Mega Man: Dual Override (Multi) Gameplay Trailer

Arriving fresh from Gamescom, Mega Man: Dual Override receives a new trailer, this time focusing on some gameplay. We see a look at an all-new Robot Master in the form of Twinkle Girl, our second ever female Robot Master in the series, and even spot an old haunt from Mega Man 8 and Mega Man & Bass thrown in, speaking of Robot Masters! Mega Man: Dual Override is playable on the Gamescom show floor and releases next year.

Gravity Circuit (Multi) Review

A new review for an older indie game is here on the site, and at this review's conclusion, we're officially one review away from SuperPhillip Central's 1,100th! A massive number of reviews on the site, for sure, and some might even be called "quality" at that! Your mileage will vary, of course! Regardless, let's take a look at a game that recently received a sequel announcement: Gravity Circuit. As a massive Mega Man fan, I'm kicking myself for not having played this sooner. Better late than never, though! 

Time to break some circuits

Gravity Circuit recently celebrated its third anniversary in July and an announcement of a sequel arriving next year. Of course, with a third anniversary celebration, I'm a little late to the party on covering the game. That said, as a rather large Mega Man fan and nerd, I felt I was lacking by not playing this game yet. In the end, Gravity Circuit is not just one of the best indie Mega Man-likes available, but it also manages to outdo many of the Blue Bomber's own entries.

After some time of peace and after having been defeated long ago, the Virus Army unexpectedly returns, laying siege to the planet in a bid for total world domination. The resistance known as the Guardian Corps have been weakened and spread too thin with no alternative than to call an old hero into the fold: Kai. This robot mercenary wields the fabled Gravity Circuit, giving him the power to take the fight to the Virus Army and hopefully vanquish them once and for all. 

Gravity Circuit's story is one that doesn't meander or mess around too much, but it does throw some surprises and twists here and there. Ideally, it'd be possible to fully skip all cutscenes, if only for the repeated plays the game encourages you to perform, but this isn't always possible. Still, what's here doesn't get in the way too often. The gameplay is the star of the show, and it makes a darn good first impression.

Said first impression puts players into the role of Kai in an opening city stage, sort of reminiscent of Mega Man X's opening highway stage. Here, the basics of Gravity Circuit are taught to the player. Whereas Mega Man X utilizes his X-Buster to shoot foes from far away, Kai prefers a more up, close, and personal approach. 

Eat robot foot, Virus Army!

Kai's Gravity Circuit gives him the ability to punch and kick foes into submission, turning their bodies gray. Upon this, Kai can pick up and chuck the robotic corpse of his opposition into other enemies and faraway objects. He also has a hookshot to utilize, allowing him to attack foes from afar with its much weaker, but somewhat safer penetrating point. Weakened enemies can be grabbed by the hookshot, and then, you guessed it, tossed to oblivion.

The hookshot isn't just a weapon; it's also a means for traversal. Whether to swing across otherwise impossible to cross chasms, lift himself up to higher areas, or allow him to perform some acrobatic maneuvers, Kai's hookshot is an invaluable tool to progress through levels and get through the game. This is alongside is standard dash and optional but super useful burst techniques.

Kai gets into the swing of things, and players will, too, for that matter, 
eventually moving through stages with surgeon-like precision!

These burst techniques give Kai an extra edge in combat. Through using up some energy from a gauge, Kai is able to perform special moves and abilities in turn. These can range from powerful, move-interrupting uppercuts to bosses, lengthy power beams that give Kai knockback upon using them, and even piledrivers, as if he were preparing for a WWE wrestling match against C.M. Punk. Either way, these bursts definitely even the odds, or if you're proficient enough a player, make things even more favorable for Kai in the war against the Virus Army.

After the initial stage is complete, Kai has access to the Guardian Corps base. It's the hub that features various NPCs, though at the beginning of the game it's awfully lonely inside. Like any traditional-style Mega Man game, eight stages become available to play in any order. Each houses a Robot Master--or rather, Circuit, that must be taken down, one that is causing havoc in its particular area of the world.

The Circuits' stages in the game give plenty of variety, offering different platforming obstacles, environmental hazards, and contextual challenges to overcome. From the junkyard's dripping purple goo, that slows Kai's movement down to a total stop if he gets covered in it, to the snowy mountain's propensity to freeze our protagonist in ice at a moment's notice due to its plethora of enemies and hazards, Gravity Circuit presents players plenty of trials and tribulations.

