GOG Galaxy and a ProNet account are required in order to get access to community content, multiplayer, leaderboards, and cross platform saves - a ProNet account will be created automatically once you start the game and choose 'Log in to ProNet with GOG Galaxy'.
This is one of the best boomer shooters of recent years, if not the best. You get lots of diverse weapons, all have a 2nd fire mode, and they all feel punchy! The levels have cool layouts, many secrets, and the overworld map makes it easy to replay any of them.
The graphics are also great. The style strikes a very good balance between resembling shooters of the olden times (the shader that turns actual 3D models into pixelated sprites is perfect!), but also having drastically improved visuals (e.g. lighting)
Honestly, I didn't finish the game yet, but I often come back to it!
For the past decade my experience with first person shooters have been extremely underwhelming. Prodeus is probably the first game aside from Doom and Doom Eternal that actually got my blood pumping.
I find many things about this game to be done absolutely flawlessly.
The sound design is on top of my list, and you may think "If sound design is the best thing about your FPS game then it's a bad FPS game" and you'd be wrong. It's just that the sound in Prodeus is absolutely stellar, I can't name a single game that would so consistently shake me to my core with every vibration my headphones produce.
The visuals are amazing as well, they seem to somehow set the expectations at first when you just start playing the game, and then also surpass those same expectations they've just set. I don't know how the creators did it, but they did and it works. Absolutely love it.
Levels in the campaign that are available at the time of me writing this review are incredibly designed, and fit seemlessly with your weapon progression. The bigger battle arenas masterfully utilize the impecable movement creators implemented for your enjoyment, paired with incredibly satisfying weapons, and juicy, meaty enemies.
The lowest point of this game is honestly its menu design, but I could not possible care less about it.
I also didn't seem to notice any performance issues some other reviews mention, but that might be because I'm late to the party and those have been fixed.
Bottom line is - if every time another Call of Duty ad trailer pops up in your social media feed you feel any degree of nausea, Prodeus just might be the cure.
The shooting is excellent, the weapons, levels, art direction, music, enemy variety. FPS glory. The only gripe I have is the respawn system. There are no quicksaves, you only respawn onn checkpoints, but that doesn't reset the game. It's like a mandatory vita chamber mode that I didn' like very much.
Aside of that though, buy this game if you like old school FPS.
Perhaps this game shares a common ancestry with the original DOOM, but if you associate boomer shooters with fast-paced, visceral combat, DOOM 2016 and others do it so, so much better.
The issue is the combination of enemy design and level/encounter design.
In D16, you need to move, you cannot really hang back. The game is designed to make that an inefficient and often ineffective tactic. Movement is life.
In Prodeus it is actually often the most effective way to play. You turn a corner and there is an enemy. You shoot him once, retreat behind the corner, wait for him to shoot, come back and finish him off. Efficient and saving resources. The enemies cannot really counter this. Their movement is slow, if they move at all. This kills any kind of dynamic and fluent engagement. If there are several enemies, you just hop in and out of cover again and again. It becomes a predictable formula.
The devs were very much aware of this circumstance because they use some really tedious methods to break this loop. 1) spawning in enemies around you - including behind you. This forces you to move but it also feels really cheap when you get hit from behind by an enemy that spawned in a location you just passed. 2) Cheapshot enemy locations: open a door? bang, enemy behind it shot you. Drop down a shaft? Bang, 3 melee enemies in melee range.
Lastly, the music might be nice but it often ramps up too late, ends too soon or doesn't start at all. E.g. I had the more metal part kickstart when engaging 3 enemies. 10 seconds later it stopped while I was aiming at the last enemy. The engagement wasn't even done yet.
In conclusion: it's an ok game, but honestly, if you want the best fast-paced action shooter, there are better options out there. The pixel gore might be nice but honestly it just passed me by while I was playing Prodeus and thinking about how much better shooters like DOOM 2016 or Nightmare Reaper are in this category.
