Shantae and the Pirate's Curse

Shantae and the Pirate's Curse
I haven't played other games in the series, but it seems Shantae was once a genie, but now lives life as a human in Scuttle Town. The mayor has sold the town to an evil Baron much to the dismay of Shantae. Meanwhile, Shantae's rival Risky Boots tells her that her former master is returning from his grave which is a threat to the world. They then team up to stop him; Risky providing her pirate ship to travel, and Shantae doing the grunt work.

It's worth mentioning that the women in the game are strangely sexualised for what you would think could be aimed at a younger audience.

Pirate’s Curse is a Metroidvania game. Shantae travels to islands in sequence, usually performing a fetch quest to unlock a dungeon. In the dungeon, she can recover one of Risky's pirate items which helps Shantae progress through the dungeon to the boss.

The Pistol can be used as a weak long range attack or used to hit out of reach switches. A Pirate Hat can be used as a parachute to extend jumps, or rise via air currents. The Scimitar is used for a downward strike which can destroy weak blocks. The Boots allow Shantae to charge with the Scimitar which destroys weak horizontally placed blocks, or become immune to damage (she can pass through flames and run on spikes). The Cannon provides a triple jump.

There are plenty of enemies to defeat along the way, primarily using Shantae's hair-whip attack. The Pistol is the first item you acquire and gives you a weak projectile attack. Later on, the Scimitar and Cannon can be used as a downward strike. Enemies mainly drop currency and items, but sometimes hearts to restore your health.

There are “heart-squids” to find which are usually hidden. Collect four of these and you can gain another heart for your health-gauge much like in the Zelda series. In the shops, you can purchase a few additional attack moves, or upgrade Shantae's hair speed and power.

There are also 20 Cacklebats to kill to recover their Dark Energy. These appear to be an optional collectible but Risky Boots hints that you should collect them just before you go to face the final boss. It turns out you won't get the Good ending without doing so.

There are a few screens to be displayed on the touch-screen. There's an item screen where you can double-tap health restoration or attack buff items to use them, and a map screen to help you navigate the areas.

Areas in the game aren't too big, but the amount of enemies make navigation rather tedious, especially since they respawn when you return to previous screens. You can return to Risky's ship by using a Pirate Flare item which are purchased from the store. These cannot be used in dungeons though which is sometimes inconvenient. Any backtracking within the game is rather frustrating.

I also found the placement of enemies were often designed to frustrate, rather than posing a hard but fair challenge. There's plenty of jumps where enemies will suddenly spawn in your path (like ghosts), or creatures pouncing from off-screen.

There's a couple of moments where the gameplay style changes. One section has you running and jumping to navigate platforms and avoid enemy attacks; where one hit sends you back to the check-point. Another section has you navigating using stealth; hiding in shadows to avoid guards.

Save areas are placed at regular intervals but they annoyingly don't restore your health. You can quit out at this time and reload to regain full health. This is another strange design decision.

Shantae seems to have a cult following but I'm not sure what the hype is here. It's a decent game but the frustrating design decisions hold it back from being more than that.