Double Kick Heroes | Preview

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Music rhythm games are pretty old hat these days, having been run into the ground at the height of their popularity, around ten years ago now, through a greedy and endless stream of cookie-cutter releases. By throwing shoot-‘em-up elements into the mix, alongside an apocalyptic story and a cast of corny characters, Double Kick Heroes seeks to draw disillusioned fans of the genre back into the fold when it hits Steam Early Access on 11 April.

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by Sam Sant

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@SlamShotSam

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In the pixelated face of a zombie outbreak, the eponymous Double Kick Heroes set out to save the world with the power of metal - and not in the spiritual sense, having linked their instruments to two turrets mounted at the rear of their convertible. With separate keys bound to each gun, not only do you need to consider timing when hitting notes scrolling along the familiar fretboard at the bottom of the screen, but also your choice of input. Unconventional hordes of approaching undead dictate whether you’ll need to fire from the top or bottom, creating a juggling act as you attempt to simultaneously monitor two vital but disparate visual elements in order to stay alive.

The gradual introduction of mechanics - like maintaining a combo chain to upgrade your weapons, playing second and third instrument tracks to charge special abilities, prioritising different enemy types, and steering during boss encounters - ensures a consistently high level of challenge is maintained throughout. While the learning curve can be rough, even on the normal difficulty setting, it compels you to keep playing by making every victory feel well-earned, and, coupled with the empowering element of performance that accompanies skilled play, makes for a strong motivator to keep improving - just like learning to play an instrument.

By throwing shoot-‘em-up elements into the mix, alongside an apocalyptic story and a cast of corny characters, Double Kick Heroes seeks to draw disillusioned fans of the music rhythm genre back into the fold.

Whilst carving a bloody path through the USA - across 15 stages set to the game’s original soundtrack, which spans light rock through heavy metal - you’ll get to know the head-banging fivesome comprising the Double Kick Heroes. Text-based interactions during interludes make reference to all aspects of pop culture, but they’re so ham-fistedly frequent and obvious that it can feel like there’s a sleeve-tugging child shoving their collection of “cool” toys under your nose. The aim here was never to produce an artsy, postmodern pastiche though, with the foul-mouthed stereotypes quickly establishing the desired sense of character.

Story mode currently runs around three hours, but that’s set to double as DKH continues its development and the band embark on a European tour. There’s also the mysterious Hellgate mode to be added, but in the meantime polishing your skills in Arcade mode and creating/downloading custom stages via the in-depth-but-straightforward Level Editor should be plenty to keep you busy.

Most user-generated levels are based on established songs, for example Metallica’s Master of Puppets, which means you’ll need the relevant MP3 file for the game to sync up and have you play along with. It’s a clever little way around hefty licensing fees and should serve to keep devoted metalheads indefinitely busy.

​Provided you held on to them, you can also use your old Guitar Hero or Rock Band peripherals to play; you’ll have no issue plug and playing with a USB drum set, but old wireless guitars require forking out for a signal receiver, which is unfortunate when they’re precisely what most people will have to hand.

That’s not an insignificant blunder, but it’s ultimately outside of developer Headbang Club’s control. The team have otherwise done a great job on the technical front, maintaining a solid 60 frames per second during gameplay to ensure there’s no chance of dropping notes through no fault of your own.

Even at this pre-Early Access stage then, in spite of some largely par-for-the-course flaws, Double Kick Heroes is a very playable evolution of the music rhythm genre. It’s a game with a specific audience that does everything it can to cater to its niche, so, if you fit the bill, add DKH to your watchlist as it can only get better from here.