The Messenger Review

I deliver a message.

I’ve always been more of an RPG gamer, preferring sprawling narratives and choice over fast or action-packed gameplay. Nearly every game I had on my NES was either an adventure game, an RPG, or some combination of the two, with the exception of Ninja Gaiden on the NES. I never did beat it, sadly. At such a young age I was unable to grasp how to play it in any real capacity. To be completely honest, I’m not sure I could ever get past the first few areas. Despite that, something about playing a ninja who could bound wall-to-wall, throw shuriken, and slice dudes up was enthralling. Fast-forward several years and the enjoyment never translated to another purchase of a 2D ninja game. I have never owned a single Strider game until PS4 or played Shinobi. So seeing The Messenger available for just a few dollars on Steam felt like the perfect opportunity to jump into a genre and style of game that passed me by, to experience something I’ve always wanted to play but never really got the chance to sit with.

Publisher: Devolver Digital

Developer: Sabotage Studio

Platform: Played on PC (Steam)

Availability: Released on August 30, 2018 for Windows PC and Nintendo Switch. March 19, 2019 for PlayStation 4. June 25, 2020 for Xbox One.

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The Messenger isn’t a Ninja Gaiden game. Despite taking some gameplay cues in level design and combat, it never drowns into itself as a derivative work. For one, it’s deeply unserious, with every character interaction landing in a joke or non-sequitur, which is not uncommon for Devolver Digital games, and even more common for Devolver games of this particular era. By contrast, every single thing I’ve seen from Ninja Gaiden leads me to believe it is self-serious. The tone matches the brutal difficulty of the game. I suppose in this way The Messenger reads more like a parody or tip of the cap than a true homage, at least in dialogue. Things change quite a bit when you move into the actual gameplay.

The levity and tongue-in-cheek nature of The Messenger’s dialogue might give you the impression that the combat and platforming would be a bit of a joke, as well. Which is absolutely not the case. The game starts off lean, with only a few abilities: sword attack, shuriken, and cloud step (the ability to jump after striking an enemy or object with a sword attack). Not a lot of variety in your approach this early on, but enemies can still kill you within a few hits, so it’s important to approach with caution. As you advance, more abilities and items become available to you, opening up your options. You’ll also get some abilities and stat boosts through shop upgrades found in the various save points scattered throughout each zone.

The art of The Messenger is absolutely stunning.

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The game does a pretty good job of getting you used to your new tools throughout the level, too, with platforming segments designed to make use of it in a teachable experience. Frankly, the platforming is by far the most difficult individual aspect of this game. Many of the world’s secrets are hidden behind complex or precise platforming segments, especially late in the game when you have to string together a multitude of perfect action sequences to reach whatever prize awaits you in the distance. In these places, even a single mistake will mean certain death. To balance this out, the consequences of dying are quite minimal, as you are simply transported to the most recently used checkpoint, and a small, red demon who eats your money appears to give you some sass before moving on. The Messenger seems to find some joy in allowing you to fail a single room over and over in rapid succession, often placing a checkpoint right before any particularly challenging room.

There’s nothing particularly wrong with this approach, but when combined with frequently “blind” platforming it can feel frustrating, like I’ve been goaded into dying without really making a mistake. One moment the level calls for you to drop into a pit, but when the screen transitions, there’s an enemy or hazard directly below you and reaching safety requires tight control and foreknowledge of the layout. It feels extremely satisfying to pull these off in the moment, but it is deeply frustrating in the aggregate. Despite this, the levels are often trying to teach you strategies for movement or conveying something that is applicable beyond your current situation.

This all comes to a head at the end of each zone when you finally face whatever big boss lies in wait for you. Generally speaking, these bosses require the use of abilities gained or learned to use appropriately throughout whichever area you’ve traversed through to get to them. If that’s not the case for a boss, there’s always some other gimmick to attend to throughout; it’s never just a straight and simple fight scenario. The bosses are all unique and are beyond a doubt the best part of The Messenger. Being able to put everything together to take down a big demon or dragon feels rewarding in a way that the platforming elements are never able to really replicate. Every mistake in those rooms feels like something you could prepare to watch out for and react to.

Being able to put everything together to take down a big demon or dragon feels rewarding in a way that the platforming elements are never able to really replicate.

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Unfortunately, much of what makes The Messenger so fun is offset by the banal backtracking. The second half of the game introduces a really neat reality shifting ability that allows you to solve puzzles and navigate the world through changes made in the transition from 8-bit to 16-bit graphics. Separate platforms, secret rooms, and a slick new hat all find themselves being used to great effect in the dimensional transition, but the major caveat is that there is very little in the way of new locales to explore. Much of the second half of the game is spent running back and forth between areas you’ve already cleared, just to grab some new object, bring it back to base, and do it again. It's even worse if you want to gather all of the collectibles for completion.

I do find myself a bit torn, in retrospect. The game has so many moments where it just crushes the design aspects of a level or boss in terms of visuals and concept, but they're ultimately dragged down by the absurdly boring and frequent revisiting of spaces. This is not an uncommon thing to be done in “Metroidvanias”, with players needing new abilities to reach new rooms, but it does feel like The Messenger handles it in a way that feels more tedious than freeing. I get the sense that it's never able to commit to any one design philosophy — caught somewhere between the old gameplay stylings of NES action adventure games and modern sensibilities regarding checkpoints and storytelling.

Verdict

The Messenger is a tightly controlled 2D platformer that also mysteriously feels haphazard in design at times. The highs and lows of the platforming and enemy design make for a very uneven experience, especially later in the game as the difficulty continually gets ramped up. That said, I do find the boss fights and well-designed platforming segments outweigh the tedium of repetitive collection by a notable amount.