So I'm late to the party I guess. I've had Transistor sitting in my Steam library, waiting silently for the day that I would actually play it. In hindsight I should have read about it at some point but I was on a media blackout for some reason (I swear it wasn't whiskey related) and I picked it up on a steam sale with little intention of playing it.
You play Red, an entertainer who's been silenced by a group of shadowy ne'er-do-wells with a magical USB sword referred to as the Transistor. It would have done a lot more than just silence you if it weren't for your boyfriend stepping in the way to take it in the gut. One thing I would like to note is that I have issues with weapons that are shaped like non-weapon things. Key blades, gas powered guitars, ect. have all left me disappointed in the past but the art design and overall color palate that was chosen eased me into my cyber-punk noire nightmare.
Anyway from that point you're introduced to the games combat system, well really there are two systems, a real time version and one where you can stop time and blink around the battlefield like a bad ass. You're given abilities in the form of traces left behind in the bodies or deceased residence of the city. You have four slots that you can assign these two and as you progress you can unlock modifier slots for the abilities that augment them in different ways. Of course if you don't like the first four abilities you can swap them out at will with any of the others you pick up along the way and half of the fun for me was min-maxing the DPS rotation.
The game has no difficulty setting but a different sort of system that you could compare to the skull system in the Halo games. Over time you pick up limiters that change how enemies behave or what happens when they die. You can find yourself in some ridiculous situations when they're all active, namely when you have to go into the combat planner just to try and find a way out of the hell you've gotten yourself into. It's really a fresh take and allows the player to change things to their style. Better at taking on multiple enemies? Just want more of them? How about tougher? You can do it all and more with the limiter system.
That brings me to the story. Being the company that brought us Bastion, Supergiant Games really poured it on thick here. The overarching tones of despair run throughout the story and there were some serious moments where it was just a little too much, especially towards the end. Don't get me wrong there are little moments of reprieve dotted around the bleakness but it's not enough to lift your spirit for long. By the end, or really in the middle of the game you really do grow attached to Red. Being silent though the only way she can communicate is through the use of terminals or occasional beautiful humming.
Really in the end it's the superior combat and story that saved this game from mediocrity for me. In reality Bioshock Infinite was the last time I really, truly gave a damn about a story in a video game. All the mindless blasting in shooters or the racing sims that have no need for story and left me wanting more and I found it in Transistor.