Each stage features unique hazards, such as the boilerworks's penchant for lava, fire, and lasers!

Fortunately, and also unlike its inspiration, Gravity Circuit does not punish players severely in its gameplay. Yes, the game is a challenge, for sure, but players won't be facing instant deaths upon slamming into a bed of spikes, falling into a bottomless pit, or getting crushed like a robotic pancake, either. Instead, Kai is placed back at the safest determined spot (i.e. one without enemies or hazards) in the stage to try the section again, simply with less health than he had previously to work with.

Checkpoints are little repair stations similar to Shovel Knight. There, players pay a fee of the energy chips earned through exploration and defeating foes, to recover Kai's health and energy immediately. Each time the station is used, the cost goes slightly up for the next visit, at least in the same level on the current run of that stage. The developers weren't overly generous with the checkpoints, but they weren't miserly with them either. Folks will have to fight through and endure some grueling and occasionally lengthy sections of stages to reach one checkpoint to another.

Stages themselves are linear in true Mega Man-style fashion, but they're also brimming with secrets and side paths. From health and energy upgrades, to innocent civilians needing to be rescued, there is a lot to find and collect within the initial eight Circuit stages. 

Some civilians are easily spotted but hard to reach. Others are equally hard to find and reach, 
requiring some proficient platforming and destroying certain walls to reach!

Saving civilians helps in not only making the Guardian Corps base feel less empty, but it also enables Kai and the player by extension to purchase new passive parts and chips that can be equipped to our protagonist. Three of these can be equipped at once, ranging from extra energy recovery and less health consumed by falling into hazards, to more accessible assists, like a double jump. 

Gravity Circuit isn't too lengthy of a game, which shouldn't surprise any fan of classic Mega Man style games, but that isn't to say the game isn't one players can't enjoy for a long time. My first playthrough took about five hours to complete, but then there is a New Game+ mode that transfers everything over from a player's previous playthrough. There's also Circuit Mode, which is like the standard story, but allows Kai to tap into his health to use burst techniques when his energy is empty. Then, throw in the just over 50 unique achievements to tackle (some requiring playthroughs without collecting health and energy upgrades or buying extra techniques or parts), boss rushes, and more, and this is a game that all in all took me about 12 hours to earn everything within.

On the subject of play control, Gravity Circuit mostly sticks its landing. The platforming is top-notch, and the impact of punching and kicking enemies into submission--it really gave me the feel of being a badass, powerful rock'em, sock'em robot. Badass and powerful, yes, but invincible and faultless, no. Sometimes I found that using the hookshot, especially on diagonals--something needed quite often to do to swing across gaps and such--was hard to successfully do. Many times I saw Kai helplessly fall into the pit because I couldn't get diagonal to register, either on the D-Pad or control stick, properly 100% of the time. As one can imagine, this was quite the frustration, especially on playthroughs without the double jump ability afforded to me. 

The Virus Army comes in all shapes and sizes, and Kai's foot is currently meeting 
the faces of each and every one of them.

Further, I found dashing and jumping in conjunction to be a bit inconsistent. Holding the back left trigger on the controller initiates Kai's dash, but when I started to dash, I couldn't always just at the same time. This, like the diagonals of the hookshot before it, led to more failures in platforming than I would have liked. Still, overall, Kai handles, controls, and plays otherwise well.

Gravity Circuit contains an 8-bit-inspired graphical style to it. The amount of pixelated details in the stages, environments, and backgrounds are truly something to behold. A lot can happen on screen at once, and unlike the NES inspiration that the game takes after, Gravity Circuit does not feature the same sprite flickering or flashing the plagued the original NES hardware for games of this type of that era. On the sound side, the music is incredibly catchy and feels like something out of Mega Man. No notes--besides the obvious and catchy musical ones. 

While Gravity Circuit isn't a perfect encapsulation of everything I love about Mega Man, the devs and designers clearly did their research, or at the very least grew up with Mega Man like I did and know what makes these classics so enduring and endearing. Gravity Circuit is a wonderfully paced, action-packed romp that doesn't outwear its welcome, delivers delightful run and jump gameplay, insanely smart level design, and plenty of platforming, boss battles, and other combat scenarios that will test every player's mettle. A superb effort all-around.

