Quite often these days, games that feature a notable degree of difficulty find themselves compared to From Software's Dark Souls series. While the notion isn't entirely off base, a comparison like this doesn't do justice to the experience that Furi has to offer.
Furi is brought to us by The Game Bakers, an independent studio based in France and created by ex-Ubisoft employees. Assembling talent from around the world, they tried their hand at mobile development until "upgrading" to the world of consoles and PC with the release of Furi.
Furi may not deliberately evoke nostalgia the way some developers use pixel art or old-school game design, but my experience with the game ended up being fueled by nostalgia and memories of gaming experiences that caused me to fall in love with the medium. Like Shadow of the Colossus and more recently Titan Souls, Furi is a "boss rush" game, though one that stakes its bets on a series of "final" bosses that may remind many gamers of the legendary bosses they cut their teeth on. To that end, Furi uses a combination of twin-stick shooting and character action melee combat that boldly refuses to expand its bag of tricks as far as the player's abilities are concerned.
This minimalism permeates the entire experience: The art design provided by Afro Samurai artist Takashi Okazaki together with a surreal and subdued minimalist story works gracefully with the core design of the game's combat, evoking memories of the underrated El Shaddai: Ascension of the Metatron as well as the bosses in the equally underrated Nier. From the first tutorial boss, the player is introduced to all of their abilities, and every following boss is a different test of how to best utilize these core set of skills. As some artists say, a work is complete not when there's nothing left to add, but when there's nothing left to take away. This philosophy is clearly felt throughout the experience of Furi.
Like the greatest "final" bosses one would find in other titles, your enemies have a number of phases that must be completed, often escalating in scale and difficulty as they're whittled down. The stranger, your cool as hell protagonist who's hair ignores gravity and physics, has three lives himself, of which one can be restored if a boss's phase is defeated. While I do find the Dark Souls comparison dubious, make no mistake that Furi is a challenge, one that has a very specific audience in mind and makes no compromises in that regard. I lost to one boss probably 15-20 times, cursing and considering giving up. However, that moment of a final slow-motion slash finally putting that boss away flooded me with joyous childhood memories of besting what was once a great source of frustration, the kind of reactions that make others wonder why we devote our time to such a hobby.
I would be remiss in not mentioning the soundtrack, which may be one of the best in history and likely the best electro soundtrack I've heard in a video game. Unlike games that have songs written out of context and applied to their respective game, every track in Furi feels crafted to help choreograph the ebb and flow of a battle and fits the game perfectly.
Furi may not be the toughest or the best twin-stick shooter, or the best sword fighting game, but its sublime combination of the lessons learned from these genres sets it apart, and it executes on the "boss rush" formula better than a game like Titan Souls. It's not perfect; the difficulty scaling is somewhat off with a couple bosses being easier than the ones that preceded them, and some boss phases can feel somewhat cheap. This is not the ideal implementation of "tough but totally fair", but it's just so damned fun to play that it never bothered me to give that boss just one more crack at it. Furi is available on PS4 (for free with PS+) and PC, and the PC version gets a slight edge here. The PC port lacks any traditional graphics options (though the art style leaves little to be improved by such options), but it does allow resolutions above 1080p and holds the 60 fps target without screen tear much better than the PS4 version can.
It's not for everybody, but I stopped every other game on my list until I finished Furi. I love the hypnotic dodging of light bullet-hell, I love twin stick shooters like Assault Android Cactus and Enter the Gungeon, I love fast-paced melee combat with parries, and I love striking art styles and surreal minimalism. Furi is a dream game made for people like me, and not many others. If you love these kinds of arcade experiences, I can't recommend it enough, and if you have PS+ all you need is some free time and bandwidth. Even though I've defeated the Guardians, there's still challenges, harder difficulties, and trophies to add more hours of white-knuckle electro insanity.
Furi is brought to us by The Game Bakers, an independent studio based in France and created by ex-Ubisoft employees. Assembling talent from around the world, they tried their hand at mobile development until "upgrading" to the world of consoles and PC with the release of Furi.
Furi may not deliberately evoke nostalgia the way some developers use pixel art or old-school game design, but my experience with the game ended up being fueled by nostalgia and memories of gaming experiences that caused me to fall in love with the medium. Like Shadow of the Colossus and more recently Titan Souls, Furi is a "boss rush" game, though one that stakes its bets on a series of "final" bosses that may remind many gamers of the legendary bosses they cut their teeth on. To that end, Furi uses a combination of twin-stick shooting and character action melee combat that boldly refuses to expand its bag of tricks as far as the player's abilities are concerned.
This minimalism permeates the entire experience: The art design provided by Afro Samurai artist Takashi Okazaki together with a surreal and subdued minimalist story works gracefully with the core design of the game's combat, evoking memories of the underrated El Shaddai: Ascension of the Metatron as well as the bosses in the equally underrated Nier. From the first tutorial boss, the player is introduced to all of their abilities, and every following boss is a different test of how to best utilize these core set of skills. As some artists say, a work is complete not when there's nothing left to add, but when there's nothing left to take away. This philosophy is clearly felt throughout the experience of Furi.
Like the greatest "final" bosses one would find in other titles, your enemies have a number of phases that must be completed, often escalating in scale and difficulty as they're whittled down. The stranger, your cool as hell protagonist who's hair ignores gravity and physics, has three lives himself, of which one can be restored if a boss's phase is defeated. While I do find the Dark Souls comparison dubious, make no mistake that Furi is a challenge, one that has a very specific audience in mind and makes no compromises in that regard. I lost to one boss probably 15-20 times, cursing and considering giving up. However, that moment of a final slow-motion slash finally putting that boss away flooded me with joyous childhood memories of besting what was once a great source of frustration, the kind of reactions that make others wonder why we devote our time to such a hobby.
I would be remiss in not mentioning the soundtrack, which may be one of the best in history and likely the best electro soundtrack I've heard in a video game. Unlike games that have songs written out of context and applied to their respective game, every track in Furi feels crafted to help choreograph the ebb and flow of a battle and fits the game perfectly.
Furi may not be the toughest or the best twin-stick shooter, or the best sword fighting game, but its sublime combination of the lessons learned from these genres sets it apart, and it executes on the "boss rush" formula better than a game like Titan Souls. It's not perfect; the difficulty scaling is somewhat off with a couple bosses being easier than the ones that preceded them, and some boss phases can feel somewhat cheap. This is not the ideal implementation of "tough but totally fair", but it's just so damned fun to play that it never bothered me to give that boss just one more crack at it. Furi is available on PS4 (for free with PS+) and PC, and the PC version gets a slight edge here. The PC port lacks any traditional graphics options (though the art style leaves little to be improved by such options), but it does allow resolutions above 1080p and holds the 60 fps target without screen tear much better than the PS4 version can.
It's not for everybody, but I stopped every other game on my list until I finished Furi. I love the hypnotic dodging of light bullet-hell, I love twin stick shooters like Assault Android Cactus and Enter the Gungeon, I love fast-paced melee combat with parries, and I love striking art styles and surreal minimalism. Furi is a dream game made for people like me, and not many others. If you love these kinds of arcade experiences, I can't recommend it enough, and if you have PS+ all you need is some free time and bandwidth. Even though I've defeated the Guardians, there's still challenges, harder difficulties, and trophies to add more hours of white-knuckle electro insanity.