Tower Hunter: Erza’s Trial
A good game with broken mechanics.
Mostly simple, kill hordes of enemies and move forward. The game doesn’t really help with any direction on things that can be done, it’s mostly up to us which means a player can probably go through the entire game without knowing some very basics mechanics that can be done. There is hardly anything in the game to read or explore more on, sometimes even the minuscule help it offers will be hard to understand. One simply has to hope they understood the message it conveys.
– Real player with 47.7 hrs in game
Read More: Best Roguevania Action Roguelike Games.
### ”A potential rogue-like metroidvania where the death is learning…“
Tower Hunter: Erza’s Trial is a mixture of metroidvania and rogue-like element developed by indie IceSea Team of two people. It adapts into side-scrolling game with the influence of soul-like mainstream. Yet still have some flaws and require polishing during Early Access (currently 3 playerable levels). It’s risk-reward fun for people who seek a challenge.
Story and Presentation
Set in the hybrid fantasy world with some modern tech elements, the world design is clean, well-produced texture, and colorful. You play as a young maiden named “Erza”who specialize in close combat and ice spells. She has to prove herself by conquering mysterious tower to prove hunter’s license and get rid of wedding plan. The story is simple and straightforward, but what lies on the top of tower is quite intriguing. You spend most of time chatting with Devil companion between the levels as I hope they develop relationship through the story.
– Real player with 42.6 hrs in game
Ghost 1.0
Game Overview
Ghost 1.0 is an indie metroidvania that is set on a sci-fi world where robots and machinery are becoming a trend to humanity, whatever the purpose for them may be.
You play as “Ghost”, a digital ghost who performs mercenary work and was hired by two genius hackers in their attempt to uncover the secrets behind the success of the Nakamura Corporation with their robots. Your mission is to infiltrate the Nakamura Space Station and steal their Artificial Intelligence algorithms.
– Real player with 50.8 hrs in game
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Ghost 1.0 is one of the best modern Metroidvanias you can buy and definitely sits alongside Axiom Verge as a standout of the recently quite crowded genre. Unlike Axiom Verge however which follows the formula to the letter Ghost 1.0 finds its own way and throughout the course of the game constantly throws in surprises and breaks conventions that really make it stand out.
The premise of Ghost 1.0 sees 2 hackers hire a mysterious agent (you) in order to infiltrate the Nakamura Space station in order to learn its secrets. Ghost is an agent capable of taking on the form of an electronic ghost and taking over Androids at will allowing you to control your main android body or a number of other androids around the station and it is this mechanic that really shines through as the game’s unique selling point.
– Real player with 46.5 hrs in game
Sundered®: Eldritch Edition
After a few day’s worth of playtime on this game, I feel like I’d like to toss in my two cents on it. By two cents, I should clarify that I mean many paragraphs. this review will not be short, and I apologise. Sundered, on the whole, is a good game. There are several elements that merit critique in my eyes, though they didn’t detract from the game so much as to merit a negative review. With that out of the way, let’s dive in to some thoughts and ramblings.
Firstly, I should say also that this game has quickly become one of my all time favorites. The atmosphere, the artwork, the enemy design and storytelling all are favorites of mine, and I think they’re exceedingly clever and engaging. However, even when you take away my biased opinions, the game stands up to scrutiny, with well designed gameplay and mechanics (as well as story and the other previously mentioned aspects).
– Real player with 82.7 hrs in game
Read More: Best Roguevania Action Roguelike Games.
Well, you can tell by my hours of gameplay that I really enjoyed this game and got the most out of it, even the bad out of it.
The harshness of the reviews left me really unsure, in the first few minutes, no matter how much I was enjoying, the game design made me fear for what people have said, so let me clarify a few things.
TL:DR
Great game, very challenging, beautiful animation, exploration is rewarded, so is proper strategy (Change your routes and upgrade luck early, please). The randomness is not unfair, it is not unfair, your skills matter. Bosses are great, minibosses often suck. The major flaw is making the “good” path so poor, but the rest is brillant. If you want to have 1 run and the best experience, I’d say “Put the hardest difficulty and fully embrace”
– Real player with 58.2 hrs in game
Abyss Odyssey
score: 2.5/5
tl;dr: clunky combat married with splendid art direction and severe lack of content
| difficulty: | 3/5 | time to finish: | 5-10h |
| fun-factor: | 3/5 | presentation: | 3.5/5 |
achievements
| difficulty: | 3.5/5 | time to 100%: | 20h+ |
| DLC: | - | multiplayer: | Online Champion |
| date-based: | - | glitched: | - |
– Real player with 27.9 hrs in game
I’d like to break the game down for you in this review. I’m gonna talk about the combat mechanics, the visuals, and the various features that make it stand out as a platformer/fighting game. When reading about this game you see it compared to Super Smash Brothers, Dark Souls, ect. The truth is that with its combined features, Abyss Odyssey does not at all play like any of the games anyone is comparing it to. So, in an effort to give you a realistic perspective of what you can expect in this game, lets get started.