[SPC Says: A-] 

This game was played via the Steam Deck version. Gravity Circuit is also available on PC, Nintendo Switch, as well as the PlayStation 4 and 5.

Mario Kart World (NS2) Main Theme and Crown City Studio Performances

What was lovingly called by the community "Mario Kart Mondays", due to the fact that Nintendo would release the much-enjoyed free roam tracks of Mario Kart World each week on its Nintendo Music service, has come to a conclusion with the arrival of Mario Kart 8 Deluxe's music. As a pleasant surprise, the over-an-hour of tracks from the game was not split up into two weeks. 

As an even greater pleasant surprise--arguably--Nintendo's primary YouTube channel uploaded two looks at the in-studio recording process of Mario Kart World, featuring the main title theme of the game and the Crown City track. The overall soundtrack certainly is one of Nintendo's very best ever put together, which if you are familiar with its catalog of musical compositions, is nothing to throw a blue shell at. It's darn impressive!

Enjoy these pair of YouTube videos showing the musicians performing the duo of themes, and if you'd like some more Mario Kart World goodness, check out the SuperPhillip Central review.

Teeto (NS2, NSW, PS5, PC) Review

After this past week's LIFTED review, we take a look at another indie platformer from the month of July. Whereas LIFTED took on a 2.5D approach, we're going full three-dimensions with the cute, charming, and colorful Teeto, available on PC, PlayStation 5, Nintendo Switch, and Switch 2 (the latter is the version of the game this review is based off).

Saving the world from sinister shadows? It Takes Teeto, baby!

Teeto is a 3D platformer built off the same vibes as exploration-based platformers such as Spyro the Dragon and Banjo-Kazooie. The latter is highly reminiscent of Teeto, as both star a pair of protagonists that work together to run, jump, and otherwise platform their way through levels. Whereas Banjo-Kazooie has a more complicated move-set to it, Teeto utilizes a simpler control setup. Teeto can jump, double jump, glide with the help of Nory, a pink bunny companion, roll, attack, and ground pound. 

A brief pause, a momentary respite to breathe and take in the scenery.

It's with Teeto's special transformative abilities that make what otherwise might be a standard fare platformer into something more intriguing. Teeto can interact with various objects in the levels of the game and take on their properties. For instance, a flower can transform Teeto into a vine form, allowing him to grapple specific faraway points with his vine arms and swing across them. There's also big boulders that Teeto can assume the abilities of, allowing him to ground pound with more force, breaking open floor and ground that otherwise would be impenetrable. 

Teeto looks ready for spring with all of that flower power!

Teeto features four acts within its 5-8 hour runtime, and each act consists of six levels. The first five levels are exploration, platforming-based with different side and main objectives to complete. The sixth is always a boss level of some form. 

There are three types of collectibles to be found within Teeto's levels: powerful purple polygonal vessels of energy known as Vionite, which serves as the game's Power Star equivalent to Super Mario 64, or to bring Banjo-Kazooie back up, that game's Jiggy equivalent. Collecting these is paramount as a certain amount is required to open up future acts in the game. 

Vionite are housed in hidden locations, but other times they're rewarded for completing objectives and tasks for NPCs in levels. Some may have you finding and fetching a lost bone for a dog, destroying a set number of shadow flags in a level, or even reaching the top of a small summit in a literal ode to the popular co-op multiplayer game PEAK. The objectives are varied enough to keep the game from growing stale, if the platforming and creative level design don't do that already.

Give a dog a bone, and you'll be rewarded with some much wanted Vionite!

Other collectibles include tiny, cute, blue, gooey creatures called Michaels. These are small in stature, but have a late-game purpose. While difficult to discover since they are tiny, the telltale sound of their giggling makes sure you won't miss them hanging around. Michaels humorously come in unique styles, such as "Chronically Online Michael" or "Michael Who Just Bought a Drone". 

The other type of collectible fills up a gauge, and that is of stars. Different sized and colored stars bestow more energy in the gauge, and a side goal is to fill the gauge in each level. The stars are also Teeto's form of currency, which is used to purchase new costumes and outfits for Teeto to adorn--from a Lucahdor wrestling costume to a superhero outfit.

