Recent reviews by AbyssalSoul

UPDATE JULY 2024: The game has received further updates that improved performance, graphics, stage flow and overall cinematography. The game is even better now with clearer indications too and the ability to make it even harder at the opening of each stage. Even MORE recommended now!

I don't even need more play time to know I'll be coming back to this now and then. Holy stars, Grand Cross is one of the most interesting STGs I've played in a while. What a treat to have a release like this in 2022.

It appears Grand Cross: Renovation is actually the proper remake of Grand Cross, a Dezaemon 2 project for Sega Saturn. So we have 22+ years of Japanese doujin gaming history here and therefore this game becomes another one of the PC doujin legends, along the likes of Siter Skain's Kamui (which is from 1999) and RefleX (whose development also neared 10 years) or Ruminant's Whimper glorious masterpiece Hellsinker (which was also being in the works for years prior to the initial 2007 release). These things do indeed take time.

Anyway, what do we have here? An esoteric response to the Radiant Silvergun grand STG formula packed in an over the top, massive explosion-driven approach only surpassed by perhaps Diadra Empty and Crimzon ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥' Clover. It's the "brandishooting" (as per the game's tag), basically employing a massive energy blade (the Sun Blade) that you brandish and strike with across the screen to destroy everything on sight to reach your ultimate destination. This blade can be positioned at will and when you activate it'll create a sort of atomic breath-like streak that's cool as hell and will actually make sweeps across the screen faster.

A scatter shot can also be applied to deal damage everywhere and both the blade and the scatter can be combined for extra damage. There is obviously the main gun too which obviously cannot compare to the brandishing of the Sun Blade.

These mechanics combined with melee kills (with an extremely satisfying ZANGEKILL bonus that wouldn't be far off Metal Gear Rising), a shield+life system that offers a risk/reward potential and technical bonuses as well as dozens of reinforcements and seemingly secret enemy formations that can be triggered provides a surprisingly solid depth to what initially seems an extremely easy STG to credit-feed through. You're even provided with a rechargeable auto-bomb system so all the tools are there for you to rule supreme.

Obviously, going for the 1cc is not as easy, heck no, that'll take you some time.

Presentation-wise, Grand Cross is a sight to behold. Over the top boss warnings, dramatic enemy and boss placement and formations that all come into scene in the most stylish and elegant ways, a completely off the charts message and UI system that tributes Radiant Silvergun's be attitude for gains, Soukyuugurentai's text excess as well as cryptic messages of all kinds that go as you play, amping and heightening the already exhilarating madness of boss rushes, explosions and firepower exchange, never breaking the action for more than maybe 2 seconds, all under the cover of one heck of a banger OST that I reviewed separately because it's that good.

Again, it's so good to see projects like this come to life despite having taking this insanely long so props to Raynex (the dev) for sticking with the project and... please I need a sequel thankfully sooner!

Quick rundown of technical things, you get a configuration launcher when you run the game and it recognizes the Xbox One controller from the get go so that's great. The launcher may cause problems with remote play and Big Picture however so bear it in mind but it's an inherent piece of STG Builder (the tool used to build the game); otherwise it runs without hiccups considering the ridiculously packed action.

The game's gotten a few updates in these months that have improved performance and actually refined some mechanics and adjusted a few other things so now is a good time to give it a shot. Heck, just get it now along the OST, it really is such a visual treat and one of the STG surprises of the year. Absolutely recommended!

Excellent OST and definitely a step up from the previous OST I heard in Vritra (which was already pretty good to begin with!!), another shmup with music from the same composer.

As mentioned in the other review, the game starts off with grand orchestral-synth pieces similar to Radiant Silvergun for the ominous prologue stages, which is excellent to set up the grandiose mood, and then it goes straight into keyboard solo and synth territory once the game begins on its proper main stages. The stage themes all carry their own gravitas (special mention to Blue Blaze for being such a banger opening tune for Stage 1) as things get more and more esoteric as you progress.

The style is very reminiscent of the Mega Man X4 Capcom era along of that late PC Engine or in-between 16-bit and 32-bit era STGs, with exquisite synths accompanying intense melodies. It's missing the electric guitars and it would feel right at home with eXceed 3rd OST, another superb OST that you should get. It absolutely nails the feel of bridging between time periods and still feel fresh.

Either way, consider getting the Game+OST bundle because it's a fantastic listen! Moreover, it provides you with FLACs for that extra quality.

