It's Paprium - the brawler you've been waiting for since the 90s! After more than 4 epic years of development, WaterMelon Games is proud to present its new 16-Bit game: PAPRIUM (code-name: "ProjectY"), a postapocalyptic, outrageous, street brawler. PAPRIUM has been crafted at WM's Magical Game Factory using Investor’s votes and suggestions. PAPRIUM has been developed by a team driven by true passion and 16-Bit excellence.
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Pretty art, music and presentation. Only problem is hitting enemies in this game has the same impact of punching a slice of the thinnest bread. This is a beat em' up btw.
I wrote this back in 2021 but I feel most of it holds true:
RULE, BE RULED, OR DIE!
So Paprium came out in 2020, ordered a copy back in 2017 (that trailer was super sick ngl) and had a coupon to get a discount on the preorder. I gotta admit, this is the first time I bought a boutique retro game print thing, and it's been a long arduous ride throughd elays, lack of updates, and just stone cold silence wondering if it even existed.
Yet after all the troubled developments, a really garbage '''launch party,''' the lead developer constantly shoving his foot in his mouth, and now the IP potentially being sold off, the game released and only one question remains:
Is it even any good?
My personal answer is its a very kinky game. When it's working in tandem with all its parts (which is very rare), it's one of the legit best experiences I've had playing a Beat em Up. Sadly it doesn't happen nearly as often as it should and it tends to hold itself back with more issues than it really should.
I want to quickly touch on the presentation of the game which is just...stunningly neon colored, vibrant, and super pops with the colors that the Genesis uses best. The title screen has really rad parallax effect, the font is BIG and BOLD, then you get into the character selection menu and it just keeps assaulting you with bright colors, flashy effects, and then the music really kicks in and, oh man, I gotta gush about this for a moment.
The music in this game SLAPS, like I'm talking a contender for one of the best soundtracks on the system. The amount of work the composers got out of the YM2612, PSG, and DAC is bassy, boomy, funky, and it just fits every stage and moment the game rolls with. Adding onto that is the extra chip in the cart itself handling all the voice and sound samples which have this crunchy sound to it that just adds this extra layer of sound that's more novelty than it is anything technically impressing. That said hearing "IT'S SHOWTIIIIIIME" on the regular cracks me up, even hours into my gameplay sessions. Even extra details like a street performer sax player walking around adding instrumentation to the current song is a riot and really gives a fun vibe. Audio in homebrew efforts should really strive to make full use of the hardware and this game really sets the bar high for that. Absolute kudos to all the audio folks on this project, it's a stellar effort.
Another fantastic aspect is background art is very well done and solid, the sense of scale is something to really behold for a beat 'em up. Once you walk out onto the street and start seeing the backgrounds, characters watching advertisements, and even lounging around, it feels like a lived-in world. Some personal highlights I found were BION-MART, which is a massive shopping center with a fun escalator battle segment, lots of neat storefronts (including an easter egg featuring some of the music used in the trailer!), and a real fun vibe in this miserable megapolis you're fighting through.
The playable characaters, enemies, and bosses have interesting and bizarre designs, but sadly don't have a lot of personality outside of when they're in a dizzy animation or taunting you a lot of the time. A real big shame since when their animations are really good in cases like being dizzy, seeing some idle taunts, and even some of the result screen poses, there's some personality in the game. It doesn't come out too much but when it does, it just adds that little sparkle to the game's entire package.
Sadly part of these designs are also held back by very unfortunate racial depictions that honest to god have no reason to be here. It's honestly a complete bummer that the enemies were included at all compared to everything else.
It's still astonishingly well put together and bold on a first impression, even with some rough edges. However repeated plays start to really bring issues into light and unfortunately this is where things just start to drop off.
One thing I noticed was character sprites (while fairly well detailed and have some decent animation) have some pretty rough animation at points where certain attacks and followthroughs don't feel like they connect properly. Once the attacks start rolling it feels awkward with enemies often taking a moment to fly off from attacks, combo chains don't look or feel as nice as they do in Streets of Rage as well. It's a an unfortunate blemish and a key thing that a beat em up should strive to get right, I feel.
Speaking of enemies, Rondo sucks. Like big time sucks. Like I'm just gonna dedicate this section tot he pinnacle of bad beat em up boss design of the year. I hate this green goblin lookin-ass gym bro with the fucking Robbie Rotten haircut. Any boss that has a one hit kill attack in a beat em up should never exist but someone thought this was a good idea. This dude's HP pool is so large and I think beats out most other bosses in the game, hilariously enough.
