20 Minutes Till Dawn is a disappointing top-down horde survival game with a Lovecraftian and abyssal theme which I had high expectations for. Unfortunately, it failed to meet those expectations and turned out to be yet another generic horde survival game that does absolutely nothing to stand out from its competitors other than its beautiful character artwork.

Overall, I don't recommend it because it is simply an average game which has more style than substance, it has very little replay value as you will experience all that the game has to offer within a few hours, it does very little to incentivize you to keep playing other than achievements, and there are far better games in the genre which you could spend your time and money on instead.

Note: this review is current as of the latest (unnumbered) update released on 11 November 2023.

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S U M M A R Y

- The gameplay is extremely standard for a horde survival game and doesn't have any mechanics that make it an original and worthwhile experience;
- The replay value is quite low as you will see and experience the basis of what the game has to offer within the first few hours and it does very little to incentivize you to keep playing after you've tried these things once;
- The graphics are made up of pixel art which is used to make cute sprites and gorgeous portraits but the levels are colorless, drab, and feel lifeless;
- The soundtrack only includes two songs and the same song is used for all three maps;
- The story is non-existent but the game has an overarching Lovecraftian and abyssal theme which is somewhat unique, though very little is done with it besides being the basis for the enemy design; and
- The game is missing a number of quality-of-life features that should be compulsory in this genre such as character and weapon stats and auto-fire to name a few.

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A C H I E V E M E N T S

The game has 34 achievements which are a chore to get as you must beat the game 14 times to unlock the hardest difficulty and then beat the hardest difficulty with all 13 characters and all 11 weapons for a minimum of 27 playthroughs. Although the game is relatively easy and getting all of the achievements should take 15-20 hours if you're proficient in the genre, this task is quite boring, repetitive, and arduous because the game has very little replay value and most of these runs will feel the same due to the limited amount of playstyles that the game has to offer via the weapons and ugprades.

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R E V I E W

The gameplay is very mundane and has no noteworthy or special mechanics to make it interesting which results in it becoming very repetitive after the first few hours. Your goal is to survive 20 minutes while facing a number of mini-bosses every few minutes, at which point the run automatically ends except in the first map which is the only one where you go past the timer to fight the final boss. Oddly enough, this boss can appear in the other two maps but you can't fight it because the timer immediately ends the run which makes the game feel unfinished. The three maps have unique sets of enemies and mini-bosses but are otherwise devoid of anything except for obstacles in first and second level which are annoyingly easy to get stuck on.

Despite the wide selection of characters and weapons, most runs end up playing the same as one another because the upgrades relegate you to using one of three playstyles: enhancing your weapon (which almost always leads to maximizing the amount of projectiles that you can fire), applying status effects or damage-over-time effects, or summoning minions to fight for you.

Although the game boasts over 50 upgrades to choose from in total, in addition to random character-specific upgrades every 10th level as well as special items that the mini-bosses drop upon defeat, this distinct lack of playstyles homogenizes the runs even further which only serves to detriment the game. As a result, I found myself becoming bored of the game after only three or so hours because I felt like I had seen and experienced all that the game had to offer.

The difficulty is on the easier side in general but has a few unexpected spikes at certain difficulty levels which are also a drudgery to unlock. The meta progression system is very dull and merely requires you to spend your currency, which isn't very innovative, and it also isn't very well balanced as some options are clearly far superior to others unless you are opting for specific build.

The currency is also used to unlock characters or weapons which forces you to choose between becoming stronger via the meta upgrades or unlocking new things which feels like a cheap way to artifically extend the playtime of the game since you need to prioritize the meta progression for the higher difficulty levels. As such, I feel like a quest system where you must accomplish certain tasks to unlock characters and weapons would have been better suited for the game and would help incentivize you to try out different characters, weapons, and builds.

The graphics are made up of pixel art which is used to create cute sprites and gorgeous portraits for each character who have a lot of charm; however, the pseudo black-and-white theme of the game with a splash of red makes the maps feel drab, lifeless, and uninteresting to look at. The visual clutter of your projectiles can also become overwhelming at higher levels and there are no visibility options to help mitigate this.

The soundtrack includes a grand total of one simple witchy-themed menu song and one very generic and forgettable dark synthwave song for all three maps which loop after one and two minutes, respectively, the latter of which ends up being drowned out by the overly-loud sound effects anyways.

The game has no story whatsoever but it does have a Lovecraftian and abyssal theme which is slightly unique among the games that I've played so far in the horde survival genre.

