Stealth Inc., Originally Stealth Bastard: Tactical Espionage Arsehole on PC (before Sony and the censors got their cunting hands on it), was one of my favourite games of the last few years. A challenging, original and hilarious take on the stealth action genre, Stealth Bastard was a brilliant blend of twitch platforming and tight puzzle design that was as masochistic as it was ingenious. Meat Boy meets Sam Fisher at Aperture Science, if you will.
The original was a series of increasingly fiendish puzzle rooms with zero plot, other than to complete each test chamber whilst sacrificing hundreds of thousands of clones as they get crushed by the shifting environment, cut up by lasers and murdered by angry robots. Stealth Inc. 2 tells the tale of a single runaway clone that escapes from a test chamber during a shutdown procedure. It’s then up to the player to guide the clone to freedom whilst attempting to help as many of his little clone buddies as possible to escape from their test chambers, too.
Meanwhile, our tubby little hero is dogged by the scientist whose test chamber you escaped from. Should the game’s hero manage his prison-break he’ll be in a hell of a lot of trouble. That and the fact that your darling little homunculus is the only thing in the way of him getting the employee of the month award for killing the most clones.
This tale of man v. clone is framed by some basic, but entertaining cut scenes, although it’s the constant taunting that your clone receives as he traverses the game’s ever-expanding maze-like over world that brings the conflict to life. The clone is taunted, tormented, prodded and pushed into the game’s increasingly-sadistic test chambers by an unseen and omnipotent force that attempts to block your escape at every turn. It becomes increasingly more erratic and furious as you continually slip through the net.
It keeps much of the cynical and biting tone of the original, as well as heaps of black comedy, with brutal slapstick woven into the very fabric of the gameplay. Once again, the game breaks the forth wall in the most delightful of ways, leaving you messages on the walls of the levels as they unfold. These messages sarcastically undermine your achievements and openly mock you every time you fail. Which you will. Hundreds, if not thousands of times.
Like its predecessor, Stealth Inc.2 is an absolute arsehole of a game. After sucking you in with a few simple chambers that introduce you to your clone’s basic platforming abilities to run, jump, hang from ledges stand on switches and hack door terminals, the game takes its rule book, tears it up in front of your face and throws you to the uncaring whims of its maniacal antagonist. It lays on numerous new additions to the rules as your clone is issued with all manner of gadgets to help him overcome the increasingly-complex death traps he’s funnelled through. Among many others, you’re given a device to hack enemy robots (which are then controlled with the right analogue stick) and an inflatable platform (complete with clown nose and smiley face) which is used to prop up falling parts of the scenery, block laser beams and toss you to greater heights. Occasionally it will also crush you by accident, because that’s just the kind of game this is
Each of the gizmos is put to ingenious use in their respective rooms, expertly designed to keep you scratching your head and splattering the bloodied remains of your clone over and over again until the pin drops and the solution presents itself to you. Like its predecessor, Stealth inc.2 is a harsh mistress, tough but fair, and incredibly addictive. However, this won’t stop you swearing like a sailor after your clone doesn’t quite get into cover properly and gets blasted into pieces by a laser for what feels like the hundredth time.
Although the chambers themselves represent some of the best puzzle platforming on the Wii U (or any other platform for that matter), the overworld feels like an afterthought. For all its fun, Metroidvania trappings, with new areas opening up as you increase your arsenal of gadgets, if you take a wrong turn you’ll often find yourself having to needlessly re-negotiate some of the game’s trickier obstacles.
However, despite this particular bugbear, the transition between overworld and chambers is pretty smooth and the facility is diverse, huge and charming. The game’s simple visual style, with a cast that can almost be described as cute, belies the game’s complexity and incredibly dark humour.
In single player, Stealth Inc. 2 Is basically an expanded version of its predecessor but like Portal 2, it becomes a very different beast in co-op. Unlocked once you have completed the introductory chambers, Co-op mode tasks one player with guiding the clone through the test chambers, using a Wiimote and Nunchuck (or ideally a Gamepad Pro), and the other uses the Wii U Gamepad to control the world around them like some benevolent AI, moving platforms, deploying gadgets and hiding the clone from cameras.
The easiest way to describe it is as an odd mix of the Murphy stages in Rayman Legends and many of the asynchronous multiplayer concepts introduced in Nintendoland. It requires constant communication between players as the person using the game pad inputs codes needed to open doors and hacks terminals displayed on the TV, while the gamepad player can often see hidden enemies and other pitfalls that are not visible on the TV screen.
As well as local multiplayer, the game also features an incredibly robust set of online features, including the usual Miiverse functionality and automatically-updated leaderboards. It gives the player the ability to share levels and download additional levels made by others using the game’s comprehensive Level editor.
The editor itself, despite not having any kind of manual or tutorials attached to it, is pretty easy to use. After selecting how big you want your level to be, you simply select the environmental structures, enemies, switches and other odds and sods to populate your blank canvas however you want using either analogue sticks or touch controls. Although it’s a little daunting at first, it really doesn’t take much time at all before you’re building all kinds of devious death traps for the community to kill themselves in.
With a plethora of content (potentially endless thanks to the level editor), some of the best multiplayer to be found on the Wii U and the infuriating yet satisfying ‘just one more try’ sensibilities that make you late for work when you started playing the night before, Stealth Inc. 2 is simply one of the best downloadable titles on the Wii U. It’s tough but fair, funny but cutting. It’s a double hard bastard!