I've had the luck of testing this game prior to release so I saw it grow and improve in the process. The final result, considering the speedy dev time of Terarin, is nothing short of amazing. Riding hot on the heels of the previous title, Raging Blasters (which I also recommend to try since it's very beginner friendly), Moon Dancer opts for a simpler approach, mixing the lock-on mechanic (with three distinct types of guided laser missiles) of titles like RayForce but adding a traditional coating to it, including checkpoints, which are a trademark of older era STGs. There also is a loose chaining system that (thank heavens) doesn't require stage-long chains from you as well as hidden items and some bonus enemies you can destroy for extra points. Your score and difficulty also determine que extend thresholds so it's a good incentive to get you to score well and obtain a good stock of lives to face the final stages.

Oh, and don't worry though: the checkpoints and stage structures are so masterfully crafted that recovery after death IS possible, unlike titles of that era and that, for sure, is an EXTREMELY welcomed change for those looking for a challenge.

The three difficulty modes are also fairly accessible but those not used to one hit deaths may still find it difficult. Nothing that some practice and stage layout learning can't fix. Most stages are fairly short but intense and very well designed in their enemy wave patterns to keep you engaged.

This is one of the most accesible STGs I have played in a while and that alone warrants a recommendation but the addition of an engaging and replayable Caravan Mode as well as an amazing OST (perhaps even better than Raging Blasters, especially the first stage theme!) certainly elevates the whole experience and warrants getting the game+OST bundle. Or you can head to Bandcamp and get it there too.

Specs wise, you won't need a superpowered PC to get it running, it'll detect an Xbox One pad straight out and running it through Steam Link to play it on my phone proved extremely easy although you will want a bluetooth gamepad in that case.

In short: very recommended!

It's still in early access but, man, what a treat and find this early (pun intended) in the year. Vampire Survivors should run on a toaster so thankfully we can skip the technical details. It's a deceivingly 'simple' 2D autoattacker with a strong horror/monster movie theme drinking straight out of Castlevania and B-films of the era. Not much in the shape of story, it's pure mechanics. You're thrown into an arena and your goal is to survive up to 30 mins against increasingly brutal hordes of non-stop spawning mobs.

You get a bunch of weapons at your disposal that you can upgrade as you level up, while randomly picking one each time you level up. That's where a rogue-like element shows up since you can mostly bet on getting the weapons and special effect items you get but it's all in that gacha/dice roll (props to the gacha theme since it's the embodiment of all gacha and you're not forced to pay real currency when you pick one chest!). You do get permanent upgrades that help you start in a stronger position but, still, it's not an easy task to reach the 30 mins mark. And what's your reward for doing so well? A swift death. Spoilers: death itself comes and takes you.

There is a huge addicting and cathartic effect in planning a strategy as you desperately move around to position yourself and destroy some of the blatant Castlevania-like candles and flames for precious gold and items. Certainly a bit more entertaining than watching a cookie spin, right? The fact that it's compressed into 30 minutes sessions makes this an ideal pick up and play for those with little time to game. You're not demanded to sit through hours of non interactive cutscenes and dialogue, just pure raw, balls-to-the-wall auto-attacking.

So, yeah, with that strong core of combining items and weapons to create your ultimate build, multiple characters to pick up from and the fact that it's still in development and is probably going to add even more content, yeah, surprise of the year and indie GOTY for sure. Gotta love when the stars align like this! Go get it now!

Absolute doujin surprise of 2021 for me. This game came out of nowhere and surprised me at just how engaging the crazy mechanics are and how neat the overall direction is. It's a beat 'em up that is played almost strictly with twin sticks so a controller is a must. (Note: I'm using an Xbox One wired controller.) Sounds a bit odd, yes, and it takes some time to get used to the controls but, oh boy, once you click to this system it's a zen of crazy combo chain hits in the several hundreds non stop.

I think we could draw some similarities to Fairy Bloom Freesia, which also has a stage progression and bosses but Liblade combat feels tremendously more impactful and there is a bit more dramatism in the battles, especially thanks to the great music selection and sleek enemy and boss design, each one requiring you to attack differently to counter their abilities. Suddenly you'll be chaining and combining all these attacks, all at the same time and dishing out incredible damage: you can parry some enemies and projectiles and send them back to their rightful owners and, well, it can get quite exhilarating.

It is not without a few issues, especially performance-wise as when the chaos and action is extreme there are some weird and random frame drops but this may vary depending on your PC and what things you have running in the background.

There is also the initially confusing (due to the sheer amount of things it has) skill tree that you can develop by obtaining points from defeated enemies. If you die, you can pay up some of those points to have partial or full recovery, or lose half and pick them up later if you go to the spot where you died. YES; it's "like that one FROM game" in that regard and an incentive to try to clear the rooms in one go.

Back to the skill tree, you get a lot of insane attack abilities but understanding them takes a while. Luckily you are provided with a well made training room where you can practice everything before venturing into the stages, which are short but tough as nails so be prepared.

