Recent reviews by Jpayne

So before I even get to the actual review, I'm going to preface this for the hardcore gamers who will inevitably flock here to defend the game vehemently. I know the game is meant to be hard. I accept this. None of my review is related to skill issue, though you may very well write in the comments that it is. You may also feel inclined to point at the early access tag and excuse the game for any flaws I may list here. Feel free to do so, however I will first point out that this is a review of the current state of the game when I played it, and that is why game reviews made in the early access period are marked as such.

Now, first I will mention the hotly debated water system. I will not be going into detail on this since plenty have already done so in their reviews. My stance is that in its current implementation it is very poor, and should be changed heavily to not punish you for simply not playing.

I will start with the good. The vibes? Fantastic. The visuals are interesting and exactly how I had hoped they would look. The art team has done a great job. The music and sounds are also very well done and fit great.

That's... about where my good things to say about the game kinda end. Don't get me wrong, it has a lot of potential but oh boy is it rough right now. Very rough. I know the devs were coerced by the community into doing Early Access but I do think they should've waited a bit. Releasing it like this, even in Early Access, was way too early.

Performance can be a bit finicky, but I was able to run it at 60 fps most of the time though it would occasionally dip. This is expected, but is worth mentioning for those with less powerful systems.

The AI is... not the best. This is a pretty big issue, because the concept of the game revolves so heavily around interactions with the AI. One example I can give is an interaction between two mechs and two tanks I encountered. Initially I believed they were allied to one another, but it turned out the tanks were actually hostile to the mechs. It took about 60 seconds or so for them to even engage each other despite being quite literally next to them. Interestingly the tanks seem rather bouncy, every time they were shot by a mech they'd fly straight up about 20 meters. The spawns are also fairly wonky. There were a few times AI spawned far too close to me, immediately aggroing on me. AI occasionally gets stuck in a loop of walking into objects or in circles. Sometimes the AI functions alright, watching battles from afar was pretty interesting when they functioned good. But still the AI is very rough at the moment.

Controlling the player character is also quite clunky. Sometimes when sprinting my sprint would seem to break. I'm unsure if this was a mechanic I'm unaware of or not. Sometimes I would get stuck on simple terrain as well. You also cannot switch the shoulder you are aiming from at the moment.

Aside from the whole water thing, Hunter Killers are a rather... strange game design decision. I think picking up certain high value loot causes them to spawn and hunt you down? I'm not entirely sure myself. But as far as I know, there was no indication of any loot I was acquiring would cause this. If it certain high value loot that causes it, I feel like I shouldn't be finding it in random trashy crates. For a game that stealth is priority, it didn't feel great to just be instantly hunted down because of this.

Speaking of loot, looting just doesn't
-feel- that satisfying at the moment, at least to me. Right now loot seems to be nonsensical in its placement. Why are the cyborgs filled with booze? Obviously this is likely due to it being a very early version and will be fixed, but as I said this is a review of the current state of the game.

Very high potential, but they should've waited a bit longer for Early Access. I do want the game to succeed, so I'll be watching the development of this game and may try picking it up again after a significant amount of updates are made.

But for now, unless you just want to give the devs money to develop the game, I cannot recommend it.

they actually made weapons worth using, nice

my brain hurt

I wish I was able to give this a mixed rating as opposed to "Not Recommended".

Much like the first game this game has the same classic SUPERHOT mechanics of time only moving when you do, plus some extra goodies in the form of new powers and buffs. It's got a new progression system, turning the game into a roguelite. It's got new weapons and new enemy types.

However, after about the first hour or so the gameplay becomes increasingly more stale. Unlike the first game it is not a shooter/puzzle game combination where you must work out the best way to take down the enemies in the level to win. Instead, you play through the same 32* or so levels over and over using different powers and random buffs that you get to choose from. There are no puzzles involved, as each "run" is randomized (very minimally). This means, enemies spawn from different locations each time so you are unable to predict where they may come from and when. Now, this doesn't sound so bad until you're trying to fend off two guys only to get shot in the back by one who happened to spawn behind you.

The game has some fun mechanics and it has some great ideas but unfortunately given that there really is no variety in levels plus the lack of the classic SUPERHOT puzzle elements, it's basically just a roguelite shooter with SUPERHOT slapped onto it but minus all the content a roguelite typically has. It feels like a chore to play at times.

I might try again and update this review if they update it some more, but right now I can't stand looking at the same 32* levels over and over and over. For the 4 years of development they claim this has taken thus far, it's very disappointing.

* Adjusted number of levels to the correct amount.