Title: Mr. Shifty
Genre: Action, Adventure, Indie
Developer: Team Shifty
Publisher: tinyBuild
Release Date: Apr 13, 2017
Mr. Shifty is an Action Adventure game by Team Shifty and published by tinyBuild. In it you play the titular teleporting hero/thief, Mr. Shifty. And the game is damn hard. Seriously, its store page refers to Hotline Miami for a reason.
The story is relatively simple, in an action movie way. Chairman Stone has a finger in every pie in the criminal underworld. He’s got his hands on some Mega Plutonium, capable of used to build a doomsday weapon. Shifty and his home base support, Nyx, are all that stands against his success. If you really need it dumbed down, think of it this way; imagine if Die Hard starred Nightcrawler fighting the forces of an 80’s drug kingpin.
Shifty has three superpowers: The Mark Trail Fists of Justice™, the ability to pick up any number of objects to use as a weapon, and the ability to teleport 5 feet in any direction. And teleport you will; it isn’t very far into the game that you need to begin bamf-ing all over the place precisely. Or you will die. A lot. Mostly since Contra rules are in effect: take a bullet? Die. Get punched by a big guy? Die.
Shifty’s a one hit point wonder. And nothing’s going to help you if you exhaust your five teleport charges. Sure they regenerate fairly quick, 1 second per charge, but that’s the thing. Stone’s thugs aren’t going to wait around for that. And he has a whole lot of identical, faceless cronies all eager to punch your clock for you.
The game quickly ups the ante in every stage. I’ll freely admit I haven’t finished the game yet. It’s that damn hard, and that’s considering I got through about half of the building before hitting a wall. That being this one huge fight six or seven stages in.
The important thing to keep in mind is that the game is hard, but rewarding; few things feel better than making it through a part that was giving you trouble. I just didn’t have the sort of time that lets me smash my head against a brick wall.
It’s a small thing, but I complain about it so much: controller support. Games like this are meant to be played on one, So I’m happy to say Mr. Shifty does, truly, have full controller support. I don’t know if this is due to my constantly bitching about it, or the bitching of others, but I love not having to quit a game just to fix something broken with a controller emulator.
The soundtrack, from what I’ve heard, is pretty pumping. That’s a low bar, though; I was often so focused on not dying I paid the music little mind. But judging from those few lulls, it’s pretty good.
Overall, Mr. Shifty is an infuriatingly difficult, but fun, game. I’d only recommend it to the hardcore, though. And at $15, it might leave players not up to the challenge feeling a bit cheated. But otherwise, I’d argue it’s worthy of a purchase. Especially if you want to live out your Nakatomi Plaza superhero fantasy.
Pros:
+ Satisfying controls
+ Pumping soundtrack
+ Full Controller Support
– It’s hard
– Like really hard
– I warned you
*We were provided a copy of this game for review*
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