Rebel Transmute is another Metroidvania that doesn’t break the mould: Moon Mikono crashlands on an unforgiving planet full of aliens and environmental hazards – “but if it ain’t broke, don’t fix it” as the old adage goes. Rebel Transmute feels very much like Metroid and Axiom Verge, which should encourage you to give this a shot. However, for everything it does right – which is looking beautiful and having original concepts – it wasn’t quite enough for me to recommend it.
I spent roughly 20 hours playing Rebel Transmute. My first playthrough was 12 hours but I encountered a fork in the road whereupon I took the wrong path, and the only solution I could find was to start a brand new playthrough where I chose the alternate path instead.
For those curious, here was my predicament: There are areas locked off by doors which require a Fuse to unlock them. I had 1 Fuse but 2 doors to unlock. The door I chose to unlock gave me access to an area I couldn’t yet traverse, meaning the area behind the door I could explore couldn’t be unlocked. The only solution was to start again. This is a massive oversight and it’s one that some people might not be so forgiving over.
Thankfully, I managed to get through the first 12 hours in 3 hours, and I quickly got back on track. Once I unlocked the correct door it was obviously the correct way to go but this is a Metroidvania that rewards you for exploration, so it’s frustrating to be punished for doing so. I won’t lie: this left a sour taste in my mouth that made it difficult to embrace any decisions for the rest of my hands-on, just in case I bumbled into another irreversible dilemma.
Another problem I had was how often I would come across dead ends, and I eventually ran out of places to explore. After 20 hours of walking around and hitting brick walls though, I was ready to chuck the towel in. Backtracking is one of the genre’s cores, and I often enjoy the grind of backtracking when its pulled off successfully. Backtracking in Rebel Transmute felt broken though. Sometimes I would have to force a manual respawn from the settings. Sometimes you have to use fast travel to reach a new area. That concept of itself is actually a cool one but it didn’t click with me on this occasion.
Despite my grievances, Rebel Transmute is fun to play. As Moon, you steadily unlock a series of Modules that can be equipped that let you build your unique version of her. I opted to equip every upgrade I could possibly carry, which isn’t easy as it requires finding Batteries to increase the amount of weight Moon can carry. Additionally, Moon also unlocks permanent upgrades called Transmutations, hence the title of Rebel Transmute. These upgrades are the skills Moon must acquire to explore every nook and cranny of the alien planet she has landed on.
If Metroidvanias are your go-to game, you will most likely be pulled in by its allure, and my critique will do little to convince you otherwise. So if you do decide to give Rebel Transmute a shot, I sincerely hope you enjoy it more than I did!
