High on Life is a shooter game in first person mode made by
Squanch Games, a studio founded by "Rick and Morty" co-creator Justin
Roiland. In the game, the player assumes the role of a suburban dweller lost in
an alien world where a drug cartel traffics in humans because it has figured
out that smoking and eating us gets aliens high. Armed with the first talking
gun, voiced by Roiland, the player goes into battle against bipedal ants,
hopping frogs, and the most common of enemies: alien cartel soldiers in vague
form who appear to be covered in a thick layer of liquefied Velveeta.
The weapons in High on Life talk, because that is the main
element of the game. The guns are in the hands of the unnamed protagonist and
their bullet-shaped eyes roll upward from the lower right edge of the screen.
Almost everything the player does in the game, from using a skill to rocket
through a tunnel to eliminating an enemy, is commented on by them. In
dialogues, weapons take over while the character listens silently, occasionally
selecting text input as a silent response. Throughout the game, the character
is little more than a vessel for the weapons to dialogue.
High on Life works equally well as a decent shooter and as a
colorful setting in which Roiland and a host of other comedians crack jokes for
10 hours. And just as the game's protagonist feels like a vessel for gun talk,
this focus on humor makes the player's involvement in the action feel like a
necessary evil that allows for more jokes. However, this does not mean that
High on Life is a terrible shooter.
The shootings in the game benefit from a distinct, rubbery
aesthetic that lends slapstick kinetics to shoot-outs in jungles with
nuclear-green rivers, slums filled with rainbow graffiti, and shady desert
canyons. Everything has an appropriately wet sound: the thunder, crackles, and
pops of gunfire mingle with the viscous splash of the gun spraying in
alternating fire mode, or the muddy spray of anthropomorphic bullets reloaded
into a grenade launcher-shaped weapon. When enemies are defeated, they fall to
the ground in loose piles. Melted cheese dripping from the cartel fighters
flies off them in clusters as they are hit, until their grayish, spindly bodies
are exposed and they fall dead.
Combat starts slow, but improves as more weapons are
acquired and I like to combine their talents. Unfortunately, the variety of
enemies is disappointing, and most encounters are repeated. As the adventure
progressed, I began to avoid the optional firefights whenever possible because
they felt more and more like a laborious task. Boss fights are similarly
superficial, and some of them are too challenging for the player, resulting in
minor deaths.
Outside of battles, you can explore a minimal selection of planets that offer large explorable hubs with Metroid-like abilities and decent platforming challenges where you use jetpacks. Although they are artistically beautiful, they are surprisingly lifeless, with NPCs serving more as signposts to provide questionable jokes. High on Life desperately needs a map or compass because the areas are so large and confusing that it is easy to get lost. I often found myself wandering in search of inconspicuous warp gates back to headquarters. The absence of a map is also unfortunate, because there are stores on the planets that sell exclusive upgrades, but it is tedious to find these needles in the haystack.
It is important to say that aside from navigating levels
with throwing platforms, grappling hooks, jetpacks and boots strapped to the
wall, shooting aliens makes up the majority of the game's activities.
Unfortunately, the comedy that also makes up a large part of
High on Life's offering is much more inconsistent than the action. In addition
to the pistol, the player uses a frog-like shotgun voiced by J.B. Smoove from
"Curb Your Enthusiasm," an energetic machine gun (Betsy Sodaro from
"Disjointed") and a toad-like launcher with multiple breasts and an
alien anus that gives birth to swarms of baby-like offspring (Tim Robinson from
"I Think You Should Leave"). While Roiland's humorous style fits well
with the fast-paced delivery of the jokes that keep "High on Life"
going, Smoove and Robinson come across as uncharacteristically down-to-earth,
save for a handful of excellent one-liners.
The rest of the cast is better and broad enough to keep the
jokes from becoming annoying. Although he doesn't star, Kevin McDonald from
"The Kids in the Hall" is one of the real stars of the game,
appearing in several roles, from the helium-voiced boss to the three-eyed pink
shopkeeper. Maria Bamford's scenes also stand out, even if she doesn't get
enough time to really shine.
