This extra appendage could so easily have been a simple quirk of character design, inconsequential to the player, but the developers seem to relish finding uses for it. Aidan’s third arm, an admittedly dubious sounding gimmick, comes into play as an ace in the hole a defence-breaker, a gun-shooter, and a power weapon that can deal huge amounts of damage when charged. A chunkiness to its animations and a casual looseness to its hit-boxes that makes it simply delightful to, say, clobber three baddies at once and dart away with a dodge roll to avoid a sniper’s bullet. There’s something of the 16-bit era in how it all moves. It’s not what you’d call slick: it’s scrappy and daft. Unfortunately for them, you have three fists, and a personal stake in getting the job done.
Making good on the title, his latest mark is fleeing the scene, leaving you at the mercy of his henchmen. Thrown into a job gone awry, bounty hunter and Robocop-helmeted protagonist Aidan starts the game in mid-pursuit. It has the gadgets, and the swagger, but none of the exploring and backtracking.
If you’ve always liked the idea of Metroidvanias but never had the patience for them, They Always Run might well have been invented just to scratch your particular itch.