I like a game where the collectibles are shown in order. That is, if you're near the level's exit and you pick up a Vionite, it won't be listed as the first Vionite collectible in the level in the UI. This is insanely helpful and welcomed for knowing if you've missed a collectible in a level. Usually you have time and the opportunity to backtrack, but sometimes you're stuck having to replay a level to pick up a missed goodie. Because the objectives and platforming are so enjoyable with tasks being fun and movement feeling great in general, I found myself actively seeking out every collectible and thus, 100% completion.

Teeto is positively energized, ready to [literally] charge into battle.

The levels themselves are full of interesting challenges and locales. While you start in traditional mascot platforming fare, such as caves, forests, and mountains, Teeto quite quickly picks up the pace on originality, having our two heroes enter subway stations, grocery stores, and through electrified backyards of suburbia. Some levels are more open-ended, while others have a more linear design to them. Either way, there is plenty of ways to go off the beaten path, discover a cleverly hidden collectible and find something of value.

Speaking of electricity, an electrified lawn certainly is one way to keep unwanted guests off of the grass!

Teeto is designed not just for solo play, but you can even bring a friend locally to play the game with you via split-screen play. Both players have a surprising amount of freedom, able to move far away from one another and pretty much can split up tasks between them or opt to work together on an objective simultaneously. The only times players are forced together are between areas/rooms or certain story triggers in levels. I was amazed by how well the co-op worked, and really, Teeto truly shines in its co-op and how it executes it.

Platforming is pretty breezy, as is the game itself. Checkpoints are fair, and falling to Teeto's demise is seldom a huge punishment. You don't lose progress or collectibles nabbed; you simply start at a nearby point in the level. Really, the only sticking point in the level of challenge is that of boss battles. Teeto and Nory only have three hearts between themselves to work with, and while bosses do drop hearts of restorative health when they're attacked, these battles are more challenging than anything else within the game. A certain 2D plane battle in the third act I found more frustrating and difficult than anything else by far in Teeto's adventure, other than the final boss battle itself.

Bosses serve as a modest but noticeable jump in difficulty compared to everything else within Teeto.

If there are any huge gripes other than the difficult jumps that come from the boss battles, it's that the enemy variety is woefully lacking. There's probably just four or five generic enemy types of Shadows to contend with. 

More worrisome and annoying were the crashes, at least on the Nintendo Switch 2 version that I played. These crashes happened twice upon falling into two separate pits in the final act of the game. Further, there were moments where the game completely locked Teeto out of certain actions, like aiming and attacking with his blob blasts, or worse yet in the snowy mountain level, being completely unable to jump after being shot out of a cannon. I either had to return to the hub or better yet, just plummet from the summit to my doom to get the controls and actions working properly again.

Nevertheless, what always worked for me was the presentation of the game. Teeto is a charming and cute game graphically, offering nothing truly amazing visually, but what style it has works and works well. The draw distance is rather lovely, and certain vistas and vantage points, like the top of the aforementioned snowy mountain level, shows off a gorgeous sunset. 

Absolutely breathtaking. Just be sure not to slide off the side, Teeto and Nory!

On the sound side, Teeto doesn't disappoint, but also doesn't overly delight either. The voice acting has a charm to it, but the music I would struggle to say is excellent. It's certain serviceable, but there's nothing truly memorable outside of perhaps the level clear theme. Certain typos in the game, especially during one of the more important scenes in Teeto, made for a less than fantastic impression, as well.

Teeto shines in its simplicity, whether that's its platforming gameplay or its graphical style. Its transforming mechanic, used to solve environmental puzzles and perform platforming, lends itself naturally to the gameplay without feeling shoehorned in. Glitches and bugs aside that will no doubt be cleaned up as time and patches roll on, between the co-op, fun objectives, craftily hidden collectibles, and level of charm, Teeto was a game I enjoyed hitting 100% completion on. While it isn't a title that hits the same highs of Banjo-Kazooie, Spyro the Dragon, or any other 3D platforming titan Teeto might have inspiration from, it's a wonderful game all the same. 

[SPC Says: B-] 

A code was provided by the publisher for the purpose of this review. 

Orbitals (NS2) "Creator's Voice" Video

Nintendo returns with a new entry in its series of videos called "Creator's Voice" with interviews from the designers and creators behind Orbitals, a co-op only action-adventure game which resembles something out of an 1980s era anime. There's good reason for it being co-op only as well as having that '80s anime resemblance, as you'll find out with this video. Orbitals releases exclusively on the Nintendo Switch 2 on September 3rd.