Stages while good looking, often run WAY too long. Not even accounting for the fucking missions you have to do that really just take the game from adequate to downright FRUSTRATING. Having to take close to 40 minutes to get to the last stage of a route and then do a 15-20 minute long sequence with minimal time to breath is stressful enough, more on that coming up regarding the enemies. One of the many hitches that creates is fatigue and a lack of wantt o play when you spend so long on one stage only to finally get your mission and have to spend another 10-15 in another segment after the fact. And if you die there?
Back to the start of the previous stage, not the mission. And if you run out of continues?
Game over, start the route over in the Ice Factory.
Fuck.
All of this and probably the most major thing for me I realized replaying Bare Knuckle 3? The way it paces its enemies is incredibly underutilized and makes for an incredibly frustrating experience each stage.
Usually in Streets of Rage/Bare Knuckle (I'm just gonna shorten these to SOR/BK), you'll get introduced to a small pool of enemies early on, usually about 3 mook types with very specific simple AI, one to charge forward, one to flank, and one to back off and then slide in. Individually they each don't pose much of a threat but together creates a modular challenge where by eliminating one by one, you change how the rule of battle goes. Once you reach later sections of the games, you're greeted with more complex driven AIs who do multiple functions (like jump attacks, back offs, being immune to throws) which require more adaptation along with denser HP pools.
Paprium lacks this. It lacks so much of this. Paprium's enemy AI is very dense for the most part but most run very similar routines and often ape, very poorly i might add, what SOR/BK already put into the genre (especially the whip wielding officers). On top of this, from the get-go you're swarmed with groups of 4-6 enemies with these basic patterns, high damage values, and large HP pools that hon estly would fit better towards the end of the game, not the first few stages! And these groups grow to about 8 or so by the end game with cheaper AI coming out of the woodwork making it a chore to fight back swarms while getting thrown left and right in groups and losing HP to situations you can't really fight out of without either using BLU or a life. A fuck off annoying mess.
Honestly that's really what gets me about Paprium is it takes a lot of the elements that made SOR/BK and many other beat em ups great and, while improving on them aesthetically in a lot of places, it misses the mark in its gameplay and longterm appeal I can't really stand to recommend it as a whole. And that's not accounting for whatever the hell's going on with Fonzie and Watermelon Games, you can look that up on your own time.
Overall Paprium is a great first impression game that, sadly, falls under a lot of stress that does more to hurt it than help it. There's a gem of a game in here with a lot of solid content and ideas. However in the state its released in (at the time of this writing, possibly could change if this Megawire thing ever happens), it's a frustrating chore of a game that genuinely needed more love than notoriety.
Be ruled, Paprium.
RULE, BE RULED, OR DIE!
So Paprium came out in 2020, ordered a copy back in 2017 (that trailer was super sick ngl) and had a coupon to get a discount on the preorder. I gotta admit, this is the first time I bought a boutique retro game print thing, and it's been a long arduous ride throughd elays, lack of updates, and just stone cold silence wondering if it even existed.
Yet after all the troubled developments, a really garbage '''launch party,''' the lead developer constantly shoving his foot in his mouth, and now the IP potentially being sold off, the game released and only one question remains:
Is it even any good?
My personal answer is its a very kinky game. When it's working in tandem with all its parts (which is very rare), it's one of the legit best experiences I've had playing a Beat em Up. Sadly it doesn't happen nearly as often as it should and it tends to hold itself back with more issues than it really should.
I want to quickly touch on the presentation of the game which is just...stunningly neon colored, vibrant, and super pops with the colors that the Genesis uses best. The title screen has really rad parallax effect, the font is BIG and BOLD, then you get into the character selection menu and it just keeps assaulting you with bright colors, flashy effects, and then the music really kicks in and, oh man, I gotta gush about this for a moment.
The music in this game SLAPS, like I'm talking a contender for one of the best soundtracks on the system. The amount of work the composers got out of the YM2612, PSG, and DAC is bassy, boomy, funky, and it just fits every stage and moment the game rolls with. Adding onto that is the extra chip in the cart itself handling all the voice and sound samples which have this crunchy sound to it that just adds this extra layer of sound that's more novelty than it is anything technically impressing. That said hearing "IT'S SHOWTIIIIIIME" on the regular cracks me up, even hours into my gameplay sessions. Even extra details like a street performer sax player walking around adding instrumentation to the current song is a riot and really gives a fun vibe. Audio in homebrew efforts should really strive to make full use of the hardware and this game really sets the bar high for that. Absolute kudos to all the audio folks on this project, it's a stellar effort.
