Josh Cui reviews Talent Not Included…
The developers over at Frima Studio have brought to us Talent Not Included, an indie action platformer which although it provides a few hours of fun platforming with a unique setting, ultimately falters in giving incentives for progression and fails to breakthrough the vast array of platformers available.
Taking place in world of “Notthatmuchfurther”, Talent is presented as almost a literal talent show, in which the game unfolds as a play and all action takes place onstage. The content is itself broken into its three “Acts”, with a different actor used as a playable character per act; as the game plays out levels are introduced in the form of stage shifts, as players jump, dodge, and destroy anything in their path to reach the small objectives at the end of each level.
With its cartoony graphics and seemingly simplistic control system, I thought Talent would play out quite easily, and I turned out to be massively wrong on that front. I performed horribly in my first hour or so of gameplay, and should perhaps first admit that I’m not that good terrible at platformers and have generally been all my life, and so as I was learning the basics of the game, I felt initially frustrated at the seemingly low amount of health you’re given and the punishing nature of some of the puzzles presented. Rest assured however, that with some practice and being a little quick on the keyboard the game is not all that difficult and can be finished in roughly 3-4 hours.
And herein lies some problems: The game is extremely short; anyone with a shred of experience in platformers will roll through the game in under 3 hours, and those who struggle more with it will only add perhaps another hour or 2. Despite the unique setting the game provides, some of the later levels feel similar and repetitive, or required frustrating trial-and-error deaths to figure out puzzles easier. The characters too are not very interesting with very little story; although there are quests designed for each character, there isn’t much of an incentive to get them, and it doesn’t really matter why (at least Mario had Peach).
For those fans of platformers who have a couple of hours to burn, there’s no reason not to pick up Talent Not Included and give it a quick spin, but for the average casual player, there are definitely better options in the genre currently.
Pros:
-Unique setting design
-Cartoony art that fits the theme well
Cons:
-Characters feel bland and generic
-Levels eventually start feeling repetitive
-Very short game, can be completed in roughly 3 hours
Rating: 6/10
Josh Cui
Originally published October 6, 2016. Updated April 14, 2018.
