Cuphead: A Celebration
Hard to complete, impossible not to love
Ihave always loved playing games on the hardest difficulty. I’ve completed Dark Souls 1–3 on New Game Plus and done challenge runs in each. I always made an effort to play most story modes on the hardest difficulty to make the game last longer and to challenge me as a player to utilize everything at my disposal to complete the level. I even adored playing DOOM Eternal on the hardest difficulty, but there’s one game that stands above the rest and actively makes me think ‘Am I even good at games?’. It’s in the form of a 1920s animation-style anthropomorphic cup.
Cuphead may be the most rewarding, visually engaging, and challenging game that I have ever played. But how does a game that makes me want to break my controller so badly hold such a fond place in my heart?
Style
It would be a crime to talk about Cuphead without talking about its fantastic sense of style, humor, and genuine originality. Inspired by the ‘Golden Age Of Animation’, if you were to cut Cuphead it would bleed art. The titular character himself is an expression of how amazing artists can be with the right freedom; studio MDHR’s character design is nothing short of fantastic.
From a pair of frogs that turn into a slot machine to a killer carnation, Cuphead is just so visually engaging, colorful, and creative. Even when you die, it’s almost a pleasure to watch the animations of whatever killed you… as long as you haven’t thrown your controller at your monitor just yet.
You can tell that the game is a passion project from the first look. Every mob created is a clear demonstration of how much care has been taken in the creation of Cuphead. Each one is animated so beautifully and smoothly while the bosses have so much personality packed into just one fight. With names like ‘Hilda Berg’ and ‘Sally Stageplay’, you can see that the old Disney animations are a key inspiration in the construction of this game. Even the animation process was the same, with an excruciating amount of hand-drawn pages used to create a fluid motion. The game is a love letter to tradition while
exploring every creative ounce.
I firmly believe that the game could be priced upwards of £40 for the animation alone. The crew made something utterly legendary — it seems as though the whole game was fuelled with passion and love and it’s beyond clear to see. Even if you don’t enjoy challenging games, I would strongly encourage you to play this yourself and experience how fluid each
painstaking hand-drawn animation feels. Luckily, the casual player can still enjoy the impeccable designs even against Cuphead’s notorious difficulty.
Gameplay
Cuphead is a run-and-gun platforming game where you control either the titular Cuphead or Mugman. You are tasked to capture 19 souls from the Devil’s “Soul Contracts” in order to wipe out a debt owed to the Devil.
With such a gorgeous animation, many are surprised by the subversively difficult gameplay (myself included). With lightning-quick reactions and great timing required, Cuphead can be an infuriating experience for many.
Luckily for many, as well as my sanity, Cuphead does have an easier mode for levels, meaning you can still progress, however you don’t collect any souls. I recommend playing on normal when wanting to avoid replaying any tedious fights over and over.
However, within the difficulty of the levels and the boss fights, the player is able to recognize subtle patterns, visual and audio cues and begin to recognize timings. To lose in a level just leaves you with more information. You recognize where you failed and know what to do next or, as has happened to me so many times, you fail right at the end but know that you can do it.
It’s so hard to blame the game for any failures (despite this I still occasionally blame my mistake on the game or the good old reliable “I lagged”). Each input is so responsive that the game is very rarely, if ever, actually at fault. It’s difficult, of course, but it’s not impossible. You just have to minimize your mistakes.
Looking back retrospectively, it was almost a pleasure to keep retrying the same boss-fights over again. I would recognize incredibly minute details in the animation and sound design that would greatly help my efforts. It seems that the game almost forces the player to look at the expansive work that MDHR put into the game. If the player looks at the background for fights, where they would notice the slightest indication of an attack and know when to dodge. It makes the player listen out for when the Boss would attack, as well as aware of their movement cycles so that attack timing would be improved.
It isn’t a mistake that Cuphead is so difficult, it’s quite intentional. The game wants you to recognize how much effort has gone into not just the design but the fluidity of the gameplay itself. Each pixel-perfect dash, each mid-air parry, and each weapon for purchase greatly help the player with every step of the journey.
Shop
Cuphead includes a recurring shop titled Porkrind’s Emporium where the coins earned in normal levels can be used to purchase an array of unique weapons, dashes, and extra health. Although you have to balance out what you have in your inventory and decide what to take, each coin unlocks another way to play Cuphead. You’re also supporting a small,
independent business-pig.
You can have weapons such as ‘The Lobber’, which slowly fires bouncing projectiles at a medium distance, or ‘Charge Shot’, which has an incredibly low fire rate but delivers long-range attacks dealing large amounts of damage. For many bosses certain weapons are required, such as for ‘Goopy Le Grande’ the ‘Scatter Shot’ is the most effective.
With a game that is packed with so much ingenuity, style and creativity, it just goes to show how much thought and passion went into it to make sure that players would never give up or get bored.
Replayability
Even though I have had to put down the controller after coming a pixel away from beating a boss (which I’m totally over, by the way, and it definitely doesn’t even keep me up at night anymore), I always come back to Cuphead. I always actively want to progress in the game because Cuphead doesn’t make you feel helpless, as many notoriously difficult games do. The game lets you know how far you progressed in each level, not to taunt you (even though it feels like it) but to say, ‘You’re almost there’. Each time you enter a boss fight you think ‘This time I’ve got it’.
It’s a pleasure to replay this game. It’s a pleasure to fight the same boss and know exactly what they’re going to do and remain one step ahead of them. Trust me, the amount of serotonin you get from beating the boss that tormented you for so long is unrivaled.
Even after 3 years, I keep replaying it every now and again. Getting to learn the same bosses that had me pulling my hair out, just to beat them in an incredibly satisfying way is nothing short of fantastic. Do yourself a favor, if you’ve never played Cuphead give it a go. For many, it’s a game that itches the challenge many gamers strive for, but, for others, it’s a great experience at seeing how creative games are becoming.
