FIRST LOOK: Ex-Lionhead devs’ King of Meat looks like Fall Guys meets Diablo

What do you get when Diablo meets Takashi’s Fortress? It’s a query that the majority sane folks have by no means requested, but for the Guildford-based Glomade, there was solely ever one reply: King of Meat.

Regardless of sounding like a questionable kebab store, this bizarrely named co-op creation swaps dodgy doners for vibrant, chaotic dungeons, thrusting 4 gamers into lethal arenas as they race to succeed in the end line.

Set within the mystical world of Loregok, King of Meat casts gamers as contestants within the final recreation present. In a world that’s half mediaeval fantasy, half company hellscape, Loregok’s fame-hungry residents yearn to hunt glory on the land’s solely remaining TV channel. Their path to celeb? Dodging flamethrowers, belching folks off platforms and cracking waves of skeletons over the top. It’s all very charming, foolish, and unashamedly British.

“There’s this Guildford shared thread that runs via a variety of these video games, “ says Glomade founder, Jonny Hopper, reflecting on his studio’s earlier expertise “I labored on Little Large Planet, our artwork director labored on Fable, earlier than it was Fable… our designer was design lead on Black and White… all of us share that barely wry sense of humour.”

Impressed by the staff’s love of heavy steel, Wrestlemania and The Operating Man, there’s greater than a whiff of Fall Guys to Glomade’s obstacle-clambering extravaganza.

Teaming up with three different ridiculously-dressed heroes – a Shovel Knight-esque warrior, a squawking chook man and a comically Poundland samurai – my hours with King of Meat have been spent slashing, leaping and rolling throughout flaming traps, crushing enemies with gigantic horse hoofs, and sliding down sticky hills as I averted my teammates’ poorly thrown bombs. Cheers, guys.

When you and your band of weird armour-clad athletes clamber and battle throughout every lethal new course, it’s as much as gamers to uncover hidden secrets and techniques, rack up kills, and earn as many model factors as they’ll inside the time restrict.

Regardless of Mediatonic’s apparent unstated affect on King of Meat, Hopper explains that it’s the zipped-head of Sackboy that casts the longest shadow: “One factor that we’ve found via Little Large Planet, is that when you give folks a set of tactile, enjoyable instruments, they’ll shock you indefinitely.”

Set to launch with over 100 totally different developer-made arenas, Hopper reveals that user-generated content material is King of Meat’s secret doner sauce.

“The expectation is, as quickly as King of Meat will get into folks’s hand, [players] might be making ranges that we’ve by no means imagined,” Hopper says, “…and so they’re going to take stuff additional than we’ve ever thought.”

“My hours with King Of Meat have been spent slashing, leaping and rolling throughout flaming traps, crushing enemies with gigantic horse hoofs, and sliding down sticky hills as I averted my teammates’ poorlythrown bombs”

With customized maps created through the intuitive-looking Komstruct mode, this high down map builder sees gamers inserting obstacles, enemies and devious traps, Dungeon Keeper model. In a pleasant contact, gamers can go away “ideas” for ranges that they love, with essentially the most acclaimed user-made arenas finally graduating to official map playlists.

Between every match, gamers discover themselves chilling “backstage” at Ironlaw Plaza, a medieval twist on Splatoon’s Inkopolis sq.. Half social area, half outside market, right here gamers unlock splendidly ridiculous outfits, improve their weapons and purchase further assaults and showstopping ‘glory’ strikes. In a bid to encourage their neighborhood of budding creators, screens within the plaza will proudly spotlight the newest and biggest player-made ranges.

“Finally, it’s all about making creators really feel good,” Hopper explains, “They don’t seem to be only a useful resource to be mined, they’re folks. You need to reward them, spotlight them and have fun them.”

When you’re like me, nevertheless, you’ll most likely by no means even hassle booting the artistic mode. Fortunately for Glomade then, they solely want a small variety of engaged creators for King of Meat to thrive: “If 10% of our participant base make a stage, and simply 10% of these ranges are any good, we’ve nonetheless primarily acquired extra ranges than anybody’s ever going to play,” Hopper explains.

But regardless of coming away impressed by its huge UGC potential, the maps I performed all regarded jarringly comparable. That is, in fact, a pre-release construct – so let’s hope that when gamers have been given entry to creation instruments, that they’ll harness them to create extra visually distinct arenas.

Nonetheless, there’s arguably a much bigger horse hoof lurking ominously over King of Meat – the state of on-line video games in 2024. In a 12 months the place we’ve seen a number of reside service titles fail –  and for Naughty Canine and Inventive Meeting‘s efforts, earlier than they’ve even launched – creating a web-based recreation is at present an enormous danger. It was stunning then, to listen to that King of Meat will shun the free to play mannequin in favour of a ‘mid-priced’ price.

“If 10% of our participant base make a stage, and simply 10% of these ranges are any good, we’ve nonetheless primarily acquired extra ranges than anybody’s ever going to play”

“I feel what we’re attempting to do is give [players] good worth for time,” says Hopper, “We’re not partaking with free to play mechanics in any respect. At launch, we’ve acquired this promise of 100+ ranges, providing a 30-to-40-hour assured good time. So out of the field, you’re going to get a extremely cool, curated expertise”

There’s, in fact, a narrative loosely tying all of the co-op carnage collectively, with art work and dialogue that takes a jab at a dystopian-esque, domineering capitalist company – which is fairly on the nostril for a recreation revealed by Amazon.

“As you progress via the sport, you meet all these totally different characters and firms,” Hopper explains, “There’s a bunch of tales that we’re going to uncover and…we’ve acquired a multi-year narrative plan for the place we’re going to take issues.”

Whereas the satirical opening cinematic and loading screens burst with character, the dialogue spouted by the varied NPCs within the plaza fails to hit the identical grin-inducing highs. Fortunately although, a lot of the humour in King of Meat comes from its gameplay.

As you’d anticipate from ex-Media Molecule and Lionhead creators, King of Meat is unabashedly foolish,  revelling in having you shove fellow gamers off cliffs, or haphazardly dash across the map, dragging objects from earlier rooms throughout the map with chaotic abandon. Nonetheless, at this stage, the fight feels somewhat flimsy.

There’s little weight to sword swings or arrow pictures, primary and heavy assaults feeling unsatisfyingly simplistic. Whereas Glomade has tried to compensate with a slew of ‘zany’ talents – a pressure push-esque knock again and an AOE horse leg that stomp on opponents – they’re instruments which can be senseless somewhat than constructed for mastery. With many unlockable talents promised down the road, let’s hope for extra thrilling fight potentialities to flesh out the mashing.

“As you’d anticipate from ex-Media Molecule and Lionhead creators, King of Meat is unabashedly foolish,  revelling in having you shove fellow gamers off cliffs”

Regardless of these minor points, I loved my time with Glomade’s quirky debut. Whether or not King of Meat can do sufficient to outlive the cutthroat multiplayer panorama stays to be seen, however it’s onerous to disclaim that it’s a recreation made with love. With Glomade hinting at a PVP mode coming put up launch, and it already that includes extra levels than you’ll be able to shake a hammer at, King of Meat seems set to supply a beneficiant serving to of family-friendly enjoyable.

“King of Meat is the mediaeval Operating Man, the place you bought stamped on by horse hoofs and belched off cliffs.. and perhaps even on the identical time,” pitches Hopper, with a smile, “It’s the sport that we need to make and that we need to play. It’s enjoyable, it’s silly, and it’s a spot the place you’ll be able to have a good time.”