So lastly, the story, which is kind of there, is quite strange indeed so I'll leave that to you to discover. It left more questions than those that it answered but, well, I wouldn't mind a sequel with even more refined mechanics, a custom OST and a more fleshed out world that expands on it.

All in all, very recommended!

Usually this type of game could go easily dismissed but The Adventure of Nayu is such a cute, moe-moe pretty game that oozes author passion that its only fault is the ridiculously short length. Regardless, you will still get a few hours (maybe for the busy gamer it's even beneifical that it's not too long!) and overall it's really nice, chill out and with a fairy-tale book approach to its art.

We are talking of an auto-clicker type of game (so you don't directly control the characters) but unlike some of the titles of this genre that will try to devour your souls and time, Nayu offers a nice light hearted story and won't demand much out of you. Combined with a very nice soundtrack and accessible price, it's worth every penny, especially if you want to support the developer in future endeavours given how important these reviews are.

You can also play a shmup style minigame and unlock a few costumes for Nayu if you so fancy so despite the little length it still packs quite a lot.

Technical aspects don't matter as much, the game ran fine in most of the PCs I tried it and it's not very demanding so no need of some crazy video card either.

Not much else to say, seriously, just go ahead and give it a try!

Tasomachi is a beautiful short length doujin 3D platformer/exploration that harkens to the old days of collect-a-thons but it's done with such a style and mood that I couldn't help but love it. (The short length helps a lot but, unfortunately, people looking for a meatier experience won't find it here.)

What Orbital Express achieved here was a mixture of solitude, exploration, Far Eastern townships with a distinct retro-tech style that are abandoned and you slowly restore to their former glory and a relaxed, chill out feeling that the excellent soundtrack (which has a similar tone to Yasunori Mitsuda's work on Chrono Cross) really elevates. In short, the story is kind of there because it's the journey through that matters as you work to repair your ship and ultimately try to help the situation.

A photo mode is also included to take screenshots around and it's indeed very helpful since the game features a night/day cycle that make for a lot of cool shots.

My praise goes to the mood and chillout effect achieved through the game. Yes, there are trials, platforming and some challenges ahead (which will eat a few hours of attempts) but the town exploration and overall relaxing feeling is simply great when you are sick of all the visual clutter, noise, gunshots and carnage.

That's it on the aesthetics.

Mechanics-wise, you slowly acquire different abilities as you progress through the challenge areas but the entirety of these are a bit floaty (especially the dash/double jump) and I think the issues are caused by Unreal Engine itself. Thankfully since you don't have any deaths, your only punishment if you fall off a platform is being sent back to try again almost immediately.

You get to drive the airship as well so be prepared for inertia-driven controls rather than arcade precise movement. Again, it's mostly for exploration so luckily you don't need the ship all that much except for one achievement and with enough practice, that last challenge can be done.

Once you collect enough key items by clearing quests across the towns or finding them in hidden spots, you can access the final area and by beating that you are free to do one last pass to get all the remaining collectibles, which are not too many (thank heavens) but can take a bit to find since the maps provided are static and have zero indication of where you are at any spot. This is where the airship helps since you can oversee the entire area.

Last bit are the graphics, which sport simple polygons on terrain and strong architecture cues which are carried by the global lighting through the previously mentioned day/night cycle. Most things look very pleasing as a whole and, of course, it helps it also runs without any hiccups, at least on my configuration. You may have to tone down a few things in the options however since, being an UE game, it may be temperamental on certain PCs.

In short: very recommended if you're looking for Tatsuki-type of relaxed Kemofre-like ambience adventure/exploration of about the right length, without any punishing or harsh difficulty, this is for you. As per usual, when on doubt, pick it on a sale but make sure to get the OST bundle!

For a one man project this is surprisingly well done so heavily recommended on that alone. Otherwise, well, it's an H game through and through so don't go expecting some façade or excuse for the lewd. It takes no prisoners from the go. It runs great, looks the part and offers some nice fun! (Wink Wink.)

What else to add. You can choose and customize (very lightly as selection of items is quite limited) three prominent succubus girls and then embark on touchy events of all the kinky kind. Knock them all over and become master supreme of the succubus or die their slave trying.

It's a shame that the clothing options are also kind of cumbersome and piece disappear entirely. The game would've immensely improved with half-states similar to Illusion titles but, well, once again, for a one man project the results are still excellent. Perhaps clothing physics too but that may certainly affect performance. Back to topic, uncensors and quality of the animations and actions (which seem to have a high level of manual work -pun unintended-) look perhaps even better than in those, and right out of the box. The bodies look great although all three have the same type and you don't have an option to change that.

