Revenge of the Headless

I really liked the concept behind Revenge of the Headless. It's basically like that classic arcade game

Breakout or Arkanoid (The brick breaking game, you've probably played it), but instead of bricks you have enemies that fire missiles at your paddle. So you have to dodge while you're trying to aim the ball at these moving targets, it's quite challenging.

The story behind the title is that you're a Durahan, which is a Japanese version of the Dullahan, the Celtic headless horseman. And, as the title suggests, you're out for revenge. Not that the game has or needs a real story. But for the sake of flavour, they added this mythical fantasy setting to the game. The paddle is the headless body and the ball is your head.

This game has pixel graphics, which usually I love, but in this case, it looks pretty basic. Sadly, after playing this game for a while, I've come to the conclusion that that's true in general for this game. It's pretty basic, it doesn't feel fleshed out. I didn't feel excited to explore more of this game, or wanting to play “one more go” after I died. I think the main issue is the gameplay, which falls flat somehow.

I think one of the main problems is most of the ways you take damage feel, well, unfair. Enemies have attacks like throwing bombs, or spitting pools of acid or webs that hold you in place. And what happens is say, an enemy throws a bomb in the bottom left corner, that's fine, you can avoid it. Unless the ball happens to be headed to that corner, in which case you either get hit by the bomb, or you miss the ball. Either way, you lose a heart. So, it mostly comes down to luck, and the thing is, this is how you'll lose most of your health, through unavoidable damage. That's just not fun.

In the end, I can't recommend this game. It really is a good concept, but I just don't think it works. I give it 1.5/5 stars.