Mayhem Brawler by Hero Concept - First Impressions Review - Levels 1-3.

Howdy Gamers

Today I'm checking out Mayhem Brawler by a new developer called Hero Concept.

I haven't heard of this development team before so I had a quick look at their website. It seems they have only made 3 games so far, Doughlings Invasion,Doughlings Arcade and the newest title Mayhem Brawler.

It seems Hero Concepts mission is to recreate classic 90s arcade games and bring them into the modern era...

https://heroconcept.com/
"ABOUT HERO CONCEPT
At Hero Concept we develop visionary reimaginations of the timeless classics of arcade gaming. We are ardent students of games and we study the histories of the ever-present classics in order to carry them into the 21st century–with panache.

We do this in an impossibly lean manner: with a tight-knit team, low overhead, and budgets that defy the norms of the industry. We release on all major platforms and take care of our community of players.

We enjoy developing new skill-sets as we venture into new genres and new audiences. We aim to make every next game deeper and grander then the previous one while creating more inventive, immersive, and indelible worlds within them."

Intriguing , very intriguing. I spent alot of the early 90s playing arcade games and I am real nostalgic for that era of gaming so I will certainly be keeping an eye on future projects from Hero Concept.

So lets dive right into Mayhem Brawler and see what we are dealing with here.
The game released on Steam on Aug 19th and is currently £15.49, it currently has a very positive review score.

The Steam description reads...

"Mayhem Brawler is an urban fantasy themed beat 'em up that brings back the 90s arcade vibe to present day. With comic book style art and kick-ass soundtracks, it offers a unique experience that you can tackle solo or as co-op with friends while defining the next step in the story with your choices."

When the game begins we have a choice of 3 characters...

These 3 characters are police officers but they seem to have X-men like abilities.

Troy Statham seems to be a kind of Werewolf character.

Jonah Jordan seems to be some kind of dolphin human hybrid.

Grace Gardener has psionic abilities.

The game opens with comic book style slides...

It seems like there is some suspicious activity at the docks...in 90s arcade brawlers there is always suspicious activity at the docks!

The game looks a hell of alot like Streets of Rage 4, which is a good thing. I love this new generation of cel shaded comic book style games.

I had to give up on Streets of Rage 4 as it got far to difficult at stage 3 and became nothing more than an exercise in frustration trying to make progress. I have been hoping similar games would come along to fill that 90s inspired cel shaded void so I was pretty excited when I saw the trailer for this one on Steam.

I started playing Mayhem Brawler on the second difficulty level so I guess we will see how far I can progress in this first impressions post...

First stage...The Docks...lets find out what these criminals are up to...

Gameplay is pretty straightforward...we have our main attack...

We can smash objects to obtained food to restore health...

Each character has a special power attack which consumes the blue power bars underneath the characters health bar.

Often times in these side scrolling brawlers you need to sacrifice some health to pull of a power move. Thats not the case here the power moves have their own power meter which is replenished by attacking and chaining together combos.

We can also pick up weapons dropped by enemy's which is always fun. This game has quite a good verity of weapons including guns.

all gifs in this post are created by me from the video capture above

This game also has automatic weapons...if a 90s inspired arcade brawler lets you pick up machine guns it already gets a solid 9/10 from me :).I can only think of 3 different 90s side scrolling games that had guns, Cadillac's and Dinosaurs, The Punisher and Alien Vs Predator all by Capcom.

Gif by me :)

Before long we make it to the first boss...

His name is Chainado , a very suitable name for a 90s inspired brawler villian...hes a big guy with a chain...

It turns out he is also the most wanted smuggler in Europe...

It took me 3 attempts to beat this first boss. I had a hard time dodging the projectile bullet attacks and dealing with the different waves of enemies...

You get 3 life's at the start of the game, if you continue you start back at the start of the stage. It seems there are no checkpoints in this game.

Having to start over twice allowed me to try the other 2 characters...

Lets try Psionic powerhouse Grace Gardner next...

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Again I managed to get Chainado down to around 1/4 of his health but again the combo of Chainados attacks and the bullet projectile attacks got me...

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I decide to try again with Grace her attacks are quick and she is by far the cutest of the 3 characters...lets do this...GIRL POWER!

This time I manage to take out the machine gun guy...

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With the machine gun guy out of the way I manage to take out Chainado!

GIRL POWER!

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The story continues with some more comic book style slides.

At this point we get to select which route we want to go to next. We can go interview She Wolf at a diner stage or go to a bar to question the truck driver who is also a guitarist in a rock band. I Chose the guitar guy in the bar route.

Its pretty cool that the story branches and gives you options this adds a lot of replay ability.

The new level comes with new enemy types. These Arcane gangsters are a pain, they can summon guns from nowhere, have a knife attack and regular attacks. Its best to take them out asap.

These blue Meijin enemies are also a pain, they can cast an attack that looks like a Hadoken from street fighter and they teleport all over the place.

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This Meijin killed me with a Hadoken which pissed me of so I hacked him to bits with a meat cleaver...

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This machine gun takes out these 2 Arcane gangsters pretty efficiently....machine guns in side scrolling brawlers rock!

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Grace puts up a brave fight with two hadoken throwing teleporting Meijins but ends up getting taken out by one of the fiery blue balls of death...

Ok its time to check out the third character Jonah Jordan the human/dolphin super soldier hybrid...

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This dude looks bad ass with a meat cleaver....

Finally we make it to the second boss , Stephen Grosskopf

This guy was much easier than the first boss I manged to take him out on the first attempt

We get some more story from Grosskopf via more comic book slides...

The cargo came from a super soldier lab in a huanted neighbourhood...

The container was loaded onto the truck by vampires....the plot thickens....

We have the choice to arrest him or let him go I decide to let him go...he's just a truck driver...

Time to fight some vampires....yeah!

We have these new enemy types who look like they are inspired by Wesley Snipes in Blade...

And these Katana wielding girls who drop automatic pistols when the die...

The machine pistol is the coolest weapon so far....

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Blades duel wield knife attack is also pretty cool...

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The boss of this stage is Nosferatu...hell yeah!...

Shooting Nosferatu with the machine pistol is cool as shit! :D

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Stabbing him with one of Blades daggers is also fun...guns and knifes and vampires...fuck yeah!

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This nasty bloodsucker has a nasty blood sucking attack....which sucks...

One of his red headed Katana wielding minions finishes me off with an attack that's cooler than some Mortal Kombat Fatalities....

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Nosferatu and his minion pose for the winning picture...looking good guys :)...

With the video approaching the 1 hour mark I decide not to continue. I will for sure be back soon to take this bloodsucker out so if you enjoyed this post stay tuned for more Vampire slaying action.

Conclusion:

This game rocks! I liked Streets of Rage 4 and got pretty excited when it was announced but ended up getting more frustrated with it than I think I ever have with any game due to its ridiculous difficulty.

This game has a number of difficulty settings which means Im going to get to see the story all the way to the end. The story here is wild, Mutant X men style cops cool bosses, freaking vampires, I love it and I'm eager to see how it continues.

Combat is what you would expect from a side scrolling brawler but the veriety of different weapons keeps things interesting.

I love the 90s arcade brawlers like Cadillac's and Dinosaurs, Alien Vs Predator and Night Slashers. Mayhem Brawler reminds me of all of those.

The graphics are real slick comic book style which I love.

Overall I like this more than Streets of Rage 4.

Ill give it a solid 9/10 but I'm going to add an extra 0.5 because it has machine guns baby yeah!

Its a 9.5/10 from me, ill be playing a lot more of this real soon. If you grew up playing 90s arcade games your going to love this one, check it out.