The game is lacking a number of quality-of-life features that should be standard in the genre such as displaying stats on the pause menu to help optimize your build, more information on the character selection screen with regards to their specific upgrades, an auto-fire function, number counters for various abilities that rely on kills, and an endless mode with leaderboards. You also can't rebind the "E" key for some reason which is irritating.

Overall, I don't recommend the game because it's frankly lackluster, it does nothing unique to help it stand out from its competitors in the genre, and it does very little to incentivize you to keep playing unless you're an achievement hunter. I especially can't recommend it for its regular price of 5.00 USD because I didn't feel like there was a point to playing the game after the first three or so hours and only continued to do so to collect all of the achievements.

Ultimately, the game feels like it prioritizes style over substance due to its eye-catching artwork and dark aesthetic but these aspects can't make up for its unremarkable gameplay and lack of depth and content. There are far better games in the genre which I recommend playing instead such as the slightly cheaper Halls of Torment which has far more content or the free Disfigure which has more depth to it.

good game, handles combos well, sticks nicely to the colour palette throughout the entire game. A decent amount of stuff in game. you'll get your money's worth but (criticism time), there are a couple of QoL things that could be done to make it better, you cannot see stat modifiers in pause (which would also be helpful), redundant items and which serve no purpose especially the standing still book(removes your ability to move, and due to you not being able to destroy projectiles, it takes any fun away from that being an option or possible combo to use, I'm not saying projectiles should be "parry-able" but just replace the tome. You cannot see skills and abilities or synergies from the main menu, so you gotta plan a run on the go.
The game could definitely use a content update or DLC to keep engagement.
Personally - I think a map with more physical obstacles would be good(not trees that can hurt you like in first map, but things you need to move around as they block you, or just adding more detail to maps
Also, unlockable items and modifiers or skills(i know starting weapons exist), think more like vampire survivors) would help with engagement and reasons to keep playing and more reasons for completing higher darkness levels
Good game though and I don't think its been abandoned, although I haven't seen an update in a bit.
works well on anything (i have potato laptop) and is very addicting until around the 20 hour mark
you will enjoy though.

I'm trying to spend less time playing [Action Roguelike] [Bullet Hell] [Survival] or whatever this genre is called but this one is good. Easy to unlock everything in a couple of hours. It also runs well on my awful work laptop, which doesn't help me play it less, but is a point in its favour.

Spin to win, baby.

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The price is pretty fair for what you get, but the longer you play, the less fun it becomes. A few maps, characters that get skills attached to them, and some ok weapons.

Other vampire survivors-like games offer more then this one does.

Overall, should have been left in the oven more to cook.

20 Minutes Till Dawn is a rogue like where each run takes about 20 minutes as you fight of hordes of creatures. You start with a chosen character and gun, and as you gain levels get more abilities and bonuses. Each time you beat the game a higher difficulty unlocks until "Darkness" 15.

This game has style, a good variety of playstyles, and is pretty fun to grind for a dozen hours or so. For the price, absolutely worth it. One thing that really stands out is the use of color, where most things are almost black and white, but then you get streaks of red that really stand out. A cool design decision and a great sign that the creator wanted to actually put in some creative effort. While not all the weapons, characters and abilities are completely balanced, you do usually feel like you have a shot at winning with most of them. Despite there being a few different ways to play, because you get so many level ups during a run, a lot of runs do end up looking the same by the 20 minute mark. Its not a huge problem, since most of the challenge is more at the 10 minute mark of the run where you will need to have assembled some sort of build before you've had a chance to degrade into sameiness. The meta progression is a little weird, with unlocking several different upgrades but only being able to use one per tier, but you also unlock characters and guns, so there is pretty much always something to get.

I don't really have any major complaints, except that at the end of the day the core gameplay is just ok. A twinstick shooter fighting of hordes of enemies is not exactly new, but the polish and fun is there. If you want something to grind for a few hours, this fits the bill well.

Similar to Vampire Survivors, this rogue-like shoot 'em up game has a lot to offer. A specialty tree, various weapon choices, and characters with unique abilities. The game gives you the freedom to mix and match as you desire, which is what makes this game shine. Great game for those that have occasional time to kill with each rounds taking 20 minutes to complete.

GOOD 20 MINUTES

lovely

its great to just have on the desktop, you can play it whenever you have 20 minutes spare, its kind of reminiscent of cookie clicker in that sense, you just pop it on and play for a few runs casually with some videos, podcasts, audio books or whatever your into playing in the background.

the game gets a tad monotonous, theres a lot of things that vary from character to character, but some of them are just not that interesting, i find myself enjoying the first character the most, just because of the triple the effect of your next skill, perk she gets, because its the most fun thing in the game, imo