Developer Strange Scaffold has released the post-launch content roadmap for its latest title, I Am Your Beast. Many interesting new features are on the way, including more le??vels, mod??es, and angry scope-ripping.

The roadmap for I Am Your Beast was posted on Steam to celebrate the game's launch. It shows that there's a lot still on the way and that the game is worth hopping into early if you like the look of the gameplay. Alongside the new modes and levels promised are controller support and the ability to rip scopes off of sniper rifles to give the game more "Doom (2016) vibes, basically."

More features for more fans

Strange Scaffold explained in its roadmap post that the passion for I Am Your Beast has been noticed, which is why it's pushing to get these post-launch features out there. It wants to repay all those players who de??lved into the game's demo and everyone who broke it with their speedruns.

The features that are yet to come to the ga?me are ??as follows:

• No Timer Mode: A mode that allows you to disable level timers if you don't want to play with them on.
• More Levels: Extra levels that push the boundaries of what is challenging and weird in I Am Your Beast.
• Expanded Level Overview: More insight into how you performed in each level so you can optimize every run.
• Controller Binding: The game didn't have controller support at launch but it should arrive shortly.
• Scope Ripping: As I mentioned at the top of this article, this feature will add extra rage into the game so that Alphonse rips the scopes off of sniper rifles to enhance the frenetic rage deep in the game's DNA.

I Am Your Beast sees you blast? through remote woodlands, taking out soldiers using whatever you can get your hands on in a furious fr??enzy of revenge over being pulled out of retirement for one last job. The game provides an overview of your flow through each level and encourages replayability with a timer so you can see if you're able to beat your last run.

The meat of I Am Your Beast is the moment-to-moment gameplay in which you rush around each level, taking enemi?es out as you go. It's fast-paced and fun and includes a movement system that feels like one where anything?? is possible if you just master it and get enough practice to run, gun, shoot, and repeat.

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While El Paso, Elsewhere was among my favorite games released last year, this year’s offering from Strange Scaffold has left me somewhat cold. That’s okay. Clickolding and Life Eater were pretty ex?perimental and they ??just didn’t gel with me.

I was going to overlook I Am Your Beast. Something about its trailers didn’t gel with me, either. At this point?, I can’t even remember what it was that made me stick my nose up at it. That’s because when I actually sat down to play it, it didn’t take long to gel with me at all.

I Am Your Beast (PC [Reviewed])
Developer: Strange Scaffold
Publisher: Strange Scaffold, Frosty Pop
Released: September 10, 2024
MSRP: $19.99

You play as Alphonse Harding, who is very violently opposed to doing one last job for his employer, the COI. He was, supposedly, told many times before that doing one last bit of wetwork would free him from his employment, and now he’s just done. ?Jaded would be putting it lightly. He react??s to being pulled out of retirement by killing every one of his co-workers in the area. When more get sent in, he kills them, too.

I Am Your Beast is pretty loose with its narrative. It’s hard to really get a feel for the stakes, as it’s la?rgely just you in a forest, killing anyone wearing khaki in the area. The job, your employer, and the goals behind them are left pretty vague. They sound cynical, but so does everything else. The enemy soldiers are extremely blasé about the whole “being killed by a hyper-competent?? mega-soldier�thing. It either sounds like an expected outcome or an annoying inconvenience.

Harding is also voiced by Xalavier Nelson Jr. (the director at Strange Scaffold), and he’s largely just the same character as James Savage from El Paso, Elsewhere. He speak??s in a low, overly-calm voice with a cutting, lighthearted edge. If Alphonse Harding had turned out to be James Savage having a nightmare at the end of the game, I probably wouldn’t have been surprised. I mean, I really like that voice. The dialogue is fun, and the delivery is great. It’s just�the same character with a different backstory. 

The narrative als??o lacks depth, mainly delivering cliches of action movies with hyper-competent, nigh-invincible protagonists �my favorite kind of action movie �and it’s really hard to tell if it’s taking itself seriously.

The game itself, on the other hand, clearly doesn’t take? itself seriously. It’s an action game of the highest speed. You’re challenged to complete simple objectives and exit the level as quickly as possible. Sometimes, this involves killing all the enemies, and other ??times, you just need to touch a few laptops. However, your expedience is what is really important.

I’m having some difficulty recalling a movement system I enjoyed as much as I Am Your Beast. While it has some parkour elements, it’s not focused around them. You can climb trees and cross wires, but you can’t, say, run on walls. There’s no diving like in Max Payne (or El Paso, Elsewhere, for that matter.) T?here is also no bullet time to help you make sense of t?he chaos.

Where it’s successful is where most games find their success in combat: it’s very readable. It’s easy to tell what object you’re about to grab from the environment, and whenever you hit an enemy in the face with something, you know that their weapon is going to come flying out of their hand directly into your path of movement. It makes picking up a branch, throwing it at an enemy, stomping on their head, catching their knife, and then hurling that at another enemy both possible and intuitive without needing to boil it? down to dedicated interactions or QTEs.

It’s clearly a game based around the philosophy of making the player feel powerful. Enemies will bark out ridiculous, panicked statements lik?e “Harding’s using headshots!�just to fluff up your ego. Marketing material calls it “he's-in-the-walls player fantasy,�which feels appropriate.