It's only missing that, more fluff and options. (True 3P -there is an option to bring another of the succubus but it's fairly limited in scope-, an option for "outside", more outfits, clothing half states to make them stand out, proper after-facts without fade to white -although how fitting, heh-) and such.

The game has already gotten several patches, and free content updates so props to the dev and hope they fine tune things a bit more before moving to the next title, which I hope includes some of the missing things here. The foundations are super solid already and it's a friggin' miracle it made it like this, untouched and uncensored on Steam. Miracles do happen!

Heck, it even has achievements to keep you motivated and hopefully it'll get Steam cards too!

Alright, let's stop here. When in doubt, wait for a sale but even at full price it was good so, as mentioned in the opening, recommended with an open mind.

Surprisingly solid STG with an awesome soundtrack. Get the combo that comes with the OST because it's really good!

Anyway, quick analysis: while nobody is here for stories, the game does use the folklore of Indra and the titular Vritra and sets them in a future world with extremely spiritual vibes, similar to what you could see in Treasure's staple titles like Radiant Silvergun or Ikaruga. It's really good, stylish and well presented, with biomechanical and mechanical enemies that have a sort of 'magitech' feeling. The final stage is especially exhilarating once you reach the final box climax.

There are some calls to other horizontal shmups like R-Type, Darius or Gradius, with a Stage 3 that's a huge battleship destruction, almost a trademark of horizontal STGs and some enemies whose attacks may feel familiar. You have a plethora of secondary weapons divided in Types A and B, where I found B to be the best for higher difficulties since some have more reach with the options (which can block a lot of the incoming flak if used carefully) while you're focused micrododging the bullet hell.

The game's difficulty is balanced towards slowly increasing difficulty, with the first clear being actually fairly easy but locking you out of the True Last Boss if you do so. It's not impossible to reach it though: you get an additional life with each continue so eventually you can power through it if you're curious to check it out so in that regard it's a very fair affair. (Now, that 1cc on the highest difficulty is another matter!)

Mechanics-wise, there is not much around: you can control the speed of Indra and you have a special weapon bar that you can use to fire the multiple special weapons. The scoring system is not too complex (which I think is a virtue for a change): you rack up a rate meter every time you destroy enemies and the meter goes down if you stop chaining enemies. It's a sort of soft chain system thank heavens, and not a hard chain challenge like in DoDonPachi. However, it's not without risk: death will reset your rate and this number carries over across stages so you're kind of expected to do a full chain/no death run if you plan on reaching the highest scores.

For that purpose, once again, your dragon-ship doesn't die in one hit. You get three hits (which refill after clearing a stage) so that at least makes it so that one mistake doesn't completely destroy your run. Again, that's just fair design and less punishing.

The game also comes with a Caravan Mode and a "Mugen" option where you have to survive for as long as possible. Both modes do extend the playime for sure.

Vritra runs pretty well an almost all modern hardware and detected the Xbox Controller I use right out of the box so that's another plus.

All in all, for STG fans this is a great pickup and for those not familiar with the genre, you may want to wait for a sale but if you do, get it with the OST. Worth it every penny.

STG NEVER DIE!

The Moving Castle is, as the title implies, not quite a sequel and more like an expansion of the original Chuusotsu game, perhaps setting the stage for a proper second game. As such, it's a much shorter affair (about 3-4 hours), still in kinetic form. At the same time, I felt the shorter length is welcomed since I'm not a fun of monstrously long works and the characters really help carrying the events.

The story this time follows Arue and her newfound friends through the process of creating a doujin manga for a futuristic Comiket-like event, again, all tinted in the same dystopian and (this time around) EXTREMELY dark background of the world they are living in. This time another character is added to the roster, a cute meganekko (my weak spot) called Mogami that's just great and it would be a shame if she doesn't show up in the sequel. You heard me devs! Give more meganekko love!

Ahem, keeping it serious, the story takes a moment to call out on the prepotence of artists, criticism over the merciless doujin and commercial battleground involving game, manga and other materials creation in Japan and combines it with the even heavier background provided by this very close and bleak future where people are controlled like sheep through nanomachines.

Either way, it truly surprised me how many interesting questions the Chuusotsu series poses under a seemingly carefree and cute slice of life VN so props to the devs for sticking to the theme and definitely looking forward to see a second part! If you already checked the first, no harm in checking this 1.5 extra story even though it kind of leaves you wanting more. (Of everything, especially Monami!)

Props to Fruitbat for bringing this one, it's always cool to see VNs outside of the companies/brands and from smaller devs.

Lastly, not many technical comments this time around. The game, just like its predecessor, runs on a toaster.