with a copy provided by the publisher.
Estimated reading time: 9 minutes
Are you
interested in a new metroidvania title that actually has some interesting rare
aspects? Played too many and now they all seem the same? Well then, perhaps I
can interest you in a cool title called Kotama and Academy Citadel.
Kotama and Academy Citadel stars Kotama, who is an exchange
student at Carmel Academy. Upon arriving, you’re notified that the Academy is
currently undergoing a student election for the position of Carmel star. Since
it seems fun, Kotama decides to participate. As such, it is now your goal as
Kotama to help out the other students to get their votes, as well as visit the
four department heads to try and get some of their votes as well. That’s all
the plot you’re outright given. Don’t get me wrong, there’s a lot more going on
and it’s super interesting, but it’s all hidden in sidequests and notes you can
pick up that are strewn about the Academy. Do your best to help people out and
find those notes to figure out what’s really going on.
As far as gameplay is concerned, Kotama follows the general
metroidvania format, but builds upon it in it’s own unique way. A 2.5D
adventure through a school with various themed zones, you will be engaged in
side-scrolling type combat and platforming. Both combat and exploration have
their own unique twists to them, so let’s start with the action packed combat.
Fighting enemies is pretty neat with Kotama. You will start
with your first weapon the Umbrella Lance, but are able to unlock more as you
progress through the game. Each weapon as enhancement levels which increase
damage, but also allow you access to unlocking skills for those weapons as
well. Each weapon has it’s own unique playstyle, and once unlocked you always
have access to them, both for combat and exploration. Each weapon has a light
combo and a heavy attack. The interesting aspect here is that light hits splash
chrono fluid on enemies. Once enough has built up, enemies get a purple outline
and hitting them with a heavy attack detonates the chrono fluid, dealing damage
to both the enemy health and guard gauge. Enough hits to the guard gauge and
the enemy is stunned for a while.
Each weapon can also parry attacks, but has a different
range that you can parry in, and deals different chrono fluid build-up as well
as different damage values. Each weapon is also really unique in how they feel
in combat, but none of them are worse than any other. It’s entirely what you
feel most comfortable with. I actually swapped between all three fairly often
depending on what I was fighting. This is pretty important if you’re trying to
parry, as some attacks cover a wide area.
So, let’s say you’re getting hit often in combat, how do you
heal? Well, the game handles health and healing in a pretty rare way.
Basically, you have very few hit points, but you do have a shield/armour
system. Your shield can be recovered by spending the in-game currency to fully
recover the shield, or by detonating the chrono fluid on an enemy when you get
access to the ability. Since upgrades get rather costly the later in the game
you are, it provides a very interesting balance between keeping money for
healing, or spending it on upgrades or purchases at the shop. I personally
don’t recall playing a metroidvania where the currency is directly used to
heal, so I found it a really cool idea.
So, let’s talk about the exploration and some of the unique
tools and mechanics used. In terms of metroidvanias, the standard progression
gated behind abilities and upgrades are there, as well as some bound by certain
weapon aspects. For example, the umbrella lance can be opened to float
slightly, slowing your descent and allowing you to get to further platforms.
Your other abilities are mostly common to metroidvanias: a dash, a
grapple/slingshot, and abilities to get through specific door types. What isn’t
common is how the Kotama handles some of the character abilities. First of all,
the dash is also a slide while moving forward to get into small tunnels. Normal
enough by itself, but if you slide/dash forward off a ledge, you conserve
direction/crouched posture. This means if there is a small tunnel in a wall
opposite a ledge, you can dash off the ledge
and straight into the tunnel/hole. Not all that often done I find, so
when I discovered that, I was pretty happy. My favourite ability though is the
one you get to go through metal grating. I did not see it coming, and it was
the most unique way of handling metal grated blockers in a metroidvania I have
ever seen: you turn into a slime creature and sort of amorphously blorp
through. On it’s own it’s not a truly unique ability for games in general,
although exceedingly rare in metroidvanias. Couple this with how you can
slingshot and turn into a slime to yeet yourself through far away grating or
through ceiling grating? Oh man, did I ever enjoy that. There is something
oddly satisfying about seeing you fling yourself across a map and through a
metal grating.
Now, let’s talk about another pretty unique exploration
mechanic: time. Yes, I know timed quests and such are nothing new, but in
Kotama and Academy Citadel time only progresses every time you enter a new room
you haven’t been in since your last visit to the rewind station. Every new room
you explore increases the time by one hour, and returning to the rewind point
will turn back time. Some interactions can only be done before certain hours,
which means you either have to get there with the shortest route, or by getting
enough upgrades to the amount of time you can rewind to give you enough leeway
to get there in time. There are these stalks hidden in the academy that can
recover one hour of time when you hit them, but they are often hidden behind
fake walls and in hard to reach areas.
