New Blood Interactive's pulp detective immersive sim "Fallen Aces" is on sale right now, but the price of this slapstick noir caper may be equally newsworthy. With the intro price and launch discount, "Fallen Aces" is only $10, and after playing the first two of the intro episode's five levels, it's well worth the price.

PCG newsreader Andy Chalk once said that Fallen Aces was like Condemned: a cross between Criminal Origins and a Dick Tracy comic, and he was right. The level's '30s pop art and atmosphere is impeccable, but it's the Max Payne-esque comic book cutscenes that really knock you out. With more voice work than any other game New Blood has ever done, the Classico Noir characters have already won me over.

My secret hope was that Fallen Aces would scratch my rarely-fulfilled "Dark Messiah of Might and Magic" itch, and Arkane's second game is a moody, atmospheric environment. Instead of squatting and walking around, he took advantage of all the depth of the immersive sim and brought it to slapstick hijinks, like kicking enemies into a non-OSHA compliant bottomless swamp or leaving them to slide on an icy surface.

And "Fallen Aces" nails it. First of all, the levels are great, and they do a great job of recreating the "this is a real place, and it just keeps going and going" feeling of "Thief" or "Dishonored." The first mission allows you to explore multiple levels of apartments and surrounding city blocks, including a secretive comic book cafe and a confrontation with a donut shop. The second, on the other hand, feels like a homage to Thief 2's Shipping and Receiving, with an open-ended dockyard divided in two by a drawbridge.

There are always multiple ways to get past enemies and obstacles. At one point I was able to throw a stapler through an open window, push a button, and open a door, and while there is a gondola that can take you across the harbor to the second half of the mission, you can also climb to the roof of the warehouse and walk across the gondola's cable like a high-wire artist.

In "Fallen Aces" it was 100% possible to ghost, but I was never tempted to hit a quick load when caught. Jabs, crosses, and uppercuts are affected by the attack's charge time and direction of movement. It felt incredibly nice to hit enemies, and I loved how Fallen Aces found a way to have its cake and eat it too by allowing for flashy play while still preserving the no-kill playstyle. You can stun an enemy with your fists or a blunt weapon and then wake them up again if your friends find you. Killing someone doesn't earn you a Deus Ex-style reprimand, but there's a certain charm to the unlucky goons that makes killing them a little more conscience-racking. Not so much as not vaporizing the entire squad with the occasional exploding barrel.

Anything in the environment can be picked up and thrown, a nice new twist on Fallen Aces' already improvised combat. Usually, it's trash cans, drums, or discarded melee weapons that stagger enemies or interrupt long-range attacks before they can close the gap, but there's no shortage of bright red, beautiful gas canisters, so even a six-on-one fight was a piece of cake. I would also be remiss if I didn't mention the tactical banana peel: when you find a banana, eating it increases your strength slightly, and the peel causes the enemy to stumble, leading to an instant kill or takedown.

Also, Fallen Aces will be on the opposite arc from most digital distribution prices, as New Blood will be adding episodes in early access (two more episodes will be added after the just-released episode) in a post on Steam, outlined plans to increase the game's price. Late adopters have to pay more.

In the age of the eternal "I'll wait until it's on sale" this makes a certain kind of business sense. While I'm not a big fan of playing a game in Early Access bit by bit, this first episode of Fallen Aces is already worth $10; Fallen Ace's launch sale lasts until June 21, after which the price goes up to $13