Developer: Soft Machine Publisher: Toshiba EMI Release: 12/23/98 Genre: Beat em up
In the US the side scrolling beat em up went in to hibernation during the 32-bit era. While the US would receive a few stand out titles like Guardian Heroes and Die Hard Arcade for the most part developers did not know what to do with the genre and we ended up with well-meaning drek like Fighting Force. In Europe and Japan the brawler was still alive and I admit being a little jealous. But after playing crap like Lucifer Ring it stings a bit less. They certainly tried with Lucifer Ring but this is a short and boring mess of a title.
Lucifer Ring stars Nash, a swordsman in a fantasy world under siege by evil. An undead wizard named Bair has collected the four Lucifer rings and plans to use them to resurrect…..Lucifer. Nash must battle through Bair’s minions to stop the wizard before it is too late. Lucifer Ring is developer Soft Machine’s second attempt at a 3d brawler. There first effort was Crisis Beat and the less said about that game the better. Die Hard on a cruise ship should have been an easy slam dunk yet they fumbled it so hard. Lucifer Ring is better but still not something I would ever recommend.
For a brawler your move set is limited. You have two attacks, a weak slash and a strong attack. You have a simple multi-hit combo and two different dash attacks but that is it. There are no throws or grapple moves let alone temporary weapons as is typical of the genre which is disappointing. There is a crowd control super move which uses a little bit of health when the gauge is not full but otherwise you will be performing that same combo for the length of the game. The game has a little bit of depth in the form of elemental swords. Throughout the game you can find different swords with elemental effects such as freezing enemies or shocking them. Depending on the level and enemies they can make certain sections absolutely trivial. But you must find them first.
The level design is a mixed bag. Each stage has multiple smaller segments. As enemies appear a barrier contains you to a small area until the wave is complete. The pacing is good as the waves are small (with a counter) and they go down fast. There are occasional branching paths as well as multiple boss battles per level to break things up. Overall though Lucifer Ring is incredibly short. There are only five levels and two are only a few screens long. To pad out the game there are platforming segments that are absolutely awful due to the camera. You cannot manipulate it and it always gives the worst view possible. Judging distance is a crap shoot and unfortunately what starts out as a means of finding extra items becomes mandatory. You will lose many lives over this, especially during what should have been a cool final boss battle.
Even with its flaws Lucifer Ring is easy overall. Your life bar is extremely long and you can take a lot of punishment before death. Your special power meter fills up fast and can decimate large chunks of a boss’s health. The special swords you find will make short work of them just as fast. It sounds like overkill but I can kind of see why: despite their easily recognizable pattern the bosses have a lot of health and these fights could drag on if you did not have these overpowered options. Extra lives are found regularly and you can have infinite continues. The only challenge comes from dealing with the stupid camera during the forced platforming segments. While cheap you will not have a hard time seeing this one to its conclusion. This is a very short game and the ease of difficulty makes the journey that much shorter.
I do wish the general gameplay was better as there are some positive aspects of Lucifer Ring. The enemy diversity is among the highest in the genre. Every level features new enemies with different tactics and behaviors. This has always been one of the weakest points of brawlers, they rely heavily on palette swapping which grows old fast. The fantasy setting allows for a wide variety of enemies and the pacing for the most part is good. Enemy waves are short and sweet as enemies go down fast. But the staid gameplay and ill advised platforming ruin what could have been a decent 3d brawler.
In Closing
Lucifer Ring is competent at best and awful at its worst. I will never fault a developer for trying something different but that does not mean you should play it. Between its terrible platforming and repetitive gameplay there is little to see here. The parts are there but they are assembled in to a jumbled mess that is not worth your time. Lucifer Ring is an interesting snapshot of the growing pains the 3d brawler was going through but is a curio at best.
