Liverpool Sound and Vision Rating 9/10

Crimsonland is a top-down shooter game available for download from the PlayStation Store for the PS4. Crimsonland is a re-make of a game known by the same name that was released for Windows in 2003 and was actually 10Tons’ first ever game with the re-make providing a rather fitting celebration of a special milestone of having endured over a decade in the videogames industry! A decade in the videogames industry is not exactly easy, but congratulations are not just in order for over a decade in the industry, but also for such a diversity of games from Sparkle to King Oddball and even Crimsonland showcases a clear departure from one another, which takes plenty of enthusiasm, guts and imagination to achieve, so long live the exceptional indie games and long may they continue to flow onto PlayStation consoles for many years to come! However, does Crimsonland shape up to the same level of quality as their Sparkle games and King Oddball?

The quests game mode includes six chapters with each chapter containing ten levels for a total of sixty levels as you attempt to endure hundreds of enemies in almost every level. Progressing through the quests game mode will unlock new modes for the survival game mode, amongst other interesting content regarding weapons and perks.

The survival game mode is the only one that is initially available, which allows you to use weapons and perks unlocked in the quests game mode for a high score attempt with the interesting gameplay mechanic that when you have killed enough enemies; you will achieve the next level, which allows you to choose one perk from a selection of four, therefore making for a more rewarding experience by providing you with more of a fighting chance of surviving. Meanwhile, there are a further four un-lockable game modes earned as you progress through the game.

The texture and colour of the surrounding environments vary from grass to sand, although the size and scope of the area of exploration for each level does not vary, which is technically not a negative at all; as each level is huge in scale with enemies attacking from all directions with an appropriate amount of space to attempt to manoeuvre around them when things start getting a little too congested.

The enemy design varies greatly as there are different types of spiders ranging from normal ones to exploding red spiders and even duplicating arachnids that produce two others of a smaller size until they can no longer replicate, although that in itself requires around five kills for each duplicating spider, alongside hordes of zombies, aliens, lizards and much more besides, while you should also be weary of pods for every type of enemy that will spawn enemies at a faster rate than you can kill them individually, so players have to make sure you circle around the spawn pods until they have destroyed them, otherwise they will have an endless supply of enemies to deal with.

There is a great variation of weaponry as there are a total of thirty weapons, although just the pistol and assault rifle are available from the start, followed by a further twenty-eight un-lockable weapons as you progress through the game including conventional weapons, such as shotguns, miniguns, sub machine guns and a flame throw and the more non-conventional weapons, such as the plasma rifle and plasma minigun, amongst many more weapons. Every weapon is diverse to the point that each weapon has its own set of attributes including: clip size, accuracy, damage, fire rate and reload time.

There is just as much variation to the perks as is the case for the weaponry as there are a total of fifty-five perks, although twenty-six of them are available from the start, followed by a further twenty-nine unlockable perks as you progress through the game. Each perk provides a different affect, such as the Bloody Mess that provides more gore and increases your XP by 30%; the Lean Mean EXP Machine that increases your XP in a steady stream; and the Bonus Magnet that draws a variety of power-ups close to your character and much more besides, while examples of the unlockable perks include the Bonus Economist that increases the duration of bonus power-ups by 50% and the Thick Skinned that allows you to trade a third of your health in order to receive a third less damage from every enemy attack.

The extras area includes a listing of your unlocked weapons; unlocked perks; statistics; amongst other features. The weapons and perks features allow you to view the items you have currently unlocked and how many of each you are yet to earn from your in-game performances. The statistics contain in depth detail and are spread across three categories including: trooper, general and weapons picked up with the trooper category including: the amount of times you have died, average lifespan, total kills and nests destroyed, amongst others, while the general category includes the amount of time played, quest progress alongside the weapons picked up category including the amount of times you have picked up each of the thirty pieces of arsenal during combat.

Crimsonland supports the share feature that allows you to upload a video clip or a screenshot to Facebook or Twitter and broadcast live gameplay footage via Twitch or Ustream as you are experiencing the game with a simple tap of the share button and selecting the option of your choice. The PS4’s hard-drive continuously stores your most recent fifteen minutes of gameplay footage, so you still have the chance to decide if you would like to share something amazing a few minutes after it has taken place. The share feature is a next-gen revolution that has only improved with the further customisation provided by the Share Factory app that allows commentary, music, themes, stickers, effects, text, picture-in-picture video between your game footage and your reaction from the PlayStation Camera and much more besides, which will only continue to prosper and flourish as it matures with additional features and further experimentation in the future.

Crimsonland supports cross-buy between the PS4 and Vita, although it unfortunately does not support cross-save, so players will not be able to continue from your previous progression on the Vita version when playing the PS4 and vice versa, however as Crimsonland is also remote play; you can technically continue on playing the PS4 version anywhere you want to with the same save file during remote play. Cross-buy presents a superb amount of value as it means that you will be purchasing both the PS4 and Vita versions of the game with just a single purchase.

