Guacamelee: Pretty Damn Fun.

     While I bought this a while back, I hadn't really gotten to play much of it.   Last weekend I went and finished the entire game in 2 short sittings.  (On the PS Vita, not the PS3)

    It was well worth the purchase.  You play as Juan Aguacate.  A simple agave farmer that becomes a supernatural luchadore that can swap between the realms of the living and the dead.
     The story is simple, your love is taken by Carlos Calaca, an undead skeleton man-demon, and you are killed by him in the process.  You then are revived and given a magical luchadore mask and super powers with which you can hunt down Calaca and his group of hooligans.  There is nothing of great depth in terms of story, but there is plenty of humor make you laugh out loud.  Notably when you get the power upgrades, and one of them is "NOTHING POWER!"  Where you don't actually get a power, but the screen plays anyway.  The Pollo Power is quite hilarious as well, turning you into a chicken.

     The combat grows very nicely from simple punches and kicks into a vast array of super powered combos and additional skills like the almighty suplex.  This gets compounded by the ability to swap between living and dead realms.  Some enemies can only be fought in one of the two, but may damage you in either.  It creates a hugely satisfying system of fighting polarized into two worlds.

     Although I must say, there could've been slightly more, or better, uses for the living and dead realm switching story wise.  Many puzzles and platforming sections rely on swapping mid-jump or flight, but story wise it felt under-utilized. 
     Which brings me to the only point that I felt was sort of unfair or imbalanced.  The Thule Tree's Tree Tops level.  Thank the game makers this wasn't made to be a mandatory part of the game, or I would've never finished the it.  This segment requires and amazing array of platforming skill and realm flipping timing, which I just couldn't manage on the Vita's compact controls.  I am a grown man and my hands get super cramped on the child sized controls. 

     Here's a video of the level From a Youtube fellow named TheCrabShack:

     The art style is quite interesting as well.  Simple 2d side scrolling and a unique color scheme.  I can only hope for more expansion DLC (there is a costume pack that changes abilities of the player based on which of the 3 new suits they are wearing) because the game is very, very short.  Regardless, I look forward to whatever Drinkbox Studios' next game is.  And in the mean time, I'll probably give their Tales From Space games a try.

     On a side note:  One of my favorite things in the game is the homage posters all over in the background.  They have nods to the Super Mario Bros., Link from The Legend of Zelda, and Grumpy Cat (among others) all made up with a Mexican flavor.  I made sure to include a screencap of one above