Another fantastic aspect is background art is very well done and solid, the sense of scale is something to really behold for a beat 'em up. Once you walk out onto the street and start seeing the backgrounds, characters watching advertisements, and even lounging around, it feels like a lived-in world. Some personal highlights I found were BION-MART, which is a massive shopping center with a fun escalator battle segment, lots of neat storefronts (including an easter egg featuring some of the music used in the trailer!), and a real fun vibe in this miserable megapolis you're fighting through.
The playable characaters, enemies, and bosses have interesting and bizarre designs, but sadly don't have a lot of personality outside of when they're in a dizzy animation or taunting you a lot of the time. A real big shame since when their animations are really good in cases like being dizzy, seeing some idle taunts, and even some of the result screen poses, there's some personality in the game. It doesn't come out too much but when it does, it just adds that little sparkle to the game's entire package.
Sadly part of these designs are also held back by very unfortunate racial depictions that honest to god have no reason to be here. It's honestly a complete bummer that the enemies were included at all compared to everything else.
It's still astonishingly well put together and bold on a first impression, even with some rough edges. However repeated plays start to really bring issues into light and unfortunately this is where things just start to drop off.
One thing I noticed was character sprites (while fairly well detailed and have some decent animation) have some pretty rough animation at points where certain attacks and followthroughs don't feel like they connect properly. Once the attacks start rolling it feels awkward with enemies often taking a moment to fly off from attacks, combo chains don't look or feel as nice as they do in Streets of Rage as well. It's a an unfortunate blemish and a key thing that a beat em up should strive to get right, I feel.
Speaking of enemies, Rondo sucks. Like big time sucks. Like I'm just gonna dedicate this section tot he pinnacle of bad beat em up boss design of the year. I hate this green goblin lookin-ass gym bro with the fucking Robbie Rotten haircut. Any boss that has a one hit kill attack in a beat em up should never exist but someone thought this was a good idea. This dude's HP pool is so large and I think beats out most other bosses in the game, hilariously enough.
Stages while good looking, often run WAY too long. Not even accounting for the fucking missions you have to do that really just take the game from adequate to downright FRUSTRATING. Having to take close to 40 minutes to get to the last stage of a route and then do a 15-20 minute long sequence with minimal time to breath is stressful enough, more on that coming up regarding the enemies. One of the many hitches that creates is fatigue and a lack of wantt o play when you spend so long on one stage only to finally get your mission and have to spend another 10-15 in another segment after the fact. And if you die there?
Back to the start of the previous stage, not the mission. And if you run out of continues?
Game over, start the route over in the Ice Factory.
Fuck.
All of this and probably the most major thing for me I realized replaying Bare Knuckle 3? The way it paces its enemies is incredibly underutilized and makes for an incredibly frustrating experience each stage.
Usually in Streets of Rage/Bare Knuckle (I'm just gonna shorten these to SOR/BK), you'll get introduced to a small pool of enemies early on, usually about 3 mook types with very specific simple AI, one to charge forward, one to flank, and one to back off and then slide in. Individually they each don't pose much of a threat but together creates a modular challenge where by eliminating one by one, you change how the rule of battle goes. Once you reach later sections of the games, you're greeted with more complex driven AIs who do multiple functions (like jump attacks, back offs, being immune to throws) which require more adaptation along with denser HP pools.
Paprium lacks this. It lacks so much of this. Paprium's enemy AI is very dense for the most part but most run very similar routines and often ape, very poorly i might add, what SOR/BK already put into the genre (especially the whip wielding officers). On top of this, from the get-go you're swarmed with groups of 4-6 enemies with these basic patterns, high damage values, and large HP pools that hon estly would fit better towards the end of the game, not the first few stages! And these groups grow to about 8 or so by the end game with cheaper AI coming out of the woodwork making it a chore to fight back swarms while getting thrown left and right in groups and losing HP to situations you can't really fight out of without either using BLU or a life. A fuck off annoying mess.
Honestly that's really what gets me about Paprium is it takes a lot of the elements that made SOR/BK and many other beat em ups great and, while improving on them aesthetically in a lot of places, it misses the mark in its gameplay and longterm appeal I can't really stand to recommend it as a whole. And that's not accounting for whatever the hell's going on with Fonzie and Watermelon Games, you can look that up on your own time.
Overall Paprium is a great first impression game that, sadly, falls under a lot of stress that does more to hurt it than help it. There's a gem of a game in here with a lot of solid content and ideas. However in the state its released in (at the time of this writing, possibly could change if this Megawire thing ever happens), it's a frustrating chore of a game that genuinely needed more love than notoriety.
Be ruled, Paprium.
The Cyberpunk of the Genesis homebrew scene. Paprium was a complete utter dumpster fire behind the scenes and is still burning with Fonzie being unable to ship the rest of the preordered copies out almost a year after the game finally launched. I was one of the few lucky ones to actually obtain a copy(along with a broken Grand Stick III, thanks Fonzie!) after this wild ride and unfortunately the game isn't in a state where it would've been worth the wait to obtain it.
