Bastion
Publisher: Warner Bros. Interactive Developer: Supergiant Games Platform: PC Release: 2011 Genre: Action / RPG Players: 1 Rating: 9.2 \ 10.0: Outstanding
Above is the kid battling a Gasfella.
I’ve played my fair share of indie games throughout my decade of gaming, but it somehow took me until 2019 to finally play what is often considered one of the best titles ever produced by a small team. After finishing Bastion, I can safely say I agree with this sentiment.
The game immediately captivated me without the need for a lengthy cutscene. It begins with a boy rising from his bed atop a floating piece of debris in a void. You gain control of him within seconds, and platforms begin appearing before the boy as you move him forward. The moving soundtrack by Darren Korb starts to kick in alongside gruff narration from Logan Cunningham. Soon enough, the kid, who is never referred to as anything but, meets up with Rucks, the source of the narration and the only character who ever speaks outside of the game's several vocal songs. He explains to the kid that he has arrived at the Bastion, the heart of the city of Caelondia, and that he must retrieve the cores scattered throughout the city in order to undo the effects of the Calamity that broke apart the floating landmasses and turned all but a few survivors to ash. This plot eventually thickens, as survivors of the calamity are introduced and the reasons for why the Calamity occurred are hinted at more and more.
Bastion plays like a linear dungeon crawler, with an isometric viewpoint and pieces of the levels floating into place as you progress and hordes of enemies appearing as unexplored areas are unveiled. The path you travel along is quite constrained, but every so often there are small optional segments that contain extra crystals, the game's currency. Near the end of each level is one of the cores that are needed to reverse the Calamity, and upon returning to the Bastion with a core, a core can be spent to build a new structure that can be accessed between levels. These include the refinery, which can be used to equip an additional stat boosting beverage each time you level up, the forge, which is used to upgrade weapons with crystals and crafting materials, and the shrine, where you can enable idols that increase your experience gain in exchange for raising the game's difficulty in various ways.
This idol system is a fantastic way to allow players to adjust the difficulty of the game as they see fit. For example, if someone was best accustomed to the damage and health levels of enemies on normal difficulty, but wanted a greater challenge without jumping all the way to hard mode, they could enable the idols that increase enemy attack speed and cause enemy corpses to explode. I find this preferable to something like Halo's skull system, as many of those individual modifiers are enough to drastically change the experience.
You’ll be spending the bulk of your time in Bastion battling enemies, and this is where the game shines. The combat isn't very complicated - you can wield two weapons, unleash a special move by consuming black tonic, heal by using a health tonic, use a shield, and roll to evade attacks. Almost every encounter is well balanced - there are usually many enemies, just enough to make avoiding damage challenging but fair; there are a wide variety of foes with unique attributes and attacks, but unlike many games I've played where this is the case, not one of these enemy types was annoying to fight. The game's various weapons all felt distinct, and finding ideal combinations of weapons, special attacks, and tonics was entertaining. Fights are often fast-paced and fierce as a result of their immaculate design, and combat is rarely boring. The only time that the battles even approached being dull was during the several optional side stories which can be accessed from the Bastion in which you face numerous waves of enemies in the Kid's dreams while the fascinating backstories of each major character are explained. Bastion has all the hallmarks of a great action game, and with a good story to boot.
The game immediately captivated me without the need for a lengthy cutscene. It begins with a boy rising from his bed atop a floating piece of debris in a void. You gain control of him within seconds, and platforms begin appearing before the boy as you move him forward. The moving soundtrack by Darren Korb starts to kick in alongside gruff narration from Logan Cunningham. Soon enough, the kid, who is never referred to as anything but, meets up with Rucks, the source of the narration and the only character who ever speaks outside of the game's several vocal songs. He explains to the kid that he has arrived at the Bastion, the heart of the city of Caelondia, and that he must retrieve the cores scattered throughout the city in order to undo the effects of the Calamity that broke apart the floating landmasses and turned all but a few survivors to ash. This plot eventually thickens, as survivors of the calamity are introduced and the reasons for why the Calamity occurred are hinted at more and more.
