Over the past decade, the Metroidvania has seen a tremendous resurgence in popularity. And yet, it’s easy to forget how far we’ve come. If we rewind the clock back to the year 2013, the Metroid and Castlevania franchises were on ice and the indie Metroidvania scene was only just beginning to take off. That’s when Matt White launched a Kickstarter for a Super Metroid-inspired game, titled Ghost Song, which smashed through its original funding goals and went into full production. Now, nearly a decade later, Ghost Song has finally been released on Nintendo Switch, and it is a wonderful homage to some of the genre’s greatest entries, although Switch perhaps isn't the best place to play.
In the first few minutes of the game, you’ll immediately notice that Ghost Song has two primary inspirations. Level design, enemy designs, and atmosphere influences are clearly based on Metroid. Single-block vertical platforming reminiscent of Super Metroid and the primary enemy design looking eerily similar to a Chozo will make any Samus fan feel at home. As for gameplay, however, Ghost Song instead draws heavily from Dark Souls. You lose your currency when falling in battle, having to trek back to where you last died in order to reclaim them. Using those, you can choose to level up certain stats, like health or damage, at statues around the map. There estus flask equivalents, which can be used at any time and refilled at save points.
Arguably the biggest Soulslike inspiration comes from the game’s difficulty. In Ghost Song, there is very little room for error. Enemies hit very hard and very fast, and you have little in the way of invincibility frames. More often than not, you can easily get trapped in a corner with an enemy repeatedly attacking you until you die. And because you lose your currency after each death, the difficulty can get incredibly frustrating. Thankfully, there is an “explorer” mode you can select before starting the game, which is perhaps preferable for first-timers or people who prefer to drink their Metroidvanias without a large slug of Soulsborne. Upon dying, you retain your currency, and simply respawn at a checkpoint. Without question, we'd recommend most people start with this when playing for the first time, as it doesn’t make the gameplay and combat less difficult, but it does make dying far less punishing.
Although Ghost Song pulls heavily from its inspirations, it also has several ideas of its own. One of the best additions comes from your combat options. At all times, you will have access to both your gun and a melee attack, as well as a third slot to add a secondary weapon. What makes the combat stand out is how the game encourages you to switch between weapons on the fly. Using your blaster too much will make your arm glow red, meaning your firing speed is reduced and your blaster deals less damage. But, when your blaster is glowing red, your melee attack will do significantly more damage. However, your melee attack has a stamina meter attached to it, meaning you can’t abuse it either.
This risk-versus-reward element of battling makes combat far more interesting, since you are constantly changing your strategy mid-battle. Your third, equipable slot can be filled with any number of items you find throughout your journey. This ties into the parts system, where, rather than always finding permanent upgrades throughout the world, upgrades need to be equipped. These can range from powerful missiles to a melee upgrade or the ability to see enemies’ health bars. Since you can only equip a certain number of upgrades at once, you never truly become overpowered, but the system does give you flexibility to craft your loadout to your own unique playstyle.
Outside of combat and the game’s Dark Souls-inspired systems, Ghost Song is a very standard Metroidvania. You’re exploring a large, open world, gathering upgrades and making progress throughout the story. Unlike Metroid or Dark Souls, the story plays a much larger role here. Discovering who, what, and where you are is your primary goal, and along the way you’ll encounter several characters (some more alive than others) who will help you along your quest. The mysteries of The Deadsuit and the history of the planet you’re exploring are highlights.
As for playing the game on Switch, however, there are unfortunately some technical problems that detract from the overall experience. Visually, the game looks great, with highly detailed backgrounds and a fantastic art style. The same cannot be said by how well the game runs, however, as there were regular frame drops and input lag during combat and exploration. Even worse, loading times between screens are incredibly long, sometimes upwards of 10-15 seconds. Considering how often you are traveling between screens, especially while backtracking, the load times significantly hamper the pace of the game. These issues could be addressed through patches, of course, but at launch they add a significant qualification to what would otherwise be a very strong recommendation.
Conclusion
Ghost Song is a game that wears its inspirations on its sleeve with pride, and although it may feel a bit derivative at times, it is still able to create its own identity through a great combat system and unique worldbuilding. While the game can be brutally difficult, “explorer” mode makes the game more accessible than it would otherwise. Unfortunately, the game suffers from significant performance problems on Switch, from an inconsistent frame rate to extensive loading times that destroy any flow the game has. If you’re willing and able to look past those issues, Ghost Song is an easy recommendation for any and all fans of the Metroidvania genre.
