Gryphon Knight Epic – A charming mustachioed shooter
I’ve spent my spare time over the last few days digging into Gryphon Knight Epic, an awesome arcade style shooter from indie studio Cyber Rhino Studios. With all of the RPGs and adventure games that I’ve been playing lately, it was nice to get into what seemed like a simple shmup at first glance. However, Gryphon Knight Epic blew me away with the level of depth a game comprised of seven stages can have. There’s a half dozen squires to choose from, a likewise number of subweapons, as well as potions to use and rune stones to collect. It’s a game brimming with personality and more than a few mustaches.
The core gameplay in Gryphon Knight Epic is that of a side-scrolling shooter. Players pilot our stalwart knight, Oliver, mounted atop his trusty gryphon, Aquila. Oliver is equipped with a magical full-auto crossbow that never runs out of ammo or needs reloading. It mostly follows the formula of many games from the genre: fly along the slowly moving screen shooting anything that appears while dodging incoming fire. Oliver can be flipped around (to shoot the guys sneaking up on him from behind) and the movement of the screen isn’t entirely fixed in its direction. In fact, there are several points in each stage where the player has to choose from a branching path and it’s often possible to retrace steps to unlock new areas to explore. Opening new areas usually leads to caches of gold, rune stones that permanently boost Oliver’s abilities, and the occasional cameo from other indie games. I literally laughed out loud and set down my controller for a minute when I first encountered Volgarr the Viking in an ice cavern.
Maybe my shmup skills aren’t what they used to be or maybe my ego was just a little too big, but either way I was getting my ass handed to me when I first started playing the levels outside of the tutorial. You see, I thought that I’m a competent player and of course I should be able to handle things on knight difficulty right out of the gate. Difficulty can be selected at the beginning of each stage between squire, knight, and epic (clearly easy, medium, and hard) each with their own set of perks and drawbacks. The problem was that I was completely missing one crucial point: upgrades are a part of the Gryphon Knight Epic experience. So, like a dumbass, I kept trying to plough headlong into a difficulty I was wholly unprepared for. It was a little frustrating, but thankfully humility kicked in and I started playing on squire difficulty. That’s when the magic happened and everything started falling into place. I beat a stage, got a new subweapon, got some gold, and started on my path to upgrades. Then it’s time to go back and replay the stage on a higher difficulty for bigger rewards while searching for new paths to take.
Hey, kid! You like Mega Man? We got your boss weapon taking fix right here. Okay, the bosses aren’t going to explode in a satisfying pop of pulsing orbs, but you do get to take their shiny weapons once they’re defeated. As Oliver tracks down and confronts each of his six former cohorts and defeats them in single mounted combat, he’ll acquire their unique weapon to take with him into future battles. Again, I suggest playing on squire difficulty until acquiring at least one of these weapons. Using these subweapons in game consumes energy which slowly regenerates, but it does prevent me from ravaging entire stages with and endless barrage of triple arrow shot or charging invincibly through everything with my lance. And just like virtually everything else in the game, these weapons can be enhanced by spending gold at the magic shop in between stages.
Besides the magic shop, there’s a merchant to visit as well. It’s there that you can buy your squires to assist you in your quest and a variety of useful potions. If there’s any point in having the ugly duck squire, I have no clue what it is. Both of the shopkeepers are worth checking out for their dialogue alone. (There’s also a Steam achievement for listening to all of their dialogue.) I personally make sure to stock up on health potions in between stages as well as the squire maximizing potions. I take a lot of hits and need all the help I can get when running on knight or epic difficulty.
Gryphon Knight Epic has a colorful, retro feel that makes it a welcome departure from the gritty look of so many other recent indie games. If that’s not enough to get you to play, the art direction is top notch and there’s a mustache on every mid-level boss. The dialog can be a bit rough at times, but the story isn’t the most important part about the game. What is important is that it has great controls, tons of variety, and an endless supply of charm. For the ever present question of how long does it take to beat Gryphon Knight Epic, it took me about 5 hours to get through all the stages on squire difficulty which includes finding all of the runes. I’m still working on knight difficulty, so there’s some replay value if you like a good challenge. I recommend it for lovers of the shooter genre.
We were provided with a review key for Gryphon Knight Epic.
