Don't look for a knight in armor, a cyberpunk mercenary or a soldier overloaded with guns in the game, because the character you play is a simple tertiary employee. Reduced to its simplest expression and anonymized to the extreme, since it takes the form of a stickman, this anti-hero par excellence is very easily controlled (directions and jumps) but "benefits" from movements influenced by physics , and therefore often wacky, rubbery and approximate. At first, we therefore think we are dealing with a simple joke game or gimmick as there are so many, especially since the emphasis is particularly placed on absurd humor. It is for example possible to commit suicide from the first seconds of the game, while a telephone booth ringing conceals the invitation menu to play in coop. Add to that the presence of a single attack button, and it becomes very tempting to call Stick it to the Stickman a simplistic little adventure.
Getting started is therefore very simple, but as the difficulty increases, it becomes important to fully understand the effect of each blow and to meet the right enemies at the right times.
Wrongly, because the game actually turns out to be a real rogue-like! Thus, the combat system is based on a succession of icons permanently displayed on the screen. We therefore always press the same button, but it is to carry out very different attacks in a cyclical manner. Various bonuses make it possible to improve these blows or to add others to the line of icons, which induces a notion of strategy, while certain throws use limited ammunition. If you run out of projectiles, attacking then automatically switches to the next skill. Getting started is therefore very simple, but as the difficulty increases, it becomes important to fully understand the effect of each blow and to meet the right enemies at the right times. The game mainly uses a 2D profile view and asks us to progress from floor to floor in financial offices, knocking out all the employees one by one, up to the CEO who we must then eliminate in order to take his place. .
THE FIGHT OF THE STICK MAN
Rogue-like requires, the adventure obviously does not stop there. We then unlock some improvements thanks to the money earned during the previous course, and it is then a new employee that we take in hand. This principle might seem repetitive but we played nearly two hours without feeling any weariness. It must be said that we gradually unlock different employee archetypes, such as the handyman, the jogger, the extrovert, the caffeine addict, the egomaniac, the task avoider or even the delegator. Each of them has its own selection of basic moves, as well as a unique passive ability. The skills are extremely varied and often surprising. Very quickly, the classic kicks and other uppercuts give way to throwing coffee cups, glue guns, axes, strangulation, wrestling grips, Shoryuken or even levitating objects. . Our favorites for the moment are the power of the force which allows you to take yourself for Darth Vader for a few seconds, the sip of coffee which restores some health points and multiplies the damage of the next attack, and the dismissal. Based on a pun in English ("you're fired"), this attack can literally ignite our opponents. The success of the game is also due to the interaction with the sets, which can be used to simplify your life. Propelling an opponent through the window or onto an electrical cabinet, for example, avoids having to kick him to death. The version we tried was limited to the office building mentioned above, but other levels are planned. We therefore hope that the warehouse, the science center and the airport will have even more good surprises in store for us.