Comments 38
This is becoming a recurring issue on Switch. Hope we get an enhancement in 2023.
@HOUSE In this case I actually think the game is simply not well optimized. I mean, the switch runs Crysis, Witcher 3 and Doom Eternal, so it should be definitely able to run a 2D game like Ghost Song.
It sounds like a really good game for those really into the Metroidvania and Soulslike experience. Alas, I am only onto the top end Metroid-like games and I am not into Soulslikism. Thanks for the review
Steam Deck it is then!
@chipia Correction: The Switch runs heavily downgraded versions of Crysis, Witcher 3, and Doom Eternal, when compared to their PS5 and PC counterparts.
Nintendo needs an upgrade.
Been playing this on my Series X via GamePass and it’s fantastic. Really a shame it doesn’t perform well on Switch. I might have been down to rebuy it to have on the go.
@chipia If this were a simple 2D game, I'd be inclined to wholeheartedly agree. However this game appears to be using a variety of fancy dynamic effects, which may be computed in real time. If these effects are in fact being done on the fly, then they are likely computationally expensive, even in 2D. Coupled with the fact that many contemporary technologies are optimized for 3D, and that's a major reason you get performance issues in 2D games on contemporary hardware.
That said, there are a variety of optimizations or graphical trade offs that could be made to improve performance to be seamless or close to it. Of course, this would come at increased development costs and/or loss in visual fidelity.
As a side note - Apparently this game was using the Stencyl engine circa 2017, which is an engine you don't typically see on the Switch - I'm unsure if the switch version is based on the same codebase or if they ported to a different engine. I wouldn't blame the engine for performance problems first without good reason though.
I just tried this out on GamePass this morning, and after a few minutes, I was hooked. I was hoping the Switch version would be serviceable, but it sounds like it’s in need of a performance patch.
So I should Steamdeck this one?
@mbrickn
Yeah there's a lot of aspects which make up a game that optimising it can be a very complex or difficult task especially when you are targeting multiple systems with such a wide range in specs.
i am hoping we see some newer hardware announced since while it wont stop bad ports it feels like closing the gap somewhat would make it easier for devs.
Sounds like the development for the Switch has laziness going for it.
Played a chunk of this one on Gamepass so far. I think it’s… fine? I dunno. Maybe I’m burnt out of Metroidvanias, but I just felt like I’d been there, done that with this one. I’ll probably finish it, but I do think there’s better games in the genre, and especially hearing about its performance on Switch, there’s literally like an easy other 20 options to try in the genre instead before this one.
Keep these Metroidvania coming.
I'll get this eventually.
The difficulty sounds like a pro for me.
I found Blasphemous pretty easy so I'm up for this.
Physical copy would be nice.
I'm always up for a new Metroidvania. Fortunately I have other means to play these games nowadays. Game Pass on PC or Steam Deck here I come.
I'm not one to beg for a Switch Pro or whatever, but perhaps the time has come.
Instead of waiting for a switch pro buy a Xbox series S and you will be able to enjoy this game without bad frame rate and it’s on also on gamepass .
A bit sad cause the game is really good.
So technical issues can be patched hopefully... probably a higher score than 7...i really wish websites would update reviews as games get future patches... metacritic is full of switch games with low scores at launch due to technical issues and later the game plays better and sometimes the user reviews will say so but I wish major sites like this one would go back to reviews post patches
@ParadoxFawkes For what it’s worth — the SwitchUp channel on YouTube frequently posts videos discussing post-patched versions of various Switch games. Usually they are called “all patched up” or similar, and discuss several games within one video
To bad about technical issues on Switch. Depending on how bad that is I can concur this game is phenomenal on PC. One of the BEST METROIDVANIAS EVER!!!
@ParadoxFawkes maybe the games should have been delayed instead?
@ParadoxFawkes That's a lot of extra work for bloggers. I think them making the issue known along with their initial impression is sufficient, then it's up to us to keep a close eye on updates/patches if that's something we're hoping for before buying. It's kind of only fair anyways, it's the state that the devs more or less decided to release the game in.
This is how the Aeterna Noctis review should have been handled.
