By NinjaGuyX
If you grew up in the cool era of the early 2000s and enjoyed arcade-style games, you'll feel right at home here with Denshattack! It's an amazing love letter to everything I love in gaming. This game might be about a train, but it's so much more! Let's dive in!
Emi's Story Is Weird In The Best Way
The story takes place in a future Japan where the rich live inside huge domes, while regular people are left outside them. But as the game itself says, "Who cares about this!"
You play as Emi, who lives outside the domes. She's a simple food delivery train driver with crazy train-driving skills, for some reason. It's funny because some random dude asks her to join the Denshattack scene, where train drivers compete against each other, and she's just like, "Sure, let's do it," and that's how it goes.
I love the development of Emi. She's very careless but so positive at the same time. She'll accept just about everything thrown at her while always spinning it in a positive way. It reminds me of my youth, to be honest!
You'll get nice cutscenes while playing that introduce new characters and move the story along nicely.
Driving A Train Gets Crazier And Crazier
So! Sure, what you're seeing here is weird, but doesn't it look cool? If you've been gaming for the last 20-plus years, you've seen some weird stuff out there. Yes, I'm looking at you, Katamari Damacy.
Your main goal is simply to make it to the end. But they don't make it easy! Avoid obstacles while jumping, switch tracks, grind rails, wall-ride, woooooahhh... yeah, it just gets crazier and crazier.
As you keep playing, they introduce new mechanics. Look at that, I can now do tricks in the air and pull off manuals... WITH A TRAIN.
Okay, okay, I need to get my composure back, haha. But just know that the pacing is great. As soon as you nail something, they throw something new at you. You just never get bored in this game.
Denshattack! Looks Like An Early 2000s Dream
Guys, I love the graphics. I'm a sucker for cel-shaded visuals. They're such eye candy for me.
You can tell it was heavily inspired by games like Jet Set Radio and Sonic Adventure. It feels weird saying it, but if you love those games, this is exactly what the gameplay feels like. Heck, I'll even say there's a nice element of Tony Hawk's Pro Skater in there.
Going Back For Gold Medals Is Part Of The Fun
There's also great replayability in this game. If you're enjoying it, it's almost mandatory that you go back to these levels to get the gold medal!
You need to accomplish three things. First, you need to hit a certain high score, which you do by building your combo without crashing or losing momentum. Next is time attack, where you simply make it to the end as fast as you can.
Last is a list of challenges for the level, which are genuinely fun to figure out. These include things like finding secrets, doing tricks on a pipe a certain number of times, or even completing the level without crashing. They're all unique per level.
Speaking of which, the sheer amount of levels in this game is insane! There are so many unique details in them, I can't imagine how much time it took to craft them all. Hats off to the designers because I'm having fun the entire time.
There's just a certain groove you get into as you keep practising and getting better.
Different Trains Add More Ways To Play
At some point, you also unlock different types of trains to choo-choo-choose from. I'm sorry.
Each has its own skill set. You can choose one that fits your play style or one that gives you an advantage on a specific course.
You also get to customize the colour and add decals. Simple customization, but I like it.
The Soundtrack Deserves Its Own Spotlight
If you review this game without talking about the soundtrack, you seriously don't deserve to have a video out there.
Most of it is composed by the trio of Sean Bialo, Andrew One, and one of my favourite composers of the modern era, Tee Lopes. He absolutely nails how retro music should sound in this day and age.
And there are so many guest appearances! They got Daytona USA composer Takenobu Mitsuyoshi, 2 Mello, who's composed some legendary soundtracks, and they even got Persona and Shin Megami Tensei composer Shoji Meguro alongside Lotus Juice. And I'm just scratching the surface here.
Look up the soundtrack. It's an absolute must and a love letter to some of the best composers out there.
Denshattack! Gets My Must-Buy Stamp Of Approval
I think you know by now that I'm an absolute fan of this game. Not only does it hit my gaming nostalgia 100%, but the sheer amount of content, the polish, and the care put into this game is out of this world.
Denshattack! gets 5 stars out of 5 for being exactly what I needed, and it gets my must-buy stamp of approval!
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