gameplay. The Moldenhaur brothers have a real geek’s eye for animated history, too. Sure, we’ve had games with beautiful animation in them – see WayForward’s hugely under-played A Boy And His Blob or Vanillaware’s sumptuous Muramasa: The Demon Blade, both for Wii – but none has quite managed to evoke an era or style of animation quite so comprehensively as Cuphead. The result is a game that doesn’t look quite like anything we’ve seen before. Each character and frame has been painstakingly drawn by hand almost entirely digital techniques – albeit with a bit of Photoshop to add colour at the end. If the delicate backgrounds look like watercolours, that’s because they are. What’s most remarkable about Cuphead is that its creators haven’t taken any shortcuts in creating their animated world. That same febrile sensibility spreads through every frame of Cuphead, it seems – it’s a game where you’re attacked by a gigantic, grinning flower one minute and a Bluto-like villain riding a sailing boat the next (one of the characters Max Fleischer brought to the screen in his heyday was, of course, Popeye). ![]() His work had an unfettered, anarchic feel, where ordinary objects come to life and all of reality seems to be in a violent, wobbling state of flux. Fleischer was an early pioneer of hand-drawn animation, creating with his brother Dave and a small team of artists such characters as Betty Boop and Koko the Clown. Since 2010, they’ve been crafting a game that pays homage to American animation of the 1930s – specifically, the immediately recognisable work of Max Fleischer. There’s still no release date for The Delicious Last Course, though we hope to hear more on that closer to E3.This is the labor of love from two Canadian brothers, Chad and Jared Moldenhaur. Rumours suggest that this is just the tip of the iceberg, though.Ĭuphead’s free major DLC update releases April 18, the same day as the game’s launch on Switch. Studio MDHR even partnered with calligraphers to use unique lettering for Korean, Chinese and Japanese boss battles and title cards.Ĭuphead’s release on Switch seems to be further strenghten the relationship between Microsoft and Nintendo, following their cross-play synchronicity and the unique tile sets devised for Minecraft. There’s lots of quality of life fixes, bug quashing and even reduced loading times to improve the overall stability and speed of the game.įinally the game has been localised into additional languages, with specially curated fonts for each language. There’s new fight intros for both Cuphead and Mugman as well as additional special effects. ![]() Studio MDHR have also gone back and re-animated the cinematic cut scenes while also adding in some new art. The big story is that Mugman can now be played in single-player and even has his own theme music. ![]() Following the massive announcement during Nintendo Indies Direct yesterday, Cuphead will release on Switch with a host of changes.Ĭoming April 18, a free DLC update will also be available for PC and Xbox owners which make some major tweaks ahead of The Delicious Last Course.
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