01 September 2023 , 04:00
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When Foamstars was first announced I was like what I imagine most of you were like from how strange the concept is. But after playing Foamstars for about 40 minutes my excitement has bubbled over.
Right away I'll address it. Foamstars isn't Splatoon at all. Having two colour coded teams where you can move faster on your own colour, some similar abilities, and the lack of actual guns is pretty much where the comparisons begin and end. You'll want to cover the map in your foam, but it's mainly used to gain tactical advantages rather than being the end-goal of the game. You'll be able to build up pillars of foam and snipe enemies off the top of them, or create soapy strongholds to force enemies to head to you.
Foamstars goes more for the standard shooter route of eliminations, you'll need to shoot enemies with your foam to put them in a bubble, and then surf into said bubble to confirm the elimination. The kicker is you'll be able to surf into your teammates bubbles to give them a second lease of life. Which will deter camping from teams that aren't focused, as a sniper won't want to be up fighting for the bubbles.
The mode I played was called Smash The Star. In this mode teams have seven eliminations to go through. Once that seventh elimination is gone, one of your team is designated as the Star, and your job is to protect them. Those who have played Gears of War 2 may recognise this as that games best mode Guardian.
While the team I was on won all four games, it's a surprisingly tension driven affair. The shift in everyone's playstyle once that leader is designated makes the final minutes intense. Our last game almost ended with our streak being broken had i not saved our leader as we teamed up to take down the enemy leader.
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There was 8 classes available, each with their own skills and weapons. I played as Pen Gwyn who could send penguins out to create a streak of foam in its path, Jet Justice who weilds a shotgun that doubles as a grenade launcher, and Mel T with a giant ice cream cone shooting rocket launcher. I never got to try the full roster, but no two characters required the same strategy out of the four I had a chance to use.
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We had a short Q&A with Square Enix staff afterwards, and when I asked producer Kosuke Okatani about the game's music I was told that the aim of the game is to make it feel like a party. That shines through in almost every aspect, from the unique character designs, colour scheme, and of course the music.
The music in the games reveal trailer was evocative of Lyn Inaizumi's work on Persona 5 (I had hoped that asking about the music would lead them to confirm if it actually was Lyn, but I had no such luck). Whereas the battle theme in the demo was a drastically different tune that wouldn't feel out of place in an advert for kids bubble bath (with the wonderfully goofy refrain of "scrub baby, scrub baby, scrub some more").
I'll clarify now that I've never really gotten into Splatoon. I appreciate the game from an aesthetic standpoint but the core game mode never did it for me. So Foamstars – to me at least – is more exciting than its squiddy inspiration thanks to a gameplay loop more in-line with conventional shooters while taking on board Splatoon's strengths. In an increasingly hard to pierce live service game market Foamstars has a hard battle ahead of it, but I hope it does better than most seem to think it will.