Decided to pick this game up again on Xbox because I wanted an excuse to experience it again (and gamerscore). My main goal was all achievements, but I got sidetracked by wanting to S-rank every boss of the main game before moving on to the DLC; my playtime would've been about half what it was otherwise.
In terms of achieving what it aims to, Cuphead is a damn near-perfect game. It sounds, looks and feels stunning, and I feel the boss rush style of gameplay compliments the wacky, animated 1930s aesthetic better than a lot of other genres could even hope to. Being thrown into chaos after chaos is kinda what makes Cuphead what it is - every boss or level will go for a theme, and its ways of doing so will always feel authentic and well thought out.
The distribution between bosses and run-and-gun stages is to be expected, since the latter are not the highlight of the game for most, but I do enjoy them for what they are, especially when going for the pacifist rank in each of them, which in my opinion makes them way more fun. Even obstacles which seem built around combat can be just barely slid by with precise movement, and it's evident there was care into ensuring players could reliably beat these levels without harming anything.
As for the bosses, there are definitely some high highs and some lows sprinkled in between, and I do wish there were a couple more plane fights, but most of my complaints come from experience with their Expert variants, which I'll go into detail about now:
- Cagney's first phase gets craaaazy. Chipping away at his minions moreso than him makes it a little more manageable, but it's like a mad dash to get to phase 2 before I can breathe again.
- Beppi's horse phase felt like RNG. If I got a yellow horse while the rollercoaster was on screen, the run was basically dead.
- Dr Kahl's last phase goes on for WAY too long. It feels like they planned a phase afterwards and just... didn't implement it. Each time I got past his robot phase in S-rank attempts I would kinda just be praying that I did THAT fast enough to allow him to kill a minute while I waited for him to die.
Any other boss not listed here either didn't give me much trouble or did so in a way where I was having too much fun to care. You could apply my complaint about Cagney to the Devil's penultimate phase, but it's just so damn fun in the moment that I can excuse it (It's also the final boss to be fair).
A more broad complaint I do have about the bosses is their parry distribution, and how varied it can be between bosses. Take Grim Matchstick for example, who only has parry opportunities in his first phase. If you're trying to speed through the fight for the time bonus, sometimes he doesn't even get the chance to fire three of these at all, leaving you unable to get any parries in during the rest of the fight. Compare this to bosses like Captain Brineybeard, Wally Warbles and King Dice which have - I'm not even exaggerating - a dozen parry opportunities in EVERY attempt, and it feels like a bit of an oversight. If you want a unique example of parry distribution, Goopy Le Grande has three very obvious parry opportunities that remain constant every attempt, but he has no natural parry opportunities elsewhere. He is the ONLY boss to do this, and good for him, but I'm not sure why they only did it here - I can only assume it was to account for the fact that he has no projectiles.
Now to talk about the Delicious Last Course! I haven't mentioned it up until now to keep my thoughts pre and post DLC seperate.
Whilst Cuphead nailed its aesthetic, the DLC's almost feels like it evolved with time, mixing in that rubber hose style with 1940s Disney animation, but it works super well and the transition is seamless. The music is phenomenal once again - this time with a lot more variety - pleasantly surprising me with scatting and even yodelling thrown in there (I guess that's what a band with twice the number of members gets you!)
In terms of difficulty, the DLC will definitely challenge you even if you've completed the base game on Expert. I can say with confidence that the final boss of the DLC is the hardest S-Rank in the game for me by a landslide. As for my favourite DLC boss, I'm actually part of the minority that loves Mortimer Freeze - his fight just feels great to me the whole way through, especially the yeti phase which really gets the platformer gene going.
The absence of run-and-gun stages wasn't really a complaint from me - the alternative was a lot more fun! I'll let you discover it for yourself, but it really makes you master enemies in otherwise unexplored ways and I would kill for more content just like it.
As for extras not exclusive to Isle IV, Chalice is a fun playable character. Her quirks make her feel like an easy mode, but there are some scenarios in which parrying with her is scarily difficult, especially in one boss in particular. She feels like a combination of charms in a way, and I do like that, but I avoided using her for main game S-Ranks as a way to not feel cheap (I used her for Isle IV though, lmao). Her super arts are subpar for the most part, but then art 2 is just... absurdly good. You'll see.
The new weapons are fun, especially crackshot. Twist-up and converge are pretty good and definitely ones I can see myself using more than some of the base game ones. The new charms are neat, especially THAT one, although it was a missed opportunity for it to be a fun toggleable challenge mode charm. Again, I'll let you figure it out, but I will say that I'm glad they didn't gatekeep the process of unlocking it to Isle IV only. I think I would've gone insane otherwise.
At the end of the day, through all my complaints is passion. If I didn't love this game as much as I do, I wouldn't be able to think of those little things that would make it just that bit better. A lot of my gripes were nitpicky, and I'll survive knowing they'll stay that way, but Cuphead is a wonderful game, and while my hunger for more content isn't quite satiated, its last course leaves a nice aftertaste in my mouth.
