Game Info
GAME NAME: Isbarah
DEVELOPER(S): Leikir Studio
PUBLISHER(S): Neko Entertainment
PLATFORM(S): PC
GENRE(S): Action, Indie
RELEASE DATE(S): Febuary 25, 2015
Isbarah is a unique indie PC title. It’s a cross-genre platformer, with a mixture of some hardcore Contra bullets everywhere in your face action along with dual boss type battle levels. Isbarah is a game of technique and problem solving. You’ll need to fully figure out boss patterns in order to move forward. You also have to smartly manage your powers so you can survive, each power regenerates over time so you don’t want to burn everything at once. You also have to be agile in the platforming arena one slip could cost you the whole level.
The story is quite intriguing although some of the character names are laughable. For example, you start off with “God” talking. The universe is interesting. Every thought made by humans contribute to the landscape of this ever changing universe. The creatures within this universe are called “The Designs.” They all have different behaviors and looks. Along with these creatures are things called “Designless.” These are only concept creatures who haven’t been fully created by human imagination. These “Designless” are desperate to evolve so they are infecting other designs which in turn are making them more powerful. They want to be their own creature so they are trying to take over “The Designs.” Like I said, a weird story but somewhat interesting.
Iria the daughter of “god” is given god-like powers to prevent this world from falling into chaos, especially since god rules with an iron fist and Iria his daughter is the only weapon he has to punish anyone that bends his law.
You can pretty much see where this is headed. Each level is a platforming level with a two phase boss approach. You have to jump and dodge your way through the level, and activate rail guns to get the enemies attention. You stand within the circle radius of the rail guns to activate them to fire.
The controls are pretty basic but need to be precise and will test your skills as a gamer. To jump you hit the space bar, to fall through platforms you hit s, and use the standard w, a, s, d for movement. To dash/attack you use your right mouse button to draw a line and you’ll follow that line and can also slow time down but only a few times before a regenerates so use it sparingly and wisely.
Once you get the attention of the boss, he will fully reveal himself and start an attack sequence and barrage you with projectiles. This is the most challenging part, you have to stay within the circle and do whatever you can not to get hit. Once the circle becomes small enough you have passed the barrage and can attack the enemy for phase 2 which is essentially same cycle from the beginning, going through the level, activate, rail gun, etc. Once you do this twice you defeat the boss and deliver the final blow before seeing another story cut scene and moving on to the next boss.
The graphics have a comic style quality and approach to them, sometimes frames look sloppy or slapped together although the characters are done very well. The music is amazing, it’s fast paced metal music which I absolutely loved and goes well with this bullet hell platformer.
The Recommendation
Isbarah is one of those really fun platformers that will test your gaming skills and sometimes your patience. You do get a ton of content, the music is excellent metal music and at times gameplay can get addicting, so for $13.99 you can’t go wrong. I highly recommend checking out Isbarah if you want to play a unique platforming title.
