El Shaddai: Ascension of the Metatron Review

El Shaddai: Ascension of the Metatron Review

By: Ed Beers

PS3/XB360

“Lemme tell ya a tale.” True a traditional start to a story, but in a story such as this, traditional and expect is a good place to start. As one might be able to tell from the title, this game is based on a Judeo-Christian text, namely The Book of Enoch, ancient (300 BC - 1st century BC) Jewish writings of the Great-Grandfather of Noah, fallen angels, and their giant babies. But this isn't a religious study blog this is a game review.

The story begins when seven angels, blinded by their love of humanity, may just have doomed it by their actions. They left the heavens, and came to Earth, where they were worships above God. They created the Tower of Babel as their home of worship, and the angels began to mate with the humans. Their children, the Nephilim (giant humanoid blobs), feeding upon each other grow larger and larger, threatening to swallow the world in flames. Seeing this, God prepared a flood, a flood that would cleans the world of the humans, the fallen angels, and their children. Wishing to save humanity from such a fate, a heavenly scribe, Enoch, went to Earth to find and purify the fallen angels, and stop their children. Followed by the four Archangels, and provided support by the aloof Lucifel, can Enoch climb all the levels of The Tower of Babel, and purify the fallen and their children, and stop the flood?

The visuals are stunning, original feeling, and each level of the tower feels fresh and different. One second you'll be fighting wave after wave of enemies in an ethereal coliseum, before being thrown into a cartoony, almost cute 2-D platforming level, before finding yourself racing along a Tron like futuristic city, or leaping across a living Japanese ink painting. The pacing between these scene changes is just right, moving to a new word just as you feel you've seen all you need to of the one you're in, alternating easily between 3D action, and 2-D platforming. The music following you through the game follows a similar trend, changing with the background, as well as in or out of battle. Some levels, if you don't like angelic choirs or tribal drums can get on one's nerves, but nothing too truly terrible.

The controls for the game are simple enough, you have your attack button, your jump button, your block button, and your purify button (will get to that in a second, don't worry). Gameplay however, can get very complex in some battles. As you enter battle, you'll have chances to steal and purify the weapons your enemies are using against you, there are three types of these. The sword-like Arch, the long range Gale, and the shield turn gauntlet Veil. The more you use your weapons, the more impure they become, which is why you need the to purify them during and after battle, the more pure the weapon the more damage they do. Course things would be far too easy if that's all there was to combat. Like many battle systems in Japanese games, things in El Shaddai work on the rock paper scissors system. Gale's most effective against Arch wielding opponents, Veil against Gale, and Arch against Veil. That's not to say you cannot win if you have the 'wrong' weapon, but they make it hard enough to encourage you to steal the more effective weapon any chance you get. Don't be surprised to find yourself facing each enemy type in one group of enemies that comes along. But, the game is kind, they realize how hard many fights well get. When you get defeated, and you will, you'll notice our hero scribe falling in slow motion, and darkness closing in around him. That's your cue to mash every button on your controller, to get right back on your feet. Course, get knocked down too often, the amount of mashing you'll need to do gets larger, and the time you have to do it in gets smaller. Can't have things getting too easy, where's the challenge in that?

This game is a beauty to behold, there's just something wonderful about how it looks and feels that I did not feel in the demos or teaser trailers. Maybe it's the sense of control, or the flow of the story, but it is something that needs to be experienced. Though most argue that video games are not art, I believe El Shaddai is, at very least, a giant step forward towards a piece of art that is also a video game. Please, give this often passed by game a hand on try.