Scar-Lead Salvation (PS5) | REVIEW | A Repetitive Sci-fi Shooter Roguelike Drowned in Awkward Silence

Joining the growing ranks of modern roguelikes is Idea Factory and CompileHeart's latest indie project, Scar-Lead Salvation. This loop driven bullet-hell 3D shooter introduces to us an amnesiac female protagonist who has somehow spawned into an AI controlled military testing facility. It is through the inner dialogue of this protagonist as she navigates the futuristic maze of corridors and rooms guarded by robots along with the joint conversations with the resident AI that we slowly piece together the mystery of what is going on and who the leading lady is in all of this. It seems her Earth, in this instance, was invaded by an alien species known as the "Contractors". This unexpected event being the trigger point that pushed the need for military intervention, and a weapons experiments program. Something our leading lady finds herself a participant in whether she likes it or not.

While storytelling is kept to a bare minimum, and dialogue instances few and far between it is that gameplay loop that carries most of Scar-Lead Salvation's value. The meat and potatoes of it all. This loop which incorporates multiple floors connected by winding maze-like corridors, and rooms called "Cuboids" laid out like a laser tag arena has you taking on the tedious task of clearing, looting, and fighting the boss of each given stage in order to forward the plot and gain access to additional key features. 

As the nameless female protagonist you come with a dual gun carrying capability out the gate as well as an Exo Drive that uses Exo Skills, and two main moves that can be used in combat or traversal. The latter two being the self-explanatory parry and the uniquely named Mirage Shift which is a dash maneuver for getting the heck out of Dodge. As you make your way from Cuboid to Cuboid you will encounter various robotic AI controlled enemy threats that shoot different types of projectiles. These projectiles can be parried to fill up the Exo Drive, and will allow for up to four uses of Onslaught (the game's powered up state). Thus leaving the basic damage dealing to your two optional guns of varying types and rarities. Each of which comes with an upgrade level, and can be upgraded several times over through a bench using the Elm chips dropped from the mechanical minions. 

Aside from the main loop objectives there are some rooms or Cuboids that offer up different lucrative opportunities. For example you can find three different colored boxes including a red one for weapons, a blue one for Exo Skills, and a White one for health refills in some enemy free or populated rooms. The red weapon crates drop random rarities and types, and can be slotted into your primary or secondary gun slots. Leaving the blue ExoSkill crates to hold randomly generated and stackable passives. Combat, of course, requires a mastery of both guns and skills. Likewise, swapping between the two guns, which is a core mechanic of itself, simply requires a pressing of L1. 

When it comes to gunplay mechanics swapping is half the battle. Reloading guns, as it turns out, is an automated featured triggered after the ammo is spent and dependent upon the guns' reload speed and ammo capacity. Making strategy and positioning crucial aspects of gameplay. You'll also find that these useful and sometimes situational guns with limitless ammunition not only vary by types like assault, smg, shotgun, sniper, and elemental, but that they each have different performance stats. Something that can be improved upon with incremental weapon bench upgrades. Stats like reload speed, damage, rapid fire, and magazine capacity are accounted for at the point of pickup.

Exo Skills, the passives of the game, are additionally a huge part of the gameplay loop in that once you unlock all four of the skill slots you can allocate, and stack the effects of each to the max. Thus improving upon their effects. Things like extra health, extra damage, extra defense, further dashing (Mirage Shift), and various resistances will help you better survive each stages' set of floors and Cuboids, therein. That and the brief power charge you get from an Exo Skill slot per parry charge can assist in the damage dealing as well.

Other lucrative rooms of interest are accessed by warp portals and can take you to Cuboids of a special sort. A free revival perk, or a free bench upgrade are among the bonus opportunities scattered among the randomized layouts of each given stage. There's even challenge rooms filled with robots for Elm chip farming. At the end of each stage's set of floors there is also a boss fight. Winning these boss battles is how you unlock more Exo Skill slots, and loop features like a quick access portal to the most recent stage. 

The biggest underlying gimmick of this game outside of the mystery and loop is the fact that the female protagonist visibly takes damage as she is shot. This takes off layers of her cyber suit down to her underwear, and when it's all gone along with her coinciding health bar she will find herself resurrected at the starting point with only Exo Skills carrying over alongside progression based feature unlocks. The only time you won't have to repeat this cycle is if you have a special item that revives you one time in the are which you fell. Other than that it's five floors with several randomized Cuboids each, and a changing biome with harder to defeat enemies after each stage's boss is cleared.

The Presentation ...

In the way of plot and personality Scar-Lead Salvation is lacking in a major way. Story is drip fed between long session of repetitive silence that borders on being mind numbing. The enemy variety is small, and only really changes up after a boss, and the Cuboids are just small trials or looting opportunities which pad a mostly dull experience. 

The game itself uses a 3D anime inspired art style with a clothing destruction detail for the female protagonist. Most of the game is spent staring at her thick thighs as she runs forward in a third-person point of view. The environments she runs through are lazily crafted, and similar by design with only the barriers and walls meant for cover shooting, randomly changing. The soundtrack, itself, is forgettable and quite honestly I can't remember anything standout about it other than it was generic. The voice acting, on the other hand, was decent. Nothing to write home about though. I comes with both English and Japanese voice-over options as well as subtitles. 

The Verdict ...

Scar-Lead Salvation is a task in tedium. It is a boring maze-runner turned cover shooter with bullet hell shooting mechanics put to use in rooms setup like laser tag arenas that do not translate into the usual IFI grand design. It honestly looks, and plays like a rushed indie project that wasn't fully fleshed out. The insanely long pauses between dialogue is unforgivable. It makes the game more of a chore than a proper roguelike experience. With the repetitive nature of the life and death playthroughs only serves to further exhaust any pleasurable aspect the game might have had otherwise. All things considered I cannot recommend this game. It would have to be on a major sale for me to do that.