In terms of achieving what it aims to, Cuphead is a damn near-perfect game. It sounds, looks and feels stunning, and I feel the boss rush style of gameplay compliments the wacky, animated 1930s aesthetic better than a lot of other genres could even hope to. Being thrown into chaos after chaos is kinda what makes Cuphead what it is - every boss or level will go for a theme, and its ways of doing so will always feel authentic and well thought out.
The distribution between bosses and run-and-gun stages is to be expected, since the latter are not the highlight of the game for most, but I do enjoy them for what they are, especially when going for the pacifist rank in each of them, which in my opinion makes them way more fun. Even obstacles which seem built around combat can be just barely slid by with precise movement, and it's evident there was care into ensuring players could reliably beat these levels without harming anything.
As for the bosses, there are definitely some high highs and some lows sprinkled in between, and I do wish there were a couple more plane fights, but most of my complaints come from experience with their Expert variants, which I'll go into detail about now:
- Cagney's first phase gets craaaazy. Chipping away at his minions moreso than him makes it a little more manageable, but it's like a mad dash to get to phase 2 before I can breathe again.
- Beppi's horse phase felt like RNG. If I got a yellow horse while the rollercoaster was on screen, the run was basically dead.
- Dr Kahl's last phase goes on for WAY too long. It feels like they planned a phase afterwards and just... didn't implement it. Each time I got past his robot phase in S-rank attempts I would kinda just be praying that I did THAT fast enough to allow him to kill a minute while I waited for him to die.
Any other boss not listed here either didn't give me much trouble or did so in a way where I was having too much fun to care. You could apply my complaint about Cagney to the Devil's penultimate phase, but it's just so damn fun in the moment that I can excuse it (It's also the final boss to be fair).
A more broad complaint I do have about the bosses is their parry distribution, and how varied it can be between bosses. Take Grim Matchstick for example, who only has parry opportunities in his first phase. If you're trying to speed through the fight for the time bonus, sometimes he doesn't even get the chance to fire three of these at all, leaving you unable to get any parries in during the rest of the fight. Compare this to bosses like Captain Brineybeard, Wally Warbles and King Dice which have - I'm not even exaggerating - a dozen parry opportunities in EVERY attempt, and it feels like a bit of an oversight. If you want a unique example of parry distribution, Goopy Le Grande has three very obvious parry opportunities that remain constant every attempt, but he has no natural parry opportunities elsewhere. He is the ONLY boss to do this, and good for him, but I'm not sure why they only did it here - I can only assume it was to account for the fact that he has no projectiles.
Now to talk about the Delicious Last Course! I haven't mentioned it up until now to keep my thoughts pre and post DLC seperate.
Whilst Cuphead nailed its aesthetic, the DLC's almost feels like it evolved with time, mixing in that rubber hose style with 1940s Disney animation, but it works super well and the transition is seamless. The music is phenomenal once again - this time with a lot more variety - pleasantly surprising me with scatting and even yodelling thrown in there (I guess that's what a band with twice the number of members gets you!)
In terms of difficulty, the DLC will definitely challenge you even if you've completed the base game on Expert. I can say with confidence that the final boss of the DLC is the hardest S-Rank in the game for me by a landslide. As for my favourite DLC boss, I'm actually part of the minority that loves Mortimer Freeze - his fight just feels great to me the whole way through, especially the yeti phase which really gets the platformer gene going.
The absence of run-and-gun stages wasn't really a complaint from me - the alternative was a lot more fun! I'll let you discover it for yourself, but it really makes you master enemies in otherwise unexplored ways and I would kill for more content just like it.
As for extras not exclusive to Isle IV, Chalice is a fun playable character. Her quirks make her feel like an easy mode, but there are some scenarios in which parrying with her is scarily difficult, especially in one boss in particular. She feels like a combination of charms in a way, and I do like that, but I avoided using her for main game S-Ranks as a way to not feel cheap (I used her for Isle IV though, lmao). Her super arts are subpar for the most part, but then art 2 is just... absurdly good. You'll see.
The new weapons are fun, especially crackshot. Twist-up and converge are pretty good and definitely ones I can see myself using more than some of the base game ones. The new charms are neat, especially THAT one, although it was a missed opportunity for it to be a fun toggleable challenge mode charm. Again, I'll let you figure it out, but I will say that I'm glad they didn't gatekeep the process of unlocking it to Isle IV only. I think I would've gone insane otherwise.
At the end of the day, through all my complaints is passion. If I didn't love this game as much as I do, I wouldn't be able to think of those little things that would make it just that bit better. A lot of my gripes were nitpicky, and I'll survive knowing they'll stay that way, but Cuphead is a wonderful game, and while my hunger for more content isn't quite satiated, its last course leaves a nice aftertaste in my mouth.