The Blogtastic Blogfest That Is Getmeoutofthis.net!

Yeah, I’m not going to do that narration thing all the way through this. You don’t need to worry about that.

Bastion is a fantastic game, completely worth $15 dollars, and you really should play it.

I play a lot of games, stupid and otherwise, and very few games have the level of polish that Bastion has. Every inch of it seems polished to perfection. The look, the music, the narration, the combat… you can tell every one of them is doing exactly what Supergiant Games wanted them to be doing. They did what they set out to do, and they did it well.

The narration, the first time you hear it, really does amaze. It’s like “Woah, it’s so dynamic!” Having played through the game a second time in New Game Plus (because it was that fucking fun) I can see how it all works now, certainly. You kind of figure out how they piece all the audio together to make it seem extremely relevant even though the game really can’t read your mind and know exactly what you’re doing. That doesn’t make the narration any less entertaining or awesome, though. It’s just this perfect way to feed you backstory about the world without feeling forced or getting in the way of the awesome combat. It’s just great.

Similarly, the combat is AWESOME. The game is set up, with its Idols, to let you adjust the difficulty however you want. Of course, I never really pumped them up much. (I used a few in my New Game Plus playthrough, but not many, and I turned them off if I encountered trouble.) But having the potential there, and giving you big monetary rewards for turning them on is a good idea. It lets you customize the game to your liking.
The combat itself is quick-paced, but lets you use strategy. You can be very defensive, using counters and such, and spec yourself out with the various buff beverages to reward that sort of play. Or you can set yourself up to be Kamakaze like me, and that works too. There are 10 weapons in the game, all of which you can upgrade, and surprisingly, each one is fairly different and fairly effective. The weapons constantly surprised me. One of my favorite weapons, for example, ended up being the Galleon Mortar. When I picked this weapon up, and saw how slow it fired and how hard it was to aim, I scoffed at its utility. But as I started to use it, it became my go-to distance weapon. It’s so good at clearing out armored enemies that I fell in love. On my New Game Plus, I focused on trying all the weapons, and upgrading everything, and I was constantly impressed by how fun they all were. If I had to pick my least favorite, it would either be the Calamity Cannon or the Fire Bellows, but both of them have their use, and I could totally see some players really loving those in a way I did not. Again, this just speaks of extreme polish to me: all the weapons have a place, and they’re all fun. There are no duds.

What’s really impressive, in a game that is, ultimately, about fast-based RPG-ish combat, is how much heart is in the game. The narration, the music, it all kind of tugs at your heartstrings, and I love it for that. The decisions you make at the end of the game, which determines which of the two endings you get, are actually surprisingly hard to make. I had to think about it a bit on my first playthrough. (On the second playthrough, I obviously just picked the other one, to see the other ending.)

Bastion is a labor of love, clearly, and it is one that paid off. It is, hands down, one of the best games I’ve played this year. It doesn’t overstay its welcome, and every moment of it is enjoyable and puts a smile on your face. If you have a 360, you should buy it right now. Seriously.