So, what happens when you run out of time? Well, nothing too
serious really. You can still explore, and you’re not locked out of anything
you can’t solve by rewinding time for specific quests. What does happen
however, is that any enemies fought in locked rooms (yes including bosses) get
a lot stronger. They also give better rewards though, so there is a reward for
“increasing the difficulty” as it were.
Here’s an interesting topic for the more veteran
metroidvania players: quality of life options. Those like me that have to 100%
metroidvanias can sometimes get frustrated when you’re missing one item and
have to go slapping every wall in the game trying to find that one missed item.
Thankfully, Kotama and the Academy Citadel does two things to make this a
non-issue. Once you get to the end game, if you’ve activated every map room,
then hidden areas on the map are indicated. Since rooms show on the map in the
general shape of the actual room, an addition is added in grey if you haven’t
been there, a really nice feature. Additionally, you can get an equipable
ability that will indicate on the map the locations of important upgrade items.
Since these are only obtainable at the end of the game, it doesn’t make
exploration feel pointless, but helps with cleanup. As an added bonus, the map
itself will usually note important aspects such as abilities, health and shield
upgrades, and sidequest objectives. You can also place up to 50 tokens on the
map to indicate places of interest.
The developers are also very invested in community response,
as they actively fix or change issues people have. Don’t like the glasses that
Kotama gets given early game? You can toggle those off. Not a fan of the
fanservice shots on beating a boss? Turn on streamer mode. Trying to do a
platforming section but you keep accidentally backdashing into a hazard? Toggle
off backdash for the platforming section. They’ve even added platforming
section skips you can turn on if you aren’t good at them. A bunch of these were
actually patched during the period I was playing, which feels nice as a player
to see the developers invested in their players like this.
Honestly, I don’t really have many complaints with Kotama
and Academy Citadel. Almost all the issues I did have were either of my own
making, or solved through a patch before I could voice them. My only remaining
complaints would be the occasional lag I got when returning to the train
hub/rewind station from too far away, and the final film for a sidequest. The
lag is because my computer is getting old and I have the graphic quality set to
Picasso instead of potato, but the final film I only found because I did a full
lap of the train after I’d done literally almost everything else. I’ll have to
doublecheck to see if I just missed a note or something on my next playthrough.
For a few aspects I really liked that I haven’t covered yet,
I’d refer to the “secret” boss and the graphics of Kotama. As your shield gets
damaged, Kotama’s clothes get progressively more worn out, and I’m pretty sure
drained of colour. Similar for a specific ability on cooldown, the colour of
one of here clothes items turns white on cooldown, while it returns to dark
purple/blackish when charged. Really nice design choice. The secret boss
though? That I loved. Oftentimes I feel you can tell how much developers like
their own game by the quality of the optional content, especially late game
optional content. The secret boss in this game? One of my favourite in any
metroidvania I’ve played. Easily top 5 optional end/post game metroidvania
bosses I’ve ever fought. Great design, cool animations, wonderfully integrated
into the extended storyline, and a challenging but not unfair fight. Yeah I got
my butt kicked a few times, but I really loved the fight. Exceptionally well
done execution.
The graphics are also pretty on point as well. While the
game does take a…very fanservice-like view of the characters in the all girls
academy you’re in, the art is well drawn and each unique character has their
own theme in outfit going on. Additionally, while the different areas of the
academy are somewhat similar in terms of base background, they are all enhanced
by the unique theming for that area of the academy. Furthermore, the character
animations are great. Everything looked really smooth, and none of the
characters or enemies moved in an awkward fashion. Enemy types are pretty
varied as well. While the game isn’t super long, clocking in at about 17 hours
for me to get 100% completion, it also isn’t more expensive than the game is
priced at, so I’m happy in that regard as well.
Overall Kotama and Academy Citadel is a stellar addition to
my extensive metroidvania collection. The combat is fluid and fun, exploration
feels really rewarding, quality of life inclusions are very welcome without
taking away from gameplay, the multiple weapon system is fun and rewarding, and
character interactions and discovering the back story is exciting. I thoroughly
enjoyed my time guiding Kotama to becoming the next Carmel Star, and I hope
that you do too. I can’t wait to see what the next step for 2p games is after
this.
Score: 9.5 / 10
