HIGH Vibrant atmosphere with expert storytelling.

LOW Unbalanced, grindy combat.

WTF People flying by spinning in place.

TRANSCRIPT:

Hi everyone! Eugene Sax here with another review from GameCritics.com!

In some places, music is more than just the rhythm of sound. On Saturn, music is the source of electricity and life for its highly cyber world. In this sci-fi setting, Bobo is an imprisoned sinner not because she’s committed crimes, but because she has an ability that most do not — she can sing. After an escape from confinement and a decision to rebel against the system in earnest, she’ll uncover the truth about Saturn’s music and a secret artifact known as the Keylocker that will set their world free. 

Keylocker is a turn-based tactics RPG where players control Bobo as she leads a rebellion against the corrupt Emperor of Saturn who’s outlawed music in order to control electricity. Players will fight against members of the Saturn church while gathering equipment and resources to ultimately take on the Emperor himself.

Just a glance will show that Keylocker is gorgeous. The pixel art is both beautiful and decrepit, highlighting both the neon-soaked city and the slimy dregs that Bobo pulls themselves up from. The characters are also great, each with a unique portrait and style, from the hacker wearing a computer version of Greek drama masks, to the gas mask girl with a keyboard guitar. These faces are in stark contrast to most of the enemies who are shown in muted colors, all feeling very uniform.

For most of the campaign, players will follow cyborgs Bobo and Dealer. They seem a bit one-note to start with Bobo being rebellious and wild, while Dealer is aloof and self-centered. However, they quickly evolve from tropes into much more. Dealer soon shows a softer and caring side, while Bobo learns self sacrifice and the value of the greater good. This growth also applies to the enemies as well, as their initial notes of infighting during story scenes are revealed to be varying motives that reveal themselves as players progress.

Combat has players managing both EP (electric points – the equivalent of mana) and LP (life points). Once the LP of a character drops to zero, they are out of the fight. EP is used for everything during a skirmish, like charging up a shield for allies, providing armor, or powering up moves that attack enemies directly. The developers lean heavily into timing-based fights similar to something like the Mario and Luigi series. Selecting an action will trigger a prompt, and if the player hits the action command perfectly, they’ll receive a bonus to the action like more damage on a hit, or completely dodging enemy attacks.

It seems fine on the surface, but the problem with Keylocker‘s combat is how frequent and unbelievably brutal it is. As players finish each enemy, a danger meter will fill. When it’s maxed out, more enemies will spawn in. This can lead to some encounters having waves of enemies instead of just a single group. And as I mentioned just a moment ago, timing is key to every action. If a player attacks and misses the mark, the damage they deal is significantly reduced, or they might even take damage themselves in the process. And that’s just for attacking. If players miss a single button on defense, that could mean a character death, even if they’re at full health — And this is on the normal difficulty!

The other problem is how grind-focused the campaign is. Players need to fight to level up, but this timing-based fighting is just too dangerous, and players with imperfect rhythm might find the early parts basically impossible to crack. On the other hand, someone who can nail the timing consistently could probably walk through most of the content with nothing to worry about.

I want to like Keylocker more. The world is beautiful, the atmosphere of cyber-Saturn is great, and I have found parts of the story to be genuinely moving. However, those things just aren’t enough to make up for its grindy, repetitive and punishing combat, and ultimately, this is a hard one to recommend to anyone besides the most hardcore RPG players.

For me: Keylocker gets 6.5 sad guitar plucks out of 10.

Disclosures: This game is developed by Moonana and published by Serenity Forge. It is currently available on PC, PS5 and XBS/X. This copy of the game was obtained via publisher and reviewed on the Steam. Approximately 10 hours of play were spent playing the game, and the game was not completed. There are no multiplayer modes.

Parents: According to the ESRB, this game is rated E10+ and contains Fantasy Violence, Mild Blood, and Mild Language. Characters will be seen coughing up pink blood when they are close to death, and the portrait screens for the characters will become bloody and beat up. Players will be using everything from musical instruments to firearms to attack robots, cyborgs, and animals. There is some cursing (d***, b******, etc), but not the major curses (f*** or s*** for example).

Colorblind Modes: Colorblind Modes are not present.

Deaf & Hard of Hearing Gamers: This game offers subtitles, but subtitles can not be altered and/or resized. All of the audio cues required for gameplay also come with visual cues. The game is fully accessible.

Remappable controls: Controls are completely remappable.

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HIGH A chill, pleasant mood elevated by lovely music and art.

LOW It’s very short, and oddly strict about timing.

WTF It’s oddly bright and upbeat for a game about trying to get some sleep.

When it comes to rhythm games, one persistent (yet understandable) misunderstanding about the genre is that it’s about appreciating music. While the overwhelming majority of rhythm games are framed around music, rhythm play is ultimately about rhythm. Music is just the best mechanical device to build a timing-based set of mechanics around. It’s why so many rhythm titles are still playable in the deafening cacophony of an arcade, or why many rhythm players can still succeed with the music on mute. However, Half Asleep Games’ Melatonin might be one of the few where the music is truly essential.

