4cr Plays - SteamWorld Heist (Wii U)
SteamWorld Heist, from Swedish developer Image & Form, caught me by surprise. First, as a huge fan of the previous SteamWorld Dig, by its marked gameplay departure but more especially by how much I actually enjoyed it. If there is any genre in video games that I couldn’t ever get into, it is the turn-based strategic realm of gaming. Fire Emblem, Advance Wars, Final Fantasy Tactics, XCOM, Shining Force and so on, I never could get into. Sorry guys, I cannot digest.
Not only that, but I utterly suck at them. Not being the greatest gaming tactician coupled with the overwhelming intricacies of the classes, stats, attributes, equipment... well, that means my enjoyment of these games usually ends within the first few battles. My slim pedigree of completed RPGs is certainly to fault here, as I’m usually favoring, with a few exceptions, a more streamlined approach to the genre. This is exactly where SteamWorld Heist got me as it makes a last appearance on the Wii U, after debuting on the 3DS and releasing on a plethora of platforms.
Following the adventures of Captain Piper Faraday, a space captain pirate steam robot against the awful rusty Scrappers, the Royalists group and even mysterious aliens, SteamWorld Heist is at its heart a turn-based strategic shooter. Each of your characters move on the 2D side-scrolling randomly generated level, with yellow and blue lines displaying how far you can reach further. Within a yellow distance, you can go and still fire your weapon. Sure, you’ll reach a farther distance with blue, but it’ll end your turn.
Unless you keep a good distance from your enemies, you’ll want to take cover behind the variety of barrels and other items spread throughout a level. Enemies will pop-up from behind doors, or after certain conditions are met (like when a countdown expire) but are similarly restricted. Your crew will grow larger over the course of the game, each with their own set of weapons, skills and it is up to guide them in one piece (good luck!) until you reach the exit.
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Combat is where the fun really is, and weapons in Heist are a highlight. Shotguns can deal massive damage to even multiple enemies if you’re close enough. SMPs usually spread their bullets. And then you have the game’s best feature: the sniper rifle, which draws a trajectory line (slowly swaying up and down, following your character's movement) that can bounce off multiple times, ricocheting all over the place before nailing that nasty steam-robot on the other side of the behind the head (if you’re good enough). Not unlike a video game of golf, nailing a shot is absolutely satisfying, relying on skill and risk-taking instead of arbitrary statistics. It’s genuinely satisfying and, more importantly, fun.
At the end of a level, you’ll be given a star rating based on the amount of loot you’ve gathered, and the number of crew members who survived. Surviving bots will be given experience points that can unlock new abilities, while the accumulated stars will boost your reputation and unlock extra areas on the map.
Loot consist of water, the game’s vital currency (you’re steam robots after all!), as well as new weapons, armors and extras plus an array of cool (purely cosmetic) silly hats that you must knock off your enemies head. To upgrade your crew armory, you simply swap your gun for a newly acquired weapon for extra damage, more shots or fewer restrictions. Same goes for things such as armor that can provide extra health points, bombs for dealing massive damage and more. It is all very streamlined, once again clearly highlighting the great impact it has over the gameplay.
Just like SteamWorld Dig, Heist is very pretty if even more colorful than its predecessor. It is bright, nicely animated and looks stunning an HDTV. The music is also excellent, nicely tailored to each of your actions with a special mention to the over-dramatic bar tune singing your praise. This is a terribly charming game, and while the story doesn’t fare into uncharted territories, the way it is presented to you through wise dialogue, funny speech bubbles, and silly characters, more than makes up for it.
While I’m far from an exemplary SteamWorld Heist player (I’ve been juggling between the Regular and Experienced difficulties and even been contemplating the Novice difficulty every now and then), and the game probably won’t make me a better tactician, the simple course of actually completing missions, even getting better at them on a second visit, and thus playing an actual turn-based strategy game, is an incredible feat. It’s on the most accessible spectrum of the genre, and probably the only side of the genre I can digest, but I absolutely recommend it. This is such a stunning game worth the praise it got since it debuted on the 3DS last year, and you should certainly add it to your collection.
