Selaco. I've waited for this game for TWO YEARS, as many others who are finally playing it have as well. I'm glad it's finally here as it's certainly been worth the wait. I've played the game for a little over 18 hours, and it's the only FPS which has allowed me to eat over 25,000 calories worth of food in the first chapter, and bond with a semi-sentient Roomba which tried to nibble off the toes of my enemies.

Please note that before you continue with reading this review I'd like to state that the following review opinions and views expressed are from playing on Admiral Difficulty, so it's possible that they may not be reflective of your experience.



The Good

- Gameplay. It's primarily about the gameplay with this one, and it feels fantastic. Taking inspiration from multiple games, but primarily striving to be a "F.E.A.R.-Like" (as more games should be) it has a more methodical approach to the gameplay it delivers requiring the player to think more and run less than most of the games within the same design category. Even though it's relentlessly challenging (on Admiral) it's one of the best FPS experiences I've had in quite some time, and I crave for more.

- Fantastic enemy variety. There are quite a few enemies in the game, so none of the firefights ever truly felt stale. On top of the number of enemy types, there are upgrades for each of the enemies which are given throughout the campaign to make them more deadly as if they're actually mounting an increasing assault against the player.

- Weapon variety and their upgrades. I've never played a game which allows me to carry around a game-ending throwable explosive which will kill everyone in the room including myself, but Selaco allows you to do that and it just assumes you know what you're doing.

- Fantastic worldbuilding and scale, as well as being genuinely beautiful. I wasn't actually expecting much from the world of Selaco, and more so just assumed it'd be a game I played more for the gameplay and spectacle, but I've been genuinely surprised by it. There's so much lore and worldbuilding through the environmental cues and details left around, and the datapads paint a good picture of what was going on up to the events that transpire within the game. I also didn't expect the game to be as gorgeous as it is, with the pixel-art style they'd gone with for the games graphics, but when I first stepped foot out into one of the large open areas I was awe-struck by how pretty the game is.

- Soundtrack and Audio Design. Selaco's Soundtrack is fantastic, and fits wholly into the world of the game with each track filling out the world with that one little more detail that was needed. Audio design and positioning in Selaco are also excellent, with each enemy type conveying its own sounds as they look for you, and the enemies even going so far as to communicate with one another to give the player more feedback as to the current combat situation they're in. THERE'S ALSO A JUKEBOX WHICH TURNS ON MUSIC AT A POINT WHICH HAS FULL POSITIONAL SOUNDMAPPING AND IT'S AMAZING OH MY GOD.

- Meticulous and painstaking world detail. I find this to be fascinating, as there are SO MANY THINGS to interact with in Selaco, and many of them serve no reason at all. You can pump a soap bottle onto a sink until it's empty, you can flush entire rolls of toilet paper down the toilet, you can throw a banana peel on the ground and have an enemy slip on it. Truly astounding how much attention and work has been put into making the world almost wholly interactive, and it's magnificent. There are even things scattered about such as various food items which give you a small but not insignificant amount of health back, and I love it.

- Full Mod Support from Launch. How cool is that? I understand that's mainly just due to GzDoom and all, but I've only ever seen this done a handful of times. Absolutely incredible, and I'm so excited to see what comes to Steam as a result of this.

- Vac-Bot's and ISAAC's. No notes, just good.


The Ok

- Some of the weapon balance. Occasionally the weapon balance in the game just feels weird. Your primary workhorse that you get access to is the Assault Rifle, but it fell quickly to the wayside for me when I found the SMG's as they're close in damage but also stun enemies and kill them faster. Nailgun's in the F.E.A.R. series have always been my favorites and the weapons I've always been the most excited to find in them, but in Selaco for the longest part of having it I felt like it was just taking up an extra space on my weapons bar that wasn't necessary even though I did eventually find an upgrade that let me rain hundreds of nails upon my enemies. On top of all this, Ice Grenades feel ENTIRELY useless, being the only thing in the game I never used as they didn't freeze or slow the enemies I wanted them to.

- Occasional unintuitive map progression. This is only a problem in a FEW of the maps in the game, but it's pretty bad. I was worried I was the only one, and there are several discussions specifically talking about the exact spots I was stuck on. It sort of has that old-school Doom-like problem where to progress occasionally you have to just kind of bumble around until you find where to go on accident. Sadly this isn't exactly helped with the Automap either, as whilst it does fill in points of interest and areas you've been, it doesn't do a particularly great job of conveying what direction you're supposed to go in.


The Bad

- A Flashlight with a completely superfluous recharge. Battery drains so slowly and returns in like 2 seconds to the point it feels entirely unnecessary to make it even have a recharge. We're in the future space year of 2255 with batteries that can power entire segments of the Selaco itself, so miniaturized infinite batteries don't seem too far-fetched.

- Massive performance hits in big gun fights. I truly LOVE the excruciating level of work that has been put into this game for the amount of destruction and everything that can be caused in it. However, there are occasional gunfights that have caused my FPS to go from 160FPS on a 2070 Super down to 40's and 50's due to all of the destruction and terrain effects going on.

- What? No slo-mo juice? This is more of a joke, but I do kind of wish it was in the game for the added flair, though I've no idea how taxing this would be on the GzDoom engine.

- Not enough weaponized Vac-Bots in the entire playthrough.

- No Vac-Bot/ISAAC Plushie's which can be purchased

_
Final Verdict

Overall Score: 9.5/10. This is the closest a game has come so far to being my perfect game, and with more to come maybe it someday will be the game I preach about nonstop to my friends.

Worth $25? What a silly question to ask. With how much is packed into the game, the answer is definitively a YES.