Sibella is a mad scientist chemistry professor at a university.  She’s just created a love potion and wants to try it out on everyone she comes across.  Naturally the students, faculty, and even law enforcement will try to stop her.  Guide Sibella as she tosses syringes at people and robots in her crazy quest for love in this Mega Man inspired 2D platformer.  It’s available on PlayStation consoles and Switch, but reviewed on PS4 here.

Sibella can run and jump, and throw syringes straight ahead with a button.  Play control is very much like Mega Man, and the pixel graphics help seal the feel.  Robots just explode when shot, but humans and other living things will stop attacking and have hearts all around them. You can then get close to them and trigger an animation of Sibella hugging or kissing that person or petting a monster.

There are only three stages in the game, but they are very long.  Too long, really.  They’re probably about the size of three regular Mega Man levels.  Each stage has a mid-boss and a final boss.  When you defeat one, you’ll get a weapon from them that you can use by switching to them with the shoulder buttons.  These weapons include bouncy spread shots, screen clear rain, travelling on the ground, etc.  Special weapons take energy, and you can refill that energy by collecting purple pills.  Green pills restore some of your regular energy, and if you run out of that by getting hit, you’ll lose a life.  Lose all lives and it’s Game Over and you must start the stage over again from the beginning. You can pick up extra lives along the way, too.   While I am a big fan of Mega Man games, I lost interest in this one pretty quickly because of the tedious and unfair level design.

Kid Factor:

Love Chemistry – Sibella’s Formula is rated E-10 with ESRB descriptors of Fantasy Violence and Mild Language.  I didn’t notice any bad language, and you just throw syringes and other silly weapons at robots that explode and people that just get hearts around them.  When you lose all your energy, you just fall over and burst into bubbles, also just like Mega Man.  I’m surprised this didn’t get an ESRB descriptor of Suggestive Themes.  Even the game warns you at the beginning there is lots of forced hugging and kissing, and your character is rather bouncy if you know what I mean.  But the pixel graphics negate a lot of the realism.  Reading skill is helpful for the text, and younger gamers may find it too difficult.  One of the few games I’d say is best for teens and older, not what the ESRB says.

Tags: Game Reviews