Paprium is an incredibly perplexing game that's both aimed at a very specific niche audience yet also does everything it can to drive them away. As a Genesis/Mega Drive fan one of my favorite aspects of homebrew games and the big appeal is seeing what people can do with the console hardware after years of documentation and experience has been available. Paprium tries desperately to flex itself as the ULTIMATE Genesis game with 80 WHOPPING MEGS OF MEMORY except the cart itself is stock with so many custom chips it can't even really be classified as a Genesis game anymore beyond just using the console to power it up. What makes this all the more egregious is Fonzie in his infinite wisdom went out of his way to make this game borderline impossible to play on any clone consoles because again this is supposed to be THE Genesis game despite actually hardly using the console's hardware and hilariously enough his shitty attempt at this backfired hard as it turned out the game is unplayable on a lot of official Genesis consoles as well.
Now with all that out of the way you could still be telling yourself "Well maybe the game it really good in spite all of this to make it worthwhile!" at least that's what I was telling myself for years waiting for my copy to arrive. Sadly this isn't the case, for the first hour or so you'll be wowed by its flashy presentation but once the novelty runs out the cracks really start to show. Enemy AI is borderline unfinished with even incredibly basic attacks like the jump kick being extremely exploitable as they have no counter attack to it. There's a "bully" mechanic where when enemies will get put into a stunlike state that requires you to use a specific type of attack to do damage which ruins the flow of combat but to make it even worse there's also a glitch where if you use that attack too early it does no damage. There's also some visual issues as well which is pretty bad for something that wants to wow you with how great it looks such as bizarre perspectives when it comes to the breakable walls and televisions throughout the game. The throw attack rather than having an actual grab animation when you pick up an enemy has them magnetically fling to your hands. Glitches aside it also has a vary small variety of enemies and bosses which wouldn't be so bad if the game was fairly short but due to the insanely convoluted routing and secrets you're expecting to replay it numerous times for hours to fully unlock everything or get to the true ending.
Paprium is not a terrible game but it is held back with its blatantly unfinished state in a lot of areas leaving a very sour taste in the mouths of people who had been and still are waiting years to get their copy. Do yourself a favor and pick up Xeno Crisis or Demons of Asteborg if you want a technically impressive and great homebrew on your Genesis.
Paprium is an incredibly perplexing game that's both aimed at a very specific niche audience yet also does everything it can to drive them away. As a Genesis/Mega Drive fan one of my favorite aspects of homebrew games and the big appeal is seeing what people can do with the console hardware after years of documentation and experience has been available. Paprium tries desperately to flex itself as the ULTIMATE Genesis game with 80 WHOPPING MEGS OF MEMORY except the cart itself is stock with so many custom chips it can't even really be classified as a Genesis game anymore beyond just using the console to power it up. What makes this all the more egregious is Fonzie in his infinite wisdom went out of his way to make this game borderline impossible to play on any clone consoles because again this is supposed to be THE Genesis game despite actually hardly using the console's hardware and hilariously enough his shitty attempt at this backfired hard as it turned out the game is unplayable on a lot of official Genesis consoles as well.
Now with all that out of the way you could still be telling yourself "Well maybe the game it really good in spite all of this to make it worthwhile!" at least that's what I was telling myself for years waiting for my copy to arrive. Sadly this isn't the case, for the first hour or so you'll be wowed by its flashy presentation but once the novelty runs out the cracks really start to show. Enemy AI is borderline unfinished with even incredibly basic attacks like the jump kick being extremely exploitable as they have no counter attack to it. There's a "bully" mechanic where when enemies will get put into a stunlike state that requires you to use a specific type of attack to do damage which ruins the flow of combat but to make it even worse there's also a glitch where if you use that attack too early it does no damage. There's also some visual issues as well which is pretty bad for something that wants to wow you with how great it looks such as bizarre perspectives when it comes to the breakable walls and televisions throughout the game. The throw attack rather than having an actual grab animation when you pick up an enemy has them magnetically fling to your hands. Glitches aside it also has a vary small variety of enemies and bosses which wouldn't be so bad if the game was fairly short but due to the insanely convoluted routing and secrets you're expecting to replay it numerous times for hours to fully unlock everything or get to the true ending.
Paprium is not a terrible game but it is held back with its blatantly unfinished state in a lot of areas leaving a very sour taste in the mouths of people who had been and still are waiting years to get their copy. Do yourself a favor and pick up Xeno Crisis or Demons of Asteborg if you want a technically impressive and great homebrew on your Genesis.