As of late Playstation plus has given me no end of pretty decent titles to play on both the consoles and the Vita and this month has been no exception with titles like Valiant Hearts, OlliOlli 2 and a particularly interesting title called Counterspy. Counterspy is a stealth orientated 2.5D Sidescrolling game not dissimilar too much to the original Metal Gear titles in that you have to go through a number of levels while trying to remain undetected while aiming for the highest score.
Counterspy was developed by Dynamighty, a San Franciso based company founded in 2011 and comprised of a few ex-Lucasarts and even Pixar employees. Now while these developers consider themselves 'indie' they did receive some help from SCE Foster City Studios who had worked on more well known titles such as Uncharted and Infamous. Dynamighty state they focus primarily on action based games for both the console and mobile platform with Counterspy being their first title released. Counterspy was released in August 2014 on both the Playstaion 3, 4 and Vita with cross buy/play functionality and met with generally neutral reviews.
There was a later IOS version released a month later which I have not personally played, but from what I have seen it does seem to be pretty much the same core gameplay as its Playstation counter part. Now I generally enjoyed this game for what it was, but it was not an amazing title that I would go out of my way to recommend to just anybody. There are however aspects of the game I really enjoyed, so let me try and explain why I stuck with this game until the end.
In terms of the story of the game it is nothing amazing and honestly I feel like it could have been ignored entirely. You play as an agent working for C.O.U.N.T.E.R, a group who want to prevent the two unnamed superpowers who both seem to be modelled after Russia from launching nukes on the Moon and causing it to crash into the Earth. It's up to you to infiltrate either of the superpowers bases and retrieve information on when and where the nukes will be launched while keeping the defcon level of each country as low as possible.
The only story interaction you get in the game is before and after every level in which you have a briefing with C.O.U.N.T.E.R in a fashion similar to the codec conversations found in Metal Gear. While these are used primarily to explain each step of the process in stopping the superpowers they do attempt to throw in a lot of humour which did make me laugh a number of times but also fell flat at others, however I think the use of humour benefited an otherwise pretty generic storyline and enhanced it sightly.
Now the gameplay itself is what I believe is one of the games biggest strengths because it takes the pretty simple concept of a sidescroller but adds some neat stealth aspects to it. Your objective is to find the hidden blueprints within each level, however some levels may have less blueprints but more upgrades for yourself and vice versa, what is also interesting is every time you back out and retry a level its layout will be slightly different.
You need to have 5 parts of the currently assigned blueprints in order to progress, once you obtain these you must then do it 5 more times obtaining 5 blueprints in total, this leads you to the final level, naturally the difficulty does ramp up each time however I personally did not feel a difficulty change until the last few levels of the game. To progress through levels you typically make use of a sneaking function by lightly tapping the directional buttons so not to make a sound and avoid the enemies. While progressing you will be looking out for upgrades, health, ammo and blue prints, most of which can be found in lockers or computers.
The use of these upgrades is quite useful as it's not really health based but weapon and gameplay based, for example it allows you to unlock a tranquillizer or a shotgun, which is useful as you have four slots for weapons, or you could unlock an ability which gives you one less defcon level at the start of the stage or even the ability to run and not have your footsteps heard. These abilities however only have a one time use per payment, but you can use up to three a stage which really helps during the final level.
Now you have a few ways in which you can tackle a level, you can either try your best to not be seen and stealth the entire thing by hiding and using a silenced weapon and takedowns, or you can just take out an enemy as you see fit without dying. Regardless of how you play if you do manage to get seen an enemy may begin to call in that you have infiltrated the vicinity, the longer they call the higher the defcon level will be. This means if you go past defcon 1 then you have 50 seconds to reach the end of the stage.
The interesting thing about the defcon counter is that it carries over each level of that respective superpower, so you could be at defcon 1 (the highest) with one side but defcon 5 (the lowest) with another. If you do want to lower a defcon level however you must be in a room with an officer (who wears white) and kill every enemy but them making them surrender, this will bring you defcon level down by 1 each time so is it paramount that you do NOT kill an officer if you want to do well.
The best way to actually fight back with the enemy is to hide behind pillars and ramps which allow you to be in cover and aim you weapon for safety, as you can die relatively quickly in this game you'll be using this tactic the most, especially when faced with rocket wielding enemies whose rockets you can shoot as they move slow enough to give you time to think.
While the game is a single player experience only it does make use of leaderboards in which you can check your overall score with your friends and the world, what I thought made this games use of leaderboards interesting however was that if you beat the score of the person directly above you on the board then their 'agent' would be dead somewhere within the next level for you to find. While they were sometimes easier to find than others if you did locate them you would gain a small bonus for that level.
While this did add some replayabilty to the game for those who want to go back and beat a friends score it does not help the overall issue for some which is the general length of the game. Being that this is an 'indie' title I personally did not expect it to be a long experience, which was good because I beat this game in two sittings coming up to about 2 and a half hours. This was with me having difficulty on the last level because I was pretty terrible at it and with me searching pretty much every nook and cranny of a level for upgrades.
Now do I think this is a problem for the game itself? No because this game focuses on a repetitive nature which kind of puts you off playing for a long stretch of time, it also is avalible on the Vita which means if you're the type to play this on a commute or something you don't really want a game with long levels and hours of gameplay. I actually find the length of the game fine in that respect, yes it could have been a little longer but depending on who you are and what you're playing it on it may actually benefit you, especially if like me you got this for "free" on Playstation plus.
Another plus for me would be both the art style and music used in the game, now with ex-Pixar staff working with the team you can see why the art is just so great to look at, it really conveys this dark and sombre tone to the industrialised look of a secret base like you'd see in an old spy movie. The only real bright colours you actually do see are on the screens or propaganda posters seen throughout the levels, which I feel works really well as it juxtaposes the dull colours surrounding it and quickly draws your attention.
The music, while not overpowering is pretty good as it again feels like it belongs in an old spy movie, it generally feels like it belongs in a James Bond theme with its use of the Bass and Trumpets in the background as you sneak.
While the AI in this game is pretty simplistic in that they follow a general walking pattern across the level and just duck and shoot at you there are some frustrating moments when they decide to hide in a corner of the level you just cannot reach as there is no pillar to crouch behind that allows you to face them, which would be fine as you could just lure them out. However the a problem arises when they begin the call in that they have seen an enemy, and with no way to stop them you'll pretty quickly get your defcon level raised substantially.
While this only happened a few times to my I have seen quite a few complaints about it online so it does not seem like something they decided to patch out or perhaps are even aware of, other than this small problem and the general basic AI there are no real problems with the game glitch wise which is a plus.
Overall I feel like this game was great in the sense it was a short enjoyable ride, however I think if it were any longer I would quickly become bored, I feel if there were to be a sequel to this title the developers would have to add enough new or expanded upon content to keep it fresh. The core gameplay is great and the use of leaderboards is a step in the right direction without the game having an unnecessary multiplayer mode.
I personally played this on the Playstation 4 but I feel as though it would have been better suited to my Vita because of its length. I think if you're looking for something new and short to play on a commute to work or on a plane ride this game would be perfect, you'll probably complete it during the trip or at least on your return but honestly I think those kind of games work really well on the Vita, because y'know it's a portable console.
I would highly recommend picking this up on PS+ while you can or if you see it for a cheap price sometime but I would not say it is a essential title for a Sony console in any way, but it is a nice short and refreshing take on the stealth genre and makes for a nice time sink in between other titles.
As always thanks for reading I hope you enjoyed it.
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