'Hello Neighbor 2' is more quirky and frustrating than scary
"High on Life" offers plenty of well-crafted and
solid jokes, though the sheer amount of dialogue can numb the player's ear in the
same way that a marathon of an entire season of a TV comedy can make it
difficult to hold in laughter. At its best, the constant chatter during action
scenes fades into the background, creating an effect similar to listening to a
podcast that just happens to pick up on what's happening on screen. When
"High on Life" finds this rhythm, a well-timed joke hits the mark. A
character muttering "Jesus Christ" as the player leaves a
conversation, a gun reminding the player to use a special ability spilling out of
its "hole," or simply a foul-mouthed, murderous comment from one of
the guns in the middle of a gunfight: unexpected jokes often have the most
impact.
Whether the style of comedy is suitable for a player
depends, of course, on personal preferences. None of the jokes are particularly
exciting. The jokes usually focus on such topics as alien masturbation (which
turns out to be a deep well), inappropriate insults, and gross interference
with characters, usually related to the bodily functions of a bizarre being.
Far less welcome are a series of jokes that break the fourth
wall and appear at regular intervals. At the very beginning, enemy ants scream
that they think they are the toughest enemies in the game, even though we know
they are just fodder for an introductory shootout. An environmental puzzle that
moves on a pipe is called sloppy design by Roiland, before the gun fears that
the game's rating at video game sites Kotaku, Polygon and IGN will suffer. A
boss fight heavily references a memorable sequence from the first "Metal
Gear Solid," and shooting a deceptive-looking alien in one area leads the
gun to note that "High on Life" has just lost any chance of an
"E for All" age rating. None of these sections add much to the development
of their covers. They merely point out that there are other games and that
"High on Life" is one of them.
Callisto Protocol is the smaller and more unstable brother
of Dead Space.
High on Life screams at you for hours about how insanely
fucked up everything is, with tired dialogue exchanges that let potentially
funny parts fall flat. Humor is less about coming up with clever gags and more
about repeating the same basic gag with a barrage of swear words until it
hopefully becomes funny. That's not usually the case. Also, everyone seems to
be a slight variation of the same crude caricature, whether it's the
irresponsible older sister or the bounty-hunting moocher mentor. The game takes
everything in stride and even makes jokes that break the fourth wall about game
design and the industry in general. However, it also does little to refresh the
tropes it mocks. Criticizing a puzzle that doesn't follow the rules without
doing anything unique makes the joke hollow and hypocritical.
The gunplay feels acceptable enough to provide pointless fun, but it's not great. Close combat is reminiscent of Doom's Glory Kills, but without the satisfying speed. The limited arsenal of edged weapons has primary and alternate firing modes. Kenny, for example, fires a standard pistol and can fire mortar-like goop bullets that fling groups of targets into the air and juggle bullets. My favourite weapon is Gus, a shotgun that fires a large disc that bounces off enemies. The cool thing is that you can hit this disc to extend its momentum.
In these moments, and generally throughout the game, there's
a certain desperation or self-awareness. When so many jokes are delivered at
such a relentless pace, it feels perhaps inevitable that High on Life feels
like the creators have decided to play it safe by offering a huge amount of
comedy in the hope that some of it will catch on. It feels like someone is
trying out their tight five on a gagging audience. (The game has a menu button
to reduce the amount of irrelevant chatter, but this button feels like a dumb
and self-conscious band-aid rather than a solution to a messy design concept.)
This points to a broader, underlying problem with "High on Life": Roiland's seemingly unintentional humor, marked by stutters and false starts, doesn't fit as well with a quality video game as it does with a deceptively cheap cartoon like "Rick and Morty." "High on Life" is clearly the result of deliberate and careful thought and effort. It's hard to imagine anyone perceiving it as a product of spontaneity, and spontaneity is what Roiland's comedy is all about.
This uneven mix of humor and design prevents High on Life
from ever feeling like a natural combination of video game and traditional comedy,
though there are plenty of moments where a better blend of the two elements
occurs. What's here is worth watching for viewers curious about the concept of
a comedy shooter, but it's too uneven and too desperate to satisfy anyone but
them.