Cryptark

The concept is nice and the superficial execution overall good. It's a rogue-like bullet-hell with various modes to get the precious artifacts which permanently unlock new units. There is a massive catch though: The visibility range is so low thanks to a focus on looks, that you get constantly shot by off-screen fire and rammed to death by fast drones in half a second. To mitigate this you have to mostly play by the mini map which shows enemies as mushy red dots, that in turn makes you squint all the time and removes any accuracy and tactical combat, making it become a mostly super fast reflex based game. The difficulty curve is very steep. Performance of the Linux port is not great but okay,in spite of the 2D graphics unlike other contemporary indies it has deadly slowdowns on an Athlon II in the later levels. We're not in the 80s anymore, we have big screens with high resolution, so why not use it or at least reduce the enemy's perception to your own? I'll never come back unless the distance you can see is extended since this is not "Volgarr the Viking" (which has the same problem but is mostly melee), but a game with mostly ranged combat. At least I got it with a good discount and didn't pay full price.

holy shit this game is awesome and the enemies designs are great, has a ton of action, and supports local coop all on one PC or in my case cheap ass laptop, no need to buy another copy, all you need is another controller, personally i feel the keyboard and mouse controls are really tight. I am loving this game, cant wait to have girl friend over to play this.

I grew up playing contra, metroid and such games. Eventually, I strayed away from "noisy" games and went full adventure-simulation mode. Until I played Cryptark! I got it at the christmas sale (came within a star) and thought "Hey, I dont dig this kind of games, but I'll give it a try". Never repenting. I play a couple waves in rouge EVERY night before going to sleep, helps me relax. It's a super easy to pick-up and forget about game, and I dont mean this wrongly. It is indeed a fine piece of software, and what I am referring to, is that it is as easy to play, and play and replay as any "connect three of this or just tap to do something" mobile games. Fun but challenging, pretty but dark. This game has it all. Customization, progression, frustration and joy. It also kicks the nostalgia in. This is one of my favourites in my collection, I'd give it a 5/7 but deserves more of a 9/11. Great game!

I do get better at this game after hours of play, but this critical bug never get complete fixed. ver 1.23 - enemy sometimes can get passed the wall then kill you. - level generation create area that you can't access to clear the mission. punished you with this basic issue.

I don't usually play games like this, but got sucked in. It's not as difficult as some people make out (I soon picked it up, and am even playing with a controller where one of the left stick angles doesn't work), and I like the way that thinking about what you do really gives you the edge. I've played a few games and reached the final Cryptark ship, but imagine it will take more attempts to beat it. I like the dark bio-engineered mood to things (probably because one of my novels is about exploring abandoned spaceships!) It's kind of like a free-roaming Katakis/Denaris (Amiga) with a lot more options and exploring fun.