"There is a good game here, but buy it on a different platform."
I barely had any performance issues on Switch to be honest. Had minimal frame drops and it was during exploration not in combat. The load times sometimes seemed a bit long but not 10-15 seconds long, more like 5 seconds. The game is not hard at all. Many of the bosses are too easy and exploitable. Controls could be a bit tighter specially during combat (you cant immediately dash any direction you want). However I really enjoyed the game overall, particularly the story and atmosphere. I would give it a solid 8.
I'll look into how bad the performance is, but either way, I will not pay much at all for a game that doesn't work as intended.
@sfb I agree. That's why I consider both the reviews here as well as SwitchUp's video ones when deciding on a game to buy. They review games after patching and are overall more considerate with the games they review.
@sfb I've seen some of those, and I respect them for it as I've bought games later than launch after I've seen they are reviewed much higher than the initial release.. and there are quite a lot... here's hoping alan wake gets patched up to a decent level to make it worth it
@SpaceboyScreams I don't think it is... there are many a slow news days and this site itself has many polls and ranking articles just for the heck of it, it's something worth doing ..a patched score or revisited score..as some games are not at all what they were at launch like no mans sky
I somehow can’t get excited for another Metroid clone anymore. Especially since we’ve seen so many indie games that did a lot more with the formula.
Been playing all weekend on Switch, no performance issues and load times between screens is 2-5 seconds - not bad imo. Game is great so far.
I don't understand. They had a decade for preparing the game and they could not have it ready for Switch? It's not a Wii U but Switch. Is there any beta testing anymore before releasing a game? Do we have to wait every time a patch to smooth the frame rate, performance issues, etc?
@HOUSE Have this on my PS5 wishlist for these reasons. As far as an enhancement for the Switch, it would be nice to see Nintendo pull out all the stops to make the successor/upgrade powerful. Perhaps it may not be as powerful as the steam deck but i would gladly drop $400-500 on a powerful hybrid unit if Nintendo wises up to the advances in technology
They just launched a patch that locks the framerate
I always wait til physical special edition anyways, and by then the technical stuff should be cleaned up. Looks awesome.
Blame the performance issues on the weak and pathetic Switch.
@Jcdbengals that must be a lot of physical junk (in or out of the sometimes obnoxious boxes) lying around the house. Too much depreciation in the value of L.E./S.E. physicals ever since almost every game was deemed worthy of the like.
How you still find joy in it is bewildering, yet causes a glint of jealousy, as I'd love to feel the excitement of an unbox or knowing I had something that was truly limited and likely sought after. Even though I feel that the legitimacy of my last sentence when coupled with the sheer number of S.E.s released, is highly inaccurate.
I don't know why people aren't sick of games that are little more than a conglomeration of various other games instead of an original idea.
It seems games these days, especially a lot of indie games, are little more than bits and pieces of the games the creators grew up on, or were "inspired by". I'm getting especially sick of seeing "souls/rogue likes".
The video game market crashed in the 80s because little effort was being put into creating something unique and of quality. That's what a lot of these games are like, and it makes me wonder if we're headed in the same direction.
Finished this game and highly recommend it on Switch.
I bought the physical version.
It has been patched and is a much better game for it.
If you like a Metroidvania with excellent atmosphere then this really shouldn't be passed on.
I played both handheld and docked and it performed well on both.
Also, if you have a decent sound system or play with headphones you're in for a treat.
The atmosphere is amazing.
One of my favourite Metroidvania's and I've played over 20 this year already.
Load times are a lot less than 15 seconds too, more like 2 to 5.
I would up the rating to about an 8, 9 if you like your Super Metroids over your Dreads.
If you're thinking of grabbing it and the initial review made you wait then I can recommend grabbing it.
Btw, it has an "Adventure" mode for those who want an easier experience so that negative listed really doesn't count.
Playing on a physical version, and it’s performing well enough, post-patches. Still has a few hitches now and then, and the camera movement when jumping and ascending vertically feels a little choppy. You can also tell certain environments are causing the game to struggle a bit. So not perfect, but totally playable. Looks beautiful on the OLED screen as well!
Despite this, really enjoying it so far. It’s weird, challenging, and packed with nostalgia for Metroid-lovers looking for something new and mysterious. Highly recommended, and totally playable on Switch.
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