If you're looking at this game page, chances are you know the kind of game it is. It's jank. Let's get that out of the way. But it's surprisingly 'good' jank. It's the kind that people who seek out these titles will enjoy and fin a lot of redeeming qualities in it. For the kinds of people who don't enjoy the B-tied games, just pass on this.
Visually, the game has some great looking levels that would have been more impressive about 9 years before the game came out. The direction is communicated clearly, but is also muddied by repetitive props. The art team was clearly more talented, but hampered by other aspects of the project. There are visual design elements that scream "That artist/level designer belongs at a AAA studio."
The game's AI drives a lot of poor level design choices in terms of path through the levels. It forced level designers to cater to the AI and it's lack of responsiveness. The enemies wind up in predictable locations because they need to get the drop on you to be deadly. They are also perfectly accurate. Expect to have your health drained if you aren't prepared for an enemy to be right around the corner. (They're right around the corner.) Some later levels have faster enemies that make for slightly more interesting fights, but nothing that ever feels like the AI is getting creative.
That said, levels aren't nearly as confusing as in other jank games. If you're accustomed to how bad some are, you'll be able to find your way through Exodus pretty easily. It's not as clearly communicated as, say HL2, where you know where you need to go and just need to solve a puzzle first, but it's not quite E.Y.E or Chaser level of "... I'm so confused"
Weapons have cool visual designs, but are only really effective when you hit the head. Nothing feels more or less powerful than another when hitting the body. The recoil takes getting used to, but winds up manageable once you have a rough idea of how it works.
The sound design is garbage. It all sounds like it came from a CD of free sound effects. Voice lines are direct translations of the language the writers spoke. "We have red code!" is something you'll hear alot.
The story is just pointless. You can ignore it.
I'm really only recommending this to fellow jank-lovers as one of, in my opinion, one of the better jank games. It has redeeming visual elements that are hampered by everything else. Had the AI, sound, weapons, and story been better, and had the game come out around 2003, it would have been a great Deus Ex Invisible War rival. If you play it just for the art direction, it's worth about $5. If you want something like Half-Life 2, or COD:MW2 in terms of story or combat, skip it.
But, for anyone who just wants a ~15 hour janky shooting experience, you could do a lot worse and you could do a lot better. Overall, in the realm of janky shooters, I'd say the game is a solid 89% Just below A tier, and nowhere near S tier, but I dont feel that it ever really goes down into C territory if you can excuse the weapons and AI. Once you recognize that the voice lines and sounds are a product of low budget, they become excusable to the point of irrelevance.
I've played my fair share of janky games, and I can see myself revisiting Exodus at some point. If I run out of AAA titles to replay, this would be near the top of my list because I still felt it had something to offer, at least visually. And when compared to a lot of B titles circa 2000-2010,, I think this one does shine at least a little
