Iconoclasts - 6/10
Iconoclasts is a cute MetroidVania made by a solo devloper (Joakim Sandberg) over the course of 10 years. It has an interesting setting, sometimes-great pixel art, and an overall interesting story, but the combat and difficulty fell a bit flat for me.
Iconoclasts tells the story of Robin, the daughter of a mechanic, as she ventures through a world oppressed by a religious military that worships a space worm. Driven by her want to help people, and armed with her recently deceased father’s wrench, Robin sets out on an epic adventure that culminates with her eventually saving what’s left of their planet.
The story has a heavy focus on environmentalism and religion, which I appreciated. Taking something as core to our daily lives, like the planet and it’s health, and taking us somewhere far in the future where we’re shown the eventual consequences of our abuse of the planet makes for a great central plot point. Then introducing another charged topic, like a zealot religious group being the main antagonist, and you’ve got a game that, theme wise, is right up my alley. It just needs Nazi’s, honestly.
The gameplay itself is where I feel like Iconoclasts stumbles, mainly in it’s difficulty and clunkiness were really a letdown for the game. Particularly in the boss fights, I often felt like I didn’t know what the game wanted from me, and as I’ve said many times in the past, not knowing what a game wants is one of the most frustrating experiences. Even turning the difficulty down didn’t fully alleviate this, as it does in many games, allowing you to just brute force things you’d have to otherwise engage with. Iconoclasts still forced you to fight these obtuse systems.
But past the rough edges, behind the obtuse bosses, there’s a great MetroidVania. It’s one I enjoyed my time with, even if there were low points scattered throughout. The premise of being a mechanic and having to fix things throughout the game to progress felt like fresh take on the puzzle element of MetroidVania’s, even if it’s execution wasn’t perfect. The game does a great job of making being a mechanic central to the plot, and your character that having it also be the solution to the game’s puzzles felt so natural, and more importantly, unique.
I think Sandberg had a lot of inspired ideas. Ideas that, like making your character almost-silent, added to the overall experience. For example, having your character be a silent protagonist and explaining it early on by saying “She hasn’t spoken much since our father died” makes the times where you do talk that much more impactful. It’s also a nice medium between other games where the protagonist never shuts up and ones like Blasphemous where they’re totally silent. The story itself is another place Sandberg had some great ideas. I mean, having a space worm be the deity people worship sounds completely out of left field, but how is that any different from our own religions? We just happen to have made our gods in our own image, whereas Iconoclasts introduces a real space worm and even lets you encounter them at the end of your journey.
Overall, Iconoclasts was a fun time that was let down by some rough edges and obtuse mechanics. I would still recommend the game as a cute and unique spin on modern MetroidVania’s, especially if you’re looking for a serious story in a more whimsical world. I wouldn’t recommend it over some of it’s contemporaries like Haiku, Prince of Persia, Hollow Knight, etc, but if you’ve played through those and want more, Iconoclasts isn’t a bad use of 12 hours.
- Zack
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