Things 'Splode! A! Charge! Review!

Written By: Tyler
Platform Played On: PC
Get It Here: http://gamejolt.com/games/action/charge/24329/

Rating: 9
Verdict: With its surreal, disconnect, Sci-Fi atmosphere and its fast and intense action, Charge! lives up to its name and offers a great game full of things exploding and dying.


The last game I played by Jake Clover was Tandoor, and it is the first time he disappointed me. I could understand what he was going for, but I didn't think it worked. But I love Clover as much as a man who has never met the other man can love someone, and I was excited once I saw that he made another game.

Charge! is a very apt title for this game because that's exactly what you do -- you charge forward. You are a soldier that looks exactly the same as the others. While you are more useful than your AI allies because you are the player, when you die you just quickly respawn as another soldier that looks identical. Then you continue to charge, either jumping, shooting or bombing your way to victory. When you get to an enemy base, that acts as a checkpoint, and you continue your frontal assault until you reach the end of the level. It's a very simple concept.

But it works splendidly. Yes, I said splendidly.

Though it's a simplistic game where things go boom, don't ignore the artistry on display here. By his own admission, Clover likes making games where things blow up, but he also fused military actions with a surreal, Sci-Fi environment.

The visuals are about what you'd expect from a Clover game, with its slightly messed up art style and the excellent blend of colours so it's not just another drab shooter, but look around and there are actually things going on, some of which expands to the actual gameplay. Fires rage, things fly through the sky, bombs get dropped on you, bodies hang around and certain things crack and feel the consequences of war.

It's a chaotic experience all around because there is so much going on and though he has said there isn't a lot of skill involved, you still don't want to die so you're trying to stay alive. But things come at you quickly, and you're always on the move. Machines come into the action and start laying waste to your comrades, the enemy is always advancing on your position.

Helping in this is the song by Jack King-Spooner that acts as the theme to all this carnage. Like a lot of the King-Spooner music I've heard, it adds an otherworldly feel to the whole experience. It was a great choice by Clover because it's fast and yet dark. It doesn't hit emotional highs, but it somehow manages to make the whole war you're fighting seem, well, kind of messed up. It feels like hell to some degree, which is how war should feel.

My only real complaint with the game is that sometimes the character doesn't jump when I hit jump. This can get annoying in battle when a good run is spoiled by the fact I tried to jump and couldn't.

When I play a King-Spooner game, I expect some surreal, weird, social commentary where I walk around a lot (this isn't a criticism), but what I'm admiring the most about Clover is that he does have an odd visual style going on in all the games I've played by him, but he seems more Tarantino-ish in his approach. He clearly as the knowledge and love for games, and without actually knowing him I would imagine he plays games of all types, but he often chooses to make violent games. He's good at it too, and you ca see this in a game like Nuign Specter -- where the guns are loud and abrasive, the violence sudden and full of impact -- or now Charge!, which is a game that manages to make the shooter genre exciting despite how minimalist this may look like on the surface.

For me it's a return to form for a guy who has made a bunch of great games.