The concept of Melatonin is heavily informed by genre classic Rhythm Heaven, and like Rhythm Heaven, Melatonin frames its challenges around scenarios set to music. But, where Rhythm Heaven was whimsical, silly, and focused on bizarre, energetic set pieces, Melatonin‘s framing is a more coherent and chill.

As one might expect of a title named after the brain hormone that helps regulate sleep, Melatonin is about a young person trying to get a good night’s rest. Unfortunately, their brain seems to have other ideas, with stages organized into five “Nights”. Each musical piece is centered around a dream subject, such as “Work,” or “Nature,” or “Space”. Melatonin‘s hand-drawn visuals are excellent, with character art and lines reminiscent of modern cartoons and a light, pink-and-pastel color scheme.

The music is a standout, with a number of relaxed pieces produced both by Half Asleep Games and other producers like Gravity Sound and Filippo Vicarelli. Fans of selections found in the “Chill Beats” and “Lo-Fi Girl” corners of YouTube and Spotify will find much to like in Melatonin‘s soundtrack. While consistently of a piece with the dreamy vibe, the songs do vary in tone, with some of the more stressful dream subjects having a darker mood.

Meanwhile, Melatonin varies the interactions with each dream, with the patterns themselves varying throughout the song. For example, a dream about shopping might show players a pattern first, then have them swipe their credit card to match the pattern to buy trinkets. Meanwhile, a dream about time challenges players to wait until the pause in the beat to bat away a flying clock. A dream about exercise has players hitting shoulder buttons to flex their right or left biceps. Melatonin then ups the challenge by speeding up the song, slowing it down and messing with the prompts.

Melatonin‘s strongest Rhythm Heaven influence is in the nature of the these prompts. While most modern titles often use a standardized set of visual cues to tell players the timing of the beat, Melatonin challenges players to listen to the beat for their cue. Most stages vary or even hide the prompts at certain points, forcing a player to pay attention to the audio as much as the visual. Helpfully, the game doesn’t throw a player into the deep end, as there’s a mandatory practice stage for every song and an explanation on the nature of each mechanic.

Melatonin also has assists that may help players with poor timing or those with disabilities. These can consist of adding a metronome beat, or permanently turning on the tutorial-style button prompts, which makes Melatonin a more “traditional” rhythm experience. Personally, I found the scoring assists which widens the “perfect” timing window to be the most helpful. Melatonin doesn’t penalize one for turning on assists either, which I appreciate as someone who was never a fan of the way some devs try to shame players who want to take it easy.

A while it’s a conceptually-perfect perfect love letter to Rhythm Heaven while still offering its own vibe, Melatonin isn’t free of the occasional sleep-disrupting issue. Without assists, play is surprisingly unforgiving on timing. Perhaps it’s just my own lack of skill (or my aging reflexes) but some stages were basically impossible for me to complete without turning on scoring assist. A few of the interactions also rely on an unintuitive understanding of the timing for their cues, as well.

Also, Melatonin is on the shorter side, clocking in at under three hours to get through all available stages. The included custom beatmap options and a personal quest to get a perfect score can add time to that number, but one could theoretically clear Melatonin in the time it takes to have a nice weekend nap.

With all that said, Melatonin never stopped putting a smile on my face. The pitch-perfect sound and visuals, along with the twist on Rhythm Heaven‘s under-imitated style make for a unique and memorable, if brief, experience. Consider it a compliment when I say that my time with Melatonin passed by like a pleasant dream.

Rating: 7 out of 10

Disclosures: This game is developed and published by Half Asleep Games. It is currently available for the PC, Switch and PS5. This review is based on a code provided by the publisher and reviewed on PS5. Approximately 2 hours of play were devoted to the single-player mode. There is no multiplayer mode. The game was completed.

Parents: This game is rated E by the ESRB, with content descriptors for Mild Fantasy Violence. The rating does not have a description, but if it did, it would probably read something like: “This is a story-driven rhythm game in which players control a young person in their dreams over the course of five nights. Players will attempt to hit buttons in time to the music and according to specific patterns in each stage. During the game the protagonist dreams of playing a video game where they shoot cartoon aliens.”

Colorblind Modes: The game has no colorblind modes.

Deaf & Hard of Hearing Gamers: Gameplay relies heavily on using audio cues, and in its default mode will gradually hide visual cues to further challenge the player. Assists are available in the accessibility menu to permanently enable visual timing cues, making the game playable for players that are deaf or hard of hearing. There is no voiced dialog in the game, and all text is rendered onscreen. This game is fully accessible (with the appropriate features turned on.)

Remappable Controls: This game’s button controls are not remappable.

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