Eyecandy: Supergiant Games definitely have an eye for art. Each level/area, is something to behold. It has inspiring landscapes and dream-like sunsets. The texture pallet didn’t seem repetitive and every nook and cranny is filled with the utmost detail and the still frame cinematics manage to push forward the story rather than hold it back. And it’s all by hand too. I honestly wish I knew more about art, but if I had to try and pin it, I would say somewhere around the pastel look is how this game is. The game’s artist “JenZee” actually has a Deviantart page where you can view all of his work.

SoundDesign: The actual effects in Transistor were very nicely designed and have a good variety with each enemy and each attack. They all sounded of high quality and were believable. Although, there were moments where I was spamming a certain attack and it was the same sound effect every time and it did annoy me. But that’s just a personal peeve. The voice acting was also a work of art. Logan Cunningham, who is coming back to Supergiant from doing Bastion, brought Transistor to life. He had a very smooth performance and it never sounded like he was “nagging”. But, the music, Oh Lord let’s talk about this music. Darren Korb is now in my top 10 composers. Once again, he flawlessly executed a video game. If you’re familiar with his other works you’ll recognize his eclectic influences all nicely wrapped into multiple tracks. If I had to guess a genre it would be something crazy insane like Digital-folk-hiphop or something. I don’t know, but it’s all there, guitars, the beats, harps, accordions, synths, a little bit of everything. After buying the soundtrack (as I did with Bastion) it’s been on repeat all day. And if you liked Ashley Lynn Barrett in Bastion, then you’ll love her in Transistor. Darren snatched her right back into the studio and made yet another masterpiece. The overall mood of the OST is depressing, moody, dark, but uplifting at the same time. And because there’s a music filter within the game I caught myself pausing, unpausing, and Turn()ing within the game just so I could hear all the different versions of one track seamlessly transition into one another. A definite recommendation.

Gameplay: Transistor kind of has you on that off-angle-top-down-view (called Isometric). It features real time combat with a strategy based feature called Turn(). When you press the command, the battlefield freezes and you can plan out your attack according to however you see fit, and then when you hit the command again, Red goes off and executes all the moves and combos at light speed, and then you wait for it to recharge, it’s really cool and at times can even save your life. Now when I played this game I only died I believe, twice. But TECHNICALLY I probably died about 99kajillion times. The way death works in this game is that you have four slots for attacks called Functions. Each function has two upgrade slots that you use your other acquired functions for certain buffs. As well you can apply a Passive Upgrade to your character, for a constant battlefield effect. Now when you run out of health, you lose your functions one by one. Then when you run out of health on your last function, it’s game over. Supergiant is very forgiving in this game and they don’t want you to die, they give every chance possible. At very few times did I feel cheated and only yelled out “Bullspit!” one time. But even then, one of the buildings got in the way of the borders of the battlefield. Usually when something like that happens the engine will “hollow out” the structure so that you can see the main character at all times. Well this game did not do that and actually caused me a death. But if you happen to be dying too much you can hit your own little personal beach house called the Sandbox and practice different moves, combos, etc. There’s doorways that lead to speed, resistance, and other challenges alike to hone your skills. And upon each mission that’s completed, you unlock a piece of the soundtrack to listen to AND get granted experience so you can stay ahead of the games rising difficulty. I spent so much time there, that at one point, I did forget where I was and upon returning to Cloudbank, Transistor said, “Back to reality…”. If the game is too easy, you can activate what’s called a Limiter to debuff the main character somehow, but the trade-off is it will give you an extra percentage on top of what you earned for every battle you win. So in a way, you choose the difficulty of the game at any time. Also when you beat it, there’s a Recursion mode where you keep everything from your last playthrough and go at it again.

Conclusion: Supergiant literally got the same exact team from Bastion (adding four or five people to make a team of 12) and conjured up something beautiful. Transistor is chock full of detail and is a work of art through and through. The music, the actual art itself, the voice acting, it all intertwines perfectly. Every Function has a story and you have to play the game from every angle to get the “full” experience. It only lies shy on the core story.

A game from creators of Bastion. Oh, what expectations I’ve had for this one. Obviously had the preorder with the soundtrack going and played it day one. And what a strange experience it was. I like most aspects of the game, and yet I wasn’t inclined to play it at all next time, so I finished it only now (2-3 months later?) by forcing myself to do it which is pretty sad, because the main story is actually VERY short. Without much of side “challenges” (which are decently designed but most of the time force you to play with predesigned powers (“functions”) installed and it was pretty unfun for me, because I like to design my own tactic in this game) the game takes around 3 hours to finish. With getting “some” challenges done it goes up to 4-5 hours. Nevertheless, I don’t think this gamelength is really acceptable, so that’s a sure “con” for me. Now some pros and some more cons.

Pros:
-The music. It’s very good, wouldn’t expect otherwise from Darren Korb. While the game was sitting idle in my library, the soundtrack I have purchased got it’s share of plays in the last months. Just like in the Bastion. One thing I would say it feels a bit lacking of electronic elements, which would be suitable in this setting.
-The art is impeccable, with great love to detail. Just like in Bastion.
-The setting. Very strange, interesting, kind of unique. Just like in the Bastion.
-The “functions”-system. Robust and full of variations, makes for good replayability and interesting levelups.
For some cons:
-The story. Very basic, not trying to hook you in at all. Mostly it goes by like “whatever, I am here somewhere, go on now”. There’s not much happening at all, the synopsis of the story would take approximatly 1 page after it’s all done. I mean, I don’t belong to the type of players, who cna’t play a game, which is weak on story, but I require at least good gameplay to have interest in it.
-The game-play. Repetitive, gimmicky and boring overall. The “planning thing” is gimmicky, overpowered and breaks the flow. The regular mode makes you feel seriously underpowered and is a bit of a cluster-fuck. After I’ve found the “right” functions combination, all of the fights where just a grind. In combination with the first flaw – it is why it felt like I don’t want to go on (I just couldn’t figure it out in the first hour yet).
-The sword. He is so whiny and emo it makes me want to smack him and tell him to grow a pair. While he is the 80% of the means how the story and setting is conveyed to player, in the end I just wished he would shut up -_-

Overall, you might want to check it out at your own risk, but this is no Bastion.