Hyper Light Drifter

Yes, it looks great and the sound design is amazing. We all know that by now. I'm not very far into the game but this needed to be said if reviews are to be actually informative and not just gush and give 5 stars. Nobody is talking about some of the technical stuff, so here it is. 30 fps lock, like Nuclear Throne but more of a problem than with that game. I've lost the character in the action more times than I can count already and it's caused a LOT of deaths. It just doesn't stand out enough from everything else to easily tell what's going on when zipping around, slashing and dodging dozens of enemies at a time. Combined with the low fps it makes it hard to follow. The cursor is also not visible enough, it's just pure white with a lot of transparency, so that ALSO gets lost a lot and caused a lot of deaths. You need to know where the cursor is not only to aim the gun, but because when you dash you will dash towards it. Making it brighter or stand out more would have been a big help, or even also having the mouse lock to near the character, like Galak-Z for fast aiming would have been great. Combined with the previous two issues, you also get knocked down from certain (read: many) attacks, can be killed very quickly (there are even a lot of insta-kill traps) and when you die, any items or collectibles in that room DO NOT SAVE. No, having a screen that shows every time the game launches saying "Use a controller" is not an excuse to not properly make the game playable on the PC's primary and native control method. Most of all, please fix the cursor.

I can't get over how great this game feels. With a controller, every action and movement is deliberate and immediately responsive. The whole thing is presented to you with very little explanation, but the setting is so universally understandable that it's impossible not to jump right in and get exploring. It's going to take a lot of willpower to not let this consume my life and destroy my test scores.

If you came here expecting a pixelated, dungeon crawler that matches modern gameplay mechanics with 80's retro design and an ambient cyber-punk electro soundtrack then you came to the right place. The game looks and sounds amazing...if you're into the call-back aesthetics of pixel art. Highly detailed and well designed art but pixel art none the less. The use of color and variety in all aspects of the design from enemies to scenery to far off background vistas makes everything in this game gel together really well. Blended with the soundtrack composed by Fez music designer Rich Vreeland aka Disasterpeace, HLD delivers a solid experience for those who enjoy a blend of an alien apocalyptic wasteland, crawling with an array of enemies. Gameplay wise this game is going to seem tough to begin with, relying on a dodge mechanic to get you out of tight scrapes, and a variety of melee and ranged attacks to knock back the hordes. The designers like to mix a variety of environment based obstacles alongside rooms of leaping, crawling and blasting creatures, all coming for you whilst the floor drops away or the walls slide in to flatten you. The initial flaw (and what's stopping me giving 5 stars) is that the game has issues detecting my gamepad, (other users have reported similar issues and the devs have announced they are looking into this), so I'm using the fairly awkward keyboard and mouse controls which, due to the 'hard to see' onscreen cursor used to decide weapon and dodge direction, eventually becomes uncomfortable. This game is right up my street, and I'd recommend to anyone who is enjoying the retro revival scene that calls back to our childhoods but uses modern ideas to continue to expand upon the old school aesthetics that got people into gaming.

After the bad taste in my mouth that Slain left, Hyper Light Drifter has been a great change of venue. Its gameplay is a beautiful blend of Alundra and bullet hell games. The enemy types are incredibly diverse and are given their own intro to give you a good idea of how they work. The level design and the enemy formations force you to strategize differently with each encounter. Its lack of text combined with its stellar soundtrack (Disasterpeace made it, so you really can't go wrong) also give the game an incredible level of theming. The graphics are a beauty to behold as well. I have not yet completed it, but I am already very invested.