I have been following Chasm since it's early Kickstarter days, having played an early build at IndieCade East in 2014 . Which means I have been waiting and waiting and waiting for the full release of Chasm , because it's basically the Rolls Royce of metroidvania experiences. Nostalgic art style with a smooth soundtrack paired with great controls and interesting levels.
“Our goal has always been to make something like what we grew up with but also add something new but not push it too far,” said Chasm developer James Petruzzi.
The demo at PAX East 2016 definitely strikes that balance. I’ve played a grand total of maybe 30 minutes of Chasm spread across several years, but jumping into the demo felt very familiar. All the stuff you want is there. Red health, blue mana, simple inventory UI, stats you recognize and smashable ornaments full of loot. A deep skill system appears to be in the works, although the demo only gives players access to a slide dash and, eventually, a ledge grab. But Petruzzi said those key elements need to be perfect and that achieving perfection takes time.
“We’re getting very close right now to finishing the core path of the game, which means items, enemies, bosses, power ups, areas, etc. That’s been a huge push,” he said. “We’re hoping to finish that in the next couple of months. From there, it’s just extra content and polishing. We want to add a lot of extra stuff to the game to give people reasons to play it over and over.”
Petruzzi shied away from putting an exact release date or release window on it. They have missed deadlines in the past and realized it’s better to be late than wrong.
“We were very wrong two times already, so we’re going to wait,” he said regarding a release date announcement. “It's hard to put an exact percentage on it but we’re seeing some light at the end of the tunnel. We’re getting close.”
Based on what I’ve experienced, I feel like Chasm will be worth the wait. It’s one of those games that draws you in (if you’re a fan of the genre). You walk past and see it being played and stop to watch. And if you get a control in your hands you want to keep going, and it's not hard to imagine losing hours of your life to exploring the maps it creates. Especially considering that the layout comes by way of procedurally generated modules, so the game stacks rooms together in new and interesting ways each time you play.
“I feel like we’ve been able to take procedural generation to the next level and make it like a classic adventure game and not a mishmash where we just throw you into a roguelike,” said Petruzzi.
But dealing with nostalgia requires a fair amount of nuance and technique. Games that skew too nostalgic just feel like boring clones. Games that change too much feel like they were poorly designed, they make you go “how hard is it to make a game like [insert iconic title here].” Petruzzi and his team at Bit Kid are well aware of the challenges.
“You want it to feel like nostalgia but at the same time throw people some surprises,” he said.
Chasm is scheduled for release later this year for PC and PS4.
Are you at PAX East? Did you see Chasm ? No? Why not? Let us know in the comments.
