Zeno Clash

 Genre: Action, Indie

Developer: ACE Team

Publisher: The same guys.

System: PC, Xbox

Written by: Matt Sears

Zeno Clash was the debut title of Chilean developer ACE Team. Released in 2009, one of many years from the Source engine’s lo-o-ong heyday, it enjoyed enough success to warrant an Xbox port and, coming the 30th of this month, a sequel. With Zeno Clash II on the horizon, now is a good time for a look back.

Trouble is, I don’t remember the game that well now, so I gave it ten minutes.

Zeno Clash’s most defining feature is clear right from the outset, and that is its rich, colorful, almost excessively imaginative world.

In a show-rather-than-explain sort of way, it opens with a dialogue-free cutscene of baby things, both human and monstrous, being raised by some freaky bird-person-thing. They live in a home eccentric alien gypsies might say is “a bit too eclectic in decoration for my tastes—but I like that you’re experimenting! And beautiful colors. Beautiful.” One of the monster men’s strange facial features will probably cause you to wonder aloud, “does that guy have balls on his jaw?”

We’re off to a good start.

Feeling of Understanding: 0%

About fifteen seconds into that good start, you watch yourself kill the leader of the monster commune, Father-Mother. This is all a bit much to happen at once, so you pass out. Perfect time for some tutorials led by the spirit of a dead orc. Even better, he saw what you did and he thinks you screwed up by not dying yourself. Thankfully, pressing matters in the waking world will let you escape his reprimands before long.

Feeling of Understanding: 0%

At this point, it’s you and some girl that agrees with what you stand for (I am assuming here, she just came along), against the world. But if only she was faster at opening gates! Thanks to her weak arms, most of my final five minutes was spent combating Father-Mother’s kiddos in a bid for escape.

Feeling of Understanding: 0%

Combat is a blast, if not exactly a perfection. The controls are relatively simple—4 keys and a little attention to how you move your character in time with attacks—but they allow for very deep and enjoyable strategy. Similar to Mirror’s Edge, your first-person camera rattles and rolls with every antic. The effect is visceral, meaning that it puts the action right into your guts for you but also that some people might find it turns their guts right out of them. Dramamine.

Let’s call combat 15% of the game.

Feeling of Understanding: 15%

I had just enough time before the 10 minute finish to complete a second tutorial that followed the fight. It introduced me to a simple firearm, a thing that functioned like a backwards ramrod rifle and made from driftwood and bandages. So I guess there are some facsimiles of guns in the game too.

If you’ve been following the Feeling of Understanding Meter closely, you probably think you know my grasp on this game. I pledge to give you a complete review of games in ten minutes, and that means I need a complete picture of that game at the end of ten minutes. It’s been ten minutes. So...

Feeling of Understanding must be: 100%

Happy Thoughts: This game is a visual feast that rides an excellent line between pretty and grotesque. Also, I bet that sending a foe rolling head-over-heels with the back of your fist never gets old.

Sad Thoughts: A couple of these voice actors have got to get in the game and step up their game for the sake of this game. The graphics haven’t aged very well, though that’s no fault of the game. I mean, let’s all beat on SNES games for being two-dimensional (sarcastic).

What I Bet Comes Next: Um...

Hold on. I can do this...

So we have that, like, village of what looked like huge coral out in the desert... We killed that creepy Father-Mother thing that was raising a bunch of monsters... Our dead friend made fun of us...

Okay. You probably get the help of some magical hermit, learn a little about the monster condition from him as well as how to teleport, and return to your village to fight everyone rather than run forever. The final boss is a human-lobster thing like Larry the Lobster from Spongebob but rendered with more terrifying realism and it’s three stories tall.

Nailed it.