Dustforce is a 2d action platforming game were you take control of various members of a cleaning crew tasked with, well, cleaning. Except these are no ordinary cleaners, oh no, this is by far the most athletically able maintenance crew that has ever existed.
There’s a sort of low gravity thing going on as you control your nimble cleaner and slide down drops sweeping as you go. It’s easy to get the hang of Dustforce because there’s nothing really complicated at work. But it very quickly becomes satisfying as you quickly zip around the map furiously cleaning as you go. It’s one of those easy to learn difficult to master deals. There isn’t much of a challenge in Dustforce unless you make one for yourself trying to achieve high scores and perfect your strange cleaning ballet.
Achieving perfection is much more difficult than progressing through the game – although later levels require you to achieve certain scores in previous levels to unlock them. After you complete a level you’re given a grade that represents how efficient, or inefficient, your cleaning was. This takes much more time and patients to master. You’ll need to not only have pretty masterful control over your character but also need to learn the quickest, most efficient, route around an area. You’ll also likely need to make no mistakes as you use the low gravity momentum style physics to clean up a level.
The smooth cartoon style effects complement the slick gameplay perfectly. Cleaning a section of dirt has a satisfying effect that helps you methodically progress through an area. As you attempt to keep the flow of a level going and smoothly float from platform to platform the stable frame rate and vibrant graphics make sure you’ve got the right tools for the job.
But due to the perfectionist style gameplay Dustforce can also become quite frustrating for those just looking for a fun platformer. It’s easy to just complete a level but to achieve anything better than the minimum requires a huge amount more effort. The real core of the fun in Dustforce comes from the strive towards high scores and not from progression. There’s really very little fun for those looking to just play and not spend hour after hour perfecting their technique.
If you feel the need to achieve higher and higher ranks or even attempt to climb the online leaderboards Dustforce can offer you many hours of entertainment. But other than that there’s very little to do and enjoy. The four characters have different abilities, which the game doesn’t tell you about, that you’ll need to use to complete certain areas of certain levels but other than that it’s all about improving your own skill.
There’s certainly more on offer from Dustforce to a platforming veteran looking for a new challenge, at the expense of accessibility to new players. But for those who know there way around a platformer the control system will likely feel a little unresponsive. It was difficult to tell whether or not it was the platforming mechanics that made it feel this way or a control system that was a little slow. It didn’t hinder me from getting through the game but when trying to achieve those pesky high scores it became an occasional problem. It’s not something that gets in the way all the time but it’s something that seasoned pros will likely notice very quickly.
Overall Dustforce is an enjoyable little platforming with a simple concept that requires much time and effort to master. If you’re looking for a challenge that demands patients and effort then Dustforce is for you. But if not there’s little to nothing on offer really. There are four characters which have even less dimensions that their environment and nothing but easy to complete, very difficult to master levels. Dustforce is absolutely one for the platforming enthusiast.
