High on Life Reviews
need to know
what is it? A geeky, underwhelming shooter co-created by Justin Roiland.
Expect to pay: £46/$60
release date: come out now
Developer: Squanch Games
Publisher: Squanch Games
commented on: AMD Ryzen 5 3600, Nvidia GeForce 2080 Super, 32 GB RAM
multiplayer game? Do not
Association: Official Website(opens in a new tab)
Edge Magazine once lamented that we can’t talk to monsters. Well, a King Kong-sized monkey’s paw must have curled a finger somewhere, because High on Life had me begging the monsters to shut up the gobs they slapped. 2022 is often the year video games talk too much, whether it’s Dying Light 2’s grueling cutscenes or Atreus’ unwelcome PS5 exclusive God of War: Ragnarok hint. High on Life took this trend to maddening extremes, with a case of oral diarrhea so severe it risked facial prolapse.
If you’re sitting there thinking “Well, Uh. This is a game developed by the studio co-founded by the co-founder of Rick and Morty, course There’s a lot to say, “Let me interrupt you there.” Rick and Morty is a 20-minute cartoon in which Justin Roiland’s fast-stuttering style (often) passes more than a pickled scientist Barbed Tongue’s sharper screenplay. Life’s climax is 15 hours of Interdimensional Cable — a tortuous salad of words, constantly looking for a joke and only delivering it occasionally, usually covered in some goo. It’s The difference between a glass of expensive balsamic vinegar and stuffing your head into a bucket of white vinegar.
(Image credit: Squanch Games)
It’s not that High on Life is no way interesting. Sometimes it is.But this is the headline issue of High on Life, and it will always be sometimes anything. It’s a first draft of a comedy script with some good jokes, an average sci-fi world with a couple of decent levels, and a completely mediocre shooter with some fun gags stretched to the limit.
Check the body before I start dismembering it. High on Life puts you in the role of an unspecified teenager who is home alone with their younger sister when, oh, suddenly, aliens invade. But with the help of one of the invaders’ weapons (revealed to be sentient weapons known as Gatterians), you escape to an alien metropolis called Blim City. Here, you learn that humans have become the hot new poison of the interstellar underworld, and with the help of hapless bounty hunters, you’re determined to assassinate the head of the G3 cartel, an organization that’s invading Earth.
All in all, a strong introduction. While High on Life can’t quite match the gorgeous looks of Modern Warfare 2, it has some impressive areas, especially when you leave the boxy suburbs for the dense and colorful alien hub of Blim City . The hookshot idea of having a gun that is also a character is also fun, and it’s a joy to pick up a pistol and hear a non-Morty start babbling.
rerun
(Image credit: Squanch Games)
The freshness may last an hour. Then the rot started.The problem isn’t just your gun talking too much, the problem is everyone Talk too much. Almost every NPC you meet spits out dialogue as if they ate a moldy thesaurus, and all the characters point out the obvious and say “Yeah, uh, well, I guess that’s kind of weird, but That’s what you are!” or a festering mass of radioactive obnoxious riffs.
It’s the difference between a glass of expensive balsamic vinegar and stuffing your head into a vat of white vinegar.
If you’ve ever wanted to hear 10 minutes of fake Mario Goomba trying to sell you alien semen, High on Life is for you. no joke. The joke is that he sells alien semen, which is a bit embarrassing! Especially when the game says “alien cum” over and over again, aaa- adds some hesitation there. Alien cum! This is, this is what this little alien Goomba sells. That’s the joke now. I’ve already explained it, but I’m going to repeat it just to make sure I’ve screwed it all up!
Amid the ongoing tsunami of words, there are some heartfelt laughs. One area has a joke about a group called Mothers Against Violence, which does a better job of shaping Roiland’s casually repeated antics at the same point into something funny. The humor also falls off the floor when it revolves around characters the writers have bothered to add some depth to, like Gene, the loafing bounty hunter who helps you track down G3. For all of Rick and Morty’s hiccups and silly alien names, it’s good at using it to explore the many neuroses humans suffer from. Few of these appear in High on Life. Gatterians who accompany you are particularly mediocre. Only one, Creature, manages to rise above the familiar comedy archetype, and his relentless positivity stands in stark contrast to the game’s relentlessly acerbic tone.
