Orbital Bullet Review (Lios)
“Around around around the world”
-John Orbital Bullet
Excluding good or bad, what do you think separates a smash hit from a game lost to the sands of time?
Previous popularity, hype surrounding the game, or just luck?
If your answer was the latter I think Orbital Bullet fits the bill, a roguelite with a nice idea, great controls and game structure and a sizeable amount of content.
Story
In the far future, machine overlords sought to control and replace humanity, they’re about to succeed in their aim if it wasn’t for a cyborg who alone must put an end to the menace.
A bog standard setup to have you go guns blazing from the moment you boot the game up.
X-Factor
A 2D run-and-gun with a twist, a twist so hard that makes a complete circle, since you’ll be ascending (or descending) towers, and running around a cylinder means 2 things:
You can see all the enemies on screen on the other side of such cylinder
No dead ends since running in a direction will bring you back at the beginning
The game also pushes your speedrunning instinct as there will be an incentive to finish each level quickly, meaning that no matter if you just begun or you spent hours with this title, you’ll be always pushing to get better.
Gameplay
It’s a roguelite so you know the drill, try to get to the end in one go one death and you’ll start over from the beginning, albeit able to invest in some upgrades.
You can have 2 active weapons to mix and match for various situations, maybe preferring grenade launchers for tight clusters of enemies and a sniper gun to hit that lone enemy on the other side of the tower, or any other combination you can make with the weapons you find during the run.
You have one special ability tied to the 4 classes, along with their own stat increase.
During the run your base stats can be increased in 2 ways, from perks you can find or acquire from a vendor, and by leveling up and choosing perks from a skill tree randomized for each run.
The game is fast and to the point, most enemies die in 2-3 hits, making you focus less on what’s the gun with the highest damage number, but the gun with the bullet pattern you need most.
One thing that you won’t see in other games is a 2-lane system, where you need to find a jump point to switch between them since enemies will be present on both and a floor needs to be cleaned of them before proceding on the next one.
Downsides
Progress is very slow at the start since the game demands upgrade materials that just refuse to spawn in the early game, maybe having you on a run that is fruitless since you start a new save with barely the tools to clear the first world.
I would also tweak the speedrunning component slightly, since right now there’s a target time to meet and if you don’t you won’t get any reward.
Instead, I would make it so that there’ll be a reward but you’ll have a chance at a better one the less time it took to reach that spot.
In the end I really enjoyed it, it’s a competent roguelite that just lacks a bit of flair and pomp in a sea of competitors.