If you prefer to play the PS4 version via remote play to continue on from where you previously left off with your save file, rather than the Vita native version of Crimsonland, then you can do so. Crimsonland’s performance during remote play is identical to that of the PS4 version, particularly in regards to the graphics and audio as it performs exactly as you would expect the PS4 version to do so. The only negative is the remote play control scheme in which you must shoot with the top left or right of the rear touch pad and despite the rear touch pad being more responsive than in some cases during remote play; it is certainly not ideal as your natural instinct is to reload with L and shoot by pressing R, but the remote play control scheme has not been optimised to allow that as they are still configured to replicate the actions of L1 and R1 from the DualShock 4 controller.

However, in comparison between the remote play functionality and the Vita native version; the control scheme has been optimised for the Vita native version of Crimsonland with L to reload and R to fire, while the DualShock 4 touch pad controls have been accurately mapped to the touch screen as is the case with the rest of the control scheme providing as much of an intuitive control scheme as the DualShock 4 controller, alongside an excellent level of graphical and frame rate performance with an optional touch screen based user interface for the Vita native version; therefore it would certainly be the best course of action to just play through the entire game again due to the appropriate level of optimisation, especially considering how entertaining the game really is.

No expense has been spared in re-mastering the graphics; as they have certainly had a strong re-master in comparison to the original version of the game with the surrounding environments, a variety of enemies, excellently designed weaponry and plenty of gore filled blood splatters all looking as good as you can get for a classic top-down shooter.

The presentation of the game is solid with a great user interface across various menus such as the main menu, quests, survival, level selection, extras and various other gameplay menus with support for navigation via the left and right analogue sticks, directional pad and face buttons, although it does not include support for navigation via the touch pad, although that is not an issue considering the other methods of navigation that are available. The background of the menu screens consists of various gameplay demos of all manner of enemies being riddled with plenty of bullets.

The audio consists of sound effects and music that makes the most of weaponry being fired, loud explosions from nuclear blast power-ups and explosive spiders and every type of enemy has their own scream when you have killed them, while the hard and heavy rock music is certainly the appropriate soundtrack. However, as good as the audio is; there is no DualShock 4 speaker implementation, which is surprising as it could have produced the sound effects in an optional mix of weapons being fired and loud explosions or screams and explosions from the various enemies or the rock soundtrack.

The trophy list includes twenty-one award with all twenty-one being bronze trophies. Some of the trophies will naturally be earned as you progress through the game, such as the six bronze trophies for completing the six chapters on any difficulty level and the Home Wrecker bronze trophy for destroying over 500 nests. However, the majority of the awards are not as easy as progressing through the game as there are the Club Hardcore and Grim Reaper bronze trophies for completing all six chapters in the hardcore and grim difficulty levels respectively, while the Not a Scratch bronze trophy for completing all six chapters of the Quests game mode in the normal difficulty level with full health remaining is another hard trophy; as is the case for the Little Survivor, Mr Survivor, Arms Race, Feel the Rush, Quickly! and Booom bronze trophies for achieving anywhere from 50,000 to 500,000 points in the appropriate variation of survival game modes. Players should estimate depending upon skill and a good trophy guide to provide some helpful tips that it would take anywhere from ten to twenty hours to 100% the trophy list.

Crimsonland features local co-operative multiplayer for between two to four players across the quests game mode and all five survival game modes, which is great to see considering how many games do not contain any form of local multiplayer. The fact that multiple players can be spread out beyond the normal confines of the screen by the camera angle pulling back to a higher position in order to still be able to capture all of the frenetic action is an extremely positive design choice as it results in the feeling of freedom, rather than being constrained to a small area of the environment.

The online leaderboards focuses on global rankings and your friends’ scores for each of the five survival game modes, while also having separate leaderboards to showcase scores between single player and local co-operative multiplayer, they also contain each player’s rank; nationality; name (PSN ID); favourite weapon or in the case of the Rush survival mode is replaced with your total amount of kills; and score with the positioning of each player based upon their overall score and each one automatically displaying the score you have set.

There are three difficulty levels including normal, hardcore and grim. The major differences between each difficulty level are naturally what you would expect, such as stronger attacks inflicting more damage on your characters’ health, faster moving enemies and more pods spawning more enemies.

Overall, the re-master of Crimsonland is 10Tons’ best and most engrossing game yet and if you are a fan of top-down shooting games or even shooting games in general, then you should definitely give Crimsonland a try, especially considering the value with such a quantity of content for a cross-buy purchase of just £7.99!

Jason Bonnar

Analysis

• Title: Crimsonland
• Developer: 10Tons Ltd
• Publisher: 10Tons Ltd
• System: PS4
• Format: PSN Download
• Cross-Buy: Yes (PS4 and PS Vita)
• Cross-Play: No
• Multiplayer: Yes (2-4 Players Local Co-Operative Multiplayer/Online Leaderboards)
• Hard Drive Space Required: 94MB