Hey you, stop there for a minute. It won’t take you long to read this, and I think it’s something important that you need to know. The fact is that we are on March 4 and, surprise! We already have a candidate for GOTY ! It’s called Loop Hero and maybe, like me a few weeks ago, you won’t give a penny for it either.
In fact, my first two sentences regarding the game when Devolver Digital announced it were “ how ugly ” -yes, I beg your pardon- and that was followed by a “ I don’t understand anything ”. If you were the visionary that I avoided being, you know what to do: run to the store for him. But if you’re as lost as I was a few weeks ago, let me stand on your doorstep to tell you about our lord and savior Loop Hero .
Loop Hero: the first indie gem of 2021
Let’s talk about the elephant in the room first. A candidate for GOTY indie? At this time of year? At this time of day? In this area of the country? Exclusively located inside your PC? Yes it is .
Despite the danger of stopping at one of its main screens full of pixelated paths and dolls with little visual actuality, Loop Hero is one of those games that you understand minute by minute, discovering a seemingly simple experience that twists and becomes more complicated as you go. of the hours, and that begins to unravel and shed lights and surprises as the days go by.
I have been with it for several weeks and I have not been able to avoid the temptation to play it almost daily , no longer because of the arrival of this imminent text, but because it is one of those terribly addictive formulas to which it is difficult to deny a bit more of your time. One of those who eat your free half hour out of nowhere, but also one of those who can keep you until the wee hours of the morning repeating that of ” one more and I’ll quit .”
But how? How can this seemingly out of nowhere genius take over your leisure time through turn-based fights, cards, resource management, and city and scenery building? How the hell can a mix of genres this crazy work? Let’s try to land it.
Understanding Loop Hero
In Loop Hero we put ourselves at the controls of the classic fantasy hero, a warrior destined to save the world from a catastrophic event. However, this is the most catastrophic of all those that are remembered because, literally, he has left nothing behind him.
The world is empty, and every time we leave our camp we must rebuild it to try to remember what happened and defeat whoever is behind it. Right there begins the loop -the cycle- that gives its name to the game, a path that is generated randomly and that is surrounded by a dark nothing waiting to be filled.
Walking we will run into monsters from which we will extract three resources . Some will give us weapons and items with which to improve our statistics for that cycle, others will give us supplies that will serve to improve our options for future cycles from the camp, others will give us cards with which to fill that void and, finally, the The rest will give us any combination of these three elements.
The first is easy to understand, it will be a sword with more damage or an armor with more defense, in addition to the occasional additional ability such as greater evasion or attack speed. More or less options depending on its category and the level of the piece.
The second gives room for an additional section that we will talk about later, so for now we are going to focus on the one that turns each Loop Hero game into something completely new, the cards.
A fantastic mix of genres and ideas
So that nobody scares me, we will say that with the Loop Hero cards we are closer to the placement of stage pieces such as a board game a la Zombies , Carcassone or Saboteur , than to something Magic or Hearthstone style.
You start with the basics, for example a meadow and a mountain, and from the combinations you make you generate bonuses for the cycle and unlock new options for cards or enemies.
Stones and mountains, for example, increase the health of your hero for the duration of the game and, if you put nine together to form a square, an even larger mountain will be created from which a harpy will be born every so often that will perch at some point From Stage.
The continuous placement of pieces, whether they are elements of the scene -such as rivers that double the statistics of adjacent pieces-, areas of the path -which will deliver resources as they pass and will summon enemies from time to time-, or special buildings -such as the library, which will change randomly the cards you have in your hand-, it is one of those risk and reward mechanics that require some strategy to finish getting the hang of it.
Luckily, whenever you want you can stop the action to place cards and rethink your next steps. If you do nothing, our character and his world will follow their course automatically, waiting for you to improve his inventory or continue giving life to his world.
The more cards placed, the more bonuses, but also more enemies. To more enemies, more cards and objects won with which to improve our options to continue. A fish that bites its tail in which until the appearance of the boss depends on how many cards we have on the stage.
From the combinations that we take -for example a lightning tower capable of damaging enemies but also burning nearby forests, thereby creating a new card-, we will obtain other enemies and, with them, also new resources that will serve to continue expanding our collection of options.
Improving your camp and expanding your collection
If there is a maxim that Loop Hero cannot escape, it is the feeling of farming and grinding during the first hours. With three main bosses and a combination that shapes its final chapter, the way you scale its difficulty may seem like a toothache, but most of the time you get stuck because you haven’t yet understood how a particular aspect works or, in failing that, you are not investing your resources properly.
The path of each of our cycles has a beginning and an end in which, if the boss has not seized it, you go through a camp where, in addition to healing your health, you activate the bonuses and buildings that respond to each new loop .
When you are close to him you will always have the option of letting the game run its course to continue walking and fighting automatically or, if you wish, retreat to return to the camp with all the resources you have in your pockets.
Although there are some improvements that will allow us to leave part of the resources obtained each time we go through the bonfire, the key to Loop Hero is that, if you die during a cycle, you will lose practically everything. Supplies and items collected will disappear forever, and you will return to your camp to re-plan your next game.
There you will decide what to do with everything you have achieved and, if you have enough materials, you will be able to create a town where others who wander through the void will be able to find refuge and help you in the most varied ways.
It is the place where you will create a forge to start each cycle with a set of weapons, where you will shape houses that allow you to carry more objects in each game, where you will place the library from which to study your enemy cards, scenery and supplies to find out how to get that missing piece, or where you will set up a cemetery that will allow you to come back to life once per game.
The list of options is much larger, nourished and logical than it seems at first glance. And from there, from studying it and carefully measuring what your next step will be, that series of eureka moments is born in which you understand that things are not about grinding and farming like crazy. That the options to dodge that bullet were there and you just hadn’t realized it.
With new classes that completely modify the way you approach each game, a huge collection of cards, and a good handful of secrets waiting to be revealed, Loop Hero is one of those games that you never want to end.
Hopefully a new building, another character to dominate, yet another enemy. An additional excuse to add to the huge list of options of this tiny and endearing genius. Another reason to fall back into its clutches for days as if it were the first, with that stupid ” how ugly “, and that innocent ” I don’t understand anything .”
It is not only that I consider Loop Hero to be an essential game and one of the most original indies of recent times, it is that with this I am going to give you the turra as I already did with Nuclear Throne, Subnautica or Return of the Obra Dinn.
Because things well done have to be celebrated from the rooftops, and this great game like the glass of a pine tree called Loop Hero, and sponsored by Devolver’s good eye, well deserves a minute of your most meticulous attention.
Essential
Loop Hero
| Platforms | Pc |
|---|---|
| Multiplayer | Not |
| Developer | Four quarters |
| Company | Return Digital |
| Launch | March 4, 2021 |
| Price | 12.74 euros |
The best
- A superb mix of genres.
- Much deeper than it seems.
- Terribly addictive.
Worst
- It takes a bit to get the hang of it.
- It ends up getting short.
