Masquerade: The Baubles of Doom

Does anyone remember the PSOne classic, Pandemonium? It was a quirky and light-hearted adventure about a jester and sorceress who go on an epic and maddening adventure. It was colourful, energetic and, above all, highly inventive. Now 20 years later, it looks as though we might have another fun platformer called Masquerade: The Baubles of Doom to entertain us.

Masquerade is the tale of a blue skinned jester called Jaxx who’s on an epic quest to save the land from an invading clown army (yes, you heard it right) and their desire for obtaining a couple of magical balls (yes, again, you heard right) which contain great power. Jaxx must also save his trusted sidekick Comedia from the legendary commander known as The Big Nose. So what you get is a classic tale of an abnormal hero taking on the forces of evil and who gets the girl in the end. It’s a noble fable, filled with humour, energetic gameplay and colourful visuals.

Well… it has the visuals right at least.

Masquerade’s gameplay mechanics revolve heavily around a combat system similar to the Batman: Arkham series. Players will chain together combos, perform counter-attacks and deliver some devastating power attacks in order to fight their way through hordes of clown soldiers. This is mixed together with some platforming and various set pieces that revolve around the colourful nature of the game. But the main problem Masquerade has overall is that it’s mind numbingly repetitive.

Combat is a huge factor with this problem as it’s very thin in design, lacking any variation or engaging motivations. Jaxx only has one weapon and merely three special attacks which unlock after collecting a set amount of red noses. There’s a lack of variation with only a single attack, no heavy attacks or combos to perform. So things just become furiously repetitive and dull. Not to mention that 90% of the enemy types are the same, just with a different paint job. Bosses are just like the standard NCPs you see, just a bigger clown with a funny accent that solely requires you counter, hit and nothing much else until they are defeated. Pretty dull and tedious as far as combat goes.

But the repetitive nature doesn’t stop there. Level designs often fall under dull, linear structures that never break up with interesting or engaging set pieces. It’s just fight enemies in a certain area, jump around in some slow winded platforming sections and a bit more combat. Platforming is painfully slow and with the awkward camera controls, it’s difficult to keep focused or judge jumping distances while attempting not to fall. Mission objectives go from defeat a group of enemies, destroy the spawn point and defeat more enemies, usually ending things on a rather simplistic boss battle.

There were only a couple of levels which broke up the stale format with some amusing set pieces and rather thoughtful puzzles. One particular level gets players to overcome a series of tasks under the watchful eye of a mad leprechaun, known as Barry, with a small army of chattering teeth. That’s kind of funny; it’s just a shame not much else is.

Well, to be honest, the humour is so paper thin I only chuckled once that I can remember. Masquerade seems to find it difficult to decide what type of audience it wants to amuse. Whether it wants to break adult or childish jokes, it attempts to blend the two styles, rather poorly. The whole concept sounds rather kid friendly but then you’ll get a crude and not so subtle adult joke about balls, nose jobs (haha … get it?) or some other lude innuendo. It could’ve played out as a children’s game with hints of adult humour, just what the Simpsons and Animaniacs did so well. But here, it’s just bland, typical toilet humour with little impact, shock value or creativity. I mean, spawn points in this game for NPCs are outhouses. Really?! You couldn’t think of anything more imaginative? Either be a children’s game or be one for adults instead.

All I can say is that the visuals are nice, along with presenting some great facial animations. That, and one or two platform puzzles actually made me think for a few minutes. But overall Masquerade: The Baubles of Doom is a dull and uninspired romp that’s terribly unfunny and highly repetitive. I like the concept and with more work this could have been a cracking game, but sadly it’s just a bore fest filled with one too many ball gags …. Jokes I mean. The game wasn’t daring enough to have clowns with ball gags. Come on guys, it would have been funny at least!

+ Looks very pretty
+ Some nice facial animations

- Tired and lazy sense of humour
- Repetitive and dull gameplay
- Just very unimaginative and boring

A Steam key was provided by the publisher for the purpose of this review.