Bastion plays like a linear dungeon crawler, with an isometric viewpoint and pieces of the levels floating into place as you progress and hordes of enemies appearing as unexplored areas are unveiled. The path you travel along is quite constrained, but every so often there are small optional segments that contain extra crystals, the game's currency. Near the end of each level is one of the cores that are needed to reverse the Calamity, and upon returning to the Bastion with a core, a core can be spent to build a new structure that can be accessed between levels. These include the refinery, which can be used to equip an additional stat boosting beverage each time you level up, the forge, which is used to upgrade weapons with crystals and crafting materials, and the shrine, where you can enable idols that increase your experience gain in exchange for raising the game's difficulty in various ways.
This idol system is a fantastic way to allow players to adjust the difficulty of the game as they see fit. For example, if someone was best accustomed to the damage and health levels of enemies on normal difficulty, but wanted a greater challenge without jumping all the way to hard mode, they could enable the idols that increase enemy attack speed and cause enemy corpses to explode. I find this preferable to something like Halo's skull system, as many of those individual modifiers are enough to drastically change the experience.
You’ll be spending the bulk of your time in Bastion battling enemies, and this is where the game shines. The combat isn't very complicated - you can wield two weapons, unleash a special move by consuming black tonic, heal by using a health tonic, use a shield, and roll to evade attacks. Almost every encounter is well balanced - there are usually many enemies, just enough to make avoiding damage challenging but fair; there are a wide variety of foes with unique attributes and attacks, but unlike many games I've played where this is the case, not one of these enemy types was annoying to fight. The game's various weapons all felt distinct, and finding ideal combinations of weapons, special attacks, and tonics was entertaining. Fights are often fast-paced and fierce as a result of their immaculate design, and combat is rarely boring. The only time that the battles even approached being dull was during the several optional side stories which can be accessed from the Bastion in which you face numerous waves of enemies in the Kid's dreams while the fascinating backstories of each major character are explained. Bastion has all the hallmarks of a great action game, and with a good story to boot.
For being released early in the late-2000s indie surge, Bastion's presentation has aged remarkably well. The environments are hand drawn in remarkable detail, and although the 3D models used for characters initially looked a bit out of place to me, I eventually grew to find them aesthetically pleasing. The aforementioned soundtrack amplified the fantastical atmosphere to great heights during the more peaceful moments of exploration, and increased the intensity of combat. It's difficult to describe what the soundtrack sounds like - the composer describes it as "acoustic frontier trip hop", and I very much enjoyed listening to it. Cunningham's performance as Rucks is perhaps my favorite element of the presentation. Even when delivering exposition, he does so in an encapsulating manner, and the brief comments he makes on certain actions, such as the kid falling off a platform.
There are few qualms that I have with Bastion, but the game isn't perfect. One of my issues is with the game's arsenal. Most of the weapons were great fun to use, but several of them, such as the mortar and the sniper rifle, are overly situational and impractical to use outside of the levels they are introduced in. This is hardly annoying because you are free to use whatever weapons you choose for the vast majority of the game, but the variety of weapons that are always useful is lower than I would have liked. Additionally, the optional mastery challenges for each weapon often require borderline perfect performance in order to earn the highest rewards that you can receive from them, but this is also is a mere nitpick. Another small complaint is that much as I enjoyed the story, I was disappointed by the lack of characterization that some of the game's few characters received, especially the completely silent Kid. Their backstories were interesting, but they were not.
Bastion is an all around excellent game. From its beautiful visuals to its exciting combat, there are few areas in which it falters. It is easily one of the best indie games I've ever played, and I would strongly recommend it.
Ups
Beautiful visuals
Invigorating soundtrack
Invigorating soundtrack
Simple but satisfying combat
Intriguing story
Idol system is innovative
Excellent narration
Intriguing story
Idol system is innovative
Excellent narration
Downs
Several overly situational weapons
Optional challenges drag on too long
Lack of characterization for the kid
Optional challenges drag on too long
Lack of characterization for the kid
Also available on Xbox 360, Xbox One, PlayStation 3, PlayStation Vita, PlayStation 4, and Switch
ESRB: E 10+ Content: Animated Blood, Fantasy Violence, and Use of Alcohol and Tobacco Price: $14.99 (Download)
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