Fallen Aces Preview - It's Gabagood

Fallen Aces is clearly a labor of love. Developed by Trey Powell and Jason Bond, this New Blood Interactive-published title nails this hand-drawn, noir-inspired mafia game and offers a compelling introduction to the crime-ridden city of Switchblade City. Main character Mike's adventure through these mean streets offers up a compelling story full of twists and turns. This is one tasty helping of gabagool, boys.

Fallen Aces -- the Next Great Immersive Sim?

Fallen Aces' story is surprisingly involved and features beautifully-crafted comic book style cutscenes. This serves as the perfect way to keep the narrative flowing without getting in the way of gameplay, which is where the real meat of Fallen Aces is.

This is a full-on immersive sim, no doubt about it. Fallen Aces offers unparalleled freedom in your approach to each and every situation. You'll go through the mean streets of Switchblade City, navigating ports full of goons, booby-trapped junkyards, fancy clubs, and more.

The best way to convey the total freedom Fallen Aces offers is by explaining how a typical mission goes. My favorite has Mike infiltrating an opulent mansion filled to the brim with goons. Find evidence for a murder, and get the hell outta' there. Quick and clean, right?

Mansion Infiltration

Fallen Aces doesn't hold your hand when it comes to your approach, so there are many different side pathways or hidden entrances and exits to your objective. Going through the front of the mansion? Bad idea -- there's armed thugs. I'll go around the side and look for a quiet side entrance.

This mission also equips you with some handy tools -- a blackjack (no doubt paying homage to Thief) and a tranquilizer gun. Perfect for my side objective, asking that I don't kill any bad guys throughout the mission. The side entrance is being patrolled, so I sneak up behind the guy and whack 'em with the blackjack, and hide his body for good measure so as not to alert the others.

It's worth noting that this mission takes place at night. Lights illuminate certain areas near the front of the house, but this side entrance I'm aiming for is covered by trees and the shadows will help keep me unseen. I hop the fence, take out a few more guards quietly, and find a side entrance to the kitchen.

Drat, more guards. They're all over the place like roaches, so I do what I do best -- be stealthy, and don't get caught. Only, a goon turns the corner and immediately knows I'm up to no good, so there goes my cover. Nothing a few fists can't fix.

Speak with Your Fists in Fallen Aces

The developers are bold to introduce a mostly melee-focused FPS game, but they've somehow succeeded. See, when stealth fails, you can always rely on your fists or blunt force object you might find in the environment. Fist-fighting is quick, punchy (in more ways than one!), and doesn't feel clunky at all.

You're able to parry or block blows from baddies, which adds just a bit more depth to the combat system. Though you're better off just whacking them over the head with a pipe or stabbing them with a broken bottle a few times. The environment is as much your weapon as the items you carry, so use it to your benefit.

In one instance, I saw a banana peel and I just knew that this could be useful. Throwing it down in front of a goon, he'll trip over in a comical way. That gumball machine in the corner store? Throw someone into that, it'll break, and these goofs'll start tripping on gumballs like a bunch of doofuses.

Stealthy or Not? The Choice is Yours in Fallen Aces

Switching between stealth and combat was my go-to for completing this mansion mission. With a complex layout and plenty of other entrances and exits, I made a quick escape after some more armed goons arrived to take Mike out.

This is the core gameplay loop for Fallen Aces, but if you're bold, you can go all-in without worrying about stealth. Sneaking in always provides a more intriguing and complex experience, however, as the thrill of not getting caught and finding weird or hidden paths forward is what I love about immersive sims such as this.

The other missions in Fallen Aces are just as compelling -- the finale of this first episode, in particular, feels even more lethal and high-stakes than the previous few. Finding a way into this great big nightclub with no real direction for my target, relying only on my senses -- it takes me back to that opera house from Thief.

In its current state, Fallen Aces is not a long experience, but it's still one I didn't want to end. There's one episode worth of content and it's polished as polished can be, and two more are on the way. If this is any indication of what we have in store for the other two, man, this game would make even Tony Soprano proud.

Fallen Aces was previewed on PC via Steam Early Access with a code provided by the developer over roughly 4 hours of gameplay - all screenshots were taken during the preview process.