Between them, Capcom, Bandai Namco, NetherRealm, and Arc System Works have the fighting genre well covered, releasing new entries in long running franchises every couple of years. There are plenty of outliers out there too, able to plug gaps between long waits, such as modern day SNK. Today’s fighting games are, mostly, rich and complex, designed by huge studios while pushing the latest tech for their backends. Anything coming from a smaller indie studio is only ever going to be a labour of love, a few examples of which we’ve seen already.
This brings us onto Mostroscopy, first released on PC and now available on Xbox. It’s a one-on-one fighter with a unique premise and aesthetic, mixing 1950’s horror tropes with Mexican Luchadores. As such, the cast of pugilists includes vampires, werewolves, mummies, fish creatures and several beasts from Mexican folklore who are up against a handful of beefy masked Lucha libre wrestlers. A few characters carry melee weapons – such as a Japanese detective armed with a samurai sword – and some have summonable companions, such a duo of girls in cat suits who attack as a team. You’re bound to find a favourite or two within the cast.
It draws from the 1950’s monster movie premise for its presentation, using a permanent film grain filter and menus inspired by posters of the era, in addition to story cut-scenes that use vintage comic book style panels. Fights also randomly play in black and white, or have a similar filter applied, dousing the screen with purple lighting. Even the final boss fight will occasionally play out in monochrome.
The fighting system has purposely been kept simple. Only four buttons are used, two to attack (X and Y) along with a dedicated guard button (RT) and a taunt button (X) that’s largely surplus aside from inducing extra personality into the already eccentric cast. The A button isn’t used within combat at all. Each attack button can be used in conjunction with a direction, allowing for a simplified combo or attack to be performed, such as a grapple, projectile, or assortment of rising kicks and heavy/light punches. This means there’s no need to memorise inputs for specials, making the whole shebang instantly accessible. From the very outside, you’ll be able to pull off strings of combos and other flashy attacks with just a push and a single button press.
Countering does require timing though, so there is some tact to the proceedings. Most characters also play and feel differently from one another, with the wrestler using grapples and heavy hits, a monster who attacks similarly to Capcom’s rendition of the Hulk, and a female character who launches herself from the ground.
Fighting game purists will easily notice flaws within the combat system, with way too many openings to secure an easy victory. A couple of the battle locations are also smaller from the rest, easily making it possible to trap rivals against a wall (or wooden box, in one instance) and then pull off seemingly endless combos. The animation, while far from poor, has a few issues with transitioning from one attack to the next, changing stances in a blink of an eye. This isn’t enough to lend it a rough edge, thankfully, and this is despite the visuals generally being a generation behind the times.
More detrimental is the variety of modes present. It seems the developers have added numerous new updates and features since launch, but online play is still yet to come. Instead, it has a short story mode for each character – with beginning and ending still image cut-scenes – and a challenge mode based around combos. There’s a training mode and a versus mode too, along with a jukebox. Options are very few, especially when it comes to graphics. There are the usual sound options, a choice of difficulties for the story mode (also referred to as arcade mode) and that’s about it.
I spent a weekend with Mostroscopy, trying out every character and beating their story modes while dabbling with the challenges. The cast is rich and varied, and fights play out quite similarly to how you’d expect with rivals performing combos, grapples, launching projectiles and the occasional flashy charged attack. It isn’t as if battles merely see two characters exchanging identical kicks and punches. But at no point did it fully engage, forever feeling like something crucial was missing. Imagine Street Fighter without fireballs, or Mortal Kombat without fatalities. Mostroscopy has a style about it, but that’s only face deep. And the faces here are the kind only a mother could love. Somebody looking for a fun diversion before the next big fighting game arrives may get a kick out of it, but don’t expect it to be your next obsession.
Oribe Ware Games’ Mostroscopy is out now on Xbox formats. Published by Seashell Studio. A PC version is also available.