Yooka-Laylee and the Lightning that Can Never Return to the Bottle

Man, I don't even know what to do with this dusty old blog anymore. I don't think I updated at all on November, and nearly ignored the blog this month as well. However, it felt right to post something before the end of the year, so here it is. Don't expect anything too organized... I'm just going to prattle on about a handful of games I've been playing lately.

First on the menu is Yooka-Laylee. I grabbed a copy of this for the Switch when the price dropped to three dollars, and it certainly is... a game I've been playing. From the mismatched power couple who serve as the heroes to the inanimate objects with buggy eyes to the referential jokes with all the subtlety of a lead pipe to the back of the skull, Yooka-Laylee's intentions are clear. It wants to bring back the vibe of the European platformers popular on the Nintendo 64 in the late 1990s, but it concentrates way too much on window dressing while leaving the core of the gameplay unrefined. 

And there are minecart races, because you
DEFINITELY wanted to relive those little
nightmares.
(image from New Game Network)

 

Almost from the moment you walk through the doors of the Hivory Towers, Yooka-Laylee reveals itself as cryptic and unfocused. Stages are gigantic, without the benefit of a map to help guide you through them, timed challenges are given ruthless time limits, and obtuse puzzles are frequently presented without apparent solutions. Why won't those plants talk to me? What do I do with this giggling bush? How the hell do I get through this door? Talking to the sexual innuendo snake hidden in each world and buying his moves chips away at the brick walls of confusion the game insists on dropping in front of you, but I still can't fathom how anybody could finish this game without a strategy guide. 

You'll get your three dollars' worth out of Yooka-Laylee just from bumbling through the stages and collecting hidden whatzits, but this is the Switch. There's no end of top-tier platformers on this system, and playing this clumsy 1990s throwback feels like slumming when you've got Kirby and the Forgotten Land and a million Mario games at your fingertips.

Speaking of Kirby and the Forgotten Land, I picked that up in a recent sale, and was quite pleased with it. There was a lot of early hype about this being an open world game, but calling it "open world" is as much of a stretch as Kirby trying to get his mouth around a rusty Volkswagen. The stages are typically wide hallways, granting the pink puffball some lateral movement but little room to explore the environment. You'll find the occasional fork in the road or a path hidden behind some debris, but beyond that Forgotten Land is only slightly less linear than a traditional Kirby game. (Not that I'm complaining after playing Yooka-Laylee.)

The enemies d'jour in Forgotten Land are
Woofos, corgis at their most adorably
deadly.
(image from Nintendo EVERYTHING!!!)

Each recent Kirby title comes with its own signature gimmick, from the all-consuming Hypernova fruits in Triple Deluxe to the mighty mechs in Planet Robobot. Forgotten Land introduces the Mouthful, which lets Kirby partially consume and adopt the characteristics of objects too large for him to swallow outright. Suck up an abandoned car and Kirby becomes the car, letting him crash into walls and soar over ramps. Eat a traffic cone and Kirby turns into a pointy pylon, letting him break through cracks in the floor and impale enemies. It's not one of the most memorable tricks up Kirby's proverbial sleeve, but it does bring variety and simple puzzle solving to the action.

Beyond the faintly open world gameplay and the most optimistic post-apocalyptic setting you've ever seen in a video game, it's business as usual for the Kirby series. Forgotten Land offers a perfect balance between light, breezy fun and a wealth of content... there are tons of goodies to collect and an abundance of distinct stages to visit, but there's never so much on your plate that you feel overwhelmed, and everything's clear enough that you're rarely left feeling confused and frustrated (looking at you, Yooka-Laylee).

Finally, there's Street Fighter 6. Capcom bunted with the last Street Fighter game, but this feels like a swing for the fences, with a story mode that feels like a game in and of itself, rather than a bunch of versus matches sandwiched between exposition (sorry, Mortal Kombat 11). Plenty of reviewers have compared the World Tour to Sega's Yakuza series, and it's hard not to notice the similarities when you're hoofing it through Metro City, finishing silly fetch quests and scrounging money and items from any thug stupid enough to cross paths with you. 

Street Fighter 6 not only makes tons of
references to past Capcom games, but
builds on Final Fight and Street Fighter
lore in unexpected ways. You can fight
pretty much anyone in this game if you'd
like. Starting fights with strangers in
Metro City is just a way to introduce
yourself, like shaking hands, or dogs
sniffing each others' butts.
(image from Tom's Guide)

 

The big difference is that while Yakuza's combat mechanics were only pretty good, Street Fighter 6's fights play like a standard game of Street Fighter, which makes them damn near perfect. As you advance, you'll meet Street Fighter legends and learn both their stances and signature moves, eventually turning your character into a patchwork quilt of martial arts mastery. It's frustratingly limited when the game starts and you're stuck with the move set of the aggressively generic Luke, but the range of your abilities expands as you visit new countries and meet the fighters who live there. Pretty soon you'll have a terrifying Frankenstein's monster of a fighter, sewn together from the body parts of past Street Fighter champions.

And oh yeah, the actual versus fights are spiffy too, although they practically feel like bonus content next to the meaty story mode. Street Fighter 6 dumps the V modes of Street Fighter 5 into the trash where they belong, and replaces them with the vastly superior drive gauge. The drive gauge works a bit like stamina in a Dark Souls game... it's a bar that depletes when you use special techniques like boosting the power of a special move, but refills when you leave it alone. Use it too much and you could drain it completely, leaving you vulnerable and potentially helpless. It's up to you to use the drive gauge effectively but S-P-A-R-I-N-G-L-Y, so you're shattering turtles with the block-breaking Drive Impacts and doling out bonus damage, but not exhausting yourself and getting caught with your pants down. It's a compelling play mechanic and one of the most monumental we've seen in a Street Fighter game since the supers in Super Street Fighter II Turbo. Don't be surprised if the Drive Gauge sticks with the Street Fighter series for a few sequels.

A playing card reject with an unhealthy
addiction to steroids. Just what I always
wanted in a Street Fighter game!
(image from Capcom)

There are new characters, and as expected from Dimps-era Street Fighter, they're hit or miss. One of the highlights is Kimberly, who carries the teenage schoolgirl ninja torch first lit by Ibuki, but zests it up with graffiti and a street smart attitude. On the downside, you've got gladiator giantess Marisa (ME WANT SNU-SNU!!!) and JP, an elderly man in a top hat* who's almost as exciting as Capcom's last dud Necalli. Maybe you guys should stop serving up fresh cowpies like El Fuerte, F.A.N.G., and Rufus, and just steal ideas from Jojo's Bizarre Adventure and Bloodsport again. Just sayin'.

It has become apparent that I'm entirely too high to finish the rest of this review, so I'll just conclude by saying that Street Fighter 6 is the very best Street Fighter has been in years. Years! Kudos, Capcom. Way to catch up to Mortal Kombat after nearly a decade of eating its dust.

* Okay, so I mixed him up with the other guy from Street Fighter 5, another lame-tastic lamie from the land of lame fighting game characters. Shit, you might as well bring back Angus from Kasumi Ninja, complete with great balls of fire that erupt from his lifted kilt.