This was shown at a Nintendo Direct and it instantly got my attention. A fast FPS with an interesting card system for weaponry. It wasn’t entirely clear to me if it was some kind of roguelite or if it was a level-based game, but I knew I’d be getting it on release.

It got a release date during not-E3 2022, and I bought it the moment it released. Let’s see if it was worth me getting excited for it!

Developer: Angel Matrix, Ben Esposito
Publisher: Annapurna Interactive
Release date: June 16, 2022
Platforms: Switch, PC (PC version reviewed)
Genre: Speed-based FPS

Review

This is not a game you play for the story… but there is a story and it’s not bad. You play as Neon White. Neons are the souls of people who were sent to hell, but Believers (divine beings that have angels working under them) grab a bunch to help them fight demons. The neon to kill the most demons gets to remain in heaven for a year, until the following year’s competition. Neon White was obviously in hell so you get the impression he might not be the nicest person, but also he lost his memory. There’s other neons that seem to know him though, specifically Neon Yellow, Neon Red and Neon Purple, and he becomes friends with some of the angels. There is a super neon that won the last few competitions, named Neon Green, who becomes something of a rival… he doesn’t like you. As you progress through the game (and also as you find gifts in levels) you start finding out more about your past, your connection to each of the characters, and your connection to Green. I watched one review for this game, where the loser complained about how “literally every conversation is covered in sexuality” or whatever… There’s 2 mandatory scenes that are a bit suggestive. And there’s some optional conversations where there’s some very minor teasing but it’s not particularly sexual. And even if it WAS covered in sexually-suggestive dialogue… what would be the problem? Anyways… story isn’t too bad, and there’s at least 2 endings, which is based on regaining your memories.

I don’t have much to say about performance. My PC (using a 3700X and a 3060Ti) ran the thing at ~250fps most of the time at 1440p. Good job team. The reason I would bring up versions is controls. This is an FPS, so there’s actually no way this is even decently playable on Switch. Maybe if it was a slower game or something, but if you want semi-good times, you’re gonna need fast aim movement and accuracy. You know, being able to quickly snap between targets and stuff. The Switch version does implement an auto-aim lock-on feature, which kinda removes a lot of the skill aspect of the game. Just play this on PC.

The core gameplay is very cool. Basically you start with a sword. Weapons don’t show up in front of you like every other FPS ever, instead there’s a card in the corner showing what weapon you’re using, how much ammo you have left and what the discard effect is. Most weapons are different types of guns. You move very swiftly, but also you’re fairly floaty in the air. Each weapon/card has 2 functions. There’s the main attack, which is usually some kind of bullet or explosive. Then each card gets a different Discard option, which tends to be some form of movement option. For example, the shotgun turns you into a dashing fireball that you can use to move quickly in any direction. The purple machine gun card shoots an bomb that sends you flying upwards when its explosion touches you. The green machine gun makes you go down very fast and stomp the ground. The semi-auto rifle does a super quick horizontal dash. And there’s a few more. The weapon goes away if you use all the ammo, or use the discard effect.

Each level has 2 requirements: get to the end, and kill all the demons (the demon condition is removed in a few levels). If you get to the end without killing all the demons, the exit doesn’t work. Most demons need a few hits to die but it’s usually pretty fast. If you’re using the discard effect, that’s a one-hit kill and sometimes AOE. There’s usually a clear path from start to end, which you’ll usually do your first time around. But with creative use of discard effects allows you to either just go faster through the normal path, or find alternate paths. Once you finish a level, a few things happen depending on your time. A gold medal unlocks the gift in the level (which is hidden or hard to get to) and opens up a level hint. The level hint will place an icon in the level showing where you can go to do the level faster. You still have to, you know, do it correctly. If you’re fast enough you’ll get an Ace time, which unlocks the speedrun leaderboards for the level. An Ace time, at least at the time I was playing, got you at ~5000th place in the rankings. So at that point, you can keep playing, finding better paths, executing your current path better, and try to go up in the rankings. This is very much a speedrunning game.

Speaking of speedrunning, people are absolutely insane at this game. Seriously look at this video. I’d say I’m pretty good at this game. I got Ace times in all levels (except one level I hated), a few levels I got (at the time) in the top 200 times. I’m a decent Neon White player. That video? I have no idea what’s going on and how they actually manage to get all the kills. It’s WILD. Each level will be about optimizing movement and use of discard abilities to both go faster but also make sure you kill everything. Some spaces on the leaderboard are milliseconds apart, it can be VERY optimized. If you’re into speedrunning, this is a fun one. I do have one complaint though… it would be amazing if the leaderboard let us SEE the top runs,  instead you just seeing the time and hoping the people uploaded a video to youtube. For a speedrunning-focused game, that’s a bit of a miss. Even just a ghost of the better times would be nice. Also, there’s no way the Switch version is anywhere near as good for speedrunning. Because controls.

So that’s pretty much the game. Go through a level, play it over and over to get better times because it’s fucking fun to do so, find gifts, give gifts in the hub (which sometimes puts you into sidequest challenge levels), and keep progressing through new levels. Not every level is a banger, there’s a small amount that just didn’t do it for me, but most of them are really fun to figure out. There’s very-skippable dialogue when you give gifts, eventually I’d just fast-forward through all of it.

Overall

Let me put this very simply… If this doesn’t make it in the top 8 in my Games of the Year post, that means this year was AMAZING when it comes to new games. Because this game is damn fun.

The fast and smooth gameplay, amazing level design, the mostly-well-built speedrunning aspect… it all just works and turns out to be one of the better gaming experiences this year. I really can’t elaborate further, it’s just good.

Of course I recommend this game. Buy it. On PC. Right now.