– Real player with 25.9 hrs in game
Dark Devotion
Short review: 9/10
Long review: This may get rambly, I don’t usually write reviews, but this game is awesome. I’m also gonna make a few comparisons to Souls games.
This game is incredible. It’s got nice style, it’s got good music, it has some pretty fun mechanics that make it feel like I could keep playing it for a very long time, even if I did beat it.
What’s good about this game?
Just about everything.
Combat and general gameplay mechanics.
It feels like it’s taken the best of the souls series, and compressed it into 2D. It feels incredible, responsive, and has some fun stuff you can change up for different builds. It has its own fairly unique leveling system, where you essentially keep your upgrades and XP when you die, but lose all of your gear. It allows you to choose from quite a few weapons straight from the start when you die, so it’s not like dying nets you losing everything you’ve picked up along the way. It just makes it so you start back with your basic load out. As you play through, enemies can, and usually will, drop weapons that are able to be picked up. Some people may not enjoy this, but it makes the game super fun in my opinion, as it forces variety in builds.
– Real player with 37.1 hrs in game
Awesome game, had a great time with it.
With its stamina-based combat, punishing difficulty and a bleak dark fantasy setting, Dark Devotion inevitably draws comparison to Dark Souls. Yet, players expecting simply a 2D version of the influential RPG will instead find a very different game that belongs more in the action category, with some platforming and rogue-like elements.
–
Every time you start the game or your character dies, you go back to the shelter having lost all of your possessions. You must then leave the shelter through one of several doors, each leading to a different area in the game world, and attempt to reach the next point of progress. Aside from one, these doors must be unlocked first by reaching their respective areas on foot.
– Real player with 29.7 hrs in game
TOKOYO: The Tower of Perpetuity
Very good daily run roguelite tower climber. The lack of a primary attack and reliance on a single slow-recharge bomb makes the entire thing feel a lot more like a danmaku game than a platformer. Characters are pretty diverse and have completely different styles of bomb attack which leads to needing to play them in completely different ways. Using the foxgirl you need to hold back and allow the missiles to home, while the maid boy (cute) needs to get very close and whack into enemies. Powerups being random and tied to player corpses makes each run feel just unique enough to make you change up your playstyle, but the powerups are weak enough that succeeding in a run still feels like a test of skill instead of luck.
– Real player with 24.6 hrs in game
even though it’s in early access game you can still enjoy what the game offers! the gameplay is very fun even without a “normal attack” as you journey through the tower you learn you use your skill better and find better items to assist you.
the graphics are amazing and the pixel art style just has a unique charm that just makes everything so cute! the game reminds me of older arcade games I used to play
the game easily worth $10 and can offer tons of fun.
the social features are very fun and I hope that they get expanded on more!
– Real player with 16.9 hrs in game
Xenon Valkyrie
I got Ending C (a bad one) and, after 22 hours, that’s good enough for me. I had originally thought I could put this in my “cleared” pile much sooner, but it turned out to be a bigger hurdle than I’d anticipated. And while I do genuinely enjoy the presentation and the tunes are great, the gameplay loop itself is not particularly varied or engaging. Luck also plays an annoyingly large role in determining a good run, as while you can use a VERY slowly accumulated currency to unlock powerful new weapons, it’s entirely up to chance whether those weapons will randomly turn up in a chest during a run. You might just find the same weapon you have equipped! There are also enemies who can catch you off-guard and ruin a run quickly, such as a jumping skull that explodes when it touches you, or a robot that fires explosive bullets that might send his body flying right into you.
– Real player with 21.8 hrs in game
UPDATE! The dev has been listening to player feedback, and has pretty much fixed, repaired, optimized almost everythign we asked for!
Better sword attack range?
check
Hp in the levels themselves?
check
cheaper shops?
check.
And hes’s not done, this game is shaping up to be very very VERY good now.
check the review date for negative reviews, they mjight not be aware this dev is a hard worker!@
I was eagerly anticipating this game, at it’s current state. it’s alright. But I feel it needs a few things to make it really good and fun to play as well.