It doesn’t last very long, though. Or, at least, it doesn’t maintain that momentum for long. I clocked in at 2 hours. It pulls the brakes on you a couple of times, the first requiring you to complete a certain number of optional objectives and the second requiring an S rank on at least one level. The cutscenes, which are almost exclusively big dialogue subtitles displayed across a pan over a forest, actually take up a large amount of runtime. My husband complained that every time he looked at my screen, all he saw were s?ubtitles.

However, the main narrative serves just as a foundation for the gameplay. It encourages you to complete side objectives and try and increase your rank on each level. It doesn’t really reward you very well, but being able to act with its frenetic combat is its own reward. That’s actually quite refreshing since a lot of games these days prop themselves up with minuscule prizes to keep you interested. I Am Your Beast just lets the fun do the talking.

The soundtrack is also enjoyable, but because the game just felt like a flash of entertainment to me, it was hard to really take it all in. It’s the same composer as El Paso, Elsewhere, and I kept listening to that soundtrack after the game was done, so I’m happy. Xalavier Nelson Jr.?? lends his vocals to a few tracks again, which I enjoy, even if it furthers the feeling that he’s typecasting himself.

I Am Your Beast is weak in some areas, but not significantly so. A large portion of it is just fine, but what’s good is really good. It manages a combat system that is fast and chaotic while still remaining intuitive, which is an impressive feat. Part of me wonders if something like this could be applied across a wider, longer game without diluting it. As it is, I Am Your Beast applies it perfectly, making it a short-lived but impactful?? ex??perience.

_{[This review is based on a retail build of the game provided by the publisher.]}

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It’s late notice, but Strange Scaffold has announced that they need more time to deliver their micro-sandbox FPS, I Am Your Beast. It was originally slated for August 15, but has be?en pushed back to September 10.

It’s always a difficult decision to delay a game’s launch, but personally, I’m a bit relieved. There wa?s no way I’d have time to play it for review this week. Next month? Possibly!

In a Twitter post, Strange Scaffold said, â€??œWe want to make sure it’s as breathtaking as you expect and ?we know it can be, while letting our team hit that goal in a healthy and sustainable way.â€?Healthy and sustainable? In this economy?

Furthermore, the information I got from their PR is that this is to en?sure the game is stable. It happens. Sometimes bug squashing and polish doesn’t go as smoothly as hoped.

I Am Your Beast is a fast-paced “covert revenge thriller FPS�that has yo??u sprinting through hordes of ??enemies, taking them out in fanciful ways. It focuses on player fantasy, making you feel powerful and hyper-powerful.

There was a demo during Steam Next Fest this past June, but I was recovering from a nervous breakdown and wasn’t able to fit it into my schedule. I figured I’d circle around to it anyway, since I’ve been keeping an eye on Strange Scaffold for a while. El Paso, Elsewhere was one of my favorite games of last year. This year, I wasn’t as keen on Life Eater or Clickolding, but I appreciate their vision. Playing a game that tries something interesting but misses the mark is much more meaningful than playing one that competently does nothing special. Hopefully, I Am Your Beast is both interesting and hits the mark.

I Am Your Beast will now release on PC September 10, 2024.

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Strange Scaffold, the developer of the kidnapping simulator Life Eater, has revealed its next title, I Am Your Beast. It's a fi??rst-person shooter and covert thriller title in which you exact revenge on those asking a little too much of?? you and learn to hate wasps.

In I Am Your Beast, you play as returned secret agent Alphonse Harding. The prob??lem is his retirement has been interrupted by 'one last mission' a few too many times, and now he's out for revenge. The latest mission quickly descends into a guerrilla war between Harding and his employers, the Covert Operations Initiative, and will see you shooting through a forest full of enemies while using the weapons aimed at your head to take them down.

Take fast-paced revenge to a whole new level in I Am Your Beast

You can play the I Am Your Beast demo right now by heading to its Steam page and trying it out. The game launches for PC on August 15, 2024, via Steam, and will come to iOS slightly later on August 28, 2024.

Strange Scaffold's Xalavier Nelson Jr. revealed I Am Your Beast during the PC Gaming Show 2024. Alongside the trailer, ?he hinted at his newfound hatred for wasps, and there's actually a clip in the video that reveals where this might have come from.

The?? game is designed for you to quickly take down enemies and then use their weapon??s to keep up your killing spree. In addition to firearms, you can use melee weapons to take out your foes and even drop wasp nests onto them. Just watch out for the inevitable stings because you've got to move fast through this game, or you'll be taken out fairly quickly.

I Am Your Beast features a fully-voiced story with over 20 levels to shoot your way through, delivering on a 'he's-in-the-walls' power fantasy with head-exploding power to boot. The comic book art style might not be for everyone, but as a fan of the original XIII, I instantly want to dive in.

This isn't a linear adventure, with open sandbox levels to explore and chase objectives, as well as the overarching goal. With such a big focus on speed and stealth, it's hard to imagine how these side objectives will work, but Strange Scaffold has ?a portfolio of games that subvert expectations and end up giving you some of the most enjoyable experiences. So I'm confident it's going to get this right as well.

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