Madness Accelerant

Newgrounds is, more or less, my source of browser-based games. I SOMETIMES play outside this comfortable box of cartoony glory, but not often (mainly because it's pop-up free!) - and as a result I've become at least partially aware of some recurring characters in their games. The weird stitch-faced doll things of Madness Accelerant are a good example.

Created by Tom Fulp, the more-or-less head honcho of Newgrounds, Madness Accelerant follows one such stitch-faced dude on a path of vengeance against a clown.

Somehow the clown can turn into a flaming demon, like so:

And you spend the entire game hunting him down... or getting hunted down by him... and fighting the clown in various underground, industrial locales, full of gun-toting thugs. It's all based on another Flash production, Madness Consternation, though unlike that movie this is playable.

What's the story behind it? I have no idea. You shoot stuff. A lot. That's the important thing, isn't it?

Concept

As mentioned, Madness Accelerant is based on an action-packed Flash movie (and a bunch of other 'Madness' movies before it), and thus is pretty damn action-packed itself: you spend the entire game in the thick of combat, either fighting the clown, his cronies, or both at the same time (typically both). It's a side-scrolling beat-em-up with lots of guns, and when you run out of ammo on one gun you beat up anybody nearby and take THEIR gun - which is easy to do, since new enemies WITH guns appear on the screen as soon as your old gun runs out of ammo.

Follow that?

Simple enough. Short answer, you kill things.

Controls

Though Madness Accelerant features the occasionally-maddening ASD configuration for control (or you can use a mouse, but I don't have that luxury when I'm sitting in bed - yay for being a writer), the game's pretty easy to navigate. A to fire, S to jump (and again to double jump), D to switch weapons with whatever's on the ground, directional keys to move around. Smooth, simple, satisfactory.

Graphics

The visuals on Madness Accelerant are, oddly enough, leaps and bounds beyond those of the original Flash movie, and pretty damn good for a browser game. It's a heavily industrial game cast in lots of greys and reds, and quite pretty to watch in motion.

There's only one problem with the visuals: sometimes there's so much going on on the screen that the game will get laggy. Yes, a browser game that gets laggy - never run across that before. This won't happen terribly often, though, and your guy has enough health that cheap deaths shouldn't be a big problem.

Sound

I am not terribly fond of the music in Madness Accelerant, but that's not a condemnation of the quality of the music - it's just not my cup of tea. Heavy rock/techno stuff that you'd expect from a game like this. What else can I say? The average gun-loving gamer should get a kick out of the soundtrack. It is, if nothing else, not overly distracting in any way.

Challenge Rating

Madness Accelerant is not difficult on your first play through. It's fairly short, and though there's a lot coming at you at one time the enemies follow very distinct patterns that are easy to learn and avoid. Three lives is more than enough to get through the game.

But then you beat the game, and find Madness mode, and it's a fair bit meaner with taking damage. You are warned. (Though keep in mind that you have to be a Newgrounds member to play.)

Conclusion?

Madness Accelerant is a neat game. The lack of variety in enemies hurts its overall score a little bit, but if you want a quick, fairly easy way to vent some repressed anger (with a gun!), this sucker's the way to go.

PLAY MADNESS ACCELERANT