– Real player with 10.8 hrs in game
Metal Unit
Metal Unit is a fun little Side scrolling game with rouge-like elements. You’ll probably find similarities if you’ve played games like Dead Cells.
The progression is quite slow, since you’re running around with epic items around chapter 3 but your character is still weak as fuck. The rate at which you gain your Secondary Currency (CC Gems) is sluggish. You get a bunch for dying and you lose all your items and reset the chapter but you’re only going to get about 8-12. Which gets you maybe one or two skill investments like health, resistances etc. Which is fine in the beginning but it fails to scale how far you’re into the game. Chests are fairly common now which is a nice change and you can also buy one from a Random NPC if he spawns. Not as slow progress as it used to be but it’s imporving.
– Real player with 27.4 hrs in game
Metal Unit is a surprisingly accessible roguelite 2D side scrolling platformer released in 2021, that has a large amount of enemy types, excellent selection of weapons, tight control scheme, substantial crafting system and a plot that quickly becomes quite dark the further you progress. The price is good for what you get and I highly recommend picking it up.
Story
Humanity has been decimated and is stuck in the middle between a war amongst the monstrous creatures coming up from the middle of the earth and the aliens invading from space. You play as Joanna, the amnesic pilot of Metal Unit 11 who is out to discover why her sister defected from humanity to work for the aliens. While the story arc is only over 5 chapters it twists a fair bit but can’t really be described in more detail otherwise the plot hooks will be spoiled. At the end there are just as much questions that are left unanswered, even when collecting all the manual fragments to piece the background story together. A lot of the NPC’s responses to the character make a lot more sense the further you get into the game.
– Real player with 23.5 hrs in game
SHIRO
“Boot Successful."
Awoken by a quake of unknown origin, a lone android opens her eyes in the depths of a top-secret laboratory. Why is it so empty? Why are these doors… locked? The silence is… deafening.
SH1-R0 follows a rogue android through the story of her two-sided conflict caused by the mistakes of an eons-dead alien race, and the ambitions of humans that are on the verge of repeating them.
As a highly advanced combat android, string together earth-shaking combos to crush waves of enemies while you explore labyrinthine high-security facilities all over Earth… and from beyond the stars.
Your combat abilities are unimpeded by the length of your weapon. Pick your fighting style and bring enemies down to your own turf or take the fight to them!
Unlock advanced movement abilities to reach new areas, and blaze through familiar ones with blinding speed. Dash, climb, crawl, and wall-jump, your exploration arsenal is fully-loaded.
Explore mazelike laboratories, high-tech military posts, and ocean-borne floating utopias with sprawling pathways, doors, and puzzles. The map doesn’t tell the full story!
Features:
High-Speed Combat – Take on entire battalions of enemy soldiers and alien defense mechanica with lightning-fast movement abilities and fluid combat abilities. Frame-perfect controls offer simple-to-learn, difficult-to-master combat that is satisfying to both genre-newcomers and veterans alike. Find your playstyle amongst a variety of weapons and combos!
Hand-Crafted Pixel Art World – From desolated laboratories to alien military space stations, every pixel of the environment is hand-crafted to bring SH1-R0’s immersive storyline to life.
Full Orchestral Original Soundtrack – The entirely original soundtrack brings the epic proportions of SH1-R0’s story full-circle, bringing a new level of immersion to the environment and action.
Highly-Developed Character Cast – Meet a broad cast of characters both friend and foe, and sometimes in between. Keep your wits about you, not everyone has you in their best interests.
ReversEstory
After playing the mobile version (which is great by the way), this definitely feels easier but also more fun with some added movement options. It’s a fast paced shooter/platformer with some replay-ability and different characters each with their own playstyles and bosses. Overall, not too heavy on the bullet hell aspect.
The translations to English isn’t perfect, but still understandable and the UI was clearly designed with mobile in mind and could use some adaptation to PC/controller/mouse.
– Real player with 6.8 hrs in game
Coming from the free mobile release, I’m gonna say it right here: the PC version did not meet my expectation. I do recommend the game still if you can go past the issues, or at least play the mobile version.
The controls just hardly translate well from touch screen to controller (or keyboard). Also, since the game got no way to change your controller deadzone, it’s very easy to have the experience messed up by a very slight drift of your joystick, making your character jump in a direction even doe you want him to jump without moving.
– Real player with 0.6 hrs in game