There are no in-betweens when it comes to combining what seems, on the surface, to be a hodgepodge of conflicting genre staples. Either it works -- much to everyone's amazement the majority of times -- or it doesn't. It's not hard to see the intention -- an admirable one at that. When it seemingly feels like video games have reached the precipice of establishing entirely new genres no one has genuinely seen before, much like movies or music, is it all that surprising that the only way is to experiment and combine? On occasion it bears fruit in ways that on paper sound ridiculous, but end up anything but. The concept of a twin-stick styled, overhead shooter pretty much speaks for itself when it comes to what this brand of game entails mechanically and in presentation alike. So why not throw in the concept of vehicular movement, or in Gripper's case, moving about the arena-styled space on a motorbike. While you're at it, throw in some behind-the-character, anti-grav, tubular levels to conquer. Oh and a story, with voice-acting and an overall theme that appeals to the trendy nostalgia of '80s era cyberpunk-esque envisioning of what the future may sound, let alone look, like.

Commendable developer Heart Core's myriad of inspirations may be to see on-screen and in-play, it's harder still to share in the sentiment that the game is in anyway compelling. That its concocting one conflicted style of gameplay with another feels either interesting to dabble with and more so, interesting to see unravel. Easy it may be to claim Gripper, if anything, comes out worse due to the demo's short and surprisingly abrupt run-time of around thirty minutes. Though any and all conversation around what constitutes a "long enough" vertical slice if you will is an entirely separate matter that's not wholly exclusive to Heart Core's latest effort. The fact of the matter is, sadly, Gripper is one of those cases that falters twice-over in its first impression: the gameplay isn't long enough to construct a thorough or detailed response towards. And more damning of all: what there is here just isn't all that fun to engage with. Gripper may well herald an ambition to be creative in its pitch, but even from such a sparse demo such as this, that pitch doesn't exactly inspire confidence.

The first problem is the dialogue. Something which Heart Core, I'm sure, are not administering deliberately or through some naive sense of self-importance. But from the word go, it's hard to care about a narrative if the voice acting itself suggests a lack of direction. What little dialogue there is to hear delivered in the kind of flat, apathetic way that can only conjure thoughts of reading straight from a script and little more. Nothing to do with the scope or the limitations of the world itself; The Game Bakers' Furi was (to be a tad reductive here) little more than a set number of arenas and stylised corridors to mosey on through. Yet that game's cast of characters were satisfying to duke it out and engage with, not just because of their respective boss fights, but through their dialogue and all the nuanced ways they brought both their personalities and the lore to the forefront. Gripper has none of this; a few introductory slides that point to something more profound are quickly replaced by voice work that feels anything but.

Then you have the gameplay, possibly a more guilty culprit than something which you can forget about in due time. Because with what Gripper asks of you, it's hard to avoid similar frustration when it so often feels like the game is actively causing friction to work against you. Not that friction somehow exists, but that the game is eagerly wanting it to be there on top. The general loop during the more twin-stick controlled segments being that you're required to latch onto specific objects or projectiles to then fire them back at the main target or "boss" at the center of the arena. OK, you think, this is a break from the usual formula of firing some ammunition or weaponry or other such projectile at a given target. Gripper instead, you assume, requires more of a tactical edge to how you both attack and defend one's self from the flurry of hostiles and other such threats around you. Again, on paper, an admirable-enough attempt to deviate from the norm -- replacing infinite, already-possessed bullet-fire with a more snatch-and-grab opportunism to fight back and stave off one's vulnerability.

If only it didn't feel like said pitch was not only cumbersome to control, but rather demanding with just how repetitive and needlessly multi-step the process is. Instead of just firing back at a foe, you're telling me I have to scout for a viable projectile, pray I latch onto it -- which by the way is not instant, requiring you to fill a meter to pry it loose, whilst praying you don't get hit, which in turn forces you to start over -- line up my aim and then fire? All while ducking and weaving between foes that take considerable chunks of health out of you? A dodge mechanic, which the game spends little time either tutorialising or making sure you've understood properly, barely helping matters on top. Why not just, I dunno, give me a weapon to fire. Like any good, traditional, modestly-enjoyable twin-stick shooter does. Why Gripper have you made the pitch harder to get on-board with? And not in a way that's enjoyable to work out, nor similarly-fun to see unfold before me, amid these circular arenas of sorts. Not least when you find yourself resorting to doing mindless rings around a foe -- as much a consequence of just wanting to stay alive, let alone that the game makes it more frustrating to defend one's self than it should be.

Has it come to the point then that the tubular driving sections are but the only highlight here? That unlike the top-down combat of prior, Gripper does at least succeed in not complicating matters. Even going as far as to instill a modest amount of satisfaction in deducing the correct time to dodge, the correct time to move left and right and overall, learning from one's mistakes so as to reach the coveted end goal. An area you do want to invest in, if for a brief minute or two. As simplistic in presentation it is, the game is at its best when it's not trying to reinvent the wheel. When the objective is laid out in as simple and as straight-forward a manner as you can get: avoid what we throw at you and you're good.

It may well be that the combat evolves later on. That the story sparks so much into life that that rejuvenation spills over into the flat voice-work present. That, more importantly, Gripper doesn't lose sight of its gameplay being, first-and-foremost, easy to get into and apply. I can't say that even after such an extremely brief glimpse, that developer Heart Core's attempt to stand out and be different is all that compelling. And worse, it's a system I'm not keen to repeat over and over, be it for narrative reasons or something else entirely. When a multitude of prior releases in this respective niche of boss-rush, twin-stick action games, simply require you to move and hold down a trigger to strike back, Gripper instead demands more without much in the way of a satisfying feedback loop. It's a hard sell and one this game may unfortunately lack in the way of a sufficient-enough identity to back up.