Scars Above Review
Is this new indie alien game any good?
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Platform: PS4/5 Xbox 1/X|S PC
Reviewed on: PC
Publisher: Prime Matter
Developer: Mad Head Games
Release: Feb, 28 2023
Time Played: 7 Hours
Genre: 3rd-Person Action-Game
ESRB: T
Intro:
Scars Above is a story rich sci-fi game set on an alien planet full of mystery and aliens. A third person shooter taking you through various environments testing your skills and abilities to overcome challenges and discover the unknwon. It wasn’t a long game it took me about seven hours to complete, if you want to see some game play you can check out the live stream by clicking the card up there. But first let’s talk about the game, ya know, how it works, was the story any good, does it play well, etc. Then we can get to how it rates.
Story:
Follow Dr Kate Ward, a member of the Sentient Contact Assessment and Response team, or Scar for short, tasked with figuring out why a giant pyramid suddenly appeared, hanging around right next to earth. Upon inspection the SCAR team is sucked toward the structure with a blinding flash and Kate wakes up, alone, on a mysterious planet, and haunted by ghostly figures guiding her steps as she tries to figure out what the hell happened to her and the team.
Kiddos:
There wasn’t much to worry about the kids seeing in the game. There is violence with some monsters and maybe some spooky parts of the game, but there was no blood flying with attacks, and the language stays pretty low key. I let my kids watch when they wanted, and they enjoyed it.
Gameplay:
I was surprised to find a minor Souls-like mechanic in the game, usually that’s all it takes for a game to get a souls-like tag. Moving through the game I would find Pillars, these were safe spots that I could touch to set my current spawn point if I died, touching the pillar would restore some ammunition and bring all the enemies I had defeated back.
I have to bring up a nasty little bug I had right at the beginning. I like to remap my keys, especially my interact key, that belongs on my mouse. It would work in scars above when I remap it, but when a popup tutorial shows up, I was unable to move to the next page with my new mapped button, or with the old one. After many failed attempts I had to restart my game and put the interact button back to default in order to move on with the game. Very frustrating.
Kate, the protagonist, is not a soldier, she is a doctor, scientist, astronaut, and engineer. I think that about covers it, so she doesn’t have the combat know how, but her big brain can get her through most situations. Her first weapon is a big knife for melee, it was ok in the beginning, but I pretty much stopped using it after her gun was unlocked.
At the very start Kate designs a projectile unit using a space welder and a 3d printer, she names it Vera. Thankfully she finds Vera on the planet and can use it to defend herself. While the game progresses, she finds elemental additions she can add to Vera, making for a very versatile weapon.
The different elements could be changed very quickly using a weapon wheel. Some enemies were weaker to a specific element, so when I was being attacked by a lot at the same time swapping between elements on a second’s notice was very handy. And there were some environments that could only be passed with a specific element. The different element shots were also like different guns, electric being like a battle rifle shot, fire shooting like a grenade launcher, and acid was a shot gun, terrible at long range but excellent when up close and personal.
Besides her gun and knife, Kate would also find different items and gadgets she could use. It’s a unique mechanic with the items, she only needed to find one, after that she could craft the item using fibers. Fibers are found on the bodies of enemies or small nodes throughout the planet. The item is used immediately after crafting so there was no stockpiling. Gadgets on the other hand used a battery with so many charges. There is a small training tutorial after finding a gadget so you can get comfortable with its usage. I used all gadgets and items throughout my entire play through. I’m sure some could be dismissed but the game is a lot easier to handle when everything is used accordingly.
Kate also has an ability tree to passively upgrade her equipment or personal stats like defense and offense. There are two sides, engineering and xenobiology, each with four tiers and eleven abilities to gain. In order to move up a tier a pre-requisite of so many abilities in lower tiers had to be obtained. In order to get ability points Kate had to scan new enemies and find special knowledge cubes. There is no grinding for experience, only a finite can be obtained. But there is enough to get every ability point by the end with a few points left over. I didn’t see a respec option but I never ran into a situation where that would be necessary.
Combat wasn’t difficult, but it wasn’t easy at times either. Most of the time it felt just right. Basic enemies would sometimes have a weakness, and sometimes the environment could create a weakness, like if I was fighting an enemy while they were in water I would get extra damage with my shock attacks while they were wet, but that would also weaken fire attacks, if the enemy had a weakness to fire I would have to adjust my combat to deal with it. Most bosses had a main weakness, but it wasn’t as simple as just shooting them down with the right element. There would be a small mechanic that would take some thinking to manage while trying not to die and damage the boss at the same time. I really enjoyed the combat, not having to think to hard but it didn’t turn into a monotonous buzz kill.
I was surprised at how short the game ended up being. I beat it in seven hours, I didn’t rush the game, but I didn’t dilly dally a lot either. I was also able to get every achievement, most of them were gained through the story but a few could only be obtained by explore a lot of the nooks and crannies. It’s nice to play a game where I don’t have to do a lot of crazy things like hop over three rocks and shoot a sign for achievements. So, without further ado, let’s get these ratings underway. First let’s look at visuals, the environment looked really good, but the characters themselves seemed pretty stiff. I could hear the emotion in their voice, but the faces didn’t really convey how they were feeling, we’re going to give that a three. The story was very well done. The game started with a lot of questions that were all answered at perfect times. There were no loose ends by the time I beat the game, it’s getting a solid five. Gameplay was average, it played smoothly, but there were some things that got repetitive, like having to cross a lake multiple times, I had to freeze a path and walk across, every time. That’s a four. Now replayability doesn’t feel very high. The game was well done, but it’s not something that I’m going to be thinking about forever and want to get back into, so that’s a one. And finally how much fun did I have, I had a lot of fun. There wasn’t any point that I felt like it was a chore to get through, I enjoyed figuring out how to defeat different enemies or how to overcome the environment. That’s a five too, this game was really well done. Totaling out at 3.6 puts Scars Above on the high end of the Mid Shelf. Dam close to top shelf but not quite there. I would definitely recommend this game if your looking for a good quick story to get through.