Game EXP: State of Anarchy: Master of Mayhem (NS)

Disclaimer:  I received a copy of State of Anarchy: Master of Mayhem for the Nintendo Switch from developer Lapovich Games, and publisher Sometimes You through Indie Gamer Chick's #IndieSelect last week.  The game was given with not expectation or promise of a good or positive review, only that the game be talked about and shared through social media channels.  All of the words contained in this article, unless otherwise noted were conceived and written by me and are my on thoughts and experiences while playing this game.

State of Anarchy: Master of Mayhem is a top down twin-stick shooter that is similar in mechanics to the first two Grand Theft Auto games, as well as Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars on the Nintendo DS.  The game is made up of sections where you drive from one end of the city to the other with the sole purpose to rob a bank, although along the way you are welcome to defend yourself as necessary, or just cause general havoc as every single character on screen is trying to kill you, so you just go and try and kill them right back.  The other section is the actual bank robbing process where you run through a singular building killing everyone/thing that comes near you while you try and take out the miniboss located near the middle of the massively large bank building.  Methods of mayhem in the game depend on what stage you are on, as your primary weapon changes with each bank you rob, but you are also armed with a secondary weapon (also gained when you rob banks? I am a horrible person and have forgotten, although I am pretty sure that is how a new weapon is acquired).  What really makes SoA:MoM stand out more so than other games with similar story lines, is that the art here is all done in a child's hand drawn aesthetic.  Colors are purposeful and bold, almost like an MS Paint picture that someone used a bit  of copy/paste elements to create the landscape and world.  Even the sound effects in the game sound like the developers at Lapovich just recorded themselves making car, gun, and dying noises.  If you make the sound "Brbrbrbrbrbrbrbrbrbrbrbrbr" with your mouth right now, that is the sound while driving the car in State of Anarchy, and that is pretty great.

One major departure from the semi-GTA formula is that the game is made up of concrete stages, which helps break up the game a bit, in that I am currently on Stage 13 out of 48.  However, some stages are broken up into multiple sections, which I have found to be a little frustrating especially in the alien stages that include the run-and-gun areas followed by an alien boss fight, or the driving after the alien ship followed by another alien fight.  So after I died multiple times against the boss at the end of Stage 13, I turned the game off, thinking that I would be able to pick the game back up at the boss fight, only to find that I had to go through the beginning of Stage 13 all over again.  A little frustrating, except that your skills and abilities still carry over, even when going back and replaying earlier stages.  The gun you have however, is all dependent on the Stage you are playing.  So for instance, the buzz saw gun you use in Stage 9 will not carry over if you then replay Stage 4.  I feel this counteracts the need to grind previous stages for additional skills and abilities, but everyone is forced to use the same equipment for each stage.

Going into SoA:MoM, I was a little bit concerned considering my experience with InkSplosion a few weeks back.  In that game, which was also a twin-stick-shooter, I definitely felt at a disadvantage playing on the Switch, or at least with the Switch's Joy-Cons.  Here, I did not find my hands cramping often, although I would still require re-adjusting my thumb position, especially during the stages that required driving and shooting in order to proceed; this was the only time I did not like the buzzsaw weapon.  The stages too where you went head-to-head against the alien you just shot down, I felt like my skill that I had brought to the previous levels was not enough when I was required to dodge wave after wave of bullets and other projectiles.

And I guess this is kind of where I am at with State of Anarchy: Master of Mayhem if you look at the layout of the stages.  There are two earth stages where you drive around then loot a bank.  Then one stage where you drive around attacking a UFO.  Then two more stages where you drive around then loot a bank.  The one stage where you get abducted by aliens and run around on an alien planet followed by an alien boss fight.  Followed by an outer space stage where you fly around then fight an alien ship boss.  Then you crash back to earth and start the process all over again.  Believe it or not, I am kind of hoping that there is a fetch quest or an escort quest somewhere in there just to break up the pattern, but that does not seem to be the case.

Essentially, the point of the game, from where I am currently sitting, is that you kill enemies to earn experience points to learn skills to better kill enemies, and pick up money to buy skills to help you better kill enemies.  In a game that purposefully is light on story, I kind of wish there was a little bit more variety.  Maybe that is a little unfair, requesting so much more from a small development team, but that is just the way I feel, which is one of the main reasons why we are here.

But let us end on an up note!

The music!  The music to this game is something I was not expecting at the quality that is presented.  Chatsky (of whom I can find nothing about) has written music that is oddly suited for this type of game.  The driving around (shooting bad guys, running over bad guys) music is much more upbeat and cheerful than you would expect to find, but taking into account the art style, makes these stages in the game a lot of fun, thanks in part to the music.  And then there is the music that plays when you enter the bank, damn!  I would link to the soundtrack and the composer, but I have not been able to find any additional information about Chatsk, and the only soundtrack I have found has been bundled with the Steam version of the game.  But I am going to leave the music there as there is a 87.47% change that we will be using a song for an upcoming MIDI Week Single.

So that is what I have to say about State of Anarchy: Master of Mayhem.  Similar to Devious Dungeon,  I will continue to play (and post) about the game as the stages layout lends itself for easy pick up and play, but for now the repetition in stages has caused my interest to wane a bit.  But I will be playing the soundtrack (and scouring for more music by Chatsky), which along with the art style and sense of humor, are some of the highlights of this indie title.



~JWfW/JDub/Jaconian
It's No Stranger to You and Me

Hahahahahahahahahahaaaaa!