(Image credit: Squanch Games)
No doubt some people will find High on Life hilarious. But even when you do, the humor is sprinkled throughout what would otherwise be a thoroughly mediocre first-person shooter.It is not bad, even though it hovered around the danger zone for a long time. For the first three hours of this game, you have one weapon at your disposal: Gatteria Kenny. Kenny is a swamp standard pistol with a secondary fire called a Glop-shot – a gooey mortar that launches enemies into the air. The idea is that you juggle enemies to do more damage, though that’s more trouble than it’s worth, since constantly looking up and shooting enemies means you can’t see what the enemies around you are doing.
With only Kenny on your side, the shot is very flat, lacking any sense of rhythm or momentum. To make matters worse, the combat music in this game is the worst I’ve ever heard–an atonal, repetitive sci-fi buzz that completely fails to elevate the action in any way. Lullabies will make you more motivated. Really reprehensible.
Combat becomes even more interesting when you pick up other Gatterians. Gus Like a Chameleon is a serviceable shotgun with a disc sidefire that you bounce off for extra hits. The Sweezy, meanwhile, is a fun replica of Halo’s needle gun, and the most effective weapon in the game. But creatures are my favorite again. He shoots his children at his enemies—colorful imps who grab them and bite them to death. He also has a useful secondary fire that temporarily turns enemies to your side. Proxy weapons are always hard to please, and creatures are a great example of how to do it right.
gun talk
(Image credit: Squanch Games)
When you acquire the Creature, High on Life’s arsenal is ready. But that’s all you get except for the last Gatterian you unlock on the last level, and your melee weapon, the Knifey.Even though High on Life is a great Shooters, five guns aren’t enough for more than 15 hours of fun. High on Life is far from being a good shooter, always favoring gags over tight shootouts. Many enemies are covered in a glop, which acts like armor and disappears from them as you deal damage. It’s a neat way of visualizing damage, but the act of killing enemies is loose and springy, especially the very awkward melee executions, like someone manipulating your character from a mile away. The variety of enemies is also far from enough, with half the roster including annoying bugs sprinting along the ground, and floating drones that are equally difficult to fight.
Even if High on Life is a good shooter, five guns won’t be enough for 15+ hours of fun.
The lack of weapon or enemy variety is indicative of a broader problem that High on Life runs out of ideas midway through. The first few missions take you to some impressive locations. Well, an impressive location – a sprawling cyberpunk city built at the bottom of an asteroid. The other host planet is an ugly purple forest world populated by legally distinct alien care bears who love everything in this damn game and never stop talking. Still, it sends you on a wild planet-hopping adventure. But it turns out that you can only jump between those two planets (and Blim City), and the second half of the game repeatedly brings you back to both locations. The new areas that appear in the second half are noticeably smaller than the first, and as the game progresses, it relies more and more on arena combat.
(Image credit: Squanch Games)
At least these spaces are fun. Many weapons’ secondary fire modes double as navigation tools. Gus’s disc-shot can be embedded into certain surfaces to create platforms, while Sweezy can create time-dilated bubbles to slow down a spinning fan. Through these tools, the three planets will unfold over time, revealing new paths that will lead you to sentient Luglox chests, which you can slice open for coins. None of this is particularly novel, and the way your character moves is vague, which speaks to the limited budget. Still, High on Life is a better first-person platformer than a shooter. Faint compliments may be damned, but faint compliments are as good as the ones you get from me.
I’d love to tell you that High on Life is great.Not only because I love Rick and Morty and would love to see the best video game version of the show, but because despite everything it does wrong, there is a eccentric To High on Life, I would like to see more in games of this scope. A live alien gun that talks to you is a cool concept. The sci-fi universe it paints has moments of eureka moments, and glimpses of a fun shooter during the game’s most intense moments. But the whole enterprise is undercooked and then crushed under a mountain of unbearable dialogue.
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