Something I often mention is the necessity for certain games to make themselves noteworthy. Metroidvanias—and rogue-likes—with buttery-smooth pixel art can feel like they’re a dime a dozen at times, and someone’s hard work could easily get lost in unstable digital marketplaces.
I highly praise games when they take new approaches to commonplace mechanics, as they give the average customer a reason to look at them.
However, Gestalt: Steam and Cinder reminded me games don’t inherently require uniqueness to survive. This Castlevania-inspired Metroidvania’s best qualities come from finely tuned gameplay hallmarks of the genre and other mechanics seen throughout similar titles.
The game shows its inspiration boldly, as several aspects of the presentation are from Castlevania. The pop-up damage text, the character portraits and the little item pick-up prompts exude passion for games like Aria of Sorrow and Symphony of the Night.
These quirks don’t try to nostalgia-bait players. Rather, they mix pretty well with the rest of the visuals. It’s a nice inclusion that informs veteran players that the developers understand what makes a Metroidvania good.
Like Castlevania, combat in Gestalt focuses mostly on melee attacks. Designing close combat in a game like this can be tricky, but the game gives the player enough maneuverability options to balance fights accordingly.
Gestalt’s combat also involves breaking people’s defenses but makes it work with the established gameplay mechanics instead of forcing everything to operate around it. Whereas games like Vernal Edge only had one way to get through combat efficiently, the player doesn’t have to rely on certain moves to make their way through Gestalt.
Additionally, there aren’t too many moves that weaken an enemy’s stamina. This allows players to approach encounters however they want, whether they shoot past an enemy or literally shoot past them. Combat always stays interesting during the game’s runtime and allows for smooth progression.
Player skill does little to mitigate the lack of invincibility frames, however. Rooms full of enemies will shred through one’s HP like a woodchipper eviscerates paper because there’s barely any time to recover.
The flow of exploration also gets interrupted in weird ways. The wall jump and ledge grab moves clash surprisingly often in the early game, making it hard to tell where one can reach.
Additionally, the loading zones between sections stretch beyond where the player might think they are. This makes going from one area to another in a vertical direction consistently clunky.
Some interactable objects also occasionally blend into the environment. It’s never an egregious problem—I only got tripped up by this once—but it causes the player to be aware of their surroundings forcefully and not naturally through their curiosity and sense of exploration.
These faults are thankfully few and far between, as Gestalt often overshadows them thanks to its level design. Areas are crafted so they inherently teach the player about important gimmicks and moves.
For example, the Outskirts section immediately shows the player that they can use the bombs being launched at them to destroy weak floors and harm enemies. You don’t have to go out of your way to put two pieces of a puzzle together, as the moments that showcase these mechanics occur just from one’s instinct and natural movements.
Granted, I played with tutorials turned off, so it’s possible that I only noticed this due to a lack of in-game prompts. However, this natural flow of gameplay and mechanics still stand out as one of the game’s best features. It also arguably caters excellently to both veterans and newcomers to the Metroidvania genre due to how the game informs the player of mechanics directly and indirectly.
All in all, I give Gestalt: Steam and Cinder an 8/10 and would highly recommend it to anyone enthusiastic about games like Metroid and Castlevania.
