Cuphead: The Delicious Last Course: hands on with the new DLC

Cuphead fans have waited five long years for the game’s expansion, Last Course!, and it’s finally almost here. This add-on is available on all platforms starting June. One of the expansion’s new bosses, Mortimer Freeze, brings new challenges and new gameplay systems to Cuphead’s style of run-and-gun fun, and Polygon recently spent the better part of an hour trying to take him down at a hands-on event.

Mortimer Freeze is a three-phase boss that we’ve briefly glimpsed in its first form in the Cuphead DLC’s release date announcement trailer at the end of 2022. We saw the boss’ second and third phases during the Summer Games Fest 2022 livestream. At the Summer Game Fest Play Days event in Los Angeles, I resolved to battle the boss until I’d bested it, which took dozens of attempts across about 45 minutes.

To fight Ms. Chalice I controlled. Cuphead’s new DLC character. She brings several new abilities to the table compared to Cuphead and Mugman: She has an extra point of HP, an inherent double jump that’s independent of parrying, and a dodge roll, plus her dash can act as a parry when you connect with a pink object. These abilities give her an edge over the game’s original characters, making it easier to take down tough foes.

However, playing as Ms. Chalice isn’t an automatic win button; her abilities will take time to master — particularly the dodge roll, which requires pressing the dash button while holding down on the control stick. That’s not so simple to perform in the heat of combat, but the invincibility frames it provides will make it worth working into your repertoire.

The Mortimer Freeze fight seemed designed to show off Ms. Chalice’s dodge roll and dash parry. The first Mortimer form was a magician flying above Ms. Chalice’s head, dropping Tarot cards and large fishes from the sky. His small, unpredictable ice creatures were especially difficult to dodge. Trying to jump out of their way got me killed multiple times until I learned to use Ms. Chalice’s dodge roll to avoid taking damage from them. In the meantime, it was satisfying for her to utilize her dash parary to gain Super Art energy using slow-moving pink Tarot card cards.

Mortimer is now a Abominable Snowman-style creature, with a bucket at its head. Mortimer rolls along the screen, stopping sometimes after a roll and stringing three together before launching into the air to complete the roll. As a result, attempting to jump over him proved unwise, since it was difficult to predict when he’d launch into the air instead of rolling across the ground.

Other deadly threats are also available to the snowman shape. The snowman transforms into a refrigerator and produces ice cubes. They break down into smaller pieces after impacting the ground. It also unleashes flying popsicles that careen at you out of the sky during subsequent attacks, adding to the fight’s already considerable chaos. It also summons several blades from the snow, which are often used by the boss. I suffered a lot of damage when they arrived while I was trying to dodge flying popsicles.

The third phase was the hardest. It took me several tries before I got there. Mortimer transformed into a huge flying snowflake, and the arena slid upward into the air with Ms. Chalice’s feet. To make the battleground dangerous and deadly, I needed to jump quickly to floating platforms.

The boss, in snowflake shape, throws buckets across the screen. They release small crescent moons which bounce back at the audience after they hit the wall. Mortimer can also fly an electric eyeball through the room and move in opposition to the floating platforms. Multiple vertical bursts are fired by the eye before it returns to the boss. It is extremely hard to avoid getting hurt. Also, the snowflake shape summons sharp icecream cones. These cones form a circular circle around your platforms and then move toward the center of the screen.

Luckily, Ms. Chalice’s other abilities made dealing with this form slightly more manageable. The alternative Chaser Gun of Ms. Chalice, which fires green star projectiles that hit the boss regardless of my direction, helped me focus more on avoid its unpredictability and jumping on rapidly-moving snow platforms. The DLC is familiar with this attack. In addition, I got into the habit of saving up Ms. Chalice’s Super Art, a highly damaging vertical beam of light that stretches above and below her, for Mortimer Freeze’s third and most difficult phase.

I conceded defeat after countless attempts and we were not able to beat the boss, despite all our efforts. This was until the end, when I saw the boss. Cuphead Station was empty, and no one was there. I looked around and decided to keep trying, even if the security guards kicked me out. Mortimer Freeze finally left after several more failed attempts. Predictably, it was the most rewarding thing I’d done all day.

Cuphead: The Last Delicious CourseIt will be available on the Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4 and Windows PC (via Steam or GOG) and Xbox One starting at $7.99